V-' ^! . •■■■■:-
1 ■-;..
HISTORY
OF
MIDDLESEX COUNTT
MASSACHUSETTS,
WITH
! 1 ()! r 1 ; A P l-[ re A i . SKE]TCHES
I IF MANY OK ITS
Pioneers and Prominent Men.
illMl'II.KD ISI>Kl: TICK Si:i»F.KVISIliX i)F
I < I i \ \ M ! I ' ' \ I I I I ; [ >
VOL. II.
I Xj XjTJ S T K. ^^T E ID .
I'H 1 L.\ I)ELPHI.\:
.r. w . 1. 1 ; w I s A- ( • < >.
1 N il 0 .
( 'opi/riqht, I.V'U.
liY J. \V. LKW IS Sc ('(».
All !:inf'l< lifterrM.
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CONTENTS OF VOL. II.
CITIES AND TOWI^S.
CHAPTER I.
LOWEXL 1
Early History.
CHAPTER n.
Lowell — {Continued) 16
The Tuwn of Lowell.
CHAPTER III.
Lowell— (Con^'ntterf) 26
City of Lowell.
CHAPTER IV.
Lowell— ( Conlinued) 50
Hayora.
CHAPTER V.
Lowell — (Continued) 58
Politics.
CHAPTER VL
Lowell — [Continued) 64
Baaka.
CHAPTER VII.
Lowell— fCona'nuerf) 71
MnDufacnirea.
CHAPTER Vin.
Lowell — (Continued) 112
Scboola.
CHAPTER IX.
Lowell — (Continued) 126
Ecclesiastical History.
CHAPTER X.
Lowell — (Continued) 179
Military.
CHAPTER XI.
Lowell — (Contintud) 188
The Freag.
CHAPTER XII.
Lowell — (Continued) U'o
Medical.
CHAPTER XIII.
Lowell — ( Conlinued) 222
Societies.
CHAPTER XIV.
Lowell — ( CoTtlinued) 231
Miscellaneous.
CHAPTER XV.
Chelmsfi-bd 239
Early History.
CHAPTER XVI.
Chelmsford — (Continued) 249
lodiao History — FreDcb aod lodiao Wars — War of the ReTo-
lutioo— Shays' BebellioQ — War of the Rebellioo.
CHAPTER XVII.
Chelmsford — (Conlinued) 259
Educational History.
CHAPTER XVIII.
Chelmsford — (Continued) 264
Manafactnreo.
CHAPTER XIX.
Chelmsford — {Continued) 269
MlscellaDeoua.
CHAPTER XX.
Dracut 276
Early Hlstoiy.
CHAPTER XXL
DRA.CVT— (Continued) 278
Indian History.
CHAPTER XXEL
Dractjt — (Continued) 284
ClTil and Docnmentary History.
CHAPTER XXm.
Dbacut — (Continued) 290
£ccleela«ticai and EducationaL
CHAPTER XXrV. ,.;^
DnxcuTr— (Continued) .i..5?lL
Jterolotlonary.War.
CONTEXTS.
' CHAPTER XLIII.
300 CdsckRD— {Continued) jS-l
Ci'nrurJ Fight— Brunt and Strife .if Revoluticiri.
CHAPTER XLIV.
CoscoRD—iConlinufd) .-,37
Prtigrees and Prosperity aa u Shire-town and ;i Literur) Ceiitie
CHAPTER XXV.
Dr.\cdt— ( Continued)
Shaj-8' Eebellion and MiBcellaneous.
CHAPTER XXVI.
Dracvt— (Continued) 3]g
War of the Kebellion— ManufactureB— BiograpliicaL
CHAPTER XXVII. i — Celebratioii»-3Ioui.ii,eut6-Hebrll,„n
• „, - ^-^ CHAPTER XLV.
The Beginnings. -v^j . .
CHAPTER XXVIII. | courts, School*. t«deti.s, I>„n.tiun». etc.
BiLLEKICA— (Ct)n(m»ed) p.og ,
The Indians and Indian Wara. CHAPTER XL VI.
Co.N'CORD— (Con(ini/C(/)
Professional and Official I'lti^ens— Coiirlusi.-n
(iu:',
CHAPTER XLVII.
CHAPTER XXIX.
BiLLERlcw — i Continued) .332
IteligioiiB lljotory.
CHAPTER XXX. : Lincoj-n ,112
Rtl.LKRIC.A. — [Continued) ."^SS f^r'r Hi>fMT—rlMir..lie-— Military llr-|..ry— Fnnch ju. I
Land Di,trib.mon-D>™en,berment. '"''""' ""■-■'■''- If- lutiou-l.ist ..f .s,|die,H-\Var ..1
^ l.-lj— W.ir of th.- Heb.-lh.jii— .\it ot lu. ■.i(.o.,iiir,n— Town
CHAPTER XXXI. ! "rtice,-, etc.
BiLLERicA— iCoH(miterf) 34O CHAPTER XLVIII.
B.llericaiatheRevolntinn. LlSVOL^-^ Continued) t^o;
CHAPTER XXXII. j <^"ll>'S^<''™'luaf=-Plo-in:.„5-E.lMc.,M..unl-B,inK|.i.l«ces
DiLLKRic.\— (CoHdnuet/) 3II 1 CH U'TEK MAX
Kdnrjuioll. j
I Aylr rt3.j
CHAPTER XXXIII. 1 I,itro.l..Mion -T..|.mU.M'I'.v -Ku.ly liMhun Tube,- Bound-
liK.LEttrcA — tConlinued) 34Q ] anesof the r. mm.
ii.iig.ou8 History. I CHAPTER L.
CH.\PTER XXXIV.
BlLLKKUA — i Continued)
31iaci'Ihiiieuiis.
349
\YF.R — (Omtinued)
Kariy Sftttlerrf.
M-2
CHAPTER XXXV.
Ty.NGSBORoumi 357
CHAPTER XXXVI.
M'DBUi
CHAPTER XXXVII.
Waylano 413
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
Maynard 437
CHAPTER XXXIX.
STOMiHASl 46]
CHAPTER XL.
Groton .501
CHAPTER XLL
('<J^i->i--'> .570
.■Settlement— &rly History — Indian Tloiihles — Captain
Wlueler'H Narrative.
CHAPTER XLII.
Conci^Wi—i (.'nnlinued) 577
CHAPTEi; LI.
.A.YER — {G'/i07/lli;'/l (5,50
Highways— I'. ■ii|Hayr—niidr,M:_T.n el II — M,,|., :,i,.| Pl...^
CHAPTER LH.
.\yer — [Continued) 6.57
Canals— Ruilroadi—I'ustdilii e -Tidosrapb— Telepbunc.
CII.VI'TER LI[[.
.\yf.k — ( t'iin/iniic(/l ,jm
Schools— Library — Water uoiks.
CHAPTER LIV.
.\yek - (toH(i»iic(/) gp.5
Industries— .\ucieut Mills--Maiiufiuton-3 -Xoiiipaivr».
CHAPTER LV.
Ay'er — I Continued) ^70
Reugiois Societies: B.ipli3( — Unitarian — Catholic — 1 ..n
gregfttlolMilirt— .Methiidist.
CHAPTER LVI.
.A.VER — iConlinuetl) qj^
Fire and File * 'oiiipaiiies.
CHAPTER LVII.
Independence in i'hnn;h and .-state— Preparations for Ke».i- 1 .-Vyer — (Conlinutd)
lutioa — Journal of a British Spy,
6S4
New Town— Agit.ition for Sot-off— lucorjioration.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER LVIir. | CHAPTER LXXII.
Westford ''S9 ' Bedford— (Coiitiivteil) 828
Colonial Troubles— Botitoo Tea Party — Minute Heo — CoDCOHl
CHAPTER LIX.
Wakefield '1'
CHAPTER LX.
WiSCHESTER "■*''
Ci\il Htstury previuus to Itou.
CHAPTER LXI.
\Vl>"CHESTER — ( Conliitued) '-^b
EccIeBiastical History.
CHAPTER LXir.
BoXBOROliiU
CHAPTER LXI [I.
Reading
Tfi9
703
Fight— Women 8 Part— Battle of Banker Hill.
CHAPTER LXXJUI.
Bedford — {Continued) 831
Supplies for tha Amiy— Fiuancial Trouble*— Vote for GoTer-
nor under the CunstitutioD iu 1780.
CHAPTER LXXIV.
Bedford — (Continued) 834
Shays' Bebelllon and Subsequent Troubles — ClTll War— Bed-
ford's Honored Dead.
CHAPTER LXXV.
Bedford — i Coniinued) 836
CHAPTER LXIV
North READiyt;
808
Finaucial Troubles — ')ld Tenor and Lawful Money — Slavery
10 Bedford— Bill of Sale of a Negro Boy in 175«.
CHAPTER LXXVI.
BedfiiRD — I Continued) 838
Puhtic Charity — How Dispenseit— Town Farm for the Pour.
CHAPTER LXV.
Sll I
Bedford
The P:.rent Towni(--EHily lir.tut- aiiil S^ttl^iiicnt.,— The T»i>
Brothers — Dlsiharge of lu'li.in l hiiiiis— i;.<i ii-.n^— linui-
IKfriitiuii.
CHAPTKi; LXVI.
BEDFORD — (Cojilinwid)
X^nie -Uouu.l.iries— Beilcvnlrmi.— l!.i"i'l»— i'ii-.! M'-jmi--
Uou'^e and .Miiii-t»r— Chiirche., F.Tiiifd— T.iM-.i— ."'■in- "Id
Fniinli*'-; ami Sites.
CHAPTER LXV 11.
BEPFiiRn— l,Cb'i/i"':r('' ...
Ri'l.iiioii of First rhuMii ■nl r..uii— |ii»iiii»sk.h -I l;->.
Nichohiii B.jiv»»— Kiint Brll- Miuielry f \>\ . Xulh.iiii. 1
bheliii.iD dnd Rev. JoM-ph Pen uli.
(Jil.APTER LXV II I.
Beufobp — {ConliiivaU
Tim I'leriiy of New Kus:l»iiil— Itcv. Sauninl Meariis- Pace
.lud H.irtw^ll Fim.l— Will .d \iinn Pa^e— New Miiliii-j-
IIoU6e — SiiigiDS-J" hool— .'^.ibl'iiiU-?^' Iiool.
CHAPTER LXIX.
Bedford —(Ci^nttnued) 82L
S-parali'in hnw-ren Clmn li -ml r'ovii 1 iiiMnnu.l'on^n'ca-
tioiwl -oci.-ty iirsunized— Their ll.m.H;..r W..i/.hip— W,,rk
of I'liilariJU Chun h aud Firil I'.u :h— Death of llev.
:^amuel .-lenrn!=— .^teatii-.' [le^ctiidaiit-s- 1 huriih cl Christ.
i^HAPTER LXX.
Bedford— ( 'ijn(i«»e'') ^-'^
CHAPTER LXXVIL
Bedford — (Continued) 839
Burial-Grounds.
I CHAPTER LXXVIII.
I Bedford — (Continued) 840
Highways- Bridges and lUilroads.
^1„ I CHAPTER LXXrX.
j Bkdford — [Continued) 844
I jitai;c-llout«f»— Foat-Oflice — PystOiMier— Industries— Residen-
tial Town— luventiona.
i CHAPTER LXXX.
>!.* Bedford — (Coniinued)
846
8-::o
SrhouU and Libraries.
CH.VI'TER L.\'\t.
Bedford— I,' '■'"''""'''l ...
Indian Tn'ublefe-ludiii.hiiil ,s. rvir. — KxiK-in-iKe of Mary
I.une— 5la-twell Family— F«!ni.h NeutraUi- FreutU aud
Indian Wars.
8-J7
MiriiigJ— Likes— Ponds— Public-Houses— Bedford Springs.
CHAPTER LXXXL
I'.KDFORD — (Contintifd) 847
Fire-EnKine — Enforcement of Law— Drink Custom — Wltch-
. raft— Bounty for Crows, elc.
CH.\PTER LXXXII.
Bedford — ^Continued) 849
Profanity and Drunkenness Puniahed hy Law — Titblogiiien
aud their Duties— Minor Offl-Ters -English Rigbt.
CHAPTER LXXXIir.
BtDFORD — (Coatiaued) 850
Noted 0\'Ca6lon8.
CHAPTER LXXXIV.
Bedford — (Conlin'Uii) 851
Topi>grapbical and Miscellaueuuth
CHAPTER LXXXV.
Bedford — (Cnniintird) 853
Early Method of Collecfiug Taxes— Souin Early Oustoou and . .' <■■ ■
IniprovemcDts. .,.*., t
CHAPTER T.XXXVT i '
Littleton ^^t''^
CITIES AND TOWNS.
CHAPTER I.
LO WELL}
HY CHARLES C. CHASE.
KARLY HISTORY.
The spot on which the city of Lowell now stands
is not without hi.storic interest. Where now stretch
its busy streets, resounding with the innumerable
voices of industries, there once stood the thickly-
gathered wigwams of the red man of the forest, or
the humble anil scattered homes of the early English
settlers. Ever since tlie race began this spot has had
its peculiar attraction as the liabitation of man. It
was never a solitude. The echoes of human voices
have ever mingled with the soun<l of its water-falls.
The .^[errimack and Concord iiivcrs unite within
the limits of the city, and there are water-falls on
each of these .-itreams within a mile of their junc-
tion. The Hsli which sw.irmed about these falls had
from time immemorial attracted the Indian, .-md the
vast water-power which they aH'ordcd allured tlie
enterprising white man to the favored spot. The
two rivers have each an honored name in history.
What civilized man first discovered the Merrimack
is an interesting but unsettled question. De Monts,
Champlain and (Captain .John Smith each has his
claim to the honor. Doubtless, Champlain, the at-
tendant and the i)ilot of the French admiral, De
Monts, made the Hrst historic mention of the river;
for, in 11)04, in writing to France re.'tpecting the
transactions of the expedition of De Monts on the '
banks of the St. Lawrence, he says : " The Indians [
tell us of a beautiful river far to the south, which '
they call the Merrimac." .\gain, in the following !
seascm, when, on the night of July 15tb, the bark of
De .Monta had sailed from the Isle of Shoals to Cape
Ann. Champlain was sent to the shore by his com-
mander to observe five or six Indians who had in a
canoe come near the .admiral's bark. To each of
these Indians Champlain gave a knife and some bis-
1 III preparing tliede pafces, the viiliiuble hjetunes ut Lowell, by Rev.
Dr. Hfliry \. titled, Cliarle^ I'owley, LL. D., au«i Alfred GilniAO, Esq., ■
have l)L'en freely coiisulled, aud to these gelltlcliien tlio writer tenders
hla dilK'ere thiinks.
cuit, " which caused them to dance again better than
before." When he asked for information regarding
the coast, the Indians " with a crayon described a
river which we had passed, which contained shoals
and was very long." This river, without doubt, was
the Merrimack. On the 17th of July De Monts en-
tered a bay and discovered the mouth of another
river, which was evidently the Charles River.
It should here be remarked that some writers have
believed that the river whose mouth waa discovered
on the 17th of July was the Merrimack ; but the
fact that Champlain, on the KJth, while at Cape
Ann, was informed by the Indians that De Monts
had in the previous night passed unobserved a river
which was very long and had shoals, forbids the sup-
position that the river, whose mouth waa discovered
on the next day, whilesailing south from Cape Ann,
could be the Merrimack. Who was the first discov-
erer of the Merrimack, therefore, still remains in
doubt. Champlain clearly marks the identity of Cape
.\nn by mentioning the three islands near its point.
.\round the falls of these streams were the favorite
(Ishing-grounds of the Pawtucket tribe of Indians.'
Here in the spring-time, from all the region round,
they gathered to secure their annual supply of fish.
Here they reared their wigwams and lighted their
council-firea. Here, for the time at least, the In-
dian had his home. His women and children were
with him. On the plains, where the young of our
city celebrate their athletic gtimes, the sons and
daughters of the forest engaged in their rude and
simple sports. On (he waters, where now our pleas-
ure-boats gaily sail, the Indian once paddled his
light canoe.
The Pawtucket tribe was one of the largest and
most powerful of the Indian tribes. Gookin, a writer
of the highest authority in Indian history, informs us
that before the desolations of the great plague in
1617 the tribe numbered 3000 souls. Its domain ex-
tended over all the State of New Hampshire and
parts of Maine and Massachusetts. Little, however,
is known of their history before the coming among
them of the Rev. John Eliot, the great apostle to the
- Wamesits is the name giveo to the Indiaiu near Concord Blr«r, bui i
the Pawtucketa and Wamraiu belonged to ttae aune tilbe.
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHTTSETTS.
Indians, about sixteen years after the landing of the
Pilgrims at Plymouth.
This devoted Christian missionary, now forty-three
years of age, had been educated at the University of
Cambridge, England, and had subsequently, in the
new world, been settled, with the title of " teacher,"
over the church in Roxbury. By his labors some of
the Indiana of the vicinity had professed their faith
in Christ, and were known by the name of Christian
or Praying Indians. With some of these Praying In-
dians to aid him in his missionary work, Eliot vis-
ited, in 1647, the red men of the Pawtucket tribe on
the banks of the Merrimack and Concord. Passacona-
way, the Indian chief, with his sons, fled at their ap-
proach. Some of his men, however, remained and
listened to the message of the devoted apostle. In
the following year Eliot, upon a second visit, gained
the ear of the chief, who declared bis purpose
in future to " pray to God." In 1653, upon the peti-
tion of Eliot, the Legislature of Massachusetts granted
to the Pawtucket Indians the land lying about the
Pawtucket and Wamesit Falls. The tract thus
granted contained about 2500 acres. Gookin informs
us that every year in the beginning of May the
apostle Eliot " came to this fishing-place of the In-
dians to spread the net of the gospel to fish for their
souls."
Passaconaway, whose usual home was at Penna-
cook (now Cuncord, N. H.), ruled over a wide do-
main, extending from the Merrimack to the Piscat-
aqua. As a powwow and sorcerer he had a wide-
spread fame. It was thought that he " could make a
green leaf grow in the winter, the trees to dance
and water to burn." He lived to a great age. Gookin
says that he "saw him alive at Pawtucket when he
was about 100 years old.' In a speech which the
aged chieftain made to his tribe before his death, are
the following words : " I am now going the way of all
flesh, and not likely to see you ever meet together anv
more. I will now leave this word of counsel with
you, that you may take heed how you quarrel with
the English." He is supposed to have died about
1661.
Wannalancet, his son, now more than forty years
of age, became his successor. He respected the dying
advice of his father. He was a lover of peace, a man
of gentle nature. Too often the unsparing vengeance
of the white men, aroused to frenzy by the perfidy
and cruelty of other Indians, fell upon the head of
the innocent Wannalancet. But he refused to retali-
ate. His memory is recalled by every generous
heart with sentiments of honor mingled with pity.
The home of Wannalancet was on the banks ofthe
Merrimack, at Litchfield, N. H., about twenty miles
north of Lowell. In 1669 he came down the Merri-
mack, and, as a defence against the hostile Mohawks,
erected a fort upon the hill in Lowell which was
from this circumstance denominated Fort Hill. This
hill is now the property of the city of Lowell, which
' has generously adorned its grounds and n^^de it the
most beautiful of our public parks.
Lender the gentle Wannalancet the fortunes of his
tribe rapidly waned. Lawless white men seized upon
his lands. .\t length he fell into the hands of
enemies. Though set at liberty, he refused to return
to his home. In 1677, when about fifty-eight years of
age, he was visited by Indians from the north, who,
' as Eliot declared, " urged him partly by persuasion
i and partly by force to accompany them to their coun-
I try." The unfortunate and di.iheartened chief finally
t consented, and with a band of about fifty followers,
which embraced all but two of his once powerful
tribe, he departed to the wilds of Canada. As a tribe,
I the Pawtuckets long since perished from the earth.
Their name and their sad memory remain. An igno-
rant and indolent race, almost utterly destitute of
1 every art and comfort of civilized life, subi-isting upon
1 the coarsest food, and wasted both by pestilence and
i war, they melted away before the advancing ranks of
I the more enterprising and aggressive settlers from the
'< Old World. Few traces are now left, in our city, of
their habitation. An occasional Indian arrow head,
or other rude implement, dug up while laying the
foundations of some modern .structure, a few traces
of the old trench which once separated their lands
from those of the white man, remind us that we live
on historic ground. The familiar words " Pawtucket,"
" Wamesit," " Passaconaway," " Wannalancet," and
others, which the people of Lowell are fond of em-
I ploying in giving names to the streets and the vari-
ous institutions and enterprises of the city, attest the
I pride and pleasure with which we recognize the his-
toric fact that on the soil where our city now stands
there " once lived and loved another race of beings,'
I in whose fate we take a poetic interest, and whose
memory we do not wish to .see blotted out forever.
j Let ua also briefly notice the white men who, in
j early days, dwelt upon this favorite spot. In 1652
; about twenty of the inhabitants of Woburn and Con-
cord, Mass., petitioned the General Court to be al-
lowed to examine a tract of land lying on the west
side of the Concord River with the view of forming a
new settlement, and their petition was granted. They
found the land " a comfortable place to accommodate
God's people." The General Court gave them a tract
of land originally about six miles square, bounded on
one side by the Concord River beginning at its junc-
tion with the Merrimack. About the same time the
grant, already referred to, giving to the Pawtuckettribe
of Indians a tract of laud lying about the falls in the
Merrimack, was made upon the petition of the apostle
Eliot.
On the River Chelmer, in the County of Essex, in
England, there was a village called Chelmsford (Chel-
mer's ford), a name which seems to have been dear
to the little band of men to whom we have just re-
ferred ; for they give the name of Chelmsford to the
new settlement. This little colony of Englishmen in
LOWELL.
a few years receive an important addition to their
numbers and their wealth by the accession of a large
part of the members of the church in \Venham,Ma88.,
with their pastor, the Rev. John Fiske. The colony
consisted of men of the most devout religious char-
acter. So careful were they that no irreligious person
should come among them that no one was admitted
to citizenship except by "a major vote at public
town-meeting." Lands and accommodations were,
however, gratuitously offered to mechanics and artif-
icers who would set up their trades in the town.
The sound of innumerable looms and spindles, which
now is heard in everj- part of this (Sty, was not heard
her^for the tirst time when our great manufactories
were built, for, in l<i56, more than 230 years ago, at
the Jlay meeting of the town of Chelmsford, thirty
acres of land were granted to William How if he
would set up his trade of weaving and perform the
town's work. Similar urt'ers encouraged the erection
of a saw-mill anil a corn-mill, it being e.Kpressly
stipulated in case of the latter that a "sufficient mill
and miller" should he employed. Truly the far-see-
ing and wealthy men of Boston, who established the
great manufactories of our city, were not the first to
recognize the value of the work of the loom and spin-
dle, and to foster and encourage the manufacturing
interests of our country.
But the history of the town of (Chelmsford is not
the history of fvowcll; for the territory of the city
embraces only that part of the town known as East
(,'helmsford. Of the town of Chelmsford we need
onlv -^ay that from its earliest days its staid and pious
inhabitants, devoted mainly to the peaceful pursuits
of agriculture, have transinitte<l to their posterity an
honorable mime. The patriotic zeal with which they
espoused their country's cause in the days of the
Revolution, and their brave and generous participa-
tion in the datigers and expenses of the war, make a
historic record of which their posterity may well be
proud.
But of Kaat Chelmsford, which, in its early days,
was the name by which th^ site of our city was called,
let us brieHy apeak. At the beginning of the present
century this village contained forty-five or fifty
houses. The natural advant.-iges of the place — its t
water- falls anil its fertile meadows — attracted not only ]
the farmer, but the mechanic and artisan. There is !
on record a description of the village as it was nearly l
one hundred yearn ago. As one came down on the j
side of the Merrimack from Middlesex Village and I
past Pawtucket Falls, he passed successively the resi- I
dences of Silas Hoar, Amos Whitney, Archibald j
A[cFarlin, Captain John Ford, Captain Phineas |
Whiting (where now stands the splendid residence of \
Frederick .A.yer), Asahel Stearns, Jonathan Fiske,
Mr. Livingston (in a house once used as Captain
Whiting's store), and Joseph Chambers, a cooper.
Then came, near the siteof the Lowell Hospital, a red i
school-house, from whose windows the pupils, when
tired of their books, looked down upon the water-
falls and the huge rocks of the river.' Near the foot
of the falls lived Benjamin Melvin. Near by stood
the saw-mill and grist-mill of Nathan Tyler— mills
which, in 1810, were swept away by the ice in a win-
ter freshet. Mr. Hall, a blacksmith, lived on the site
1 of the Ladd and Whitney monument. Josiah Fletch-
er lived near the site of the John Street Congrega-
I tional Church. Crossing the Concord River, we come
to the "Old Joe Brown House,'' a two-story house
still standing conspicuously on East Merrimack
Street, in the open space just east of the Prescott
boarding-houses. Next, on the spot now occupied
by St. John's Hospital, was the " Old Yellow House,"
once a well known hotel and subsequently the resi-
dence of Judge Livermore.
This historic house has been moved back from the
street, but still is used as an appendage of the hos-
pital. On the site of the American Honse was an inn
kept by Joseph Warren. Nathan Ames and John
Fisher did a large business as blacksmiths near the
paper and batting-mill on Lawrence Street. " Mr.
Ames " (as Z. E. StOne, Esq., from whom I obtain
these facts, informs us) " was the father of the well-
known Springfield sword manufacturers of the same
name." Near the junction of Central and Thorndike
Streets were the houses of Johnson Davis, Moses
Hale and Ephraim Osgood. On the old Boston road
lived Sprague Livingston, and on a cross-road leading
to Middlesex Village Robert and Samuel Pierce.
Levi Fletcher lived between Chelmsford and Liberty
Streets, near the old pound. Near Gates' tannery
■itood a school-house. In this vicinity was the house
of John Gload and Samuel Marshall. On the Chelms-
ford road, as one goes towards the city poor-farm, was
the house of Isaac Chamberlain, on whose site was
supposed to be the house of John Chamberlain, whose
combat with the Indian chief Paugus, in"Loveirs
fight," has been " immortalized in history and in song."
Next beyond were the dwellings of Henry Coburn
and Simon Parker. Great interest attaches to the
latter house as having once been the residence of
Benjamin Pierce, Governor of New Hampshire, and
father of President Franklin Pierce. The following
extract from an article upon Governor Pierce, written
by Joshua Merrill, Esq., of Lowell, will not fail to
interest the reader: " Benjamin Pierce was bom in
Chelmsford (now Lowell) December 25, 1757. His
father, Benjamin Pierce, died when his son was six
years old. After his father's death he lived with his
uncle, Robert Pierce, a farmer, whose honse stood on
the^oad leading from Lowell to Chelmsford, where Or-
lando Blodgetfs stable now stands. He remained with
his uncle until April 19, 1775. He was then ploughing
in a field on Powell Street, directly west of the stone
stable erected by .\ldis L. Waite. He heard the firingof
guns, and soon messengers arrived notifying the in-
habitants of the battles of Lexington and Concord.
Young Pierce, then in his eighteenth year, chained
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTV, MASSACHUSETTS.
hia oteers, as he called them, to a stump ; went to the
house, took his Uucle's gun and equipments and started
for Concord on foot. The British had retreated be-
fore he arrived at Concord. He enlisted in Captain
Ford's company. Having entered the service at the
commencement of the war, he continued to the close.
In one of the battles, when the bearer of the colors
was shot, young Pierce seized the colors and bore
them to the front during the conflict."
Young Pierce, as a soldier, won a noble name, but
this is not the place co record his life. But there i.s
one incident in his life of such touching interest that
I can hardly forbear to mention it. At one time after
leaving the army, he became addicted to the habit of
too free a use of intoxicating liquor. His sister, with
whom he lived, remonstrated with him, but without
effect. One day he came home intoxicated, and when
his sister saw his condition the tears began to run
down her cheeks. She wiped them off, but they
would come. He looked at her a moment, and then
said : " Becky, tears are more powerful than words.
You shall never see me in this condition again.''
And she never did. Such power is there hidden in a
tear.
In subsequent years Governor Pierce, when he
came from his home in Hillsborough, New Hamp-
shire, to Lowell, to visit his old friends, took delight
in pointing out to them the stump to which, on April
1S>, 1775, he hitched his steers. He settled in Hills-
borough after the war, and was (lovernor of New
Hampshire in 1827-29. He died in 1839, at the age
of eighty-two years. His son, President Franklin
Pierce, was born in Hillsborough, November 23, 1804.
Other old residents of ninety or one hundred years
ago, might be named, but we must not go too far
away into the neighborhood of our city, or make our
narration tedious by repeating too many names.
