The Daily Times and Chronicle, Tuesday, June 26, 1979

Burlington Past and Present, by John E. Fogelberg
(Article # 001)


The Wyman Association held its annual meeting a week ago
last Saturday on the grounds of the old Wyman House on Francis
Wyman Road. Arthur Wyman, a direct descendant of John Wyman and
a resident of this town, was re-elected President of the Assoc-
iation for the tenth time by those other members of his family
tree who came to the yearly business meeting and cookout.
Attendance this year, probably partly due to the gasoline
shortage, was down considerably from that of previous years and
from the high-water mark set in 1972 when 96 Wymans made the
trip.
Looking as if it were about to fall down or be blown away,
the old house was bought by the then new association of Wyman
descendants in 1900 and carefully restored. Today it is a
credit to their foresight and family pride, and a place to
which Burlington school children are taken from time to time to
emphasize Colonial living and local history.
Harold and Dolly Smith are the tenants and caretakers
today and have been since February of 1964. To them the old
house, its timbers held together with wooden pegs, its huge
central chimney, its floors no longer plumb, is a place to
love, and they have made it a warm and happy home once more.
Several years ago some archeology students from Brown Uni-
versity conducted a dig around the old place, but they found
nothing of any real significance. However, they did find sev-
eral artifacts which they estimated belonged to the time of
Christ, which indicates that the area may have been occupied by
Indian tribes from time to time.
It is known that during the early years of the house's
existence Indians did camp in the field across the road when
they wished to barter with the settlers, although the main
Indian encampment hereabouts was on ground now occupied by
Chestnut Hill Cemetery.
The brothers John and Francis Wyman came to New England in
1640 from a farm in Herts, England, about 25 miles from London.
Francis was just 21 at the time and John was two years younger.
Both came to Woburn when it was founded in 1642, were among the
32 original signers of the, Woburn Charter or Orders, and built
their houses and started their tannery business close to Cen-
tral Square on what is now Wyman Street, then called Wyman's
Lane. Their small colonial business was the forerunner and laid
the groundwork for the tremendous growth of the leather indus-
try which Woburn enjoyed until fairly recent times.
In 1655 the brothers bought from President Dunster of
Harvard College his 500 acre grant in Billerica for 100 pounds.
Ten years later they bought the adjoining 500 acres on this
side of the Billerica line from the estate of Martha Coggin,
called the Woburn Coytemore Grant, for only 50 pounds. On this
latter grant each brother built a farm house about a half mile
distant from one another. The one still stands, the other has
long since disappeared and its exact whereabouts forgotten.
Woburn records indicate that Francis Wyman was living on
his farm during the troublous times of an Indian uprising known
as King Philip's War. The Wyman family tradition has the house
occupied as a frontier post for the protection of farmers in
the Shawshin area of Woburn, since 1799 a part of the Town of
Burlington. Francis Wyman and his son Francis Jr. and John
Wyman and his son John, Jr. fought in that war, one killed in
the bloody Swamp Fight in 1675 and another dying, of wounds the
following year.
An amusing incident of those troubled and dangerous times
also found its place in the Mass. Archives because John Wyman,
then a Lieut. in the militia, and his daughter Bathsheba got
into trouble with the law.
In April of 1676 Indians had raided settlements in Chel-
msford and Billerica. The Billerica garrison was being bol-
stered by militia under the command of a Captain John Cutler
who gave to Constable John Seers a warrant to impress those
horses and other equipment which might be needed by his troops.
Knowing that John Wyman had two horses on his farm, here Seers
came to impress one of them. Then the fun began.
John Wyman, who no doubt felt that he and his family had
suffered enough already, refused to allow Seers to take one of
his horses. In fact Wyman physically refrained him from doing
so, and told one of his servants to ride the horse away. Seers'
seventeen year old grandson Daniel tried to interfere and was
promptly hit over the head with a stick wielded by Wyman's
black servant, Jim Carringbone. Daniel retaliated by calling
him a black rogue, struck him with his musket and threatened to
shoot him. Bathsheba Wyman and others now got into the act, and
Seers, now free of Wyman, "struck her," he said, "with a stick
upon the coats but not to hurt her at all." Somehow Seers did
manage to capture a horse but Wyman wrenched the bridle from
his hand with "many reviling speeches" and pushed him away.
Bathsheba stuck her foot out at the right time and poor Seers
ignominously fell to the ground, a rather undignified posture
for a Constable of the Crown. Seers called Wyman a heathen,
Bathsheba called Seers something far worse, Carringbone hit
Daniel again and a boy working for Wyman at the time rode the
horse away. "I was forced to go away without any horse,"
complained Seers to the General Court, "not withstanding the
great haste Captain Cutler was in."
The Court took a dim view of the whole affair and fined
both Wyman and his daughter forty shillings apiece. When Wyman
appealed the Court added the constable costs of six shillings,
adding what Wyman thought was an insult to an injury.
By 1694 the Woburn records show that Francis is assessed
for 370 acres of land, John's widow (John died in 1684) is
assessed for 115 acres, and a Lieut. John Wyman is assessed for
300 acres, all in Woburn. Some other large landowners at that
time were named Winn, Symes, Johnson, Richardson, Graves and
Simonds.
This part of Woburn became Burlington in 1799 and the old
house on Francis Wyman Road, then known as simply the Road to
Bedford, passed out of the hands of Wymans in 1820 when Abel
Wyman sold to Mathew Skelton, who in turn sold to Joshua Reed
in 1827. Reed continued to live there until he died in 1899 at
the age of 98. Actually no Wymans lived in Burlington for many
years until Arthur Wyman moved his family here in 1966. One of
his young sons is named John.