Governor Benning Wentworth - created 63 towns with the stroke of a pen (or quill)

 
After the French and Indian War, it was clear that the land north of Northfield on the west side of the Connecticut River did not belong to Massachusetts, thanks to the boundary line created by King George II’s surveyors in 1740. New Hampshire and New York proceeded to squabble over that territory until Vermont became the 14^th state in 1781. Massachusetts actually had more right to that land than any other colony, since it had bought and paid for a good chunk of future Vermont in 1735, and sent soldiers to help defend the fort at Number 4 during the French and Indian Wars.

Regardless, after the French and Indian Wars, the territory west of the Connecticut River was ripe for settlement. In 1761, Governor Benning Wentworth, of New Hampshire, granted charters that created 63 towns in what would become Vermont. Wentworth wanted to get a jump on New York, who had equal and even more valid claim to the same properties. Governor Wentworth sold each charter to a group of sixty grantees, who each paid a him a fee of £20, which was a significant amount of money. In addition, he kept two shares of each town for himself. To guarantee that he would have the support of the church, he stipulated in the grants that each town set aside a share of land for the church. He was desperate for a title, so he named the towns after nobility in England, in hopes that some of them would support him in his quest to become a noble himself.

Benning Wentworth was born, raised, and died in Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He went to Harvard College, and graduated fifth in his class, after having set a college record for accumulating the most fines for broken windows. He went back to Portsmouth after graduation and joined the family merchant business. The Wentworths imported wine from Spain, in trade for New Hampshire timber used to make ships’ masts.

New Hampshire was under the jurisdiction of Massachusetts until 1741, when Benning Wentworth became the first Royal Governor of New Hampshire. Although he made himself rich by selling the New Hampshire Grants, for most of his tenure he was well-liked by the people of New Hampshire, who called him “Uncle Benning”. (Virtual Vermont “Benning Wentworth” September, 2012
http://www.virtualvermont.com/history/bwentworth.html)

Governor Benning brought some drama into colonial Portsmouth in 1760, when he hosted a dinner party attended by some local guests, relatives, and a minister. His wife had died 5 years earlier, and at this dinner, he announced that, at age 64, he was going to marry his 23 year old servant girl, Martha Hilton, and asked the minister at the dinner party to marry them. Martha and Benning Wentworth remained married for ten years, until Benning Wentworth died. Martha inherited his property, but she kept it in the Wentworth family by marrying Michael Wentworth, Benning’s cousin. She and Michael had one daughter, also named Martha, who died unmarried in London, England in 1851. Wentworth also had three children by his first wife, but they all died young.

Although residents of Portsmouth were amused at “Uncle Benning’s” May-December marriage to Martha Hilton, the citizens of colonial New Hampshire began to get sick of the corruption and high taxes that were such a part of Governor Benning Wentworth’s administration. In 1767, Benning Wentworth resigned, and he died three years later.

 

 

This is Governor Wentworth.  He was a stout man, but his clothing here is padded to make him look even larger.  In these days, being overweight was a sign of being wealthy, and apparently he did not think he was large enough to seem as wealthy as he was.  You can sort of tell if you look at this picture that his stomach could be padding.

 

 

 

 

This is Martha Hilton.



 



Windsor County Court September 25

Elizabeth McAllister DOB 3/24/62 was charged with driving with a suspended license on August 17^th in Springfield

Mitchel Noble, DOB 1/20/92 was charged with possession of cocaine and giving false information to an officer to implicate another in Springfield on August 8. Noble was arrested when officers responded to a complaint of suspicious activity in the parking lot of the Edgar May Recreation Center. The callers reported that the occupants of a vehicle parked there might be dealing drugs. Springfield police officers followed up on the call, and found the vehicle and the drivers. When they asked Noble to empty his pockets, a bag of what looked like crack cocaine fell out of his pocket.

You can read the press release here. http://springfieldvt.blogspot.com/2012/08/police-log_6.html

　

Chelsea Philips, DOB 8/1/87 was charged with retail theft in Springfield on August 1.

