Of axe and hammer, saw and plane.”
[Illustration: Illustrated capital]
Walking around the brow of the hill through Carver Street, we pass the
handsome vestry of the Baptist church, built in 1915, and next the
Universalist church, erected in 1826 on the spot where stood the ancient
Allyne House, one of the last of its architecture to disappear in the
colony. Standing on this elevation, we can see the reason for the
selection of this place for the settlement. There below us, are the
waters of “the very sweet brook,” into which the “many delicate springs”
still continue to run. How sweet they must have tasted to the palates of
those poor stormtossed wayfarers, who for months had been drinking the
ship’s stale water! Sweet and pure they are now as they were then. Then
the brook came to the sea in its natural wildness, unfettered by bridge
or dam. Where it met the waters of the ocean was quite a wide estuary,
so that before the lower bridge was built schooners of considerable size
were wintered here nearly up to the second bridge. Beyond it is the land
where there was “much corn land cleared.” Just below the junction of
Carver and Leyden streets they built their first building, a “common
house.” In 1801, in digging a cellar at that place, several tools and a
plate of iron were found, which without doubt were in this “common
house.” This house was about twenty feet square, and thatched. It took
fire in the roof Jan. 14, 1621, and the thatch was burnt. It was a
common log house, such as built now by Western pioneers, and probably
was not used many years. These articles found were probably left in it
unnoticed when vacated and only came to light when the little colony to
whom they were so useful had expanded into a great nation. A sign and
bronze tablet now mark this spot.
“Mourt’s Relation” furnishes us an interesting record:—
“Thursday, the 28th (old style) of December, so many as could went to
work on the hill, where we proposed to build our platform for our
ordnance, and which doth command all the plain and the bay, and from
whence we may see far into the sea, and might be easier impaled, having
two rows of houses and a fair street. So in the afternoon we went to
measure out the grounds; and first we took notice how many families
there were, willing all single men that had no wives to join with some
family, as they thought fit, so that we might build fewer houses; which
done, and we reduced them to nineteen families.
“To greater families we alloted larger plots; to every person half a
pole in breadth and three in length, and so lots were cast where every
man should lie; which was done and staked out,” and this was laying out
of Leyden Street, so named in 1823. An unfinished plan of this street is
to be seen on the old records of the Colony, at the Registry of Deeds.
The full plot of the little settlement was about as shown in the annexed
line drawing.
[Illustration: Settlement plot]
Burial Hill.
_The _Edw Winslow._ _Town _Gov. Bradford._
Brook_ Square._
_Francis Cooke._
_Mr. Isaac Allerton._
_John Billington._
_A Highway leading to _King St. now Main St._
Town Brook._
_Mr. William Brewster._ _First _Stephen Hopkins._
Street—now
Leyden St._
_John Goodman._ _John Howland._
_Peter Brown._ _Samuel Fuller._
_Common House._ Cole’s Hill
First Burial Place.
The Harbor
[Illustration: POST OFFICE AND CUSTOM HOUSE.]
Continuing up Leyden street to Main street, we pass on our left the U.
S. Government post office and custom house building, a handsome Colonial
edifice completed in 1915. This site is peculiarly and historically
appropriate for the Federal building, as it is the lot assigned to
William Brewster, Dec. 28, 1620, (old style), in the laying out just
described. He was the elder or spiritual teacher of the Pilgrims, so on
his homestead where he taught religious liberty which distinguishes our
country, the Nation places its representative cornerstone—a most happy
coincidence of the marking of Colonial and National beginnings. The
public fountain at the corner gives invitation to “freely drink and
quench your thirst” from the Pilgrim Spring on the Brewster meerstead,
the water of which is sent by electric power from the cool, copiously
gushing source near the bank of Town Brook, 200 feet away.
