In April 1659, Ensign Noyes came to make accurate survey of the eighty square miles granted to the town, and John Prescott was deputed by the townsmen at their March meeting to aid in the survey and “mark the bounds.”  Among his varied accomplishments, natural and acquired, Prescott seems to have had some practical skill in surveying, the laying out of highways and the construction of bridges.  In 1648 John Winthrop records:  “This year a new way was found out to Connecticut by Nashua which avoided much of the hilly way.”  As appears by a later petition Prescott was the pioneer of this new path.  In 1657 he was appointed by the government a member of a committee upon the building of bridges “at Billirriky and Misticke.”  In 1658 he with his son-in-law Jonas Fairbank was appointed to survey a farm of six hundred and fifty acres for Captain Richard Davenport, upon which farm the chief part of West Boylston now stands.

To the General Court which met October 18, 1659, the following petition was presented: 

“The humble petition of John Prescot of Lancaster humblye Sheweth, That whereas yr petitioner about nine or ten yeares since, was desired by the late hon’red Governour Mr. Winthrop, w’th other Magistrates, as also by Mr. Wilson of Boston, Mr. Shephard of Cambridge with many others, did lay & marke out a way at ye north side of the great pond & soe by Lancaster, which then was taken by Mr. Hopkins & many others to bee of great vse; This I did meerly vpon the request of these honored gentlemen, to my great detrimt, by being vpon it part of two summers not only myselfe but hiring others alsoe to helpe mee, whereby my family suffered much:  I doe not question but many of ye Court remember the same, as alsoe that this hath not laine dead all this while, but I haue formerly mentioned it, but yet haue noe recompence for the same; the charge whereof came at 2’s p day to about 10’l; it is therefore the desire of y’r petitioner yt you would bee pleased to grant him a farme in some place vndisposed of which will engage him to you and encourage him and others in publique occasions & y’r petitioner shall pray etc.”

One hundred acres of land were granted him, and speedily laid out near the Washacum ponds, where now stand the railroad buildings at Sterling Junction.

We get very few glimpses of Prescott from the meagre records of succeeding years, but those serve to indicate that he was busy, prosperous and annually honored by his neighbors with the public duties for which his sturdy integrity, shrewd business tact, and wisely directed energy peculiarly fitted him.  He had taken the oath of fidelity in 1652.  Such owning of allegiance was by law prerequisite to the holding of real estate.  Refusing such oath he might better have been a Nipmuck so far as civil rights or privileges were concerned.  He was not yet a member of the recognized church however, and therefore lacked the political dignities of a freeman; although his intimate