James Howe, Jr., owned “a small house in the orchard,” “3,” and a third
of other “housing,” which may have included “the old house,” that stood
in 1711, “near” “5” south of “2,” “the southwest corner of the orchard.”
While searching the records of deeds, the writer noted a course in a
description: “Thence to the gate opposite James Howe, Junior’s.” The
locality was well known to him, and that knowledge located the gate. He
had often seen a gate there, between 1840 and 1850. It swung at the
entrance of the avenue leading to the residence of James Howe, Senior,
marked “gate” on the map. That fact was tangible; Mrs. Howe’s home was
at “2” on the map or near it.
Thus far and no farther, till one day looking over the ground back of
the present residence of Mrs. Eliza Howe Perley, “6” on the map, the
writer noticed a peculiar hollow in the otherwise level surface, and to
his question, What made it? she replied, “I don’t know; I have always
heard it called Mary’s hole.” He immediately exclaimed, “Mary Howe,
daughter of the witch.”
His conclusion: There the surviving daughters, Mary and Abigail, lived,
secluded and alone, beneath the shadow of the cruel attainder. After the
death of Mary, their home became Mary’s cellar; and when all appearance
of a cellar was gone, it became “Mary’s hole.” To-day there is not the
slightest vestige of “Mary’s hole”; the old home, known only to the
saddest pages of New England history, is arable ground.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration:
THE AARON HOWE HOUSE, LINEBROOK PARISH
Built in 1711, the birthplace of Rev. Nathaniel Howe (1764-1837), of
Hopkinton, Mass., and of Rev. Benjamin Howe (1807-1883) of that
parish; taken down about 1853.
]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Illustration: DESCENDANTS OF JAMES HOWE
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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