| Notes |
- COMPILED GENEALOGY: THE HISTORY OF MARTHA'S VINEYARD, VOL. 3; Banks, C.E.;
Dukes Co Historical Society; Edgartown MA; 1966; p. 20-21:
"ATHEARN FAMILY
The most promising clew to the English origin of this family is found in
the existence of an Athorn (Athourne, Atherne) family as early as 1602 in the
parish of Boughton-under-Blean, co. Kent, which is situated ten miles north of
Ashford, from whence came our Nicholas Butler. Ther author has already
stated his belief that Simon Athearn came to New England as servant in the
employ of Butler, and the proximity of the two parishes seems to indicate that
locality as the region where the Athearn family originated. With the exception
of a family of the same name (Athorne) residing in Stratfield--Mortimer, c.
Hants, at the same period, this is the only occurrence of the name known to the
author after an extended research among the manuscript and printed vital
records of England.”
“Nothing less than a separate chapter would enable the author to give an adequate portrayal of the strenuous life and fruitful career of this unique character among the early settlers of the Vineyard, Simon Athearn of Tisbury. Amid the settingngs of a most peaceful and bucolic life he managed to stir up more contrary breezes than any man of his time, and was a continual thorn in the flesh of the ruling family on the island. It is a matter of regret that the author has not been able tto ascertain his antecedents. Indeed, his name is unique, and nowhere has it been observed in the scores of volumes containing the records of English parishes; and a professional genealogist of London stated that he had never seen the name in his long experience. No other family of this name emigrated to New England in the 17th century, and as far as known he was the sole and first bearer of it in this country. It has been suggested that the name is of similar origin to Attwood, Att-water, Att-well, being originally Att-hern. Sewall spelled it Atturn in his Diary in 1712.
His gravestone at West Tisbury records the name Attharn and the only early English instance with a spelling approaching it, Atturn, occurring before 1600, seems to bear out this theory rather than the supposition of its identity with Atherton. It may be identical with Hathorn, now Hawthorne. But whatever the mystery attaching to his antecedents, and it covers as well his previous residence if any in this country before his appearance at the Vineyard, his subsequent life and doings after his settlement are an open book.
If the record on his tombstone is correct he was born about 1643, and the first mention of his name in the town records of Edgartown is under date of 1659, when he served on the jury. This presupposes an error somewhere; either on the gravestone or the Edgartown records, which are a transcript, not too carefully made, for he would have been at that date a minor sixteen years of age, and therefore ineligible for that duty. The occasion of his first appearance, however, on the record seseems to be plausible as well as characteristic, for he spent most of the remainder of his career in court, as he had begun. He stated in a deposition that he was aged about 56 years in 1698, which carries us back to 1642. It is the belief of thhe author that he came to this country as a boy in the employ of Nicholas Butler of Edgartown, who was a man of property, and kept a number of servants. According to tradition he selected his future wife as she was romping with her playmates neaear her father's house, having about her dolls and other childish evidences that her thoughts were far away from matrimony. The girl was Mary, daughter of John Butler, and according to Judge Sewell "his wife was not fourteen when he married her." The young husband had probably taken up land at Tississa in the present limits of West Tisbury, by a purchase from the Indians before the settlement of Tisbury, contrary to the rights of Thomas Mayhew, the patentee, who had prohibited the purcchase of Indian titles without his consent. Athearn thus began his long course of opposition to the Mayhews and their official of affairs on the Vineyard. Out of this Tississa incident endless litigation arose. As soon as Peabody, Standish, Allelen and Skiffe made their purchase in Tisbury Simon Athearn purchased a lot of land in 1670 and was admitted, May 20, 1671, as an associate proprietor. In 1672 his dwelling house was located on Great Neck on the east side of the Old Mill river oon a lot of land comprising twenty acres. He also owned fifteen acres "at the turn of the brook" where the well-known Dr. Fisher mill property was afterwards developed. Here on his home lot were born to him and his wife nine children, all of whom married save one, and the sons maintained the high standing and distinction in Vineyard affairs that their father had set.