Plymouth in 1627
[Illustration: Illustrated capital]
In 1627, Isaac DeRaiseres, an officer from the Dutch Colony of New
Netherland, now New York, visited Plymouth, and in a letter to Holland
sends the following description of appearance of the place:—
[Illustration: Pilgrims and stronghouse]
“New Plymouth lies on the slope of a hill stretching east toward the sea
coast, with a broad street about a cannon shot of eight hundred (yards)
long, leading down the hill, with a (street) crossing in the middle
northwards to the rivulet and southwards to the land.[1] The houses are
constructed of hewn planks, with gardens also enclosed behind and at the
sides with hewn planks, so that their houses and court-yards are
arranged in very good order, with a stockade against a sudden attack;
and at the ends of the street are three wooden gates. In the centre, on
the cross street, stands the Governor’s house, before which is a square
enclosure, upon which four patereros (steen-stucken) are mounted, so as
to flank along the streets. Upon the hill they have a large square
house, with a flat roof, made of thick sawn planks, stayed with oak
beams, upon the top of which they have six cannons, which shoot iron
balls of four and five pounds, and command the surrounding country.”
[1]An error in statement of the points of the compass is here evident.
It should be “southwards to the rivulet and northwards to the land.”
Town Square
[Illustration: Illustrated capital]
Above Main and Market streets we enter Town Square, shaded by its noble
elms, planted in 1784. On the corner of Main Street, a large building
was built in 1875 by Mayflower Lodge I. O. O. F., covering the spot on
which stood the house of William Bradford, so many years, the Pilgrim
governor. It was burned January 10, 1904, and the “Governor Bradford
Building,” a handsome brick structure with stores and offices took its
place. A bronze tablet calls attention to the locality.
[Illustration: GOV. BRADFORD’S HOUSE IN 1621.]
Above this is the Congregational Church, known as the “Church of the
Pilgrimage.”
The present building was erected in 1840, and stands very near the site
of the First Meeting-house in Plymouth, built in 1638. A tablet on the
front of the church bears the following inscription:—
This tablet is inscribed in grateful memory of the Pilgrims and of
their successors who, at the time of the Unitarian controversy in
1801, adhered to the belief of the Fathers, and on the basis of the
original creed and covenant perpetuated, at great sacrifice, in the
Church of the Pilgrimage, the evangelical faith and fellowship of the
Church of Scrooby, Leyden, and the “Mayflower,” organized in England
in 1606.
[Illustration: CHURCH OF THE PILGRIMAGE.]
Opposite is an old building, now the Town House, on which is a
historical bronze tablet. It was built in 1749 as a court house, the
town contributing a part of the cost for the privilege of using it. When
the new court house was built, in 1820, this old colonial building was
purchased by the town and in it most of the town officers are located,
also public sanitary conveniences. At the head of the square is the
First Parish Church, the original church of the Pilgrims.
The first “Meeting-house,” as the Pilgrims called church edifices, to
distinguish them from houses of worship of the established church, has
been proved, by the investigations of Mr. W. T. Davis, to have stood on
the north side of the square, near the spot occupied by the present
Governor Bradford building. Of this we know but little, except that it
was erected in 1638, (the Forefathers before that time worshipping in
the fort on the hill), and had a bell. In 1683 a new building was
erected, not on the same lot, but farther out at the head of the square.
This was forty-five by forty feet, sixteen feet in the walls, had a
Gothic roof, diamond window glass and a bell.
In 1744, still another church was built on or near the same site. This
remained until 1830, when a Gothic edifice was erected. This stood
farther up the hill than the previous one, and was destroyed by fire
Nov. 22, 1892. The present stone building was completed and dedicated on
December 21, 1899, and has on its front, tablets designating it as the
first church. Its entrance portal is a fine reproduction of the arched
doorway of the old church at Austerfield, England, in which Gov.
Bradford was christened.
[Illustration: CHURCH OF THE FIRST PARISH.]
Burial Hill
“The Pilgrim Fathers are at rest;
When Summer’s throned on high,
And the world’s warm breast is in verdure dressed,
Go, stand on the hill where they lie.”
[Illustration: Illustrated capital]
Beyond and above Town Square stretches the verdant slope consecrated
from the earliest years of the colony as a place of sepulture. Here
repose the ashes of those who survived the first winter. “In one field a
great hill, on which we point to make a platform and plant our ordnance,
which will command all round about. From thence we may see into the bay
and far into the sea.” Marble tablets mark the location of the Old Fort
and Watch Tower, while numerous stones and monuments, which can easily
be deciphered, point out resting places of Pilgrims and descendants.
[Illustration: GOV. BRADFORD’S MONUMENT, BURIAL HILL.]
