WINKLEY POND HISTORY

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Early Settlers / The Two Mile Streak

Barrington first began with the ‘Two Mile Streak’, granted in 1719 to encourage industrial development in the province, it was then called New Portsmouth, This two-mile wide strip of land was set aside to provide homesites for imported workers at the Lamprey Ironworks. Wood from this strip was converted to charcoal for the Ironworks. Descendants of early settlers still live here. 

The town of Barrington was chartered by proclamation in a document dated May 10, 1722 and signed by Samuel Shute, Governor of the Province of New Hampshire, and The Streak was into the new township. There appears to have been living on the Two-mile Streak in the year 1747 sixteen families and upwards of ninety inhabitants, who petitioned the Provincial Governor and General Assembly for protection against the Indians. 

Of those prominent in the original settlement of the town were William Cate, Hugh Montgomery, Sampson Babb, Arthur Danielson, Paul Hayes, Eleazer Young, Mark Hunking, Samuel Brewster, Timothy Waterhouse and Francis Winkley.

Read more about one of our oldest landmarks!

Old Aggie and the Winkley Family

One of Barrington’s most endearing historical figures was Old Aggie, a slave, who despite her extremely adverse circumstances, was remembered most for being cheerful, giving, and kind. Aggie’s story tangentially involved Francis Winkley, and no doubt she lived for a time at the Winkley homestead, adjacent to the Hunking Garrison. Below is Aggie’s story as printed in the Rochester Courier, September 26 & October 10, 1930, about 90 years after her death.

**FROM** The Rochester Courier: September 26, & October 10, 1930 Issues.

The following sketch of the life of "Old Aggie," the famous Barrington slave girl of a century ago, was given by Mrs. Annie Wentworth Baer of Marjery Sullivan chapter of the Daughter’s of the American Revolution (D.A.R.), at the recent unveiling of the tablet in Aggie’s memory at Pine Grove cemetery in East Barrington:

The first settlements in Barrington were made between 1732 and 1740 and were mostly families from Portsmouth, N.H.  The original proprietors of the town were Portsmouth men. Captain Mark Hunking, son of Col. Mark Hunking, was born in Portsmouth about 1700.  He was a sea Captain and sailed on long foreign voyages and gained much wealth.  About 1750 he came to Barrington and settled in the eighteen-year-old town.  He built a garrison house on an elevation a few rods north of where the railroad crosses between it and Winkley’s pond.  His burial ground is on the south side of the railroad not far from where the carriage road crosses the railroad.

When Capt. Hunking was sailing on one of his late voyages to the West Indies, about 1750, he brought home a jet black Negro girl, eleven years old.  This child came with the family to Barrington and was one of the few slaves in New Hampshire.  It is written that she was the last slave who died in our state.

The last of Capt. Hunking’s life he was seriously afflicted with rheumatism, and was unable to move about much, so he had trucks put under an arm chair, and in this Aggie, this slave girl, wheeled him about the house and premises. He died in 1775.  After his death we read that Aggie lived in the family of Parson Benjamin Balch, who was pastor of the Congregational church from Aug. 25, 1784, till 1815 when he died.

Some records tell us that she lived in the Winkley family.  One of Captain Hunking’s daughters married Francis Winkley of Portsmouth and lived near the Hunking garrison.  Elsewhere we read that she at last became a town charge, and was bid off to the lowest bidder, that is, to the one who would board her the cheapest.  Town farms and county farms were yet to come. The local historian of this historic town, Mr. Wiggin, tells that she was often boarded in some Foss family and must have been happy there, since at one town meeting a man whose name was not Foss bid the lowest and she went to this new home, but she was so homesick that she was allowed to return to the Foss home.
 

The milk of human kindness flowed unadulterated and Aggie’s heart beat naturally.  She was a constant attendant at church, and sat in the gallery, often all alone.  It is remembered how faithfully she nursed the town folk when stricken with a contagious disease, and spared not herself in her service to others.  She died in 1840 or thereabouts.  The records of her death differ a little, but it is believed that she had lived a century, and "her memory smelleth sweet."