Lovewell's Fight: The Woods Family

 

The Woods Family seems to have had the most family members involved in the fight.  One of them became more famous for his act during the fight than the others. 

The WOODS FAMILY

Nathaniel Woods was born on October 19, 164 in Groton, Massachusetts, son of Nathaniel and Eleanor (Whitney) Woods.  He was the grandson of my 8^th great-grandparents Samuel and Alice (Rushton) Woods of Groton, Massachusetts and nephew of my ancestor Abigail (Woods) Barron, who was an aunt to the mentioned Elias Barron by marriage to Samuel Barron.   In 1725, Nathaniel was 30 years old and unmarried.  He enlisted from Groton and made a sergeant of the company.  When the fort had been erected at Ossipee Pond, he was left in charge.  He and the other survivors from the battle arrived in Dunstable, Massachusetts five days afterwards.  Maybe the fight and loss of his younger brother affected Nathaniel by thinking of marriage and a family soon, that his brother never got a chance to do.  Nathaniel married his first wife, Alice French on 14 September 1725 and would have 6 children and two more wives before his death in 1766 in Pepperell, Massachusetts.

Daniel Woods was born on May 10, 1696, in Groton, Massachusetts and brother to Nathaniel Woods.  In 1725, he was 28 years old and unmarried.  He enlisted with his brother from Groton, Massachusetts.  He was killed in the battle and buried on the field.

Thomas Woods was the first cousin to both Nathaniel and Daniel Woods, son of Thomas Woods and his 2^nd wife, Hannah Whitney.  The same relationship with the others as Nathaniel Woods.  In 1725, Thomas was only 19 years old and youngest in the company.  He also enlisted from Groton.  He was killed in the battle of May 9, 1725, and buried on the field.  Now two of the Woods family members had been lost.

Abigail Woods, sister to the above Thomas Woods, was born 19 August 1692 in Groton, Massachusetts.  She married John Chamberlain on 13 October 1712 in Concord, Massachusetts.  In 1725, Abigial was 32 years old and pregnant with their 4^th child.  John was 33 years old and enlisted from Groton in 1725.  John and his father were farmers and millers in Groton until his father was murdered in 1709.   During the fight, John was wounded but not seriously.  He is given credit as being the one who shot and killed the Abenaki leader Paugus.  Seth Wyman is credited in some sources, but he was said to have killed 2 natives and not Paugus. 

                                An engraving by John Gilmary Shea, 1872, Wikipedia

Pat Higgins wrote about Lovewell’s fight between the two men in his blog “The Maine story” as follows: “As the story goes, Chamberlain's gun became fouled in the course of the fight. He crept down to a small brook to wash it out. As he stepped out onto the bank, a warrior on a similar mission approached from the opposite bank. The two men recognized each other and began furiously to prepare their guns. Reputedly, Paugus said to the ranger, "I shall now very quick kill you." "Perhaps not," answered Chamberlain. He had an ace in the hole; his gun primed itself with just a thump on the ground Chamberlain had time to take careful aim while Paugus was still priming his gun from his horn. In a flash the white man fired and Paugus lay shot through the heart.  Quite interestingly, this tale was not told until after the last ranger died in 1798. With no one to refute the story, it spread like wildfire and was hotly argued by the 19th century historians”

Chamberlain’s descendants claim that he was known as “Paugus John” afterwards adding to their claim it was him and not Wyman.  There was a story that Chamberlain years later killed one of Chief Paugus’ sons who came looking to kill Chamberlain to avenge his father’s death.   So many years later it’s hard to tell the truth from fiction.

John returned home to his wife and family and had six children in total.  His wife, Abigail died on January 20, 1738, whereas John survived until his death in 1758 in Groton, Massachusetts.

The story of Lovewell’s Fight has been remembered in a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and both Nathaniel Hathorne and Henry David Thoreau wrote about Lovewell’s Fight.  There is even a YouTube Ballard about the battle.  There are books published on the fight as well.  There is a good podcast by Jim Cornelius with more details on the background history of the towns and Capt. Lovewell leading up to the fight.

Lovewell's Fight: Robbins, Jefts and Barron

Three relatives to my ancestors were killed in the Fight at Fryeburg.

ROBBINS

Jonathan Robbins was the son of my 8^th great-grandfather, George Robbins and his 2^nd wife, Alice Frye.  He was a half-brother to my ancestor, John Robbins, son of George Robbins and his first wife.  Jonathan was born on November 19, 1686 in Chelmsford, Massachusetts and moved to Dunstable about 1710 where he settled.  He married Margaret Lund on January 16, 1711-2 in Concord, Massachusetts.  He was commissioned as a Lieutenant in 1724 and served on 3 expeditions with Capt. John Lovewell.  In 1725, he was 38 years old and married for 14 years with five children.  He set out as one of two Lieutenants under Lovewell in April 1725.  On May 9, 1725, after finding their first Native and returning to get their packs, Lovewell’s company was ambushed and both Jonathan and Lt. Farwell were wounded early in the engagement.  He eventually died from his wounds.  A manuscript of the fight states that Jonathan asked to have pistol left with him.  He said “the Indians will come in the morning to scalp me and I will kill one more of em if I can.”  His widow petitioned for administration of his estate.  She remarried to William Shattuck in 1729.

