eM Mackay, Zhe Terns of Pentkese Island, Mass. 279 
islands extending from southern Massachusetts towards the west- 
ward, which are called the Elizabeth Islands. These islands 
divide the waters between the. mainland and the island of 
Marthas Vineyard. That portion of the ocean at the southward 
is known as Vineyard Sound, and that to the northward as 
Buzzards Bay, so named by the early settlers of Dartmouth on the 
adjoining mainland, it is supposed, from the abundance of the Fish 
Hawks (Pandion haliaétus carolinensis) formerly found there, these 
birds being called Buzzardet or little Buzzard in the earlier works 
on natural history. 
It was on the westernmost island of this group that their dis- 
coverer, Bartholomew Gosnold, landed in 1602, and built a fort 
and storehouse, on a small islet in a pond at the western end of 
the island, which he named Elizabeth, in honor of the English 
queen of that name. This island, of about five hundred and 
sixteen acres, is known to the present generation as Cuttyhunk, 
and by the Indians as Poocutohhunkunnop. It was formerly 
wooded with trees of various kinds. Situated at the entrances 
of Buzzards Bay and Vineyard Sound, with an altitude of one 
hundred feet above the sea, it affords one of the finest marine 
views to be obtained: on the coast. 
A little less than a mile away, in a north-northeast direction, 
is another small island of about seventy-five acres of upland, 
with an elevation of eighty feet, and formerly covered with cedars, 
none of which now remain. This island was named Hills Hap, 
by Gosnold, and from which he is said to have taken a canoe 
which he carried to England on his return. Locally this island 
was sometimes called Pune, but is known to the outside world as 
Penikese, which last name is spelled in quite a variety of ways. 
Nearly a mile from Penikese in an easterly direction is a gravelly 
shoal called Gull Island, and still farther away in the same direction 
lies Nashawena Island, which is distant a little over two miles, 
and on the southeast end of which, at Fox Point, a few Terns are 
said to breed. This at present treeless island is about three and 
a half miles long by one anda half miles wide, and contains 
about twenty-five hundred acres. 
"I have availed myself of Ricketson’s History of New Bedford for several 
references. 