There is perhaps a popular impression that the
proper history of Lowell began in 1822, when the first
great manufacturing company, The Merrimack, was
organized and began its operations in the village of
East Chelmsford; but surely a thriving town or city
does not first begin to exist when it gets a new name,
or when .some great event or enterprise gives it a new
and powerful impetus and brings it prominently be-
fore the public mind. Let us glance at a few of the
enterprises of this village of a date many years ear-
lier than 1822.
Middlesex Canal.— The Merrimack River, instead
of keeping, like other eastern rivers, its continuous
southern course to the ocean and having its mouth
at the harbor of the city of Lynn, abruptly farns
towards the northeast, a short distance above Paw-
tucket Falls, and reaches the ocean at the city of
Newbury port. Indeed, there are geological indications
that the river did once pursue its southerly course to
the ocean, passing along the west side instead of the
east side of Fort Hill. Mr. Cowley says : " The exca-
vations made for the Middlesex and the Pawtucket
Canals disclose unmistakable proofs that the channel
of the Merrimack, in this vicinity, was once a consid-
erable distance south and west of its present situa-
tion.'' Some great convulsion of nature bad changed
the bed of the stream.
The rocky bed of the Merrimack and its dangerous
falls were a great obstruction to the transportation of
the timber and other products of the country to the
cities on the Atlantic coast. It was this obstruction
which suggested the construction of a canal from the
bend in the river above referred to to the city of Bos-
ton, thus securing a far shorter and safer means of
transportation th«n had before existed.
The proprietors of the Middlesex Canal were in-
corporated in 1703. Col. Loammi Baldwin, of Wo-
burn, the animating soul of the enterprise, a man of
indefatigable industry and unyielding perseverance,
of sound judgment and fertile genius, was appointed
as engineer. The first turf was removed by Col.
Baldwin on Sept. 10, 1794. " The progress of con-
struction was slow, and there v\ere many embarrass-
ments. The purchase of land for the canal from
more than a hundred owners demanded skillful diplo-
macy." The canal was opened to public navigation
in 1803. It was "30 ft. wide and 4 ft. deep, with
twenty locks, seven aqueducts, and crossed by fifty
bridges. It was supplied with water by the ( 'oncor-l
River at Billerica, which at that place is 107 feet
above the tide in Boston Harbor, and 20 feet above
the Merrimack. It cost about :<">00,000." It has been
wittily remarked that, " like an accusing ghost, it
never strays far from the Boston and Lowell Railro.id,
to wiiich it owes its untimely end." In its early days
the succe.-s of the enterprise seemed secure. Its tolls,
rents, etc., steadily increased. In 1812 they were
:?12,(>00. and in ISKI they were $32,600. In the opin-
ion of Daniel Webster the value of timber bad been
increased .'So,(i00,00(l by the canal. Vast (luantitiesof
lumber and wood were transported ujwn it. Passen-
gers also were conveyed in a neat boat, which occu-
pied almost an entire day in reaching the city of
Boston. But by degrees the enterprise lost the confi-
dence of the public, and even of most of the proprie-
tors themselves. To keep in repair the aqueducts
and locks, the l>anks and the bridges, demanded
constant and very heavy outlays of money. The
death of its engineer. Col. Baldwin, in 1808, was an
irreparable loss. The aid granted by the Legislature
proved of little avail. Dividends were not declared.
Assessment after assessment, one hundred in all, was
extorted from the long-suffering stockholders. But
in 1819 the greatest difiiculties .seem to have been sur-
mounted, and the first dividend was paid. From
1819 to 183(5 were the palmy days of the enterprise.
But in 1835 the Boston and Lowell Railroad began a
disastrous competition. The tonnage dues on the ca-
nal, which in 1835 amounted to nearly $12,000, sunk
to a little over $6000 in 1836. The opening of the
Nashua and Lowell Railroad to traffic in 1840 wag
LOWELL.
another fearful blow to the prosperity of the canal.
The warfare with the railroads was pluckily waged,
till the expenditures of the canal outran its income.
It was vain to prolong the struggle further. The ca-
nal's vocation was gone, and its property waa sold for
$130,000. On October 3, 1859, the Supreme Court
issued a decree declaring that the proprietors had
" forfeited all their franchises and privileges, by rea-
son of non-feasance, non-user, misfeasance and ne-
glect."
Col. Baldwin, the distinguished engineer of this en-
terprise, deserves a brief notice. Having enlisted in the
army of the Revolution in April, 1775, he rapidly rose
to the position of colonel. With Washington he
crossed the Delaware in December, 1776, and partici-
pated in the gallant fight at Trenton. On retiring
from the army on account of ill health he returned to
the town of Woburn. where he passed a long and use-
ful life. He was the first high sheriff of Middlesex
County after its organization under the government of
the United States. He often served his town in public
offices, and to him the country is indebted for the
propagation of the celebrated Baldwin apple.
Pawtucket Canal. — This canal around Paw-
tucket Falls, as it lies entirely within the limits of
the city of Lowell, demands of us a more specific
notice.
The precipitous falls, the violent current and the
dangerous rocks aflbrded an almost impassable ob-
struction to the transportation of lumber and other
produce of the country to the cities on the coast.
From the head of the falls to the mouth of the Con-
cord River beiow is a descent of more than thirty
feet. Lumber and wood coming down the Merri-
mack had to be conveyed around the falls in teams
and formed into rafts in the river below. To obviate
this difficulty the plan was formed of constructing a
canal around the falls. For this purpose a company,
known as " The Locks and Canals Company," was
formed, to whom a charter was granted June 25. 1792.
The president of this company was Hon. .Fonathan
Jackson. Mr. T. B. Lawaon tells us that after many
preliminary meetings, and the consumption of many
good dinners, it was resolved that a " canal be cut at
Pawtucket Falls, on the side of Chelmsford, begin-
ning near the great landing-place, thence running to
' Lily Pond,' from thence by ' Speen's Brook ' to Con-
cord River." A contract was made with Joseph
Tyler to complete the proposed canal for £4344,
lawful currency. Tyler failing to fulfill the contract.
Thomas M. Clark, of Newburyport, was appointed
superintendent of the operation in January, 1796,
with the pay of $3.33 for every day of actual employ-
ment in the work of construction, together with his
board and traveling expenses. By the energy and
fidelity of Mr. Clark the canal was opened on Oct.
18, 1796, about four years from its inception. The
day of the opening was celebrated. Men, women
and children crowded around the banks to witness
the scene. The boat which was to make the first trip
through the locks was filled with the directors of the
company and invited guests. At this point a circum-
stance occurred which is thus narrated by Allen, the
historian of Chelmsford: "Scarcely had they en-
tered the first lock when the sides suddenly gave way.
The water, bursting upon the spectators with great
violence, carried many down the stream. Infants
were separated from their mothers, children from
their parents, wives from their husbands, young
ladies from their gallants, and men, women, timber,
broken boards and planks were seen promiscuously
floating in the water. All came safely to land, with-
out material injury."
The canal cost about $50,000, and proved a practical
success, although the dividends to its stockholders
were small, averaging, it is supposed less than four
per cent, annually.
But the future had other uses for the waters of this
canal than that of transportation of produce ; for in
1821, twenty-five years after its construction, it began
to be relied upon to furnish the water-power for the
great manufacturing enterprises which were then
springing up in our city. For this latter purpose it
is still employed. The property of the original com-
pany, once mainly owned in Newburyport, fell into
the hands of Boston capitalists engaged in the new
manufacturing enterprises, new directors were ap-
pointed and large purchases of land were made; but
the original name remains, and " The Proprietors of
Locks and Canals " .still, as a company, hold a very
large and valuable amount of the property of the
city, and exercise a controlling power in its great
manufacturing enterprises.
Bridges. — For nearly 150 years after the settlement
of the town the people of Chelmsford crossed the
Merrimack in ferry-boats. But on February 4, 1792,
the General Court of Massachusetts granted an act of
incorporation to certain persons as proprietors of Mid-
dlesex Merrimack River Bridge, subsequently known
as the Pawtucket Bridge. This bridge crossed the
.Merrimack at the head of Pawtucket Falls. It was
completed at a coat of about $8000, and opened on
November 5th of the same year. Its abutments and
piers were of wood, and it seems to have been cheaply
built, for thirteen years subsequently a new bridge
with stone abutments was constructed at the cost of
$14,500. The work of the construction of the first
bridge is interesting to the reader of the present day
as incidentally showing the change in the methods of
doing business within the last 100 years. This change
will be well illustrated by the following extracts from
the records of the company, as found by Mr. James 8.
Russell among the papers of the late Dr. J. O. Green.
" May 23, 17'J2. Meeting edjoursed till to-morrow momlog tU t
o'clock/ "
" Jone 11, 1792. Col. Loamml Baldwin appointed to procure one toa
of iron A two barrele of New Englaod ram."
"June 27, 1792. Each man to be allowed half-pint of mm per da^
when maeter workman calls for It"
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS
" Aug. 27, 1792. Voted that Col. Baldwin be desired to procure one
barrel of New Eoglaod rum aud balf a barrel of West lodia rum Jvr
the proprieiort/ "
"Oct. 24, 1792. Voted that all persons tbat sball come oo Not. G, to
see tbe bridge [opened], be treated with flip .& toddy ut tbe expense or
the proprietora.'*
This was a toll-bridge, but free passage was voted
to all persons to any public meeting at tbe west meet-
ing-hou^ie in Dracut.
The tolls, until 1796, were designated in English
money, and for foot passengers were " from two-thirds
of a penny to one cent Si, five mills."
The enterprise proved a profitable one to the stock-
holders, netting for one period of thirty years an av-
erage income of more than twenty-four per cent, on
the cost. But the days of prosperity ere long had
passed away. The corporation had lived its three-
score years and ten. The days of toll-taking were
passing away and men were demanding a free passage
over every stream. The proposal in 1822 to build a
new bridge near Hunt's Fails, where now stands the
Central Bridge, threatened a dangerous rivalry. The
monopoly could not be sustained, and at length, in
18G1, the bridge was sold for $12,000 and made a free
bridge. Of this price the county of Jliddlese.x paid
$0000, the city of Lowell ji4000 and the town of
Dracut $2000.
" The freedom of the bridge," Mr. Gilman tells us,
" w:i8 received with great rejoicing. SIcFarlin's
horses drew the toll-gate across the bridge, preceded
by a band of music, and a gathering at Huntington
Hall, in which were represented Dracut & neighbor-
ing towns, look due notice of the affair."
It would be tedious to repeat the various recon-
structions of this bridge from 1805 to the construction
by the city of Lowell of the present substantial iron
structure, of which due mention will be made in the
proper place, in connection with the Central Bridge.
Allen informs us that the first bridge over the Con-
cord, near the cemetery, was built in 1658. This
bridge was removed higher up the river in H)62, and
again removed in 1699.
The first bridge at the mouth of the Concord (at
East Merrimack Street) was erected in 1774, and was
blown down by a gale before it was finished, and a
second bridge was erected. In 1819 a third bridge was
built at the joint expense of Tewksbury and Chelms-
ford.
MANDFAtrruRES. — In 1801 the first power-card-
ing machine in Middlesex County was set up in
Lowell by Moses Hale. Mr. Hale had a fulling-mill
on River Jleadow Brook, not many rods from the site
of the Butler School -house, and in this mill he placed
the new carding-machine on which in 1803 he carded
more than 10,000 pounds of wool. Such was the
humble beginning.
In 1818 Mr. Thomas Hurd purchased a building
60 feet long, 50 feet wide and 40 feet high, which in
1813 had been erected by Phineas Whiting and Col.
Josiah Fletcher for manutacturing purposes, and
fitted it up for the manufacture of woolen goods. This
building was .situated on or near the .site of the i)res-
ent Middlesex Mills. Here Mr. Hurd had sixteen
looms, employed twenty hands, and made 120 yards
of satinet per day. In addition to this building,
which was ofwood, he erected a larger building of brick
for his manufacturing operations. The latter build-
ing was destroyed by fire in June, 1825, and it
was rebuilt in 1826. This fire was the largest and
most destructive in those early days. Mr. Hurd be-
came bankrupt in the financial reaction of 1828, and
in 1830 his mills became the property of the Middle-
.sex Manufacturing Company.
Wmdowdkiss.— In 1802, on the banks of the Mid-
dlesex Canal, a few rods from the Merrimack River,
was erected a large building, 124 feet by i!2 feet, for
the manufacture of winduw-glass. This enterprise
employed about 100 persons, and made annually
about 330,000 feet of glass, the value of which was
$43,000.
Powder. — In 1818 powder-mills with forty pestles
were started on the Concord River by Moses Hale.
After various changes in the proprietorsliip of these
mills, O. ,M. Whipple became the 'ole ))ropriftor in
1827. This manufacture was at it.s zenith in the
Mexican War, when in one year nearly a million
pounds of powder were ptoduced. It Wius discon-
tinued in 1855. Mr. Whipple was a man of great
energy, and though he commenced with a small cap-
ital and in a humble way, he amassed a handsome
fortune, and became one of the foremost citizens of
Lowell.
Fisheries. — Not only the Indians, but the Eng-
lish settlers found in the waters of the .Mtrrimack and
Concord an abundant supply of fish. The rivers
teemed with salmon, shad and alewives. Instead of
the rude devices employed by the Indians, the fish in
great numbers were tiiken in nets and seines. Capt.
Silas Tyler, as quoted by Mr. Gilman, gives an inter-
esting account of fishing in his days: "The best haul
of fish I ever knew was eleven hundred shad and
eight or ten thousand alewives. This was in the
Concord, just below the Middlesex Mills. My uncle,
Jo% Tyler, once got so many alewives that he did not
know what to do with them. The law allowed us to
fish two days per week in the Concord and three in
the Merrimac. This law was enforced about as well
as the ' prohibitory law ' of the present day, and just
about xs much attention was paid to it. The Dracut
folks fished in the pond at the foot of Pawtucket
Falls. They would set their nets there on forbidden
days. On one occasion the fish wardens from Bil-
lerica came and took and carried oflT their nets. The
wardens, when they returned to Billerica, spread the
nets on the grass to dry. The next night the fisher-
men, in a wagon with a span of horses, drove to Bil-
lerica, gathered up the nets, brought them back and
reset them in the pond.
" People would come 15 or 20 miles on fishing days
LOWELL.
to procure these fish. Shad were worth five dollars
per hundred and salmon ten cents per pound."
But the palmy days of the fisherman have passed
away. The dams and numerous other obstructions
have almost entirely prevented the fish from ascend-
ing the streams. It is still a problem whether the
recent attempts to re-stock the rivers with fish, by
building fish-ways to facilitate their ascent over the
It was this sentiment that inspired many a far-see-
ing and patriotic American at the beginning of the
present century. It was not the spirit of enterprise
and the desire of gain alone that moved the noble men
who, nearly seventy years ago, laid the foundations of
the great manufactories of our city. The spirit of
patriotism also ennobled their great undertaking. As
we read the history of the inauguration of their great
falls, by hatching in the rivers spawn taken from i work we are compelled to admire their generous and
other places, and by protecting the fish by more strin-
gent laws, will ever prove successful.
Having defined and described the territory of our
city, and given a brief outline of its history in those
early days when it was the gathering-place of the Paw-
tucket Indians, and when, subsequently, it was known
as a quiet New England village, we come to a new
benevolent regard for the general welfare of our city,
and the moral purity of its inhabitants.
But before describing the work of these noble men,
let us briefly glance at their personal histories, — let
us know who and what they were.
Five of their number must receive especial notice :
Francis Cabot Lowell, because he was, in the gener-
era, when suddenly the uneventful life of the farm j ous language of his colleague, Honorable Nathan
gives place to the din and clatter of machinery and to
the bustle and activity of a great manufacturing es-
tablishment.
But before describing the beginnings of the great
enterprise, let us briefly recall some of the remoter
causes which led to its inauguration.
It is poor generalship to allow the enemy to hold
possession of the springs which supply the garrison
with water. It is poor statesmanship to allow another
nation to control the production and supply of the
Appleton, " the informing soul which gave direction
and form to the whole proceeding;" Patrick T. Jack-
son and Nathan Appleton, because, while the great
enterprise was still a doubtful experiment, they nobly
embarked in it their fortunes and their honor ; and
Kirk Boott and Paul Moody, because by their great
executive talents and their inventive genius they
made the experiment an assured and triumphant
success.
Francis Cabot Lowell may, in classic phrase, be
necessaries of life to the peo|)le of our own. Depend- ! styled the eponymous hero of our city, for from him
ence is the badge of slavery. Dependence upon Eng- | Lowell received her name. He is said to have been
land was the galling yoke upon the necks of our |
fathers. That immortal proclamation of their emau- |
cipation was not denominated " 77te Declaration of\
Rights," but "' The Declaration of Independence." But j
when political independence was gained, commercial ;
dependence remained. For the very clothing that
kept us warm we were dependent upon English capi-
tal and English skill. The scanty earnings of the 1
enfranchised American farmer found their way into i
the corters of the English manufacturer. This de- |
pendence weighed heavily upon the minds of patriotic i
men. \
The following extract from the Rev. Mr. Miles' |
" Lowell As It Was, and As It Is," exhibits in clear j
light our dependence upon other countries, in the first j
part of the present century, for our supply of cotton |
goods : 1
■■ Iq 1807 and ISOS there were imported from Calcutta 53.000,000 of \
yardd priDcipally uf coarse cotton goo4i8,aQd worth, ob prices tben were. <
over S12,UOO,(XtO. Id ISlo there were made in all the factories of the 1
United States, as appears by returns made by order of 3Ir. Gallatin, ,
thensecretury of the treasury, only 8oB,t4,5 yartls of cotton clotb. This ;
is not so tuany yards as four of the e;itAblishments of Lowell can now 1
(1845) tura out in one weelc. In 1307 the country received nearly all i
its cotton ){oods from Great Britain snd the East Indias. ' |
This dependence weighed like a galling yoke upon j
a free people. It began to be seen that if a country |
is to be truly free, it must have within itself all the
means of supplying the people with every necessary
and comfort of life. It must be able to live and to pros-
per, though every other nation should be blotted out.
a descendant of one of two brothers, Richard and
Percival Lowle. who came to Newbury, Massachu-
setts, from Bristol, England, in 1639. His grand-
father wiis Rev. John Lowell, who, in the first half of
the last century, was for forty-two years pastor of the
First Church in Newburyport. His father was John
Lowell, LL.D., judge of the United States District
Court of Ma.ssachuesetts.
Fkancis Cabot Lowell was born in Newbury-
port, April 7, 1775. He graduated at Harvard College
in 1793, when only eighteen years of age. He became
a merchant, but was driven from his business by the
embargo, the non-intercourse act and the war. He
went to Europe for his health in 1810, returning in
1813. Of his sojourn of three years in Europe, so
pregnant with results of the highest importance to
the future manufacturing interests of our country,
I shall hereafter speak. He died August 16, 1817, in
the prime of early manhood, at the age of forty-two
years. It was his son, John Lowell, who gave $240,-
000 to found the Lowell Institute in Boston.
Patrick Tracy Jackson was bom at Newbury-
port, August 14, 1780, and was the youngest son of
Hon. Jonathan Jackson, who was a member of the
Continental Congress and treasurer of Harvard Col-
lege and of the State of Massachusetts. Having
completed his education in Dummer Academy, when
about fifteen years of age, he entered the store of
Wm. Bartlett, of Newbiuyport, a wealthy merchant,
who is widely known as the munificent patron of the
8
HISTORY OF :\IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Theological Seminary at Andover, Mass. He proved
to be a young man of such remarkable energy, abil-
ity and fidelity, that before he was twenty years of
age Mr. Bartlett put him in charge of a cargo of mer-
chandise for St. Thomas, giving him authority above
that of the captain of the vessel. Subsequently he
made three voyages as captain of merchantmen. He
then engaged in commercial business in Boston, es-
pecially in the India and Havana trades.
In 1813 his brother-in-law, Francis Cabot Lowell,
returned from his long sojourn in Europe, witii his
mind filled with the idea of establishing in our own
country the manufacture of cotton goods. Mr. Jack-
son became convinced of tiie feasibility of Mr.
Lowell's plans and entered heartily into his viewH.
From this time a new life opens before him. He had
been driven from his mercantile business by the
war, and now he becomes a manufacturer, a railroad
builder, a man of intense energy and wonderful ac-
tivity in the inauguration and management of great
undertakings. Of his connection with the early history
of the cotton manufacturing enterprises of our country,
[ shall speak hereafter. He died in Beverly Septem-
ber 12, 18-17, .It the age of sixty-seven years.
Nathan .\i'vi,eton was born in New Ipswich, N.
H., October <>, 1779. When less than fifteen years of
age he entered Dartmouth College. He, however,
soon left the college to engage in mercantile busi-
ness in Boston with his brother Samuel. When of
age he became the partner of his brother, the title of
the firm being 8. & N. .Vppleton. His brother Sam-
uel became distinguislied both as a man of great
wealth and of almost unexampled benevolence. Of
Natliau Appleton's connection with Lowell & Jack-
son in establishing cotton manufactories, I shall
speak in the proper place.
Mr. Appleton was elected to Congress in 1830, and
again in 1842. He acquired great wealth. He died
iu Boston, July 14, 1S(J1, at the age of eighty-two
years.
Kirk Boott was the central figure in that group of
distinguislied men who laid the foundations of the
city of Lowell. As, in the introduction of the man-
ufacture of cotton in America, Francis Cabot Lowell
was the " informing soul," so in its introduction in
Lowell, Mr. Boott was the controlling will. He was
the leader without a guide. He solved problems be-
fore unsolved, and trod a path before untrodden.
Mr. Boott was born in Boston, Oct. 20, 1790, and
was of English extraction. His father. Kirk Boott,
came to Boston in 1783, and became a merchant in
the wholesale traffic in dry goods. He was the
builder of the Revere House, which, with the family,
he occupied until the close of his life. The son re-
ceived his early education in Boston. Subsequently
he studied at the Rugby School in England and
entered the class of 1809 in Harvard College. It was
probably due to Mr. Boott's taste for military life that
he left the college before completing the course of
study, and went to England, where he qualified him-
self to enter the British Army as a civil engineer. At
the age of twenty-one years he received a commission
in the Britisli Army and aubsei|uently was made
lieutenant in tiie Eighty-fifth Light Infantry and
with this regiment took part in the Peninsular Cam-
paign under Wellington, landing in Spain in August,
1813.
Mr. Boott ser\-ed till the close of the campaign, en-
gaging in the capture of San Sabastian, in the battles
of the Nieve and the Nivelle, in the passage of the
Garonne and in the siege of B.ayonne. Rev. Geo. R.
Gleig, once the chaplain-general of the British Army,
writes in 1887, when in the ninety-first year of bis
age, that lie remembers .Mr. Boott as his comrade
in that campaign, and as a " remarkably good-lnoking
man, a gallant soldier and a great favorite in the
corps."
.Vt tlie close of the wars of Napoleon the Eiirbty-
fifth Regiment was ordered to .America to take part
in the War of 1812. .Mr. Boott, being by birth an
American, refused to bear :irn)s ngainst his native
land.
His regiment, however, went to Aiiieiica. took pari
in the eng.agements near the eity of Washingtcm and
in the battle of New ( )rleans. M r. Boott, having visited
.\merica, returneil to England ami studied engineering
at the Military Academy at Saiidburst, before finally
resigning his commission.
Before returning to .\mer ic:i .Mr. Bontl married an
English lady, who belonged to a family of very high
|>rofessional standing, ami whom the Rev. l)r. Edson
calls " an excellent and devout woman, the very
beauideal nf :\n English lady." 'Mi coming to Bos-
ton he engaged with two brothers in mercantile pur-
suits, which, however, were attended with very lieavy
losses. So that when his friend, Patrick T. Jackson,
pjoposed to him to become the agent of the Merri-
mack Mills, in Lowell, he promptly accepted the po-
sition and came to East Clielmsti)rd (now Lowell) in
April, 1822, the year in which the first mill was
erected.
And here, for fifteen years, Mr. Boott found a field for
the exercise of his powers such as few men have enjoy-
ed, and which few men jiossess the ability to occupy.
He was guided by no precedent. Up to this time manu-
factures iu America had been carried on in small, de-
tached establishments, managed by the owners of the
property ; but now the great experiment was to to be
tried of so managing the affairs ofgreatjoint-stock com-
panies xs to yield to the owners a satisfactory profit.
To do this demanded a man of original commandirig
intellect, of indomitable courage and of iron will.
Such a man was Mr. Boott. For such a position his
natural ability and his military experience had ad-
mirably qualified him.
He entered upon his task with resolute courage and
conscientious devotion to duty. His life was an in-
tense life, every hour bringing its varied and urgent
// / / /r /J7-^- /^^
^
LOWELL.
duties. He was agent of the Merrimack Mills, sup-
erintendent of the Print Works, agent of the Propri-
etors of Locks and Canals. He bargained for the
construction of mills and had the general oversight
of the work.
His pen and pencil were busy upon drawings and
plans for new structures. He was arbiter in a
thou.sand transactions. He interested himself in the
public schools and in municipal afl'airs. In the re-
sponsive services of the Sabbath worship bis voice
rose above the rest, and he was everj-where acknowl-
edged as the leading, guiding master spirit.
He was not selfish and grasping. Though he lived
liberallj' and in an elegant home, he was very far
from being a wealthy man.
It is not strange that one whose mind was so deep-
ly absorbed and so heavily burdened with rea|>onsibili-
ties should sometimes, by the military brevity of his
decisions, oH'end the sensitiveness of other men. He
was almost overwhelmed with care^. In one of his
letters, in wliich he refers to an unwise business
transaction of a friend, he says, " I am almost wor-
ried out. Since this unhappy disclosure 1 get neither
sleep nor rest."
How fnr bis excess of cares affected bis physical
condition it is impossible to tell, but for several of
the last years of his life his friends observed the
signs of declining health. At length, on the lltb of
April, 1S37, as he sat in his chai.se, which stood in
the street near the Jlerrimack House, where be had
been conversing with a friend, he instantaneously
died and fell from his chaise to the ground. He was
cut off in the prime of his manhood, in the forty-
seventh year of his age. His death left a vacancy
which could not be filled. (»l his family, the wife
of t'harles A. Welch, Esq., of Bost<^in, and Mrs.
Eliza Boott, who has resided in or near London, are
the only survivors.
But wealth and character and high executive abil-
ity were not alone sufficient to set in motion the ten
thousand looms and wheels and the innumerable
spindles of the new enterprise. There was needed
also a man of inventive genius, like Hiram of old.
whom "Solomon fetched out of Tyre," and who was
" filled with wisdom and understanding and cunning."
Such a man was Pai'i, Moody, whom the distinguished
men mentioned above brought to their aid.
Mr. Moody was born in Newbury, Mass., May 21',
177!). His father was a man of much influence in
the town, and was known as " Capt. Paul Moody."
Two of his brorhers graduated from Dartmouth Col-
lege. His original design of living a farmer's life was
changed by the discovery that he was the possessor of
a genius for mechanical invention of no ordinary
character. By degrees his talents became so well
known that his aid was sought in positions of high
responsibility. In such positions he had been em-
ployed in the Wool & Cotton Manufacturing Com-
pany in Amesbury, and the Boston Manufacturing
Company in Waltbam. He gained a distinguished
name as the inventor of machinery for the manufac-
ture of cotton. He invented the winding-frame, a
new dressing-machine, the substitution of soap-stone
rollers for iron rollers, the " method of spinning yarn
foT filling directly on the bobbin for the shuttle," the
filling-frame, the double speeder, a new " governor,"
the use of the " dead spindle," and various other
devices which gave speed and completeness to the
work of manufacturing cotton. His inventive mind
was the animating spirit of the cotton-mill. His
presence and genius were invaluable factors in the
successful operations of the new enterprise. Besides
being a man of great inventive genius he was known
as an ardect and influential advocate of temperance
among the operatives in the mills, an exemplary
Christian, and a loving husband and father. He died
in .Tuly. 1831, at the age of fifty-two years. Of this
event Dr. Edson, in the funeral sermon delivered
,Iuly 10, 1831, says: "His death [has] produced a
greater sensation than any other event that has tran-
spired in this town. He died in the full strength of
body, in the very vigor of age and constitution."
Subordinate to these five distinguished leaders in
the enterprise, there were others of whom we should
also make mention as we pass.
