The Portland daily press., 1876-08-10
A Waif and its Story.

The writer was recently shown paper and
its history told, by an old lady resident in a
town of Androscoggin county. who at the age
Of eighty-three years retains much of former
vigor, the careful preservation of the manu-
script showing how strangely the events there.
with connected were impressed upon the minds
of surviving relatives.
To her expressions of wish to preserve this
with other memorials of her family, now in her
possession, we suggested that their preserva-
ton would be made the most secure by making
the Maine Historical Society their custodian
in whose care should be placed the many man.
uscripts, books, maps, pamphlets, coins and
the like, of historical interest, now yearly lost
or destroyed in almost all of the towns of the
State
With few slight emendations this is copy
of the paper: Falmouth, January 9Th, 1766.
order you, Theophilus Simonton, to embrace
the first opportunity, the first wind, for the
West Indies, and sell the schooner William,
sails and cargo. From the owner, John Thorn
as"
The vessel was a new one, and about to leave
Falmouth now Portland, Maine, on her first
voyage, nearly all of her officers and crew be-
ing related by affinity or lineage, her captain
Theophius Simonton, being the grandfather of
this sged lady who showed us the manuscript
and told its history.
The weather was intensely cold, and all
hands on board had much to do in thawiug the
pumps and making the needful preparations
for departure, when the father of Captain ST.
monton, man of sternness OF manner, came
on board the William and in his accustomed
way abruptly inquired, "Wby are you not off
upon your voyage?"
The son. Captain Simonton, called a boy
from the shore ard engaged him to deliver
this paper to his. the Captains wife, at their
home upon the lake, and Immediately set out
upon the voyage
Captain Simonton's wife, who had been di-
rected to keep this paper until her husbands
return, foreboded evil fortune for the vessel
from the first.
Weeks passed away, and then months, with
no tldings received at home of the vessel or of
her crew, and months wore Into weary years
and the most unweared inquiry revealed not
the slightest gleam of intelligence of their
mysterious fate and for hundred and ten
years the mystery has remained sad perplex-
ity to their friends and descendants.
By what one of the many perils ever attend
ing life upon the ocean, whether overwhelmed
by the force of a tempest, fron defect in the
vessels construction, by exposure and starva-
ton upon desert shores, by the murdsrous
hands of outlawed buccaneers, from collision
with an unseen object when the dark shadow
of gloomy night brings other dangers for voya-
gers on the great deep, or in what other way
they perished Will remain forever unknown to
the living.
The preservation of this memento BY the
wife OF Captain Theophilus Simontou, and by
his daughter, Ann Wilson SlmontoD, and by
his granddaughter, Sarah Miller, shows that
the memory OF him who thus perished, has
been also preserved by there generations with
womanly devotion, and after the lapse of more
than century, is still tenderly cherished, and
amid the continued series of change in the ma
terial world, the force and coservationn of in
tangible, viewless intuitions. b. d. 3. Jr