History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts - citizen hylbom blog

130 HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY.
the merchant service before he was twenty years of
age, deserves mention as a successful naval officer.
In the latter part of the year 1776 he was captain
of the private armed brigantine the Hawke, of ten
guns and eighty men. In May of the next year
the Hawke was taken into the service of the state,
and sailed, with other vessels, in company with
Captain Manly, on the disastrous cruise which has
been mentioned. Captain Oakes was more fortu-
nate than his more powerful consorts ; for, being
separated from them, he escaped their fate and
took several valuable prizes. The Hawke's armament
being increased, he continued in her until
1779 (making at least three important captures in
the year 1778), when he purchased an interest in
the armed brigantine Thomas, of which he took
command. Early the next year he made a short
cruise in the ship Favorite, of ten guns ;
and on his
return he took command of the letter-of-marque
Patty, of which he was an owner. In the latter
vessel, in April, 1781, he took the British brig
Betsey, bound from New York to Lisbon. After
the war he made several mercantile voyages, and
in 1796 was in Paris as agent for the influential
house of John and Eichard Codman of Boston.
He retired from the seafaring life soon after this,
and became prominent in town aff'airs. He was
chosen representative to the General Court twelve
times. This service, though not unbroken, is un-
paralleled in the history of the tnwii by any other,
except that of Captain John AVaylr, who represented
the town during an uninterrupted term of eighteen
years, crowned at its close by the office of Speaker
of the House. Captain Oakes died August 16,
1818, at the age of sixty-seven years.
Dr. John Sprague, who acted as surgeon's mate
in Bridge's regiment in the early part of the war,
entered tlie naval service as a surgeon, in which
capacity he was taken prisoner in 1777, in the
schooner Active, Captain Andrews Gardner, one
of the ill-fated fleet of Captain Manly. He was
exchanged about the same time as Captain Waters,
and became surgeon on board the state sloop Win-
throp, where he remained until the close of tlie
war. He practised medicine in Maiden until liis
death in 1803, and is remembered as a man of
ready, but rough wit, of whom many stories are yet
told by the old inhabitants.
Dr. Ezra Green, wiio was graduated at Harvard
College in the class of 1765, was a son of Ezra
Green, and was, at the opening of the war, settled
at Dover, \(\v TIaui])sliirc, in (he ijractiec of his
profession. During the siege of Boston he was
attached to Eeed's New Hampshire regiment as sur-
geon ; and, after the evacuation, he went with the
army to New York, and thence to Ticonderoga and
Canada. After the retreat of the northern army
he returned to Dover, and in October, 1777, was
appointed surgeon of the ship Ranger, which was
commanded by the afterwards celebrated Paul
Jones. It was during the cruise which followed
that Jones carried terror and alarm along the
British coasts, and made his famous descent upon
Whitehaven and his more famous call upon the
Countess of Selkirk. Dr. Green -nas attached to
the Eanger until the close of the summer of 1779.
He afterwards made two cruises in the Alexander,
and returned to Dover in 1781. In the practice
of his profession and in the exercise of the kindly
ministrations of life he passed far beyond the usual
bounds of man's life, and died at Dover, July 25,
181^7, "at the very advanced age of 101 years
and 28 days ; retaining, to his last hour, a clear,
unclouded mind."
Besides the persons whom I have mentioned
other inhabitants were engaged upon tlie sea dur-
ing the war ; and the names of Isaac Smith, Naler
Hatch, and Nathan Nichols appear as commanders
of armed vessels.
The population of Maiden at the close of the
war was about the same as at its commencement.
In a valuation, taken in 1784, one hundred and
two dwelling-houses are mentioned. Three hun-
dred acres of tillage-land sujjplied the crops of the
scanty population ; and about the same number of
acres of "English and Upland Mowing," with a
thousand acres of fresh meadow and salt marsh
land, furnished the winter sustenance of their mea-
gre herds. The residue of the improved land con-
sisted of twenty-five hundred acres of pasturage
wiiile about tlie same number were in wooded and
wild land. " An Acco' of Every persons Stock in
Trade " amounted to the not princely sum of £210.
Ninety-tliree horses and eight hundred and thirteen
oxen and cows constituted tlie herds of the ^laldeii
yeomanry ; and their flock of one hundred and
fifty-tiiree sheep aiul goats furnished wool for win-
ter weaving and cloth for their wear.
Tlie bridge over the Mystic River was formally
opened to the public " by firing of a cannon and
the regailing of the workmen at the expense of the
proprietors," September 20, 1787. Tliis bridge,
alTording a direct way to Charlestown and Boston,
was of inimedinle benrlit to "Maiden and tlie towns
;