EzKA WoRTHEN was born in Amesbury, Massa-
chusetts, February 11, 1781. He was the son of a
ship-builder, andafter securing a common-school edu-
cation he took up his father's trade. A fellow-work-
man and himself constructed a small vessel on their
own account. Leaving his trade, he turned his atten-
tion to the manufacture of woolen goods. In com-
pany with three partners, he erected in Amesbury a
brick mill, fifty feet by thirty-two feet, for the manu-
facture of broadcloth. In 1814 he accepted the invi-
tation of the Boston Manufacturing Company to take
charge of their machine-shop in -Waltham. After
a service of eight years in Waltham he was appointed
in 1822 the first agent of the Merrimack Manufactur-
ing Company, the earliest of the great Lowell com-
panies. He entered upon his duties with character-
istic energy and zeal. Soon appeared indications
of declining health. He often suflTered paroxysms of
pain. He was a man of an excitable temperament,
and his physicians warned him of approaching danger.
On June 18, 1824, while engaged in showing an awk-
ward workman how he should use his shovel, he sud-
denly fell and died.
He was a man of quick wit, bright intelligenc«and
kindly, genial nature. He had served theMerrimack
Company only two years, when he was cut down in
the prime of early manhood. His age was forty three
years. It was Mr. Worthen who had the honor of
being the first to suggest East Chelmsford and Paw-
tucket Falls as the place for the new city.
And here let us stop to observe how short were the
lives of the sis distinguished men who have just occu-
pied our attention. Only one of them reached the
10
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, :MASSACriTTSETTS.
allotted three-score years aud ten. Mr. Appleton
lived eighty-two years, Mr. Jackson sixty-seven years,
Mr. Moody fifty-two years, Mr. Boolt forty-seven
years, Mr. Worthen forty-three years, and Mr. Lowell
forty-two years. Perhaps the assumption of so great
responsibilities was too severe a tax upon the human
brain. The longevity of many of the ablest English
statesmen, however, does not seem to warrant such a
conclusion.
John Amory Lowell was born November 11.
1798. He was nephew and son-in-law of Francis C.
Lowell, for whom our city was named. He graduated
from Harvard College at the age of sixteen years.
During the management of Kirk Boott he made most
of the purchases of materials in Boston for the Merri-
mack Company. In 1835 he built the Boott Mills, of
which he was the treasurer for thirteen years. He
also built the Ma-ssachusetts Jlillsin 183'J, and served
as treasurer. Mr. Appletnn says of liim : " There is
no man whose beneficial intiuence in establishing
salutary regulations in relation to this manufacture,
e.'cceeded that of Mr. John Amory Lowell." Few
men have ever combined, to so remarkable a degree,
rare classical soholarship and great business capacity.
To these were added a brave and fearless spirit,
modesty and generosity. His long life was one of un-
tiring industry. He died October 31, 1881, at the age
of eighty-three years.
John W. Boott, eldest brother of Kirk Boott, was a
merchant in Boston in company with the elder Kirk
Boott, and afterwards with John A. Lowell, the
nephew and son-in-law of Francis C. Lowell. He
joined his fortunes with those of his brother Kirk,
and took ninety of the tUlO shares in the company first
organized.
It may be best to state at this point that of these
600 shares Kirk Boott, Jr., took 90, John W.
Boott 90, Nathan .\ppletou 180, Patrick T. Jack-
son 180, und Paul Moody HO. (Jthers soon afterwards
became shareholders.
Having brieriy shown who the founders of our city
were, we shall with greater interest and more intelli-
gently follow them in their united labor in establish-
ing our great manufacturing industries. Henceforth
their histories blend together.
The city of Lowell is fortunate in having the limits
of its history perfectly defined. No mist of doubt
beclouds its early days. Unlike some cities of the
ancient world, it was built, not by divine, but by
human hands. The walls of Thebes arose in obedi-
ence to the tones of Amphion"s golden lyre, but the
structures of Lowell are the work of the mason's
trowel and the Irishman's pickaxe, hod and shovel.
We know the history of the founders. Their very
thoughts have been recorded. The past is secure,
nor will the present and the future go unrecorded.
The germ of the history of the great manufacturing
industries of Lowell is to be found in the sojourn of
Francis Cabot Lowell in England and Scotland from
1810 to 1813. It was duriiit: these years that his
mind became inspired with the patriotic purpose of
securing for his own country the inestimable advan-
tage of being the manufacturer of its own cotton
fabrics. No doubt he also thought of the wealth
which he supposed would acrue to those who engaged
in the undertaking. He would have been more than
human if he did not. I cannot do better at this
point than to quote the language of the Hon. Nathan
Appleton : " My connection with the cotton manu-
factures takes date from the year 1811, when I met
my friend, Mr. Francis C. Lowell, at Edinburgh,
where he had been passing some time with his family.
We had frequent conversations on the -ubjcct of the
cotton manufacture, and lie informed me lliat he had
determined, before his return to America, to visit
Manchester for the pnrpuse of obtaining all possible
information on the subject, with a view lo the intro-
duction of the improved manufacture in the L'liited
tjtates. I urged him to do so, and jjromised him iny
co-operation.'' And here it will not be amiss briefiy to
show what there was in the manufactures of England
and Scotland that so much attracted the attention of
Mr. Lowell.
It has been said that the birthi)l:ice of cotton man-
ufacture was India, but th,at its second birthplace was
England. India manufactured, indeed, but its im-
plements were rude and it.s processes were slow.
England mantifactured, and its implements were the
most wondertiil products of human skill, and its pro-
cesses swift as the glance of the eye. This wonderful
rapidity was a new revelation to the world. It had
all come within one generation. A new era had
dawned — the era of invention. JIuch had long since
been done to please the taste of man, now something
is to be done to supply the comforts and relieve the
hardships of his life. Instead of slavishly supplying
power from his own muscles, he is hereafter to direct
the power which nature has put. into his hands, (t
seems inexplicable to human reason that painting,
sculpture, architecture, elo<iuence and poetry, which
demand the subtlest powers of the intellect, should
have reached their perfection two thousand years
ago, while the development of the useful arts, upon
which .so much of the happiness and comfort of man-
kind depend, has lingered on through ages of delay.
How wonderful it is that the genius which could see
an Apollo Belvidere in a shapeless block of marble,
could devise no improvement on the distafi" aud the
spindle !
These two simple implements and the one-thread
spinning-wheel had had undisputed sway for unnum-
bered years. Far back in the ages of mythology the
Parc;e spun from the distaff the thread of human life.
In the days of Solomon the virtuous woman laid her
hands to the spindle and her hands hold the distatf,
and even the writer well remembers that, in his boy-
hood, in the house of his grandparents, the rude and
cumbrous hand-loom filled the corner of the room,
LOWELL.
11
while the small, foot-turoed spinoing-wheel stood
before the fire.
One of our old residents, Mr. DaDiel Knapp, gives
us the following account of his early years : " In the
spring of 1814 my parents were young laboring people,
with five small children, the oldest not eleven years
old. AVe had cotton brought to our bouse by the
bale, to pick to pieces and get out the seeds and dirt.
We children had to pick so many poundb per day a.s
a stint. We had a whipping-machine, made four-square,
and, about three feet from the floor, wa.s a bed-cord run
across from knob to knob, near together, on which we
put a parcel of cotton, and, with two whip-sticks, we
lightened it up and got out the dirt and made it ready
for the card. My mother was carrying on the bleach-
ing business at this time. There was no chemical
process. The bright sun, drying up the water, did
the bleaching. This was the mode of bleaching at
this time."
This wonderful change attracted the attention and
admiration of Mr. Lowell. About 1760 the era o(
invention had begun, though as early as 1738 John
Kay had invented a method of throwing the shuttle
which enabled the weaver to d(j twice as much work
as before. The shuttle thus imjielled was called the
Jly shuttle. But this invention was seldom used until
1760. In 1760 Robert, the son of John Kay, invented
the drop-box, which enabled the weaver to employ
different colors in the same web. John Wyatt had.
in 1738, invented the method of spinning hi/ rollers,
Hargreaves invented the larJitiij-mifhiiie in ]7('U,
and the spin>iiii(/-/tnni/ ii\ 1764. In I 768 Arkwright
first set up his tpliiniini-framc, and then followed, in
1775, the invention of the mule by Samuel Crompton.
By this machine were pnxluced the finer qualities ot
thread. It superseded the jenny. .So wonderful are
its possibilities that more than a thousand threads
may be spun by one machine at the .same time, and
one workman can manage two machines. In 1785
Cartwright exhibited his first y^oifec/oom. I need not
speak of other inventions or of the various devices
for the perfection of cotton manufacture which at-
tracted the inquisitive mind of Mr. Lowell.
Upon his return, in 1813, he entered upon the
work of doing in America what he had seen
accomplished in the Old World. He enlisted his
brother-in-law, Patrick T. Jackson, as his associate,
who had been driven from his mercantile business by
the war, and who agreed to give up all other business
and take the management of the enterprise. The
partners purchased a water-power on the Charles
River in Waltham (Bemis' paper-mill), and obtained
an act of incorporation. Most of the stock of this
incorporated company was taken by Messrs. Lowell
& Jackson. The services of Paul Moody, whose skill
as a mechanic was well known, were secured.
Up to this time the power-loom had never been
used in America. Mr. Lowell was unable to procure
drawings of this machine in Europe, and he resolved
to make a machine of his own. He shot himself up
in the upper room of a store in Broad Street, in Bos-
ton, and, with a frame already wasted with disease, he
experimented for several months, employing a man
to turn the crank.
At length, after the new mill was erected in Walt-
ham, and other machinery was set up, Mr. Lowell set
in motion his improved power-loom, and, for the first
time, invited his friend, Nathan Appleton, to witness
its operation. Mr. Appleton says in his account of
this examination of this machine: "I well recollect
the state of admiration and satisfaction with which
we sat by the hour watching the beautiful movements
of this new and wonderful machine, destined, as it was,
to change the character of all textile industry. This
was in the autumn of 1814." With the skillful aid of
Mr. Moody other improvements were made. The
efficiency of Horrock's dressing-machine was more
than doubled. The double speeder was greatly im-
proved. "Spinning on throstle spindles and the spin-
ning of filling directly on the cops, without the pro-
cess of winding," was introduced.
Of this latter improvement, a pleasant anecdote i.s
told. I give it in Mr. Appleton's language ; " Mr.
Shepard, of Taunton, had a patent for a winding-
machine, which was considered the beat extant. Mr.
Lowell was chaflering with him about purchasing the
right of using tkem on a large scale at some re-
duction from the price named. Mr. Shepard re-
fused, saying, 'You must have them ; you cannot do
without them, as you know, Mr. Moody.' Mr. Moodv
replied : ' I am just thinking that I can spin the cops
direct upon the bobbin.' ' You be hanged ! ' said Mr.
Shepard; 'well, I accept your offer.' 'No,' said Mr.
Lowell, ' it is too late.' A new-born thought had
sprung forth from Mr. Moody's inventive mind, and
he had no more use for Mr. Shepard's winding-
machine."
The enterprise was now an assured success. The
capital of $400,000 was soon taken up and new water-
powers near Watertown were purchased.
In the War of 1812, when British manufactures
were excluded from our markets, the manufacture of
cotton goods was greatly increased, but the effect of
the peace in 1815 was to bring the American manu-
factures into ruinous competition with those of
England. The new American mills must have the
protection of a tariff, or every spindle must cease to
revolve. Mr. Lowell went to Washington and
earnestly urged upon Congressmen the necessity of
protection. At length Mr. Lowndes and Mr. Cal-
houn were brought to support the minimum duty
of 6} cents per square yard, and the measure was
carried. The tariff, together with the introduction of
the power-loom, proved sufficiently protective. Who
could then have believed that the same grade of cotton
cloth which sold for thirty cents per yard would be
sold in 1843 at only six cents?
And here, five years before the mills in Lowell were
12
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COTTNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
started, the "informiug soul " of the enterprise dis-
appears from the scene. Mr. Lowell died in 1817, at
the age of only forty-two years.
We should add iu passing that it was the original
design of the founders of our American manufac-
tures to start at Waltham only a weaving-mill and
to buy their yarn of others. In the early days of the
cotton industry no one thought of turning cotton to
cloth in the same mill. Weaving was done here, and
spinning there. It- was a new thought, when the
loom was set up in Waltham, also to put in the
spindle.
These men believed that the only profitable way to
make cotton manufacturing successful was by joint-
stock companies with large capitals. As long as the
prices of goods were high and competition did not
demand a change, these companies were remarkably
successful. High salaries were paid to treasurers and
agents and fortune smiled on the stockholders. But
a change has come. Prices are extremely low. com-
petition is eager, and it begins to be a question
whether, in order to successful cotton manufacture,
it will not become necessary for individual owners to
run their own mills and dispense with high salaries
and too liberal .1 use of money. Rigid economy
seems to be the only means of securing fair profits.
Joint-stock companies are on trial.
We should fail to do justice to the memory of the
noble men who inaugurated this great enterprise if
we did not refer to their wise foresight in carefully
providing for the moral and religious welfare of the
operatives. In this beneficent work Francis C.
Lowell had been the leading spirit. John A. Lowell
once said of hiru that " nature had designed him for
a statesman, but fortune bad made him a merchant.''
The forecasting wisdom, the broad moral views, the
deep foundation on which all his plan.s for good were
laid, reveal the evident traits of statesmanship. "In
England and on the continent the operatives in the
mills were sordid, vicious and every way degraded."
He determined that it should not be so here, and
therefore built boarding-houses for the operatives and
put them under the care of matrons selected tor that
purpose. He paid pew taxes in churches for them.
He instituted schools and used every means to main-
tain in the daughters of the countrymen, who had
entered the mills, all the simplicity and purity of
their rural homes.
It is not pleasant to confess that it has been found
ditlicult, after the lapse of more than sixty years,
fully to maintain this high moral tone. But the fact
that it was maintained so bing as the operatives were
of pure New England birth does the highest honor
to the founders of our great manufactories.
The managers of our mills have sometimes found
it impossible to employ a number of American girls
sufficient for the demands for help. And so the for-
eigner began to be employed. But when the foreign
girl came, the Yankee girl departed. At the present
time a Yankee girl, born and bred among the New
England hills, is rarely seen in our mills.
We come now to the introduction of cotton manu-
facture in the city of Lowell. The insulHciency of
the water-power in Waltham demanded that a new
site should be sought where cotton-manufacturing
might be conducted on a magnificent scale. It is a
very interesting fact that the history of the selection
of the spot on which Lowell stands for that site is
minutely -known. The Rev. Dr. Edson, first rector
of St. Anne's Church, was fully acquainted with all
the facts, and in 1843 he kindly wrote them out for
preservation in the archives of the " Old Residents'
Historical Association." I can give but a brief ab-
stract of his interesting narrative.
j The proprietors of the Boston Manufacturing Com-
! pany at Waltham, anxious to extend their profitable
operations, in the winter of l.'>:.'l-2, were in search of
a site for erecting new mills. In tlii> search Mr.
Paul Moody, who was in their em|>loy at Waltham,
• became interested. On one occasion Mr. Moody took
Ills wife and daughter in his chaise, and went to
Bradford, M;\ss., for the purpo.se of visiting two of bis
children who were in Bradfonl .Academy, and also to
meet other gentlemen to examine water privileges in
the vicinity of that town. The day was rainy, and
I the gentlemen did not appear. The next day, with
I his family, he roile to .\mesbuiy, where he met his
I old xssociate. Mr. Ezra Worthen, who, when he
! learned the object of his search, said: "Why don't
you go up to Pawtucket F'alls'? There is a power
' there worth ten times as much as you will find any-
1 where else." Mr. Moody and Mr. Worthen went up
; to P.awtucket, examining Hunt's Falls on their way.
i and, taking dinner at the tavern of Mr. Jonathan
Tyler. Pawtucket Falls were examined, and they re-
turned to their res|)eotive homes.
I Jlr. Moody reported his observations to Mr. .lack-
' son, then in charge of the mills at Waltham, and Mr.
I Thomas M. Clark, of Newburyport, father of Bishop
I Clark, of Rhode Island, w.aa engaged to buy up the
shares of the proprietors of the locks and canals on
Merrimack River. These shares were purchased at
half their original cost, their value being very much
reduced on account of the construction of the Mid-
dlesex Canal. Several farms near the falls were also
purchased .at low r.ates.
Mr. Clark was selected as the best agent for the
transaction of this important business, in which
much prudence and some secrecy were demanded,
because in the construction of the canal, many years
before, he had held a responsible position, and was
well acquainted with all the parties. We have the
authority of Bishop Clark for stating that when his
father appeared among the farmers to purchase their
farms, some supposed that he was intending to start
up an enormous tannery, while others judged him to
be insane.
^t is interesting to recall the locations of the farms
LOWELL.
13
purchased by Mr. Clark. These farms were as fol-
lows: Nalhan Tyler's farm of forty acres, between
Merrimack Street and Pawtucket Canal, reaching
west nearly U> Dutton Street, and east as far as the
Massachusetts Mills; Josiah Fletchers farm of sixty
acres, lying between Merrimack Street and Merri-
mack River; the Cheever farm, lying above the Law-
rence Corporation ; Mrs. Warren's farm, lying be-
tween Central Street and Concord River, reaching
north as far as Pawtucket Canal, and south as far as
Richmond's Mills; Joseph Fletcher't. farm of about
100 acres, bounded on the north by Pawtucket Canal,
and on the east by Central Street. The farms con-
tained about 400 acres, and the average price paid
per acre was about SIOO. The entire purchase re-
quired about s40,00O. The united cost ol' the canal
and farms was about !S100,000.
To show the rapid increase in the value of these
farms, I need only mention that nine-tenths of the
Cheever farm were sold at eighteen dollars per acre,
but the sale of the other tenth being necessarily de-
ferred on account of the insolvency and sudden death
of the owner, this tenth when sold brought more than
^720 per acre.
And here let us pause lor a moment and briefly
trace th.' history of that most important i>arl of the
land described above, which \\e> between the Merri-
mac River and the Pawtucket Ciinal, and on whicli
now stand most of the great manufactories of the city.
.\bout lU.5o, at the solicitation of tlie .\postl<
Eliot, it was granted by llie State of Massachusetts tn
the Pawtucket Indians, who had erected their wig-
watus in great numbers upon it. and had, to some ex-
tent, cultivated the soli. In li;-<i', it wassold by tiie
Indians to Colonel .louatlian Tyugand Major Tb<)ma^
Henchman, the former of wbom resided near Wicasuck
Island, iu the Merriunic, wbicli now Iteloii-s t<i tlie
town of Tvngsboni'; til-' latter was an intluential man
among the early settlers of Clielmsford. These gentle-
men soon sold the land to torty lour citizens of (.'lielms-
ford. The above-naine<l owners arf by no means the
only proprietors of this interesting tract «f land. It
was at one time the property of Ensign William
Fletcher, one of the mutsl important of the early set-
tlers of Chehnsfi.rd. In the year 1688 it wac by two
Indians — J<din .Nabersha and Samuel Nabersba—
conveyed bv deed to .losiab Richardson, an ancestor
of the well-known attorneys-at-law of the same name,
now members of the Lowell bar. This deed is re-
corded at the registry in East Cambridge, and reads as
follows :
•■TlliK present imlfnlure wilnenselh an usreenienl l.el\reen Ji«ial.
Ki. barJeim, SeDr., of llitjlnnrunl, in llie C^.iinry uf Middlews, in New
Englalul, on yt- one |wrl, hihI .ioliu .Ne«lierl.;i, .I.»<-|.li Li'"- "nJ .Samu.l
.NMllert..!, of W..nms3erk, «c, f.ir ye lovi- we l-ar for ye Iwforesai.l Jo-
fiali, liave letl unto liini one liiircell of ian.l lyinc at ye nioutl. of I'.pn-
ronl river »nJ p.inly mum MerriniH.k Kiver, on ye 6.mtl, side of aaiil
River ; westerly tip.n, ye UiIlIi. being ye bounds of ye land whicli we,
ye Kiid Indians, sould tu :ilr. Tynge .md Mr. Henelinian : bomiIi by ye
little llro..ke ealK-d Speenn Br.iuke, all winch land we. ye said Indians
above uanie.l, have lelt nuto the above said JoHali for the space of One
Tbounnd and one. VMre to him, his heirs, execiiton, adminiBtratoreand
asBictiR lo u»e and improve as he, ye said .losiah, or his heirea, adminis
ti-Hlors or aMignr. shall see cause. For which he, ye said Josiah, is lo
pay al ye terms and one lobiicco pipe, if it be demanded. In vritne«
hereunto, this inih of .lanuary, in ye year of our Lord one tboawndsix
hundred eighty and eight.
".loHN JiEfltiEBBA [X] his mark.
"SABirEL Nesheeba [X] his mark."
The indolent and improvident Indians were wont
to dispose of their lands very readily and at a low
price to their enterprising white neighbors. On ac-
count of probable transactions, which have not been
recorded, the above account does not admit of an easy
and satisfactory explanation. There is, therefore, lit-
tle cause for apprehension that the descendants of
" ye said Josiah," now residents of Lowell and mem-
bers of the legal fraternity, will, upon the strength of
the above deed, deem it wise to lay claim to the vast
possessions of all the great manufacturing corpora-
tions of the city.
The site selected for a new manufacturing enter-
prise was remarkably adapted to the full development
of the designs of its far-seeing projectors. The fall of
thirty feet in one of the largest of American rivers
was at the time believed to aflbrd a supply of power
almost inexhaustible, the river having a water-shed
of 4000 sipiarf miles. The flattering success of their
manufacturing establishment at Waltham filled them
with buoyant hope of still greater success on the
banks of the Merrimack. They went promptly to
the work. First a dam is thrown across the Merri-
mack at Pawtucket Falls, and the Pawtucket Canal is
made wider and deeper. The work of digging and
blastinir nccupied '-Od men. The canal, when com-
pleted, wa> supposed to be capable of supplying
power for tifiy mills.
Thr Mi;ui;iM.\'K M.\sfrA(Ttu:iN(i Company,
the lirst of the great manufacturing companies of
Lowell, was incorporated February 0, 1822. The
persons named in the bill as forming the company
were Kirk Boott, William Applcton, John W. Bootl
and Fbene/'.er Appleton. The capital was ^000,000.
The company promptly began the work of construct-
ing their lirst mill in the spring of the same year.
Mr. Boott, as agent, comes upon the scene in April.
Under his energetic command the work moves on
apace. On September 1st, of the next year, the first
mill is completed ; water is let into the canal and the
wheel started.
Of this canal I ought to say that it was a branch of
the Pawtucket Canal and was constructed by the
Merrimack Company after purchasing the Pawtucket
Canal. Its course is near Dutton Street. Other
branches have been constructed as new mills have
needed them.
Mr. Ezra Worthen comes as superintendent of the
mills near the time of Mr. Boott's arrival. He en-
tered with energy aud zeal upou his new work.
While actively pushing forward the enterprise he
14
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
falls dead in the presence of his workmen. He had
served only two years.
Mr. Worthen's successor, as superintendent, was
Warren Colburn, who had already, at Waltham, had
experience in the management of mills. Mr. Col-
burn was born at Dedham 179.3, and graduated at
Harvard College at the age of twenty-seven years.
From the interest in education which he acquired
while a teacher in Bo.ston he endeavored to improve
upon the text-books in arithmetic then in use by
publishing the Intellectual Arithmetic. The title
" Intellectual " was very properly given to the work,
because throughout the work fixed rules and formul.T
are studiously avoided, and a direct appeal is con-
stantly made to the intetlert and reason of the pupil.
This, together with other school-books published by
him, gave him a high reputation outside his work as
a manufacturer, and throughout his life he took a
deep interest in the cause of popular education. He
delivered public lectures and often served on the
Lowell School Committee. To him the schools of
our city are greatly indebted for their efficiency and
excellence. Mr. Colburn died September 13, IS.S.S,
;it the age of forty years.
The superintendents of the Merrimack .Mills have
been a.s follows : Ezra Worthen, from 1822 to 1S24;
Warren Colburn, 1824 to 1k;',.3; .lohn Clark, 18?.3 to
1848; Emory Washburn, 1848 to 1849; Edmund
Le Breton, 1849 to LS'iO; Isaac Hinckley, IS'iO to
186(5; .lohn C Palfrey, l.%6 to 1874; and Joseph
S. Ludlam from 1874 to the present time.
Pris'T Works. — We are told by Nathan Appleton
that in coming to Lowell it wiis the purpose of him-
self and Mr. Jackson to print calicoes as well as to
manufacture cotton cloth.
The work of printing calicoes by the ^lerrimack
Company began in the autumn of 1824 undpr the
supervision of Mr. Allan Poll')ck. .U'ter two years
Mr. Pollock resigned his position while the print-
works were not yet completed. In 1826, in order ^o
perfect the work of calico printing, .Mr. Boott went to
England to employ ihe needed engravers. Mr. John
D. Prince, an Englishman of high reputation for
skill in this art, was invited to come to Lowell, and
having resigned his position in Manchester, lie as-
sumed the superintendence of the Merrimack Print
AVorks.
Mr. Prince was paid a very liberal salary for as-
suming a position of very high responsibility, and
well did he meet the high expectations formed of
him. He filled the position for twenty-nihe years,
and then retired upon an annuity of $2000. He was
a true Englishman in life and manners, a man of
generous hospitality and of exemplary fidelity. He
died January 5, 1860, at the age of eighty years, leav-
ing to his friends the grateful memory of his social
virtues and to the poor the honor of being a noble,
cheerful giver.
In 1855 Henry Burrows succeeded Mr. Priuce as
superintendent of the print works. Mr. Burrows was
succeeded in turn by James Duckworth (1878); Robert
Leatham (1882); Joseph Leatham (1885); and by
the present incumbent, John J. Hart (1887).
The history of the Merrimack Company will be
more fully recorded in the appropriate place, when
we come to give an account of the other manufactur-
ing companies of the city, but so much of it as has
already been given .seemed ."o intimately connected
with the history of the city itself, that it could hardly
be omitted.
LoCK.s AND CANAL.S COMPANY. — When the Mer-
rimack Manufacturing Company purchased all the
jhares of the old Locks and Canals Company in 1822
they secured all the rights and privileges granted by
the charter to the old company in 1702. After con-
ducting the aflairs both of the new manufacturing
company and of the old Locks and Canals Company
its of one consolidated company for more than two
years, it appeared to be better to re-establish the
Locks and Canals Company, giving into its jurisdic-
tion all lands and water-power belonging to the com-
pany and retaining only the manufacturing opera-
tions. Tlii.-s was done on February 28, 1825, under a
-pecial act of the Legislature permitting it, and down
to the present time the company exists under the
charter of 1702.
The following have been the agents of this com-
pany since its reorganization : Kirk Boott, from 1>*22
to l.-<37 ; Joseph Tilden, from 1837 to 183.H; William
Boott, from 1838 to 1845; .Tames B. Francis, from
1845 to 1.885; .lames Francis, from lS.s,5 to the pres-
ent time, .lames B. Francis, on account of his long
service, deserves special notice.
.lA^rES BuHENf) Fr.A.Nti.s was born in ."southleigh,
(Xxfonlshire, England, .May 18, 1815. His father was
superintendent of Dutfryn, Llynwi and Forth Cawl
Railway in South Wales. The son was thus most
fortunately situateil for acquiring an early knowledge
of the work of an engineer, which was to occupy his
future life. When tburteen years of age he was em-
ployed upon the harbor-works of Forth Cawl, and,
subsequently, upon the Grand Western Canal.
At the age of eighteen years he came to America,
landing at New York .\pril 11, 1833. Fortune fav-
ored him ; tor at that time several of the earliest
-American railroads called for the services of men ot
his profession. He very soon found employment un-
der George W. Whistler, the distinguished engineer,
in the surveys of the New York, Providence and
Boston Railroad.
In the next year, Mr. Whistler having been em-
ployed to build the locomoti\es for the Boston and
Lowell Railroad, and to construct extensive hydraulic
works for the proprietors of locks and canals on the
Merrimack River, Mr. Francis accompanied him to
Lowell, and became associated with him in these en-
terprises.
When Mr. Whistler left Lowell, in 1837, Mr. Fran-
/s. =^
A-t-t^ C^-^'
LOWELL.
15
cig was appointed by the Proprietors of Locks and
CaDals as chief engineer. In 1845 he was chosen
agent also of the company. These offices he held
until 1884, when, after a service of fifty years, he
tendered his resignation. The company, however,
desiring to retain his services, appointed him to the
newly-created office of consulting engineer, and hi^
son. Colonel James Francis, was chosen his suc-
cessor as agent and engineer.
In his new position Mr. Fnincis is the consulting
engineer in all important worlvs connected with the
hydraulic improvements of Lowell, and where great
interests are at stake in other and distant parts of the
country, his professional services are frequently de-
manded.
Our limited space will permit only a briel
notice of Mr. Francis' works as a civil engineer.
