Northern Boundary of Mascoma's (Mascommah's) Deeds

This past weekend, the Old Redneck and I went back on the Connecticut River to find the southern boundary of the deed to Southern Vermont and New Hampshire.  We still didn't find it because we got rained out two days in a row.  We did talk to a man in Brattleboro who runs a canoe shop who said that if there was a ledge of white rocks along the Connecticut River in 1735, it was blasted away by the railroad.  I didn't even think of that, but I know the railroad did a lot of blasting when they were laying the rail beds - just ask Phineas Gage.  (But that's another story - we'll get there eventually).
     We put the canoe in the water at the Westminster canoe launch.  I believe that Dunshee Island, just a little bit downriver from the Westminster canoe launch, is the northern boundary mentioned in the deed.  The deed says, " bounded north at the mouth of a brook on the west side of said river emptying itself into said river between two and three miles above the great meadow aforesaid, against the second island in said river north of said great meadow ."  We know the Great Meadow was in what is now Putney.  This island is huge and probably permanent.  At the very middle of the island there is a brook on the west side of the island emptying right into the side of the island. You can see all this on a map of the Connecticut River, with all the canoe and boat landings, and the islands, at
http://www.crjc.org/boating/boating12.htm.

From the vantage point of the river, the island and the brook coming into the river look like this.

This is the island as you are heading toward it.

This is the very tip of the island as we were right up close to it.  It was hard to get a picture from the canoe,  I was afraid I would tip it over!

This is a picture of the brook coming into the side of the island, from the west, or Vermont, side.





Mascoma's (Mascommah's) Land Deeds

Mascommah signed three deeds.  There are copies of these deeds in the Hampden County Courthouse in Springfield, Massachusetts.  The originals are in a hermetically sealed vault somewhere, in Boston, I think.  I went down to Springfield to get copies of the deeds.  I was worried about driving and parking in the city but it was really easy.  The courhouse was huge and intimidating.  The old deeds were in the basement.  When I got down there, a really nice man named Tony helped me find what I was looking for.  Lo and behold, there was Mascommah's name and mark right in front of me.  So here are the deeds.

This is my favorite one because you can see Mascommah's name and mark really clearly, four names down from the top.  This is the deed to the Deerfield River parcel of land,

 The above deed is the deed to the land in Sunderland, Massachusetts and points west.  There are some who believe that this piece of property extended west as far as Newfane, Vermont.  Again, Mascommah's mark is the fourth down.


The above deed is my least favorite because you can hardly see Mascoma's name and I don't believe there really is a mark.  Unfortunately, it is the deed that we spent so much time on the river looking for the boundaries of.  It is the southern Vermont and New Hampshire deed and the one that most applies to the Upper Valley.  I guess it figures. Mascommah's name is the seventh down from the top.

After spending most of the summer finding the Indian Mascommah, I guess I have to leave him now and go on to other topics.  If I could go back in time and meet him, I would tell him that there is a river, a lake, a school, and a bank named after him.  I would tell him that the English people, who became Americans, really messed up the Connecticut River that he traveled on and loved, but then they got their act together, and now it is beautiful and clean.  Maybe in the spring, I will go to Schagticoke New York and do some research there and find out more about the village he lived in when he came down the river and signed those deeds.  And if we ever get nice weather, the Old Redneck and I will try to find the southern boundary of that deed one more time.  Rest in Peace, Mascommah.