The marble obelisk in memory of Gov. William Bradford, the second
governor, with its Hebrew text, now difficult to decipher, but
translated by good authority to read: “Let the right hand of the Lord
awake,” together with a Latin inscription, freely rendered: “Do not
basely relinquish what the Fathers with difficulty attained,” erected in
1825, is near to us, and around it are numerous stones, marking the
graves of his descendants. On the south side of the Governor’s obelisk
is inscribed:
H I William Bradford of Austerfield Yorkshire England. Was the son of
William and Alice Bradford, He was Governor of Plymouth Colony from
1621 to 1633 1635 1637 1639 to 1643 1645 to 1657
[Illustration: GRAVE OF THOMAS CLARK, 1697.]
On the north side:
Under this stone rest the ashes of William Bradford a zealous Puritan
& sincere Christian Gov. of Ply. Col. from 1621 to 1657, (the year he
died) aged 69, except 5 yrs, which he declined.
A little back, on a path to the rear entrance to the hill is the oldest
stone in the cemetery. It must be remembered that for many years the
colonists had far other cares, and many other uses for their little
savings, than to provide stones to mark their graves. These had to be
imported from England at much cost, and consequently it was some years
before any were able to afford the expense. The oldest stone is that to
the memory of Edward Gray, 1681. Mr. Gray was a merchant, and one of the
wealthiest men in the colony. Near the head of this path is a stone to
William Crowe, 1683-84. Near by is one to Thomas Clark, 1697,
erroneously reputed to have been the mate of the “Mayflower,” but who
came in the “Ann,” in 1623. Clark’s Island received its name from John
Clark, now known to have been the mate of the “Mayflower.” Beside the
grave of Thomas Clark is that of his son, Nathaniel, who was one of the
councillors of Sir Edward Andros, Governor of New England. Other old
stones are those of Mrs. Hannah Clark, 1697; and John Cotton, 1699.
These are all the original stones bearing dates in the seventeenth
century. There are some with dates of that century which have been
erected since, by descendants, including the monument to Governor
Bradford, before alluded to: the fine granite shaft to Robert Cushman;
and the stone over the remains of John Howland. The inscription on the
latter stone reads as follows:—
Here ended the Pilgrimage of JOHN HOWLAND who died February 23, 167
2-3, aged above 80 years. He married Elizabeth daughter of JOHN TILLEY
who came with him in the Mayflower Dec. 1620. From them are descended
a numerous posterity.
“Hee was a godly man and an ancient professor in the wayes of Christ.
Hee was one of the first comers into this land and was the last man
that was left of those that came over in the Shipp called the
Mayflower that lived in Plymouth.”—(Plymouth Records.)
Near the Bradford monument are the graves of his family. The face of the
stone at the grave of his son, Major William Bradford, shelled off in
1876-77, but the inscription has since been retraced. The cut following
is reproduced from a view taken of the original, and is an exact
_facsimile_—
Here lyes ye body of ye honourable Major William Bradford, who expired
Feb’ ye 20th, 1703-4, aged 79 years.
He lived long, but still was doing good,
And in his country’s service lost much blood,
And a life well spent, he’s now at rest,
His very name and memory is blest.
[Illustration: GRAVE OF MAJOR WILLIAM BRADFORD.]
At the grave of another son the headstone reads as follows:
Here lyes interred ye body of Mr. Joseph Bradford, son of the late
Honorable William Bradford, Esq., Governor of Plymouth, Colony, who
departed this life July the 10th, 1715 in the eighty-fifth year of his
age.
The following are some of the inscriptions of the older stones:
Here lyes ye body of Mrs. Hannah Sturtevant, aged about sixty-four
years. Dec. in March, 1708-9.
Here lyes buried the body of Mr. Thomas Faunce, ruling elder of the
First Church of Christ in Plymouth. Deceased Feb’y, 27, 1745, in the
ninety-ninth year of his age.
The fathers—where are they?
Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord.
[Illustration: GRAVE OF DR. FRANCIS LEBARON.
“THE NAMELESS NOBLEMAN.”]
(Elder Faunce was the last who held the office of ruling elder in the
church. He was contemporary with many of the first comers, and from him
comes much of the information we possess about the localities now
venerated.)