JEFTS

John Jefts was born in 1696 in Billerica, Massachusetts, son of John and Lydia Jefts and grandson of my 9^th great-grandparents Henry and Hannah (Births) Jefts.  He was a nephew to my ancestor Hannah (Jefts) Spaulding.  In 1725, he was unmarried at 28 years old.  He enlisted from Groton, Massachusetts, but was probably a resident of Billerica.  John was killed instantly early in the battle and buried on the field.

BARRON

Elias Barron was born in 1695 in Groton, Massachusetts, the youngest son of my 8^th Great-grandparents, Ellis and Mary (Sherman) Barron.  He was a brother to my 7^th great-grandfather, Samuel Barron.  He married Priscilla Wilson in 1718 in Concord, Massachusetts.  In 1725, Elias Barron was 32 years old and had three children.  He enlisted from Groton, Massachusetts.  During the fight, he was wounded and said to have crawled away and died near the battlefield.  His widow remarried to Jonathan Mead and died in July 1740.

                                            The monument to the men killed in Lovewell's Fight

                         Dedication of the monument at Fryeburg, Maine in 1904 by the                                                            Massachusetts Society of Colonial Wars

Lovewell's Fight: Fulham-Whitney Families

The more I researched the participants in Lovewell’s company, I realized that this affected not only a direct male ancestor, but a direct female ancestor, Tabitha Whitney. 

FULHAM-WHITNEY FAMILY

Tabitha Whitney was my 7^th Great-grandmother, daughter of Jonathan and Sarah (Hapgood) Whitney.  She was born August 22, 1696, in Watertown, Massachusetts.  She had married her first husband, Jacob Fulham of Watertown, Massachusetts in 1715.  In 1725, she was 28 years old and had been married for 10 years and was the mother of three children with a fourth one due within the year by Jacob.  He was 31 years old and enlisted from Weston, Massachusetts and also yeoman or farmer.  He was made a sergeant in Capt. Lovewell’s company.  Jacob was one the men killed in the battle.  From the Genealogies of the Families and Descendants of the Early Settler of Watertown, Massachusetts by Henry Bond, [1855] p. 227: “A sergeant named Fulham, and an Indian, distinguished by his dress and activities, singled out each other and both fell, mutually slain by their antagonist weapon.”  

Monument at Fryeburg, Maine

Tabitha gave birth to late husband’s son, Elisha Fulham on June 26, 1725, some two months after his death.  She filed a probate petition for administration of her late husband’s estate on August 10, 1725.  An Inventory taken listed that Jacob owned two Bibles and other small books, showing he was a literate man for the time.   Among the creditors of the estate was George Parkhurst of Weston, Massachusetts.  George married Tabitha (Whitney) Fulham on April 19, 1726.  Jacob’s father, Francis Fulham, petitioned to be guardian of his son’s children.  An agreement between Francis and George Parkhurst, now the husband of Tabitha, allowed George to remain on his son’s estate if he provided for Tabitha and his son’s children.  The final division of Jacob’s estate was made in 1741.  George and Tabitha Parkhurst had five children together with their last child born days before George’s death on March 17, 1734. Their son, Jonathan Parkhurst being my direct ancestor.   She married her 3^rd husband Samuel Hunt on August 10, 1736, whom she remained with until her death on November 2, 1762, in Harvard, Massachusetts.

Isaac Whitney was the brother of Tabitha Whitney.  He was born in 1703 in Watertown and was 22 years old in 1725.  He enlisted from Concord, Massachusetts, but probably was from Watertown or Weston.  Isaac was one of the ten men who were left behind at the fort in Ossipee and survived the battle. He and the other men returned to Massachusetts five days after the Fight in Fryeburg, Maine.  He settled in Concord, Massachusetts where he was a glazer (term for a glass cutter and or pottery maker).  Probate for his estate was in 1744 in Middlesex County, Massachusetts.  The fort at Ossipee was built on what is eferred to as an Indian Mound or burial ground.  Today that area is now a golf course.  The Indian Mound is maintained by the owners of the course.

Lovewell's Fight: The Farrar Family

 
Though I'm from Maine, I was surprised to discover that my ancestor Jacob Farrar died in a Colonial Fryeburg conflict.   I am sure this is taught to local school children from this area, but I had never heard of Lovewell’s Fight in 1725.  When I read that Jacob had been killed in this fight between the Native people and the early colonists from Massachusetts, I had to research what this was about Lovewell’s fight or the Battle of Pequawket (the Abenaki name of the area that is now Fryeburg, Maine).

                                Painting of Lovewell's Fight by John Burton

The more I studied the surnames of the men who were killed or survived, I realized many of them were in my ancestry.  Not only were these men descendants of my ancestors, but were brothers, cousins, and brothers-in-law to each other and my ancestors.  This one small skirmish affected several of my ancestral families which I was never aware of until now, including another female ancestor.

