HISTORY OF NASHUA, NH - Part I Geography, Topography, General Description and the ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS. ---------------------------------- Information located at http://www.nh.searchroots.com On a web site about GENEALOGY AND HISTORY OF NEW HAMPSHIRE and its counties TRANSCRIBED BY JANICE BROWN Please see the web site for my email contact. ---------------------------------- The original source of this information is in the public domain, however use of this text file, other than for personal use, is restricted without written permission from the transcriber (who has edited, compiled and added new copyrighted text to same). ======================================================== SOURCE: History of Hillsborough County, New Hampshire Philadelphia: J.W. Lewis & Co., 1885, 878 pgs. PLEASE NOTE THAT THE INFORMATION IN THIS DOCUMENT IS TRANSCRIBED DIRECTLY FROM THE ABOVE SOURCE, AND IS NOT NECESSARILY THE BELIEF OF THE TRANSCRIBER. ALSO NOTE THAT THE INFORMATION REGARDING THE LIFESTYLE AND CULTURE OF THE "INDIANS" (NATIVE AMERICANS) REFERRED TO THIS THIS DOCUMENT MAY NOT BE HISTORICALLY CORRECT! page 10 NASHUA, N.H. by John H. Goodale CHAPTER I TOPOGRAPHY--NATURAL FEATURES Boundaries--Area--Rivers, Brooks and Ponds--Intervales and Plains-- Forest-Trees--Wild Animals--Fish--Climate--Meterology The city of Nashua lies in the southern part of Hillsborough County, on the boundary line of Massachusetts. It is bounded on the north by the town of Merrimack, on the east by the Merrimack River, which separates it from Hudson and Litchfield, on the south by Tyngsborough and Dunstable, Mass., and on the west by Hollis. Its length is about six and one-half miles from north to south, and its width a little more than four and a half miles from east to west. Its area is about eighteen thousand eight hundred and ninety-eight acres, or nearly thirty square miles. THe surface in the eastern section is generally level, consisting of plain and intervale; in the western it is rolling; while in the southern section are several ridges of moderate height. The highest summit in Nashua is Long Hill, near the Massachsuetts line, which is four hundred and thirty-nine feet above ocean level. The city is well watered. The Merrimack River flows along its eastern boundary. The Nashua River, from which the city takes its name, comes from the southwest, furnishing the water-power for the cotton-mills and other manufactories of the city, while Salmon Brook, coming from the south, and the Pennichuck, on the north, are attractive and beautiful streams. There are three small natural ponds in the township, Lovewell, in the southeast; Round, in the northwest; and Sandy, in the southwest margin of the city proper. Of these, the Sandy is the more noticeable. It lies in a circular basin of six acres, has no visible inlet or outlet and is fed by subterranean springs. Its surface height various about three feet, usually the highest in April and lowest in October. THe water is unusually clear, and furnishes the most of the ice used in the city. In agricultural resources, Nashua is below the average of the adjoining towns. The intervale of the Merrimack and Nashua Rivers, limited in extent, is easily cultivated, and excellent for the growth of corn and vegetables. The higher lands of the southern part have fine hay-fields and orchards, but the plain and the most of the rolling lands which cover the larger portion of Nashua are comparatively unproductive. The soil is a deposit of the Glacial Drift period,-- a sandy deposit worn from the northern hills during that geological epoch, when glaciers or icebergs were drifting across New England. More than two centuries ago the early explorers named these plains the "pine barrens." The bowlders of granite so abundant in the northern and western towns of Hillsborough County are much fewer and smaller in Nashua. Ledges crop out about Mine Falls, and one ledge a mile west of the city proper furnishes a small amount of rough material for cellar walls and other stone-work about the city. Almost every forest-tree common in Southern New Hampshire was originally found in this township. The lofty white-pine grew on the rich alluvial soil of the two rivers, often having a height of one hundred feet and a diameter of three feet. There was also, upon some portions of the intervale, and upon the higher grounds on the north side of the Nashua River, a heavy growth of sturdy hard pine, which was used by the early settlers for the manufacture of turpentine. The thin soil of the plains was covered by a scrub pine growth. The pine growth, has, to some extent been superseded by the birch and oak. The prevailing forest-trees at the present time are the pine, oak and birch, with a sprinkling of maple, ash, elm, basswood, spruce and walnut. The oak is largely of the red and the birch of the white species. Very few trees which had reached the average growth a century ago are now standing. Very few acres of woodland have been cleared of late in Nashua, and the percentage of land covered by a natural forest growth is increasing. The early settlers of Nashua, found fewer wild animals here than in most other localities. The constant presence of the Indians in the Merrimack Valley, and the absence of sheltering ravines and ledges, largely account for this. While in some of the earliest settlements the pioneers found wild meats of great service, the scanty records of "Old Dunstable," makes little