The epitaphs in old graveyards possess much interest to the lovers of
the quaint and curious, and this first cemetery of New England is not
without its attraction of that kind. The following are some of the most
interesting:—
This stone is erected to the memory of that unbiased judge, faithful
officer, sincere friend, and honest man, Col. Isaac Lothrop who
resigned his life on the 26th day of April, 1750, in the forty-third
year of his age.
Had Virtue’s charms the power to save
Its faithful votaries from the grave,
This stone had ne’er possessed the fame
Of being marked with Lothrop’s name.
A row of stones on the top of the hill, near the marble tablet marking
the locality of the Watch Tower, is raised to the memory of the
ministers of the First Parish. Back of these is the Judson lot, where
the sculptor’s chisel has perpetuated the remembrance of Rev. Adoniram
Judson, the celebrated missionary to Burmah, whose body was committed to
the keeping of Old Ocean. On the westerly side of the hill is a monument
erected by Stephen Gale of Portland, Me:—
To the memory of seventy-two seamen, who perished in Plymouth Harbor,
on the 26th and 27th days of December, 1778, on board the private
armed brig, General Arnold, of twenty guns, James Magee, of Boston,
Commander; sixty of whom were buried in this spot.
About midway on the easterly slope a little to the north of the main
path up the hill, on the stone to a child aged one month:—
He glanced into our world to see
A sample of our miserie.
On a stone a little farther north, to the memory of four children, aged
respectively thirty-six, twenty-one, seventeen and two years:—
Stop traveller and shed a tear
Upon the fate of children dear.
On the path towards the schoolhouse on a stone to a woman with an infant
child by her side:—
Come view the seen, ’twill fill you with surprise,
Behold the loveliest form in nature dies;
At noon she flourished, blooming, fair and gay;
At evening an extended corpse she lay.
Near the entrance to this path is the grave of a Revolutionary soldier,
Capt. Jacob Taylor, died 1788:—
Through life he braved her foe, if great or small,
And marched out foremust at his country’s call.
On this path is the grave of Joseph Bartlett, who died in 1703:—
Thousands of years after blest Abel’s fall,
’Twas said of him, being dead he speaketh yet;
From silent grave methinks I hear a call:—
Pray, fellow mortals, don’t your death forget.
You that your eyes cast on this grave,
Know you a dying time must have.
Near the same place is a curious stone, to the memory of John Cotton:—
Here lyes interred three children, viz., three sons of Rev. Mr. John
Cotton, who died in the work of the gospel ministry at
Charlestown, South Carolina, Sept.
ye 18th, 1869, where he had great success, and seven sons of
Josiah Cotton, Esq., who died in their infancy.
On the southerly slope of the hill, near a pine grove, is a stone to a
child:—
The fathers have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set
on edge.
On the stone to the memory of Thomas Jackson, died in 1794:—
The spider’s most attenuated thread
Is cord, is cable, to man’s tender tie.
MARTHA COTTON, 1796.
Many years I lived
Many painful scenes I passed,
Till God at last
Called me home.
In a long lot enclosed with an iron fence:—
F. W. Jackson. obit M. C. H. 23, 1797, 1 yr. 7 dys,
Heav’n knows what man
He might have made. But we
He died a most rare boy.
[Illustration: FANNIE CROMBIE.]
As young as beautiful; and soft as young,
And gay as soft; and innocent as gay.
A little farther on in this path is the stone to Tabitha Plasket, 1807,
the epitaphs, on which, written supposedly by herself, breaths such a
spirit of defiance that it attracts much attention:—
Adieu, vain world, I’ve seen enough of thee;
And I am careless what thou say’st of me;
Thy smiles I wish not,
Nor thy frowns I fear,
I am now at rest, my head lies quiet here,
Mrs. Plasket, in her widowhood, taught a private school for small
children, at the same time, as was the custom of her day, doing her
spinning. Her mode of punishment was to pass skeins of yarn under the
arms of the little culprits, and hang them upon pegs. A suspended row
was a ludicrous sight.
Mr. Joseph Plasket (husband of Tabitha) died in 1794, at the age of
forty-eight years. The widow wrote his epitaph as follows:—
All you that doth behold my stone,
Consider how soon I was gone.
Death does not always warning give,
Therefore be careful how you live.
