The Towne Family in Piscataquis County and the Salem Witchcraft Vol 3 page 176 176 SPRAGUE'S JOURNAL OF MAINE HISTORY The Towne Family in Piscataquis County and the Salem Witchcraft Read before the Piscataquis Historical Society October 2, I9I3, By JOHN FRANCIS SPRAGUE The name of Towne, or Town and Towns, as it is sometimes spelled, may be found occasionally in nearly all communities of Anglo-Saxon derivation. The earliest record of this family sur- name that has been found is A. D. 1274, when William de la Towne, of Avely, a village in Shropshire, England, about twenty miles southeast of Shrewsbury, was, at that time, engaged in the prose- cution of an action at law against one of the officers of the parish, and the year following was on a jury at Astley.(1) Nothing else appears relative to this name until about one hundred and thirty or forty years later, in the reign of Henry IV, when the arms of a family of this name were impaled upon the windows of the church in Kennington, Kent County. Thomas Towne was an important personage at about that time and possessed much land about Charing. The first known of the name in America is 1635, when William Towne settled in Cambridge. The ancestry of the Piscataquis Townes begins with: William Towne, b. in England in 1600, and who emgrated to America with his wife Joanna (Blessing) Towne and five or six children and finally took up their residence in Salem. The exact date of their arrival in America is not known, except that it was as early as 1635. Their children were: i. Rebecca. bapt. February 21, 1621. m. Francis Nourse, of Salem, who d. November 22, 1695. ii. John. bapt. February 16, 1624. Never m. iii. Susannah. bapt. October 2o, 1625. Never m. iv. Edmund. bapt. June 28, 1628, V. Jacob. bapt. March 11, 1632. vi. Mary. bapt. August 24, 1634. m. Isaac Estey. vii. Sarah. bapt. September 3, 1648, m., first, Edmund Bridges, January ii, 166o; second, Peter Cloyes. viii. Joseph. b. 1639. bapt. September 3, 1648. (1) The descendants of William Towne by Edwin Eugene Towne (1901) P. 5. THE TOWNE FAMILY 177 Edmund, son of William, was one of a committee from the town of Topsfield. who in 1675 (during King Philip's war) presented a petition to the General Court for leave to form military companies to protect the people from the Indians while at their work. Thomas Towne who was the ancestor of the Piscataquis Townes was the fifth generation from William Towne and was born at Topsfield, Mass., February 8, 1743. He first married Elizabeth Towne of Thompson, Conn. She lived but a short time after her marriage, and for a second wife he married Sarah Burton of Wilton, N. H. He was the father of a family of thirteen children; the first, Sarah, born in 1775, and the last, Mary, born March 4, 1790. He was one of the early settlers of Wilton, N. H., which was incorporated in 1762, but in the year 1778 Or I779 he changed his residence to Temple in the same state, where he resided until he came to Maine in I802; except he possibly may have lived for a short time in Lyndeborough. He served in the Continental Army in Capt. Benjamin Taylors' Company of Militia, which marched from Amherst, N. H., Decem- ber 8, I775, to join the army at Winter Hill, and served until after the evacuation of Boston. His next enlistment was in Capt. John Goss' company, Nichols' regiment and Gen. Stark's brigade with the Northern Department. He enlisted July 2o, I777, and was in the service at this time two months and eight days, receiving his discharge September 27, 1777. He was one of those patriots who won enduring fame and glory at the battle of Bennington, on August 16, I777, and who assisted Gen. Stark in winning for his services the just recognition of merit so long deferred! Loring states that "to Eli Towne belongs the honor of being the first permanent settler of Dover, Maine, but his father and brother Moses preceded him in the first steps toward it."' There may, how- ever, be some question as to whether he was really the first settler. Abel Blood felled the first trees and made the first opening as early as I799, and possibly in the year 1798, on the present site of East Dover Village. He received a deed of 6oo acres of land from Robert Hollowell and John Lowell. Sketches of Revolutionary Soldiers by Edgar Crosby Smith in Pis- cataquis Historical Society Collegtions, Vol. I, P. 20I. (3) Lorings' History of Piscataquis County, P. 39. 178 SPRAGUE'S JOURNAL OF MAINE HISTORY Loring also says that Eli Towne felled an opening on this lot in 18o1 and "spent the summer of 18o2 raising a crop on it and enlarging the opening." There is no evidence that Abel Blood aban- doned this place between 1799 and 18oo, hence there is quite a rea- sonable presumption that he lived and had a home there until Eli Towne came in i8o1. When that strange and awful delusion led by Cotton Mather and his cruel and blood thristy associates swept over Puritan New England, in the last days of the Seventeenth Century, known in history as the "Salem Witchcraft," two of the unfortunate victims were daughters of William and Joanna Blessing Towne. They were Rebecca, the wife of Francis Nourse, and Mary, the wife of Isaac Estey. The first of these sufferers to be brought before the magistrates in the meeting house, on the twenty-fourth of March, 1692, was Rebecca, the wife of Francis Nourse. Rev. Mr. Hale, the minister of Beverly, opened the court with prayer, after which the accusations were read, all of which she denied, earnestly asserting her innocence of anything wrong; but, notwithstanding, she was committed to prison, where she remained till June 30, when she was tried, con- victed, and executed July 19. At this execution the Rev. Mr. Noyes tried to persuade a Mrs. Good to confess, by telling her she was a witch and that she knew it, to which she replied, "You