WHO WAS SHEFFFIELD'S FIRST SETTLER?
A common web page featuring the area states:
The first English settler to cross the “hideous howling wilderness” into Berkshire County was Matthew Noble of Westfield, who arrived in 1725. The following spring, he returned to Westfield and brought his 16-year-old daughter, Hannah, to keep house for him. The township had been purchased from Chief Konkapot and other Stockbridge Indians in 1724. Purchase price was 460 Pounds, 3 barrels of cider, and 30 quarts of rum. It covered an area 18 miles by 12 miles centered on the Housatonic River.
And yet, there has been disagreement on the subject. For example, Rev. James Bradford wrote:
Mr. Obadiah Noble was the first white man who came to reside in Sheffield. He was from Westfield, and came and spent the first winter here with no other human associates than the Indians. In the spring, he went back to Westfield, and in June, his daughter, afterwards the wife of Dea. Daniel Kellogg, returned here with him. She was the first white woman that came into the town. She travelled from Westfield, when about sixteen years of age, on horseback, bringing a bed with her, and lodged one night in the wilderness, in what is now the east part of Tyringham.
From History of Berkshire County, Massachusetts....
That declaration has been more-or-less quoted by J. W. Barber (“Massachusetts Historical Collections”), J. G. Holland (“History of Western Massachusetts”) and by J. G. Barnard and G. A. Hoadley (addresses at the Centennial celebration of Sheffield on 19 June 1876). The thesis is rebutted as follows:
There is no evidence Obadiah Noble ever had a daughter. He had five sons, all births recorded in the Sheffield town record.
Hannah Noble (later Mrs. Daniel Kellogg) is known to have been the daughter of Matthew, and not the daughter of Obadiah Noble.
George D. Noble informed the author of The Noble Family History that his grandfather (Obadiah’s son, Nathaniel Noble, whom he well remebered and who died at age 87 in 1824) used to tell him, "My father, Obadiah Noble, was the first white settler of Sheffield; he came from Westfield to Sheffield in the fall of the year, lived the first winter in a wigwam, and the next spring went for his wife, and soon brought her, a bride, to Sheffield."
The objections to George Noble's statements, are:
Obadiah Noble was only eighteen years old in 1724, much too young to have been the pioneer settler of the town.
The first settler, according to George Noble, would have been married as early as 1725. Obadiah's oldest child (Peter) was born in May 1734, and therefore it's probable that Obadiah wasn’t married much before 1733.
If any person by the name of Noble was the first settler of Sheffield, it was Matthew, and not his son Obadiah.
Matthew is known to have been in Sheffield on 3 Feb 1727, when on that date (Hampshire Deeds, E. p. 61)
“Matthew Noble, of Housatunnuck, husbandman, in consideration of a certain sum paid by Capt. John Ashley of Westfield, gentleman,” made over to Matthew, “two certain tracts or Parcells of lands, with a house, barn and ortchard or ortcharding upon it, which Parcells of lands Containing in quantity by Estimation about two hundred acres, lying and being partly within the Bounderies and precincts of ye township of Springfield, and partly within ye boundaries of the township of Westfield, in the aforesd County, it being a tract of land, which the sd Mathew Noble formerly Dwelt upon, and lyeth Easterdly of ye mountaine, which rangeth between the sd Westfield and Springfield, and alsoe lyeth Southerlie of Westfield river.”
If, as is above recorded, he was in Westfield in February 1727, he could not have gone there during the winter, but must certainly have removed to there as early as the previous year. How much earlier, is not known.
Proprietor's records and a survey were taken by Captain John Ashley, Ebenezer Pomeroy, and Thomas Ingersoll. This Committee was to advance the settlement of the town by selecting persons who would become permanent residents. Home lots were drawn in three divisions, and the town was incorporated in 1733.
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