mention of any aid from this source. The bear and deer, never numerous in this vicinity, soon disappeared. The moose, panther and wolf seldom came below Lake Winnipesaukee. The beaver, a former occupant of Salmon Brook, had already disappeared. The racoon, fox, rabbit, woodchuck and squirrel were still numerous and annoying. But the scarcity of wild animals as a source of food was compensated by the abundance of fish. Especially was this true in the spring. The Merrimack and its branches were the favorite resort of the salmon, shad and alewife. Migratory in their habits, they arrived early in May, and not only the larger streams but the tributary brooks were full of them. At the foot of ever cascade the pools were crowded with the agile salmon. The pioneers had no need to resort to the Merrimack, since it was far easier to catch them in the smaller streams. Salmon Brook was so named from the multitude of salmon taken every May between the Main Street bridge and its entrance into the Merrimack. The Pennichuck was equally famous for the facility with which this delicious fish could be taken from its waters. They varied in weight from three to sixteen pounds. The early settlers in the adjacent towns relied upon "Pennichuck beef" as the greatest delicacy of the year. For half a century shad and alewives were used as dressing for the corn-fields, and were rarely cooked until salmon became scarce. After the building of the Pawtucket (Lowell) dam, both salmon and shad disappeared from the waters of the Merrimack and its branches. From a topographical examination, it is very evident that Nashua owes its origin and growth as a city from the river from which it derives its name. It is a small river, but the water-power it furnishes has been sufficient to found a city of fifteen thousand inhabitants. Its sources are in the northern part of Worcester County. The small streams flowing from the base of Mount Wachusett unite in the Lancaster meadows, entering New Hampshire about seven miles from its mouth. Its fall of water between Mine Falls and its mouth is about fifty-four feet. The climate of Nashua is healthy. It is exempt from malaria and fogs, and in the warm season is free from annoying insects. The average temperature is forty-eight degrees above zero. Its highest temperature within the past thirty years was ninety-nine degrees above, and its lowest thirty-two degrees below zero. The degree of temperature varies with diffferent localities in and about the city. In ordinary weather the difference is small, but at dawn on severely cold winter mornings the mercury is usually six, and sometimes ten degrees lower at the Concord Railroad Station than at Mount Pleasant and the South Common. There is less fall of snow here than in any other town in New Hampshire not bordering on the Atlantic Coast. Exceptional winters occur, but ordinarily the number of weeks of good sleighing in the city is few, often not exceeding four. The average rainfall is thirty-nine inches. Nashua is the third city in the State in population, the third in valuation and the second in the value of its manufactures. It is thirty-five miles from Concord, forty miles from Boston, two hundred and sixty-two from New York and four hundred and ninety-two from Washington. No extensive view of scenery is visible from any part of the city; but from the towers of the High School and the Mount Pleasant School buildings there is not only an attractive view of Nashua itself, but on a fair day there can be clearly seen the twin summits of Uncannonuc, in Goffstown, the precipitous side of Joe English, in New Boston, the Crotched Mountain, in Francestown, the Grand Monadnoc, in Jaffrey, the Pack Monadnoc, in Peterborough, and Mount Wachusett, in Central Massachusetts. CHAPTER II page 140 THE ABORIGINAL INHABITANTS Indian Tribes--The "Nashaways"--Corn Raising--Stone Implements-- Hunting--Modes of Cooking--Salmon and Shad--Wigwams-- Treatment of Squaws--Wars--The Birch Canoe--Clothing--Stone Relics Nashua was the first settled of the inland towns of New Hampshire. It is not certainly known in what year the first white inhabitant built his cabin within its limits, but it could hardly have been earlier than 1665 or later than 1670. Fifty years before the Scotch settlers came to Londonderry, and seventy years before any other town of Hillsborough County, outside of "Old Dunstable," had a white resident, there were log cabins on the banks of Salmon Brook, a little above its junction with the Merrimack. Longer than any other towns in the State, except Dover and Portsmouth, this settlement occupied a frontier position, exposed to all the perils and terrible disasters of savage hosility, and none did more heroic service in rescuing the colonies from the barbarities of Indian warfare. It is now more than two-thirds of a century since the last Indian remaining in the State died in a remote cabin in Coos County. The prophecy of Passaconaway has been fulfilled. The race of New Hampshire Indians is extinct. To the generation of to-day the Indian is a myth. To our forefathers they were a terrible reality--an untiring, ever-present, merciless foe. The history of Nashua would be incomplete without a description of its original inhabitants. Of the twenty thousand Indians in New England on the landing of the Pilgrims, two thousand were in New Hampshire. More than three-fourths of these lived in the Merrimack Valley. The rapid growth of the Massachusetts Bay colony