Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

Cape, which seemed to be clumsily worked, and to have but few men on board. Supposing she could be easily taken, the people of Sandy Bay," then grown to the number of three or four hundred, "made preparations to board her. They were urged on by Lieutenant Poole, who on this occasion showed more valor than discretion. He persuaded Captain Rowe, against his own better judgment, to join in the enterprise; for the latter had some suspicions that the vessel was a ship-ofwar in disguise. Every mechanic, fisherman, and farmer, that could be found, was enlisted, to the number of twenty; and, having procured three fishing-boats, they proceeded fearlessly to the attack. They had scarcely left their moorings, when the Yankee Hero' hove in sight, coming round Halibut Point. The boats steered directly for her; and, upon getting alongside, the men were received on board by Captain Tracy," the commander, "who eagerly declared his readiness to attack the British ship. The boats were sent back, and the brig made all sail and stood towards the ship; into which, as she got within cannonshot, she let off a broadside. The ship immediately opened two tiers of ports, and sent such a broadside in return as satisfied our Cape men of their mistake. Poole wished to board the ship, and carry her sword in hand, or die in the attempt; but his advice of this reckless measure was unheeded, and a fight commenced almost under the

[ocr errors]

ship's guns. The brig maintained the contest about an hour; at the end of which, having spent her ammunition, she struck to the British frigate Milford,' of thirty-six guns. The brig's last gun was filled with pieces of iron, spikes, and a crowbar. The latter, being the only missile left on board, I was thrust into the gun by Poole, who when he went on board the frigate as a prisoner discovered this new implement of war sticking through the bits of her windlass. It was called by the British sailors the Yankee belaying pin.'

[ocr errors]

999

Early in August, after the Bunker Hill battle of the 17th of June, 1775, a British sloop-of-war, the Falcon," several days hovered round the north shore of the Cape. She spent her time while in Ipswich Bay impressing men from vessels and boats, and sending barges to the shore here and there to take cattle and sheep. One day she sent a barge to Coffin's Beach to get sheep from Major Coffin's farm. The sturdy major, and five or six of his neighbors whom he had mustered, from behind sand-hills fired well-aimed rifles so rapidly at the approaching enemy, that the latter, believing that a much greater force withstood them, beat a retreat. Afterwards the same barge went into Squam Harbor to cut out a vessel, supposed to be a West Indiaman, deep in the water with a valuable cargo; but the vessel was found to be heavily laden with sand. Subsequently the Falcon " sailed into Massachusetts Bay, and entered Glouces

ter Harbor, holding in hand a West Indiaman, which she had captured, as a prize, and pursuing another, to double her success. But she was so hotly opposed by the brave men on shore, that she fled to sea, leaving the two Indiamen, several barges, and thirty-five men as the cost of her temerity.

AFTER THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.

Forward from the close of the Revolutionary War, the population at the end of the Cape, within the limits of the territory known since 1840 as Rockport, increased rapidly. Mr. Babson, the careful and thorough historian of the Cape, records the "striking fact" that this "latest settled portion" of the Cape "had, up to 1840, outstripped all the older localities in a proportionate increase of population.' "This growth," he says, "is attributed to the success of the shore-fishing for most of this period, to persevering industry in agriculture, and the quarrying of stone; to all of which the economy and other good habits of the people have been important auxiliaries.”

PIGEON COVE HARBOR.

Since the shore-fishing could be carried on only in small boats, and the people became ambitious to engage in larger business, the artificial harbors which have been mentioned were built to afford anchorage and shelter to vessels of heavy tonnage. These harbors of Rockport and Pigeon Cove were badly damaged by the great storm of 1841. At Pigeon Cove, the wall which received the brunt of the storm gave way and fell, and the vessels in the harbor were destroyed. A higher, firmer, and more extended barrier now occupies the place of the one demolished, and one would not suppose the sea would ever rise to such a pitch in wrath as to make this great work of thirty years in building, and still in building, a ruin. But some idea of the force of the sea in the time of wind and tempest may be got, by visiting at the end of Andrews' Point an immense block of granite, of a hundred and fifty tons' weight, which, in the disastrous day for the harbor, was wrenched from its solid bed, and whirled over twenty yards to the spot where it lies. The huge block would seem more exposed in its new place than where it had been packed thousands and thousands of years, but there it rests during the toughest gales, warding like a giant the blows of the waves, or, unaffected, taking all their poundings till their rage is spent.

[merged small][graphic][merged small]

The town of Rockport to day, the town of two villages, which are almost united by a chain of habitations stretching from one to the other on a single road, as seen from vessels crossing Sandy Bay, or from the Salvages, three miles from shore, or from the steamers and other craft, large and small, passing the outermost points of the Cape, is one of the prettiest of the sea-board towns. Seven churches and chapels, representing different forms of Christian belief; the town-house, ample and convenient for the purposes of the building; the school-houses, erected and used to answer the ends of education; the extensive steam cotton-mill, built

« AnteriorContinuar »