Historic Portsmouth Harbor

This weekend we took a one and half hour tour of the historic harbor in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.  I've taken cruises to the Isles of Shoals, and up the Piscataqua River from Portsmouth, but I'd never seen the sights of Portsmouth from the harbor.  It was a beautiful day, and the views were spectacular.

Our tour boat took off from Ceres Street, behind the businesses along Market Street.  This is the view of the restaurants along Bow Street, just around the corner.  The back decks were packed with happy people lunching and enjoying the waterfront. 

The new Sarah Long drawbridge was finished last year.  It looks brand new from downtown Portsmouth, and carries traffic and trains over to Kittery, Maine and the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard. 

The Portsmouth Naval Shipyard is actually located on Seavey Island in Kittery, Maine.  Submarines are repaired here, but are not visible to the public, even from boats in the harbor.  We could see the tail end of one, but it was covered with tarps. 

Many visitors to Portsmouth think this impressive building is an abandoned hotel.  However, it is located on Naval property on Seavey island.  It is the abandoned Naval prison.  There are lots of stories about the prisoners here, and one of the only true stories is that Humphrey Bogart was once an MP who was bringing a prisoner to this facility during WWII.  His prisoner tried to escape whilst changing trains in Boston, and attacked Bogart with his manacles.  This left Bogart with a mangled lip that was repaired by an Naval doctor, who botched the job and left him with a distinctive lisp.  Prisoner have been kept at Seavey Island since the War of 1812, but this prison building dates from 1905 and was known as the "Alcatraz of the East".  You can read the history of this prison at this Wikipedia LINK.  

I've blogged about Fort McClary before at this LINK.  It is an impressive spot to visit, with great views of the harbor and the Isles of Shoals.  Seeing it from the middle of the harbor was a treat. 

Fort Constitution is a New Hampshire State Park located at the tip of New Castle Island.  You can visit the fort and climb the lighthouse.  This was once known as Fort William and Mary before the American Revolution.  The British used to keep a large supply of gunpowder stored here.  One of the first acts of rebellion during the war was 14 December 1774 when the local people of Portsmouth stormed the fortress and confiscated the gunpowder.  The powder was distributed throughout the colony and used during the Revolutionary War. You can read more about the history of this historic site at Wikipedia at this LINK. 

This Life Saving Station on Wood Island dates from before the establishment of the US Coast Guard.  Men in wooden boats would row out and rescue crew and passengers from floundering ships.  It is being renovated into a museum that will only be accessible by boat.  Plans are to open it to the public in 2019.   You can read some of the history HERE. 

Whaleback Lighthouse is located at the mouth of the Piscataqua River in Portsmouth Harbor.  It is actually in the town of Kittery in the state of Maine.  During the "Perfect Storm" of 1991 the waves from the Atlantic were higher than this 70 foot lighthouse.  Lighthouse keepers used to row out here and do two week stints of duty on this rocky little island.   There is a good sketch of the history of this lighthouse at Wikipedia at this LINK. 

From the mouth of the harbor we could see the Isles of Shoals six miles out to sea.

Our tour boat went around New Castle into Little Harbor and past the historic Wentworth-by-the-Sea hotel.  This hotel was originally built in 1874, and hosted the 1905 Portsmouth Peace Treaty to end the Russian-Japanese War.  This treaty was hosted by President Theodore Roosevelt, and Japan gifted the American people the cherry trees that now line the Potomac Basin in Washington, D.C.  You can read more about this historic hotel HERE. 

In Little Harbor you can see the historic Wentworth-Coolidge mansion, built by the Royal Wentworth Governors who lived here before the American Revolution.  It is now a museum house open to the public, and there is a lilac festival here every spring.  The Wentworth family brought the first lilac cuttings to New England, and now the purple lilac is the New Hampshire state flower.  Residents of New Hampshire treasure cuttings from the lilacs here on the Wentworth mansion property, and re-grow lilac trees at homes and parks all over the Granite State.  You can read more about this historic mansion at this LINK. 

A large cache of lobster pots seen along the working waterfront of Portsmouth Harbor

Our tour boat moored right in front of the Moffatt-Ladd historic house museum.  This 1763 house was a wedding gift for Samuel and Sarah Catherine Moffatt, and remained in their family for 150 years. It was also the home of William Whipple, who signed the Declaration of Independence. It is owned by the National Society of Colonial Dames, and is open for tours and for rental for weddings and functions.  You can read more about the Moffatt-Ladd House HERE. 

We took our tour with Portsmouth Harbor Cruises, at 64 Ceres Street:

http://www.portsmouthharbor.com/    

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Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Historic Portsmouth Harbor", Nutfield Genealogy, posted July 16, 2018, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2018/07/historic-portsmouth-harbor.html: accessed [access date]).

Cochecho Massacre, 27 June 1689, Dover, New Hampshire

The Damm Garrison House in Dover, New Hampshire

is located inside this pavilion at the Woodman Institute

This map is located inside the Damm Garrison at the Woodman Institute in Dover, New Hampshire
It explains the events of Cochecho Massacre, and maps out the locations of the garrisons

The first recorded captives carried to Quebec, Canada to be sold to settlers and native Indians occurred at the Raid on Dover, also known as the Cochecho Massacre, in Dover, New Hampshire on 27 June 1689.  This makes this raid very interesting to genealogists, since some of the women and children who were taken north converted to the Catholic religion.  These same English people later married French spouses and left descendants in Canada.  Some of the captives were redeemed and came home, and some of the redeemed refused to return because they preferred life in Canada!

