CHAPTER XIV

A STAGING CENTRE

The story of the tavern and stage life of the town of Haverhill, New Hampshire, may be told as an example of that aspect and era of social history, as developed in a country town. It shows the power the stage-coach was in bringing civilization and prosperity to remote parts of the states, what an illumination, what an education.

Haverhill is on the Connecticut River somewhat more than halfway up the western boundary line of the state of New Hampshire, at the head of the Cohos valley. It is a beautiful fertile tract of land which had been cleared and cultivated by the Indians before the coming of the white man. It is lovely and picturesque with its broad intervales, splendid mountains, and peaceful river winding in the sweeps and reaches of the Oxbow; so lovely that Longfellow declared Haverhill the most beautiful spot he ever had seen. The town has but little colonial history. It had no white settlers till 1761; but the first who did take up land and build there were, as was the case with nearly all New Hampshire towns, men of unusual force of character and energy of purpose; by Revolutionary times the town was well established, and its situation and resources made it the authorized place of rendezvous for the troops destined for Canada. At the end of the war, when the danger of Indian invasion lessened, the town grew rapidly, but there were still only bridle-paths blazed through the woods by which to connect with the world, and until this century its only roads were the river road, the Coventry Road over Morse Hill, and the old Road from Plymouth, New Hampshire.

But the day of the turnpike and vast changes was dawning. In 1805, in this town, still poor and struggling, were men who contributed their share to the building of the old Cohos Turnpike from Plymouth through Warren to Haverhill. The old post-rider, faithful John Balch, who had carried on foot and on horseback the scant letters throughout the dangerous days of the Revolution, was succeeded by Colonel Silas May in a Dutch wagon, carrying packages and the mail. As he drove into town blowing his horn he inaugurated a change for Haverhill that was indeed a new life. By 1814 a permanent stage line was established between Concord and Haverhill through Plymouth; and the first coach came down the long hill on its first trip, with loud and constant blasts of the horn, with a linchpin gone, but wheel safely in place clean up to the tavern door, thanks to Silas May's skilful driving. A leading spirit in obtaining the turnpike charter and one of the proprietors of the first stage line was Colonel William Tarleton (or Tarlton), then a dashing young fellow of great elegance of manners; he kept the Tarleton Tavern on Tarleton Lake on the Pike till his death. Every stage and team that went down or up the Pike stopped there to water the horses, with water in which was thrown salt; and every passenger had at least a hot drink. His hostelry was famous for two generations, and all the while there swung in the breezes that swept over Tarleton Lake the old sign-board which is shown here. It is an oaken board on which is painted on one side an Indian and the name William Tarlton and date, 1774; on the other a symbol of Plenty. It is owned by his grandson, Amos Tarleton, of Haverhill, to whose cordial interest and intelligent help I owe much of this story of Haverhill's coaching days.

[Illustration: Sign-board of Tarleton Inn.]

The turnpike line from Concord to Haverhill was scarcely under way when a rival line was started which came through Hanover, and connected with the stage line to New York. Others followed with surprising quickness; the chief were lines to Boston, New York, and Stanstead, Canada; lesser lines of coaches ran to the White Mountains, to Montpelier, Vermont, to Chelsea, Vermont, and elsewhere. The reason for this sudden growth of Haverhill was found in its position with regard to the neighboring country; the topography of upper New England made it a proper and natural travel centre.

As many coaches came into Haverhill every night and started out early the next morning, as many passengers changed coaches there, it can be readily seen that the need of taverns was great, and a number at once were opened. Often a hundred and fifty travellers were set down daily in Haverhill. The Bliss Tavern was one of the first to be built and is still standing, a dignified and comfortable mansion, as may be seen from its picture on page 314. Its landlord, Joseph Bliss, was a man of influence in the town, and held several important offices; his house was the headquarters where the judges of the court and the lawyers stopped when court was held; for Haverhill was a shire town, a county seat, from 1773. At some of the courts of the General Sessions of the Peace as many as twenty-two justices were present; and court terms were longer then than now, so justices, lawyers, clients, sheriffs, deputies, jurors, and witnesses came and remained in town till their law business was settled. Sometimes the taverns were crowded for weeks. The court and bar had a special dining room and table at Bliss's Tavern, to which no layman, however high in social standing, was admitted. On Sundays all went to the old meeting-house at Piermont, where there was a "Judges' Pew." Sometimes executions took place in town--a grand day for the taverns. When one Burnham was hanged there in 1805, ten thousand people witnessed the sight. Old and young, mothers with babes, lads and lasses, even confirmed invalids thronged to this great occasion.

[Illustration: Sign-board of Tarlton Inn.]

Besides the court and its following, and the pampered travellers in stage-coaches, Haverhill taverns had by 1825 other classes of customers. Backward and forward from upper New Hampshire and Vermont to Boston, Portsmouth, and Salem, rolled the great covered wagons with teams of six or eight horses bearing the products of the soil and forest to the towns and the products of the whole earth in return. These wagons, which were the Conestoga wagons of Pennsylvania, made little appearance in New England till this century; they were brought there by the War of 1812; but they had there their day of glory and usefulness as elsewhere throughout our whole northern continent.

The two-wheeled cart of the earliest colonists, clumsily built and wasteful of power, was used long in New England for overland transportation; though the chief transfer of merchandise was in the winter by "sledding." There seems to have always been plentiful snow and good sledding every year in every part of New England in olden times, though it is far from being so to-day. The farmer, at that season of the year, had little else to do, and the ancient paths were soon made smooth by many sleighs and sleds.

