Algonquian history Before the 17th century, the lands that now constitute Dartmouth had been inhabited by
Algonquian-speaking people.
John Winthrop (1587–1649), the English leader of the
Massachusetts Bay Colony, wrote in his journal that the indigenous community inhabiting the territory that would become Dartmouth was that of the Nukkehkammes. The
Wampanoag, with a population is believed to have been about 12,000, had settlements throughout the territory that is now southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island, including
Martha's Vineyard and
Nantucket.
Massasoit (c. 1581 – 1661),
sachem of the Wampanoag, administered a territory roughly corresponding to
Bristol and
Plymouth counties. The
Narragansett inhabited areas to the West. Gosnolds explorations of the area took him to
Round Hill, which he named Hap's Hill. Additionally he described the territories of Dartmouth as being covered in fields with flowers,
beech and cedar groves. He picked wild strawberries, and noticed deer. He also saw the
Apponagansett River which runs through Padanaram Harbor, and the
Acushnet River. Settled sparsely by the natives, with the arrival of the pilgrims in Plymouth, the region gradually began to become of interest to the colonists, until a meeting was held to officially purchase the land.
Old Dartmouth people around 1620, between the first European explorations of the Acushnet River in 1602 and the establishment of Old Dartmouth in 1652. On March 7, 1652, English colonists met with the native tribe and purchased
Old Dartmouth—a region of that now contains the modern cities and towns of Dartmouth,
Acushnet,
New Bedford,
Fairhaven, and
Westport—in a treaty between the Wampanoag—represented by Chief Ousamequin
(Massasoit) and his son
Wamsutta—and high-ranking "Purchasers" and "Old Comers" from
Plymouth Colony:
John Winslow,
William Bradford,
Myles Standish, Thomas Southworth, and John Cooke. 30 yards of cloth, eight moose skins, fifteen axes, fifteen hoes, fifteen pair of breeches, eight blankets, two kettles, one cloak, £2 in wampum, eight pair of stockings, eight pair shoes, one iron pot and 10 shillings in another commoditie [sic]. While the Europeans considered themselves full owners of the land through the transaction, the Wampanoag have disputed this claim because the concept of exclusive
land ownership—in contrast with hunting, fishing, and farming rights—was a foreign concept to them. According to the European interpretation of the deed, in one year, all Natives previously living on the land would have to leave. This led to a lengthy land dispute as the deed did not define boundary lines, and merely referred to the ceded land as, "that land called Dartmouth" About six months after the official purchase, Dartmouth began to be settled by English immigrants around November 1652, and it was officially incorporated in 1664.
Quakers , built in 1791, is the oldest Quaker meeting house in southeastern Massachusetts. The site had been used by the Quaker community since at least 1699. Members of the
Religious Society of Friends, also known as
Quakers, were among the early European settlers on the
South Coast. They had faced persecution in the
Puritan communities of
Plymouth Colony and
Massachusetts Bay Colony; the latter banned the Quakers in 1656–1657. When the
Massachusetts Bay Colony annexed the Plymouth Colony in 1691, Quakers already represented a majority of the population of Old Dartmouth. One reason for this is that the inhabitants enjoyed their independence from the Plymouth Colony and they did not want to have a large enough population for the Plymouth court to appoint them a minister. In this conflict,
Wampanoag tribesmen, allied with the
Narragansett and the
Nipmuc, raided Old Dartmouth and other European settlements in the area.
