Northborough, Massachusetts

A HISTORY of  NORTHBOROUGH

A History of Northborough

Northborough’s origins  begin with the history of the vast land area to its east which was previously all part of what is known today as the town of Sudbury. Sudbury was the nineteenth town in the Massachusetts Bay Colony and only the second to be “situated beyond the flow of the tide”. It was settled and incorporated in 1639. Originally it was bounded on the east by that part of Watertown which is now known as Weston, on the north by Concord, and southerly and westerly by “the wilderness,” or the unclaimed lands of the Colony.  After  the settlement of Sudbury, the residents reached out for new acquisitions of land and the establishment of other communities.  The first occupations of lands were to the south in the areas that are now Wayland, Framingham and Natick.  Attention was then turned westerly to the areas that are now known as Marlborough, Northborough, Southborough, Westborough and Hudson.  In 1656, the following Petition was presented to the General Court:-

To the Hon. Governor & e assembled in Boston.  The humble Petition of several of the inhabitants of Sudbury whose names are here underwritten showeth that whereas your Petitioners have lived divers years in Sudbury and God hath pleased to increase our children which are now divers of them grown into years so that we should be glad to see them settled before the Lord take us away from hence and also gad having given us some comfortable cattle so that we are so straightened that we cannot so comfortably subsist as could be desired and some of us having taken some pains to view the country we have found a place which lyeth westward about eight miles from Sudbury which we conceive might be comfortable for our subsistance, it is therefore the humble request of your Petitioners to this Hon’d Court that you bee pleased to grant unto us eight miles square or so much land as may containe to eight miles square for to make a Plantation.”

This Petition was signed by the following parties:  Edmund Rice, Wm. Ward, Thomas King, John Wood, Thomas Goodnow, John Ruddock, Henery Rice, John How, John Bent Sr., John Maynard, Richard Newton, Peter Bent, Edward Rice.

An affirmative answer was given to the Petition at a General Court session held in Boston, May 14, 1656.  A committee was appointed to lay out bounds and to make a report to the “Court of Election.”

Thirteen petitioners settled within the new area called “Marlborrow.” The population increased and in 1716 the General Court received two new petitions from two different groups seeking to set off further lands on the westerly edge.  The petitions sought overlapping sections of this area but were finally reconciled, combined and approved on November 18, 1717 and the town of Westborough was formally incorporated and separated from the other lands.  Less than thirty families occupied this new town which was oddly shaped being narrow and especially long from North to South. The town continued to grow and by 1742 it had swelled to include more than one hundred families.

A dispute began to arise among those residing in the “north side” who were primarily congregated in the far upper portions in the Ball Hill area and outnumbered by the south siders. There was a sense among the north siders that they were not getting equal treatment in representation so efforts were made to elect one of their own. In addition, the location of the only meetinghouse, although in the geographic center of town, was much further for those residing in the north. In 1743, the town meeting refused to build another meetinghouse.  By 1744 the northsiders had stepped up efforts for separation and the “North Precinct” was established that year.  It was not until an additional twenty-two years had passed, in 1766, the advocates of separation were successful and the town of Northborough was born.