This Photo is going around Facebook today. It is from the Great Fire of Portland in 1866 that started from Fireworks. It was not the first burning. In 1775 the British set fire to an area of Falmouth (Mass) now Portland, Maine. A petition of relief for sufferers was made to the then Massachusetts legislature and notably signed by John Hancock and also notably given to Samuel Freeman and others. The land grant was for two townships. One was the New Portland area and the other was an adjacent 6 mile square lot called township #3 aka the Little River Plantation. In 1808 it took a name from one of its major landowners and became Freeman, Maine.
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