Revolutionary War One of the minutemen signalled by
Paul Revere spread the alarm of the approaching British forces into Dartmouth, after moving through
Acushnet,
Fairhaven, and Bedford Village. Three companies of Dartmouth
Minutemen were marched out of the town on April 21, 1775, by Captain Thomas Kempton to a military camp in Roxbury, joining 20,000 other soldiers. Prior to the
war Kempton had been a whaler in
New Bedford. The additional two Dartmouth companies were led by Captain's Dillingham and Egery. The last Dartmouth town meeting called in the name of
George III occurred in February 1776. Also in 1776, and again in 1779, Dartmouth voters where called upon to sit on the Committee of Correspondence, Safety and Inspection, with the job of looking for individuals performing treasonous acts—and to report them to the War Council. Dartmouth had two companies of soldiers in the 18th Regiment of the Bunker Hill Army. No Dartmouth troops were ever again ordered north following March 17, 1776. In 1778 the village of Padanaram was raided by British troops as part of
Grey's raid. The village was then known as Akin's Landing, and following Elihu Akin driving three
Loyalists out of the village in September 1778, British raiding parties burned down most of the village, focusing on Akin's properties. The raiders targeted Akin specifically because he had expelled the Loyalists from Dartmouth. They forced Akin to move to his only remaining property, a small home on Potters Hill—the
Elihu Akin house. Elihu never financially recovered from the attack and died poor, he lived at the house until he died in 1794. Fixing the damage to the town from the raid cost £105,960 in 1778. Which is roughly equivalent to nine million dollars in today's money. In honor of Elihu, and to commemorate his earlier shipbuilding, the village of Padanaram was called Akin's Wharf for 20 years after the war.
Civil War Prewar years , built at
Russells Mills Village in 1805, was rammed and sunk by a
sperm whale bull in 1851. In the years before the
Civil War, in the early 1840s, Dartmouth launched a whaling vessel owned by Sanford and Sherman, had a bowling Alley burn down, as well as hosting an Abstinence rally with some shops refusing to sell
Rum and cider. In 1855, the town was home to one
cotton mill, three
salt works, one factory that made
railroad cars, sleighs, wagons, and coaches, two
tanneries, seven
shoemakers, and five shingle mills, as well as launching one ship. The town had an abundance of livestock, including over a thousand sheep and cows. 850 swine. 428 oxen. As well as 4102 acres of English hay, and 712 acres of
Indian corn.
1861 The first town meeting in Dartmouth related to the Civil War was held on May 16, 1861, and contained a preamble about the towns stance on the war. In 1862, the town of Dartmouth voted to pay volunteers for the war.
William Francis Bartlett stopped in Dartmouth after being wounded at the
Siege of Yorktown. Several Dartmouth soldiers were at the
Second Battle of Bull Run. George Lawton, Leander Collins, Robert H. Dunham, Frederick Smith, Joseph Head, Abraham R. Cowen, and John Smith were all present at the battle. They served in the 8th Battery MVM, the 16th, and 18th Regiment MVI, and the light artillery. In the New Bedford Republican Standards August 18, 182 issue it was reported that a Dartmouth town meeting voted to pay a $200 bounty to nine-month volunteers. In the month following the
Battle of Antietam, many Dartmouth men joined the 3rd regiment of infantry in the Massachusetts Volunteer Militia. They completed training at
Camp Joe Hooker in
Lakeville before leaving for Boston on October 22, 1862. They then embarked on the Merrimac and Mississippi for
New Bern, North Carolina. Dartmouth then proceeded to fulfil its second quota, sending 20 men to Company F, and three to company G. At the
Battle of Fredericksburg, Private Joseph Head, a machinist, Frederick Smith, a seaman, and Frederick H. Russell—all from Dartmouth—were injured. Isaac S. Barker, a carpenter, was killed.
1863 On March 3, 1863, the town voted to raise $5,000 for monthly payments of aid for families of volunteers. Acting Master James Taylor of the
ironclad warship USS Keokuk arrived at his Dartmouth home on April 21, 1863. He looked "as if he had suffered anything but defeat," after the Keokuk attacked
Fort Sumter and was riddled with bullet holes. Dartmouth soldiers also fought at the
Battle of Gettysburg. Three soldiers served in the 1st Regiment MVI, one in the 16th, and 33rd, and six in the 18th.
