I've been exploring the new ancestors I foiund when the John Cutter West brickwall. The families are mostly from Barnstable and Plymouth couties, but yesterday I discovered the immigrant ancestor of one branch originally settled in the Essex County town of Lynn. And it turns out this ancestor, Thomas Dexter, Sr, was quite a rambunctious character. I've found mention of several clashes with church and government authorites. One in particular has been amusing because it involved a clash with another of my ancestors, John Endecott.
I found the following account in a History of Lynn written by Alonzo Lewis and James R. Newhall over 150 years ago.
At this time, there was no bridge across Saugus river, and people who traveled to Boston were compelled to pass through the woods in the northern part of the town, and ford the stream by the Iron Works, which were near the site of the present woolen factories, in Saugus Centre. The following extract from a letter written by Mr. John Endicott, of Salem, to Gov. Winthrop, on the 12th of April, illustrates this custom. Mr. Endicott had just been married. He says: "Right Worshipful, I did hope to have been with you in person at the Court, and to that end I put to sea yesterday, and was driven back again, the wind being stiff against us;" and there being no canoe or boat at Saugus, I must have been constrained to go to Mistic, and thence about to Charlestown; which at this time I durst not be so bold, my body being at present in an ill condition to take cold, and therefore I pray you to pardon me."
A quarrel had arisen, a short time previous, between Mr. Endicott and Thomas Dexter, in which the Salem magistrate so far forgot his dignity as to strike Mr. Dexter, who complained to the Court at Boston. It was on this occasion that Mr. Endicott wrote the letter from which the preceding extract is made. He thus continues: "I desired the rather to have been at Court, because I hear I am much complained of by Goodman Dexter for striking him; understanding since it is not lawful for a justice of peace to strike. But if you had seen the manner of his carriage, with such daring of me, with his arms akimbo, it wrould have provoked a very patient man... He hath given out, if I had a purse he would make me empty it, and if he cannot have justice here, he will do wonders in England; and ;iif he cannot prevail there, he will try it out with me here at blows. If it were lawful for me to try it at blows, and he a fit man for me to deal with, you should not hear me complain." The jury, to whom the case was referred, gave their verdict for Mr. Dexter, on the third of May, and gave damages ten pounds, (USA) [An error was made in copying from the record, which stands thus: "The jury findes for the plaintiffs and cesses for damages xls." ($8.88). It is evident that the second numeral and s, were mistaken for a pound mark, thus increasing the 40s. to loll Besides the evidence of the blow, Mr. Endicott manifests somewhat of an irascible disposition in his letter; and Mr. Dexter was not a man to stand for nice points of etiquette on occasions of irritability. Some years afterward, having been insulted by Samuel Hutchinson, he met him one day on the road, and jumping from his horse, he bestowed "about twenty blows on his head and shoulders," to the no small danger and deray of his \senses, as well as sensibilities -pp137-8
HISTORY OF LYNN, Essex County Massachusetts Including Lynnfield, Saugus, Swampscot, and Nahant, Volume 1 John L.Shorey pub. Boston, Ma. 1865
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