That Whereas the honourable Court did pleas formerly to grant vnto vs the Inhabitants of Stow a certain Tract of Land to make a Village or Township of, environed with Concord, Sudbury, Marlbury, Lancaster, Groton, & Nashoby:  And Whereas the said Nashoby being a Tract of Land of four miles square, the which for a long time hath been, and still is deserted and left by the Indians none being now resident there, and those of them who lay claim to it being desireous to sell said land; and some English challenging it to be theirs by virtue of Purchase; and besides the Town of Groton in particular, hath of late extended their Town lyne into it, takeing away a considerable part of it; and Especially of Meadow (as wee are Well informed) Wherefore wee above all o’r Neighbour Towns, stand in the greatest need of Enlargement; having but a pent up smale Tract of Land and very little Meadow.

Whence we humbly Pray the great & Gen’ll Court, that if said Nashoby may be sold by the Indians wee may have allowance to buy, or if it be allready, or may be sold to any other Person or Persons, that in the whole of it, it be layed as an Addition to vs the smale Town of Stow, it lying for no other Town but vs for nighness & adjacency, togeither with the great need wee stand of it, & the no want of either or any of the above named Towns.  Shall it Pleas the great & Gen’ll Court to grant this o’r Petition, wee shall be much more able to defray Publick Charges, both Civil, & Ecclesiasticall, to settle o’r Minister amongst vs in order to o’r Injoyment of the Gospel in the fullness of it.  Whence hopeing & believing that the Petition of the Poor, & needy will be granted.  Which shall forever oblidge yo’r Petition’rs to Pray &c: 

     Tho:  STEEVENS.  Cler: 
     In the Towns behalfe

     [Massachusetts Archives, cxiii, 330.]

This petition was granted on October 21, 1702, on the part of the House of Representatives, but negatived in the Council, on October 24.

During this period the territory of Nashobah was the subject of considerable dispute among the neighboring towns, and slowly disappearing by their encroachments.  Under these circumstances an effort was made to incorporate a township from this tract and to establish its boundaries.  The following petition makes a fair statement of the case, though the signatures to it are not autographs: 

To His Excel’cy:  Joseph Dudley Esq:  Cap’t:  Generall & Gov’r:  in Chief in and over Her Maj’ties:  Province of Mass’ts:  Bay in New-England, Together with y’e Hon’ble:  the Council, & Representatives in Gen’ll:  Court Assembled on the 30’th of May, In the Tenth Year of Her Maj’ties:  Reign Annoq Dom’i:  1711,—­The Humble Petition of us the Subscribers Inhabitants of Concord, Chelmsford, Lancaster & Stow &c within the County of Midd’x in the Province Afores’d.

     Most Humbly Sheweth