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Chapter 1:
Name and location.
Medford, a town in
Middlesex County, Massachusetts, lies in 42° 25′ 14″ 42, north latitude, and 71° 07′ 14″ 32, west longitude.
It is about five miles N. N. W. from the
State House in
Boston; and about four miles N. W. by N. from Bunker-Hill Monument.
It borders on
Somerville,
West Cambridge,
Winchester,
Stoneham,
Melrose, and
Malden.
It received the name of Meadford from the adventurers who arrived at
Salem, in May, 1630, and came thence to settle here in June.
When these first comers marked the flatness and extent of the marshes, resembling vast meads or meadows, it may have been this peculiarity of surface which suggested the name of Meadford, or the “great meadow.”
In one of the earliest deeds of sale it is written Metford, and in the records of the
Massachusetts Colony, 1641, Meadfoard.
The Selectmen and Town-clerks often spelled it Meadford ; but, after April, 1715, it has been uniformly written
Medford.
No reason is given for these changes; and why it received its first name, history does not tell us.
Josselyn in 1638, writes thus: “On the north-west side of the (Mystic) river is the town of Mistick, three miles from
Charlestown, a league and a half by water.”
This author gives the name of Mistick to land on the north side of the river, and reports a thriving population as then gathered between the two brick houses, called
forts, which are yet standing.
At that early period, boundary lines were indefinitely settled, and names as
