OXFORD HILLS  — With much of Oxford Hills missing out on Independence Day events it is appropriate to consider some of the figures who made American independence possible, fighting for it during the American Revolution. After the war, dozens of veterans made their way east to settle the Maine frontier and make their marks on the fledgling nation. Here are the stories of three different war veterans who took different paths to the area and became part of its lore.

Norway

Jacob Frost, who settled in Norway in 1800, was one of those soldiers whose legend is true but included at least a token of embellishment that took root through the years.

A native of Tewkesbury, Mass, Frost was a soldier with the colonial army that met British troops at the Battle of Bunker Hill. After being wounded in the hip by a musket ball he was captured and imprisoned at Fort Halifax. Despite receiving little medical attention and with the bullet lodged in his hip, Frost and three fellow Americans managed to remove a stone from the wall of their prison cell and dig their way out beneath it.

Although one man was unfortunately too large to squeeze through the escape tunnel, Frost and two of his comrades began making their way west towards Massachusetts. Their plan to evade recapture was to travel under cover of darkness and hide during daylight hours. The still injured Frost was concealed by the other two soldiers with leaves under a blown down tree while they hid separately.

As Frost nestled in his makeshift blind, a group of British soldiers dispatched to recover the escaped prisoners sat on the very tree he was hidden under, discussing their orders and likely providing details that allowed the Americans to evade them once the sun set.

The trio had received little to eat in prison and so saved almost no rations ahead of their escape; hunger was at times the most dangerous threat they faced. Stopping at one farm, the most they could pilfer was an old shoe which they tore into shares and chewed. Frost is to have said the leather was the sweetest morsel he ever ate.

Occasionally they managed to rustle up a hen out of a barn but as DownEast Maine was largely inhabited by Tories, colonists loyal to England, they dared not build fires for cooking and ate their meals raw.

One day they dared knock on a colonist’s door to beg for food. Against the odds, the woman of the house invited them in to hastily eat and take more food with them before her husband returned, certain that he would turn them over to the Tory authorities.

In 1800 when Frost traveled north, this time immigrating from Massachusetts to Norway, he carried with him a cannon ball inscribed with his name and that of Bunker Hill, where he presumably recovered it from. That ball is now in the collections housed at the Norway Historical Society.

“The cannon ball is attributed to Jacob Frost,” says Susan Denison, curator for the historical society. “We also know darn well that he didn’t take it Halifax with him, although it’s possibly true it was from Bunker Hill.

“It was at the Norway Library for years and years, I remember it as a kid. It’s probably a cannon ball from that era and maybe it came from Bunker Hill. That it was a souvenir taken by Jacob Frost is unlikely, because we know what happened to him.”

There was, however, one souvenir that Frost certainly carried from Boston to Halifax, back to Massachusetts and then finally to Norway. And that is the musket ball that put him out of the battle and into enemy hands during the Battle of Bunker Hill. The bullet had been left in his hip since 1775 and was only removed in the 1830s, a few years before he died.

Paris

Isaac Bolster came to Paris with his family in 1784. Born in Uxbridge, Mass. on April 27, 1825, Bolster’s first military service came in the 1750s during the French and Indian Wars. Not much is known about his role in the colonial militia then. He married Mary Dwinell in 1761; the couple had their first child the same year.

More is known about Bolster’s time in the Continental Army during the American Revolution, thanks in part to a soldier he recruited as the war began in April 1775, Samuel Bixby. Bixby kept a diary of his time in Capt. Bolster’s regiment, providing glimpses into happenings during the next several months.

Bixby’s entry of June 17, 1775 indicates that Bolster’s troops were not engaged when the colonists clashed with the British Army at Bunker Hill. Stationed at Roxbury, Bixby makes note of General George Washington arrival on July 5. At that time Bolster’s unit was engaged in building fortifications in case of an enemy attack.

Late that summer tragedy struck Bolster’s family when three of his seven children all died within two days of one another.

