Radio Script #312
Little Talks On Common Things
September 30, 1956
Ever since our school days, many of us have liked to think that no settlements on this side of the Atlantic are older than Plymouth and Jamestown.
Those dates of 1620 and 1607 are we I I embedded in our merrori es. We know, of course, that the Spaniards founded St. Augustine in the previous century and that they had also established settlements on the Pacific coast before the Engl ish landed either on the James River or on Plymouth Rock. But it comes as a surprise to many of us when we learn that the oldest settlement in North America north of the Gulf of r~xico is not in the United States at al I, but in Canada, in the province of Nova Scotia.
It is known today as Port Royal, a few mi les from Annapol is Royal, on the west coast of Nova Scotia. Here, three years before the settlement at James~ town, Champlain bui It in 1604 what was cal led the Habitation. And there on the spot today stands a carefully constructed replica for the tourist to see. The Habitation was a quadrangle of attached bui Idings, completely surrounding an open court. Entrance was by a single narrow gateway, and outside was a twelvefoot pa I isade. The bui Idings contained not only barracks for soldiers, but also shops for artisans, a trading fort for the Indians, and the governor’s quarters. On the bastion were gun holes through which protruded the cannon, faced out to sea.
Here, by the time when the English landed at Jamestown, was a French settlement of more than 300 people, with a protected habitation against attack. At least Champlain thought it was wei I protected. But an expedition from Virginia captured it in 1613. The Habitation was destroyed, and when a new settlement was made it was six mi les away at Annapolis Royal. Before I saw Annapolis Royal, al I I knew about the place was that it changed hands several times between English and French during what we cal I the French and Indian wars, and that it was the place where the Tory preacher Jacob Bai ley took refuge when he was forced to leave Pownalborough on the Kennebec.
There in Nova Scotia Bai ley continued to preach for many years, and there he lies buried.
Annapolis Royal was the site of old Fort Anne, and on the site of the fort, where is maintained one of the best colonial museums in all Canada, the original rampart may sti II be seen. The powder magazine, erected in 1708, has its original masonry and iron door. The old portcul lis gate is sti I I intact.
The museum has several rooms, each containing authentic relics from colonial days. A tour of the rooms gives one a genuine feeling for this historic place, to which ships from all the western world came in times of peace, and where in times of trouble the armadas of France and England alternately disembarked conquering troops.
The first fort on this site was bui It in 1635. In 1654 it was captured by Col. Robert Sedgwick of Boston in the name of Oliver Cromwel I, but in 1667 the treaty of Breda restored it to French rule. Ten years later New Englanders took it again, but the French soon got it back. That dauntless Maine Yankee, Wi I liam Phipps, captured it again in 1690, but by 1702 it was again in French hands.
In 1710 it was finally brought into English possession after a successful eight day siege, and it was then that the place was named Annapolis Royal for Queen Anne. Previously, when in English possession, it had been cal led Port Royal, the same name as the settlement abandoned in 1613, six mi les away. During The long French and Indian wars after 1710, the fort was repeatedly attacked by French and Indians, but always held out. A garrison was maintained there as late as 1854.
A mark of Nova Scotia’s association with Maine is a monument on the grounds of the old site of Fort Anne. We Maine people are fami liar with the name Sieur de rv10nts through the we I I known S i eur de Monts spri ng ,at Bar Harbor. \1e know he was one of the French exp lorers who came to ~#. Dese rt ear I yin the 17th century. Nova Scotia too has a claim to this gallant Frenchman. On the monument at Annapolis Royal are these words: nTo the illustrious memory of LieutGeneral Pierre du Guest Sieur de Monts, the pioneer of civi lization in North America, who discovered and explored the adjacent river in 1604, and founded on its banks the first sett lement of Europeans north of the Gu r f of Mexi co.”
Now let us turn to someth i ng nearer home.
One of the persons to whom I pa i d spec i a r attent ion j n “Kennebec Yesterdays” was Elihu Bowerman, pioneer settler of the Quaker community at North Fairfield. Tonight I want to tel I you about another fami Iy of that general region, in which the Society of Friends became prominent and influential.
As am sure most of my listeners know, when you take a ride up through Fairfield Center, a few mi les beyond the Center itself you come to a fork in the road, the left fork leading to Norridgewock and the right fork taking you over what is cal Jed the Middle Road to Skowhegan. Taking that right fork, you cross Martin Stream, where both a saw mi II and a grist mi II were once operated, but are now gone, ascend a steep hi I I and then ride along a high plateau. Just after you pass a crossroad which goes west to Larone, you come to a rather extensive area which for a century and a half has been known as the Covel I District.
Sti I I standing on the left of the highway, near where the district begins, is the house bui It by Allen Covell in 1828. His great-grandson, Arthur Cove I I, now lives in \1atervi lie and is the ch i ef source of my i nformati on about the Cove I I Di stri ct.
The first Cove II to come to Arne ri ca was eight gene rat ions back of the present Arthur Covell. He was Nathaniel Covell, who arrived in Boston from Chelmsford, England in 1653. He had made his way to the new country across the seas the hard way, that many an emigrant had to take, namely by selling himself for a term of years as an indentured servant. The master to whom Nathani e I was indentured was a membe r of the famous VJ ins’ ow fam i I Y wh i ch gave the Plymouth Colony its governor and many years later gave our Central Maine town of Winslow its name. Nathaniel Covel I was bound to serve Edward Winslow of Marshfield for seven years after his arrival in the colony. On his part Winslow paid his servant’s passage, and agreed to provide him with food, clothing and lodging for the seven years, and at the end of the indenture term, to pay Covell ten pounds in lawful money of England in such goods as the colony affords and also 13 bushels of Indian corn.
