Early History of Windham County

Royal charters & land grants

In colonial New England, the king of England appointed governors to his various
royal provinces and ruled through them. They had the authority to grant, in his
name, any unchartered land in their province, but this could be complicated when
the land to be settled was unsurveyed wilderness, and the province borders
uncertain.

The earliest grant in what would become Vermont was land in the future town of
Vernon, included in the 1672 township of Squakheag (later Northfield MA). A
further deed ".......covering (this) grant was made August 13th, 1687 by.....
Indians of the place, in consideration of 200 fathoms of Wampum and 57 value
of trading goods" (1). In 1736, Massachusetts granted another section of future
Vernon, and it was here that Sartwell's and Bridgman's fortified settlements
were built around 1740.

The year 1740 is an important date and will be returned to later, but first it is
necessary to backtrack to another early land sale. In its eagerness to found new
towns, the province of Massachusetts had exceeded its bounds. In 1713, in
settlement of various disputes, Massachusetts agreed to cede to Connecticut
107,793 acres of equivalent lands. These lands were then sold by Connecticut in
1716 "one of the portions, containing 43,943 acres, being the present towns of
Putney, Dummerston and Brattleboro" (2).

Unfortunately for the aspiring settlers of these newly acquired backwoods,
"....the whole of this tract of county had previously, from time immemorial, been
in the possession of the native Indians" (3), the Abenaki, who wanted to keep
their land and were prepared to fight for it. Until the end of the French and Indian
Wars, the Abenaki presented a formidable obstacle to settlement.

In recognition of the threat posed to their frontier, the Massachusetts authorities
voted to build a defensive "....blockhouse above Northfield, in the most
convenient place on the lands called the equivalent lands" (4). By the summer of
1724, Fort Dummer was ready for habitation. It was used as a base for
"...scouting and punitive expeditions into Abenaki country" (5) during times of
war, and as a trading post during times of peace. John Sargent arrived at the
Fort with his family around 1730, followed by a few others. Another handful of
frontiersman tried to develop settlements along the Connecticut River at
Westminster (chartered by Massachusetts in 1735 as Township Number One)
and Rockingham (under possible charters as Number Two or Fallstown or
Goldenstown). Around 1740, fortified settlements were started on Fort hill on the
Putney Great Meadows of the equivalent lands, and, as already mentioned, in
Hinsdale/Vernon. All but Fort Sartwell were abandoned or destroyed during the
King George's War of 1744-1748, and many of the inhabitants killed or taken
captive.

But to return to 1740. On March 5th, King George II ordered a survey to settle a
north/south boundary dispute between Massachusetts and New Hampshire.
Upon its completion, Fort Dummer was found to be in New Hampshire, whose
governor was Benning Wentworth. Despite an inconclusive correspondence with
the governor of New York over their respective east/west border, and the
decision to refer the question to the crown, Benning Wentworth took the 1741
survey results as recognition of his jurisdiction over the lands to the west of the
Connecticut River. With the ending of the King George's War, he went to work
issuing Royal Charters to this land, starting with Bennington in the far
south-western corner. In 1750, his second Vermont charter went to Halifax, his
third in 1751 to Marlboro, followed by one to Wilmington. In 1752, the previous
Massachusetts Township Number One, now abandoned, was regranted as
Westminster, and the possible Township Number Two to the north was granted
as Rockingham. According to Child's Gazetteer "...Wentworth was interested in
the settlement of Rockingham on account of the excellent masting for ships
obtained in this section, and came here personally to make examination and to
take measures for better securing the masting trees from being cut and felled,
as they had, by charter, been secured for the masting of His Majesty's navy".

In 1753, Governor Wentworth was particularly busy. The equivalent lands
together with the other lands were divided into townships of Fulham (later
Dummerston), Putney and Brattleboro; Vernon was "confirmed to the
proprietors", and Fane and Townshend were chartered. As were Grafton and
Guilford in 1754. And then all this activity was brought to a halt by the outbreak
of the final French and Indian War. The towns where some settlement had
preceded the New Hampshire charters, Westminster, Putney, Brattleboro and
Vernon, were again disrupted by Indian attacks. The other towns either had their
charters extended, or forfeited and reissued after the war's end in 1760,
because of the impossibility of compliance in the face of Indian hostility. But then
the earlier hindrance worked to the advantage of the settlers for "...in their
expeditions against the French, the English colonists had made themselves
acquainted with the fertility and the value of the lands lying between the
Connecticut River and Lake Champlain, and the conquest of Canada having now
removed the difficulty and the danger of settling them, swarms of adventurers
began to migrate hither, and from the year 1760, the population of Vermont
began to increase with considerable rapidity" (6).

This is not the end of the complicated story of the New Hampshire land grants.
In 1764, King George III ruled in favor of New York in its east/west dispute with
New Hampshire. With the Connecticut River declared the border, New York’s'
governor began issuing his own charters to the New Hampshire Grants, which
were now considered part of Cumberland County, New York. The resulting
period of turmoil played out differently in each town, with some accepting New
York's authority and others refusing it.

In 1777, Vermont declared itself an independent state with a constitution that
prohibited slavery. In 1791, Vermont was admitted to the Union as the 14th state
and grants to all remaining lands were made by the Vermont General Assembly.

1 Hemenway Vermont Gazeteer vol. 5, 1891
2 Child's Windham County Gazeteer 1884
3 Thompson's History of Vermont 1842
4 Child's Windham County Gazeteer 1884
5 Calloway Western Abenaki of Vermont 1600-1800, 1900
6 Thompson's History of Vermont 1842