Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 5.djvu/131

 FIRST SEITLEMENT IN NEW HAMPSHIRE. 109

��FIRST SETTLEMENT IN NEW HAMPSHIRE.

��BY GEORGE WADLEIGH.

" Notes on the First Planting of New Hampshire, and on the Piscataqua Patents. John S. Jenness. Privately printed — pp. 91. Portsmouth, IsrS."

THE time when, the manner in which, and the individuals by whom the first settlements were made by Europeans at Little Harbor and Dover Point, wh^re, it is generally acknowledged, the original "planting "of New Hampshire was commenced, are so obscure, and have been so frequently a matter of contro- versy, that we gladly welcome all attempts which are made to elucidate them.

For more than two hundred years, on the authority of Hubbard, Prince, and other early historians, followed by Belknap, the facts in relation to these settle- ments, briefly stated, and generally accepted, were, that Sir Ferdinando Gorges and Capt. John Mason, having obtained from the Council constituted by the King of England, "for the planting, ruling and governing of New England," a grant of all the land between the rivers Merrimack and Sagadehock, extending back to the great lakes and river of Canada, formed a company with several merchants of London and other cities, and styling themselves "the company of Laconia," attempted the establishment of a colony and fishery at the mouth of the Piscataqua river. For this purpose, in the spring of 1623, they sent out David Thomson and Edward and William Hilton, who had been fishmon- gers in London, with a number of other people, in two divisions, furnished with all the necessaries for carrying out the design. Thomson landed at the river's mouth, at a place which he called Little Harbor where he built a house, after- wards known as "Mason Hall," erected Salt Works, and made other prepara- tions for carrying on his business, but the Hiltons set up their fishing stages eight miles further up the river on a neck of land which the Indians called Winnichahannet, but they named it Northam and afterwards Dover. Thom- son, not being pleased with his company or situation, removed the next spring, or a short time after, to an island in Massachusetts bay, where he lived and soon after died, while the Hiltons and their associates remained and made a perma- nent settlement in Dover.

All efforts to ascertain the precise date of their arrival, or the ship in which they came, had proved unavailing. The day of the month and the month were unknown. In 1823, at the celebration of the 200th anniversary of the settlement of the State, at Portsmouth, when it was considered desirable to fix upon the day of their arrival, if possible, for the purpose of suitably observing it, all efTorts to do so were found to be in vain. It was then declared that "Prince, the most laborious of all antiquaries in New England, in 1736, could give no precise date, and no discovery of documents since has made it more definite " then that they arrived in the spring of the year. From the fact that no vessel was known to have arrived from England in that year until about the ist of June, it was conjectured that the colonists might have been landed at the Piscataqua late in May, and the 23d of that month was accordingly selected for the celebration.

These statements remained unquestioned and were incorporated in all our histories and school books, until a document found among the ancient papers of Gov. Winthrop, now in the possession of his descendant, the Hon. Robert C. Winthrop, gave a different reading to our early history. This document is an indenture, dated Dec. 14, 1622, between David Thomson on the one part.

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