l6o TACTS RELATING TO GROTON, MASSACHUSETTS. 



"The Fitchburg Reveille," September 28, 1871, has the 

 following account of the start: 



The Balloon Ascension, which had been announced for Tuesday 

 [September 2 6 J, but failed to come off, took place at a quarter 

 to five o'clock [on Wednesday]. The airship, with its soUtary 

 passenger, rose gracefully and sailed rapidly away in an easterly 

 direction, wafted by the light, west wind, which was blowing at the 

 time. We learn by telegraph, that Prof King landed safely near 

 Groton Junction. 



•' The Fitchburg Sentinel," September 30, gives this ver- 

 sion : 



The balloon ascension which had been postponed from the 

 previous day [Tuesday] on account of the rain, took place at *a. 

 quarter to five [on Wednesday]. Prof. King, the aeronaut, after 

 leaving ^erra firma in his Air-ship " Aurora," rose to the height 

 of about half a mile, and then borne by a sHght breeze, floated 

 slowly off to the eastward, and after an hour's sail, landed in the 

 town of Ayer, without mishap. 



It is certainly a singular coincidence that an aeronaut, 

 going up from Boston Common, and sailing westward, in a 

 circuitous direction, should make a 'descent on a hill thirty- 

 miles away; and that the same man, some years later, going 

 up from Fitchburg and sailing eastward, should come down 

 on that identical hill, twelve miles away from the starting- 

 point, — and this without any design or intention on his part. 

 It seems to have been one of those accidents, which illustrate 

 the French proverb that " Nothing is more probable than the 

 improbable." 



THE SOUTH MILITARY COMPANY. 



The following copies of original papers were given me, 

 many years ago, by John S. H. Fogg, of South Boston, in 

 whose possession they were at that time. They relate to the 

 South Company of Groton, then commanded by Timothy 

 Bigelow, who afterward became Speaker of the Massachusetts 

 House of Representatives, as also did Luther Lawrence, to 



