The next house was built about 1790 by Jonathan Ellis, who came to the town from Bellingham, Mass., and her kept a store in one room from which “the barrel of rum and sugar and molasses enough to sweeten it for raising the new meeting house” was sent in May, 1792. In that old house, still standing and occupied, the writer was born nearly seventy-nine years ago, and around it center many a fragrant memory of the impressible days of child hood and of youth.
From the window of the room in which the writer first gave his cry of life, one looked out upon the field once owned by Nicholas Holt, beyond which was the mill pond, the tide mills and the island on which his great grandfather, John Roundy, and Joseph Wood landed April 7, 1762, built their two log houses and began the settlement of the town.
From that window one could see the the waters of the bay. Long Island, Newbury Neck, the hills of Mt. Desert and of Schoodic, and the white sails of vessels passing and re-passing on the bosom of the bay— a sight once seen ever after to be remembered. Around this place and about it cluster the earlier historical events connected with the town. The first town meeting, the gathering of the first church, the building of the first houses, the first mills, the opening of the first store and the first tavern or public house, the first marriage, and probably the first birth of a white child, and the first death and funeral in the settlement.
In this same house lived Nathan Ellis, a brother of Jonathan, and in it was born his son Vaspasian, Jan. 11, 1802, whose mother was Mary Bass, who died April 10, 1804. Jonathan Ellis was born in Bellingham June, 1774, married Susannah Parker, Sept. 11, 1795, daughter of Peter Parker, Sr.; she was born June 27, 1772; died August 17, 1803; her husband died Dec. 23, 1806. Children were:
- Jonathan Ellis, born Dec. 18, 1795; died August 21, 1815.
- Charles Ellis, born Nov. 13, 1797; died in Cambridge, Mass., March 9, 1873.
- Almira Ellis, born April 5, 1801; died in Searsport, Me., April 11, 1884.
- Amos Hill Ellis, born July 11, 1803; died in Searsport, Me.
The family of Nathan Ellis, their history, etc., belong to the village section of the town, to which they removed probably before 1812. The lot of land owned originally by the Ellis family, and which belonged with the house was very small. Whether any one occupied the house between the Ellis family and the father of the writer, there is no record to show.
Nathan Ellis Family Genealogy
The Nathan Ellis House and place next to the Deacon Benjamin Stevens house was built by Mr. Ellis in the early part of 1800, probably as early as 1810. Nathan Ellis was born in Bellingham, Mass., in March, 1777. He married first, Mary Bass, Aug. 14, 1801. She died April 10, 1804, leaving one son, Vespasian, born at the Falls, Jan. 11, 1802, who was town clerk many years and died at an advanced age.
Nathan Ellis married, second, Sally Osgood, March 14, 1810. She died Dec. 7, 1814, and he married, third, Dolly B. Newell, Oct. 31, 1818. She was born Sept. 13, 1789; died Feb. 6, 1860. The children of this family were. By first wife:
- Vespasian Ellis, never married, born as above stated.
By second wife:
- Mary Bass Ellis, born March 2, 1811; died July 3, 1851.
- Nathan Ellis, born Nov. 10, 1812; married Susan Gardiner; died at Andover, Mass.
- Lemuel Ellis, born Nov. 29, 1814; married; died in California.
By third wife:
- Reuben Newell Ellis, born Aug. 25, 1819; twice married; died at Somerville, Mass., in 1890.
- Jonathan Ellis, born Nov. 16, 1820; married; died in California.
- Edward Ellis, born March 1, 1822; died Nov. 5, 1828.
- Sarah Battell Ellis, born Aug. 2, 1828; died in Boston; never married.
- Elizabeth Smith Ellis, born April 7, 1826; married F. A. Holt; died in Boston March 16, 1894.
- Edward Henry Ellis, born May 1, 1830; went to California.
Nathan Ellis, head of this family, died April, 1848, aged seventy-one years. He was a member of the legislature, a store keeper, ship owner, many years town clerk, and an exemplary man. There is none of the family residing in the town at this writing, in 1905. After his death and the removal of his children from town, the house was occupied by various parties, the last being Jonah Dodge and family. The place was then purchased by the town as a site for the new town hall erected thereon in 1895.