History of Middlesex County, Massachusetts - citizen hylbom blog

searches, herself an ornament to German culture
and learning, studied successfully the dialect of
the people and prepared a grammar of it.
The first pastor of Newton was John Eliot, Jr.,
the son of the Indian apostle. He graduated at
Harvard University in 1656, and was ordained at
Newton July 20, 1664. So far as can be ascertained
there were at that date only about twenty families
witliin the limits of Newton. Tlie churcli was or-
ganized the same day, and Thomas Wiswall, for-
merly of the church in Dorchester, was ordained
ruling elder. Mr. Eliot was an earnest and faith-
ful minister until his death, which occurred Octo-
ber 11, 1668, after a brief pastorate of a little
more than four years. Besides his proper minis-
terial duties in his own parish, he aided his father
in his missionary work among the Indians, taking
part iu the preaching of the gospel to them iu
Stoughton, Natick, and elsewhere, and thus, like
his father, performing the double duties of pastor
and missionary. His residence was on the west
side of Centre Street, not far from the corner of
Cabot Street, and the well from whicli he drank
still yields refreshing water on the premises lately
owned by Hon. Thomas Edmands.
From the beginning, Newton manifested an
honorable patriotic and military spirit, and some
of the citizens distinguished themselves by acts of
marked bravery. A large number of tlie earlier
inhabitants bore military titles. In a genealogical
register of the town reaching down to the begin-
ning of the present century, — the period of a
meagre population and a very slow growtli, — we
find two generals, nine colonels, three majors,
forty-one captains, twenty-one lieutenants, and
eight ensigns. From 1799 till \vithin a few years,
a powder-house, erected by the town, stood near
the site of one of the ancient " noon-houses," at
the junction of Lyman and Centre streets, Newton
Centre. Newton men showed much bravery in
the early conflicts with the Indians, and some of
them were among the martyrs who fell in those
fearful struggles. John Druce, son of Vincent
Druce, belonged to Captain Prentice's troop of
cavalry, which rendered important service in Philip's
War in 1675. Captain Prentice did much to check
the progress of King Philip's troops, and by his
bold and rapid marclies drove the enemy before
him wherever he went. He was a man of great
courage. His keen eye detected every movement
of the savage foe, and his fearless band of troopers
were ever readv to accompany him into the tliickest
XEWTON. 221
of the fight. He died at the age of eighty-nine
years, and was buried under arms by his old com-
rades. He had been an officer in the company of
troopers about twenty years at the commencement
of King Philip's War, and in 1691 the Indians sent
a petition to the General Court that he might be
appointed their ruler. His house, at the junction
of Waverly Avenue and Ward Street, is said to
have been built by Captain John Clark. Edward
Jackson, son of Deacon John Jackson, was killed
in an attack by Indians on the town of Medfield,
February 21, 1676.
Through the influences of the gospel as preached
by Mr. Eliot, the inhabitants of Newton lived in
peace with the Nonantum Indians and were never
molested by them. But they dreaded the attacks
of other and hostile tribes which roamed around
them. Hence tliey erected two garrison-houses,
which might serve as a place of defence in case of
an attack. In these houses the chamber projected
over the lower room, and was supplied with bullets
and stones in abundance, that with these and with
scalding water, to be poured upon the heads of the
savages, the inmates shut up ui these places of de-
fence might protect themselves against their bar-
barous foes. One of these garrison-houses was on
land of E. C. Converse, Esq., late Israel Lombard's,
opposite the estate long known as Hyde's Nursery
on Centre Street; and another on Ward Street,
near the Newton reservoir, nearly on tlie site of
the residence of heirs of Ephraim Ward.
Newton men aided their brethren, the early set-
tlers of New England, in various quarters against
the Indians, now at Casco (Portland), afterwards
at Bethel, Me., to which some of the people of
Newton had removed; now in New Hampshire,
where the oldest Captain Noah Wiswall was kiUed
in 1690, and now in Massachusetts, where two of
the colonists were massacred at Groton, July 21,
1706, and now in Ehode Island in the woods
around Mount Hope.
In the war with the French and Indians called
the Old French War, some of the citizens of Newton
were engaged, and sacrificed their lives. One
of the most distinguished of these was Samuel
Jenks of West Newton, who served as an officer
in the campaigns of 1758 and 1760, the father of
the late Eev. Dr. William Jenks, who was born
in West Newton. Another of these brave men in
the Indian conflicts was Lieutenant Timothy Jackson,
whose wife carried on the farm and worked
on the land witli her own liands while her husband