When in 1671 Thomas Mayhew came back from New York with town charters for Edgartown and Tisbury, a mano rial grant for Tisbury Manor, and a commission as governor for life, the spirit of Simon Athearn rose within him as he saw the destinies of the island confined to the personality of one man and the government of one family. He felt that there was no place in the Massachusettssystem for governors for life. The details of the abortive rebellion against this undemocratic form of government have been elsewhere related, and it will only be necessary to explain the part played by Athearn. His growing estate, comprising his sole worldly possessions, constrained him after its failure to throw himself on the mercy of the legally established government, however distasteful it may have been to him personally, rather than to accept the full consequences of his act, and seek or be driven to a new home elsewhere. So he cleared himself as best he could, as appears by the following record:
At his Majesties court: held at Edgartown uppon Marthas Vineyard
Jan: 8: 1674-5.
Simon Athearn desiring by way of petition that whereas himself was by the Authoritie Reputed one of the Ringleaders in the late Resisting of the Govourment that being lead and induced thereunto by others the Governour and Associates would so looke uppon him and Judge him accordingly and testified uppon oath that Thomas Burchard was a principall instigator of him whereby he was induced to act in the opposition of Authoritie.
The Court fined him twenty-five pounds, one half to be paid "forthwith," five pounds and ten shillings in money and seven pounds in cattle or corn. And for speaking against the fine and sentence of William Vincent he was fined ten pounds, one haalf "forthwith" as above and the other half in produce. "And (the Court) doe take from him his freedom during the pleasure of the Court And doe revoke the former sentence against him of sending him to New Yorke." But Athearn, though defeated, was not conquered in spirit.
"A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still."
Before the year had expired we find him continuing agitation against the Mayhew government, as shown in a letter dated Oct. 8, 1675, addressed to Gov. Andros of New York. It is an interesting statement of the difficulties experienced by those not in the favor of the official circle, but is too long to be given in full.
The death in 1682 of the aged Governor removed one cause of complaint on the part of Athearn against that feature of the government of the island, the life tenure of the chief magistrate, and though no change occurred in the tenure of the Mayheew family upon the offices of the island, yet it is evident that Athearn chose to accept the inevitable conditions and bide his time. The only change in the results of his appearances in litigation after the decease of Gov. Mayhew as shown by thhe court records, is a series of decisions in which he is enabled to compromise or divide with his opponent. Prior to this they had all been adverse verdicts. But a new enemy soon appeared on the scene in the person of William Rogers, and he kept Athearn constantly before the court for two years. He charged him with stealing a cow the year previously and killing it privately. Athearn was non-suited. He sued him for slander and asked damages to the amount of fifty pounds. The jury retururned a verdict of non-liquet. The next year he complained against him for stealing a black cow, but the charge was withdrawn. Athearn had evidently reached the limit of his patience, and proceeded to take the law into his own hands by personally chastising his persistent persecutor. Rogers forthwith complained against Athearn "for hailing or pulling sayd Rogers by the eres and caueling him sayd William Roge and there with other Skurvie words in court." The court found for the defendant, though the act took place in its presence.
An amusing incident occurred at this time in which Athearn again figures as a defendant in an action for slander with damages claimed to the amount of £100. The plaintiff was Thomas Peat "Skoole master of Edgartown" and his declaration relating his grievance so dramatically sets forth the circumstances constituting the offence, that it were best told in his own language and it is here quoted:
The plaintiff stated that he was in the house of Richard Arey on the 14th of March, 1686-7, "teaching som of his skol lers then in skoolle, when in came Simon Athearn, who asked the plaintiff to give him his dafter Marys Coppy book & sum Coppys the sayd playntiffe was Ready to pleasure the said defendant, but in the entrem" the defendant was writing in his daughter Mary's book "without the liberty and privily" of the schoolmaster. The defendant "tok a pen of one of the skollers and wwrit in a Coppy boock som Skandloues & slandrous words as may apere by a manniskript of the sayd defendant, which the sayd plaintiffe will produce in which the defendant undervalewed & disparraged the savd plant: to his skollers, counseling theem to forsak him, Rendering him to be an Idell wasting person in the way of his caulling in the very Instant that the sayd playntiffe was bisied in the performance of his Douty in his Skoole, yet was the sayd defendant so Impudent before the sayd plantiffes face, Subtilly & fox like to Record the sayd Plaintiffes name in a mock verse in the skoole."