At the beginning of King William’s War (1688- 1697) there were many raids on New England settlements by the French, and the English raided French villages in Penobscot Bay and Chedabouctou (Guysborough, Nova Scotia).   In June 1689 several hundred Abenaki and Pennacook Indians raided Dover and killed more than 20 and took 29 captives.  This was one quarter of the Dover population. The raid was quite a blow to the English settlements in New Hampshire.

The Dover Raid was revenge on Major Richard Waldron who had  tricked and captured many Abenaki and Wampanoag in 1676 during King Phillip’s War.  These Indians he captured were taken to Boston where some were executed and some were sold into slavery in the Caribbean.  Twelve years later the Abenaki retaliated with the help of the French in Canada.

Waldron's garrison was attacked with a vengeance.  The Major was singled out for a particularly horrendous torture and execution.  His nose and ears were removed and stuffed in his throat.  Each Indian slashed his chest, and he was forced to fall on his own sword.  Waldron had been well known as a cheat at trade with the Indians and he had been a particularly cruel leader to the English settlers (especially to Quakers).  You can read more about Waldron at this blog post:

  http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2012/02/how-women-went-from-dover.html 

There were five garrison houses in town at Dover, and others in outlying areas.  Five Indian women came into town and asked to shelter at the garrisons, one at each.  In the middle of the night, each woman opened the gates of the garrison to the attackers.  The rest was history…

According to the book New England Captives Carried to Canada, pages 142 -  these are some of  the identified captives, all traced to French records in Quebec:

John Church (sometimes misspelled Chase)

John Evans

Sarah Gerrish,  7 year old granddaughter of Major Waldron,

Mrs. Elizabeth Hanson, wife of Tobias

----- Heard “a young woman of Cochecho”

Esther Lee, daughter of Richard Waldron, along with her child

Grizel Otis, wife of Richard, daughter of James Warren

Margaret Otis, rebaptized Christine in Quebec

Rose Otis

John Otis

Stephen (rebaptized Joseph Marie)

Nathaniel (rebaptized Paul), son of Stephen Otis and Mary Pitman

Joseph Buss

William Buss

Here is a list of some members of my family tree who were victims of the Cochecho Massacre:

I'm forced to admit that I'm closely related to Major Richard Waldron (1615 – 1689).  He was married to my 9^th great aunt, Ann Scammon.  I descend from Ann’s sister, Elizabeth (about 1625 – abut 1680) who married Thomas Atkins.   Major Waldron, as I described above, was killed, along with most of his family, and his garrison was burned to the ground, along with his grist mills and trading post.

I'm proud to tell you about Elizabeth Hull Heard (about 1628 – 1706),  my 8^th great grandmother.  According to stories in Cotton Mather’s Magnalia Christi Americana and Belknap’s History of New Hampshire and other books, she was a witness to Waldron’s deceit in 1676, and sheltered a young native Abenaki boy from death.   On the night of the Cochecho Massacre she was hiding In the woods when an Indian pointed his weapon at her, but suddenly spared her life and ran away.  The Heard garrison house was one of the few homes that were successfully defended that night by William Wentworth because Elizabeth's husband had died a few months before the attack.  It is suggested that the Indian who spared her life was the young Abenaki boy in 1675.   Elizabeth's children survived, too, including her daughter Mary (1650 - 1706), my 7th great grandmother, and her husband John Ham and children. 

[You can see that I am related to both the villain and the heroine of this massacre]

For more information:

New England Captives Carried to Canada Between 1677 and 1760 During the French and Indian Wars, by Emma Lewis Coleman, published in 1925, reprinted by the New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2012.

From the Dover, New Hampshire Public Library website

http://www.dover.lib.nh.us/doverhistory/cocheco.htm

An online article from Portsmouth, New Hampshire historian J. Dennis Robinson

http://www.seacoastnh.com/history/colonial/massacre.html

Magnalia Christi Americana, or "The Ecclesiastical History of New-England, from its First Planting in the year 1620 Unto the Year of Our Lord, 1698", Cotton Mather, in seven books (reprint), New Haven, CT,1820

The Hull Family in America, Compiled by Col. Weggant, Hull Family Association 

"A Genealogical Memoir of the Family of Richard Otis" -- 1851 -- by Horatio N. Otis. NEHGR for July 1848 & April 1850 has the Genealogy of the Otis Family Descending from John Otis, who immigrated to New England & settled in Hingham, Mass. about 1635.

Click here for blog post about the DAMM family garrison, which survived the Cochecho massacre in 1689.  The DAMM garrison was built in 1675, and is the oldest surviving garrison house still standing in New Hampshire. 

http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2015/05/the-damm-garrison-house-dover-new.html 

UPDATE -  3 June 2015
Roger W. Lawrence has written a new book "English Captives and Prisoners Remaining in New France" (for those with ancestors who were carried to Canada from New England in the colonial period). You can pre-order this book from the American Canadian Genealogical Society at this link www.acgs.org 

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To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Cochecho Massacre, 27 June 1689, Dover, New Hampshire", Nutfield Genealogy, posted May 18, 2015, (http://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2015/05/cochecho-massacre-27-june-1689-dover.html: accessed [access date]).