　

Michael Eldridge, DOB 8/5/93 pled not guilty to charges of possession of alcohol, enabling by minor and possession of less than 2 ounces of marijuana on August 5^th. Eldridge was arrested after a group of teenagers brought an unresponsive female to the Hartford Fire Department for emergency treatment. The female was transported by ambulance to Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center and police investigated a party on the Quechee Hartland Road where underaged drinking was allegedly occurring. You can read the press release here
http://woodstockearlyworm.wordpress.com/2012/08/05/hartland-quechee-alcohol-poisoning-leads-to-arrests/



Austin Strong-Lawson DOB 11/15/91 pled guilty to a charge of operating a vehicle with reckless or gross negligence in Plymouth on July 4

Karl Nott , DOB 3/18/85 pled not guilty to a charge of simple assault in Hartford on August 8

Christopher Pelletier DOB 7/26/85 pled guilty to a charge of a first DUI on Sept 6 in Hartford.

Carleton Murphy, DOB 8/8/63 pled not guilty a charge of operating vehicle with license suspended on August 5 in Weathersfield

Tyler Scott, DOB 12/30/88 pled guilty to a charge of petit larceny of $900 or less on August 19^th in Bethel

Jason Tucker, DOB 12/20/69 pled not guilty to a charge of a third DUI in Hartland on September 4

Shelly Kendall DOB 11/25/71 to a charge of careless or negligent operation of a vehicle on June 21in Hartford

Donald Clark 8/30/73 pled not guilty to a 3rd DUI charge, and giving false information to an officer to implicate another on August 21 in Weathersfield.

Two good books

While I was researching Fort Number 4, I read two books that I really loved. One was “Not Without Peril” by Marguerite Allis, and the other was “The Years of the Life of Samuel Lane” by Gerald Brown.

“Not Without Peril”, written in 1943, is the story of Jemima Sartwell. Jemima was born in Groton, Massachusetts in 1724. She was younger than the Farnsworth brothers but she was born in the same town that they were born in. Jemima’s father built a fort between Northfield and Brattleboro, called Fort Sartwell. From Fort Sartwell, Jemima moved with her first husband, to a fort at the Great Meadow - what is now Putney, Vermont. When her first husband, William Phipps, was killed by Indians, she married Caleb Howe and spent some time with him at Fort Number 4. In 1755, Caleb was killed in an Indian raid, and Jemima and her children were captured and taken to Canada. The end of the French and Indian war saw Jemima and most of her children returned to the American colonies. They moved back to Fort Sartwell. At Fort Sartwell, Jemima married a man younger than her, Amos Tute. Jemima outlived her third husband and died in 1805 at the age of 81.

This book was a page turner. Jemima had such a hard life, yet she never gave up. I’m sure Allis took lots of liberties in fleshing out her story. I know there is only so much you can do with the information you get from primary resources. However, Allis brings Jemima to life in the pages of her books. On every page, there is a new danger or adventure as Jemima travels up and down the Connecticut River searching for safety and security, needing to feed and clothe her children while keeping them safe from Indian attack.

People talk about how things are changing so quickly in the new millenium. I agree, there have been many changes from when I was a child in the 60’s and 70’s. It is mind boggling, however, to think of the changes Jemima saw in her lifetime. When she left Groton, Massachusetts, Fort Sartwell was the last outpost of English civilization. Soon the Fort at Number 4 was the edge of the frontier, and Jemima was there. She lived part of her life being terrified that Indians were going to burst into her home and kill her. She was kidnapped and brought from Fort Sarwellt to Canada, where she lived among the Indians and the French, two cultures that were totally foreign to her. When she returned home to Fort Sartwell, she could finally live without fear of the Indians, only to deal with the upheaval of several changes of government, as her town changed from being under Massachusetts jurisdiction, New Hampshire jurisdiction, and finally New York jurisdiction. Through all the switching of governments, though, Jemima was a subject of the King of England. In her later life, Jemima became a citizen of the new United States of America, and a citizen of the State of Vermont. By then, growing towns lined both sides of the Connecticut River, where Jemima had traveled up and down the river in a canoe through uninhabited wilderness only decades earlier.

