By Bill Nichols
What is history? Is history alive? Is it old and boring? Is history just the past or can history be the present, like right now? My belief is that history can be all those things, except boring.
When you think of history, do you think of old books and photos or is history more about anecdotes, stories of the old days and of the people who lived way back when? Can history be you and me and the people that are living and making that history? What about the people that are tied to the people in our history?
As the president of the Historical Society, one of my jobs is to see that all requests of the society get answered in one way or another. We get phone calls, letters of request and, of course, numerous emails each month. As a group we do our best to find the information requested and respond as soon as we can. Since I still work full time, I can’t spend as much time in the historical room doing research on topics that interest me or setting up displays to keep the museum interesting. I do what I can, when I have time, and responding and fulfilling research requests is something I can do from home most of the time.
Over the last year or so our research requests have been growing and growing. March and April were especially busy months for requests. One of these requests came from a Jason Raleigh, and when I saw it, I knew it was something I needed to attend to immediately.
Jason is a direct descendant of Philip Raleigh (Riley), the first settler of Antrim back in 1744. Jason was working on his genealogy and was wondering if Philip was buried in Antrim and if so, where was he. According to Antrim history, and Reverend Warren Cochrane in particular, Philip Raleigh returned in his later years to Sudbury, Massachusetts, from whence he came. I emailed Jason with this information and left it at that.
A few days later my telephone rang and again it was Jason. He was curious as to how he could possibly locate the grave of his sixth great-grandfather. We talked about contacting the Sudbury town offices, the Sudbury Historical Society and Cemetery Commission, if one exists. We went back and forth through email over the next ten days, and I gathered as much information as I could about Philip using our three town histories, newspaper articles and anything else that we had accumulated over the past 244 years of incorporation.
Jason seemed to be very grateful for the research and emailed that he and his parents would like to come by for a visit, which of course I thought was a great idea. He picked Mother’s Day as a day that would work for them, and I made sure my schedule was clear and advised the Historical Society Board that he would be coming for a visit if they wanted to join us.
Now the hard part. What was I going to show him about his relative that would resonate with him? You see, there really isn’t much tangible left from Philip Raleigh. His cabin is long gone, and we don’t possess any of his tools or writings, if there ever were any. There’s not even a monument in honor of Antrim’s first settler.
Philip Raleigh was born in Ireland in 1711. He came to Boston some time before 1731 and on October 8, 1731, he married Susannah Joyner in Sudbury, Massachusetts. It is said that he had twelve children during his marriage with Susannah, and in the year 1744 he decided to look for a new home.
If you were to drive from Sudbury to Antrim today, it would take you about one hour and thirty-five minutes to travel the approximately sixty-three miles. As the crow flies, it’s about fifty-six miles, and it would take the average person twenty hours to walk that distance using roads. But in 1744, there were few roads, and none were leading to this area. What would possess a man to leave his wife and half a dozen children and head north to parts unknown, during a time when danger was everywhere?
Raleigh found a spot in Hillsborough, or so he thought, and began to build his very modest log cabin. In 1746, he got word of an attack by some Indians in Hopkinton, so he hid what tools he had in a log, abandoned his cabin and headed south again, leading everyone that followed to safety. Raleigh wouldn’t return for fifteen years.
When he did return, the year was 1759 and things had changed immensely. He could barely find his little log cabin amongst the growth of trees, but his tools were still where he had hidden them in a nearby log. Raleigh lived the next year alone. Not a soul for miles. Shortly thereafter, when the lines of Hillsborough were being drawn, Raleigh found that he was actually within the confines of what would come to be known as Antrim and not actually Hillsborough, as he had initially thought.
Around 1772, Raleigh decided to visit his nearest Antrim neighbor, John Gordon of North Branch. It was midsummer and Raleigh started his journey by climbing the nearest mountain, but he miscalculated, and darkness set in, so he spent the night on the mountain. When he arrived the next day and told Gordon of his travels, Gordon decided that the mountain should be named after his friend. To this day it is known as Riley Mountain.
Around 1788, Raleigh was listed in town records as a poor man and his son-in-law, Michael Cochlan, was put in charge of his care. For this, Michael Cochlan was freed from paying taxes. Around 1789, we believe Raleigh returned to Sudbury and by 1791 he had passed away. That in a nutshell is the life of Philip Raleigh in Antrim history.
When Jason and his family arrived in Antrim on Mother’s Day, I was waiting for them on the concrete steps in front of the library. I had decided where I would take them and what I would show them, but I feared that it wouldn’t be enough.
The Historical Society Board greeted the Raleighs and showed them around the museum on the second floor of the library. Luckily, Kathi Wasserloos had been working on a display of Antrim schools and there was a photo of the schoolchildren of 1902. Included in the photo were cousins of the Raleighs, Fred Clinton Raleigh and Flora Edith Raleigh. There was a map of Antrim which clearly showed Riley Mountain. I felt at this point they realized what Philip Raleigh, their ancestor, meant to the town. The man had a mountain named after him and there it was on a map.
After the museum tour, we headed towards the Hillsborough line so they could see the site of Philip Raleigh’s cabin. We took photos of Jason and his son, along with Jason’s dad, Steve. Three more generations of Raleighs in the same spot where their sixth great-grandfather had built his cabin 277 years ago. Then they turned around for a great view of Riley Mountain and more photos were taken.
As I said before, Philip Raleigh had twelve children, and Jason and his family are descended from Philip’s son Major Raleigh. Major lived in town and built the first house on the Old Turnpike Road, currently Ed Forster’s, back in 1780. So, of course, the Major Raleigh house was next on the tour. We visited there for a while and then the ticks and black flies got so bad it was time to say farewell. Jason and his family were headed to Hillsborough’s Pine Hill Cemetery to visit the grave of another ancestor, James Raleigh.
After the Raleighs left, a few of us stood and talked about the experience. In 2027, Antrim will be celebrating its Sestercentennial—250 years—and we thought “Wouldn’t it be nice to have the Raleighs return then and bring more of their relatives?” We think it would.
Later that evening, I received an email from one of the board members expressing her enjoyment of the afternoon which stated, “What a fun time with the Raleigh family! I wonder how many other towns can brag of a direct line to their first settler?” Perhaps it was just a rhetorical question, for it’s sure to not have an answer, but it does answer the question that history can be the present. We all experienced it that day and now it’s history.
You can talk and read about Philip Raleigh in the town’s histories, but when you visit the site of his cabin or the house his son Major built or look up at Riley Mountain and you’re doing it with the descendants of Philip Raleigh himself, that’s when you’re making history. That’s when history is alive.