Editing Eliot, Maine (section)

===Founding===
Today's town of Eliot was formerly the Middle Parish of the town [[Kittery, Maine]],<ref name=stackpole>Old Kittery and Her Families", Everett Stackpole, 1903</ref> originally part of the royal grant to [[Sir Ferdinando Gorges]] known as the Piscataqua Plantation.  Kittery was incorporated in 1647, today distinguishing itself as "the oldest incorporated town in Maine."

While this may be so, settlements upriver on the north side of the [[Piscataqua River]] in today's Eliot were established considerably earlier, owing to more favorable conditions for harborage, timber, and shipbuilding.  This is the basis for Eliot maintaining it was "settled" almost a quarter century earlier in 1623.

In 1659 the local court decreed that there should be two meeting houses in Kittery.  The town's inhabitants disagreed, and held a town meeting on July 17, 1660, where it was:

<blockquote>
...Agreed and fully consented unto that this town of Kittery is by free consent divided into three parts for settling of three ministers, one in the east part as followeth, one at Nichewancick <nowiki>[today's Berwick]</nowiki> which bound ae to come doown unto Thompson point brook formerly called the black Brook and from that Brook the second division is to go downward to the great cove below Thos. Spinney's Point and the third division to go down from the great cove unto Brave Boat Harbor with Capt. Champernown Island, all of which three divisions according as they are divided each division to bear their own charges for the maintenance of their own minister.<ref name=stackpole/></blockquote>

The Upper Parish, then known as the Parish of Unity, later became the town of [[Berwick, Maine|Berwick]] (incorporated in 1713),<ref>{{Cite book  | last = Coolidge  | first = Austin J.|author2=John B. Mansfield  | title = A History and Description of New England| publisher = A.J. Coolidge  | year = 1859| location = Boston, Massachusetts| pages = [https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_OcoMAAAAYAAJ/page/n151 117]–118| url = https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_OcoMAAAAYAAJ| quote = coolidge mansfield history description new england 1859.  }}</ref> with the uppermost part of Kittery along the Piscataqua becoming the Upper Parish.  Left without a meeting house or minister, the residents of a newly created Middle Parish between the Upper and Lower along the river between it and Spinney's Cove <nowiki>[Great Cove]</nowiki> were permitted by order of the court to attend church across the Piscataqua in either the towns of [[Dover, New Hampshire]] or [[Portsmouth, New Hampshire|Portsmouth]] for one-half their going rates.<ref name=stackpole/>

Prior to Eliot's incorporation as a town on March 1, 1810, the Upper Parish had been in conflict with Kittery's other parishes since at least 1791. In 1791, the parish's minister died. His successor, according to a large faction of the parish's inhabitants, was a man of "unfair character" imposed by "a small party" of people. He was rejected by "a large majority", and a new minister was installed in 1792. The internal strife between inhabitants didn't stop there.

The minority faction, angered by the removal of their minister, petitioned the Legislature in 1796 to be set off to the Upper Parish, which was accordingly done. The inhabitants of the second Parish, which was left without a meetinghouse and left to worship across the river at half rate in the town of [[Portsmouth, New Hampshire]], accused the members of the other two of conspiring against them.

The town was likely named for Reverend John Eliot of [[Boston, Massachusetts|Boston]], a friend of General Andrew P. Fernald, the town agent largely responsible for its separation.<ref>{{Citation
  | last = Varney
  | first = George J.
  | title = Gazetteer of the state of Maine. Eliot
  | place = Boston
  | publisher = Russell
  | year = 1886
  | url = http://history.rays-place.com/me/eliot-me.htm }}
</ref>