Arizona republican., 1899-03-20
MADE IN ONE NIGHT.
How the Harbor of Marshfie1d, Cape
 Cod Bay, Was Formed.
Northeast Gale Piled Up the Sand
 and Created Valuable An- choraEe for the Coast j Skipping. i,tj'

Years ago Marshfield situated on Cape Cod bay. about half way between Cohasset and Plymouth, was a bus ting little coast town, and was in fact one of the shipbuilding towns of note in the country's earliest history. The famous trading brig Columbia, after which the Columbia river was named, was built here. as were also several yes sells used as priVateers in the war of 1872. If it had been allowed to work out it's own destiny, Marshfield might even now be thriving town like Els sex, which is known for it's honest and thorough ship-building wherever the fishermen of New England guide their restless keels. But nature intervened, and walled the town up in prison, the like of which may be seen at many places on sandy Cape Cod.
 Originally the mouth of the river was at point nearly opposite thet but gradually, as the soil washed down by the river and the sand worked up by the seat met, q bar formed extend ing from the north side of the rivers mouth across it, thus stopping the swift, direct flow which had always kept the channel free and clear. Then the river turned south, and the sandba followed it, growing in size as the flow of the river decreased, until it had become q good-sized prOmontOry inside of which the river flowed, with an outlet far to the southward of the original one opposite the town. Being turned out of it's regular channel in this way, the river also broadened and shall lowed. The current slackened, and the deposits carried down by it were dropped inside, instead of outside, the mouth, while throughout the little roadstead inside the old mouth issets formed, so that there were few good places for a boat to lie, even if any thing more than the shoalest draught could have got in over the bars at the mouth.
 So Marshfeld remained behind it's barrier of sand and peat until the night of November 26, when the big storm set in. All night long the fierce north east gale piled the water up against the outside of. the promontOry. and on the following day, in conjunction with the gale. came one of the highest tides of the year. The water rose until at
 
 in tt--e promontory. between what are known as third and fourth cliffs, and swept up into the river with all the i power of the high tide and hurricane at its back. The river was filled until the i water rose over the bridge and up into the street at Marshfield, and hun dreds of acres of the big marshes Iy- ing to the southeast of the town, and 1 from which it takes it's name, were | covered several feet with water.
 When all this immense body of water started on it's return to the sea with the | falling tide, it was impossible for it to get out quickly enough by the shallow and devious way through the mouth of the river, so it went out in the way most of it had come, in, by the break made by the sea over the PromontOry, and the securing of this strong tide undid i'll a single night the work of many years. When the Marshfield folk visited the place the next day they found. where there had been solid ground 4S hours before, clean-cut 25O feet wide and 13 feet deep for it's full width. through which the tide ran like a millrace, while in the older mouth of the river there was hardly and movement. For q mile or nOre outside of the cut the water was liscolored by the dirt and refuse which were being carried out by the and even then it was evident he bars and islets which had filled the larbor we Q being washed away.
 The work that began then has been 5oing steadily on ever since. Many of he little islets which had formed in he harbCr have entirely disappeared, md others are growing smaller every lay. There is a straight, free entrance o the sea. which is in more direct inc with the flow of the river than ven the old mouth Of years ago, and :, trough which a gOod-siZ2d vessel can nter at any stage of the tide. Inside f it is harbCr large enough for quite I
 fleet to anchor, with good holding round and frcm 90 to 40 feet of water Il most places, while the rush Of the ide appears to be deepening both chan { el and roaGstead. \ If matters continue as favorably as hey have begun, the harbor thus f created will be very val . able one, not only to Marshfield itself, U. to our coast shipping, and even lore to our yGchtsmen. Up to now here has not been single good harbor d n the south shore. as the cutter harbor Plym Outh is not a safe anchorage | or small craft, and the inner harbor W an be gained only by Il skilled pilot. u etween Plymouth and Hull there are nly Scituate and Cohasset. Both of lese are shoal. and the latter is with :. Ut sufficient protection from a north n lst gale.-Boston Transcript.