John Cragin, Scots Prisoner of War 1651 in Woburn, Massachusetts

After the heavy snows of the previous week, this weekend perfect for a drive in the countryside. One of our favorite rides is to the Frye Measure Mill in Wilton, New Hampshire. Since the weather had been bad, I Googled the website for the Frye Measure Mill, and found the schedule and directions, but then (of course!) I was sidetracked by the link labeled “history”. After clicking there, I became enthralled with the story of Daniel Cragin, the founder of the Mill. I was even more surprised to find his ancestor had been a 1651 passenger on board the “John and Sara”.

The Frye Measure Mill
in winter is absolutely beautiful!

I knew the sad story of the “John and Sara” because my own ancestor, William Munroe (1625 - 1718), was on board the same ship. It was full of prisoners of war, Scotsmen captured during the English Civil War, bound for Boston to be sold into servitude. It is one of the few ships of this era to have a fairly complete passenger list, because the human cargo was actually valuable merchandise. For this reason only, the proprietors made a list. Other ships of the era did not keep passenger lists.

wooden measures

According to the Frye Measure Mill website, and the Wilton, NH town history, John Cragin had small pox during the voyage, and was going to thrown overboard. A young English woman, Sarah Dawes, asked for his life to be spared. However, this is easily disproven by one look at the passenger list. There are no women on the list, and no English passengers. The truth is more interesting. Sarah Dawes was a servant to John Wyman in Woburn, and was with child with her second bastard child by another servant in the Wyman household, Daniel Mecrist. She was sentenced to twelve stripes in 1657. He could not marry her because he was already married to a woman he left behind in England. John Craggin married her in 1661, and took in her two illegitimate children, Mary and Benoni Mecrist.

In looking at my own family tree, I saw that John Cragin and Sarah Dawes had eight children, and two of the Cragin siblings married two Skelton siblings, grand children of my own ancestor Reverend Samuel Skelton (1593 – 1634) of Salem, Massachusetts. John Wyman (1621 – 1684), Sarah’s master in Woburn, Massachusetts, was the brother to my own ancestor, Francis Wyman (1617 – 1699). Another one of John Cragin’s daughters, Sarah, married Francis Nurse, Jr. (the son of Rebecca Towne Nurse, hung as a witch in 1692 Salem, her brother Edmund is my 10x great grandfather), my first cousin ten generations removed. There are many, many connections between my own family tree and John Cragin’s descendants.

The Cragin/Craggen/Craggin Family

Gen. 1. John Cragin, b. Scotland, died 27 October 1708 in Woburn, Massachusetts. He was captured at the Battle of Dunbar in 1652 and sent to America as a prisoner of war on board the “John and Sarah” to be sold into servitude; married on 4 November 1661 to Sarah Dawes, at Woburn, Massachusetts. Eight Children.

Gen. 2. John Cragin, born 29 September 1677 at Woburn, Massachusetts; died 26 January 1703; filed an intention to marry Deborah Skelton on 13 April 1700. Three children.

Gen. 3. John Cragin, born 25 Mar 1701; married Judith Barker of Concord, Massachusetts settled in the part of Concord which is now Acton, Massachusetts, and then removed to Temple, New Hampshire. Nine children.

Gen. 4. Francis Cragin, born in Acton; married Sibyl Piper. Ten children.

Gen. 5. Captain Francis Cragin, born 24 October 1773; married Sarah Cummings,

Gen. 6. Augustus Cragin born 19 July 1802; died 21 June 1886; married on 14 December 1830 to Almira Boynton, born 5 December 1807, and died 30 October 1883. . Removed to Temple, New Hampshire from Merrimac, about 1837. Ten children.

Gen. 7. Daniel Cragin, born 31 December 1836 in Merrimac; married 20 March 1859 to Jane L. Dolliver, daughter of John Dolliver and Lucetta Draper of Lyndeborough. Was apprenticed at age 17 to John Newell, cabinet maker, of Lyndeborough, New Hampshire. He was engaged in a furniture shop in Wilton three years later. Then he returned to Lyndeborough, with a partner, and purchased John Newell’s business in 1858. In 1876 he began the manufacture of dry measures at his own mill.


Frye's Measure Mill
Wilton, New Hampshire

Frye’s Measure Mill, in Wilton, is on the New Hampshire Preservation Alliance’s 2008 list of “Seven to Save”, among the most endangered Granite State properties. It dates back to a time when mills were made of wood, not brick like those in Manchester, and located along the streams and small rivers of backwoods New Hampshire, not just along the mighty Merrimack. Local manufacturing and locally made products were the backbone of the American economy in the 1800’s. Frye’s Measure Mill has been run by only three families over the years, Cragin, Frye and Savage. There is still a continuing battle to maintain the mill, dam, ponds and outbuildings. In 1982 the Measure Mill was accepted to the National Register of Historic Places.

Built in 1878 by Daniel Cragin, the Frye Mill still produces wooden ware measures, similar to Shaker style boxes also produced there. Using an elaborate system of wooden cogs and leather belts, the energy produced from a small waterfall turns the lathes and machinery that cuts, shapes and shaves the wooden containers that become “measures.” Measures were made in sizes from a dry cup to a quart, and each can be considered a small work of art. The shaker boxes and measures are still made of native maple, hand bent around wooden molds and fastened with copper tacks.

Frye’s Measure mill is one of the few waterpowered mills still operational, and the only measure mill still operating in the United States. Woodenware produced at Frye’s is still made by the mostly water powered equipment. It is located on 12 Frye Mill Road in Wilton, New Hampshire


There is a small display of historical information
about the Mill inside the gift shop, including
information on the Cragin, Frye and Savage families

For more information on the Cragin family or Frye’s Measure Mill:

History of the town of Wilton, Hillsborough County, New Hampshire, by Abiel Abbot Livermore and Sewall Putnam, Lowell, Massachusetts: Marden & Rowell, Printers, 1888 (the Cragin Genealogy is on page 353)

The American Genealogist, Volume 15 (1838-9), page 218- 220

Woburn Massachusetts Vital Records

History of Woburn, Massachusetts, by Samuel Sewall, Boston: Wiggin & Lunt, 1868

"Francis and Sarah Graggen Nurse of Reading Massachusetts; with notes on John and Sarah Dawes Craggen of Woburn, Massachusetts and Benoni MacKrest of Salisbury, Massachusetts", by Barbara J. Matthews, The American Genealogist, 1994, Volume 69, pages 81 - 85.


websites:

http://www.usgennet.org/usa/topic/colonial/main/john&sara.html  the passenger list for the “John and Sara” which left London 11 November 1651.

http://www.fryesmeasuremill.com/ the website for Frye’s Measure Mill, Wilton, New Hampshire with historical data, how to book tours of the mill, and shop information

Disclosure:  I have not been compensated in any way by the owners and proprietors of Frye's Measure Mill

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Copyright 2011, Heather Wilkinson Rojo