f pines. These
people were obliged to go four or five miles to Church and town meeting,
over narrow, uneven roads, travelled only on horseback or rough ox
carts. Most of them were of an independent, self-reliant type of
character, and had a mind to have a little town and parish of their own.

Accordingly they commenced a movement for a division of the town of
Lunenburg; and the first petition to have the westerly part of that town
set off was presented in town meeting in 1759. At various other town
meetings a like petition was presented and always rejected, until
January, 1764, when it was granted, and a committee appointed to obtain
an act of incorporation from the Legislature; and at last, on the third
of February, 1764, the Governor of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay
signed the Act, which made Fitchburg an incorporated town, with all the
rights and privileges usually granted, except that the two towns of
Lunenburg and Fitchburg were to have but one representative to the
General Court.

A portion of the territory of Fitchburg was set off a few years later to
form a part of the new town of Ashby.

The first town meeting in Fitchburg was held in the tavern of Captain
Samuel Hunt, on the fifth of March, 1764, when selectmen were chosen,
and other business necessary to the organization of a town government
transacted. The next business after the necessary civil affairs were put
in order was to provide for "Sabbath days' preaching," and the Rev.
Peter Whitney was hired to preach in the house of Thomas Cowdin for a
time. It was also voted to build a meeting-house, which was completed
sufficiently for occupancy in the autumn of 1766, and was located
between Blossom and Mount Vernon Streets, near Crescent Street. The land
was presented to the town by Thomas Cowdin, a new resident, who had
purchased the tavern of Captain Samuel Hunt.

In those days the tavern keeper was a man of great importance by virtue
of his calling, but Thomas Cowdin was in himself a remarkable man.
Energetic and commanding by nature, his varied experience had been of a
kind to call out his peculiar characteristics. A soldier in the
Provincial army, he served actively in the French and Indian wars, and
rose from the ranks to the office of captain. During the war of 1755 he
was employed in returning convalescent soldiers to the army and in
arresting deserters. At one time he was set on the track of a deserter,
whom he found was making his way to New Yo