HISTORY OF THE TOWN OF MEDFORD, Middlesex County, Massachusetts, FROM ITS FIRST SETTLEMENT, IN 1630, TO THE PRESENT TIME, 1855.
Charles Brooks, Ed.

Dec. 4, 1638.--Three persons having been drowned, at Charlestown Ferry, by the careless upsetting of a canoe, the court “ordered that no canoe should be used at any ferry, upon pain of £ 5; nor should any canoe be built in our jurisdiction before the next General Court, upon pain of £ 10.”

Sept. 9, 1639.--Registration of births, marriages, and deaths, expressly required; and to be sent annually to the court.

1640.--Matthew Cradock was a member of Parliament from London.

June 2, 1641.--“The bounds for Charlestown Village (Woburn) are to be set out by Captain Cooke, Mr. Holliocke, and Mr. John Oliver, the contents of four mile square.”

Mr. Carter, the first minister of Woburn, was ordained 1642, when seventy-seven ministers had been ordained in New England.

1642.--Confederation against the Indians recommended by the General Court.

May 10, 1643.--The General Court appointed a committee to lay out a road from Cambridge to Woburn.

1643.--Middlesex was the first to recommend and adopt the division of territory into counties.

Mr. Edward Collins was chosen by Cambridge a representative in the General Court; but he did not attend. They required him to give reasons for his neglect, or pay twenty shillings.

1644.--Medford was called to mourn the death of its founder, Matthew Cradock, Esq.; and, in 1649, lost a friend and neighbor, in the death of Governor Winthrop.

1644.--It was customary with the early settlers in Medford to attend public worship in the neighboring towns when they had no preaching within their own plantation. On a sabbath, in the year 1644, when it was a serious loss to have “the go-to-meeting-bonnet” injured, the following semi-tragic scene occurred near Mystic Bridge. We give the narrative in the words of Governor Winthrop ( “Journal,” vol. II. p. 161): “One Dalkin and his wife, dwelling near Meadford, coming from Cambridge, where they had spent their sabbath, and being to pass over the river at a ford, the tide not being fallen enough, the husband adventured over, and, finding it too deep, persuaded his wife to stay a while; but, it raining very sore, she would needs adventure over, and was carried away with the stream past her depth. Her husband, not daring to go help her, cried out; and thereupon his dog, being at his house near by, came forth, and, seeing something in the water, swam to her; and she caught hold of the dog's tail: so he drew her to the shore, and saved her life.” If, at this time, it was flood-tide in Medford, there can be no doubt that marital chivalry was at a very low ebb. We related this hair-breadth escape to a lady of Medford, who instantly exclaimed, “I would have thrown my inhuman husband into the river, and then married the human dog!”

March 4, 1645.--“Whereas complaint hath been made to this ”