“He depended on strong sinew and sterling good sense to establish a home
for himself and family."
Littleton, Middlesex County, Massachusetts was first settled in 1686 by English settlers and was the the location of the Native American village called Nashoba Plantation
Concord, Middlesex County, Massachusetts was settled early by the English as a frontier outpost of the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
Walter Powers was born about 1639 in England or Ireland.
Henry Swan Dana said
the New England Powers family descended from Thomas and Walter Power, brothers, born in Waterford, Ireland, who came to this country somewhere near the year 1680. In Ireland the name of the family was Power, but these men, on coming to this country, added an s to their name.
Other sources say that Walter Powers emigrated from Essex, England, to Salem, Massachusetts in 1654.
Walter appeared as a witness in a trial in Middlesex County in 1654. He was a boy of fourteen at that time.
He married Trial Shepard in 1660 when he was about 27 years old. Their children and life together are described in detail in the section on Walter and Trial Shepard.
He ran a sawmill in Littleton, Massachusetts and died there on February 22, 1708.
Old Style Calendar
Before 1752 the year began on Lady Day, March 25th,. Dates between January 1st and March 24th were at the end of the year. Old Style (O.S.) and New Style (N.S.) are used to indicate whether the year has been adjusted. Often both dates are used.
A sawmill was an important developmental step in a community. Before sawmills, boards could only be sawn by two men with a whipsaw. In a sawmill, the circular motion of a water wheel was changed to the back-and-forth motion of the saw blade with a pitman arm.
