Hopewell (Albert Co.) Sketch of Old Shepody - The Peck grant was taken up by Abiel PECK, great-great grandson of Joseph PECK who emigrated from England to Attleboro, Mass. in the year 1636. Abiel Peck was born in 1730 and married Ruth SKINNER of Attleboro. He came to Cumberland at the time of the Revolution and shortly after to Shepody where he obtained a large tract of land from the government said to contain 6,000 acres. The most of this land is still owned by the Peck family. A tombstone in the old Peck burying ground bears this inscription 'Here lies interred the body of Abiel Peck, a native of Boston, and one of the first settlers of this place, who, on the 16th of Dec., 1802, unfortunately perished in a boat, in the 73rd year of his age, leaving upwards of three score descendants to lament his melancholy fate.' During his life the country was a comaparative wilderness with no roads nor means of communication with the different settlements along the shore, except by water. It was upon one of these occasions, while attempting to cross the Bay from Dorchester to his own place in an open boat, that he lost his life. The boat was picked up in a cove near the Joggin, now known as Peck's Cove. The elder Peck had eleven children. One of these, Rachel PECK, married Thomas CALHOUN, grandfather of George CALHOUN, now Registrar of Deeds for Albert Co. The grant was for the most part divided among his immediate family, the last side of the grant, when he had first settled himself, being given to his son Abiel. The next lot, the only one that went outside of the family, was sold to David HOAR from Colchester, N.S. The next farms were occupied by his sons Elisha PECK and Thomas PECK and his sons-in-law, Nicholas PEARSON, John EDGETT, Oliver STILES and Joel EDGETT.