The Norway Muster

by Charles Francis

In the late spring of 1805 the first muster of the Oxford County militia took place in Norway. The county’s first official regimental muster was, among other things, the first major social event of the year. Whole families from as far away as Buckfield, Livermore and Hebron as well as Otisfield in Cumberland County and Livermore in Androscoggin County were there. In fact, an area had been set aside just so the women in attendance could prepare a huge community meal. Elsewhere, children who had spent the whole winter in the relative isolation of family farms took advantage of the opportunity to play in large groups. Then there were the young single girls of the region who saw the muster as an opportunity to meet the younger unattached militiamen who had come for their regular training. The Norway muster was one of the places where a good many of the young people of Oxford and adjoining counties met their future spouses.

Although the 1805 Norway muster was not the first muster held in the town — that had occurred in 1802 — it was the first for Oxford County, which had come into existence by an act of the Massachusetts General Court in