led the more adventurous emigrants to seek for advantageous and fertile lands on which to find a home. From the natives they learned of the attractive valley of the Merrimack River, and were awaiting a favorable opportunity to explore it. In the summer of 1652 the colonial government of Massachusetts, desirous of ascertaining the northern extent of their territory, appointed an exploring commission, consisting of Captain Edward Johnson and Captain Simon Willard, accompanied by Jonathan Ince and John Shearman as surveyors. THey were instructed to follow up the Merrimack River to its head and there establish a "bound." At Pawtucket Falls they secured Indian guides, and, proceeding up the west bank of the river, were the first white men known to have crossed Salmon Brook and Nashua River, and explored the intervale lands of the vicinity. Having been told by their Indian guides that the head of the Merrimack River was at the outlet of the lake, they proceeded to that point, and upon a rock having a surface just above the water, at the outlet of Winnipesaukee, they cut the following inscription: " E I S W W P IOHN ENDICVT GOV" which, modernized, and subsituting the full names for the initials, reads,-- "Edward Johnson Simon Willard. Worshipful John Endicut Governor." The commissioners made a report to the Massachusetts government on their return, and stated that they were treated kindly, not only by the tribes on the Nashua and Souhegan Rivers, but by those of the upper country. From their description it is probable that about forty Indian families were living near the mouths of Salmon Brook and the Nashua River, and as many more at the mouth of the Souhegan and on the Litchfield intervale, opposite. The Indians of the Merrimack Valley were divided into small tribes, and were designated by the name of the locality they occupied. The Pawtuckets had their headquarters at Pawtucket Falls, just above the present city of Lowell; the Nashaways lived in the Nashua River Valley and about its mouth; the Penacooks occupied Penacook (now Concord), and a part of Boscawen. The last-named tribe was far the most numerous, warlkie and powerful, and its sachem, Passaconaway, was the actual ruler of all the tribes of the Merrimack valley. He was the most sagacious and discreet chieftan of his time. These tribes, while relying largely on fishing and hunting for their livelihood, depended to not trifling extent upon the tillage of the soil to secure them from starvation during the long winter. In common with all the North American tribes, these Indian warriors, when not idle, devoted themselves to war, fishing and hunting, and imposed upon the women the labor of tilling the ground, securing the crops, gathering the firewood, and all the drudgery of the wigwam. Many of the meadows, or the "intervales," as they are often called, on the Merrimack and Nashua Rivers are basins having a surface of alluvial and vegetable deposits. No doubt they were once covered with water, which, by the deepending of the channel, has gradually passed away. In proof of this, we know that logs, leaves, nuts and other vegetation are often found buried under the surface at various depths, sometimes as low as twenty feet. Mr. Fox, in his "History of Dunstable," related that when the excavation for the foundation of the locks near the junction of the Nashua and Merrimack Rivers was made, in 1825, at a spot about one hundred feet from the Nashua River, and at a depth of many feet below the surface, the workmen found logs and a quantity of charred coals, evidently the remains of a fire. Such discoveries are not infrequent in all alluvial lands. The time of deposit, geologically considered, was recent; chronologically estimated it was exceedingly remote. The soil thus formed is free from stone, easy of cultivation and for a time very productive. After girdlign the trees and piling the brushwood, the ground was carefully burned over in autumn. WIth the coming of spring each squaw began to prepare her patch for planting. The Indian apostle, John Elliot, writing from observation, describes these patches as usually containing about half an acre each, though occasionally he saw one of a whole acre. Often a dozen or more of them were contiguous, thus insuring a better protection from the coons, crows and squirrels. The implements of the Indians were rude and simple. The student of to-day will bear in mind that the aboriginal race in North America three centuries ago were living in primitive barbarism, entirely ignorant of the use of the metals, or of any of the arts and discoveries of civilization. They were the "untutored children of nature." The bow and arrow, spear and club were their warlike weapons; the birch canoe was their highest idea of navigation; the stone hammer, wedge and gouge, and bone needle made up their mechanical outfit; the stone pestle, earthen pot, flint knife, the ladle and spoon of horn, constituted their cooking utensils; while the stone axe and hoe were the implement of tillage. The impression that the Indian axe was ever used as a cutting instrument is an error. It was an implement for pounding rather than cutting. No variety of stone, whether granite, greenstone, trap or jasper can furnish an edge of sufficient firmness and tenacity to successfully penetrade wood. The red man rarely felled a tree, and when he did, it was by the aid of pitch and fire. He used the axe for splitting wood, peeling bark and pounding the ash for