Editing Isles of Shoals (section)

== History ==
Some of the islands were used for seasonal fishing camps by [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Indigenous peoples]] and first settled by Europeans in the early 17th century. They became one of the many fishing areas for the young British and French colonies. This was one of the most northern fishing ports, the closest one to the south being [[Rockport, Massachusetts]]. The Isles of Shoals were named the "Smith Iles" by English explorer Capt. [[John Smith (explorer)|John Smith]] after sighting them in 1614.<ref>{{cite journal| url=http://digitalcommons.unl.edu/etas/4/| title=A Description of New England| year=1616| author=John Smith, Captain| journal=Electronic Texts in American Studies| publisher=Digital Commons@University of Nebraska-Lincoln| page=39| access-date=February 11, 2020}}</ref> This name did not last once colonization of New England by the British began. The first recorded landfall of an Englishman was that of explorer Captain [[Christopher Levett]], whose 300 fishermen in six ships discovered that the Isles of Shoals were largely abandoned in 1623.<ref>{{cite web| url=http://www.seacoastnh.com/shoals/history.html| title=Isles of Shoals: A Capsule History| author=J. Dennis Robinson| year=1997| publisher=SeacoastNH.com| access-date=March 23, 2011}}</ref>

"The first place I set my foot upon in New England was the Isle of Shoals, being islands in the sea about two [[League (unit)|leagues]] from the main," Levett wrote later. "Upon these islands I neither could see one good timber-tree nor so much good ground as to make a garden. The place is found to be a good fishing-place for six ships, but more can not be well there, for want of convenient stage room, as this year's experience hath proved."<ref>{{cite book| url=https://archive.org/details/nooksandcorners01drakgoog| page=[https://archive.org/details/nooksandcorners01drakgoog/page/n155 155]| quote=levett.| title=''Nooks and Corners of the New England Coast''| author=Samuel Adams Drake| publisher=Harper & Brothers, New York| year=1875| access-date=March 23, 2011}}</ref>

[[File:Hassam - 'Isles of Shoals, Broad Cove', oil on canvas painting by Childe Hassam, 1911.jpg|thumb|left|[[Childe Hassam]]. ''Isles of Shoals, Broad Cove'', 1911. Oil on canvas. [[Honolulu Museum of Art]].]]

In 1628 the [[Pilgrims (Plymouth Colony)|Plymouth Pilgrims]] exiled [[Thomas Morton (colonist)|Thomas Morton]] on the island due to his libertine activities with the Indians at [[Merrymount (Quincy, Massachusetts)|Merrymount]].<ref>William Bradford, [[Of Plymouth Plantation]]</ref>

The first town, "Apledoore", included all of the Isles of Shoals, and was incorporated by the General Court of the [[Massachusetts Bay Colony]] on May 22, 1661. At that time, the province of New Hampshire and the province of Maine were both part of Massachusetts Bay Colony. By 1665, the name of the town had changed to "Iles of Shoales". Starting in 1680 and continuing for several years, there was a general migration of the population to Star Island in what is now New Hampshire, departing from Hog Island (now known as Appledore) in what is now Maine. In 1696, the town was annexed by [[Kittery, Maine|Kittery]]. In 1715 the township of Gosport was established by New Hampshire on Star Island.<ref>Maine Historical Records Survey Project (1940). [https://familysearch.org/search/catalog/283056 ''Counties, cities, towns, and plantations of Maine: A handbook of incorporations, dissolutions, and boundary changes''].</ref><ref name= "History Rye NH">{{cite book| last = Parsons| first = Langdon D.| title = History of the Town of Rye, New Hampshire, from its discovery and settlement until December 31, 1903| publisher = Rumford Printing Company| year = 1903| location = Concord, New Hampshire, U.S.A.| pages = 231–234 (Chapter XIII, The Isles of Shoals pp. 227–244) | url = https://books.google.com/books?id=d5fpE_cEtLAC&pg=PA230}}</ref>

The Gosport community was fairly prosperous up until about 1778, when the islanders were evacuated to [[Rye, New Hampshire]], due to the [[American Revolutionary War|Revolutionary War]]. Though a small population remained, the islands were largely abandoned until the middle of the 19th century, when Thomas Laighton and Levi Thaxter opened a popular summer hotel on [[Appledore Island]]. Laighton's daughter, Celia, married Levi at the age of fifteen and as [[Celia Thaxter]] became the most popular American female [[poet]] of the 19th century.{{citation needed|date=November 2019}}  She hosted an [[arts]] community on the island frequented by authors including [[Nathaniel Hawthorne]], [[John Greenleaf Whittier]], [[Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.|Oliver Wendell Holmes]] and [[Sarah Orne Jewett]], and the [[Impressionist]] [[Painting|painter]] [[Childe Hassam]].<ref>{{cite web| url=http://www.seacoastnh.com/shoals/history.html| author=Robinson, J.D.| year=1997| title=The Remarkablest Isles}}</ref> Having executed his last drawing three days previous, the Boston painter [[William Morris Hunt]] drowned there in 1879, reportedly a suicide.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1879/09/09/94114603.pdf|title=Death of William Morris Hunt, New York Times, Sept. 9, 1879|website=[[The New York Times]]|access-date=23 April 2018}}</ref> Hunt's body was discovered by Celia Thaxter.<ref>{{cite web| url=http://www.seacoastnh.com/celia/life.html| title=Celia Thaxter Timeline| author=Norma H. Mandel| year=1999| publisher=SeacoastNH.com| access-date=October 10, 2008| archive-date=May 19, 2006| archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20060519103245/http://www.seacoastnh.com/celia/life.html| url-status=dead}}</ref>

[[William James]] visited the Isles of Shoals in 1873. His experiences were recalled in a letter to brother [[Henry James]] dated July 14-16 [1873]. At one point he reminisces, "I just lay around drinking the air and the light and the sounds. I succeeded in reading no word for three days, and then took [[Goethe]]'s Gedichte out on my walks, and with them in my memory, the smell of the laurels and pines in my nose, and the rhythmic pounding of the surf upon my ear, I was free and happy again.<ref>Ralph Barton Perry, ''THE THOUGHT AND CHARACTER OF WILLIAM JAMES, As revealed in unpublished correspondence and notes, together with his published writings. VOLUME I: INHERITANCE AND VOCATION, With Illustrations.'' London: Humphrey. [https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.78218/page/n399/mode/2up?q=pines Page 350]</ref>

The popularity of Laighton's Appledore House soon led to establishment of the Mid-Ocean House on Smuttynose Island, and the Oceanic Hotel, which is still in use today on Star Island.
[[File:William Morris Hunt Appledore.jpeg|thumb|left|250px|''Maine, View of Appledore'', 1879, [[William Morris Hunt]], charcoal on paper]]