stevenpiziks | Groton: The Exploration

Yesterday we got the car out of hock at the garage and drove to Groton, Massachusetts.

Groton is the town where Darwin's family is from. Several families founded the town in the 1600s, and Darwin is descended from nearly all of them: the Bloods, the Laurence's, the Nuttings. The list goes on. Since most of his family lines intersect here, he's been interested in visiting for years. Today was the day.

Groton is a smallish town in rural Massachusetts. It's in a deep, wide valley with a bunch of other small towns strung like beads along the string of an extremely busy two-lane highway. We drove slowly through Groton, noting the library, the town hall, the Groton Inn (est. 1640), various churches, and lots and lots of houses built in the 1700s. Darwin was enchanted and fascinated.

And then we found the cemetery. "The Old Burying Ground" they officially call it. It's across the street from a church, and was probably at the edge of town when it was first platted. It's a tree-covered cemetery surrounded by a low stone wall that was built in segments during the 1800s, if the inscriptions on the wall are any clue. (At one point you can see where they got a new or different mason to do the building--the wall becomes suddenly loose and shoddy.). We later learned that although there's lots of unmarked space, the yard is actually stuffed full of burials, with no more room for more. It looks emptier because a great many graves were unmarked or marked with wooden monuments or with stone monuments that didn't survive. The latest grave we found was form the 1940s. Most were from the 1700s and 1800s.

We found a lot of stones for Darwin's ancestors and distant cousins, including some from his great-something-grandparents. Darwin was a little overwhelmed at finding the graves of people he'd been reading about or researching for years. We found an awful grave marked with a double stone. It was for a three-year-old and and eighteen-month old who died within a day of each other of throat distemper (diphtheria), according to the stone. I can't imagine losing two small children within a day.

We also found a double tombstone that was for two different wives of the same man. He was buried next to them, with a stone of his own. Darwin and I puzzled over these for a while, and finally worked out that the man married Wife 1, and several years later, she died. He married Wife 2, and several years later, HE died, leaving Wife 2 behind, and her family or children must have raised the double stone once she died. This was odd. Why would Wife 2's family created a shared stone for Wife 1 and Wife 2? Especially since several years had passed between the deaths of Wife 1 and Wife 2?

At last Darwin hit on a theory: the two wives were sisters. When Wife 1 died, the husband married his sister-in-law (a common practice in those days), and then he died, and later Wife 2 died, so the family put up a single stone for both sisters. That makes a lot of sense, though we'll never know for sure.

We had lunch in a cafe that was trying hard to be a Cool Organic Place, but the food was decidedly mediocre for the price. Ah well.

Then we explored the town some more, looking at the 18th century buildings and even finding a house some of Darwin's ancestors lived in. It was a private house at the end of a long driveway, so I drove down it. "What are you doing?" Darwin hissed.

"Heading up for a look," I said. "We came all this to find these things, and then we aren't going to look? The owners won't do anything anyway." I drove up until we were close enough for Darwin to snap a couple photos, then I backed to the road and took off. No one did anything. There!

The library had a little information for Darwin, too, and we spent some time there so he could root through old books.

A big house on main street has been converted into an historical society museum. It was closed, but I made Darwin come around and peer in through the windows. "Nobody cares," I insisted, and nobody did. Darwin got a good look. A sign out front announced a free tour of the place tomorrow morning.

"Do you want to come?" I asked, and he said he did.

So in the morning, we got the car out of hock and drove back. This was a Saturday, so the traffic around Boston was lighter, but in Groton it was actually heavier! And it was bucketing rain. A flood warning was in effect for the area, in fact, though we encountered no problems.

It took us longer than expected to the car out of the parking garage in Boston, so we arrived about five minutes after the tour had already begun, and we joined a group of six other people in the house's drawing room. To my surprise, the tour was being conducted by a tall, gawky teenaged boy. I think the woman who ran the place was his mother. But he knew the material and was very well-spoken, so kudos to him!

The house had only recently opened after heavy renovation and rescuing, and we saw a great many artifacts from the 17th and 18th century families that had owned the place. The original family wasn't related to Darwin, but there were a great many references in the house to his relatives.

Here we have to pause for some Darwin family history. Back in the Colonial days, a tribe of natives kidnapped two small children from the Nutting family, some of Darwin's ancestors. The kids were his great-something-uncle and aunt. The natives hauled the children to Quebec and sold them to a white family, who took them in, though it wasn't clear whether it was as adopted children or as actual slaves. Many years later, the Nutting family found the children and asked for them to be returned home. Unfortunately, the kids had no memory of their original family, and they viewed their Canadian "parents" as their family. They refused to come home, and stayed in Quebec for the rest of their lives under their adopted names.

Now. While we were shifting to a different room, I struck up a conversation with one of the women on the tour. She mentioned that she was related to people in Groton through her ancestors, and I asked which. "The Nuttings," she said, and mentioned that she always thought her entire family was from Canada, but it turned out she was descended from a child who was kidnapped away from her Groton family, and . . .

So Darwin got to meet one of his cousins! And the woman's sister was there as well, so that made two!

After the tour, we explored yet more of Groton, taking our time. We came across what looked like a park, and in the middle was a large shed made of wood. Signs posted outside announced that it was a farm stand. The double doors were flung wide, and no humans were in evidence. Inside we found a glass-fronted refrigerator with home made blueberry jam and fudge and cartons of blueberries in it. There was also a freezer with ice cream bars, a table with Groton t-shirts on it, and other home made food items.

Another sign informed you that everything was on the honor system, and pointed you toward a locked cash box mounted on the wall. A price list was on the table. Darwin and I found this completely charming, and Darwin announced we had to buy some stuff. We loaded up with jam and ice cream and blueberries and Darwin stuffed the money into the slot at the top of the cash box. We never did meet the owners.

Several times while we walked around Groton, Darwin paused to spread his arms and breathe in deeply. "I love this place," he said, and he's already making plans to return, this time with intent to stay in Groton itself.

On our way back to Boston, I checked the GPS and discovered Salem was only 25 minutes away . . .