During his long period of service he had the manage-
ment of all the water-power in Lowell, demanding
the important and delicate work of making an equita-
lile distril)Uti(in of this power amonir the various
manufacluring companies. Tlii.s work required many
original hydraulii- exjteriinents on a scalf tlial had
hitherto never been atteni]iled. The re.'sults of these
e.xperiments were i>ul)lislied in the profe.*sional world
in "Lowell Hydraulic Experiments,'" in IS-Vj. Thi."
wiirk, wliicli was republished in ISilS and l^'si!. is "a
recognized authority amonLr hydraulic engineers, both
in .Vmerica and in Europe.' lie has also jiuMished
"The .Strength of Cast-iron C^olumns," and many
other contributions to technical literature.
" Mr. Francis," says an able writer upon engineer-
ing, "may lie resarded as the founder nf a new school
of hvdraulic engineers by the inauguration of a sys-
tem of experimental research, which, through his
patient and careful study, has reached a degree of
perlcction before unknown. His experiments are
marked by exactness iTnin their very inception.''
There are in Lowell two monuments of his fore-
sight and skill which deserve to be recorded. The
first is the Northern Canal, constructed in 184ii, a
work of such massive strength and such perfection of
execution, that it cannot fail to command admira-
tion for ages to come. The second is what is known
as the " (iuard Locks. ' on I'awtucket Canal, con-
structed for the [lurpose of saving the city from in-
undation in case of a very high freshet upon the
Merrimack. Mr. Frencis having learned that in 1785
there had been a freshet in which the water rose
thirteen and a half feet above the lop of the dam at
the mouth of the Tawtucket Canal, and foreseeing
that should another similar freshet occur, the guard
locks, then existing, would inevitably give way, and
the city be inundated, constructed a gate and walls
which no freshet could sweep away. This work,
completed in 18">0, was a model of scitntific skill.
But to the casual observer who, on a fair day, viewed
the quiet waters of the canal, it seemed an unneces-
sary structure. The wags even styled it " Francis'
folly." But in two years (1862) there came a freshet
like that of 1785. The old works were swept away,
but the massive gate of Mr. Francis was now, for the
first time, dropped to its place and the city was
safe.
Though in his seventy-fifth year, Mr. Francis is
still pursuing the active duties of his profession.
During his past life he has often been honored with
municipal office. He was elected a member of the
American Society of Civil Engineers November 5,
1852, and was the president of that society from No-
vember 3, 1880, until January 18,1882.
The first sale of water-power by this compRny was
made to the Hamilton Manufacturing Company,
which was incorporated in 1825, with a capital of
$600,000.
The following facts in regard to the Locks and
Canals Company, I quote from Mr. Cowley :
*' For IweDtj- years the buoinoes of lliis company was to furDieh laud
& wnter-power, and build niilJR A machinen" for the variolic uiaoufac-
turiDg conipuDies. Tliey bave nerer eugnF^ed in manufacturing opera*
I tions. Tbev kept in operation tuo niacbiue fibups, a foundry A a bhw-
■ mill until 1845, Mben the Lowell Mncliine-Shupwaa incor]K>rated. Tbey
i C'HiBtructed all mill cauale to Rupply the various cumpaotee with «ater-
pi'wer, and erected nioel of the millB and the b<iardiDg hotises attached
to them. Tbey eniplovetl constantly from h\e to twelve hundred men,
j and built two hundred 1 fifty thousand dollan-' north of niKchinery per
annum. Tlieil' Bloi k waj. long the best of which Lowell could iMjast, he-
mp worth thrice and even four timer* its par value. Their preeeut Iniii-
; neBf Jb t" sufierintend the line of the water-power which ia leased hv them
! to the fieveral couipanieb. Their stuck 18 held by thew companies In tbe
same proi'ortion In which they hold tbe water.iwwor."
I In lS4l3 this company and the Essex Company, of
' Lawrence, by acts of the Legislatures of j\Iussflchu-
I setts and New Hampshire, became joint owners of the
extensive water-power afibrded by Lake Winnipiseo-
i gee, New Hampshire. This property was, in 1889,
' transferred by sale to a syndicate of gentlemen,
mostly manufacturers, in the State of New Hamp-
shire.
The most important of the works of the Locks and
Canals Company has been its construction of the
Northern Caaal, said to be the greatest work of its
kind in the United States. This canal was constructed
in 1840 and 1847, under the supervision of James B.
Francis as chief engineer. "The canal cost $530,-
000, employing in its construction 700 to 1000 persons,
and using 12,000 barrels of cement." It is 100 feet
wide and 15 feet deep, and about one mile in iength.
The whole work is one of such massive strength and
solidity, a great portion of it being cut through solid
rock, that, like very few of modern works, it will stand
unchanged in the far distant ages of the future. And
not for solidity and strength alone is it worthy of our
admiration, but its green banks, adorned with double
colonnades of trees and its attractive promenades,
with the waters of the Merrimack dashing down the
falls in close and full view, afford to the eye a very
pleasing prospect, and display t^i tbe. visitor a pictur-
esque scene of no ordinary beautj*.
The design of this canal is to aflbrd a fuller head of
16
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
water for the mills than the old canal could supply.
The multiplicity of mills demanded a greater supply
than the old canal could aSbrd.
Before coming in our history to the incorporation
of the town of Lowell, let us gather up a few facts of
a somewhat miscellaneous character.
In 1822 a regular line of stages was established be-
tween East Chelmsford and Boston.
In 1824 the Chelmsford Courier, a weekly paper,
was started in Middlesex Village.
The United States post-office was established
in East Chelmsford (now Lowell) on May 13, 1824,
with Mr. Jonathan C. Morrill as postmaster.
On July 4, 1825, the first of the military companies
of our city was formed, and took the name of Mechan-
ics' Phalanx. Following this wsa the organization of
the City Guards, in 1841, the Watson Light Guards
in 1851, the Lawrence Cadets in 1855. But the mili-
tary history of our city will appear in another place.
On July 4, 1825, the anniversary of .Vmericau Inde-
pendence was celebrated, the orator being Rev. Ber-
nard Whitman, of Chelmsford, a public dinner being
served at the Stone House, near Pantucket Falls. I
give the names of the Fourth of July orators in Low-
ell from that date to the pr&sent, following Mr. t_'ow-
ley down to 1866.
They were Bernard Whitman, in 1825; Samuel B.
Walcott, in 1826 ; Elisha Bartlett, in 1828 ; Dr. l.*rael
Hildreth, in 1821>; Edward Everett, in 183" ; John
P. Robinson, in 1831 ; Thomas J. Cireenwood, in
1832; Thomas Hopkinson, in 1834; Rev. K. W.
Freeman, in 1835; Rev. Dr. Blanehard, in IS-'iii ;
Rev. Thomas F. Norris and John C. Park, in 1841 :
Rev. John Moore, in 1H47 ; Dr. Elisha Bartlett, in
1848; Rev. Joseph H. Towne, in 1851: Kev. Mat-
thew Hale Smith, in 1852; .lunathaii Kimball, in
1853; Rev. Augustus Woodbury, in 1855; Dr.
Charles X. Phelps, in I860; (leo. .V. Boulwell. in
1861 ; Alexander H. Bullock, in 1865.
On July 4, 1867, the statue of" Victory " in Monu-
ment Square was unveiled, and, on that occasion, ad-
dresses were given by Mayor Geo. F. Richardson,
Judge Thomas Russell, Gen. A. B. Underwood, (Jen.
Wra. Cogswell, Hon. John A. Goodwin and Dr. J. C.
Ayer, who presented the statue to the city. Ten
years later, on July 4, 1878, Hon. F. T. Greenhalge
delivered an oration, and, on July 4, 18711, the orator
was Geo. F. Lawton, I3sq. Ten years later, on .lulv
4, 1889, an oration was delivered in Huntington Hall
by Hon. Henry Cabot Lodge.
The change which took jilace immediately after
the war, in regard to celebrating the 4lh of July, is
very remarkable. The war seemed to have changed.
not the patriotism, but the popular taste of our citi-
zens. Our celebrations of the 4th have become spec-
tacular. Processions, regettaa, games and sports havt-
supplemented everything of an intellectual nature.
This, however, may be alleged in behalf of these
popular attractions, ;hat, while an oration can be
heard by only a few hundred, these can be enjoyed
by fifty thousand.
John .Vdams, the most eloquent advocate of the
Declaration of Independence in the Continental
Congress, on the day after that immortal proclama-
tion was passed, wrote to his wife these well-known
words in respect to the future celebration of that
day: "It ought to be solemnized with pomps, shows,
games, sports, guns, bells, bon-fires and illuminations
from this time forward forever.'' This prophetic de-
claration would seem to sanction the present methods
of celebrating the day. .\nd yet to every patriotic
man who seriously reHects upon the dangers which
have always threatened human liberty and free insti-
tutions tliere is reason for sober thought even on the
4th of July. Such .sober thought the people of Low-
ell once had when, on the eve of the celebration of
the day in 1881, the startling message came that an
assassin's bullet had robbed the Republic of its chief
magistrate.
CHAPTER II.
LO WEI. I.- I I'onlinued).
TIIF. luWN ()|- I.fiW F.LL.
The t<Mvn of Lctwell was incorporated March 1.
1826. For four years after the work on the Merri-
mack Mills was begun the village retained the name
oC Ea'.t Clielmsford. The number of iuliabitant.s in
this village had risen from '.'(lO, in 182", to 23"", in
[All',, more (ban eleven-lbld. These twenty-three
huiidrc'd people were lonijielled to go four miles — to
Clielmsford ('ciitre — to attend town-meetings and
transact other municipal business. The two villages
hail no common business relations and nu social sym-
|>athies. The ta.ves raised upon the valuable proper-
ty of the mills could be claimetl and expeniled by the
town of ( 'belnislbrd. The schools of the new village
were under the managenii-iit ot the towu. Various
motives conspired to make it the desire of East
Chelmsford to become a town by itself. This desire
wius gratified by its success before the Legislature in
obtaining an act of incorporation.
It is interesting to be able to know the precise
way in which the new town received the name of
" Lowell."
It seems that Derby, in England, a parliamentary
borough and manufacturing town, had, from early as-
.sociation or other cause, been suggested to the mind
of Mr. Boott as a fitting name for the new town. He
had also thought of the claims of Francis C. Lowell
to the honor of giving its name. When the act of
incorporation was completed, with the exception of
giving a name, Mr. Xathan Appleton met Mr. Boott
and questioned him in regard to filling tlie blank
with an appropriate name. Mr. Boott declared that
LOWELL.
17
he considered the question narrowed down to two,
"Lowell" or "Derby," to which Mr. Appieton re-
plied, " Then Lowell by all means," and Lowell it was.
Historic Classification. — Lowell having now
become an incorporated township with a rapidly
increasing population, and with rapidly multiplying
industrial, ecclesiastical and educational institutions,
it becomes necessary at this point, in order that the
reader may follow an unbroken and logically con-
nected narrative, to classify the various subjects of
its history, and in succession treat each subject by
itself. The remaining history of Lowell will there-
fore be considered under the following beads:
I. Annals of Lowell. — This will embrace, in a some-
what statistical form, the transactions, events and
facts, very briefly stated, which will give to the reader
a general idea of the city's growth and condition from
year to year, leaving for future consideration a more
complete description of the institutions of the city,
each in its appropriate class.
2. The political history of Lowell, with sketches of the
lives of its Mayors.
3. The Mmufactures of Lowell.
4. Banks and Insurance Companies.
5. Military History.
6. The Press.
1. Schools.
8. Churches. ,
9. Societies and Clubs.
10. Physicians.
II. Libraries and Literature.
ASXALS OF LOWELr..
1826. The year 182G was Lowell's first municipal
year. The legislative act incorporating the town was
signed by Gov. Lincoln March 1, 1826, and on March
2d, Joseph Locke, Esq., a justice of the peace, issued a
warrant to Kirk Boott to call a meeting of the citizens
on March Cth, to take the proper measures relative to
the establishment of a town government. The meeting
was called at " Balch & Coburn's tavern," now well-
known as the "Stone-house" near Pawtucket Falls.
There being no public hail, town-meetings' were called,
in those early days at this tavern or at Fryes tavern,
which stood on ihe site of the American House.
It is interesting to notice the character and stand-
ing of the men whom the new town tirst honored
with its offices. The moderator of this town-meeting
was Kirk Boott. The School Committee elected were :
Theodore Edson, Warren Colburn, Samuel Batchel-
der, John O. Green, Elisha Huntington, all of whom,
with the exception of Mr. Batchelder, had received a
college education and were men of great moral and
intellectual worth. None of them, however, gained
a more enviable name than Mr. Batchelder, a man of
the highest inventive genius, who lived to be nearly
ninety-five years of age, and of whom it was said by
high authority that "his name should be placed
among those of eminent Americans." I will not
even forbear to mention also the name of the town
clerk, Samuel A. Coburn, whose town records, still
preserved in the office cf our city clerk, are a model
for the imitation of all scribes in the ages to come.
At the town-meeting held May 8, 182G, Nathaniel
Wright, afterwards mayor of the city, was elected the
first representative of the town in the State Legisla-
ture, and Nathaniel Wright, Samuel Batchelder and
O. M. Whipple were chosen as selectmen.
The Merrimack Company had now (1826) been en-
gaged in the manufacture of cotton goods for three
years, and had three mills in operation.
The Hamilton Company had been chartered in the
preceding year with a capital of $600,000. The Mer-
rimack Print Works had been started in 1824.
The population of the town was about 2500.
St. Anne's Church had been consecrated in the
preceding year.
The First Baptist Church and the First Congrega-
tional Church were organized in this year.
A daily line of stages to Boston was established in
April.
The only bridge acrois the Merrimack had been
the Pawtucket Bridge, constructed in 1792, but in
December of this year the Central Bridge was opened
to travel.
The Middlesex Mechanics' Association had been
incorporated in the preceding year.
The town wa? divided in 1826 into five school dis-
tricts : the first district school house being on the site
of the present Green school-house; the second at
Pawtucket Fall?, near the hospital; the third near
the pound on Chelmsford Street; the fourth — the
" Eed School-house" — near Hale's Mills, and the fifth
on Central Street, south of Hurd Street.
At the gubernatorial election in April the number
of votes cast by the citizens of the new town was 162.
Governor Lincoln, the Whig candidate, had a plurality
of 42 votes and a majority of 28. But in future years
the Whig plurality became less decided.
Kurd's woolen factory was burned down.
1827. — Nathaniel Wright was re-elected to repre-
sent the town in the General Court.
The selectmen were Nathaniel Wright, Joshua
Swan, Henry Coburn.
A daily mail between Lowell and Boston was es-
tablished.
The first Savings Bank was established by the
Merrimack Corporation for the express benefit of the
operators, but it ceased to exist after about two years.
First Universalist Society formed.
1828. The representatives to the General Court
were: Nathaniel Wright and Elisha Ford. The se-
lectmen were: Nathaniel Wright, Joshua Swan,
Artemas Young.
In this year the Appieton Company was incor-
porated with a capital of $600,000, and the Lowell
Company with a capital of $900,000.
The population of Lowell in 1828 was 3532.
18
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
In 1828 coal was introduced as a fuel in the town of
Lowell by Mr. William Kittredge.
William Kittredge was born in Newburyport,
Mass., June 11, 1810, and died at hia home ou East
Merrimack Street, Lowell, Nov. 28, 18S6, at the age of
seventy-six years. He was the son of Joseph Kitt-
redge, of Newburyport, and belonged to a family of
fourteen children, all of whom, save one, lived to the
age of maturity. Of the seven sons one received a
liberal education and became a clergyman, while
most of them were well-known men of ability and
integrity in the business world.
Mr. Kittredge's early education in the schools was
limited, but he was throughout hia life a careful ob-
server of the events of his time and a constant and
thoughtful reader of the history of all times. When
he was twelve years of age the family removed to
Dracut, Ma?s., where for several years they lived upon
a farm. When fifteen years of age, in 1825, Mr.
Kittredge came to Lowell and, as an apprentice to his
oldest brother, J. G. Kittredge, he learned the black-
smith's trade. Shortly before he became of legal age
he formed a partnership with this brother, in conduct-
ing an iron-store, a blacksmith-shop and a wood -yard.
A most interesting event in the early years of Mr.
Kittredge's business experience in Lowell was the in-
troduction into the city of coal as fuel. In 1828, when
he was eighteen years of age, while engaged in shoe-
ing a hor^e for S. H. Maun, Esq., a well known attor-
ney-at-law, lie was told by the lawyer that he had re-
cently seen upon a wharf in Boston some " black
rockn" which were dug from the earth and which
would burn. He advised Mr. Kittredge to procure a
quantity of this new fuel, and agreed to purchase of
him a portion of it. Accordingly two tons were pur-
chased by Mr. Kittredge on his individual account, at
the price of S20 per ton. To transport it to Lowell in a
baggage-wagon was an additional expense of S-1 per
ton. There were at hand no stoves or grates designed
for burning coal, and it was in the broad fire-place in
the lawyer's otfice that the first attempt was made to
burn the " black rocks" in Lowell. A grate was ex-
temporized, a roaring fire of wood was started and
upon it was thrown the coal in huge lumps. The
experiment failed. At length, after hours of labor,
the coal at some one's suggestion having been broken
up into about two bushels of small pieces, the " rocks"
began to glow. The fire waxed hotter and hotter.
The paint of the room began to blister. Somebody
gave the alarm of fire. Water was poured on, but
the fire still raged. The room was filled with steam,
and the alarmed and curious citizens gathered around
the office, some even venturing inside to view the
novel scene. The first load of coal is said to have
supplied the town of Lowell for nearly three years.
Slowly, however, coal came into use as a fuel. It
was first brought from Boston in barges, then by the
Middlesex Canal, and after 1835 by railroads. The
first shipment of coal by rail to Lowell for the
trade, about 1835, was consigned to Wm. Kittredge.
Upon the close of Mr. Kittredge's co-partnership
with his brother, about 1842, he conducted a large and
successful business in wood and coal. The coal busi-
ness was conducted by him individually except about
two years (1845—46), when he was in partnership
with Mr. Nathan R. Thayer, his wife's brother.
In 1842 he purchased of the Locks and Canals
Company land lying between Market and Middle
Streets, to which, at considerable cost and trouble to
himself, in 1856, he procured a branch track from
the location of the Boston and Lowell Railroad,
which track is to tlii.s date in constant use. His
yard now contained about 13,000 square feet, with a
street front of about 127 feet, and a dumping capacity
of upwards of 3000 tons of coal. Up to the clo.-e of
his long life he continued his ever-increasing and very
successful trade. Few of Lowell's men of busir.es^s
have been so long and so familiarly known. He was
the city's pioneer in his line of trade, and he has left
to those who follow him a record for integrity and
honor well worthy of their imitation.
Mr. Kittredge took an active and generous interest
in the welfare of the city of Lowell. At the time of
his death he was a trustee of the Central Savings
Bank and a director of the ilerchants' National
Bank. Though not a politician, he was three times
elected a member of the City Council of Lowell.
For a period of nearly thirty years he was a promi-
nent and honored member of the Kirk Street Church,
of which he was one of the founders.
Mr. Kittredge posse^sed a sympathetic and benev-
olent nature. In his death many a poor family lost
a faithful friend. He was a man of simple tastes, of
remarkable self-control and of a very genial «nd
buoyant spirit. The following words respecting him
from the pen of the Rev. C. A. Dickinson, his pastor,
contain much of truth as well as beauty : " We have
all been impressed with the quiet vein of humor
which seemed to flow through his whole life, like a
rippling rivulet through a quiet meadow, — new
bursting out into an occasional witticism, and now
disclosing itself only in the sparkling eye and the
beaming countenance; yet giving to the whole man
an indescribable something which made him a stand-
ing rebuke and protest against moroseuess and melan-
choly.'' In 1842 Mr. Kittredge married Nancy Bigelow
Thayer, daughter of Nathan Thayer, of Hollis, N. H.,
who survived him for two years. His children were :
(1) Francis William, who was born in 1S43, gradu-
ated from Yale College, and is now a successful at-
torney-at-law in Boston ; (2) Henry Bigelow, who
was born in 1844, and died in 1861; (3) Elltu Fra-
nia, who was born in 1847, and is the wife of Prescott
C. Gates, Esq., of Lowell ; (4) Anna Maria, who was
born in 1850, and is the wife of Dr. Charles T. Clif-
ford, of Lowell.
The Lowell Bank was incorporated with a capital
of 5=200,000.
//Tc^/c-i^i^pp^
/t-^^^£.^>^^
LOWELL.
19
Moses Hale died io 1828, at the age of sixty-three
years. He was bora in West Newbury, September,
176o. He came to East Chelmsford (now Lowell) in
1790, and built a mill on River Meadow Brojk (now
called Hale's Brook), for the purpose of fulling, dye-
ing and dressing cloth. The building now stands.
Other and far more extensive buildings were added-
In subsequent years Mr. Hale became interested in
a great variety of enterprises, among which were
dressing cloth, carding wool, grinding grain, sawing
lumber and manufacturing gunpowder. So extensive
were these works that in 1818 they were visited by
Hon. John Brooks, the Governor of the State. On
this occasion the Governor was escorted by the
Chelmsford Cavalry.
1829. — The representatives to the General Court
were: John P. Robinson and J. S. C. Knowlton.
The selectmen were: Nathaniel Wright, Joshua
Swan, Artemas Young.
In this year the Merrimack Lodge of Odd Fellows
was instituted.
In this year one of the mills of the Merrimack
Company was burned. The Lowell Institution for
Savings was incorporated. The town appropriated
SIOOO to purchase a fire-engine and hose. The town
voted to build a town-house.
Captain William Wyman was appointed postmaster
in 1829, and moved the post-office from Central Street
to the new Town Hali, now the City Government
Building.
The Middlesex Company was incorporated with a
capital of §500,000.
1830. The representatives to the General Court
were: Kirk Boott, Joshua Swan and John P. Robin-
son. The selectmen were: Nathaniel Wright, Joshua
Swan and Artemas Young. In this year the Middle-
sex Company was incorporated with a capital of Sl,-
000,000. The population of Lowell for 1830 was G477.
The Merrimack House was opened in 1830.
As early as 1829 such was the rapid increase in the
population of the town that the want of a convenient
hall for public meetings was seriously felt. In May
of that year a committee, which had been appointed
in reference to securing a new hall, reported that the
cost of erecting a suitable town building (the descrip-
tion of which was given) would be about S18,000.
By vote of the town a committee, consisting of Kirk
Boott, Paul Moody, Jonathan Tyler, Elisha Glidden
and Elisha Ford, was appointed to erect a town-house
at an expense not to exceed $18,000. The town-house
was erected in 1830 at a cost of about $19,000.
In popular language we may say that the City
Government Building, now occupied by our city offi-
cials, is the identical town-house of 1830. It was said
of the wandering palmer on returning from his pil-
grimage, in the days of knight-errantry, that
*'Tbe niotlier that Lini bnre
"Would scarcely know Uer 6od."
So the committee who, nearly sixty years ago,
erected the town-house for $19,000, could they come
back to earth again, would scarcely recognize its
identity. The bricks indeed remain, but the two
rows of short windows have given place to one row of
long ones. The hall in the second story haa disap-
peared; the long entry running through the building
parallel to Merrimack Street is no more ; the post-
office, very conveniently located on the farther side of
this entry, has long since begun its travels about the
city, and soon the comely house of which our fathers
were proud will sink into insignificance beside the
palatial edifice now to be erected.
1831. The representatives to the General Court
were Kirk Boott, Joshua Swan, J. P. Robinson, J. S.
C. Knowlton and Eliphalet Case. The selectmen
were Joshua Swan, Artemus Young and James Tyler.
In this year the Suffolk Manufacturing Company
was incorporated, with a capital of $600,000, and the
Tremont Mills, with a capital of $600,000. The
Lawrence Manufacturing Company also, with a capi-
tal of $1,500,000. To supply these three last-men-
tioned corporations with water the Suffolk and Wes-
tern Canals were cut.
The Railroad Bank was incorporated, and the
High School was opened in 1831.
July 7th. Paul Moody, one of the founders of
Lowell, died, at the age of 52 years. He is noticed on
another page.
1832. The representatives to the General Court
were : Ebenezer Applelon, Artemus Holden, O. M.
Whipple, Seth Ames, Maynard Bragg, William
Davidson, Willard Guild.
The selectmen were: Joshua Swan, Matthias
Parkhurst, Josiah Crosby, Benjamin Walker, Samuel
C. Oliver. In this year the Lowell Bleachery was
incorporated, with a capital of $50,000, and the Boott
Mills, with a capital of $1,200,000.
The population of Lowell in 1832 was 10,254. The
Lowell Mutual Fire Insurance Company was incor-
porated.
On Jan. 25th occurred the unique convivial celebra-
tion, by the Burns Club, of the seventy-third birthday
of Robert Burns. It was held at the Mansion House,
which then stood near Merrimack Street, on the site
of the present Massachusetts boarding-houses. The
feast was attended by nearly all the prominent citi-
zens of the town. The occasion was hilarious, not to
use a stronger term. The genial Alexander Wright,
a countryman of Burns and agent of the Carpel Cor-
poration, presided, and Peter Lawson, an intense
Scotchman, was toast-master. The table was graced
by the haggis, a favorite Scottish dish, whose ingredi-
ents are the finely-minced liver and lights of a calf
and a sheep, oat-meal, beef-suet, and salt and pepper,
the mixture being inclosed in a sheep's stomach and
boiled three or four hours. After a formal address
to the haggis by John Wright, brother of the presi-
dent, the repast began. Wine and songs and speeches
followed. Dr. Bartlett, Lowell's first mayor, made a
20
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
speech and recited Burns' " Highland Mary." " The
Banks of Doun " and " Duncan Gray " were sung.
John P. Robinson, Lowell's most learned and bril-
liant lawyer, spoke of Tam O'Shanter and his gray
mare Meg. The comic Perez Fuller gave an im-
promptu medley, in which were laughable allusions
to the invited guests.
While the president, in the " wee " morning hours,
was making his closing remarkx some demoralized
reveler rudely interrupted and struck up the song,
"O, Willie brewed a peck o' maut," iu which all hil-
ariously joined. Finally, in parting, all joined hands
and made the old Mansion House resound with " Auld
Lang Syne."
September 15, 1832, Judge Edward St. Loe Liver-
more died at the age of seventy years.
1833. The representatives to the General Court
were: S. A. Coburn, John P. Robinson, Cyril French,
Simon Adams, Jacob Robbins, J. L. Sheafe, Jes=e
Fox, Royal Southwick, Joseph Tyler, Jonathan
Spalding. The selectmen were: Matthias Parkhurst,
Joshua Swan, Benj. Walker, Elisha Huntington,
Samuel C. Oliver. The population of Lowell in 1S33
was 12,963. In this year occurred that long-protracted
and exciting canvass for Representative in Congress,
between Caleb Gushing, of Newburyport (Whig), and
Gayton P. Osgood, of Aodovtr (Democrat), the vote
of Lowell favoring Mr. Gushing by a ^nlall majority.
The Irish Benevolent Society was started. The sys-
tem of sewerage was begun.
Among the many men of talent whom the rapidly-
rising town attracted within its borders was the cele-
brated Wendell Phillips. On leaving the Law School
at Cambridge in 1833, he came to Lowell and spent
about one year in the otlice of Luther Lawrence and
Elisha Glidden, who were then ic partnership, but
he did not practice in Lowell after being admitted to
the bar. Mr. Phillips' sketoh of Lowell society at
that time, as quoted by Mr. Cowley, will be read with
interest :
" Lowell was then crowded with able men — well-
read lawyers and successful with a jury ; among them,
scholarly, eloquent, deeplyread in his profession, and
a genius, was John P. Robinson. The city was rich
in all that makes good society — amiable, beautiful,
and accomplished women, hospitable and amply able
to contribute their full share to interesting anil sug-
gestive conversation, — gentlemen of talent, energetic,
well-informed and giving a hearty welcome to the
best thought of the day. The changes that thirty
years have made in that circle would afford matter
for a history deeply iuteresiing and very largely
sad."
In May, 1833, occurred a sensation which deeply
moved and interested the people of New England and
especially the citizens of Lowell. It wiis the trial for
murder of the Rev. Ephraim K. Avery, of Bristol,
R. I., who, during the two preceding years, had been
the pastor of the Methodist Church worshiping iu the
chapel near the site of the Court-House. While in
Lowell Mr. Avery had formed a somewhat intimate
acquaintance with Miss Sarah Maria Cornell, a mem-
ber of his church. On leaving Lowell for Bristol, R.