The jury found "it a trespass for a man to com into a Skolle and take a pen of one of the Skollers in Skool & whrit in one of the Skollers books without the aprobation of the master of the Skoole," and the plaintiff was awarded twelve pence damaages and costs of court. It is only to be regretted that the "mock verse" which Simon Athearn composed that day in his daughter Mary's "coppy boock" has not been preserved in order that we might enjoy a perusal of the lines which so incensed this pedagogue.
Notwithstanding all these evidences of a litigious life Athearn retained the confidence of his neighbors. He was one of the committee of the town of Tisbury to lay out sixteen shares in the new purchase in 1675. He was chosen county commissioner in 1686; constable of Tisbury in 1687; assessor in 1692; commissioner for the town (for the trial of small cases) in 1693; selectman in 1695. Such a character as the subject of this sketch is not made of the material that enters into the composition of a popular man, and although easily the first citizen of Tisbury in his day in point of energy, progressive spirit and interest in the public welfare, yet viewed from the standpoint of office-holding his true dimensions are obscured.
Athearn's possession of Tississa, which he purchased of the Indian Jude in 1674, and held without confirmation from the Lord Proprietor, or approval of the town, involved him in a long series of differences with his townsmen and litigation with a number of them on account of trespass, defamation of title and assaults. In 1678 he reached an agreement with the town concerning this neck of land by the terms of which Athearn yielded his claim to the largest part of the neck, receiving teen pounds as a return for his purchase money, out of which he was required to pay two pounds for the portion that was confirmed to him. It appears, however, that the town failed to live up to the agreement, and he felt free to act accordingly. As the neck was declared to be common lands, Athearn proceeded to acquire the shares of others from time to time; but this arrangement did not settle the contention and two years and a half later, at a town meeting, held on June 18, 1680, the following vote was passed:
being a town mitting it was put to vott whare or no Simon Atharne shoulde have the necke of land that liath upon the pountes of the Indian necke but the towne voted that the said simon Attharne should but have his share with the reste of the inhabitants and tendred the saide simon Attharne if hee youlde sine the dedes the yould pee him the mony
Whatever the hitch in the negotiations depended upon, it appears that the town authorities undertook to dispose of this neck of land by grants in 1683, and Athearn caused his protest to be recorded in the town book. This was immedi ately followed by the reciprocal protest of the townsmen against the entry of his caveat. He took this matter finally to the county court, and on June 22, 1684, the following record of the case appears:
Simon Athearn complaineth against the Constable and overseers of the Town of Tisbury for non-payment of certain monies due by contract about a neck of land caled Copeck alias tississa.
Athearn finally acquired by one means or another the possession of the much-disputed neck.
A political change which followed several years after the death of the old Governor, the transfer by Matthew Mayhew of his manorial rights as lord of the manor to Thomas Dongan by sale, was not to the satisfaction of Athearn, but he was helpless to prevent this situation and was obliged to await the adjustment of these difficulties till a more fortunate time. It was not far off and came unexpectedly. The accession of William III brought in a government which exercised less of the ancient prerogative and seemed to give expectation to Athearn that the rights of the people would be heard and considered and that the liberality of the Prince of Orange would be reflected in his Colonial representative in New York. So when Gov. Henry Slaughter, the new appointee, arrived in New York in March, 1691, he was scarcely seated in his new office before Athearn addressed him on the condition of affairs at the Vineyard.