basket materials. To the squaw it was of service in digging up bushes and roots, and mellowing the soil; but after the ground was prepared for planting, the hoe was the main implement used by the women, on whom devolved the toil of cultivating the land. It was made of granite, or oftener of hard slate, having the shape of the carpenter's adze, and with a deep groove cut around the head to secure it to the handle. The handle was a withe, so pliant as to be twisted tightly in the groove around the head of the hoe; it was then fastened with a strip of raw-hide. Both the withe and the raw-hide were made firm by drying before the handle would be serviceable. Such an implement would be of little use in the hard, stony ground, but in the mellow loam of the intervale, it sufficed to form the hills and remove the intruding weeds. The corn was of several colors, small of kernel and quicker in maturing than we are now accustomed to plant. The tribes of the Merrimack Valley began to plant "when the leaves of the white oak were as large as the ear of the mouse." From this habit was derived the adage of the first white settlers,-- "When the oak tree look gosling gray / Plant then--be it June or May." The squaws attended diligently to the growing corn, planting it in rows and hilling in much the same way we do. Some of the abandoned corn-fields on the intervales of Hudson retained for years the shape of the hills of corn as they were left by the natives. After several seasons, when the grounds became exhausted, they dressed the soil with shad and alewives. These fish luckily arrived in immense numbers just before planting-time, and were easily caught in every brook or rivulet tributary to the river. Putting a single fish in each hill was enough to secure a good yield. To the red men corn, the especial product of the western continent, was a rich gift. It springs luxuriantly from a rich, fresh soil, and in the warm loam, with little aid of cultivation, soon outstrips the weeds. It bears not ten, nor twenty, but three hundred fold. If once try, it is hurt neither by heat nor cold, may be preserved in a pit or cave for years and even centuries, is gathered from the field by hand without knife or pruning-hook, and becomes nutritious food by a simple roasting or parching before a fire. Besides corn, beans, squashes, pumpkins, melons and gourds, all of them indigenous, were more or less grown. Before ripening, the corn was often roasted for immediate use. When boiled in kernels it was called samp. When pounded in a mortar and boiled it was called hominy. When boiled with an equal quantity of beans it was called succotash. The squash and pumpkin were cooked by boiling or steaming, and used with other foods. In summer the raspberry and blackberry were freely eaten, and in autumn, the squaws, aided by the children, searched the forests for nuts, gathering chestnuts, beech-nuts, walnuts and acords for food in the winter. The acorns were parched and ground, and mixed with corn-meal. The hunting of wild animals was something more than an occupation to the red man. It was an amusement, and sometimes an inspiration. The forests thickly covering the numerous hills of this county abounded with foxes, raccoons, rabbits, woodchucks and squirrels. In the fall the bear was sometimes caught, and in the early winter venison often hung from the rafters of the wigwam. These animals were timid and wary, and could be approached only by stealth. To get within bow-shot required much skill, as well as patience, and was often unsuccessful at last. Hence other contrivances were resorted to. Traps and snares of various kinds, adapted to the size and habits of the animals sought after, were extensively used. For deer a driving-yard was built, forming a figure like the letter V., at some place known to be a resort of this animal. Placing the best marksman at the apex, the rest of the party, forming a line, beat the outlying woods so as to drive the deer within the inclosure, from which they could escape only through the opening of the apex. Here they were usually snared or shot. The wild pigeon is said to habe been suprisingly numerous before, and for a time after, the advent of the white population. Thousands, in August and September, would at twilight alight upon two or three adjacent forest-trees, many bushels of them to be taken before dawn by the natives. The Indians rarely eat raw meat. Usually it was roasted upon split sticks or wooden forks, or broiled upon live coals. When meat was boiled, it was with corn or beans, and if the earten pot was wanting, a wooden trough was used to cook the food by throwing heated stones into the water. In eating, they used neither knife, nor fork, and drank from a gourd or birch-bark cup. The tribes of the Merrimack Valley were attracted by the great number and superior quality of the fish which annually ascended the river in the early part of May. The announcement of their arrival was received with shouts, yells and every evidence of satisfaction. It was the jubilant event of the year. All the tribes gathered at the fishing haunts. Canoes, seines, torches and spears were in demand. There was usually such an abundance of the fish that salmon only were selected as palatable. Many were taken with the stone-pointed spear. More were caught with the seines made of wild hemp and the inner bark of the elm and spruce. But in the height of the "run," in the small streams the club was often the more effecitve, and