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See Also: Sudbury Town Center Project page.
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 1) HudsonRoad1941.jpg |
 2) TownCenter1913.jpg |
 3) TownCenterDU.jpg |
We are delighted to find a home for what it seems would otherwise become text trash. This boundary file also contains what was thought to be just incidental items of OCCASIONAL interest, all of which had been associated in the Registry files (book and page) with some deed or other.
The Town of Sudbury evolved from the original authorization of the Colonial Court in 1638 upon the petition of a Peter Noyes and three others to order the Town. The Town and Church were inseperable. All Church and Town matters were acted upon in the Town Meetings. In Fact the Church was called the Meeting House.In 1725 the First Parish Meeting House was completed on the Northwesterly corner of the present land.
In 1836 there was a separation of the Town and the Church in that the meetings of the Town began to be held separately from the meetings of the Church and the Church began t keep separate records. There is an old plan of the Sudbury Meeting House Lot by August Tower, dated December 10, 1894, not recorded, which shows he Meeting House, school house and the powder house on the present land. This plan also shows the triangular piece separated by Concord Road which is now known as the “Common”. It is my understanding that this common was leased to the Town for a period of 99 years at an annual fee of $1.
(... discussion of more building details and FPS v. Jones ... )
However, there is no record that we have been able to find where the First Parish of Sudbury obtained title to the property that has been used as church property.
There has been no separation of the title to this property according to the records we have been able to check.
THE INHABITANTS OF THE FIRST PARISH IN SUDBURY v. SAMUEL A. JONES & others.
October Term, 1851. Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts.
Notice it says First Parish In Sudbury. FPS currently stands for First Parish of Sudbury, Unitarian Universalist. Odd formatting symbols are in the document. I have left them as is until I can look at the Xerox(tm:-) copy.
**2 In 1723, the proprietors of common lands in Sudbury granted the land on which the meetinghouse stands, and the common about it, not including the locus in quo,“to the west precinct in Sudbury,”“for the conveniency of said west precinct's meetinghouse, and for a burying place.” The east and west precincts in Sudbury corresponded with the present towns of Wayland and Sudbury. The east precinct was in 1780 erected into the town of East Sudbury, (afterwards changed in name to Wayland,) leaving the west precinct the present town of Sudbury. The terms, east and west precinct, were used previous to such separation, to distinguish the different portions of the original town, as different parishes of the same town, and also for all other purposes, as well municipal as parochial.
Grants were made by the proprietors of common lands in Sudbury for the support of the ministry in the west parish, out of which a fund has arisen, which has since come into the possession of the plaintiffs.
The locus in quo was included in a grant from the proprietors of common land to Richard Biddlecom in 1722. And said proprietors in 1740 exchanged with John Haynes “some part of the land laid out for a training field,” &c.; in consideration of which Haynes conveyed “unto the inhabitants of the westerly precinct in said Sudbury forever, all his right, title and interest in and unto about half an acre of land laid out to the right of Richard Biddlecom, within the common and undivided land in said Sudbury, and on the westerly side of Sudbury River, and is the land whereon the school-house now stands??”
The Common does not a surveyed boundary, or, so it appears. I hope the Town Center Project gets done for pedestrian safety first and foremost. More history - lease of common. Town Board of Selectman approving lease of Common and the actual lease
