Gambar halaman
PDF
ePub

jury, and the case was continued to December, when the verdict was set aside by the Court, and it was ordered that another jury be empanelled. The case was then continued to March, and again to June, 1811, when Nathan Fiske, Coroner, returned the verdict of the jury, which the Court set aside, and continued the case to the next September, when neither party appeared.

On petition of the town of Cambridge, setting forth that two cases in which said town was petitioner for a jury to assess the damages, if any, suffered by Andrew Craigie and William Winthrop for "land taken for the highway from the Canal Bridge to Cambridge Common," had accidentally been dropped from the docket of the Court of Sessions, and praying relief, the General Court, June 22, 1812, ordered the Court of Sessions "to restore said cases to the docket," and to proceed "as if they had never been dismissed therefrom." Accordingly, on the records of the Court of Sessions, Jan. 5, 1813, the former proceedings are recited, together with the action of the General Court, and a mandamus from the Supreme Judicial Court, requiring the Court of Sessions at this January Term, to "accept and cause to be recorded the verdict aforesaid, according to the law in such case made and provided, or signify to us cause to the contrary." The record proceeds thus: "And on a full hearing of the parties in the premises, the Court here do accept said verdict, and do order that it be recorded; which verdict is as follows: We, David Townsend jr., Thomas Biglow, Thomas Sanderson, Nathaniel Brown, William Wellington jr., Jonas Brown, Ephraim Peirce, Jacob Gale, Moses Fuller, Thadeus Peirce, Arthur Train, and Gregory Clark, having been summoned, empanelled, and as a jury sworn to hear and determine on the complaint of the town of Cambridge against Andrew Craigie, have heard the parties, duly considered their several allegations, and on our oaths do say, that, by the laying out and establishing of the highway from Cambridge Common to Canal Bridge, and by the passage of the same highway over lands of Andrew Craigie, the said Craigie has sustained no damage." It may be added, that the same proceedings were had in regard to the damage awarded to William Winthrop; and the jury, in like manner, determined that "the said Winthrop has sustained no damage."

Thus ended the exciting contest concerning Mount Auburn and Cambridge streets. I have entered so fully into the details, • partly because they illustrate the character of the long-continued rivalry between the two bridges, but chiefly because I have been

assured by the late Abraham Hilliard, Esq., that in the trial of the Cambridge Street case, the principle of law was first announced and established in the courts of this Commonwealth, that the damage which a land owner sustains by the taking of his land for a highway, and the benefit which he derives from its construction, shall be equitably adjusted, and offset against each other; and if the benefit be equal to the damage, he shall receive nothing

more.

14

CHAPTER XIV.

CIVIL HISTORY.

ALTHOUGH Cambridge was early abandoned as the seat of government, it maintained from the beginning a prominent rank among the towns in the Colony. It was designated, before the establishment of counties, as one of the four towns in which Judicial Courts should be held. Having until that time exercised the whole power of the Colony, both legislative and judicial, the General Court ordered, March 3, 1635–6, “That there shall be four courts kept every quarter; 1. at Ipswich, to which Neweberry shall belong; 2. at Salem, to which Saugus shall belong; 3. at Newe Towne, to which Charlton, Concord, Meadford, and Waterton shall belong; 4th, at Boston, to which Rocksbury, Dorchester, Weymothe, and Hingham shall belong. Every of these Courts shall be kept by such magistrates as shall be dwelling in or near the said towns, and by such other persons of worth as shall from time to time be appointed by the General Court, so as no court shall be kept without one magistrate at the least and that none of the magistrates be excluded, who can and will intend the same." And when the Colony was divided into counties, May 10, 1643,2 the courts continued to be held in Cambridge, as the shire-town of Middlesex. As "the business of the courts there is much increased," it was ordered, Oct. 19, 1652, that two additional sessions should be held for that county in each year, both at Charlestown. These courts were continued for many years, and a court house and jail were erected in that town. At a later date, courts were established and similar buildings erected in Concord, and also, at a comparatively recent day, at Lowell. All these places were regarded as "half-shires "; but the County Records were never removed from Cambridge, as the principal shire, except as follows: During the usurpation of Sir Edmund Andros, he appointed Capt. Laurence Hammond of Charlestown to be Clerk of the Courts and Register of Probate 2 Ibid., ii. 38.