One of the things I liked best about this book was Jemima and Caleb’s attitude toward the river. At one point in the book, Jemima promises Caleb that she will keep herself and her children near “Big Ma”, which is what they called the Connecticut River. Maybe this is a total fiction by Allis, but if so, at least someone was thinking about the river that way in 1943. Allis’ first book, written in 1939, was called “The Connecticut River”. Allis was born in 1886 in Ludlow, Vermont and died in 1958 in New Haven, Connecticut.

 

“The Years of the Life of Samuel Lane” was about a man who lived in Stratham, New Hampshire. He was born in 1718, four years before Jemima Sartwell, and married his wife Mary the same year Stephen Farnsworth married Eunice. When he was married, Samuel had already been in business for several years after finishing an apprenticeship with his father. Samuel was a shoemaker. He would soon become a tanner, a farmer, and a surveyor as well. When he was married, he was already a homeowner and already owned several pieces of nice furniture. Samuel’s wife Mary brought many of the items she needed to set up housekeeping with her, as her marriage portion, given to her by her parents when she married. This contrast so starkly with Jemima Sartwell, who started her married life with the clothes on her back. She never really had a house of her own. She lived first in the fort at Great Meadow, the at the Fort at Number 4, and finally back at Fort Sartwell, which she took possession of after her father died.

It was easy to understand how Samuel became so prosperous so quickly. He had four businesses and he worked hard at them all. Samuel was a shoemaker and made shoes for the wealthy and elite of Strawberry Banke, as well as for the average citizens in his town of Stratham, New Hampshire. He had a tannery business, that he started when he realized that he was paying a lot of money to tanners to tan the leather he used to make shoes with, when he could tan it himself and turn more of a profit on shoes. Before long, he was tanning leather for other shoemakers to use. He was also a farmer, feeding his ever growing family from the food he grew and selling the surplus at the market at Strawberry Banke. Lastly, Samuel was a surveyor.

I originally bought this book because I wanted to know about surveying in the New Hampshire Wilderness during this time period. Samuel Lane didn’t survey in the Upper Valley, but he did get as close as Holderness. There are good descriptions of the actual process of surveying in the book, better than I could find on the internet. Samuel usually just surveyed for the people of his hometown, but in 1748, he agreed to “go into the woods”. His diary states that “this is the first time I ever Camp’d in the woods.” His life was a far cry from Jemima Sartwell’s, who spent most of her life traveling through the woods, often spending several nights in a row sleeping outside, especially when she was an Indian captive. We get the idea that Samuel was not in love with the experience of “camping in the woods”.

His first wilderness surveying trip took place in late November and early December. On the first few days the weather was pleasant, but the last two, in December, were cold and rainy. He found out he preferred cold and rainy December over the hot summer months, though. His next foray into the woods took place in the summer, and he came back so bitten on his face by mosquitoes that his family barely recognized him. From then on, Samuel refused to do any wilderness surveying except in October.

Interestingly enough, both “Not Without Peril” and “The Years of the Life of Samuel Lane” ended with the same type of observation. In “Not Without Peril”, elderly Jemima is given a coin minted in the newly formed United States of America. Allis says that “hard money meant nothing to Jemima”. She did not understand the value of currency, and preferred to take comfort in the security afforded by land, house and home. In “The Years of the Life of Samuel Lane, Samuel’s son Jabez inherits Samuel’s house and land. Unfortunately Jabez died quite soon after Samuel. The author says that there was $500 in bank stock in Jabez’s estate. Jabez intended for that money to support his wife for several years after his death. Jerald Brown says, “Such a financial vehicle was never employed by Samuel; his security rested in land and individuals.”

I would recommend both of these books to readers who like to read history. “Not Without Peril” is a novel based on the life of a real woman. You can order it from The Fort at Number 4. “The Years of the Life of Samuel Lane” is a nonfiction account of the life of a man who lived in Stratham, New Hampshire, based on his diary and account book. You can order it from many booksellers on the internet.