I., Miss Cornell had followed him and found a resi-
dence in Tiverton, a neighboring town. On the night
of December 20, 1832, she was foully murdered. The
trial (at Newport) of Mr. A^ery, who was arraigned
for her murder, occupied twenty-eight days. The
celebrated Jeremiah Mason was employed as counsel
on the defence, and Mr. Avery was acquitted.
It is said that no other clergyman of the United
States had been tried on an indictment for murder.
Tnis fact, added to the other remarkable circum-
stances attending this atrocious crime, made the whole
affair one of absorbing interest and of an intensely
sensational nature.
September 13, 1833. Warren Colburn, agent of the
Merrimack Mills, died at the age of forty years. He
was greatly instrumental in establishing and sustain-
ing the public schools of the city.
Iu 1833 the Lowell Police Court was established
with Joseph Locke as standing justice.
Judge Locke was born in Fitzwilliam, X. H., April
8, 1772. He graduated from Dartmouth College at
the age of twenty-seven years. Having been admitted
to the bar, he began the practice of law iu Billerica
in 1802. For eight years he represented that town iu
the Legislature. He held many offices, among which
were those of Presidential elector and member of the
Governors Council. He came to Lowell in 1833, and
was, in that year, made first judge of the Police Court.
He served in that office thirteen years, resigning iu
184G, when he was seventy-four years of age. He was
a man of sound learning and humane and generous
heart. He died November 10, 1833, at the age of
eigDty-one years.
Upon the resignation of Judge Locke, in 1S4G,
Nathan Crosby was appointed his successor. Judge
Crosby was born in Sandwich, N. H., February 12,
1798. He graduated at Dartmouth College in 1820.
He came to Massachusetts iu 182G, aad practiced law
in Amesbury and in Newburyport. He devoted sev-
eral years to lecturing and laboring in promotion of
the cause of temperance. In 1843 he removed to Low-
ell, where he was employed by the Manufacturing
Companies in securing the right to control the waters
of lakes in New Hampshire, for the benefit of the mills
in seasons of drought.
As judge of the Police Court he bore himself with
that dignity, humanity, courtesy and patience which
well become a good judge. He was, iu every sphere
of life, a true Christian gentlemen. He died after
holding the office for thirty-niae years, on February
10, 1885, at the age of eighty-seven years.
On February 25, 1885, Samuel P. Hadley, who had
long been the clerk of the court, was appointed Judge
Crosby's successor. Judge Hadley was born in Mid-
dlesex Village (now a part of Lowell) October 22,
LOWELL.
21
1831. He was educated at Phillips Academy, Law-
rence Academy and the State Law School. He
studied law with Isaac S. Morse, of Lowell, and
A. C. Bradley, of New York City. On August 1,
1857, he was appointed clerk of the Police Court of
Lowell, and was promoted to be justice of the court in
February, 1880.
It is interesting to learn the number and character
of the cases brought before our Police Court. For the
year endin»r October 1, 1889, the number of cases was
4040. Of these 3034 were " liquor cases." Of the
remaining lOOG, more than one-half are case.s of as-
sault and battery, etc., which are traceable to the use
of intoxicating drinks, while there were only two or
three hundred traceable to other cau:<es.
The sessions of this court begin at ten o'clock on
every working-day. The salary of the judge is f 2300.
President Jackson's Visit. — Few events in the
liittory of Lowell have been attended with so much
eclat, and remembered by the citizens with so much
pride and pleasure, as the visit of President J?,ckson,
June 2G and 27, 1833. What made the Presidential
visit 80 remarkable and so worthy of Bj)ecial de-
scription, was the unique and noveland very aucreasful
attempt of the managers of the great manufactories
of Lowell to display upon the streets, in gorgeous
procession in honor of the chief magistrate of the
nation, the thousands of Yankee mill girls then in
their employ. When to this attraction a long and
charming array of the children of the public schools
was added, it is not strange that from all the country
round, men, women and children gathered to witness
the brilliant display.
The days of railroads had not come, and it required
four entire days to ride in a carriage from Washington
to New England. The Presidential party consisted
of President Jackson, Mr. Van Buren, Gea. Cass, Mr.
Woodbury and Mr. Donalson, the President's private
secretary. The President was in feeble health, having
recently had a severe attack of sickness while in
Boston. Men who had formed their opinion of the
personal appearance of the man from reading of his
dauntless courage and his iron will, were greatly
disappointed when their eyes first rested on their
ideal hero. Says 5Ir. Oilman, then editor of the
Cjskel: " The old gentleman appears as though he
was very feeble. He has the appearance of a very
aged man ; bis white hair and thin, pale features,
bespeak a life of trial and hardship. He was, not-
withstanding, very complacent .and dignified; yet,
while looking at him, it seemed as if a tear would
start instead of a smile. It was with a peculiar
melancholy that we regarded him. Such a contrast!
his aged countenance, his hoary head, bowing all
around, and his feeble motion, the throng of eager
and curious faces crowding to obtain a clear view, and
the loud shouts that from time to time rent the air,
seemed illy to harmonize."
The Presideutial party had visited Salem and had
tarried an hour at Andover, where they visited the
seminaries and partook of a collation. On coming
from Andover to Lowell they were met on Nesmith
Street, south of Andover Street, where a brief speech
of welcome was made. The militaryand a cavalcade
of citizens re.«ted on Nesmith and Andover Streets.
On Andover Street were the civic organizations and
citizens, and on Church Street were the mill girls and
the school children. At the head of each division of
mill girls was a silk banner with the inscription:
" Protection to American Industry." The inscription
is a slogan still. There were nine of these banners,
white upon one side and green upon the other.
B. F. Varnum, Esq., was chief marshal, having
thirly-one asiisiants, the last survivor of whom, Col.
Jefferson Bancroft, died in January, 1890.
The President rode in a barouche with Mr. Van
Buren at his side. The booming of artillery on
Chapel Hill, overlooking the Concord, added to the
eclat of the pageant. At the junction of Church,
and Central Streets two fine hickory trees had been
transplanted — a delicate compliment to Jackson's
pet name, "Old Hickory." Good Master Merrill, a
stanch Jackson man, had brought out his boys in
thick array, who, as the general passed them, shouted
(as they, perhaps, had been instructed to ilo) not
"Hurrah!" but "Hurrali j'or Jcbckton!'' "The pro-
cession passed in review before the President, with
drums beating, cannon booming, banners flying, hand-
kerchiefs waving and nine times nine hearty cheeis
of welcome." But no part of the pageantry could
be compared to the procession of the Y'ankee girls.
They were over twenty-five hundred in number and
marched lour deep, all dressed in white, with parasols
over their heads.
Z. E. Stone, Esq., whose interesting account of
Jackson's visit I mainly follow, makes the following
quotation from a letter of an old citiizen; " As Gen-
eral Jackson rode through this line, hat in hand,
there was an expression on his features hard to de-
fine, partaking partly of surprise, partly of pride, and
a good deal of gratification. Julius Caesar, Napoleon,
Alexander, in their best estates, never bowed to ' two
miles of girls ' all dressed in white. It is quite
doubtful whether either of them could have survived
it. It was evident General Jackson did not know
what to mike of appearances at Lowell. He had
probably imbibed his ideas of a Northern manufactur-
ing town somewhat from the speeches of Southern
statesmen, and was prepared to meet squalid wretch-
eJness, half concealed for the purposes of the occa-
sion ; but when told that these fine blocks of build-
ings (fresher then than now) were veritable board-
ing-houses for the 'wretched' operatives in the fac-
tories, with the evidence of his own eyes as to the
condition of those operatives, he exhibited a good
deal of enthusiasm, aiid in various ways expressed
his gratification."
General Jack.son visited the Print Works and one
25
HISTORY OF 3IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of the mills of the Merrimack Corporation, where
all the machinery was in operation and the girls, in
holiday attire, exhibited to him the process of manu-
facturing cotton. Charles Dickens, in his "Notes for
American Circulation," deems the visit of Jackson
worthy of the following mention, which, however,
does but little credit to the accuracy of the great
writer : " It is said that on the occasion of the visit
of General Jackson or General Harrison (I forget
which, but it is not to the purpose) he walked through
three miles and a half of these girls, all dressed out
with parasols and silk stockings."
Major "Jack Downing's" account of the same occa-
sion is almost as worthy of belief as that of Mr.
Dickens. The major declared that at one time before
this, when the general was exhausted with hand-
shaking, he himfelf stepped for.vard and shook hands
with the multitude in his stead. Taking courage
from his success on that previous occasion, he ven-
tured to do a little bowing to the haLdaome Lowell
girls, whereupon the general pushed him aside and
said : " None of that, major; in the matter of shak-
ing hands you do very well, but when it comes to sa-
luting the girls I can manage that without your help."
On the next morning, after breakfast, Jackson, with
military promptness, at the appointed hour, took his
seat in the carriage to start for Concord, New Hamp-
shire, but Van Buren's seat by his side was vacant.
" Where is Van Buren ?" said the President. On be-
ing told thad lie had not come from the breafcf;i!-t
table, he replied : " Well, I sha'u't wait for hiin.
Drive on."
The qupstion naturally arise.", Can the Lowell mill-
girls of to-day form a procession like that which
greeted General Jackson more than fifty years ago?
The emphatic answer is " Ao." Perhaps there ia no
better place than this to speak of the great change in
the character of the female operatives in our jnills
during the first half-century of their existence.
During the first half of the present century the
n:w settlemen's on the fertile prairies of the West
called from the humble farms among the hills of
New England very many of her most ambitious and
enterprising sons. But New England's daughters,
though born with a spirit equally ambitious and en-
terprising, were compelled to remain in the old
homesteads on the hillsides. Little money could
they earn, though they had willing hands for labor.
Here and there one could earn, at teaching a short
summer school, a dollar a week and board. A poor
pittance was paid for domestic service. Custom for-
bade the Yankee girl to work, like the European
woman, in the fields. But when the great manufac-
turing enterprises were started in Lowell the services
of these same Yankee girls, waiting on the hillsides
for something for their ready hands to do, were
eagerly sought and most highly prized. They were
ju.st the help most needed. They brought with them
health, strength, patience, virtue aud intelligence.
Well could the successful and wealthy manufacturer
afford to pay generously such workmen as these. The
buildings, the machinery, the boarding-houses, all
were new. The grime of years bad not yet eomo
upon them. The humble country girl, who had rarely
held a silver dollar in her hand, felt a pleasing pride
at the end of every month upon receiving a sum
which, in her childhood on the hills, she had never
dreamed of earning. They had learned economy,
and many thousands were saved to be carried back
to their country homes. Many a mortgage which
had long rested on the small farm of the parents was
lifted by these noble and enterprising daughters.
JLany a young bride in the cottage on the hillside,
after the service of a few years in the Lowell mills,
was able to vie with the daughters of the wealthy
around her in the elegance of her outfit and the rich-
ness of her attire.
The shrewd managers of cur mills strove hard and
long to keep such, and only such, girls in their em-
ploy. And so successful were they that one of them
informs me that as late as 184G "every mill-girl was
a Yankee."
But gradually there came a change. Mills were
multiplied ; Yankee help was sometimes hard to be
found. In summer the mill-girl was fond of leaving
her loom and taking a vacation on the breezy hills
about her old home. Rival manufactories sprang up.
The margin of profits thus grew small. To insure
dividends every loom must be kept moving. At fir~t
operatives were sought in Nova Scotia to supply the
increasing demand. These operatives proved very
acceptable substitutes for the Yankees. But still
greater numbers were needed, and then, very gradu-
ally, Irish girls, and after them, French girls from
Canada, began to be employed. But different races
do not always work well together, es|)ecially in cases
in which there is supposed to exist a social ine-
quality. And so it came to pass that as the foreign
girl came, the native girl went.
But there is another still more efficient cause, per-
haps, of the withdrawal of the Yankee girls from the
mills. Within the last fifty years almost countless
new avenues of labor and enterprise have been
opened to American women. Almost innumerable
sewing-machines demand the service of the nimble
tiugers of iutelligent girls. As accountants in places
of business, as telegraph operators, as saleswomen in
the retail trade, as clerks of professional men, and in
other positions too numerous to mention, the intelli-
gent and educated girls and women of America are
finding employments more agreeable to their tastes
than can be found amidst the din and clatter of the
mills.
In process of time, too, the grime and dust of age
settle down over the once new and neat buildings
and furniture, and render them less attractive than
when the freshness of early days was upon them.
Moreover, it is doubllcsa true that the second geue-
LOWELL.
23
ration of miil-owners cares less for the moral status
of the operatives, and more, perhaps, for the divi-
dends, than did their noble fathers who laid the
foundations of these great enterprises. From all
these causes it has come to pass that a class of opera-
tives, somewhat inferior in culture and intelligence,
now fills the place of the Yankee girls who welcomed
the Hero of New Orleans in the streets of Lowell.
I am informed by a gentleman, who is intimately
conversant with the subject, that at the present time
about one-fourth only of the Lowell mill operatives
are Yankee girls, whilst the other three-fourths con-
sist in about equal numbers of French and Irish.
But still the mills find in these girls skillful and
efficient operatives. The Irish girls have many ex-
cellent characteristics, and the French are said to be
intelligent and quick to learn.
In October, 1833, the town of T/Owell was honored
by a visit from another illustrious man, the Hon.
Henry Clay. la the preceding year Mr. Clay had
been the Whig candidate for the Presidency, in oppo-
sition to President Jackson, and, though defeated de-
cidedly in the canvass, he had not lost the glory of his
great name. If any American state.sman, more than any
other, was able to rouse in the hearts of his followers
the seotimects of admiration and intense devotion, it
was Henry Clay — the " gallant Harry of the West.''
The present generation can hardly understand this
admiration, for they cannot behold his magnetic
presence nor hear his eloquent voice. Mr. Clay was
received with distinguished honor, and in the evening
he addressed the citizens in the Town Hall.
But Kirk Boott, Lowell's first citizen, refused to
share in any of the honors bestowed upon the distin-
guished guest, because, though Mr. Clay had advo-
cated the war against England of 1812, yet, in order
to close the contest, he had been instrumental, as
commissioner of the United States, in making a
treaty of peace which surrendered the very objects
for which the war was declared. Nor is Mr. Boott
the firs'. American who has felt the humiliation of the
treaty of peace at Ghent.
The year 1833 was, to Lowell, one of peculiar ex-
citement and interest. The great corporations were
mostly now in full operation. The grime of age and
use had not begun to gather on the fresh and elegant
structures of the mills and of the city. The great
experiment seemed flushed with success. The scene
was novel to all the world. Strangers from other
lands, like the Queen of Sheba, came to witness the
sight. Lowell for the time was one of the seven
wonders of the world. Other like cities had not yet
arisen to divide the admiration and wonder of men.
It was Lowell's youthful prime, when her admirers
were most numerous and moat ardent. At the present
day, such have been the wonderful inventions of
recent years, there is more to be admired than then,
hut the curiosity of men has been satisfied. Other
great manufacturing cities have sprung up all around,
and Lowell has ceased to be the one city of that pe-
culiar attraction which it once possessed. The gala
day of General Jackson's visit will never return.
1834. The representatives to the General Court
were : Samuel Howard, Kirk Boott, James Chandler,
Osgood Dane, Jesse Phelps and O. M. Whipple.
[There were in 1834 eleven vacancies. At that time
it required a majority to elect instead of a plurality
as at the present time.]
The selectmen were : Joshua Swan, Elisha Hunt-
ington, Wm. Livingston, Jesse Fox, Benjamin
Walker.
In this year Eliphalet Baker, Walter Farnsworth
and George Hill, of Boston, having purchased of Mr.
Park the flannel-mill in Belvidere, near Wamesit
Falls, begin the manufacturing business under the
name of the Belvidere Flannel Manufkcturing Com-
pany.
The Lowell Advertiser started, and Belvidere was
annexed. On May 31, 1834, a steamboat, ninety feet
long and twenty feet wide, was launched above Paw-
tucket Falls to run on Merrimack River. It was
owned by Joel Stone and J. P. Simpson, of Boston,
and was called the " Herald." Mr. Stone was its first
captain. It plied twice per day between Lowell and
Nashua. On account of the shortness of the distance
and other causes the enterprise failed. The traveler,
to gain so short a ride upon the water, did notcare to
shift his baggage from the stage-coach. However, Mr.
Joseph Bradley continued to run the boat until the
opening for travel of the Lowell & Nashua Kaiiroad.
This railroad was incorporated in 1835.
The celebrated David Crocket, the comic statesman
of Tennessee, visited Lowell May 7, 1834. He was
an ardent Whig, and about 100 young Whigs of Lowell
gave him a banquet at the American House in the
evening. He was greatly pleased wkh his reception
and declared that he was dead in love with New
England people.
If the object of history is to give to the reader an
accurate and life-like view of the condition of a people,
I can hardly fulfill my task in a better way than by
quoting from the autobiography of this intelligent ob-
server the following words : " I had heard so much of
[Lowell] that I longed to see it. I wanted to see the
power of machinery wielded by the keenest calcula-
tions of human skill. We went down among the fac-
tories. The dinner bells were ringing and the folks
were pouring out of the houses like bees out of a gum.
I looked at them as they passed, all well dressed,
lively, and genteel in their appearance. I went in
among the girls and talked with many of them. Not
one of them expressed herself as tired of her employ-
ment. Some of them were very handsome. I could
not help reflecting on the difference of condition be-
tween these females, thus employed, and thatof olher
populous countries where the female character is de-
graded to abject slavery."
Colonel Crocket served two years in Congress. Ttro
24
mSTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
years after visiting Lowell he fell in battle while
fighting in the cause of Texas against Mexico.
In November, 1834, George Thompson, the distin-
guished English philanthropist, came to Lowell for the
second time. On his first visit, in October of that year,
he had spoken in the Appleton Street Church. Upon
his second visit he was to deliver three anti-slavery
addresses on three consecutive evenings, in the Town
Hall, which was then in the second story of our pres-
ent City Grovemment Building.
Mr. Thompson had a great name already acquired
in England. Mr. Z. E. Stone, whose account of Mr.
Thompson's visit I follow, writes as follows: "He
had been a leader in the struggle for emancipation in
the West Indies ; and on the passage of the Act of
Emancipation was specially complimented in the
House of Lords by Lord Brougham,' who said : ' I
rise to take the crown of this most glorious victory
and place it upon George Thompson.'
At the time of this visit to Lowell, some of the lead-
ing citizens, engaged in manufac'.uring, believed it
would be prejudicial to the interests of our mills if
their patrons in the South ^ihould learn that the per.ple
of Lowell were interfering with their rights .is slave-
holders. Others affected to believe that Mr. Thomp-
son was an emissary of England, sent hither to dis-
turb our peace and break down our institutions. On
the day on which the last of his three lectures was to
be given, a placard was posted in the streets from
which I take the following words: 'Citizens of
Lowell, arise! Will you suffer a question to be dis-
cussed in Lowell which will endanger the safety of
the Union ? Do you wish instruction from an English-
man ? If you are free-born sons of America, meet, one
and all, at the Town Hull this evening.'
"Mr. Thompson also received an anonymous letter
in which the writer says : there is a plot ' to immerce
him in a vat of indeluble Ink,' and advises him to
'leave the country as soon as po.ssible or it wil be
shurely carried into opperration, and that to before
you see the light of another son ! '
" On previous evenings brick-bats bad been hurled
at Mr. Thompson through the windows, and he had
been interrupted by cat-calls and other offensive
tlemonstrations. But on the coming evening it was
evident more serious danger was impending. When
the hour of assembling came, an unwonted crowd
gathered in the rear of the hall. It was a scene of
great excitement and all things foreboded a coming
storm. At this point the selectmen of the town in-
terfered and persuaded those in charge of the lectures
to put off the meeting till the afternoon of the next
day. The brave anti-slavery women of the audience
gathered about Mr. Thompson, and he escaped out
into the darkness and found shelter in the hospitable
home of Rev. Mr. Twining, pastor of the Appleton
Street Church. And thus ended what came very near
being a ' mob in Lowell.' "
The rapidlj'growing town now extends its bound-
aries. Not all of the city of Lowell is embraced in llie
territory of the village of East Chelmsford. The
towns of Tewksbury and Dracut have each contrib-
uted to our city, lands, which afford some of the most
attractive sites for many of the most elegant resi-
dences of our citizens. The land in East Chelmsford
was generally low and level, in some places even
covered with swamps and dotted with ponds, but the
parts which once belonged to Tewksbury and Dracut
rise in hills from the banks of the Merrimack and
afford delightful views, not only of the rest of the
city, but of the neighboring towns and of the lofty
hills and mountains which lie far to the west and
north.
Belvidehe. — This part of the city, once belonging
to Tewksbury, is bounded on the west by the Concord
and on the north by the Jlerrimack. The lowlands
near the falls in the Concord were once the hubila-
tion of the Pawtucket or Wamesit Indians. In the
Concord in early days were four islands, the largest
two of which are crossed by one in going from the
Prescott Mills directly to High Street Church. It is
interesting to know that the site of Belvidere was
once the property of Margaret, widow of John Win-
throp, earliest Governor of the Colony of Massachu-
setts Bay. After the death of the Governor, in H)4D,
the General Court granted to ilargaret Winthrop,
his widow, 3000 acres of land, bounded on the west
and north by the Concord and .Merrimack llivers.
This large tract evidently remained (wholly, or in
pari) in the hands of her descendants for many
years. For on February 12, ItiUl, .\dam Winthroj),
grandson of ^largaret, gives by deed one-fifth (undi-
vided) of these 3000 acres to Samuel Hnnt, from
whom, I suppose, the falls next below Pawtucket
Falls derive their name. In ITUD Timothy Brown
purchased a part of the Winthrop estate and built
upon it a large house, for many years a conspicuous
and widely-known landmark of our city, known as
the " Gedney House," or more familiarly as " The Old
Yellow House." This house rose aloft with a com-
manding view, adorned, as it was, by a long row of
Lombardy poplars. For a long time in "ye olden
days " it had been a noted inn, and its long halls had
olten resounded with music and the merry dance.
Mrs. Abbott, wife of Judge J. G. Abbott, of Boston,
who in her childhood lived in the house, thus de-
scribes it: "The mansion house was beautifully
situated at the confluence of the Merrimack and Con-
cord Rivers. Standing at an elevation of forty feet
above the water, it commanded a distant and lovely
view of both the streams. Back of the house, on the
opposite side of the Merrimack, rose Dracut heights,
as if to shield the spot from the north winds. It was
certainly a lovely old mansion."
This mansion, with about 200 acres of land adjoin-
ing it, constituted what was long known as the "Gedney
Estate," so named from a former owner. This estate,
in ISIG, was purchased by Judge St. Loe Livermore,
LOWELL.
25
the father of Mrs. Abbott, who, after being wearied
of politics and the buatle of a city life, had hoped
that on this quiet farm, far out in the country, he
should at length find for his declining years a jjlace
of grateful repose. Little did he dream that within
seven years be would look down from thi.squiet home
upon one of the busiest scenes ever presented to the
view in the history of human industry — the begin-
nings of the great manufacturing enterprise of the
future city of Lowell.
Judge Livermore was a man of marked ability,
and " he had associated with men prominent in let-
ters and in politics in this and other countries." His
lather bad been a justice of the Supreme Court of
New Hampshire, as well as member of the United
States Senate, of which he was president jtro tempore
for several years: while he had himself served three
terms in the United States House of Representatives,
and filled many other important offices. It was be
who gave to his part of the city the name of " Bclvi-
dcrc." He died Sept. 15, 1832, aged seventy years.
The farm of Judge Livermore was sold in 1831 to
Thomas and John Nesmilh for $25,000. The Nesmith
brothers had been successful leaders in Derry, K. H.,
and they purchased the land for the purpose of di-
viding it up into city lots to be sold as residences.
They fully accomplished their purpose, and on this
land now Eland many of the most costly and elegant
houses of the city. The Nesmiths both lived to good
old age in the mansions on the Livermore farm,
which they had erected for their declining years,
Thomas living to the age of eighty-two years, and
John to the age of seventy-six years.
The large farms lying next to that of Judge Liver-
more and belonging to Zadoc Rogers and Captain
Wm. Wyman, are now, in like manner, being
divided into lots admirably adapted for elegant resi-
dences, and it is safe to assert that no part of the city
is more attractive and beautiful than Belvidere.
The annexation of Belvidere was for about five years
— from 1820 to 1834 — a subject of much acrimonious
debate. Thetown of Tewksbury was not willing to sur-
render the taxes of a village of so much wealth, while
the people of Belvidere felt that they were virtually
citizens of Lowell. Their business and their social
relations allied them to Lowell. Accordingly, when
summoned to attend town-meetings at the centre of
Tewksbury, four or five miles away, they felt them-
selves unfairly treated by being compelled, at great
expense and loss of time, to meet with men with
whom they had neither business relations nor social
sympathies. They acted as they felt, and turned the
town-meetings into ridicule. Mr. Geo. Hedrick, our
aged fellow-citizcD, who was one of them, gives us
the following account of town-meeting days:
"We used to charier all the teams, hay-carts and
other kind of vehicles, and go down and disturb the
people of the town by our boisterous actions. As we
neared the village a 'hurrah." gave the warning of
our approach. We took extra pains to have a full
turn-out, make all the trouble we could, and have for
one day in the year a good time. At twelve o'clock
we adjourned to Brown's tavern to dinner, and hot
flip and other favorite beverages of those dsys were
freely partaken of. We met again at two o'clock
and kept up the turbulent proceedings until seven,
and returned home well satisfied with our endeavors
for the good of the town." On one occasion they
actually carried a vote to hold the next town-meeting
in the village of Belvidere. The old town at length
relented, and the new villape, as is usual ic such
cases, gained the victory. It was the mother against
the daughter and the daughter had her way. Belvi-
dere was annexed to Lowell May 29, 1834. Twice
since that date, by legislative acts, the unwilling town
has been compelled to surrender to the encroaching
city some of the most valuable parts of its territory.
1835. The representatives to the General Court
were : Kirk Boott, A. W. Buttrick, James Chandler,
Wm. Davidson, Artemas Holden, John Mixer, Mat-
thias Parkhurst, Alpheus Smith, Joseph Tyler, O. M.
Whipple, Benjamin Walker, Wm. Wyman, and John
A. Knowles. The selectmen were : Benjamin Walker,
James Russell, Wm. Livingston, John Chase, Wm. N.
Owen. This is the last of the ten years of the town-
ship of Lowell. The repeated re-elections of Samuel
A. Coburn, as town-clerk and of Artemus Holden, as
treasurer, indicate the high esteem in which they were
held. Joshua Swan's name also constantly recurs on
the town reoords. He was often honored as moderator
of town -meetings, representative to the General Court^
and selectman of the town. He was subsequently a
candidate for mayor.
Middlesex Mechanics' Building on Dutton Street
was erected in 1835.
The Lowell Courier begins as a tri-weekly, published
Tuesdays, Thursdays and Saturdays.
The Boott Cotton-Mills were incorporated in 1835
with a capital of Sl,500,000.
Aug. 22, 1835, a meeting was held to denounce all
agitations of the question of slavery. John Aiken,
John P. Robinson, Elisha Bartlett, John Avery and
Thomas Hopkinson were among the leading citizens
who participated in the doings of this meeting. There
was entertained in those days a fear of losing the trade
of the South by allowing the impression to go forth
thai Lowell was a hot-bed of abolitionism, where
intermeddling Englishmen, like George Thompson
were allowed, uurebuked, to traduce the inslitations
of America.
On Sunday, Sept. 20tb of this year, occurred an event
which for years deeply agitated the people of Lowell,
and which is still wrapped in mystery. Rev. Enoch W.
Freeman, the talented and popular pastor of th» First
Baptist Church, was suddenly seized with illness when
in his pulpit, which became so severe that he was
compelled to relinquish the attempted performance of
religious service. He was conveyed from the cliurcli
26
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
to his home where he died after intense sufferings on
Tuesday morning His wife, in regard to whom ihere
were painful suspicions, married a second husband,
who, about five years after the death of Mr. Freemau,
died in a similar manner. Many other circumstances
conspired to arouse suspicion and to fasten upon the
wife the charge of murder. She was tried upon the
second otfence and acquitted in a court of law. But
for many years the sensation lingered in the memory
of our citizens.
Boston and Lowell Railroad. — The manu-
factures of the town demanded a vast amount of
traffic with Boston. In the colder months of the
year, when ice closed the Middlesex Canal, transpor-
tation over bad roads by wagons was tedious and
done at great cost, and, even in the summer months,
the canal afforded only a slow means of conveying
the great amount of merchandise. Six stages passed
daily from Boston to Lowell and back.
