THE MAKING OF THE MANCHAUG POND DAM
Submitted by Don Schmidt
MPA Board of Directors Area 5 Representative
Past President and Founding Member
In 1681 stone columns with the initials D.S. that stands for Dudley and Stoughton property line was erected denoting grants from the English Kings. These properties later reverted to Douglas and West Sutton. The Beaton-Waters property came from royal grants through the Nipmuc Indian tribes that were signed by the Indians with symbols, such as tomahawks or bows and arrows as they could not write. The original grant was for 1800 acres. These farms reverted to the Waters/Rich properties as we knew them in later years. The Waters farm grant is dated 1720. In 1724 the Waters/Rice farms were annexed to the town of Sutton.
The first crossing of the waters flowing out of Manchaug, was by wooden bridge which lasted only about a year. The second consisted of stone and fill, building the waters to a higher level. Circa 1852 a new dam known as the Whitings Dam was constructed at a cost of $2500. This dam took 1000 cords of heavy duty stone and raised the water level 16 foot 4 inches, which enlarged the pond from 194 acres to 380 acres. This heavy stone wall was put at the outlet for the purpose of enlarging the capacity, increasing the fall, and also for better security of the dam. At this time water power was the basis of replacing man power in such things as grinding flour, cutting logs and driving machinery for the weaving of cloth.
A 1930 topographical map survey indicates 300.37 acres surface of the Pond at the time of the survey note. This is dependent on the water level at that time, 138.02 acres are in Douglas and 162.35 acres are in Sutton. At that time they list the high water acreage at 412.3 and the low water at 193.36. This map also indicates another survey of 1905, which shows the old dam or dike as it is referred to, giving a completely different shoreline, smaller than the 1930 survey. Superimposed on this map is the outline of the original natural Manchaug Pond that indicates the acreage to be 193.36, of this 138.7 is in Douglas and 89.97 in Sutton. On the point of land that eliminates Blueberry Island it shows a shanty at the point were the Sutton/Douglas line angles off in the center of the lake. The original depth of the streams and pools were an average of 6 feet. When the new dam was built it flowed over 100 acres belonging o 21 people. As you can imagine the outline of the lake has changed considerably as any acres have been flowed over and what were meadows and stone fences have disappeared.
There seems to be a cutoff date of 1830 and earlier, that little was written about this area that can be documented except by lore or deed transfers. It is interesting to note that Manchaug derives its name from the Native People whereas the other lakes around took on the names of the farm that the pond was on such as Singletary, Stevens and Douglas. The road going across the Whiting dam was called Stevens Road as it ran from the Douglas farm to the Stevens farm. Somewhere around the turn of the century a mill was erected on the shore of Stevens pond, down near the old dam it was labeled Mill #3. I could not determine what it produced but the area was noted for guns and gunpowder at this time. Mention was made of the area supplying guns for the War of 1776 and the War of 1812.
SUMMARY OF CONSTRUCTION HISTORY AND OPERATION
The dam was reportedly constructed in 1836, although no drawings of the original construction are available. The dam was extensively modified in 1960, when the crest was widened and raised and the down embankment was constructed. The overflow spillway was replaced with the current box culvert, and the discharge conduit for the low-level sluice was extended at that time. Drawings are available for this work, which was done to accommodate construction of Torrey Road along the dam crest. Limited records of dam maintenance through the early 1980s are available at Interface Fabrics Group’s office in East Douglas, when the dam was acquired by Guilford Industries. Since that time complete records of inspections and maintenance have been maintained and are held by Interface Fabrics Group, the DCR Office of Dam Safety and the Manchaug Pond Association.