As for another taste of scandal?

Jnana Hodson

Jun 24

Dover's second minister, the Rev. George Burdet, made a quick exit from town amid scandals, quickly followed by more in York, Maine. He had even briefly been "governor," or the agent in charge of the New Hampshire province, making him in charge of both its religion and politics. Or, as historian George Wadleigh quipped, a wannabe pope.

Beyond that, as I observed in Quaking Dover, Burdet "was obviously on a downward spiral, as Thomas Gorges wrote to John Winthrop in 1641, noting that Burdet was at Pemaquid and 'is grown to that height of sin that it is to [be] feared he is given over. His time he spends in drinking, dancing, singing scurrilous songs, and for his companions he selects the wretchedest people of the country. At the spring I hear he is for England.' Later that year, the younger Gorges added of Burdet, 'the dishonor of his profession and monster of nature, is now gone for England by way of Spain.' That description of drinking, dancing, and singing rather seals the Robert Dover connection for me, even if Merrymount's Thomas Morton, the more obvious reveling partner, wouldn't return to Maine for another year or two."

I do have to wonder where the wild tavern sat in the early Maine settlement here.

So here's where he spent that wild binge – 110 miles or so from Dover, or a two-hour drive away today.

Recent research has come up with a site for the jail. I do have to wonder if the Rev. Burdet ever served time therein.

As for Robert Dover, who gave Burdet the inspiration for naming the New Hampshire settlement? He was an anti-Puritan wit and attorney. That, in contrast to the South English port famed for its white cliffs.

Reports of the cleric's subsequent movements vary, possibly ending in Ireland, "where he was named chancellor and dean of a diocese. He died in Ireland in 1671, 'after founding a much respected county family.' Had he reunited with the wife and children he'd left behind?" As I say in my book, "Or was he, in fact, a bigamist? Also, there's no mention of prison."

Turn to Quaking Dover for the details.

What my Pemaquid visit made me realize is how little history of early Maine I had encountered in drafting my book, and how tenuous so much of it I've found since remains. Yes, the early settlements, including Pemaquid, were obliterated and abandoned during the decades of warfare with the French and their Native allies, but there had been significant settlement before that, something that kept getting swept away.

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