Let’s take a walk behind the Old Jail Museum – owned, maintained and managed by Lincoln County Historical Association and located at the upper end of Federal Street, Wiscasset. The property includes roughly five acres of sloping meadow and woods to enjoy along a path that leads to a large, quiet cove before looping back. 

Bill Sutter lives across the street from the Old Jail with his wife Judith. Both have been LCHA volunteers for … let’s just say a long, long time. “You really ought to write something about the old landing down along the shore,” Bill said to me one day. “You probably know this was the place where they brought in the granite blocks used to build the Old Jail. The granite they used came from a quarry from across the river in Edgecomb.”

The following Sunday, I followed Bill as he sat on his Cub Cadet mowing the path behind the Old Jail leading downhill to the landing site. Bearing left, we passed apple trees and blooming Queen Anne’s Lace, also known as wild carrot. The path runs alongside a stone wall serving as the boundary line between the LCHA property and Marianmade Farm.

“About 30 or so years ago, a group of volunteers, I was one of them, cleared this path and I’ve been keeping it mowed every summer since,” Sutter called back over the noise of the mower. The path gradually flattens out snaking through a mix of mostly softwood trees, poplar, birch and hemlock. I noticed some medium-sized oaks, maple and a few horse chestnut trees, too. The path divides, although the one on the right is blocked by a recently fallen tree. Both lead you to the Sheepscot River shoreline. The left path we took looping around to rejoin the other, which of course carries you uphill and back to the Old Jail.

Where the trail circles back, there's a smaller path between two massive northern white pine trees. Somewhat overgrown with briers, it brings you to a ledge outcropping facing a large cove. It was here 215 years ago that scowl boats, perhaps barges, landed the granite blocks used to build the jail. 

“The huge granite blocks came from a quarry over in Edgecomb not far from where the Cross Point Road is today. After the blocks were cut, they were loaded and carried upriver to where we’re standing,” said Bill. “They off-loaded them, which you can imagine was no easy task given their size and weight. If you look carefully here, you can see the scrape marks where the blocks were dragged across the ledge.” Once on shore, the massive blocks, they measure roughly 68 by 21 inches, were loaded onto skids, or wagons and hauled uphill by teams of mule or oxen. Looking at the number of blocks it took to build the jail it must have taken a lot of muscle to get all the stone needed to the top of the hill.

I recalled reading in the late Katherine Chase Owen’s “Early Edgecomb” that it was Benjamin Brown of Edgecomb who was hired by the county to furnish the stone used to build the jail. Brown went to several sites looking for the stone he needed before opening a quarry in Edgecomb. According to Mrs. Owen's research, Brown paid his laborers a dollar a day, the workday being from sunup to sundown and typically six days a week.

As Bill correctly observed, the landing was cut off from the river when the Knox & Lincoln Railroad came through in 1871. The builders of the railroad constructed a mile-long causeway to carry the tracks across the cove linking Wiscasset village to Clark’s Point. About 20 yards from the landing site, you see what appears to be a long berm running parallel to the shoreline. This is what’s left of the former narrow-gauge railroad which opened in 1895 as theWiscasset and Quebec Railroad. It was later re-organized becoming the Wiscasset, Waterville and Farmington Railroad, which operated until the 1930s. The tracks were taken up long ago, but the embankment remains showing its path.

Almost directly across from the landing site is Goose Island; it lies just opposite the river channel making it a part of the town of Edgecomb. It was here the remains of early natives were discovered long ago when fill was taken from the island to build the railroad causeway. This brings something else to mind: Just a few yards from the backside of the Old Jail are two fairly large pieces of ledge with three holes in them, about 6 inches wide and 3 to 4 inches deep. The holes are somewhat of a mystery in that they don’t appear to have been naturally formed. I've often wondered if they could be "bedrock mortars” – places where early natives used stone pestles to pound and grind corn, acorns, or seeds during the preparation of meals.

Returning to the cove, Bill said the mudflat here is posted by the Department of Marine Resources prohibiting the harvesting of clams. A bit further north, the cove becomes a small stream known as "Polly Clark Creek,” where long ago there was once a tide mill. I recall being told from the late Jim Sutter, Bill’s Uncle Jim, this was a two-stone gristmill. One of the millstones ground grain, while the other ground the remnants of plaster from homes left abandoned during the wars with Native Americans. The plaster was ground for the lime it contained which farmers used to raise the pH level of acidic soils. The mill disappeared ages ago, but traces of the dam can found here at low tide. I recall Jim telling me one of those mill stones was carried off by someone and used for a door stoop.

The trail behind the Old Jail Museum can be enjoyed from dawn to dusk and provides an enjoyable activity after you’ve toured the Old Jail Museum led by one of Lincoln County Historical Association’s knowledgeable volunteer docents. I noticed as I walked along the shoreline the sea lavender is just coming into bloom, a sure sign that autumn is just around the corner. Thank you to Mrs. Sutter for her kind hospility, and Bill Sutter for once again sharing his vast knowledge of Wiscasset history with me, so I can share it with you.

Phil Di Vece earned a B.A. in journalism studies from Colorado State University and an M.A. in journalism at the University of South Florida. He is the author of three Wiscasset books and is a frequent news contributor to the Boothbay Register/Wiscasset Newspaper. He can be contacted at news@wiscassetnewspaper.com