A TOPOGRAPHICAL SURMISE.

LOCATING THE HOUSES OF GORGES and godfreY AT YORK, ME.

[Extract from an "Abstract of Title of Mr. Samuel S. Allen's Farm in York." By Wm. M. Sargent.]

Read before the Maine Historical Society, February 20, 1890.

BY WILLIAM M. SARGENT.

THE presence of an ancient foundation within the confines of this title gives rise to speculation as to its builder and purpose. Mr. Marshall has, and Dr. Banks and other writers, following his deductions, have, argued for the location of Governor Edward Godfrey's house, "the first ever built" in York in this vicinity; their location of it somewhere near Godfrey's Pond and Cove being so indefinite as to confound it with the traces of a perhaps earlier occupancy on our tract.

On pages four and five of this "Abstract," it has been shown that the site they call Godfrey's came to Ann Messant-Godfrey by mortgage from Rev. George Burdett; and is the same place conveyed by her daughter, Mrs. Shapleigh, to Raynes (see York Deeds, iv, 20; iii, 116 and 34). This was where she, as Godfrey's widow, took up her abode after the failure of her husband's title to his homestead on the north side of York river. It was called Mr. Godfrey's farm only by the old custom and law of coverture, of which Mr. Marshall, from his written deductions, seems to have been totally ignorant -deductions the other writers have adopted without independent research. It was not even invariably thus designated, but quite oftener the other way, Mrs. Godfrey's. (See York Deeds, vi, 158 and 169; ix, 11.)

Godfrey's deed to his son precisely locates his residence upon the north side. (York Deeds, i, 4.)

Godfrey's own language shows that he had no original title on the south side-"the south side to Ferdinando Gorges, and only the north side to himself and divers others his associates."

(Banks' Edward Godfrey, page 48, and Maine Hist. Soc. Coll., ix, 344.)

Moreover, whatever title Godfrey had to land on the south side of the river, except by coverture, as above, was to two hundred acres by an alleged deed from Vines, as Gorges' agent; (see York Deeds, i, 4), but allowing this allegation to be true, that transfer was made some years after his asserted date of building the earliest habitation and the land could not have been its site; and his conveyances away of the whole of this tract to Moore, Adams and Donnell without any mention of any buildings is additional proof that he did not locate upon that side of the river. (Pages 82 and 83, Banks' Edward Godfrey, and page 378, vol. ix, Maine Hist. Soc. Coll., and York Deeds.)

Besides the above it is only necessary to point out that Dr. Banks' notes on pages eleven1 and twenty-one2 of his "Edward Godfrey" are not only inconsistent with each other, but the latter conclusively proves, by the surveyor's return in 1644, that Godfrey's house was between "from above the wolf-trap to Mr. Norton's "- locations well known to be on the north side of the river.

Having thus banished beyond these titular limits the most formidable claimant, and the one who has hitherto had the most supporters, for the honor of selecting this early site, to whom is to be assigned the upraising of a house, that from its remains, was evidently too pretentious and too grand in its proportions for the work of any of the poorer fishermen or earlier settlers? To no less a person than Sir Ferdinando Gorges, Knight, Lord Proprietor of the Province of Maine.

That Gorges had a house a sort of governmental residence on the south side of the river is beyond all question. In his "Instructions," the second set, dated March 10, 1639 (Court Records, i, 38), he directs "yt there may be a place appointed for the hearing and determining of causes, I have thought to assigne the same to be as neare as may be in the midst of that parte of the p'vince wch is most inhabited, and that there be a house built for that purpose at my own charge if it cannot otherwise be setled." By his letter (Sainsbury's Calendar of Colonial Papers, x, 55), he shows that his house had been com1 p. 307, vol. ix, Maine Hist. Soc. Coll.

2 Id. p. 318.

pleted during the next year; -"Ashton, 28 Jany 1640, Sir Ferd Gorges to Sec. Windebank Perceives by letters received from New England that had he not lately [3 Apr., 1639] obtained the grant from the King, he should not have been master of more land than his house stands upon; his title to the rest being disputed by one and the other. Shall speed in his resolution to make good the King's grant, but does not purpose to take shipping before he receives commands."

In the deed to the "Maijor & Coality of Gorgeana" (York Deeds, iv, 46), "ye sd sir Fardind° Gorges house" is located with great precision between "Poynt Ingleby" and the harbor mouth on "a Necke of Land [then and now called Gorges' Neck] lijng at the Harbours mouth of Gorgeana aforesd, on the South side of the riuer there."

(Court Records, i, 141, 18 Oct., 1647.) "Robert Nanny shall have an extent upon the house and land of Sir Ferdinando Gorges, as two indifferent men shall judge it untill his debt of aleaven pounds starling be payd."

Now, as, in the progress of this "Title," the grants by the town of York, upon Gorges' Neck, have all been accounted for as far west as up to Point Ingleby and to the line of the two hundred acres Godfrey alleged he had from Vines, and as that grant did. not include any house, the conclusion is irresistible that Mr. Allen is the present possessor of the site of Gorges' stately house, the first and only feudal manor of Maine.

NOTE BY DR. CHAS. E. BANKS.

Having had an opportunity to examine the evidence presented by Mr. Sargent on the location of the Godfrey house, I think it proper to say that a re-examination of the matter (as published in my monograph, printed in vol. ix, pp. 295-384, of the Society's Collections), has convinced me of the correctnesss of Mr. Sargent's conclusions. I am very glad to admit my error for the sake of historical truth, and his clear and logical presentation of the case leaves but little more for me to say. That little is to explain that the statement placing Godfrey's house on the south side of the river was based upon the unqualified report of the late Hon. N. G. Marshall of York, of whose enthusiastic and openhearted interest in the local antiquities of the old town so many of us have had knowledge. Being unable to visit the locality, as I was then residing on the Pacific coast, I relied on Mr. Marshall's statement, that by local tradition and legal title the old farm of Godfrey, near Godfrey's Pond and Cove, could be shown with the ruins of the cellar. I am confident that Mr. Marshall would have been the first to admit his error, which under all circumstances was a natural one.

ENOCH LINCOLN.

Read before the Maine Historical Society, December 23, 1882.

BY EDWARD H. ELWELL.

WHEN, after an agitation extending through a period of more than thirty years, the District of Maine, then known as the "three Eastern Counties," separated itself from Massachusetts and set out on an independent career, the question might well have arisen, Has she among her sons, men capable of taking the new ship of state out of port, and safely guiding her over the untried waters of local self-government? For more than a century and a half her people had been in the leading-strings of Massachusetts, and although they had contributed their full share of able men to the councils of the state, it was thought by many a dangerous experiment to intrust to them the entire management of their affairs. Besides, the people were poor and dreaded the expense of a state government. It was estimated that the whole cost of a separate government would be one thousand nine hundred and seventy-two pounds, and this was enough to deter many from favoring the project; yet there were large-souled, patriotic men in those days. In the debate, a citizen of Portland, very zealous in the cause of separation, in order to obviate the objection of increased expense, replied that he would serve as governor two years for nothing.

The new

When the time came governors were not wanting. state was especially fortunate in the selection of the three men who filled the executive chair during the first decade of her existence. Two of them were her own native sons, and the third was not surpassed in devotion to her interests by either of the others. The three form a trio of able men, diverse in character and gifts, but one in patriotic purpose.

William King, the man of affairs, active, energetic, distinguished in the legislature of Massachusetts by his efforts in