heaps of salmon were thrown upon the banks, where the squaws, with their flint knives stood ready to dress them, splitting them and laying them upon the turf to dry. At night they were taken to the wigwam and hung around the centre-pole to be cured by the smoke. Each night was passed in dancing and feasting,--a kind of jubilee for the success of the day. The wigwams were built by the squaws. They were rude structures made of eight or ten poles set round in the form of a cone, having a stout centre-pole, to which all the others were bent and fastened, with a strong rope of bark. This rude frame was covered with bark or mats, leaving an opening at the top for the smoke to escape. There was rather a low opening in the side of the wigwam left for the purpose of a doorway, over which a bear or a deer skin was suspended to answer the purpose of a door. This was pushed aside when any one wished to enter or go out. A large pin was driven into the centre-pole upon which to hang the kettle. At the base of this pole, under the pin, was placed edgewise a large flat stone, against which the fire was made, and which protected the pole from burning. Rude mats were placed on the ground, on which theysat, took their meals, and slept. The condition of the wigwam was habitually untidy. Often in the summer season the contents and surroundings became so offensive as to compel a removal to a new location. This required but a few hours' labor, and was wholly done by the women. It is a trait of savage character to degrade womanhood. With the red man this was universal. The females bore the burden of unconditional and unremitting servitude. Under the most cruel treatment they had no redress. Their utmost efforts and severest toil had no other reward than neglect, if not indignity. It is not strange that the mothers of female infants were sometimes driven to infanticide. The tribes of the Merrimack Valley, though less ferocious than the Mohawks of New York and the Tarentines of Maine, were addicted to strife and bloodshed. Wars were as incessant and relentless before the advent of Europeans as afterwards. Extinction had been the lot of many a tribe in the long period which preceded the discovery of the continent. It required no tedious effort for a chief to fire the heart of every warrior in his clan, and once enlisted, there was no risk of desertion. The red men were not wanting in courage and persistence. Their wars were terrible, not from their numbers, for on any one expedition they rarely exceeded a hundred men; it was the parties of six or seven which were most to be dreaded, especially in a war of retaliation. Skill consisted in surprising the enemy unawares. They followed his trail to kill him while he selpt, or they laid in ambush near his wigwam, and watch for an opportunity of suddenly attacking and destroying him, and usually his squaw and children after him, and taking their scalps, hastened back in triumph to their tribe with their trophies dangling from their belts. It was the danger of just such strategy and barbarity that for two-thirds of a century made every white family in Dunstable feel insecure. The earliest explorers spoke of the birch canoe as the possession of every Indian family. Its construction required skill rather than strength. A light frame-work of ash or white-oak was first made, and this was tightly covered with white birch-bark, carefully selected, with the several pieces neatly sewed together with the sinews of some animal or the twine of wild hemp. The seams were made tight with pitch. These canoes were from twelve to fifteen feet in length, were propelled by paddles not unlike those now in use, and would carry from three to five persons, who sat on the bottom of the canoe. It floated gracefully, and both sexes acquired great facility in using it. The occasions for using the canoe on the Merrimack were frequent, inasmuch as the land on both sides of the river was more or less occupied. "At almost any hour," wrote Captain Willard, "one could see at the mouths of the Nashua and Souhegan the natives going to and fro in their canoes." The clothing of the natives in summer was an apron made of skin, fastened around the waist; in winter bear-skin, or a jacket made of smaller skins. They wore skin moccasins on their feet, and to these, when traveleing upon the deep and soft snow, the oval-shaped snow-shoes were bound, on which, though cumbersome to the novice, the Indian hunter could well-nigh outstrip the wind. The natives of the eastern continent have enduring monuments of their ancestors. The savage red men who for ages occupied the Merrimack Valley left no obelisk or pyramid, no ruin of walled town or temple. The stone implements buried in the soil they occupied are the only visible evidence of their having existed. These are most abundant around the water-falls at Amoskeag, the Weirs, Suncook and Pawtucket, but they have also been found on almost every acre of intervale between Lake Winnipesaukee and Newburyport. Around the Amoskeag Falls antiquarians have picked up thousands of the stone arrow and spear-heads with which they pointed their weapons. In excavations at Sanbornton Bay have been found stone axes, steatite pipes, coarse fragments of pottery and rude ornaments. On the alluvial plough-lands of Nashua have been dug up stone pestles, hatchets, gouges, knives, sinkers and arrow-points,--the sole relics of a race who were unable to survive the approach of civilization. (end)