War broke out
throughout New England with the Nipmuc Indians coming to the aid of Indian
leader King Philip. The English settlers completely abandoned the Quinsigamond
area and the empty buildings were burned by the Indian forces. The town was
again abandoned during Queen Anne's War in 1702. Finally in 1713, Worcester was
permanently resettled for a third time by Jonas Rice. Named after the city of
Worcester, England, the town was incorporated on June 14, 1722. On April 2,
1731, Worcester was chosen as the county seat of the newly found Worcester
County government . In the 1770s, Worcester became a center of American
revolutionary activity. British General Thomas Gage was given information of
patriot ammunition stockpiled in Worcester in 1775. Also in 1775, Massachusetts
Spy publisher Isaiah Thomas moved his radical newspaper out of British occupied
Boston to Worcester. Thomas would continuously publish his paper throughout the
American Revolutionary War. On July 14, 1776, Thomas performed the first public
reading of the Declaration of Independence in front of the Worcester town hall.
He would latter go on to form the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester in
1812.
During the turn of the 19th century
Worcester’s economy moved into manufacturing. Textiles, shoes and clothing
factories opened along the nearby Blackstone River. However, the manufacturing
industry in Worcester would not begin to thrive until the opening of the
Blackstone Canal in 1828 and the opening of the Worcester and Boston Railroad
in 1835. The city transformed into a transportation hub and the manufacturing
industry flourished. Worcester was officially chartered as a city on February
29, 1848. The city’s industries soon attracted immigrants of primarily Irish,
French, and Swedish descent in the mid-19th century and later many immigrants
of Lithuanian, Polish, Italian, Greek, Turkish and Armenian descent
