a short time, became the great Colony of Massachusetts Bay. Du- 

 ring these last two years the Plymouth people seem also to have 

 carried on the fishing business at Cape Ann, having had, in 1625, 

 two vessels engaged in it, but their efforts in this direction were also 

 abandoned at the end of the last named year. 



A spot on the westerly side of the principal harbor of the Cape, 

 the largest tract of land on its borders fit for planting, has always 

 been pointed at by tradition as the spot occupied by these first Eng- 

 lish occupants, and early records designate the place as " ffisher- 

 man's field." Here they dried their fish and gave some attention to 

 the cultivation of the soil, receiving an occasional visit from the na- 

 tives probably for purposes of trade ; and we can scarcely doubt 

 that they sometimes ascended the high ledge of rock on the shore, 

 so marked a feature on the spot, to look down upon the settlement 

 and the queers-shaped and singularly-rigged vessels tying at anchor 

 off their "stage" or wharf; and to enjoy a view of the beautiful 

 sheet of water before them, embosomed as it then was in a girdle of 

 the original forest. 



How soon after the departure of Conant and his company Cape 

 Ann became the residence of new settlers, it is impossible to tell. 

 From a sermon of the last century it seems to have had inhabitants 

 in 1633, and there can be no doubt that fishing was " set forward, 

 and some stages builded" as early as 1639. In 1642 the settlement 

 had grown to such consequence by the arrival of Rev. Richard Blyn- 

 man with several others from Plymouth Colon}^, and a few families 

 from Salem, that, in May of that } T ear, it was established to be a 

 plantation and called Gloucester. The whole number of settlers to 

 the close of 1650 was eight3*-two, about one-third of whom remained 

 in town and found here their final resting-place. Of a few of these, 

 Babson, Bray, Da}^, Elwell, Haskell, Ingersol, Robinson, Sargent, 

 and Somes, descendants continue at the present time. 



Strange as it ma}^ seem, there is nothing to show that the first 

 settlers of Gloucester were fishermen. A very few may have been 

 engaged in that occupation, in a small way ; but it is certain that 

 almost all of them were emploj-ed on the land and not on the sea. 

 Several of them were ship-carpenters, and one of these, William 

 Stevens, was one of the most prominent of the settlers. He enjoyed 

 some fame in his occupation before he came to New England, as the 

 builder of the " Royal Merchant," a great ship of 600 tons, at Lon- 

 don ; and we know that he built a ship in Gloucester in 1661 ; and 

 perhaps he built many others in the intervening years. Though it 