David Lewis Gifford was a
Union Army soldier from Dartmouth, who received the
Medal of Honor. He enlisted in December 1863, at age 1— as a member of the
4th Massachusetts Cavalry Regiment. Following the steamer the USS
Boston running aground on an
Oyster bed, leaving 400 individuals within range of
Confederate artillery. Gifford and four other men—led by
George W. Brush—manned a small boat and ferried stranded soldiers to a safe area.
1864 In April 1864, the people of Dartmouth voted to raise money to fill the quota of men for the service. At the
Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, Bradford Little from Dartmouth was wounded, and Edwin C. Tripp from Dartmouth died at the
Battle of Cold Harbor. Three Dartmouth men were wounded at the
Siege of Petersburg. Thos. C Lapham wrote to his uncle on Chase Road in Dartmouth from General Hospital Number One in
Murfreesboro, Tennessee on January 20, 1864. He described the cold weather in what he called
Old Dartmouth, as well as writing about his maladies while serving in the South, and morale among the troops, before sending his regards to his family in Dartmouth. Nahum Nickelson was another resident of Dartmouth who served in the Civil War. He enlisted in the
35th Massachusetts Infantry Regiment as a drummer in March 1864. He trained for five weeks in Boston Harbor before taking a transport ship to
Alexandria, Virginia, where he joined the
Battle of the Wilderness and the battles in Cold Harbor, and Petersburg. He was mustered out in July 1865. Once returning to Dartmouth, he built a home and would eventually be rewarded the Boston Cane, which was awarded to the oldest living resident in Dartmouth, and would be buried in the Padanaram cemetery, where he used to be a caretaker. Private Humphrey R. Davis (a seaman from Dartmouth) died in May 1864 as a
prisoner of war in
Andersonville Prison. During the
1864 United States presidential election, 384 people in Dartmouth voted to reelect
Abraham Lincoln.
Modern history The
Watuppa Branch railroad started to serve Dartmouth in 1875. During the late 19th century its coastline became a summer resort area for wealthy members of New England society.
Lincoln Park was established in 1894 by the Union Street Railway Co. of New Bedford, and became an amusement park in the mid-20th century with rides such as the
wooden roller coaster The Comet.
Round Hill was the site of early-to-mid 20th century research into the uses of
radio and
microwaves for
aviation and
communication by
MIT scientists, including physicist
Robert J. Van de Graaff. There in 1933 he built the world's largest air-insulated Van de Graaff generator (now located at the
Museum of Science (Boston)). It is also the site of the Green Mansion, the estate of "Colonel"
Edward Howland Robinson Green, a colorful character who was son of the even more colorful and wildly eccentric
Hetty Green. In 1936, the Colonel died. The estate fell into disrepair as litigation over his vast fortune continued for eight years between his widow and his sister. Finally, the court ruled that Mrs. Hetty Sylvia Wilks, the Colonel's sister, was the sole beneficiary. In 1948, she bequeathed the entire estate to MIT, which used it for microwave and laser experiments. The giant antenna, which was a landmark to sailors on Buzzards Bay, was erected on top of a 50,000-gallon water tank. Although efforts were made to preserve the structure, it deteriorated and was demolished on November 19, 2007. Another antenna was erected next to the mansion and used in the development of the
Ballistic Missile Early Warning System. MIT continued to use Round Hill through 1964. It was sold to the
Society of Jesus of New England and was used as a retreat house. The upper floors were divided into 64 individual rooms. The main floor was fitted with a chapel, a library, and meeting rooms. In 1970 the Jesuits sold the land and buildings to Gratia R. Montgomery. In 1981, Mrs. Montgomery sold most of the land to a group of developers who have worked to preserve the history, grandeur and natural environment. The property is now a gated, mostly summer residential community on the water featuring a nine-hole golf course. In 1980
Sunrise Bakery and Coffee Shop opened its first store in Dartmouth. The town appeared in national news in 2013 when
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, then a university student at Dartmouth, participated in the
Boston Marathon bombing. ==Geography==