“Passamaquoddy, August 20th, 1765.
“Sir,—Agreeable to your desire I have made the nearest calculation I could of the cost of two mills and dam on Nashwog River, and am of opinion that two hundred pounds currency will complete them. The first cost is very great, which will be mostly for the dam, yet as the stream is sufficient for an addition of three or four mills on the same dam, it will be cheaper in the end than to build the same number of mills and a dam to each on small brooks that will be almost dry near half the year.
“I must advise you Sir to have your Iron work made of the best Iron, as breaches in any part of mills is of fatal consequence to the profit of them. I have sent the dimensions of the cranks, knowing it to be the practice in New England to make them so small as to retard the business of sawing, besides frequently breaking—the breaking of one may be a greater damage than the cost of two. I have described them something large, but think you had better exceed the size than fall short of it.
“The best workmen will be the cheapest as the whole depends on the effectual laying the foundation of the dam, etc. I make no doubt but when the mills are completed they will saw at least 5 M boards pr. day.
“I am Sir, your most obedient servant,
“JAMES SIMONDS.”
It may be noticed, in passing, that Mr. Simonds writes from Passamaquoddy. The headquarters of the trade and fishery there was at Indian Island, or as it was sometimes called, Perkins Island. Mr. Simonds and Wm. Hazen were members of the St. John’s River Society and it would appear from Capt. Glasier’s letter to Nathaniel Rogers of 10th Nov’r., 1765, that the Society had ambitious designs with regard to this locality. “Our Fishery at Passamaquoddy,” writes Glasier, “is an object worth our attention; it is the best in the province. A Block-house will be built there next spring and I can get a party from the Fort sand some small cannon which will secure the Fishermen against any insult from the Indians. This spot is more valuable than you can imagine. I was promised by some of the principal Fishermen belonging to New Hampshire if I got a grant of this Island they would came to the number of 100 families with all their crafts, etc., and become our settlers at Saint Johns, and if we get Grand Manan[84] it will give us a chain of Harbours all the way to Mount Desert, which will be all we want.”
The avidity manifested by the agent of the St. John’s River Society in seeking favors at the hands of government would seems to countenance the idea, suggested in the preceding chapter of this history,[85] that when he memoralized the government of Nova Scotia for a grant of “the Point or Neck of land bearing three quarters of a mile from Fort Frederick, with 60 acres of land adjoining to it, for the making and curing Fish,” he had in view the valuable peninsula on the east side of the harbor of St. John, on which the principal part of the city now stands; but further investigation shows that this is not the case and that the point of land meant was the neck adjoining the fort, on the Carleton side of the harbor.[86]
We have ample testimony as to Beamsley Glasier’s zeal and energy as director of the affairs of the St. John’s River Society. Charles Morris, junior, says of him, “Capt. Glasier has done everything that was possible for any man to do, and more than any one else in his situation would have done to serve the Society,” adding that he had not been properly supported, and if he had retired “there would have ended the Grand Settlement of St. John’s River, for as soon as he had left it, in all probability the Indians (who have been made to believe our Dam will destroy their Fishery) would have burnt and destroyed all that has been done this summer at the Mills, and before we could build other mills and get things in so good a way again the lands would be forfeited, for there will be a court of Escheats held and all the lands that have been granted in this province that are not settled and improved agreeable to the express condition of the Grant will absolutely be declared forfeited.” “But,” he continues, “I can’t imagine the Society will suffer theirs to be forfeited, for I am well convinced that less than £30 sterling from each proprietor will build all the mills, divide all the lands and pay every expense that has attended the settlement from first to last; and each proprietor will then have 7,000 acres of good land laid out into lots, mills built and everything ready and convenient to carry on and make a fine settlement of it.”
Glasier rarely complained of the difficulties with which he was confronted, but on one occasion be admits “I am in a very disagreeable situation and am heartily tired of it, and was it not for ingaging in the Mills, would curse and quit the whole business. I have not been well treated; to agents for all the Philadelphia and other Companys have been genteely appointed and every expence paid with honor. What I have done by myself has been ten times more than they all together and the expence not the fifth part in proportion.”
Whilst engaged in his work on the River St. John, Glasier was obliged to make occasional trips to Boston, taking passage usually in the vessels of Hazen, Simonds and White. The excitement produced in New England by the operation of the obnoxious Stamp Act gave him some concern. He writes in November, 1765, “I have some things to settle with the Governor & Council next time they 223 sit, that prevents my going to Boston by this vessel, but I shall go the next time she sails, if you Boston people don’t burn her, which I should be very sorry should happen as she carrys no stamps. My heart bleeds for my Country, what will be the end of all this?”
Two projects especially claimed Glasier’s attention in the summer of 1766: The first the founding of a town, the second the building of his saw-mill. “I propose,” he says, “to lay out the Town at Grimross in 80 squares, in addition to public squares; then they are to be numbered and drawn for by some person on the spot in the form of lottery tickets, which I shall have sent to the proprietors so that we may fix as many families as can be had this Summer on the Town lots. * * I must have young Mr. Morris from Halifax to survey and lay out the Town, as nothing can be done at Grimross before he arrives.”
In connection with the erection of the Nashwaak mills Capt. Glasier acknowledges his obligation to Hazen & Jarvis of Newburyport. He says: “They have procured me men to build the mills and stores of all kinds for the workmen.” The mill geer came this season, but on the 25th October Glasier writes, “The mills won’t be finished this fall, it is such a work it was not possible to get through with it. * * * * My time has been divided between the Mills and the Surveying. I am condemned to tarry here this winter and can know nothing of what is doing in the world.”
On the 2nd February following, he writes Mr. Nath’l Rogers of Boston, “We are now employed in getting logs to the mills. I hope we shall get them going early in the summer. They will begin to pay something of the expense before the fall. It’s impossible for me to tell you in a letter the expenses of the different branches of business which I am obliged to carry on to complete the whole. It is not only building mills, surveying, etc., but clearing up the land, building houses, making roads, hiring oxen (for we have not half enough of them) and in fine so much I shall never pretend to write it. James Simonds, Esq., who is the Bearer of this, will be able to inform you much better than I can. * * * I am determined to finish what I have undertaken and then quit it. I am not in the best situation in the world, as I believe you’ll think when I tell you I am not only shut out from all society and know nothing of what is carrying on in the world, but my stores are all expended, nor is there one thing to be bought here, pray send me last year’s magazines and some English newspapers as well as the Boston ones. * * * I should be glad if you’d send the oxen, they may be not old nor of the largest kind but good to draw. I pay half a dollar a day for each yoak I hire so that they’ll almost pay for themselves in one year in work. Those that we have here have worked more than one hundred days since I came, so that if we had been obliged to have hired them at the rate I pay others it would amount to a large sum. Twelve is the least that can be employed always at the mills hauling logs, as they will cut 8,000 feet a day, I am told, when they are finished. * * * * I told you I would not write you a long letter, as there is nothing I hate so much; it’s the D——l to have ten thousand things to say.”