To remedy these difficulties it was at first proposed
to construct a macadamized road from Boston to
Loweil, and even estimates were made for this enter-
prise and a line surveyed. At this time the inventive
and far-reaching mind of Patrick T. Jackson was
turned to this subject of transportation. Already the
experiment of transportation by horse-power on iron
rails, or trams, used for reducing friction, had been
tried. At this juncture there came the tidings across
the water that Stephenson had proved that cars pro-
pelled by steam could be successfully employed on
these iron rails. •
This news decided the mind of Mr. Jacksen. He
clearly foresaw that what Lowell must have was not
a macadamized road, but a railroad, and that the pro-
pelling power must be, not horses, but steam. He
was now fifty years of age, and it was ten years since
he had accomplished his important work of establish-
ing in American the great cotton manufactures. He
enters upon the new enterprise with his wonted zeal
and energy. Men of wealth must first be peraunded
of the feasibility of the undertaking. If successful in
England, where there were great cities in close prox-
imity, the railroad might utterly fail in America.
To many, perhaps to most, the project looked quixotic
and hazardou'^. But Mr. Jackson did not falter; a
charter was obtained and the stock was taken.
The grading of the road, especially through the
mica, slate and gneiss rock near Lowell, proved un-
expectedly expensive. " The shareholders were rest-
less under increased aase-sments and delayed income."
At times the responsibility weighed heavily ou Mr.
Jackson, and deprived him of his sleep. At length
the great work was accomplished, and time has proved
the wisdom of its undertaking. Its cost was $1,800,-
000. iThe railroad was completed in 1835.
A railroad from Lowell to Bostou could now be
constructed at far less expense. Time has shown
that steeper grades and shorter curves are practicable,
and that sleepers of wood are even to be preferred to
those of iron. In a thousand ways time and experi-
ence have aided the civil engineer.
CHAPTER III.
LO WELL—( Continued).
CITY OF LOWELL.
183S. Governor Edward Everett signed the lefria-
lative act giving a city charter to the town of Lowell,
April 1, 1836. This was the third city charier granted
in Massachusetts, that of Boston bearing date of
1822, and that of S.ilem only one week earlier than
that of Lowell. With a population of more than
16,000, it was found impossible properly to transact
all official business in public town-meeting. In the
preceding year there had been ten town-meetings,
and there was a common sentiment among the best
and wisest of the citizens that the time had come for
an efficient city government. The committee ap-
pointed by the town on February 3, 183G, reported in
favor of such a government, alleging that under the
town government there was a want of executive power
and a loose way of spending money.
Still there were citizens so wedded to the demo-
cratic methods of town-meetings that they reluctantly
surrendered the municipal authority into the hands
of a select few. When the vote accepting the char-
ter was taken, more than one- fourth of the votes were
found in the opposition. The result was yeas, 961,
and nays, 328. The first Monday in May was fixed
upon as the day for filling the city offices under the
new government. And now begins an ardent politi-
cal contest. Ten years before, the Whigs commanded
such a preponderance in number that there would
then have been no doubt how a political struggle
would terminate. But by degrees the Democrats had
so gained in numbers and in influence that the party
which would throw into the canvass tlie greatest
energy and talent might indulge the hope of victory.
Each party put forward for the mayoralty its strong-
est man. Dr. Elisha Bartlett was (he candidate of
the Whigs and Rev. Eliphalet Case led on the Demo-
crats. They were both able men. Dr. Bartlett was
perhaps personally the most popular man in Lowell
— a man of pleasing address and high mental culture.
He had occupied a professor's chair in a medical
school, and had the elements of a popular leader.
Mr. Case was a man of ruder nature, but still a man
of marked ability. He loved the strife and turmoil of
politics, and entered with ardor upon the contest.
He had been the editor of the Lowell Mercury, and,
more recently, of the Advertiser, both Democratic
papers of militant type. He was, at the time of the
election, the postmaster of the city. Ou the morning
of the election Dr. Bartlett called at the post-office
LOWEl.L.
27
and walked arm-in-arm with Mr. Case to the polls,
each courteously voting for hia rival. The result
favored the Whig candidate, the vote standing 958
for Bartlett and 868 for Case. The aldermen elected
were William Austin, Benjamin Walker, Oliver M.
AVhipple, Aaron Mansur, Seth Ames, Alexander
Wright. On the School Committee elected were
Lemuel Porter, Amos Blanchard, Jacob Eobbins,
John O.Green, John A. Knowles, Thomas Hopkinson.
Among the twenty-four Councilmen elected were such
men as Thomas Nesniith, Thomas Ordway, George
Brownell, Sidney Spalding, John Clark, Stephen
Mansur, James Cook, Josiah B. French, Jonathan
Tyler, Tappan Wentworth.
1 cannot do better than to give a very brief notice
of some of these men. I shall thus best show the
cbsrncter and spirit of the times. I shall show how
our fiithers displayed their wisdom by intrusting
1 power in the hands most capable of wielding and
most worthy of the honor of possessing it. Such is our
method of judgment in private life — we estimate the
real character of a man by inquiring who they are in
whom he confides.
Of the aldermen, Captain William Austin was the
agent of the Lawrence Corporation ; Benjamin
Walker was a butcher, and one of the early directors
of first savings bank; Oliver M. Whipple was one
of Lowell's most prominent and successful men of
business ; Aaron Mansur was a well-known merchant ;
Seth Ames was the son of thecelebrated Fisher Ames,
of Dedham, a lawyer and a man of high culture;
Ale.vander Wright was the agent of the Lowell Mills,
a Scotchman by birth and a man of talent.
Of the Common C'juncil, Thomas Nesmilh was a
wealthy dealer and owner of real estate; Thomas
Ordway was for many years clerk of the city, a re-
vered deacon cf the Unitarian Church; George
Brownell was superintendent of the machine-shop— a
very responsible position ; Sidney Spalding was a
man of wealth and of high position in the world of
business ; John Clark was agent of the Merrimack
Company ; Stephen Mansiu — afterwards mayor — was
a dealer in hardware and one of Lowell's most prom-
inent men of business; James Cook — afterwards
mayor — was agent of the Middlesex Mills; Josiah B.
French — afterwards mayor — was a railroad contractor ;
Jonathan Tyler was a wealthy dealer in real estate ;
Tappan Wentworth was a lawyer of high standing,
and subsequently a member of Congress.
Of the School Board, Lemuel Porter was for many
years pastor of the Worthen Street Baptist Church ;
Amos Blanchard, a man of great learning, was long
the pastor of the First Congregational Church ; Jacob
Uobbius was an apothecary, and afterwards post-
master of Lowell ; John O. Green was a physician of
high professional standing; John A. Knowles was a
lawyer, long well known and highly respected in our
city ; Thomas Hopkinson was one of the ablest law-
yers in the State.
Lowell at that day, as baa been often remarked,
presented a remarkable array of men of talent. Per-
haps the novelty and the importance of the great
manufacturing enterprises of the city presented a pe-
culiar attraction to the minds of superior and am-
bitious men.
But not only is the ch,aracter of our early city
fathers indicated by that of the men whom they in-
trusted with power, but still more clearly by the wise
and beneficent 'measures which they promptly con-
sidered and promptly adopted. Among these meas-
ures were the erection of new edificts for the use of
the public schools, the preservation of the public
health, the lighting of the streets, the construction
of sidewalks, the establishment of a system of drain-
age, and the various other works of public utility,
which indicate a statesmanlike foresight and a high
moral sense. There were great interests at stake and
great responsibilities to be taken. The nine great
manufacturing companies alone had a capital of more
than $7,000,000, and employed nearly 7000 persons.
The city was tilled with young men and women, who,
having left the rural quiet of their country homes,
needed the care and protection of a wise city govern-
ment when exposed to the untried temptations of a
city life.
The condition of Lowell on becoming a city is ad-
mirably told in the following passage, quoted by Mr.
Oilman, in the inaugural address of Dr. Bartlett, the
first mayor of the city : " Looking back to the period
when I came among you, a penniless stranger, alike
unknowing and unknown, I find the interval of more
than eight years filled up with manifestations of
kindness and good will. One of the most striking
points of the entire history of our town and city con-
sists in the unparalleled rapidity of its growth. The
graves of our fathers are not here. The haunts of
our childhood are not here. The large and gradually
accumulated fortunes of nearly all our older towns
are not to bo found here. The great mass of wealth
which is centered here, and which hai made our city
what it is, is owned abroad. The proprietors do not
reside among us. The profits are not expended
among ua."
In 183G "the number of churches in Lowell was
thirteen — four Congregational, two Baptist, two Meth-
odist, one Episcopalian, one Universalist, one Chris-
tian Union, one Free- Will Baptist and one Catholic."
At the organization of the city government, on May
2d, John Clark was chosen president of the City
Council, and George Woodward clerk. Samuel A.
Coburn, who had been clerk of the town of Lowell,
was chosen city clerk.
The Lowell Dispensary was incorporated in 1836,
the corporators being John Clark, James Cook and
James G. Carney.
"April 16th the Legislature passed an act, removing
a term of the Supreme Judicial Court and one of the
Court of Common Pleas from Concord to Lowell.
28
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTV, .AfASSACFIUSETTS.
For the accomodation of these courts, rooms were
fitted np in the Market-House, which was erected in
the following year."
1837. Mayor, Elisha Bartlett; population, 18,010.
From this year until 1850 the city governments were
inaugurated about April lat, the municipal electioQ
being in March.
On the Ist of April a profound sensation was pro-
duced by the sudden death of Kirk Boott. He died
while sitting in his chaise near the Merrimack House.
He was forty-seven years of age.
The suspension of specie payment in all the banks
of the United States in 1837 did not seriously atfect
the mills of Lowell.
As early as 1835 the question was agitated of build-
ing a great central market. A population of 17,000,
it was thought, stood in sore need of such a stiucture.
At one time a committee was appointed to erect such
building, but a short time before Lowell ceased to be
a town all votes respecting the erection of a market
were rescinded, and it was left to the city govern-
ment, in 1837, to commit the folly of erecting, on
Market Street, a building which the people did not
need and which they would not patronize. The cost
was .?46,000.
All attempts to make a central market of this
building have failed. The stalls hired by market-
men were not patronized, and the inarket-meu moved
out. If the people would not come to them, they
could go to the people. Men prefer a small market
near their homes to a large one far away.
1838. Mayor, Luther Lawrence. On October Sth
railroad cars began to run regularly from Lowell to
Nashua.
'"A county jail, on the modern plan of separate
cells, was erected in 1838. It was taken down after
the completion of the county jail in 1858," having
stood about twenty years.
1839. Mayor, Luther Lawrence, who was killed by
accident fifteen days afier assuming his office, and
Elisha Huntington was elected m.iyor by the City
Council. He was at the time a member of the City
Council. Mr. Lawrence assumed his office April 1st,
and was killed April 16th. In this year the Mas.sa-
cbusetts Cottou-Mills were incorporated.
November 1st. The Lowell Hospital A.ssociation
was formed. Kirk Boott's private residence, which
stood not far from the site of John Street Congrega-
tional Church, was purchased for a hospital building
and moved to the place, near Pawtnckct Falls, wheie
it now stands. The hospital is the property of the
large corporations, the treasurers of the mills having
control of it. Its design is to atford medical and sur-
gical aid to persons in the employment of the mills
who need it. It is not a free hospital. When a pa-
tient, who is an operative in the mills, fails to pay, the
company for whom he works pays his bills.
The physicians in special charge of this hospital
have been Dr. Gilmau Kimball, Dr. George II. Whit-
more, Dr. John W. Graves, Dr. Hermoa J. Smith.
Buc in recent years the medical charge has been
committed to a stall' of physicians who gratuitously
serve in turn for terms arranged by themselves.
There is also a superintendent and resident physician
of the hospital, elected by the trustees. For the
year 1889 tlie stiitf of physicians was L. S. Fox,
M.D., W. T. Carolin, M.D., J. B. Field, M.D., H. S.
J-.hnson, M.D., F. W. Chadburne, M.D., and Wm.
B. Jackson, M.D. The resident physician was C. E.
Simpson. Matron, Miss C. B. Whitford. Number
of patients treated from Jan. 1, 18SS, to Jan. 1, 1889,
299, of whom eighteen died.
1840. Mayor, Elisha Huntington. Population,
20,981. The South Common, containing twenry acres,
and the North Common, uontaiuing ten acres, were
laid out in 1840.
Mr. Cowley gives us the following: "Sever.nl at-
tempts had heretofore been made for the establish-
ment of a theatre or nuiseum in Lowell, but had
failed. In 1840 this project was renewed with better
success. The museum was first started in the fourth
story of Wyman's Exchange, by Moses Kimball [af-
terwards of the Boston Museum]. The first i)er-
formance was on the fourth of July, 1840, and was an
excellent substitute for the blarneij usually indulged
in on that day. The first collection of curiosities
was procured from Greenwood's old New England
Jluseum in Boston. But the business did not pay.
In 1845, Noah Gates purchased the museum of Mr.
Kimball, and the removal by him, in ]S4(), of the
museum into the building formerly owned by the
Free-Will Baptist Church, provoked 'strong indigna-
tion in Zion.' The church w.as at once fitted up for
dramatic entertainments ; but so great was the oppo-
sition to it that in 1847 the City (.'ouncil refused to
license any more exhibitions of ibis kind."
The Liiu-eU Offering was started in 1840. This
paper receives notice on another page. From its
unique character it has gained, both in this country
and in Europe, a distinguished name. All its articles
being the contributions of mill giils, it had a charac-
ter unlike that of any other publication in the world.
1841. Mayor, Elisha Huntington.
Jan. 11th. Benj. F. Varnum, sheriff" of Middlesex
County, died at his home in Centralville, at the age
of forty-six years. He was the son of General Joseph
B. Varnum, of Dracut.
From 12 to 1 o'clock ou the 7th of Aiiril the bells
of the city were toiled on accouut of the death of
President Harrison.
Mr. Cowley gives us the following item : " Until
1841 there had been no substantial bridge over the
Concord River connecting Church and Andover
Streets. The first structure was a floating bridge for
foot-passers. The next was a bridge set upon piles.
But in the year above-named a double-arch stone
bridge was constructed, which in 1858 was replaced
by the i)resent single-arch structure."
LOWELL.
29
In June, 1841, th" Lowell Cemetery, situated near
Concord River and Fort Hill in Belvidere, was con-
secrated with appropriate ceremonies. The address
on the occasion was delivered by Rev. Dr. Amos
Blanchard. James G. Carney and O. M. Whipple
appear to have been the foremost of our citizens to
urge the establishment of this cemetery. Mi. Whip-
ple was president of the corporation for its first
thirty years. Forty acres were first purchased. Sub-
sequently it was enlarged to seventy-two acres. The
original price of a lot containing 300 square fret was
$10, but from time to time the price has increased
until a lot, completely prepared lor u^e, costs S250.
The cemetery has a beautiful stone chapel, presented
by Mrs. C. P. Talbot, also a stone olBce near the
gateway. It has bten adorned in various ways, until
it has become a cemetery in which the citizens of
Lowell take a justifiable pride. A new entrance on
the Belvidere side will add much to the convenience
of the citizens.
The Edson Cemetery, on Gorham Street, belongs to
the city of Lowell. It is well cared for by the city
and is kept and adorned with much taste. The same
may also be said of the Catholic Cemetery, on Gorham
Stree:, near by the EJsou Cemetery.
Before the great manufactories were started, Eist
Chelmsford had two cemeteries. One was at the cor-
ner of Brancli and School Streets, and it is still kept
with much care, and is the burial-place of some
families who lived upon the spot in early days. The
other was on the banks of the Merrimack in Belvidere,
Iving between East Merrimack and Stackpole Streets,
and east of Alder Street. This has been discontinued,
the bodi«s of those who were buried there having
been removed. The spot is now appropriated for
private residences.
1842. Mayor, Nathaniel Wright.
Charles Dickens visited Lowell in 1842. The im-
presiion made ui)on him by the new manufacturing
city in America, so unlike any English city, is told in
his "American Notes." A brief quotation will suffice:
"In this brief account of Lowell, and inadequate
expression of the gratification it yielded me, I have
carefully abstained from drawing a comparison be-
tween these factories and those of our own land. The
contrast would be a strong one, for it would be be-
tiveen the Good and Evil, the living light and deep-
eat shadow. I abstain from it, because I deem it just
to do so. But I only the more earnestly adjure all
those whose eyes may rest on these pages to pause
and reflect upon the differeuce between this town and
those great haunts of desperate misery.''
1813. Mayor, Nathaniel Wright. June 19th was a
gala day in Lowell. John Tyler, President of the
United States, visited the city. He arrived at the
Northern Depot about 10.30 o'clock, and there met
an imposing array. A platform was erected near at
hand, from which Dr. Huntington, chairman of the
committee of arrangements, delivered a speech of
welcome, and the President made reply. It was a
beautiful June day, and everything appeared at its
best. The children of the public schools graced the
occasion. Arrayed in order near the landing were
the High School girls, " beautiful as the morning."
The Stark Guards, from Manchester, N. H., the Low-
ell Alechanics' Phalanx, the National Highlanders,
the Lowell Artillery and the Lowell City Guards
adorned the procession. A carriage drawn by six black
horses conveyed the President, Governor Morton, of
Massachusetts, Dr. Huntington and Robert Tyler.
Then followed twenty-five carriages and a cavalcade
of citizens, under Col. Butterfield. All was beauti-
ful— only one thing was wanting, and that was en-
thusiasm. The course pursued by Mr. Tyler after
the death of the lamented Harrison had chilled the
hearts of the men who, in 1840, with wild delight,
had shouted, " Tippecanoe and Tyler, too."
1844. Mayor, Elisba Huntington. Population,
25,163. In thi< year the City School Library was es-
tablished, on May 20th. Central Bridge was rebuilt,
and an experiment of paving streets was first made.
Our city may be justly proud of its streets. It has
enjoyed this advantage over older cities, that from its
earliest days the belief was univeri<al that its destiny
was to become a city. Its broad streets, with gener-
ous sidewalks, have been laid out under the influence
of this belief.
Feb. 16th. Zadoc Rogers died, at the age of seventy
years. He was born in Tewksbury in 1774, and pur-
chased the well-known Rogers farm in Belvidere in
1805. Most of Belvidere is built on this farm of 247
acres, and the Livermore farm, of 150 acres. The
Rogers farm was kept nearly intact until 1883, when it
was purchased by a syndicate, consisting of Ethan A.
Smith, Eli W. Hoyt, Freeman B. Shedd and Thomas
R. Garrity, and sold in house lots. These lots are
being rapidly covered with elegant residences, in
modern style.
The Prescott Manufacturing Company was incor-
porated, with a capital of $800,000.
In this year the poet Whittier became a resident
of Lowell. He came to take charge as editor of the
Middlesex Standard, an anti-slavery paper, which,
however, failed of success. The people of Lowell do
not boast of the short sojourn of the poet in Lowell,
but still they feel a pardonable pride and pleasure in
knowing that the man whom a distinguished Senator
has called " the most beloved man in the nation"
was once their fellow-citizen. Though in feeble
health while in Lowell, his pen was busy, and in bis
little work entitled, " The Stranger in Lowell," hehas
given us a very pleasant transcript of his thoughts
and feelings as he walked our streets. I can, per-
haps, give no better illustration of these thought*,
and of the humane and generous nature of the poet,
than is found in the following quotation from his
little book, in which he speaks of the Irish laborers
of our city :
30
HISTORY OF -MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
"For myself, I confess I feel a sympathy for the
Irishman. A stranger in a strange land, he is to me
always an object of interest. The poorest and rudesc
has a romance in his history. Amidst all his appar-
ent gayety of heart and national drollery and wit the
poor emigrant has sad thoughts of the ' ould mother
of him,' sitting lonely in her solitary cabin by the bog,
side ; recollections of a father's blessing and a sister's
farewell are haunting him ; a grave-mound in a dis-
tant churchyard, far beyond the 'wide wathers,' has
an eternal greenness in his memory : for there, per-
haps, lies a ' darlint child ' or a ' swate crather ' who
once loved him."
Mr. Whittier was in Lowell during the Presidential
canvass of the autumn of 1844, the candidates being
Clay, Polk and Birney. His paper, the Standard
advocated the election of James G. Birney, of Mich-
igan, who received in Lowell 246 votes.
1845. Mayor, Elisha Huntington.
The Stony Brook Railroad Company was incorpor-
ated, with a capital of 1:300,000.
The Lowell Machine-Shop was organized as a cor-
poration, with a capital of S300,000.
In 1845 manufacturing in the city of Lawrence was
begun by the Essex Company.
In this year was published " Lowell as It Was and
as It Ls," by Rev. Dr. Henry A. Miles. This excel-
lent little work was the first published history of
Lowell in book-form. At that time there were two
very divergent and antagonistic sentiments in regard
to the comparative moral and industrial claims of
large corporations and of private enterprise in the
manufactures of our country. It was to repel the
charge that large corporations led to oppression, cor-
ruption and nepotism, that Dr. Miles seems to have
written his history. Fully half of the book is de-
voted to showing that the mills of Lowell were man-
aged by wise and benevolent men, and in a manner
calculated to promote the moral welfare and the high-
est good, not only of the operatives, but of the com-
munity at large. It is the common belief that such
a book could not now be truthfully written. No doubt
the general character of the operatives has depreci-
ated. The Yankee girls, reared among the New-
England hills, have departed, and girls of foreign
birth have taken their places. So, too, the owners
and managers of the mills have changed. The early
founders are gone. The grime of age has robbed the
buildings of some of their freshness and beauty, and
the ideal days are past. But we can concede no
more. The structures are still noble structures, the
owners and managers are still noble men. If the
great enterprise has lost something of the freshness
of youth, it has gained much of the stability of man-
hood. A nobler class of men cannot be found than
the agents of our mills. The influence of the man-
agement of our mills is consistently and firmly on the
side of morality. lu every grade of service in these
mills may be found very many men of devout relig-
ious character. In all that promotes the moral wel-
fare of man, these great corporations can proudly
challenge comparison with the best regulated private
manufacturing enterprises in the world.
In 1845 the City Council authorized the purchase
of the North Common for §12,857, and the South
Common for $17,954.
In this year the Middlesex North District Medical
Society was organized. This society has doubtless
done much to give dignity and character to the med-
ical profession, but quackery, like the hydra slain by
Hercules, has a hundred heads, and will not readily
relinquish its hold upon the minds of credulous men.
What is most disheartening in the labors of a society
like this is the fact that very many men who are
shrewd and sensible in all things else have a decided
predilection for quackery in the healing art.
In October, 1845, a large fire in a building owned by
the Middlesex Company, on Warren Street ; loss,
$30,000.
February 5th. The residence of AVm. Smith, Esq.,
on Dracut Heights, was burned. This fire will long be
remembered. A heavy snow fell throughout the day,
and, in the night, when the fire occurred, the driving
snow-flakes filled the air, so that it was impossible to
locate the fire. All the heavens seemed illumined
with a glowing light. The superstitious were said to
believe the end of the world had come.
1846. Mayor, Jefferson Bancroft; population, 20,-
127. Whipple's Mills were established by O. M.
Whipple on the Concord River in this year.
January 2d. A fire occurred in Bent & Bush's store,
on Central, opposite Middle Street. The night of the
fire was " bitter cold," and there was much sufler-
ing from cold.
1847. Mayor, Jefferson Bancroft.
June 30th. President Polk visited Lowell. He was
received upon hi.s arrival by Mayor Bancroft, >vho de-
livered a speech of welcome. The mills were closed
and thousands of operatives and others filled the
streets. A procession (under I. W. Beard, chief mar-
shal), in 'which were the Lowell City Guards, the
Westford Rifle Company and the Mechanics' Phalanx,
with a cavalcade of citizens, escorted him through
the city. A superb supper was furnished at Mechan-
ics' Hall. He visited the Middlesex and Pre.scott
Mills on the next morning, and proceeded to Concord,
N. H. Hon. James Buchanan attended the President
upon his tour.
September 12th. Patrick T. Jackson, one of the
founders of Lowell, died at the age of sixty-seven
years. He is noticed on another page.
The City Institution for Savings was organized.
The Appleton Bank was incorporated with a cap-
ital of 5100,000.
1848. Mayor, Jefferson Bancroft.
The reservoir ou Lynde Hill was constructed under
the superintendence of J. B. Francis. Its capacity is
1,201,641 gals. It is the property of the Corporations
LOWELL.
31
and is used for extinguishing fires, supplying water to
the Corporation, boarding-houses, etc.
The Salem and Lowell Railroad was incorporated ;
also the Traders and Mechanics' Fire Insurance
Company.
The Stony Brook Railroad was opened to travel
September 16, 1848. Abraham Lincoln visited Low-
ell. As President Lincoln had not yet attained re-
nown, it is interesting to inquire whether the people
of Lowell who heard his speech in the City Hall ap-
preciated the exalted talents and worth of the man.
He was called to Lowell to speak in behalf of the
election of Zachary Taylor, the Whig candidate for
the Presidency. The City Hall was crowded, ladies
being present. Hon. Homer Bartlett was president
and Alfred Oilman, Esq., secretary. Of Mr. Lincoln's
speech the Courier says: "Abraham Lincoln, of Illi-
nois, addressed the assembly in a most able speech,
going over the whole subject in a masterly and con-
vincing manner, and showing beyond a peradventure
that it is the first duty of the Whigs to stand united,
and labor with devotion to secure the defeat of that
party which has already done so much mischief to
the country. He was frequently interrupted by bursts
of warm applause."
The discovery of gold in California in 1848, was an
event of great importance to Lowell. It diverted the
attention of the young men of New England from
manufacturing and other enterprises at home to the
dazzling prospects of sudden wealth on the shores of
the Pacific. What Lowell mifrht now have become, had
the gold of California not withdrawn from it so much
of its enterprise and talent, is only left to imagination
and conjecture. The wonderful development of the
States west of the Mississippi has, doubtless, also
greatly affected the growth and wealth of our city,
by alluring young men to "go west."
1849. Mayor, Josiah B. French.
In April, 1849, George W. Whistler, the distin-
guished railroad engineer, died at St. Petersburg,
Russia, at the age of forty-nine years. He was born
at Fort Wayne, Ind., in 1800; graduated at West
Point when nineteen years of age, and was made
professor in that school at the age of twenty-one
years. He afterwards served as engineer in the
army. In 1834 he became engineer to the Proprie-
tors of Locks and Canals, at Lowell. His talents were
demanded in the construction, at the machine-shops,
of locomotives for the Boston and Lowell Railroad,
which was then being constructed.
This, being a new work for American engineers, de-
manded the highest skill. In this work Mr. Whistler
distinguished himself. When other roads were
equipped his services were demanded, both in New
England and the West. His talents brought him
fame. The Emperor of Russia invited him to Rus-
bia as consulting engineer of railroad*. In this ser-
vice he remained until his death, in 1849.
On Sunday, September 9th, occurred what has been
called "The Battle of Suffolk Bridge," an affair which
approached more nearly a riot than any other which
Lowell has witnessed. The Irish people, who in
great numbers had settled on the " Acre " and its vi-
cinity, had not left all their national feuds in the old
country. The " Corkonians " and " Connaught men,"
who spoke different dialects, had long indulged a
mutual hostility even here in America. In 1849 a
large class of lawless and violent men had roused the
old factional strife to such an extent that the police
of the city were compelled to interfere. At length
on Sunday, the 9th of September, the conflict began
in earnest. Showers of stones and brickbats filled the
air. The women even took part and supplied the
combatants with mis-iiles. The bells were rung and
the Fire Department came out and aided in quelling
the riot. The " City Guards " and " Phalanx " met
in their armories, but they were not called into ac-
tion. The mayor persuaded the crowd to disperse.
September 2d. Father Mathew, the apostle of tem-
perance, visited Lowell, lectured in the City Hall, and
secured about 4000 names to his temperance pledge.
1860. Mayor, Josiah B. French. Population, 33,-
383.
In this year the Prescott Bank was incorporated.
Gas was first introduced in Lowell. The Court-House
was erected.
December 16th. Great fire in Belvidere, Stott's
Mill and other buildings being burned. Los-", $37,-
400.
1851. Mayor, James H. B. Ayer.
The Daily Morning News was started.
Tne first fair of the Middlesex Mechanics' Associa-
tion was opened September 16th.
January 28th. John Clark died at the age of fifty-
four years. He was born in Waltham, 1796, and
graduated at Harvard College. At first he engaged
in teaching in Salem, and then in trade in Boston.
He came to Lowell in 1833 to act in the position of
agent of the Merrimack Company, to succeed Warren
Colburn. He was deeply interested in Lowell's pros-
perity. He was once president of the Common Coun-
cil and on the Board of Aldermen, and was greatly in-
strumental in founding the City Library.