Mr. Henry S. Miner gives me a very interesting account of these freight wagons in New England as he remembers them in ante-railroad days. Though the traffic was small in amount compared with that of the present day, it was carried on in a way which gave a sense of great life and action on the road. As even little towns furnished freight for several teams, the aggregate was large, and as they neared Boston the number of teams on the highway seemed enormous. These passed through towns on the turnpike every day, Sundays included. No vocation called for sturdier or better men. The drivers were almost invariably large, hearty, healthy Yankees, of good sense and regular habits, though they were seldom total abstainers. They could not be drunkards, for their life was too vigorous; long whip in hand, they walked beside their teams. The whip was a sign of office, seldom applied to a horse. They had to be keen traders, good merchants, to sell advantageously the goods they carried to town and to choose wisely for return trips. Country merchants seldom went to the cities, but depended wholly on these teamsters for supplies.

[Illustration: Bliss's Tavern.]

The wagons were of monstrous size, broad and high. Each horse had a ton of freight. No one was a regular teamster who drove less than four horses. But there were other carriers. A three-horse team called a "spike," a two-horse team called a "podanger," and a single horse with cart called a "gimlet," were none of them in favor with tavern-keepers or other teamsters. Still, if the smaller teams got stuck in the mud or snow, the regulars would good-humoredly help them out. Whatever accident happened to a teamster or his wagon or horses, his fellow-craftsmen assisted him, while stage-drivers, drovers, or any other travelling citizens were never looked upon for help.

An old man who drove one of these teams in his youth says:--

"When these large teams were hooked to the wagons, the starting word was 'whoo-up'; and the horses would at once place themselves in position. Then, 'Order, whope, _git_.' To turn to the left, 'Whoa, whoa,' softly; to the right, 'Geer there.' For a full stop, 'Whoa who-oof,' in louder voice, and all would come to a standstill. It was a fine sight to see six or eight good horses spread out, marching along in each other's steps, and see how quick they were to mind the driver's voice. Good drivers always spoke to their teams in a low voice, never shouted. The teamsters walked beside their teams, twenty miles a day the average. The reins were done up on each horse's hames, allowing them to spread apart with ease, a check-rein from the bit over the hames to keep them where they belonged. You could never teach a horse anything that wasn't checked up. The wagons weighed from eighteen hundred to twenty-two hundred pounds. Some wagons had an adjustable seat called a lazy-board."

With winter snows the wagons were generally housed; hundreds, yes, thousands of sleighs, pods, and pungs took their place. The farmer no longer sent to town by wagon and teamster; he carried his farm produce to town himself, just as his grandfather had in the days of the cart and sled before the Revolution. Winter brought red-letter days to the New England farmer; summer and autumn were his time of increase, but winter was his time of trade and of glorious recreation.

[Illustration: Old Sleigh with Double Dashboard.]

Friendly word was circulated from farm to farm, spread chiefly at the Sabbath nooning, that at stated date, at break of day the long ride to market would begin. Often twenty or thirty neighbors would start together on the road to town. The two-horse pung or single-horse pod, shod with steel shoes one inch thick, was closely packed with farm wealth--anything that a New England farm could produce that could be sold in a New England town. Frozen hogs, poultry, and venison; firkins of butter, casks of cheeses,--four to a cask,--bags of beans, peas, sheep-pelts, deer hides, skins of mink, fox, and fisher-cat that the boys had trapped, perhaps a splendid bearskin, nuts that the boys had gathered, shoe pegs that they had cut, yarn their sisters had spun, stockings and mittens they had knitted, homespun cloth and linen, a forest of splint brooms strapped on behind, birch brooms that the boys had whittled. So closely packed was the sleigh that the driver could not sit; he stood on a little semicircular step on the back of the sleigh, protected from the cutting mountain winds by the high sleigh back. At times he ran alongside to keep his blood briskly warm.

To Troy and Portland went some winter commerce, but Boston, Portsmouth, and Salem took far the greatest amount. On the old Cohos Turnpike trains of these farm sleighs were often a half mile long. The tavern-keepers might well have grown rich, had all these winter travellers paid for board and lodging, but nearly all, even the wealthiest farmers, carried their own provender and food. Part of their oats and hay for their horses sometimes was deposited with honest tavern-keepers on the way down to be used on the way home; and there was also plenty of food to last through the journey: doughnuts, cooked sausages, roast pork, "rye and injun" bread, cheese, and a bountiful mass of bean porridge. This latter, made in a tub and frozen in a great mass, was hung by loops of twine by the side of the sleigh, and great chunks were chopped off from time to time. This itinerant picnic was called in some vicinities tuck-a-nuck, an Indian word; also mitchin. It was not carried from home because tavern-fare was expensive,--a "cold bite" was but twelve and a half cents, and a regular meal but twenty-five cents; but the tavern-keeper did not expect to serve meals to this class or to such a great number of travellers. His profits were made on liquor he sold and sleeping room he gave. The latter was often simple enough. Great fires were built in barroom and parlor; each driver spread out a blanket or fur robe, and with feet to the fire, the semicircle slept the sleep of the healthy and tired and cider-filled. Ten cents this lodging cost; but the sale of rum and cider, toddy and flip, brought in dimes and dollars to the tavern-keeper. Many a rough story was told or old joke laughed at before the circle was quiet; quarrels, too, took place among so many strong and independent men.

[Illustration: Old Passenger Pung.]

It can readily be seen how important the tavern must have been in such a town as Haverhill, what a news centre, what an attraction, what an education. Newspapers were infrequent, but none were needed when newcomers from all points of the compass brought all there was to tell from everywhere. Mine host was the medium through which information was spread; he came into close contact with leaders in law, politics, and business, and dull he must have been if he did not profit in mental growth. But he could not be dull, he had to be companionable and intelligent; hence we find the tavern-keeper the leading man in town, prominent in affairs, and great in counsel, and it was to the stage-coach he owed much of his intelligence and influence.

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