This letter is printed elsewhere (Vol. I, pp. 179-80), but it was not in this direction a change in the Athearn's horizon was to occur. The procurement of the new charter for Massachusetts in 1691 became the opportunity for Simon Athearn to estaablish himself in new relations with the authoritiesof the Massachusetts Bay Colony. He wrote a letter of information and advice to Sir William Phipps and recommended some of his friends for local offices, and Sir William appointed one of them tto the most important office on the island If he had aspirations for official preferment himself the following recommendation from prominent residents of the Vineyard seems to show that he was a candidate for the bench. This testimonial with its curious phraseology, is worth printing in full:
Wee whose names under writen present our most humbel duty to your Excellency & your honnored Consesell & ar redy upon all demand or Command from your Exsellency to Sarve you with our Lives & fortine & pray for your exsellencys happines & prosperruty & for the happines & prosperity of your honoured Consell and we Count our sealfs happi that we are under the shaddow of your Exsellency & wee are willing to acquaint your Exsellency that wee were not willing to specke when the Gentlemen werwere here. Because that your Exsellencys orders might be setteled in Peease & quitnes now wee are willing to give your Exsellency an aCount of Mr. Simon Athearn we Looke upon him to be a well acomplish man he is no drunkerd nor no Card player nonor a man that freequint tavorns but wee doe know but he may have his feialing as well as other men: for estate: few or none upon our Iland goeth beyond him & for a Justes wee Looke upon him as fit a man as any here: so wishing & praying for your Exsellencys happines & the god of paese Bles you with al Spritual Blessings & give you a hart after his owne hart that he may tack a delight in you to doe you goode & save you from all your enemies:: wee humbly beg your Exsellencys pardon in what is amisse in writing to your Exsellency & Remaine your most humbel & dutiful servants. [*Mass. Arch., CXII, 435.]
This interesting document was signed by Andrew Newcomb, Joseph Norton, James Pease, Jacob Norton, John Butler, Thomas Norton, William Vinson, Thomas Wolling, Thomas Butler, Isaac Norton, Benjamin Norton, Moses Cleaveland, John Pease and Thomas Vinson. It is to be noted that no member of the Mayhew family appended his name to this testimonial.
In the meantime the Mayhews had made their peace with the new regime, and Athearn failed in his aspirations. He had to swallow his feelings as he saw the same old officials reinstated in the Vineyard courts. Thereafter he devoted his time to an agitation in favor of consolidating Tisbury and Chilmark as one township, the details of which are else where narrated. Although he was representative of Tisbury at the General Court for several sessions he was unable to effect anything of personal advantage to himself or for the benefit of his town. In 1696-7 he was engaged in another litigation arising from alleged trespass on his property, and personal assaults which followed this. Voluminous papers in the case prepared by him detetail the injustice he received at the hands of Richard Sarson and Matthew Mayhew, who imprisoned his son and refused to allow him an appeal to the superior court at Plymouth; Athearn states that he had been under indictment without trial for two years, on a charge of felony, and declared that there seemed to be no law by which the accused may be "discharged from such vexatious imprisonment espetially when a father-in law and his two sons are the rulle in such Infeariour Court."
It is thus that Athearn pays his respects to Richard Sarson and his stepsons Matthew and Thomas Mayhew. It is not possible to weigh the equities of this long controversy, but the recital of his grievances caused Gov. Stougton to address a letter to these justices, in which he "Signified" to them that Athearn should have the proceedings against him conducted "equal and agreeable to the Rules of Law and Justice, which is all that is expected." It must have been a strong case that induced the executive to interfere with a judicial proceeding. After the recital of all his experiences for so many years and the unfortunate results of his litigations, we may safely conclude that Athearn made a vital error in not effecting a matrimonial alliance with the Mayhew family.
The remainder of his life, as far as external evidences warrant the conclusion, was devoted to the care of his estate and the enjoyment of the declining years of an active if not a politically fruitful life. In worldly possessions "few or none upon our Iland goeth beyound him" as stated by his friends in 1791, and with extensive acres at Great Neck, Tississa, Charles' Neck, and scattering parcels of land in Chilmark, Edgartown and Tisbury, he doubtless found greater satisfaction than in the bootless campaigns he waged against the family that held sway over the island in his day and generation.
