The history of the town of Dorchester, Massachusetts, By a committee of the Dorchester antiquarian and historical society ...

308 HISTORY OF DORCHESTER.
ber. Its dimensions were 68 feet by 46, with a
tower 14 feet square, and a steeple 104 feet high to
the vane.* The cost of the building was ~3567,
10s. l1d. old tenor. A sad affair happened at its
raising, which cast a gloom over the otherwise happy event; this was the fall of Ephraim Wales (son
of Jerijah and Sarah Wales) from one of the cross
beams, causing his death the same night. The committee for building were James Foster, James Blake,
Benjamin Bird, Esq., Thomas Bird and Capt. Thos.
Wiswell. Edward Kilton, Robert Royal and Samuel Gore were the master carpenters, and found the
materials. This meeting-house was enlarged in
1795, by dividing it along the ridge-pole, moving
one half of it fourteen feet and the tower and steeple seven feet, and uniting the two halves by new
materials.
On July 7th, of this year, died Mrs. Relief, widow
of Henry Leadbetter, in the 93d year of her age.
She was a daughter of John Holland, one of the
early settlers of this town, and her first husband was
John Douse, of Charlestown.
1744. Daniel Preston, Jr. was accidentally shot
in his head at Thompson's Island, April 4th, and
died immediately.
Blake says, " This year, June ye 3d, on a Sabbath
morning a little before our meeting began (I being
then in ye Meeting-House), was a considerable shock
of an earthquake, that shook ye meeting-house much,
and throwed down some stone wall near by."
* This vane is now on Dea. Ebenezer Clapp's barn, having been
placed there in 1817, when the meeting-house above mentioned was
succeeded by the present one.