The fight occurred on May 9, 1725, during the war in northern New England. Captain John Lovewell led a privately organized company of scalp hunters, organized into a makeshift ranger company, and Chief Paugus led the Abenaki at Pequawket.  Capt. Lovewell sought to profit from colonial bounties on Native scalps, while Chief Paugus defended his people’s land against encroaching settlers along the Kennebec River in present-day Maine. Capt. Lovewell’s party consisted of 47 men, who were inexperienced with ranging and with a smaller group than had accompanied Lovewell in past expeditions.  They left Dunstable, Massachusetts (now Nashua, New Hampshire) on April 16, 1725.  Their Indian guide and two other men returned to Dunstable unable to continue.  With one of their men falling ill, they built a fort at what is now Ossipee, New Hampshire where they left ten men including a doctor and supplies for their return.  The other 34 men pressed on to Pequawket, some thirty miles away.

That morning of the 9^th while being led in prayer by the chaplain, they spotted a lone Abenaki warrior.  Suspecting he was a decoy and more warriors were ahead, the men tried to hide their packs and pursued the warrior, killing and scalping him.  However, a larger group of Abenaki warriors discovered their packs and proceeded to wait for the men to return.  As the men returned single file, the warriors attacked, killing Capt. Lovewell and his lieutenants instantly.  During the 10-hour battle Chief Paugus was also killed.  The colonists retreated.  Fourteen men were dead with four wounded, three of them died on the return to the Ossipee fort.  Abenaki deserted the area and left for Canada. There are no known number of men the Abenaki lost.

Some sources give the date of the battle as May 8^th because they did not want the fact that the chaplain who had led the prayer that Sunday morning had been the first one to scalp the first Abenaki warrior on the sabbath.  By making the battle the day before, it would preserve the chaplain’s reputation.

A monument dedicated to those who died in the battle was erected in Fryeburg, Maine.  The grave marker for those men who died there.

THE FARRAR FAMILY

Jacob Farrar was my 7^th great-grandfather.  He was born on October 23, 1692, in Concord, Massachusetts, the son of Jacob and Susanna (Reddiat) Farrar.  His family did not have any positive incidents with the native people. His grandfather, also named Jacob Farrar had been killed by Indians during King’s Philip’s War in 1675 in Lancaster, Massachusetts.  In another raid or massacre often referred to in records, his infant uncle, Henry Farrar at age two was killed in 1676.  His uncle John Farrar was later killed in an Indian attack in 1707.   Jacob married Sarah Wood in 1714 and had a family of five children. In 1725, he was 33 years old, and the temptation of the bounty placed on an Indian scalp at 100 pounds would have been hard to resist.  With the hero, Capt. John Lovewell leading them, it must have felt like a sure bet that this would provide more money than he could earn for farming.   Knowing his family’s relationship with native people he must have felt it would be vengeance for his family relatives. He enlisted from Concord and besides his family members who joined him, he probably knew the other men from Concord in the company.   Jacob was wounded in the battle and said to have expired after midnight by the pond (now Lovewell Pond).  His widow, Sarah was named administrix of his estate on June 9, 1725, with her late husband’s uncle George Farrar and her father, Josiah Wood as bondsmen.  Inventory of his estate contained books which prove that Jacob was literate.  She remarried to David Parlin on April 9, 1726, in Concord, Massachusetts, who became the guardian of her children.  The division of the estate between Jacob’s widow, Sarah Parlin and his children, Jacob and Ephraim Farrar, Sarah Conant (my ancestor), Mary Melvin and Hannah Farrar occurred on August 8, 1743. 

Mary Farrar was the sister to Jacob Farrar.  In 1725, she was 30 years old and had married David Melvin in 1715 in Concord, Massachusetts.  Her husband was 34 years old, and they had five children at that time.  David enlisted from Concord, Massachusetts with his brother-in-law and his brother Eleazer Melvin.  David was one of the 20 men who returned home from the battle, probably to the relief of his wife and children, despite the loss of her brother.  David’s brother Eleazer also survived the battle.  However, only 20 years later, both brothers joined the Siege of Louisbourg in 1745 in what is now Cape Breton Island in Nova Scotia.  David was made a Captain in Col. Willard’s regiment.  David was not so lucky this time as he was wounded and died on November 17, 1745.  However, his brother was also wounded, but survived, dying in 1756.  Mary (Farrar) Melvin remarried to John Edwards in 1749.  She died September 2, 1756, in Lincoln, Massachusetts.

Joseph Farrar, son of George and Mary (Howe) Farrar, was the first cousin to Jacob Farrar.  In 1725, he was 33 years old. He had married Mary Hoskins in 1716 and had three children.  It was his father George Farrar who the bondsman for his cousin Jacob’s widow in 1725. Both George and Jacob Farrar were grandsons of my 9^th great-grandparents, Jacob and Hannah (Hayward) Farrar.  Joseph enlisted from Concord and was one of the men who survived the battle and returned home.  Although, it is not known why, but Joseph died before August 13, 1733, when probate records show Nathan Brown was appointed guardian for the children of Joseph Farrar, late of Concord, Massachusetts.