On the several visits of Judge Sewall to the island in 1702 and 1719 he mentions dining with and meeting Mr. Athearn, and again in 1714 he notes in his diary under date of April 10: "View'd Watsha Neck all over, being conducted by Mr. Simon Athearn." We thus have trace of him to within a year of his death.
He had a family of nine childrenfour boys and five girlsgrowing up about him, of whom his eldest, Samuel, remaining a bachelor until after his father's death, inherited many of the pugnacious qualities of his famous parent. His daughter Sarah was the wife of his clergyman, the Rev. Josiah Torry. His second son, Jabez, destined to lead a distinguished life on the Vineyard, had contracted an advantageous alliance with Miss Catherine Belcher. His daughter Mary became the wife of Thomas Waaldron, and before Simon Athearn paid the debt of nature his latter years were doubtless made happy by the coming of grandchildren to play on his knee. He had passed three score years and ten, and on the both day of February, 1714-15, his earthly career was closed. The enumeration of his real and personal property disclosing, as it does, varied possessions of a man of wealth in that time, aggregating £1639, 14 shillings, 11 pence, equivalent at this time to about $50,000 is worth of the space required for its presentation. The items of tankard, cordial-cup and drinking-cup indicate that he maintained the hospitalities required of a country gentleman. Judge Samuel Sewell of Boston was a guest at his house in the spring of 1702, while on a journey to Gay Head, and doubtless sipped sack-posset from these same cups.
Not the least of the attributes of this versatile and interesting character are the helps he has given to the historian of the Vineyard in his letters regarding affairs upon the Vineyard written during the period of his political activities. Thehey are the only documents extant dealing with the personal phases of that remote time, and the motives actuating the characters in the drama, as they appeared to him. To him also are we indebted for two manuscript maps of the island drawn before 1700, and although crude in execution and sadly lacking in typographical accuracy, yet they contain valuable information nowhere else to be found. Facsimiles of various portions of these maps appear in other portions of this work.
In the graveyard at West Tisbury carved with the gruesome emblems of mortality a slate stone tells the passing stranger where lies the mortal remains of Tisbury's first great citizen.
Probate Records, I, 50.
July 21, 1715. The estate of Mr. Simon Athearn of Tisbury late deceased prized by us the subscribers.
£
The lands and building in Great Neck or homestead
600 "
The land in Tississa Neck
250 "
The land in Charles Neck
200 "
The land in the Oldtown or Edgartown
100 "
the meadow in Chilmark
60 "
the land at Keephegon
16 "
the small parcels lands between the Pine Hills
6 "
the Old Mill River his right of lands on the plain
2 "
---------
£1234 "
2dly The Moveable Estate
one pair oxen
10.0.
one pair oxen
9.10.
5 cows
17.10.
7 cowes & calves
22.15.
2 steers
6.0.
4 two year old steers
6.0.
2 two year old heifer & a bull
4.10.
8 yearlings
6.0.
one mare and a colt
12.0.
6 swine
1.16.
one mare
3.0.0
£ s
99.11
3dly 112 sheep with their lambs and fleeces at £8.10s per score
47.12.
190 sheep with their fleeces at £6 per score
57.0.