The part of Lowell now called Centralville was, by
act of the Legislature, set off from the town of Dra-
cut in 1851. In the beginning of this century Dracut
was a town of about 1300 inhabitants, sparsely settled
and devoted to agricultural pursuits. They were of
pure New England stock, devout and orthodox in
their religious life. The Varuums and the Coburns
were families of high moral and intellectual worth,
who have transmitted to their numerous posterity an
honorable name. General Joseph B. Varnum held a
high position among the statesmen of America, hav-
ing been a Representative in Congress for sixteen
consecutive years, in four of which he held the office
of Speaker of the House. He was also at one time
president pro laxporc of the United Slates Senate.
32
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Id the early years of this century, the only bridge
leading from Dracut to East Chelmsford (now Low-
ell) was that at Pawtucket Falls, but after the mills
of the Merrimack Company began to be erected in
1822, such was the increase in the number of inhabit-
ants living near the Merrimack River and below
Pawtucket Falls, and such the activity of business,
that something more than a chain ferry was needed
to meet the wants of travel and business. la 182G
a bridge took the place of the ferry. It was of wood,
uncovered, and about 540 feet in length. Its cost was
$12,000. It was rebuilt in 1844 and again in 1862, at
a cost of about 134,000. Th« iron bridge built by the
city in 1883 at a cost of §118,000 is a graceful and
substantial structure and is an honor to the city.
The village of Centriilville stands upon the slope
of the highest hill within the limits of our city, and
commands a splendid view of the great manufactur-
ing establishments on the south side of the river.
Especially in the evening, when these establishments,
stretching far along the river's banks, glow with in-
numerable lights, is the scene resplendent and beau-
tiful. Few places are more attractive for private
residences than the hillsides of Centralviile.
1852. Mayor, Elisha Huntington. The proposi-
tion to build Huntington Hall was adopted by the
City Council.
In April occurred the great freshet of 1852, when
boats were used in some of the streets of Belvidere.
An account of the freshets in the Merrimack River
for a period of more ihau a hundred years has been
written by James B. Francis, Esq., the well-known
civil engineer. From this account we learn that the
earliest recorded freshet occurred in October, 1785.
It was also the greatest of which there is any record
or tradition. At Nashua the rise in the river was
thirty-two feet, and at the head of Pawtucket Falls it
was more than thirteen feet. There was then no
bridge at Pawtucket Falls to obstruct the course of
the water. In the freshet of 1852, which occurred
after the bridge and the dam had been constructed,
the water rose fourteen fett, somewhat higher than in
1785. But from the fact that at Nashua the water
rose about two feet higher in 1785 than in 1852, it is
evident that the earlier freshet was the greatest.
The guard dam and gates of the Pawtucket Canal,
constructed under Mr. Francis' s-upervision, and des-
cribed on another page, to protect the city of Lowell,
are models of engineeringskill.
In the freshet of 1870 the water rose thirteen feet
above the dam, and in the freshets of 1859, 1862,
1865, 1869 and 1878 its rise was more than ten feet.
May 6th. Louis Kopputh, the Hungarian patriot,
visited Lowell. At St. Paul's Church in the evening
he was formally received and welcomed by the mayor.
Dr. Huntington, and he delivered before the people
of Lowell a speech remarkable for its felicity and
beauty. In this year w.is made the first attempt to
enforce a prohibitory liquor law.
1853. Mayor, Sewall G. Mack. In this year the
Belvidere Woolen Company was organized, and the
Wamesit Bank incorporated. Capital of the bank,
•SIOO.OOO. Corporations reduce the hours of labor to
eleven per day. Lowell Museum burned.
In the first part of 1853 an attempt was made in
Lowell to enforce the prohibitory liquor law, which
was enacted in the previous year by the State Legis-
lature. This first attempt failed. The law referred
to was the first of the kind in Massachusetts.
November 10th. Judge Joseph Locke died atihesge
ot eighty-one years. He was chief justice of the Police
Court for thirteen years. He is noticed on another
page.
In this year was erected the depot, containing
Huntington and Jackson Halls, the former being
named from Dr. Elisha Huntington and the latter
from Patrick T. Jackson.
1854. Mayor, Sewall G. Mack.
On July 28, 1854, occurred the most extensive fire
ever witntssed in Lowell. It caught about 4i o'clock
P.M., in a small shed or stable near the corner of
Lowell and Dummer Streets. The buildings around
were very combustible, and the south wind was blow-
ing. The intense heat overpowered the firemen and
the fire had its way. Twenty-two buildings were
burned and about 600 persons were made houseless.
But the buildings burned were so cheap and frail that
the actual amount of property destroyed did not ex-
ceed S30,000, a loss much smaller than that of many
other less extensive fires.
1855. Mayor, Ambrose Lawrence ; population .37,-
554. In this year Central Briilge was, by the City
Council, made a public highway.
The registry of deeds for the Northern District of
Middlesex County was opened. March 17, 1855,
\Vm. Livingston died.
In June of this year the Middlesex North Agricul-
tural Society was organized with Win. Spencer as
president. Its history is on another page.
July 22d, Dr. Elisba Bartlett, first mayor of Lowell,
died at Sinithfield, R. I., at the age of fifty-one years.
August 18th. Abbott Lawrence died at the age of
sixty-three years. He was born in Groton in
1792, and was brother to Luther Lawrence, second
mayor of Lowell. He employed his great wealth and
talents in advancing the manufacturing interests of
Lowell, and for him the city of Lawrence was named.
WiLMAM LiVIxosTOX affords us a remarkable
example of a truly self-made man. Fortune maybe
said to have smiled upon him only once, and that was
when she gave him the rising city of Lowell as a fair
field for the exercise of his remarkable force and
energy of character. All else he wrought out with
his own hands.
He was born April 12, 1803, in Tewksbury, Mass.,
and was the son of Wm. Livingston, a respectable
farmer. Having dutifully served his father until he
was twenty years of age, he came to East Chelmsford
y .
-^ ''/'/// /-y .^ .'
LOWELL.
33
(now Lowell) just at the time wiien the first
mills were starting, and when all willing hands
could find something to do. He began as a simple
laborer. In due time his energy and economy
enabled him to purchase a horse and a cart. Soon
lie begins to employ other men and other teams. His
force and ambition bore him still upward. In two
years he became a coniractor. His enterprise and
fidelity gave him a name. He made contracts fur
excavating earth and constructing the stone-work for
canals in Lowell, in Nashua, X. H., and at Sebago
Lake in Maine. At length he took very many and
very large contracts for constructing the mills of the
great corporations in Lowell. He cjnstructed a caual
in the State of Illinois. He erected saw and planing
mills for manufacturing lumber from the forests ot
New Hampshire. His varied contracts and enter-
prises from the days of his early manhood to the com-
pletion of the Salem and Lowell Railroad, in 1850,
are too numerous to be mentioned in this brief
sketch.
But these profitable contracts do notsati.sfy his am-
bition. He established in Lowell a depot for the sale
of grain, lumber, wood, coal, lime, brick and cement.
He purchased land near Thorndike Street, and
erected store-houses for his extensive and increasing
business. While he was engaged upon bis contracts
this business assumed large proportions, employing a
capital of «^0,000 to $100,000, and it is still carried on
ill the hands of Hon. Wm. E. Livingston, his enter-
prising son.
Mr. Livingston was also a man of courage. When
the Boston & Lowell Railroad demanded for freight
what he esteemed an exorbitant charge, he did
not hesitate to make war upon the monopoly by ad-
vocating the construction of comjieting roads. To
this conflict was due the early construction of the
Lowell and Lawrence and the Salem and Lowell
roads. It was through the persistent efforts of Mr.
Livingston before the Legislature of Massachusetts
tliat the charters of these roads were obtained in
spile of tlie earne?t remonstrance of the Boston and
Lowell road. It was mainly due to his wonderful force
and energy that these roads were promptly com-
jileied. The act incorporating the Lowell and Law-
rence road was passed in 1S4G, and the road was fin-
ished and in running order before the close of 1847.
To accomplish this remarkable work of enterprise
and despatch required much night labor, of which
Mr. Livingston had the personal supervision. It was
in this work that his zeal surpassed his prudence
for he contracted a very severe atfection of the lungs,
from which he never recovered.
As a citizen, Mr. Livingston was among the most
prominent in advancingthosepublicenterprises which
pertained to the growth and permanent prosperity of
the city.
He was a Democrat in politics, an earnest, sincere,
upright man, and special foe of all monopolies. He
iJ-ii
did not aspire to political honors, though he fre-
quently received the suffrages of his fellow-citizens.
He often held office both in the town and city of
Lowell. In 183G and 1837 he was a member of the
Senate of Massachusetts. He was also president of
the Lowell and Lawrence Riilroad.
Mr. Livingston acquired a large estate. In 1852
he erected for himself, on Thorndike Street, one of
the most elegant private residences in the city.
In 1855 it became evident that his pulmonary dis-
ease would end in consumption. Having gone to
Jacksonville, Florida, in the vain hope of regaining
his health, he died in that city, March 17, 1855, in
the fifty -second year of his age.
1856. Mayor, Elisha Huntington.
Post-office removed from Middle to Merrimack
Street.
November 7th. Thomas Hopkinson died at Cam-
bridge in the fifty-third year of his age. He waaborn in
New Sharon, Maine, in 1804, and graduated at Har-
vard in 1830. He was one of Lowell's ablest lawyers.
Having been appointed president of the Boston and
Worcester Railroad, he left Lowell about 1849, and
resided in Cambridge.
1857- Mayor, Stephen Mansur.
This was a year of financial distress. There was a
general stagnation in business. Some of the mills
stopped, some ran on short time, and many workmen
were unemployed.
A chime of eleven bells was placed in the tower of
St. Anne's Church.
January IGth. Hon. Thomas H. Benton visited Low-
ell. He delivered a lecture before the " Adelphi " in
the evening on the " Preservation of the Union,"
prefacing it with observations upon what he had seen
in Lowell during the day. He had visited the mills
and the boarding-houses, and seemed greatly pleased
and very agreeably disappointed. The following is
one of his remarks : " I had supposed the houses
were small, mean and poorly ventilated, as are those
of which we read in the old world, but on entering
I find the walls and parlors furnished as well as those
in which the members of Congress board in Waah-
ingtoii."
This celebrated Democratic Senator, peer of Clay,
Calhoun and Webster, was cordially welcomed by the
people of Lowell.
March 3d. George H. Carleton died at theage of fif-
ty-two years. He was born in Haverhill, January 6,
1805; came to Lowell, August, 1827, and bought out
Daniel Stone, Lowell's first apothecary. Carleton's
apothecary store, on Merrimack Street, was for many
years by far the best known of itj kind in the city.
It still retains his name. His old and almost illegi-
ble sign is still over the door, and is a pleasing me-
mento of the respect which his successors cherish for
his name. His life was identified with the life of the
city and of St. Anne's Church, of which he was a
warden. He was alderman of the city in 1838-39, '41.
34
WlSTOrvY OF MIDDLESEX COLLM'i.', MASSACHUSETTS.
From September 10th to October 7th was held tlie
second Fair of the Middlesex Mechanics' Association.
July 1st. Richmoud's paper-mill was burned. Loss,
$21,000.
In 1857 was started The Trumpet, a sensational
paper. The editor, James M. Harmon, found his
business of lampooning the respectable people of
Lowell somewhat expensive, having received a Hog-
ging from one of them, and being sent to the House
of Correction three months for slandering another.
1858. Mayor, Elisha Huntington.
The present bridge across the Concord, at Church
Street, waa built at a cost of §11,295.
November 5th. Hon. Nathaniel Wright died at the
age of seventy-five yeara.
March 20th. The new County Jail, on Thorndike
Street, was first occupied. This magnificent structure
cost $150,000, and contains one hundred and two
cells. If the annual rent of this building should be
reckoned at 10 per cent, of its cost, and if every cell
werekeptcoustantlyoccupied. the average annual rent
of a cell would be 'iXZ'l. When to this is added the
average cost of each occupant for food, salaries of
officers, etc., the very lowest annual expense to the
county of each prisoner is S-100. Thus a scoundrel,
who thinks his family of six persons fortunate if they
can atl'urd to occupy a tenement whose annual rent is
fifty dollars, finds, when he is so fortunate as to get
into this magnificent jail, the county lavishes upon
liim alone an expense which, if bestowed upon his
large and suffering family, would enable them to live
almost in luxury. To squander money thus ap-
jiroaches very near a crime.
1859- Mayor, James Cook.
Ollice of superintendent of schools established.
The first steam tire-engine procured.
November 14th. Thomas Ordway died at the age
of seventy-two years. He was born in Amesbury,
Mass., in 17S7, and was the son of the principal vil-
lage physician. He started business as a trader in
Newburyport in 1S09, but the great tire in 1810 con-
sumed his store and his goods. In 1821 he opened a
store in Concord, N. H. After three or four years
he came to Lowell and opened a store in the britk
block, corner of Worthen and Merrimack Streets. In
1838 he was elected city clerk, and he held the office
nearly twenty years. As city clerk and as a revered
deacon of the Unitarian Church he was long one of
the best known and most beloved citizens of Lowell.
1860. Mayor, Benjamin C. Sargeaut. Population,
30,827.
January 5th. John D. Prince died. He is noticed
on another page.
January 12'.h. Joseph Butterfield, a deputy sheriff
for nearly fifty years, died at the age of seventy-five
years.
March 28th. Park Garden, in Belvidere, purchased
by the city for a Common.
July 2d. The Registry of Deeds for the Northern
District of Middlesex County was opened with A. B.
Wright as register. Up to this date deeds of real es-
tate in Lowell had been recorded in the registry at
East Cambridge. Mr. Wright's successors have been
I. W. Beard and J. P. Thompson, the present incum-
bent.
July 14th. Nicholas G. Norcross died at the age of
fifty-five years. He was born in Orono, Maine, De-
cember 25, 1805. In his early life he was engaged in
an extensive lumber business on the Penobscot River.
On coming to Lowell, about 1845, he began a large
busines^s in lumber on the Merrimack, by which he
gained to himself the well-knowu title of ''Lumber
King."
186L Mayor, Benjamin C. Sargeant.
February 20th. Pawtucket Bridge made free ami the
event celebrated.
April lOtli. Addison O. Whitney and Luther C.
Ladd killed while marching in the Sixth Massa-
chusetts Regiment through lialtiuiure.
I July 14th. Nathan Appleton, died in Boston, at the
I age of eighty-two years. He was a Boston merchant
: of great wealth, and was most deeply interested in the
I establishment of cotton manufactures in Lowell,
i having subscribed for IS'i of the original IIOO shares
of the Merrimack Compaiiy. His tine, full-length
portrait graces Mechanics' Hall, and ''Appleton
I Street'' and "Appleton Bank " and "Appleton Com-
i pany " attest the honor in which his name is held in
our city.
,Vugust2d. The Sixth Regiment return from the war.
September 5th. tJeueral Butler having returned to
Lowell, alter the capture of the forts at Hatteras
IiiUt, was received with enthusiasm liy the people of
the city. He was escorted from ihu depot by four
military companies and received an address of wel-
come from Mayor Sargeant.
September 24ih. Prince Jerome Napoleon, with his
wife, the Princess Clotilde, daughter of Victor Em-
manuel, King of Italy, visited Lowell.
1862. Mayor, Hocum Hosford. Central Bridge
rebuilt.
Four Lowell companies enlisted for nine months'
service in the war.
August 9th. Edward G. Abbott was killed at the bat-
tle of Cedar Mountain, at the age of twenty-two years.
Major Abbott was the son of Judge J. G. Abbott, and
a graduate of our High .School and Harvard College.
He was a brave soldier and a young man of high
promise. His death produced a profound sensation.
French Immigiiatiun.— The city of Lowell during
the last twenty-five years has received into its labor-
ing class a very large number of French Canadians.
This remarkable migation began about 1863. The
number of French in Lowell amounted to about 1200
in 18(58, and now has reached 15,000, and forms a
very important part of the inhabitants of our city.
The French settlers in Canada occupy a large por-
tion of what has been known as East Canada, along
f(r^ 7^^ //'<'«.* 1 y /?^ ciXi.-* ■> o
LOWELL.
35
the bants of the St. Lawrence and the lower courses
of its tributary streams. They now number perliaps
1,000,000 souls and constitute more than one-third of
the inhabitants of ihe Province. They have been left
far behind in the race of weahh and progress by the
settlers of English origin, and to a very great extent
they live a laborious lite upon small farms which are
too often encumbered with debt. Their few cities
have increased in inhabitants slowly, and there are
few great manufactories of any kind in which the
willing laborer can earn sufficient money to start in
life or pay off the debt upon his humble farm.
In recent years it has come to these people like a
revelation that such are now the facilities of travel
by railroad that only a few hours will bring them to
the great manufacturing towns and cities of New
England, where they can readily exchange their
labor for ready money. With this incentive before them
few at first quit their rural hemes and more and more
followed. Herein New Euglandnotonly the father, but
mother, son and daughter, found ready work for ready
hands. Almost all came with the intention of return-
ing to pay off their debt and spend their remaining
days in their old homes. Very many actually do
this. Others never return. Perhaps a sou or a
daughter marries in New England and their affec-
tions are in their new home, or some profitable busi-
ness invites them to remain. Many of them pay an-
nual visits to Canada when business is less active, and
it is an interesting scene when large numbers gather
at our depots with baggage of every description to
start for their old homes. To many the pleasing ex-
citements of city life, or the facilities of reaching a
church of their own fiiith, or the advantages of good
public schools, present a powerful motive to remain
in New Eng'.and. Their old rural homes in Canada,
where no church nor school is near at hand, and
where business languishes, have by degrees lost their
charm and so they never return.
Still they love their native language and are proud
of it. They wish to iearn the English, but not to
give up the French. Above all things they hold fast
to the religion of their fathers. They are mostly de-
vout Catholics, and in their new homes they faith-
fully follow and obey their religious teachers. They
are often to be seen, even early in the morning, in
Ion"' procession, men, women and children, with
book in hand, thronging the sidewalks of our streets.
Father Gariu, the excellent and honored pastor of
St. Joseph's Church, informs me that on every Sunday
morning his spacious church on Lee Street is filled in
succession with five different audiences. And so
crowded has this church become that he is now erect-
ing a new and very spacious church on Merrimack
Street for the accommodation of the rapidly increas-
ing- number of French Canadian people. As laborers
they prove to be an industrious and intelligent class.
Tliey perform a very large part of the manufacturing
work of our city.
1863. Mayor, Hocum Hosford.
January 2Gth. First Sanitary Fair in Lowell.
September 9th. Lowell Horse Railroad Company
began to lay track?".
April 1st. Stephen Mansur, mayor of the city in
1857, died at the age of sixty-four years.
June 3d. Solon A. Perkins was killed in an engage-
ment at Clinton, Louisiana, at the age of twenty-seven
years. Major Perkins was son of Apollos Perkins,
and a graduate of our High School. He wasasuperior
scholar and a gallant soldier. Lowell had no richer
offering to make.
1864. Mayor, Hocum Hosford.
January 9th. Dr. John C. Dalton died, at the age
of sixty-eight years. He was born in Boston, and
graduated at Harvard. He was, for many years, a
distinguished physician in this city and in Chelms-
ford.
March 1st. Lowell Horse Railroad opened.
April 4th. George Wellman died, at the age of
fifty-three years. He was born in Boston, May IC,
1810. He came to Lowell when twenty-five years of
age, and was for many years in charge of a carding-
room of the Merrimack Corporation. He became
distinguished as an inventor, and is especially known
as the inventor of the self top-card stripper, which
has become one of the most important factors in cot-
ton manufacture.
April 23d. Celebration of Shakespeare's birth at
Huntington Hall.
May 6tb. Henry L'.vermore Abbott was killed in
the battle of the Wilderness at the age of twenty-two
years. Major Abbott was a fon of Judge J. G. Ab-
bott, a graduate of our High School and of Harvard
College and was a young man of fine intellect and
high promise.
May IGth. First National Bank incorporated.
June 7lh. J. H. B. Ayer, mayor of the city in 1851,
died at the age of seventy -six years.
July 17th. Three companies of the Sixth Regiment
enlist for 100 days.
August 16th. Captain William Wyman, second
postmaster of Lowell, died at the age of eighty-two
years. He was the owner of the farm on the heights
of Belvidere on which now stand many of the most
elegant private reridences of the city. He constructed
many of the buildings of the city, one of which —
Wyman'o Exchange — still bears his name. He was,
for many years, one of the most conspicuous and
enterprising men of the city.
October 20th. John P. Robinson died at the age of
sixty-five years. See Bench and Bar.
Captain Jonathan Spalding. — The high moral,
intellectual and social culture of Lowell in its early
davs has been the subject of very common remark,
and has frequently elicited the admiration of
strangers. The celebrated Wendell Phillips, who, in
1833, was a citizen of Lowell, said of the city thirty
vears afterwards: "Lowell was then crowded with
36
HISTORY OF .MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
able men, and was rich in all that makes good so-
ciety,— amiable, beautiful and accorapliahed women,
— gentlemen of talent, energetic, well-informed, giving
a hearty welcome to the best thought of the dav."
This enviable condition of Lowell was greatly due
to the humane and generous policy of the merchant
princes of Boston who were the founders of the city.
It was also partly due to the large number of men of
talent and culture whom the new and magnificent
manufacturing enterprise had attracted to the spot.
But a third and very important factor was the high
character of the people already living in the quiet
village of East Chelmsford, where Lowell now stands.
The fertile fields lying for miles around Pawtucket
Falls were owned by thrifty farmers, whose spacious
homes were the abodes of generous ho.-pitality and
of much social refinement. Among them were men
of talent and high political position. On the north
side of the river was General Joseph B. Varnum,
who, for more than twenty years, was a member of
Congress, for four of which he was Speaker of the
House of Representatives, and for one year President
])ro tempore of the United States Senate. On the
south side was the sturdy young farmer, Benjamin
Pierce, who gained an honorable name as au officer
in the Kevolutionary War, and who afterwards be-
came Governor of New Hampshire and the father of
a President of the United States. On these farms
were the ancestors of many of the best families of
our city, and the names of Varnum, Coburn, Spald-
ing, Hildreth and others are still honored names.
To this class of substantial farmers belonged Jonathan
Spalding, the subject of this sketch.
Capt. Spalding was born at East Chelmsford (now
Lowell), June 12, 1775, and died at his home, on Paw-
tucket Street, Lowell, April 17, 1SG4, at the age of
eighty-eight years. He was born at his father's farm-
house,npar Pawtucket Falls, but the home of his in-
fancy and childhood was situated near the junction of
Merrimack and Central Streets. His father was Joel
Spalding, a respectable farmer, and his grandfather.
Col. Simeon Spalding, who lived near the centre of
Chelmsford, was an otBcer in the Revolutionary
army, and one of the most important and influential
men of the town, being the trusted representative of
Chelmsford in the Legislature of the State in the
days of the Revolutionary War, a member of the
Provincial Congress of Massachusetts in 1775, and a
delegate to the convention for framing a Constitution
of the Slate in 1770. Edward Spalden, the great-
grandfather of Col. Spalding, was one of the earliest
settlers of Chelmsford.
The father of Capt. Spalding spent his life upon
his farm, if we except a short time in which he
served in the Revolutionary army. He was present
at the surrender of Burgoyne at Saratoga. In 1790,
just 100 years ago, the family removed from the
house in which Capt. Spalding was born to the man-
sion-house on Pawtucket Street, in which he spent
the remaining years of his long life, and which is
still in the possession of Sarah R. Spalding, his only
daughter.
Capt. Spalding owed his military title to his ap-
pointment in his early manhood to the captaincy of
a company of cavalry. Through life he carried
with him something of the pcsitiveness of military
discipline. Though he was very deeply interested in
the promotion of the public welfare, he was never
ambitious of political honor. He was, however, in
1833, a member of the Legislature of the State.
When it became evident to him ihat the city of
Lowell was destined to cover his ancestral farm, he
sold the larger part of it to a syndicate of gentle-
men, consisting of William Livingston, Sidney Spal-
ding and others, and it was divided into house-lots
for the homes of the people of the rapidly-extending
city. He, however, retained as much of the
est.ite as would meet his wants and pleasures while
living in retirement, and his last years were peace-
fully and pleasantly passed at the old homestead.
Capt. Spalding was (bnd of books, and was happy
in his domestic relations. He loved to rehearse to
his family the events of early days, and tell cf the
simi)le scenes of rural life, when the good people of
the town were wont to ride to church on horseback,
keeping the Sabbath with the profoundest rever-
ence, and devoting to the solemn service the entire
day, from the rising of the sun to th.3 going down
thereof. He had the pleasure of witnessing, from their
very ince|)tion, the rise and development of the great
manufacturing enterprises which have made Lowell
known the world around.
Capt. Spalding was a man of delicate sensibility
and refinement of feeling, and possessed that union
of gentleness and firmness which always gives grace
to manners and dignity to character. He was of a
social nature, and was upon terms of friendly iuter-
C'jurse with ilr. Boott and other distinguished meu
of LoweH's early days. Of the hospitality of his
home a large circle of friends have many pleasant
memories. His quiet and [leaceful life was prolonged
far beyond the allotted age of man, and it afforded a
noble illustration of that pure and strong New Eng-
land character to which is due so much of the sta-
bility, prosperity and glory of our country. His wife,
Sarah Dodge Spalding, died in 1837, at the ageof for-
ty-nine years. Of his two sons, who survived him. Dr.
Joel Spalding will be probably noticed iti this work
among the physicians of Lowell, and J. Tyler Spal-
ding, who was a member of the firm of Ward &
Spalding, in Boston, died in 1872, at the homestead
in Lowell, at the age of forty-two years.
1865. Mayor, Josiah G. Peabody. Population, 30,-
990. The effect of the War of the Rebellion upon
the people of Lowell is indicated by the fact that
just before the war, in 18G0, the population was
greater by 5837 than at its close, in 1865. But even
before the war, such was the financial prostration
LOWELL.
37
aud distress of the country, that the population of the
city in 1860 was less by 727 than in 1850.
June 17th. The dedication of theLadd and Whitney
monument occurred. Lowell hnd never seen so splen-
did a pageant. The procession before the dedication
contained a vast array of high officials and organiza-
tions dressed in uniform, too numerous to be men-
tioned. The exultation at the successful issue of the
war inspired the occasion, and men of every class
delighted to honor the two younp Lowell soldiers
who were the first to shed their blood in the great
civil conflict. The oration was delivered by Massa-
chusetts' " War Governor,'' Andrew. The monument
does honor to the city. The words of the finely ap-
propriate inscription upon it, selected by Governor
Andrew, are found in Milton's Samson Agonistes, lines
1721-4, and are the words of Manoah, the father of
Samson, as he contemplates the bravery and death of
liis son :
" Nothiu? is here fur teftre, notbins to wail
Or kuuck the breuat ; Do weuknead, nu contempt,
Dispraise, or bltinic ; DOtliiug but well uDd fair,
Atiti what liiuy quiet us ia a death bo uuble."
December 11th. Elisha Huntington died at the age
of seventy years. Probably no citizen of Lowell has
filled so many office?, or has so long enjoyed, in
political and municipal aflairiS, the favor of his fel-
low-citizens.
1866. Mayor, Josiah G. Peabody. Population,
30,878.
January 17tb. Chase's Mills burned. Loss, $173,-
000. Probably the most destructive fire that has oc-
curred in Lowell.
August Gth. Music Hall opened.
September 3d. Perez Fuller died at the age of
seventy years. He was born in Kingston, Mass.,
1797. Mr. Fuller was a tailor by trade. He was a
]>erson of very unique character. While he was a
quiet, thoughtful man, so sober in appearance as al-
most to look sad, be possessed a vein of wit and humor
which made him the delight of all who loved fun. For
years no convivial occasion in Lowell was complete
without a comic song from Mr. Fuller. As an ama-
teur actor he exhibited remarltable natural talent.
He was withal so genial a companion that he became
a general favorite. It is hardly to the credit of the
mirth-loving people of the *ity, whom he so often
delighted, that in our cemetery there is no stone to
mark his grave.
1867. Mayor, George F. Richardson.
February 4lh. Young Men's Christian Association
organized.
March 29th. St. John's Hospital incorporated.
February 4th. First fair in aid of the Old Ladies'
Home.
April 21st. Joshua Swan died at the age of seventy-
nine years. He was born in Methuen, Mass., and
came to East Chelmsford (now Lowell) in 1S24, and
entered into the em|)loy of the machine-shop, where
he served as a contractor till 1840. While Lowell
was a town no man probably received bo many offices
as Mr. Swan. He was often selectman and modera-
tor of meetings, etc. He represented both town and
city in the Legislature. He was in the Council aud
Board of Aldermen, and served as county commis-
sioner three years from 1848.