At the time of Nathaniel’s arrival Edward Winslow was in England. So by a letter dated May 2, 1653, he assigned the services of Covel I to his son-inlaw, Peregri ne Wh i te, who had been the ch i I d born on the Mayf lower duri ng its passage of the Atlantic in 1620.
Nathaniel Covel I served his seven years, then,a free man, he moved to Yarmouth where he married and settled permanently in a community once cal led Monomoy, but now a part of the Cape Cod town of Chatham. His son Nathaniel, Jr. lived a II his life on the Cape, as di d a Iso his grandson John and his great-grandson Nathaniel 3rd. Thus four generations of the American Covel Is spent their whole adult lives not far from where the Pi Igrims had landed in 1620.
In the fifth generation, however, was Samuel Covell, who was born in the Cape Cod town of Yarmouth in 1763. It was he who was the first Covell to settle in what became known as the Covel I District in North Fairfield. Sti I I preserved is the Quaker marri age certi fi cate of Samue I Cove II and Mary Ho 110- way who, after the manner of the ceremony of the Society of Friends, accepted each other in matrimony in Yarmouth, Massachusetts on May 1, 1791. Some of the names affixed among the 35 witnesses to that marriage became wei I known surnames in the North Fairfield community, names such as f-bxie, Wing and Allen.
Short I y after the i r weddi ng, Samue I and Mary Cove II took the long journey to Maine and settled in North Fairfield near their oLd Cape Cod neighbor, Elihu Bowerman, who had come to North Fairfield nine years earlier in 1782. Just where they I ived is not certain, but thei r son Allen bui It the house that sti J I stands on the west side of the Middle Road near the fork that turns off to Larone.
An interesting old diary which recently came to my attention was written by a Universalist minister in Norway, Maine more than a hundred years ago. He was Rev. Ti mothy J. Tenney, who presi ded over the Norway Un i versa list Ch urch from 1840 to 1846.
InTerest in theological controversy at the time is revealed in his entry for January 9, 1840. HDiscussion alTOng several clergymen at the \Alesleyan chape I. Lasted from 10 A.M. unti I 1 :00 P.M., then resumed at 1: 30 and conti nued tl I I 4:30. This is the first public controversy I have engaged in, and it may be the last. Yet I never felt more at ease and do not regret anything said. never had better command of myself than in the heat of the discussi on. do not know what others may th ink of it, but I am fu Ily persuaded that the doctrine of eternal punishment must have abler defenders than those who supported it at this meeting, or it wi II fall forever.”
Aga in on February 16 he wrote: “I n the even I ng I rode to Bri dgton” where heard Mr. Hotchkiss preach on conditional salvation. Salvation is not conditiona I, but is the eventual destiny of all souls. Of that I am convinced, and J sha I I rep I y to r”lr. Hotchk iss next Sabbath. iT
On November 20, 1840 Tenney wrote that he had voted for Squi re LittJe- field of BridgTon as a member of Congress, and he added, “The elections this year have gone against us. Hard cider, log cabins, and Tippecanoe songs have done for t he ~Jh i gs what good sound judgment cou I d neve r have accomp I i shed. The ignorance of the rabble has spelled the defeat of republicanism.~·
On June 11, 1841 he noted his criticism of the schools: nVisited the vi Ilage schools today. Their standing is quite good and yet not so good as might be expected considering so much money was expended on them. In them singing is a regular exercise, and perhaps is too much indulged in for the success of other and more important studi es. N
I n October he comp I a i ned about a congregati on: t!Preached on Bethe I Hi I I. The congregat i on was sma I I and i nattenti ve. But in the even i ng lectured to a more appreci ati ve audi ence in the Wa I ker schoo I house. n
On August 24 he found a funera I worth recordi ng in detai I : “Attended the funeral of Mathis Thompson. She was 91 years old. Her life encompassed the French and Indian War, the Revolution, and the last war (1812). Her father was ki I led by Indians a few months after her birth. She married Mr. Thompson in 1769 and had three chi Idren, none of whom survive her. She has been a widow for more than 20 years.”
In August, 1842 Rev. Tenney had his first ride on a train. The railroad had just reached Portland. There he boarded the train for Boston. We wish he had set down in the diary the details of that trip, but all he recorded was, ‘~he steam power moved us on rapidly, and we soon found ourselves in the midst of the cabs and omn i buses of Boston. f’ He returned to Port land by stearrer, not by tra in. He wrote, “Our journey has been a grand one. I have been we II, exlioo cept a little seasick.n
Rev. Tenney’s many diary references to my native town of Bridgtonnaturally attracted my interest. Squire Littlefield, whom Tenney helped elect to Congress, was the town’s leading citizen when my grandfather came there from Cape Elizabeth in 1845. Half a century afterward the old timers were sti II referring to the renown brought to the town by the old Squire, and at the head of the street where my father’s store long stood was the big white mansion which Squire Littlefield had bui It in 1835. The diary tel Is us that Tenney frequently preached in Bridgton, and unlike his reference to Bethel Hi I I, he never described a Bridgton congregation as inattentive.
Year: 1956