Repent in time, no time delay,
I in my prime was called away.
Nearly opposite this is one on a very young child:—
The babe that’s caught from womb and breast,
Claim right to sing above the rest,
Because they found the happy shore
They never saw or sought below.
As this path comes out on the brow of the hill, near a white fence, is a
stone to Elizabeth Savery, 1831:—
Remember me as you pass by,
As you are now, so once was I;
As I am now, so you will be,
Therefore prepare to follow me.
On the path by the fence in the rear of the hill:—
The father and the children dead,
We hope to Heaven their souls have fled.
The widow now alone is left,
Of all her family bereft.
May she now put her trust in God,
To heal the wound made by His rod.
On a stone raised to the memory of a child:—
He listened for a while to hear
Our mortal griefs; then turned his ear
To angel harps and songs, and cried
To join their notes celestial, sigh’d and died.
[Illustration: GRAVE OF NATHANIEL GOODWIN.]
A little from the path up Burial Hill to the left, just below the tall
Cushman monument, a marble tablet designates the spot where the fort of
the little colony was situated, quite a portion of its outline still
being distinct, particularly at the easterly corner. We can see at once
with what sagacity the site was chosen, undoubtedly by Standish. It
commanded Leyden Street, and the approaches from the brook over which
the Indians came.
[Illustration: THE OLD FORT AND FIRST MEETING HOUSE, 1621.]
Standing here, we have a view of the southern part of the town. The blue
heights of Manomet Hills shut in the horizon. Beyond them lies the
little hamlet of South Plymouth, a rural village with summer hotels, the
Ardmore Inn and Idlewild hotels of considerable celebrity, especially
among sportsmen, to which the very spacious and beautiful Mayflower Inn
has been added in 1917. On this side is the village of Chiltonville,
with its churches and factories. Far down to the shore, near the head of
the Beach, is the Hotel Pilgrim. Just south of the hotel are the
beautiful level lawns and attractive cozy club-house of the Plymouth
Country Club, the golf links being situated on the opposite side of
Warren avenue, running over high, clear, breezy fields and commanding a
splendid view of ocean and of land. Near lies the southerly portion of
the main part of the town, divided by the brook. Across the stream, or
pond, just beyond Main Street extension with its bridge built in 1907-8,
is the public common, laid out very early as a “Training Green,” the
name it bears today. It is an attractive square surrounded with large
elm trees, and in its centre stands the monument erected in 1869 to the
memory of the Soldiers and Sailors of Plymouth, who gave their lives for
the country in the Civil War. Before the Pilgrims came the Green was an
Indian cornfield.
[Illustration: MANOMET BLUFFS.]
Watson’s Hill
[Illustration: Illustrated capital]
Above the Green is Watson’s Hill, now covered with houses. This was the
“_Cantauganteest_” of the Indians, one of their favorite resorts where
they had their summer camps, and on the level below planted their corn.
It is famous as the opening scene of the treaty with Massasoit, made
April 1, 1621. Gov. Bradford had a tract of land assigned him here on
which to raise corn, and to this day portions of the hill remain in the
Bradford name and others of direct descent from him.
[Illustration: WATSON’S HILL.]
The Watch Tower
A little to the north of the site of the old fort another tablet marks
the place of the brick watch tower erected in 1643. The locality of this
tower is indicated by four stone posts set in the ground to mark its
corners. The brick foundations are still there, about a foot below the
surface, and the old hearthstone on which the Pilgrims built their watch
fires still lies where they placed it, on the southerly side of the
enclosure. The location of the tower was discovered many years ago in
digging a grave, when the sexton came upon the foundation. The town
records of Sept. 23, 1643, have the following entry in regard to it: “It
is agreed upon the whole that there shall be a watch house forthwith,
built of brick, and that Mr. Grimes will sell us the brick at eleven
shillings a thousand.”
[Illustration: SITE OF THE WATCH TOWER, 1643.
Back of this is seen the lot of Rev. Adoniram Judson, the famous
missionary to Burmah.]
This is the first mention of brick in the records of the colony, and it
is to be presumed that this marks about the time of the first
brickyards. The cause of the tower being built was probably the
threatenings of the Indians, which resulted in the Narragansett war.
[Illustration: ALONG THE WHARVES.]