Montague, Maine

I am curious about the village of Montague, Maine. According to "The Length and Breath of Maine by Stanley Attwood", Montague was a village in Enfield. Can anyone give any information on this place and why the name is no longer used. Montague appeared in a 1927 marriage record.

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Permalink Reply by Chris Dunham on October 4, 2010 at 2:03pm

This source says the name was officially changed to West Enfield in 1904. No explanation why, though...

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Permalink Reply by Kyla Sandberg on October 4, 2010 at 2:15pm

Thanks Chris!

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Permalink Reply by Paul Hines on November 6, 2010 at 3:06pm

Montague was a village within the town of Enfield. Enfield village proper was/is located on Cold Stream pond to the east. Enfield station of the European & North American railway sat in between, but the villages themselves were the only significantly populated areas. Montague, or West Enfield, was located on the west side of Enfield on the Penobscot river across from Howland. This area was settled with a large number of French families, (and at least half of the people buried in West Enfield cemetery are of French-Canadian ancestry), but I am only speculating as to the origin of the name Montague. As far as I know, this was merely a local designation such as appears in many towns with a "Smith's Corner" or "Smith's Mills", etc. Many of these designations were simply over-written for a logical north/south/east/west/center approach, as they were never officially incorporated. The Montague House restaurant still bears the name. Today, the bulk of the population of Enfield Township is in the West Enfield (old Montague) area, although the post office is in Enfield Village. Hope this helps! - Paul

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Permalink Reply by Kyla Sandberg on November 6, 2010 at 3:45pm

Thank you Paul for the very interesting reply to my post. I appreciate very much the information that you have provided.
Kyla

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Permalink Reply by Scott G. Brown on February 16, 2011 at 1:20pm

Montague was the original village of West Enfield. Many villages were incorporated into others and received new names as charters were granted for incorporation. You'll notice that Montague still appears on early Topographic maps of the area.

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Permalink Reply by Kyla Sandberg on February 16, 2011 at 1:34pm

Thanks Scott! I understand now. Great post.

Kyla

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Permalink Reply by Darrell Francis Ewing on March 19, 2016 at 12:11pm

I can tell you a little about Montague as I grew up in West Enfield but my father and grandmother always called it Montaque until there death. Dad was the town constable from 1935 until he died in 1963 and he told me why the name was changed. It was a unincorporated town separate from Enfield and it did not have a Post Office so in order to get a post office they was required to be combined with Enfield as a separate village called West Enfield later my mother became the Post Master in West Enfield which at that time was located in what became Harry Nash's Barber Shop and then they built a new post office down by the Penobscot Bridge across the river from the ST Regis paper company in Howland. I hope this is of help. This happened a lot in Maine back then an example was Dover Foxcroft was originaly two seperate towns Dover and Fox Croft.