TIVERTON

A short history of Tiverton

Early

Tiverton was incorporated by English colonists in 1694 within Bristol County in the Province of Massachusetts Bay. As well as being part of Old Dartmouth. In 1746, in the final settlement of a long colonial boundary dispute between Rhode Island and Massachusetts, Tiverton—together with its fellow towns along the eastern shore of Narragansett Bay, Barrington, Bristol and Little Compton, and the town of Cumberland, to the north of Providence—were annexed to Rhode Island by Royal Decree, effective January 27, 1747. Tiverton was incorporated as a town in 1747. Until that year, Tiverton also controlled the area of East Freetown, Massachusetts, as an outpost. The boundary settlement of 1746 had put East Freetown in Massachusetts, and in 1747 it was purchased by Freetown.

Men from the Tiverton outpost took part in the Battle of Freetown, on May 25, 1778, during the Revolutionary War. On the 31st of that month, a party of about 150 British regulars of the 22nd Regiment under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Campbell attacked the town. Rivington's Gazette reported that the British were making a preemptive attack based on intelligence that the American militia at Tiverton was preparing an attack against them. However, another report in the New Hampshire Gazette stated the militia was waiting in prepared defensive positions. The result of this skirmish was two British killed, several more wounded, and some fire damage to the lower mill in Tiverton. None of the militiamen were wounded or killed.

For about three years during the war, December 1776 – October 1779, the island of Rhode Island, now known as Aquidneck Island, was occupied by the British. During this time, Tiverton was a refuge for Americans fleeing this occupation, and a mustering place for colonial forces gathering to drive out the British. The British occupying forces were eventually withdrawn strategically, as General Clinton marshaled his forces for the 1780 British invasion of South Carolina.)

In its early days, Tiverton was chiefly a farming community with some fishing and boat construction. Until 1900 the manufacture of menhaden oil, a fish derivative, was one of the primary industrial pursuits. Cotton and woolen mills were established as early as 1811, when Colonel Joseph Durfee established a spinning mill at Cook Pond, in what it now the city of Fall River, Massachusetts.

In 1856, the northern part of the town was set apart from Tiverton, and renamed Fall River, Rhode Island, by the Rhode Island General Assembly. On March 1, 1862, in a case between the states that reached the United States Supreme Court, both Fall Rivers were made part of Massachusetts and the state boundary was placed in its current location near State Avenue.

Mark's Stadium is a former soccer stadium located in North Tiverton, Rhode Island. During the 1920s and early 1930s, it was the home of Fall River F.C., one of the era's most successful soccer teams. It is one of the earliest examples of a soccer-specific stadium in the United States. After the demise of the 'Marksmen', the stadium was used as a home ground by other local teams, most notably Fall River F.C. (1932) and Ponta Delgada S.C.

Adapted (trimmed) from the Wikipedia article Tiverton, Rhode Island, revision 1377625394 by its contributors, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.