are a liar. I am no more a witch than you are, and if you take my life God will give you blood to drink." Tradition says the curse of this poor woman was verified, and that Mr. Noyes was actually choked to death with his own blood. After the condemnation of Rebecca, the governor saw cause to grant a reprieve, which, when known to her accusers, they renewed their outcries against her inasmuch that the governor was prevailed upon by Salem gentlemen (said to be a committee whose business it was to carry on prosecutions) to recall the reprieve, and she was executed with the rest. The communion day previous to her execution, she was taken in chains to the meeting house and there formally excommunicated by her minister, Mr. Noyes. But it is recorded that "her life and conversation had been such that the remembrance thereof in a short time after wiped off all the reproach by the civil and ecclesiastical sentence against her," and in 1712 the church to which she belonged reversed its censure by blotting out this record. The other daughter of William Towne who suffered on the scaffold in this perilous time was Mary, the wife of Isaac Estey. THE TOWNE FAMILY 179 She was arrested April 22, tried September 9, and executed Septem- ber 22, and during the five months that she was in prison her husband came from Topsfield twice every week to render his injured but deserving companion the trifling comfort his means would allow. Before their execution both sisters sent a petition to the court. The one sent by Mary follows, which will be read with unqualified admiration by every one who has sympathy for those in trouble. A recent writer says: Mary Estey was a woman of great strength of mind and sweetness of disposition. After her condemnation she sent a petition to the court, which, as an exhibition of the noblest fortitude, united with sweetness of temper, dignity, and resignation, as well as of calmness toward those who had selected so many from her family is rarely, if ever equaled. When it is remembered that confession of sin or crime (or whatever it may be called) was the sure and only means of obtaining favor of the court, this petition must be regarded as a most affecting appeal by an humble and feeble woman, about to lay down her life in the. cause of truth and who, as a wife and mother in circumstances of terrible trial, uttered no word of complaint, but met her fate with a calmness and resignation which excites the wonder of all who read her story. THE PETITION. To the honorable judge and bench now sitting in Salem, and the Rev. Ministers, this petition showeth that your humble, poor petitioner, being condemned to die, doth humbly beg of you to take into your judicious and pious consideration that your petitioner knowing my innocence, and blessed be the Lord for it, and seeing the wiles and subtlety of my accusers, by myself cannot but judge charitably of others who are going the same way as myself, if the Lord step not mightily in. I was confined a whole month on the same account that I am now condemned, and then cleared, as your honors know, and in two days' time I was cried out upon again and have been confined, and am now condemned to die. The Lord above knows my innocence then, and likewise does now, as at the great day will be known by men and angels. I petition to your honors not for my own life, for I know I must die, and the appointed time is set, but if it be possible, that no more innocent blood be shed, which undoubtedly cannot be avoided in the way and course you go in. I question not but your honors do to the utmost of your powers in the discovery and detection of witchcraft and witches and would not be guilty of innocent blood for the world, but by my own innocence, I know you are in the wrong way. The Lord in his infinite mercy direct you in this great work, that innocent blood be not shed. I humbly beg of your honors that you would be pleased to examine some of those afflicted persons and keep them a part sometime, and likewise try some of those confessing witches, I being confident several of them have belied themselves and others, as will appear, if not in this world, in the world to come, whither I am going, 18o SPRAGUE'S JOURNAL OF MAINE HISTORY and I question not but your honors will see an alteration in these things. They say myself and others have made a league with the devil. We cannot confess. I know and the Lord knows, as will shortly appear, that they belie me, and I question not but they do others. The Lord above knows, who is the searcher of all hearts, as I shall answer at the tribunal seat, that I know not the least thing of witchcraft, therefore I cannot, I dare not belie my own soul. I beg your honors not to deny this my humble petition from a poor, dying, and innocent person, and I question not but the Lord will give it blessing on your endeavors. MARY ESTEY. The parting scene between this excellent woman and her husband, children, and friends was, as is reported by those present, as serious, religious, and affectionate as could well be witnessed, drawing tears from the eyes of all present. To complete this awful tragedy, Rev. Mr. Noyes alluded to her body in connection with others as they hung upon the gallows as "fire brands of hell."' (4) The desecendants of William Towne by Edwin Eugene Towne (1901) P. 19. (1) Vol. 2, P. 108 of the journal. (2) Ib. p. I53. (c) 1998 Courtesy of the Androscoggin Historical Society ************************************************* * * * * NOTICE: Printing the files within by non-commercial individuals and libraries is encouraged, as long as all notices and submitter information is included. Any other use, including copying files to other sites requires permission from the submitters PRIOR to uploading to any other sites. 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