Windsor County Court September 11

Brooke Barnaby, DOB 9/2/91 pled not guilty a charge of a first DUI, on August 22 in Sharon.

Corey Betit, DOB 2/27/90 pled not guilty to a charge of giving false information to an officer to implicate another.

Nicole Doyle, DOB 4/11/86 pled guilty to a charge of simple assault/ mutual affray in Rochester on July 31

 

Kailah Doyle, DOB 2/14/88 pled not guilty to a charge of simple assault/mutual affray in Rochester on 

July 31

 

Earl Guy, Jr pled guilty to a charge of driving with license suspended on July 18 in Windsor.

 

Shannon Lamb, DOB 4/26/85 pled not guilty to her first charge of a DUI, on Aug 24 in Sharon.

Christopher Robinson, DOB 12/18/82, was arraigned on charges of his first DUI in Windsor  August 23

 

Jeffrey Rowland DOB 8/26/68 pled not guilty to a charge of simple assault in Springfield July 28

 

Michael Stevens, DOB 4/27/78 pled guilty to driving with license suspended in Bethel

 

Marie Townes, DOB 3/17/84 pled not guilty to a charge of disorderly conduct/fight on July 17, in Springfield.

 

Johnathan VanAlstyne, DOB 7/12/92 was charged with operating vehicle with license suspended in Cavendish on August 4

Windsor County Court - September 4

David Goodhouse DOB 2/13/1991 pled not guilty to his first DUI, in Windsor.

Camila Bial, DOB 1/26/91 pled not guilty to charges of disorderly conduct/fight and simple assault on an officer in Hartford on July 21, 2012.

Robin Boles, DOB 10/30/61 pled not guilty to her first DUI in South Royalton.

Walter Pile, DOB4/30/48 pled not guilty to his first DUI, in Woodstock.

Darryl Booth DOB 4/5/65 pled guilty to a charge of careless or negligent vehicle operation in Bethel

Peace Comes to the Connecticut River Valley

In October of 1748, a treaty was signed between the English and the French. Hostilities at the Fort at No. 4 continued through early June, though. Obadiah Sartwell was killed while he was ploughing his fields, and Phineas Stephens was captured. After that summer, peace again descended on the Connecticut River Valley. In 1751, the settlers voted to look for a blacksmith to settle in town, and also voted to hire a minister. The most exciting development occurred on July 2, 1753, when Governor Benning Wentworth granted No. 4 a charter. No 4 was renamed Charlestown, after Admiral Sir Charles Knowles, the Governor of Louisbourg, Nova Scotia. At the time Charlestown was chartered, Stephen and Eunice Farnsworth had three children in addition to Oliver, all girls: Sarah, Submit, and Eunice.

The new village of Charlestown enjoyed a year's peace. In May of 1754, the French and Indian War began. At the beginning of the war, there were 30 houses and 180 people in Charlestown. Almost immediately, the Indian recommenced their attacks.

August, 1754, the Johnson family was captured and taken to Canada. Suzannah and James Johnson and their son, aged 6, and daughters aged 2 and four, were separated and sent to various places. Suzannah was pregnant and gave birth to a baby girl on the trail from Charlestown to Canada. The baby girl lived. When the family was finally reunited, many years later, Suzannah wrote a book about her experiences, from Charlestown. You can read it online here. http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/book/lookupname?key=Johnson%2C%20Mrs.%20(Susannah%20Willard)%2C%201730-1810

During the summer of 1755 , no residents were killed or captured, but rampaging Indians on their way to other places slaughtered Charlestown cows from out of the fields, for food. In June of 1756 Indians set a fence on fire and when Lieutenant Moses Willard went to put the fire out, he was killed. His wife Susannah was the sister of Eunice and Hannah Farnsworth (David Farnsworth's wife) and he was the stepbrother of the Farnsworth brothers. In the spring of 1757, the town was again attacked and five men were captured and brought to Canada. One of them was David Farnsworth.

