On October 29, 1705, the territory of Pamet was allowed by the general court the privilege of choosing its own officers, and was called Dangerfield—a name given by early navigators, but one which was not recognized by the residents in any of the records. On the 16th of July 1709, Pamet, as it had been previously known, was incorporated as Truro, with full powers of a town of the county, but a stringent proviso was added—that they support and maintain suitably a “learned orthodox minister.”
The records of the proprietors, distinctive from the records of Eastham, commenced in 1700, and in the meetings as recorded, and in the admission of freemen from time to time the following named persons were residents when the town was incorporated: Jedediah Lombard, senior and junior, Thomas Lombard, Dr. William Dyer, Benjamin Smalley, Thomas Newcomb, Isaac Snow, Jonathan Collins, Nathaniel Harding (1676-1741) (uncle of Elizabeth Harding who married Lemuel Rich), Joseph Young, David Peter, John Snow, Constant Freeman, Thomas Paine, senior and junior, Nathaniel Atkins, Francis Small, Lieutenant Jonathan Bangs, John Rogers, John Steele, Thomas Mulford, Hezekiah Doane, Samuel Treat, jr., Hezekiah Purington, Humphrey Scammon, Beriah Smith, Richard Stevens, John Myrick, Moses Paine, Jonathan Vickery, Micah Atwood, Josiah Cook, Ebenezer Hurd, Samuel Small, Samuel Young, Jonathan Paine, Edward Crowell, Ebenezer Smith, Jonathan Dyer, John Savage, Israel Cole, and Thomas Smith.
In 1711 we find additional settlers, as may be seen by the names of the residents who were the only cattle owners in Truro that year: Ebenezer Doane, William Dyer, sr., Jonathan Collins, Jeremy Bickford, Josias Cook, Jedediah Lumbert (perhaps Lombard), Jonathan Vickery, Constant Freeman, Samuel Treat, John Snow, Thomas Lombard, Hezekiah Purington, Thomas Rogers, Benjamin Smalley, Richard Webber, Thomas Smith, Daniel Smalley, Christopher Stewart, George Stewart, and William Clark.
On May 6, 1712, the selectmen of Eastham and Truro met to review the bounds between the towns and perfect the boundary line which had been but partially made; and in 1714 the following lie was set between the province lands and Truro: “Beginning at the easterly end of a cliff near the cape harbor, called Cormorant hill at a jaw bone of a whale set in the ground, thence northwesterly to a high hill on the back side, and thence to the ocean.” The province lands prior to this had been under the ecclesiastical jurisdiction of Truro, and these lands west of the line were, in 1717, constituted as the precinct of Cape Cod. The following year the people of Truro, from frequent difficulties arising out of the uncertain municipal powers of the new precinct of the province lands, asked the general court by Constant Freeman, their representative, to declare the new precinct either a part or not a part of Truro, that the town could know how to proceed in regard to some persons; but not until 1727, when Provincetown was incorporated as a town, was the difficulty entirely overcome.
Subsequently the settlers of the eastern part of Provincetown found themselves extending the long street of that town into Truro, and after frequent petitions to the general court, the present boundary between the towns was established, giving Provincetown a greater extent of territory. Many members of the Rich family moved from Truro to Maine during the Revolutionary War but many others stayed. (Conclusion - see August 26 and 28 for parts one and two)
Comments