1 Mass. Col. Rec.. i. 169.

and Deeds, who removed the records to Charlestown. After the revolution and the resumption of government under the forms of the old Charter, Captain Hammond denied that the existing courts had any legal authority, and refused to surrender the records which were in his possession. The General Court therefore ordered, Feb. 18, 1689-90, "that Capt. Laurence Hammond deliver to the order of the County Court for Middlesex the records of that county; that is to say, all books and files by him formerly received from Mr. Danforth, sometime Recorder of that County, as also all other books of record, and files belonging to said county in his custody."1 A year afterwards, Feb. 4, 1690-1, the Marshal General was directed to summon Captain Hammond to appear and show cause why he had not surrendered the Middlesex Records; and on the next day, he "peremptorily denying to appear," the General Court ordered the Marshal General to arrest him forthwith, with power to break open his house if necessary. The records were at length surrendered. Again, at a town meeting, May 11, 1716, an attempt was made to reclaim missing records: "Whereas the Register's office in the County of Middlesex is not kept in our town of Cambridge, which is a grievance unto us, Voted, that our Representative be desired to represent said grievance to the honorable General Court, and intreat an Act of said Court that said office may forthwith be removed into our town, according to law, it being the shire-town in said county."3 By the records of the General Court it appears that on the 8th of June, 1716, Colonel Goffe complained that no office for the registry of deeds was open in Cambridge, being the shire-town of Middlesex; the Representative of Charlestown insisted that his town was the shire; and a hearing was ordered.4 A week afterwards, June 15, " upon hearing of the towns of Cambridge and Charlestown as to their respective claims of being the shire-town of the County of Middlesex, resolved that Cambridge is the shire-town of said County. Read and non-concurred by the Representatives.' "5 The case between the two towns being again heard, June 13, 1717, it was resolved by the whole court, that "Cambridge is the shire-town of the said county;" and on the following day it was voted in concurrence" that the public office for registering of deeds and conveyances of lands for the County 1 Mass. Prov. Rec., vi. 117.

2 Ibid., vi. 173.

3 Samuel Phipps, Esq., of Charlestown, succeeded Captain Hammond as Register

of Deeds, and kept his office and the rec-
ords in Charlestown up to this time.
4 Mass. Prov. Rec., x. 63.

Ibid., p. 68.

6 Ibid., p. 145.

of Middlesex be forthwith opened and kept at the shire-town of Cambridge.' This order was immediately obeyed.

"1

66

I have not ascertained when or where the house was erected in which the judicial courts were first held in Cambridge. It seems to have been burned in 1671. In the Court Files of that year, is a document commencing thus: "At a County Court held at Cambridge, 4 (8) 1671. After the burning of the Court House, wherein was also burnt the Court Book of Records for trials, and several deeds, wills and inventories, that have been delivered into Court before the fire was kindled," etc. The Court afterwards passed this order: Upon information that several Records belonging to this County were casually burnt in the burning of the house where the Court was usually kept, this Court doth order that the Recorder take care that out of the foul copies and other scripts in his custody he fairly draw forth the said Records into a Book, and present the same to the County Court, when finished: and that the Treasurer of the County do allow him for the same." 3 The first Court House of which we have any definite knowledge, was erected, about 1708, in Harvard Square, nearly in front of the present Lyceum Hall. It appears by the Proprietors' Records that "at a meeting of the Proprietors of Cambridge, orderly convened, the 26 day of January 1707-8, Voted, That the land where Mr. John Bunker's shop now stands, with so much more as will be sufficient to erect the Court House upon (to be built in this town), be granted for that end, in case a Committee appointed by the Proprietors do agree with Andrew Bordman and John Bunker for building a lower story under it. . . . . Deac. Nathaniel Hancock, Jason Russell, and Lieut. Amos Marrett, were chosen a committee to agree with said Bunker and Bordman about building under the said house."

The Committee reported, Feb. 9, 1607-8: "Pursuant to the aforesaid appointment, we, the subscribers above mentioned, have agreed with and granted liberty unto the said John Bunker and Andrew Bordman to make a lower room under the said

1 Mass. Prov. Rec., x. 147.

2 The volume which was burned contained the Records after October, 1663, up to October 4, 1671.

8 County Court Rec., iii. 173.

4 This Court House stood where the Market House was erected more than a century later. Its position is indicated

on a pen and ink plan drawn about 1750, and here reproduced by permission of its owner, Henry Wheatland, M. D., of Salem. The Court House (called Townhouse on the plan) stood further south than is here represented, its northerly end being several feet south of the southerly front of the meeting-house.

« SebelumnyaLanjutkan »