Belmont: A Lively Stop On The Stage Line

By Isabel Morse Maresh

June 28, 1990

Belmont, located six miles west of Belfast, was incorporated as the 202nd town of Maine on Feb. 5, 1814, and was part of Greene Plantation. The Plantation was named for General Nathaniel Greene, who was an officer of the Revolutionary War and a friend of General Henry Knox.

According to some sources, the first settlement in the town was by Daniel Dolliff, who came from New Hampshire in 1784. It was written that Dolliff cut the first tree in the unbroken forest and built the first home. His son, James, was the first white child born in Belmont. The history of Morril. notes that Nathaniel Tilden, a solider of the Revolution, came with his wife Sarah and children, and settled near the pond that bears his name.

He thought that he was the only settler in the wilderness until he awoke one morning to a rooster's crowing and the sound of another axe chopping in the woods.

In 1803, James Greer came from Vermont by ox team and settled in the part of town which became Morrill, where he built the first mill. Richard Kimball came from Buxton and settled at Belmont Corner. Amos Greer, son of James, married Kimball's daughter Mary.

It is difficult to find much early history of Belmont, as the town records burned in May 1855, when John Crawford's store at Belmont corner burned. Crawford was the town clerk. John married Elizabeth Cunningham and had two sons, John and Hiram, both of whom died young. He was a young merchant and highly esteemed in town. During the fall of 1855, after his store had burned, he sought relief from the disease of consumption by going to the milder air of Cuba. As he was no better, he started home by ship and died at sea at the age of 30 years. This brief epitaph is inscribed on his headstone, "Thou art gone, dear husband, Yet I will not complain; for I know 'tis alright, I shall meet thee again."

In the 1870 Belmont census, there were six Greer households in town, with Greer's Corner named for the family. Hall's Corner was settled by John Hall, who is buried in an obscure cemetery in the woods on what was his farm. He died in 1838 at age 47 and his epitaph in the forgotten cemetery reads: "Long may thy memory be revered..."

In 1900 Hall's Corner had its own post office, a store, a little red schoolhouse, and a dancehall. My father told me that Battle Bridge on Back Belmont was where the imbibers from the Hall's Corner dancehall went to settle their differences and cool off.

Belmont was on the Liberty and Belfast stage line. It was written that Belmont Lower Corner was called Belmont Bar. On the trip home from Belfast, the Davistown (now Liberty) farmers would make a last stop at Belmont Bar, and from there the way home was hard to navigate.

Several of James Greer's sons built a mill before 1830 near what is now the town line between Belmont and Morrill. Reuben Dickey built a mill in the southern part of town on Duck Trap stream.

One of the men who took a prominent part in the affairs of town was Gideon Richards, an old-time school teacher, justice of the peace, and town official. Gideon's wife, Louisa Parker, gave birth to triplets in 1835, all three of which died at a young age. Samuel Fletcher was another school teacher and trial justice. He was often called upton to disperse justice to disagreeing neighbors. His records were available in 1929, but it is not known where they are today.

Another teacher was John Ames, famous for using discipline in unruly schools. When there was a school where the students had been known to "carry out the teacher," John Ames was called in, and it was written that there were many who could testify that they were sorry and wiser after a turn with the "Master," as the teacher was called.

Several of the early settlers had fought in the Revolutionary War. One record states that 42 residents severed in the Civil War and that 11 gave their lives in the Rebellion.

Times change, and the new gives way to the old. Belmont's history has recorded it as a "quiet little town," but it is growing up and out. While we enjoy reading and hearing the past, reality sets in and we realize that the "good old days," though a much slower pace, are jsut that, part of the past. Daniel Webster was quoted as saying "Those who do not look upon themselves as a link connecting the past with the future do not perform their duty in the world." It is also written that those who do not remember the past are destined to repeat its mistakes in the future.

In the June 14 issue, the photo of McLains Mills, Appleton, has the caption "Appleton Ridge, about 1900." This photograph was taken from F.W. Cunningham's glass negative of Appleton Village, not the Ridge. Several times captions have been in error and I will attempt to make corrections at the end of my column. One hundred years from now, someone won't see the photo and say, "So that is what the Ridge looked like," and be in error.