Barnstable County, Massachusetts (Fanning's, 1853)

BARNSTABLE COUNTY, situated at the extreme easterly part of Massachusetts, comprising the whole of the peninsula of Cape Cod and the Elizabeth island, with the Atlantic ocean on the south and east, Cape Cod bay on the north, and Buzzard bay on the west. Length, 65 miles; mean width, 5; with an area of 325 square miles. The surface is generally flat, the soil naturally sandy and barren, but covered in some places with forests of oak and pine. Courts are held at Barnstable. Pop. in 1820, 24,046; in 1830, 15,310; in 1840, 32,548; in 1850, 35,276.