David escaped from his captors after several months, and made his way back to Charlestown. After his return, he apparently decided he had had enough, and moved his family to Hollis, New Hampshire, and then to Eaton, Lower Canada.

After the attack of 1757, the King's Government approved a garrison of soldiers to be posted at the fort at Charlestown. They were a little slow in getting there, but by 1758, there were 100 troops stationed at the fort. This was a change in policy toward Charlestown, because in the past, the inhabitants of No. 4 had to beg New Hampshire and Massachusetts to send help. Even though technically the settlement was in New Hampshire, it was always Massachusetts that sent help, albeit grudgingly, and it was always provincials and not truly professional soldiers. Now they were receiving help from the crown itself, in the form of military professionals. The 100 troops were in Charlestown about a year, when they were ordered to a bigger and more important post in 1759.

In 1759, the plan was for English troops, under General Jeffrey Amherst, to attack the French at Fort Ticonderoga and Crown Point. To that end, the troops stationed at the fort at Charlestown were sent to Albany to join General Amherst in preparation for those attacks. General Amherst applied to

the Government of Massachusetts to send some provincials to Charlestown to replace the troops that were leaving. Massachusetts sent an equal number of replacement troops from Hampshire County, under Captain Elijah Smith.

The attacks on Fort Ti and Crown Point were successful, and the English took over the forts on the border of what would be upper New York State and Vermont. Crown Point had been under French control for thirty years, and many of the Indian attacks on English settlements in the Connecticut River Valley had been launched from there. With Crown Point and Ticonderoga controlled by the English, there was only one more trouble spot – the Village of St Francis.

The village of St Francis was attacked by Roger's Rangers, led by Robert Rogers. Roger's Rangers were a colonial militia that operated around Lake George and Lake Champlain. They often operated in the winter, traveling by snowshoes and attacking French and Indian winter encampments. After the victories at Crown Point and Ticonderoga, Roger's Rangers were sent on a mission to attack St Francis in Quebec. These were very tough men who had been through many battles in difficult conditions in the north country. They weren't about to be lenient on the village that had been the source of so much suffering to their countrymen. And they weren't. On October 3, 1759, Roger's Rangers attacked and destroyed the village of St Francis, killing women and children in the process.

The true story of the Raid on St Francis will probably never be known. Rogers said he killed 200 Indians and took 20 captive. The French said that he only killed 30 Indians and lost 40 men himself. There are those who say that the Raid on St Francis was too brutal and that there were mostly women, children, and old people in St Francis at the the time of the raid. There are others who say that the brutality was justified, that St Francis was the departure point for many of the Indian attacks against the English settlers along the Connecticut River. Whatever the truth was, there were no more attacks against Charlestown after the raid on St Francis. For the Connecticut River Valley, the war against the Indians ended on that day. By the time lasting peace came to Charlestown, Eunice and Stephen Farnsworth had seven children. They had added a brother, Jonathan, and two sisters, Mary and Azubah, to their growing brood, which now consisted of two boys and five girls. In addition, Relief was born in 1762 and Stephen was born in 1764. Stephen Farnsworth, the father, died in 1771 at age 57. At the time of Stephen's death, Oliver was 29 and his youngest brother, named after his father, Stephen, was 7. Eunice was 49.

After the Raid on St Francis, there was no further need for a fort at Charlestown. The town was growing, and after the French and Indian War was over, new English settlements were founded all along the Connecticut River. By 1760, the fort had fallen into disrepair. There is no record of when the last vestiges of it were removed. The original fort stood where the center of Charlestown is now, but Fort Number 4 has been rebuilt as a living museum closer to the Connecticut River. I appreciate all the hard work the people at Fort Number 4 do to keep the early history of the Upper Valley alive for us all to enjoy and learn about. Not only do they work hard to run the fort so that people can go there and see it and learn about the first white settlement of the Upper Valley, they also work hard to raise the money they need to keep the Fort open and in repair. Thank You, everyone at the Fort at Number Four!