According to family accounts, Bolster reenlisted in 1776, serving that year in the New York Campaign where Washington struggled to keep his army intact while attempting to wrest a superior enemy from its stronghold of New York City.

By 1780 Bolster was focused on business ventures, acquiring land in Oxford and Hebron, Maine and settling there with his family in 1784. His last and 11th child, Solomon, was born in Paris in 1789. Only three of his children would outlive him, Abraham (second, born 1763), Deacon Isaac (fifth, born 1769) and David (10th, born 1782).

Bolster was also involved with local politics, serving as selectman and allying himself with the region’s proprietors. He was among those who opposed Paris incorporating as its own town, which was granted in 1793 by the faraway state government in Massachusetts.

As a Paris resident, Bolster made his living as a trader and operated a store/tavern. His account books during the 1790s listed products like rum, rice, fish, wine, salt, tea, scythes, molasses, sugar and spices.

After Bolster’s wife Mary died in 1814 he remarried to Aphia Stephens Smith of Turner. Little of Aphia’s life is recorded but their marriage was also her second. She had married Seba Smith in 1788; their son of the same name would become one of Maine’s early noted humorists.

When he died on April 27, 1825 Aphia was granted $800 from debts owed to Bolster by others, indicating that he was also in the loan business.

Bolster’s will also stated that Aphia would receive from his estate: “…I give her all my household furniture and her own wearing apparel, also one cow; also I give her the wool of five sheep so long as she shall remain single … also I give her the use of my horse and chaise and harness and my sleigh and harness so long as she shall remain single, also I give her the use of my bridle and side saddle…”

The bulk of his estate seems to have been distributed among his three surviving sons.

While it is not known what motivated Bolster to place future conditions on his widow’s inheritance, it did not motivate her to mourn his death very long; by November of 1825 Aphia Stephens Smith Bolster married her third husband, John S. Carey of Leeds.

As one of the town’s early residents, Bolster put an influential stamp on Paris through community leadership, real estate and business dealings, and the generations of Bolsters to come.

Norway

Born in 1759 (with the last name “Buck”), Samuel Ames was 16 years old at the start of the American Revolution. He served in the conflict for one year, as a drummer in Col. Wesson’s Ninth Massachusetts Regiment in Saratoga, NY.

While some of the Revolutionary War veterans who found their way to Norway following the war had more dramatic narratives, such as Jacob Frost or Lemuel Shedd, who acted as a body guard to General George Washington and carried his messages to General Horatio Gates during the campaign that saw British General John Burgoyne surrender to Gates’ army in 1777, Ames made substantial contributions that helped the Norway community solidify and grow.

Ames moved to Norway from Paris in 1789, just a few years after the town’s original settlers began clearing what was then known as “Rustfield” and named for its founding developer, George Rust of Salem, Mass.

Ames is said to have been the first miller of the community; built the first “habitation” in the village and also the town’s first wagons. Ames is listed as a founder of the Universalist Church that formed in 1799 and incorporated in 1805. His legend states that it was he who beat the first drum ever heard in Norway.

Ames could also possibly claim the title of Norway’s first conservationist. Outdoor enthusiasts today have him to thank for Norway’s ancient open space gem, Ordway Grove. Ames purchased the property when he moved to Norway and acted as protector and steward for its stand of pines, some of which may date from the end of the 17^th century and have recorded heights approaching 140 feet and girths of 11 feet.

Ames held onto the property for the rest of his life. After he died in 1852 it was eventually sold to John A. Ordway who held title to it until the 1880s. The forest then changed hands several times, often at risk of being lumbered and also rejected by the town of Norway for a park space during the 1920s.

In 1931 the last 10 acres of Ordway Grove was rescued by an anonymous buyer who then donated it to Norway’s Twin Town Nature Club, where it remains protected and open to the public.

Ames also provided first-person accounts to David Noyes near the final days of his life as the latter compiled the first history of Norway.

He passed away in Greenwood on August 23, 1852.

 

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