Person:Joseph Weston (21)

Pioneering on the Kennebec River

Quoted from an article entitled The Early Settlers of Canaan written for the Somerset Reporter in 1890-93 by Ebenezer Weston^[2]

It was in the spring or early summer of 1771 that they (Peter Heywood and Joseph Weston) came to commence the work of making homes for themselves. Heywood took with him his son John, twelve years old, and Isaac Smith, age sixteen (?), a boy that he had taken to live with him. He had a son Peter, aged twenty, but perhaps he was wanted at home. Weston had his son Eli only eleven years old. It was queried why he took this boy when he had three sons older. He was a tailor in Concord, Mass., but a year or two before had removed to Lancaster, leaving his oldest boy, Joe, with his successor in the shop to finish his apprenticeship. The twin brother, Sam, was not a strong healthy boy and he was left at Concord Academy that he might be able to live without hard work. The next boy, John, was of rather small stature when grown to manhood, and was probably small of his age, while Eli was a large man and may have been as a boy larger and stronger than his brother. Or John may have been the most useful at home.

They took from Massachusetts a herd of twenty cattle and in Vassalborough bought corn and potatoes for seed making pack animals of their cattle I presume to carry their supplies and camp equipage, for there were no roads for wheels. Note Vassalborough included Sidney so they were not obliged to cross the river for their supplies. Hanson^[5] and others speak of this as though it was their first visit to the country but it is not rational to believe that they, went out with all this train like Abraham, not knowing where they were going. They must have been there previously, selected their lands and obtained their titles. I have a confirmation of this. Eli lived till 1846. A year or two before his death, he related to me some of the incidents of the journey. When they came near the end of the journey they found that there had been a hurricane, which completely prostrated a belt of timber across what is now the McDermid farm and Henry White's striking the river on the lot below. Arriving there near sunset they saw they could not get their stock through without cutting a path; they therefore cut away some of the limbs and partially cleared a space sufficient to yard the cattle threw a few poles across the entrance and left them for the night, themselves going on to their stopping place about a mile. They knew just where It was.

It is supposed that their first pitch was on the Major Abraham Wyman farm as the Great Island was most accessible from there. This Island was almost destitute of timber, having been cleared by the Indians, Hanson says. I remember that about one quarter of the ten acre Island which had never been cultivated, had no tree on it except the big deat pine. There was here and there a bunch of course grass, a few stunted raspberry bushes, and a few scattering small weeds. If the Great Island was similar, the land was easily cleared for planting their corn and potatoes, said to have been fifteen acres. It was also secure from their cattle. They probably constructed a raft on which they crossed to their island., but no one who is acquainted with the current there will believe that a raft large enough to be of any use could be managed by the boys. For food wild meat and fish were easily attainable but it is not to be supposed that they lived without bread. For meal they must go to Fort Halifax or further, and it is conjectured that they obtained a boat to transport their supplies. After planting,the next work was to build a cabin twenty feet square, it was said the roof probably covered with bark. It was on Weston's Island as he was first to bring his family. The spot has been pointed out to me many times near the river bank on what is now Orrin Reed's farm.

I. M. Weston in his address at the family reunion in Madison (1886) says, "In looking about the site of the old house a year ago, I found the remains of a pit where Joseph Weston tanned the hides of his cattle, and made shoes and even the leather breeches for himself and sons." This is a mistake. The tan pits were made by Joseph Jr., many years later, on his lot where his granddaughter Mrs. E. L. K. Adams now lives, nearly half a mile from the first cabin. There were natural meadows where they cut and stacked hay sufficient for their stock. In September Weston returned to Massachusetts for his family taking the boy John Heywood with him, leaving the others to secure the crop and care for the cattle. Before the harvesting was finished Heywood left the boys and returned to Concord. This is spoken of as a desertion and anything but credible to him, but he may have had good reasons. Anyway, he expected Weston would soon be there with his family. The boy's worked away on the crop, but fearing they could not secure it in season, they found a man to help them, giving four days of their work for one of his. He was a man by the name of Paine (?) who commenced work on the lot next north of the uncle Seth Wyman or Deacon Cleveland place; he went away before winter and never returned. Much sympathy has been expressed for these boys on the supposition that they spent the long winter alone in the solitude of the forest primeval, but this is far from the fact.

Weston was so late in starting with his family that when the vessel they came in reached the Kennebec, so much ice had formed they could get no further than Pownalborough, now Dresden. As soon as he had placed his family in comfortable quarters he started to visit the boys and remained with them two or three weeks. And there were many hunters and trappers around, some of whom made their home with the boys as there was room enough in the cabin. I have this again from uncle Eli. As there was not much work to do and Isaac could spare him, Eli went to the Sandy River with a trapper who wanted company and stayed some weeks. The game he was after was sable. One occasion the man went away for some purpose and Eli was left alone for one night. He made the round of the traps in the morning collecting the game and resetting the traps. He did not speak of it as a hardship, but it looks like rather rough usage on a boy in his twelfth year.

Joseph Weston kept a diary of his journey to Canaan with his family of which is more hereafter. The last entry was dated April 30, 1772. "We arrived at our own house." Proof that the cabin was on his premises.

Assisting Arnold's Quebec Expedition

In 1775 during the Revolutionary War, an American army led by Benedict Arnold journeyed up the Kennebec River on its way to try to conquer Quebec.[1]. Joseph, along with two of his sons, Eli and William, assisted the army in getting the boats up the river and over Skowhegan and Norridgewock Falls. Joseph later died from a severe cold caught while helping the troops.^[4]

1. ↑ Joseph Weston, in Find A Grave
   Find A Grave: Bloomfield Weston Cemetery.
   
   In memory of
   Mr JOSPEH WESTON
   who died
   Oct 16, 1775, aged 43.
   -------------------------------
   Eunice daughter of the above
   died August 12 1779 aged 12 yr
   
2. ↑ ^{2.0 2.1 2.2} Peter Heywood and Joseph Weston, in Charles L Patterson. The Patterson Family.
3. ↑ ^3.0 3.1 WESTON, JOSEPH, in Daughters of the American Revolution. Genealogical Research System.

   "Rank: PATRIOTIC SERVICE ... GUIDE FOR ARNOLD IN EXPEDITION UP KENNEBEC"

4. ↑ Burrage, Henry Sweetser; Albert Roscoe Stubbs; and George Thomas Little. Genealogical and family history of the state of Maine. (New York, New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, c1909)
   3: 1141.
5. ↑ Hanson, J. W. (John Wesley). History of the old towns, Norridgewock and Canaan: comprising Norridgewock, Canaan, Starks, Skowhegan and Bloomfield, from their early settlement to the year 1849 : including a sketch of the Abnakis Indians. (Boston, 1849)
   121-125.
6. ↑ Chapter II. Land Grants, and First Settlements, in The Skowhegan register, 1905. (Brunswick, Me. : H.E. Mitchell Co., 1905)
   pages 17-19.

   "In 1771, under these encouragements, Joseph Weston, of Littletown, Mass., a man advanced in life, who had seven sons, the ancestors of all of the Westons in Somerset County;...came to Ticonic in the summer season."
   
   "Mr. Weston, who is regarded as the first settler of Canaan, (now Skowhegan), built his log house near the bank of the river on the south side about three miles below Skowhegan Falls and made preparations to remove his family thither in the fall."
   
   "With the help of his son and Isaac Smith, Mr. Weston planted the first crop to be harvested by white men, on the Grand Island it is thought, which had partially or wholly cleared by the Indians."