104.12
4thly Money and household stuff
Province bills
38.16.17
one silver tankard
9.0.0
6 silver spoons
3.12.0
one silver cup
3.0.0
one silver porringer
3.0.0
one bed with furniture
11.7.0
one do do
12.8.0
one do do
6.12.0
one do do
6.12.0
one do do
4.10.0
£ s d
92. 5. 7
5ly his wearing apparel
2 large Bibles
5.0.0
one do old
0.2.0
some small books
1.3.0
4 law books
1.0.0
3 pair sheets
4.10.0
2 pair do
2.5.0
1 pair do
2.5.0
1 pair do
0.12.0
2 pair do
1.0.0
2 pair pillow bears
1.4.0
5 do
0.16.0
1 pair do
0.4.0
one carpet
0.6.0
£ s d
33.3.6
4 table cloths
1.4.0
23 napkins
2.10.0
1 cupboard cloth
0.10.0
1 towel
0.4.0
3 cushions
0.3.0
1 brass kettle
2.0.0
2 brass kettles
0.18.0
3 brass candle-sticks
0.13.0
1 bellmettle skillet
0.8.0
one iron kettle
0.6.0
1 chafing dish
0.6.0
1 spit pan & fender
1.1.0
one warming pan
0.16.0
one brass frying pan
0.6.0
one pair beases
0.15.0
one brass gun
1.0.0
one iron pot
0.16.0
one do
0.12.0
one do
0.9.0
one iron kettle
1.10.0
one do
0.8.0
1 cupboard
2.10.0
1 trunk
0.5.0
1 parcel wooden vessels
1.10.0
1 Gridiron
0.6.0
1 pair tongs & slice
0.8.0
3 trammels
0.15.0
box heaters & goose
0.3.0
1 pair bellows
0.2.0
old iron
0.1.0
1 pair steelyards
1.0.0
1 pair worsted corns
0.12.0
1 sword
0.4.0
1 table
1.10.0
1 do
1.5.0
1 do
0.12.0
1 do
0.8.0
1 do & form
0.10.0
2 joint stools
0.6.0
1 dozen chairs
2.14.0
8 chairs
1.12.0
6 old do
0.10.0
1 chest
0.5.0
1 do
0.10.0
1 do
0.6.0
1 do
0.6.0
1 chest drawers
3.0.0
1 cupboard
0.12.0
4 pounds hops c 9
1.10.0
3 corn seives
0.4.0
1 half bushel
0.3.0
1 hair cloth
0.12.0
2 bridles & saddles
1.15.0
1 side saddle
0.15.0
3 seives
0.5.0
2 meal bags
0.6.0
2 sleighs & harnesses
0.16.0
warping bars & boxes
0.10.0
1 pair looms
1.10.0
3 spinning wheels
0.18.0
1 pr. wool cards
0.2.6
4 pewter platter
1.12.0
2 do
0.12.0
4 do
0.16.0
13 plates
1.6.0
2 basons
0.6.0
4 porringers
0.6.0
1 cordial cup
0.5.0
1 tankard
0.7.0
1 candlestick
0.3.0
1 salt cellar
0.2.0
10 spoons
0.3.4
3 drinking cups
0.4.0
2 looking glasses
1.10.0
mantletree furniture
0.5.0
60 pounds sheeps wool
2.10.0
1 bushel flaxseed
0.4.0
6 pound flax
0.4.0
4 axes
0.8.0
3 hoes
0.9.6
1 spade
0.2.0
1 adze
0.4.0
1 auger, chisel, gouge
0.6.0
2 pitchforks
0.3.6
1 lantern
0.2.6
2 pudding
0.3.0
1 tunnel
0.1.6
1 cart & wheels
2.5.0
2 cops & pins
0.7.0
1 plow with irons
0.16.0
2 harrows
1.10.0
2 rings, staple & yoke
0.6.0
2 chains
0.16.0
1 cart rope
0.3.0
1 thousand boards
2.15.0
100 cedar bolts
0.16.0
1 beetle & wedges
0.6.0
1 Grindstone
0.10.0
20 bush barley
3.10.0
---------
76.2.10
1234.0.0
99.11.0
104.12.0
92.5.7
33.3.6
---------
1639.14.11Errors Excepted
ROBERT CATHCART
JOHN MANTER
BENJAMIN MANTER”
West Tisbury Village Cemetery Stone:
“HERE LYES BURIED
[ye] BODY OF
[Mr.] SIMON ATTHARN
[AG]ED 72 YEARS”
DECD FEBRY. ye 20th
1714/15.
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Connected Bloodlines
1642 - 1714 (72 years)
