Ashby Historical Society

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Ashby Historical Society

The Ashby Historical Society has been preserving Ashby's history through education and its collection for over 100 years.

06/02/2026

What did independence actually mean to the people of Ashby in 1776? 🌍📜
Find out on Saturday, June 13th at 2:00 PM, when the Ashby Historical Society presents a special live performance of Declaring Independence: Then & Now at the Ashby Congregational Church (21 New Ipswich Road).
This compelling performance brings history to life using primary source material researched by citizen historians. You’ll hear the actual arguments, doubts, and passions of ordinary people from Ashby and neighboring Massachusetts and New Hampshire towns as they debated breaking away from the King in the spring and summer of 1776.
The presentation concludes with a powerful, annotated reading of the Declaration of Independence to commemorate its upcoming 250th anniversary.
✨ Admission: FREE and open to the public.
Bring your family, your neighbors, and your curiosity!

05/25/2026

Ashby American Legion Post 361 Ashby MA 01431
Memorial Day schedule:
12:30-1pm legion will be honoring our fallen at west cemetery
2pm parade starts from the legion post guest speaker this year is Navy veteran Cheryl Cromwell
RAIN PLAN: Ashby elementary. Post will announce no later than 11:45am if we need to move indoors.
3:30pm chicken BBQ
Parking:
Post office
Ashby elementary
Ashby Library
Ashby market See less

05/13/2026

Dedication of the John Fitch Headstone Saturday, May 16, 2026 at 11:00 AM at the Old Burial Ground.
The final years. In 1772 John Fitch moved to Rindge to speculate in land. It was here he became wealthy and then lost everything. By 1784 he was elderly, feeble and penniless. Rather than pay to support him, Rindge had him transported to Ashby, his last legal residence. He was taken in by Samuel Gates whose wife was related to Fitch. As it happened, the Gates home was near the spot where Fitch had defended his home against attack fifty years earlier. It was here that he died April 8, 1795, aged 87 years. He was buried in an unmarked pauper’s grave in the Old Burial Ground.

05/11/2026

Following the the John Fitch gravestone dedication stop by the Old Engine House across the street for a special exhibit on homespun textiles and their importance in Ashby. Saturday, May 16th, 11 am - 1 pm.

05/08/2026

Victory in Europe Day. 81 years ago today Germany surrenderred on all fronts ending WW II in Europe.

05/03/2026

Dedication of John Fitch Headstone on Saturday, May 16, 2026 at 11:00 AM at the Old Burial Ground.
John Fitch lived near the corner of South Rd and Richardson Rd. in what was then Lunenburg. He would be instrumental in the founding of Fitcburg in 1764 and Ashby in 1767. Thus, without ever moving, he had managed to live three different towns in three years. He became one Ashby's first Selectmen at a time when selectmen's meetings were held in private homes.

04/27/2026

Dedication of John Fitch Headstone, on Saturday, May 16, 2026 at 11:00 AM at the Old Burial Ground at the First Parish Church.

part 1: Fitch's life was anything but ordinary. On July 5, 1748, during King George’s War, his garrison home in what is now Ashby was attacked by Native Americans After a fierce battle in which two British soldiers with him were killed, he surrendered when it became obvious that the attackers would burn the house with his family in it. They were forced to walk to Montreal where they were held prisoners. The following year, at the end of the war, he and his children returned. His wife died during the journey back. Fitch's name was later described as "a synonym for heroism".

04/26/2026

AHS president, Doug Leab, being photographed by Rick Cinclair of the Telegram & Gazette for an article in Monday's editon about the dedication of the John Fitch grave marker. The dedication will be held on Sat. May 16th at 11 am at the Old Burial Ground behind the First Parish Church, Common Rd., Ashby.

04/20/2026

Patriots Day
The “ Alarm” which aroused the Ashby minute-men was fired at about nine o’clock on April 19, 1775. There are good reasons for the belief that the ‘‘ Alarm” was fired in front of Lieutenant Jonas Barrett’s house.

The Ashby men who marched that day:
Samuel Stone, Captain; Jonas: Barrett, First Lieutenant ;
James Bennett, Second Lieutenant; Abijah Wyman, Sargeant; Benjamin
Spaulding, Sargeant; Isaac Brooks, Sargeant; Amos Wheeler,
Sargeant; Ephraim Gibson, Corporal; Peter. Lawrence, Corporal;
William Flagg, Corporal; John Meede, Corporal; Samuel Stone, Jr.,
Fifer; Timothy Stone, Drummer.
“Soldiers Joseph Davis, Caleb Nurss, Salmon Dutton, Oliver
Wright, James Spaulding, Joseph Goodrich, Nathan Davis, Thomas
Dutten, Benjamin Newton, Jonathan Barrett, Benjamin Barrett, Samuel
Winch, George Newell, John Lawrence, Walden Stone, Stephen
Patch, Benjamin Hodgman, Nathan Barron, Joshua Barron, Jacob
Wheeler, Elisha Davis, Thadeus Smith, Isaac Stearns, Joseph Wheeler,
William Walker, Jovathan Daby, Solomon Coleman, Jonathan Gibson,
Jonathan Stone, James Jones, Jonathan Lawrence, Jr., John Stone,
John Wheeler.”’

02/27/2026

Black History Month.
Prince Estabrook
slave, birth date unknown - 1780,
Lexington Militia, 1775,
Continental Army, 1776-1783,
farmer, laborer, Ashby resident, 1805-1830.

Address

Ashby, MA
01431

Telephone

+19783867981

Website

http://ashbyhistorical.org/

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