July 4th. The statue of Victory, presented to the
city by Dr. J. C. Ayer, was unveiled in Monument
Square, in the presence of 15,000 or 20,000 spectators.
This statue is of bronze and is seventeen feet high.
It stands upon a granite pedestal. It is modeled
after a statue in front of the royal palace in Munich.
The figure is of a draped woman with wings, extend-
ing the wreath of victory in one hand and holding a
harvest sheaf of wheat in the other. It commemor-
ates the success of the national arms in the War of
the Rebellion.
July lOth. Old Ladies' Home, on Fletcher Street,
was dedicated.
1868. Mayor, Geo. F. Richardson.
March 11th. Samuel L. Dana, LL.D., died at the
age of seventy-three years. He was born in Am-
herst, N. H., 1795, and entered Harvard College
when only fourteen years of age. He served as lieu-
tenant of the First Artillery in the War of 1812. He
became a physician by profession, and practiced in
Waltham, but his great attainments in the science of
chemistry gained him the appointment of chemist to
the Merrimack Manufacturing Company. He came
to Lowell in 1834. Probably no citizen of Lowell
has made so high attainments in science. He was an
unassuming man of the most sterling worth.
May 30lh. Decoration Day firot celebrated.
December 4th. Gen. U.S. Grant visited Lowell. He
caine by invitation of the members of the City Grov-
ernmect, who met him in Boston and escorted him to
the city. The general seemed desirous of avoiding
display, and only three carriages were provided for
the occasion. He visited the Merrimack Company's
mills and the Print Works, the Carpet Mill and the
Lawrence Mills. There was a display of flags, and
crowds filled the streets, but the pageantry which at-
tended the visits of President Jackson and President
Tyler was wanting.
December 21st. Old Residents' Historical Associa-
tion organized with Dr. John O. Green as president,
and Z. E. Stone as secretary.
March 17ih. Samuel Burbank died at the age of
seventy-six years. He was born in Hudson, N. H., and
came to Middlesex Village (now a part of Lowell) in
1823, where he engaged in trade. Subsequently he was
adealer in clothing and hardware on Central Street for
many years. Few citizens of Lowell have been bet-
ter known or more highly honored. He was twice in
the Common Council, twice in the Board of Alder-
men, three times in the State Legislature. He was
also warden of St. John's Church. On the day of
his burial, as if by a spontaneous movement, the
38
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
stores of the city were closed. So much do men
honor inte(!rity of character.
18S9. Mayor, Jonathan P. Folsom.
May 26th. The Lowell Hosiery Company was in-
corporated with a capital of $200,000.
October 15th. Hon. John Nesmith died at the age
of seventy-six years.
December 27 th. Masons celebrate St. John's Day
in St. Anne's Church.
Hon. John Nesmith. — The ancestry of Mr. Nes-
mith may be traced to that colony of sturdy Scotch-
men who, iu 1G90, sought the fertile fields of northern
Ireland, and settled on the River Bann, in the county
of Londonderry. From this colony came his great-
grandfather, Dea. James Nesmith, who, in 1719, set-
tled in Londonderry, N. H., and was one of the pro-
prietors of the town and an elder in the Presbyterian
Church. Thomas, the eldest son of Deacon Nesmith,
settled in the neighboring town of Windham, and ac-
quired a large estate. John, the son of Thomas, and
father of the subject of this sketch, was a merchant in
Windham, and died at the age of forty-four years,
leaving a family of nine children. John, the fourth
child, who was born August 3, 1793, and at the time
of his father's death was thirteen years of age, was
put to service as a merchant's clerk in Haverhill, Mass.
After five years in this position he formed a part-
nei^ship with his elder brother, Thomas, and engaged
in trade, first in Windham and subsequently in Derry,
N. H. During several of the later years of this part-
nership the brothers also carried on an extensive
and very successful commission business in New
York. Mr. John Nesmith conducted this branch of
the business of the firm and had his residence in that
city.
Having acquired property in trade, they came to
Lowell in 1831, and purchased of Judge Edward St.
Lae Livermore his estate of 150 acres in Belvidere
for S25,000, and sold it in house-lots to the cit'zens
of the rapidly-growing town. This enterprise brought
them still greater wealth.
But Mr. Nesmith was far from being contented
with dealing in real estate. He aspired to intellec-
tual achievements. His active mind enjoyed inves-
tigation and experiment. He studied works of science,
Le invented machines, he sought out new devices in
the mechanic arts; as he walked the streets his brow
was knit in thought, he peered into the future, and was
knov/n in the business world as a far-seeing man. It
was he who, foreseeing the advantage of controlling
the waters of Winnepiseogee and Squam LakeS, in
New Hampshire, for the benefit of the Lowell mills
in seasons of drought, purchased, on his own account,
the right to use these waters — a right which the
manufacturers were subsequently obliged to purchase
of him. It was he who, discerning the fitness of the
site of the city of Lawrence for manufacturing pur-
poses, purchased large portions of the land on which
that citv stands.
Among the machines invented by Mr. Nesmith
were one for making wire fence and another for
weaving shawl fringe. He engaged iu the manufac-
ture of blankets, flannels, printing cloths, sheetings
and other fabrics. He was either agent or owner of
mills in Lowell, Dracut, Chelmsford and Hooksett,
N. H.
He was a man of ardent, aggressive nature. His
convictions were positive and he could not meekly
bear opposition. His marked character brought him
public distinction. He was elected to municipal of-
fices. He was twice chosen Presidential elector and
once Lieutenant-Governor of the Siate. However,
he was not a politician, but a moralist. In political
contests it was not the partisan, but the moral, aspect
that moved him. The temi)erance aud anti-slavery
causes found in him a liberal contributor aud a life-
long friend.
In domestic life he spent freely from his large es-
tate to make his home one of comfort aud of beauty.
His graperies and his hot-houses, his fruit-trees and his
shrubbery, his fine lawn adorned with noble ornamen-
tal shade-trees, all attest his refined t:\ste, his love of
the beautiful and his tender care for the happiness of
those he loved. In his declining years he was not
the man to retire to the ease and repose so often
sought by the aged, but he Vvorked while strength
la>ted. He died not so much from disease as because
his physical powers could no longer endure the ac-
tion of his mind.
In his will he made generous provision for the in-
digent blind of New Hampsliire, and for a park iu
the town of Franklin in that State.
His death occurred October 15, 1SG9, in the
seventy-seventh year of his a^e.
1870. Mayor, Jonathan P. Folsom. Population,
40,928.
Jan. ISth, Rev. Dr. Amos Blanchard died. A sketch
of his life is found in Church History.
March 2d, B. C. Sargeant, mayor of the city in 18G0-
61, died at the age of forty-seven years.
March loth. Natives of !Maiue hold a festival iu
Huntington Hal!.
Col. Thomas Nesmith. — Very many of the early
settlers of New England were the choice spirits of
the British Isles. It was their love of liberty, their
superior enterprise, and, above all, their ardent
desire for religious freedom, that compelled them to
forsake their kindred a.nd the land of their birth,
and to welcome the hardships of a free life in the
new world. Conspicuous among these brave and
hardy einierants were the early settlers of London-
derry, N. H., and the adjacent towns. In 1690 their
forefathers had removed from Scotland to find a
fairer home and more fertile fields on the river Bann,
in the north of Ireland, and had settled in the county
of Londonderry. They were uncompromising Presby-
terians, and the persecutions which in Scotland they
had suflVrcd I'rom the English government and the
/
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h. . -.
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LOWELL.
39
Established Church had only confirmed their con-
victions and inspired in them an ardent love for
independence.
From these Scotch people in Londonderry in Ire-
land came the early settlers of Londonderry in New
England. Among them was Dea. James Nesmith,
the great-grandfather of Col. Thomas Nesmith, the
subject of this sketch. Dea. Nesmith came to
America in 1719, and was one of the sixteen pro-
prietors of the town of Londonderry, now in the
State of New Hampshire. His son Thomas, from
whom Col. Nesmith received his name, was one of
the first settlers of Windham (once a part of London-
derry), and was an enterprising farmer who, for the
times, acquired a large estate. John Nesmith, son of
the latter, and father of Col. Nesmith, remained upon
the homestead. The farm contained about 400 acres
and the spacious farm-house had seventeen rooms
and a store attached to it, together with a large hall,
which was a famous place for balk and dances in
"ye olden time." John Nesmith kept a country
store and did a thriving business. When forty-four
years of age he died suddenly, leaving a widow with
nine children.
Col. Thomas Nesmiih was born in Windham,
N. H., Sept. 7, 1788. His early education was ob-
tained in the district school and in the institution
now known as the Pinkerton Academy, in Derry.
When his father died he was eighteen years of age.
His mother was a woman of remarkable ability lor
business, although from lameness she was able to walk
only with a crutch. She resolved to retain the store
and rely upon her sons to carry on the business and
thus support the family. And doubtless it was in
this school of necessity that Col. Nesmith learned
those lessons of wisdom and foresight that made him
in future years one of the safest of financiers, and
one of the shrewdest and most far-seeing of the early
founders of the city of Lowell. He learned to lake
and to bear the responsibilities which the large
fiimily of a widowed mother imposed upon an older
son.
When twenty-four years of age he formed a partner-
ship with his younger brother John, and started a
store in Windham, in which they continued business
for about ten years. During this time he carried on a
very profitable business in the purchase and sale of
linen thread, which in those days was manufactured
on the small foot-wheel in private families. In 1822
the partners opened a store in Derry, where they con-
tinued in trade for about eight years.
In 1831 they retired from business and devoted
themselves to real estate, purchasing of Judge St.
Loe Livermore his large estate in Belvidere, in the
town of Tewksbury, for S2d,000, with the purpose of
selling it in house-lots demanded by the rapidly in-
creasing population of Lowell. This fine swell of
land, bounded on two sides by the Concord and the
Merrimack, became a part of the city about three
years after its purchase. It contains 150 acres and
upon it have been erected very many of the most
elegant homes of the city. The results of this enter-
prise, when added to the accumulations of trade in
earlier years, made the Nesmith brothers among the
most opulent of the citizens of Lowell.
Colonel Nesmith, though not a seeker for office, had
his share of official responsibilities. In early life he
was inspector of schools, and held other town offices
in Windham. In the War of 1812 he enlisted as a
soldier for, three months, and served as third lieute-
nant in Captain Bradley's company, stationed at
Portsmouth. In 1820 he was chosen colonel of the
Eighth Regiment of New Hampshire Militia. After
coming to Lowell he served two years in the City
Council, and he was a director of the Merchanib'
Bank.
His last years were spent in his home on Park
Street, his large estate affording him sufficient and
congenial employment. Colonel Nesmith was a
gentleman of the old school, dignified in manner and
observant of the gentle courtesies of social life.
It is to the honor both of the head and heart of
Colonel Nesmith that in his last will he left to his
native town of Windham $3000 for founding and per-
petuating a public library, $1000 to the High Street
Church Sab bath -School, of which his own children
had been members, and $25,000 as a fund for the sup-
port of the poor of Lowell. He died July 31, 1870,
at the age of eighty-two years.
1871. Mayor, Edward F. Sherman.
February 8th. The fir^t case of small-pox occurred.
This disease became epidemic in the city and was
the occasion of much excitement and alarm. The
city government was very severely blamed for inef-
ficient action in checking the disease, and many
citizens were roused to anger and indignation. It is
easy to judge after an event what should have been
done. The disease prevailed till autumn, and 580
persons were attacked by it, of whom 178 died.
October 23d the Board of Health reported that all
danger from small-pox had passed. The city ex-
pended S2G,000 on account of this epidemic. Its
origin is traced to an emigrant family who settled in
Mill Street. This family, having a sick child, used
every means to conceal the fact that the disease was
small-pox. The parents reported it as a case of mea-
sles. After the child had died a "wake" was held
in the house, and before the truth became known
large numbers had been exposed.
March 14th. City Council appropriated $15,000 to
establish a fire-alarm telegraph.
April lltli. Central Savings Bank organized.
August 22d. Framingham and Lowell Railroad
opened for travel.
December 9th. The Grand Duke Alexis, of Russia,
visited Lowell.
December 29th. Odd Fellows' Hall dedicated.
Sidney Spaldikg wa» born in East Chelmsford
40
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
(now Lowell) November 14, 1798, and died at bis res-
idence on Middlesex Street, Lowell, on September 2,
1871, at the age of nearly seventy-three years. He
was the son of Micah Spalding, a respectable farmer
of East Chelmsford, whose farm-house, in which his
son was born, still stands on the corner of School and
Liberty Streets, in Lowell. In lively contrast to the
namerous equipages which now daily traverse the
once quiet farm of Mr. Micah Spalding it is fitting to
record that he was the possessor of the first chaise
owned in East Chelmsford. He died April 23, 1830,
at the age of seventy -seven years, while his wife, Mary
Chamberlain [Spalding], lived to the greit age of
ninety-one years.
The Spalding family is so numerous in Lowell and
its vicinity, and bears so honorable a name, that a
brief record of the ancestral line of the subject of
this sketch will not fail to interest the reader.
Edward Spalding, his earliest American ancestor,
seems to have joined that devout band from the towns
of Woburn and Concord, who, about lCo2, being in
search of a new place of settlement, had discovered a
tract of land on the west side of Concord River,
which they pronounced " a comfortable place to ac-
commodate God's people," and which, on making it
their home, they had called Chelmsford (Chelmer's
ford), probably in affectionate remembrance of
Chelmsford in England, on the banks of the river
Chelmer. Edward Spalding was in the first Board of
Selectmen in the town. John, the oldest sou of Ed-
ward, came with his father to Chelmsford when about
twenty-one years of age and lived to the age of eighty-
eight years. Joseph, son of John, also lived in
Chelmsford and died in 1728, at the age of fifty-four
yeais. Simeon Spalding, son of Joseph and grand-
father of Sidney Spalding, was far the most distin-
guished of his ancestors. He represented in the Leg-
islature the town of Chelmsford during the eventful
years preceding the Revolutionary War and during
the first years of the war. The fact that he possessed
the full confidence of his patriotic constituents indi-
cates the quality of his own patriotism. He had the
military title of colonel. Colonel Spalding was a
prominent Free Mason and for several years the his-
toric Pawtucket Lodge, of Lowell and vicinity, held
its meetings at his house. Micah, the son of Colonel
Simeon Spalding, was, as belbre stated, the father of
Sidney Spalding.
Mr. Spalding, after completing his elementary
education, became a clerk in tiie glass woiks
of Middlesex Village (now Lowell), a village which,
situated at the head of Middlesex Canal, was in those
early days a very important centre of business. At
length he opened a store in this village, which in two
or three years he relinquished in order to engage in
trade in Savannah, Georgia. But after visiting the
South he found neither the climate nor the institu-
tions of Georgia agreeable to his tastes and he re-
turned to New England. It was while in Georgia
that he imbibed those political principles which
made him an ardent Free-Soiler during the restof hia
life.
His next business adventure proved to be most for-
tunate. In company with four or five other gentle-
men, in 1830, while Lowell was a town, he purchased
the farm of Jonathan Spalding, in the south part of
Lowell, and proceeded to divide it into house-lots for
the rapidly increasing population of the town. This
proved to be the enterprise which occupied most of
the remaining years of liis life and from which he de-
rived most of his wealth.
However, he took a prominent part in the con-
struction of the Lowell and Lawrence and the Salem
and Lowell Railroads, in the stock of which he was a
large owner. At the time of his death he was presi-
dent of the former road and director of the latter.
Although Mr. Spalding was not ambitious for po-
litical honors, he was for four years a representative of
Lowell in the General Court. He was one year a
member of the Common Council and for two years
in the Board of Aldermen. In 1861 he was nomi-
nated as candidate for mayor of Lowell, but he de-
clined the honor. Had he received the election he
would have graced the olBce, for he was a gentleman
of superior talent for business, of cultivated manners
and of commanding personal presence. His tastes
led him to the <|uiet enjoyments of domestic lile. He
was fond of books, and in his elegant and attractive
home he had much to allure him from the walks of
political life.
He, however, had his share of human sorrow.
He lived to see the death of two wives and all of
their four children. ' His third wife and one dai^gh-
ter, -Miss Harriet Sidney Sjialding, survive him. Dr.
Charles Parker Spalding and Mr. Frederic Parker
Spalding, who are sons of his third wife by her for-
mer husband, Frederic Parker, Esq., attorney-at-law,
and who were adopted by Mr. Spalding and received
his name, are now respected citizens of Lowell.
1872. Mayor, Josiah G. Peabody.
January. William North died attheage of seventy-
eight years. He was born in Weatherslield, Conn.,
July 12, 1794. He held the position of superintendent
of the dyeing department of Middlesex Mills. He
was a man of great moial worth and was affection-
ately called " Father North." He was often honored
with city offices. He was especially identified with
St. Paul's Methodist Church.
February. City Library removed to Masonic Block.
February 10th. E. F. Sherman, mayor of the city
in 1S71, died at the age of fifty-one years.
March loth. People's Club orgai;ized.
April 27th. George Brownwell died at the age of
nearly seventy-nine years. He was born in Ports-
mouth,R. I., August 8, 1793. After working as a ma-
chinist in Fall River and Waltham,he came to Lowell
in 1824, and was among the first machinists of the
Lowell Machine Shop. Ou the death ol Paul Moody
■> ',..
y^ // r< ^af,,rj
LOWELL.
41
be succeeded him as superintendent of the machine
tihop. He retired from active business in 1845. He
was a member of the Common Council, of the Board
of Aldermen and of the Legislature, and was one of
Lowell's first citizens.
April 26ih. Oliver M. Whipple died at the age of
seventy-eight years. He was born in Weathersficld,
Vt., May 4, 1794, and came to East Chelmsford (now
Lowell), in 1818, nearly eight years before the town of
Lowell was incorporated, and established a powder
manufactory which he operated thirty-seven years.
He was a man of great energy and he took a very
active part in developing the enterprises ot the city
ill its early days. He was honored both by the town
and city of Lowell with many offices, and is justly
esteemed one of the founders of the city.
August 3d. An embassy Irom Japan visited the
city.
The Pawtucket iron bridge was finished in 1872, at
a cost of $3G,000, half of which was paid by the town
of Dracut.
Lowell Water-Works.— On November 27, 1872,
the pumping-engine of the water-works was first set
in motion.
Very soon after Lowell received her city charter
(1S3C), the question of an adequate water supply
attracted the attention of the city government.
In June, 1838, Mr.'F. M. Dexier, civil engineer, of
Boston, was employed to ascertain the level of Tyng's
and Long Ponds, and of Merrimack River above
Pawtucket Falls, and also the probable cost of intro-
ducing water from each of these sources. One item of
the engineer's report was that an outlay of §168,000
would furnish a daily supply of 1,200,000 gallons
from Tyng's Pond.
It was in 1848, ten years afterwards, that this re-
port was taken from the table and referred to the
proper committee. William E. Worthen, engine'=r,
was engaged to investigate and report the cost of sup-
plying with water 7a,000 inhabitants. He reported
that no pond in the vicinity of Lowell could furnish
a sufficient supply and recommended the taking of
water from the Merrimack River as the most feasible
plan. To do this would require au outlay of $400,000
or $500,000.
Here again the question rested for seven long years.
In 1855 an act of the Legislature was obtained
allowing the city to take a water supply from Merri-
mack Rivtr.
In 18G0 more surveys were made and reported upon,
and referred to the next city government, and then
follows a long rest of sLx years.
lu 18G6 the city government raised a committee on
water supply, and appointed Mr. L. F. Rice as engi-
neer. The plau reported made Beacon Hill, at the
head of Sixth Street the place for a reservoir, and
West Sixth Street the place for a pumping station.
It was estimated the total cost of introducing water
from the Merrimack, would be $750,0U0. This plau
was submitted to a vote of the people of Lowell and
rejected.
But soon there follows a change in the popular
sentiment. The friends of the water supply measure
take courage. Again on February 23, 1869, a popu-
lar vote was taken with the result of 1868 for the
measure and 1418 against it. By this vote the city
government was instructed to proceed and to intro-
duce water into the city for extinguishing fires and
for domestic uses.
The committee into whose hands was put the
charge of executing the work consisted of the mayor,
Mr. Folsom, Aldermen Scott and Latham and Coun-
cilmen Anderson, Greenhalge, Haggett and Lamson.
New investigations were now made. Water taken
from various sources was again analyzed. The water
from the Merrimack River and Beaver Brook was pro-
nounced purest. The Council decided in favor of
Beaver Brook, with an estimated cost of over
$1,000,000.
Again opposition arises. In November, 1869, the
proposition of postponing the whole matter was
brought to a popular vote and negatived by a very
decided majority, the yeas being 824 and the uays
2754. So decided an expression of the popular will
settled the matter. And cow the work proceeds.
Messrs. Levi Sprague, William E. Livingston and S.
K. Hutchinson were appointed as the Board of Water
Commissioners and Mr. Joseph P. Davis as engineer.
The plan adopted was that of the engineer, who re-
commended that water be taken from Merrimack
River at a probable cost of $1 .265,000. This was the
final plan, and it has been carried into successful exe-
cution. Very few if any dispute its wisdom.
Mv space will not allow me to speak at length of
the filter galleries, conduits, engines, pumps, and a
thousand other appliances necessary to the comple-
tion of the great work. The rest must be given in a
statistical form. The annual report for 1888 gives us
the statistics below :
The reservoir lot od BeacoD Hill contains 17 acres. The reservoir
itself covere nearly seveu acres.
Total leiigib of u'Hier mains, miles 85
Kunilier of water-takers 15,500
Kstiiiialeil population supplied 70,000
Tnlnl charges from all sources for 1888 185,000
Ket bonded indebtedness of the city for water-
works $1,191,160
Amount of receipUi above expeuditarei ID 1888 . $o,244
Total expenditures on water-works 14,453,583
Number gallons water pumped in 1888 1,822,01X490
Number tons of coal consumed in 1888 1,8(^
Average price of coal per ton in 188S f4-44
Kumber of gallons of water used daily per capita G6^
1873. Mayor, Francis Jewett.
May 1st. Young Women's Home dedicated.
July 9th. Fisher A. Hildreth died at the age of
fifty-five years. He was born in Dracut February 5,
1818. His home was in Centralville, and through his
life he was identified with the city's histoiy. As
editor of several Democratic papers and as post-
42
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
master of the city he became very widely known.
He acquired wealth and from his estate wiia erected
the "Hildreth" block. He was a man of talent and
enterprise.
August '24th. Dr. Edson's eightieth birthday cele-
brated.
September 29th. The Daily Times appears as a
morning paper.
1874. Mayor, Francis Jewett.
March 7lh. Fiftieth Anniversary of the organiza-
tion of St. Anne's Church celebrated.
April 20th. Fire at Wameait Mills ; loss, $40,000.
September 24th. G. A. R. Hall dedicated.
December Ist. Lowell & Andover Railroad opened.
October 31st. Rev. John O'Brien ' died at the age
of seventy-four years.
In 1874 the village of Pawtucketville (1000 acres)
was set off from Dracut to Lowell. This village,
many years older than Centralville, haa a history
reaching back into the last century. Here, in 1711,
was established the old church whose history is else-
where given. The bridge over the Merrimack at this
place, incorporated in 1792, had drawn people to the
spot. This village, formerly known ;ia West Dracut,
is now one of the most pleasant and attractive parts
of our city.
In the same year (1874) Middlesex Village (060
acres) was set off from Chelmsford to Lowell. The
history of this village also runs back into the pi\at
century. Here started the Middlesex Canal, which
was incorporated in 1793 and opened in 1804. It
was a busy place in those early years. It is now a
quiet village adorned with pleasant homes.
By the annexations of Belvidere, Centralville,
Piiwtucketville,Middle3ex Village, etc., the territory of
Lowell haa been very greatly extended. Belvidere
alone contained five square miles. The extent of the
city now is more than twelve square miles, having
been enlarged by annexations in 1832, 1834, 1851,
1874, 1879, 1888.
The original territory of Lowell was not an inviting
place for private residences. The low grounds, inter-
spersed with swamps, sprinkled with clumps of bushes,
dotted with muddy ponds, hardly promised health
and a pleasant home to the new-comer. Well does
the writer remember how, at the time he contem-
plated coming to Lowell in 1845, his wise physician
shook his head and warned him of the peril to which
he was exposing his family. But by an admirable
system of drainage and the annexation of these four
villages, all of which are inviting and eligible spots
for healthy homes, Lowell may, on the score of
healthfulness and neatness, challenge comparison
with her sister cities.
Lowell haa now outgrown the crude and barren
aspect of a city in the rough process of being built,
and is fast putting on that settled and homelike ap-
> Fur biugrnphy soe " St. Patrick's CliurcU llittory."
pearance which time alone can give. When the poet
Whittier was, for a short time in 1844, a citizen of
Lowell, he missed "the elm-lined avenues of New
Haven and the breezy leafine^-s of Portland," and
even declares that " for the last few days it has been
as hothereaa Nebuchadnezzar's furnace." However, he
kindly adds : " But time will remedy all this." The
prophecy has proved true. Few cities present more
to please the eye than Lowell. Its streets are broad
with spacious grades and well paved side-walks, and
lined throughout with elms and maples in the very
prime of beauty.
The decaying old buildings, cheaply constructed in
uncouth style many years ago, and standing hard
upon the traveled street, such as too often mar the
beauty of older cities, do not appear in Lowell. The
city stands upon the border line between the decay of
age and the freshness of youth.
Nor is the scenery of Lowell without its charms.
As the traveler approaches the city from the east,
along the banks of the Merrimack, and passes the
elegant residence of Gen. Beuj. F. Butler, there is
spread out before him a scene resplendent with
beauty. On his right across thestream rise gracefully
th« heights of Centralville, crowned with forest trees,
while at their feet the waters of the river dash and
foam as, amidst the huge boulders, they descend the
fails. Far up the river two graceful bridges, spanning
the stream, are outlined on the western sky, while on
the south side of the Merrimack are ranged in long
array the vast structures of our great maiiufactorie;,
with their graceful chimneys towering far above them.
Let the traveler now turn to the left and, ascending
Lynde's Hill in Belvidere, view a far different scene
but one of equal beauty. At his feet, nestling amidst
the green foliage of the trees, are the ten thousand
homes of a thrifty and happy people, the numerous
church spires proclaiming that in the hearts of this
people there is a better worship than that of Mam-
mon. Against the western sky, and forty miles away,
stretches the long range of the Pack Monadiiock
Mountains in New Hampshire, while far beyond them
rise the dim outlines of the Grand Mouaduock. At
the left also rises the peak of Mount Wachuset in our
own State. The whole scene is one of great loveli-
ness, mingling with the triumphs of human art the
charms and beauties of nature.
1875. Mayor, Francis Jewett. Population, 49,GS8.
January 7th. Kalakaua, King of the Sandwich
Islands, visited Lowell.
March 31st. Knights of Pythias dedicated their
new hall.
July 1st. New City Charter adopted by popular
vote.
June. Tappan Wentworth died at the age of seventy-
three years. He was born in Dover, N. H., Feb. 24,
1802, and was a descendant of Thomaa Wentworth,
the celebrated Earl of Strafford. He married Anne
McNeil, a niece of President Franklin Pierce. He
4^^^ ''C7-z^t^/i^_
LOWELL.
43
came to Lowell in Nov., 1833, aud entered upon the
practice of law, in which he gained a very high repu-
tation. He was honored with many offices in the
city and the State, and in 1852 was elected to Congress
by the Whig paity.
1876. Mayor, Charles A. Stott.
January 13th. Reform Club organized.
February 8th. Fiftieth anniversary of the First Bap-
tist Church celebrated.
March Ist. Lowell celebrated the fiftieth anniver-
sary of its incorporation as a town. General Butler
delivered an oralion and addresses were made by
Hon. John A. Lowell, Marshall P. Wilder, Dr. John
(). Green, Rev. Warren H. Cudworth, Jonathan
Kimball, Bishop Clark, of Rhode Island, C. A. Stott,
mayor, and Rev. Dr. Miner. The poem for the occa-
sion was written by John S. Colby. Music by the
Lowell Choral Society and the Germania Orchestra
of Boston.
June 6th. The First Con^egational Church cele-
brated its fiftieth anniversary.
June 8th. Dom Pedro II., Emperor of Brazil, visited
Lowell.
October 23d. Albert Wheeler died at the age of
sixty-three years. He was born in Concord Decem-
ber 15, IS] 3, and came to Lowell when ten years of
age. In 1836 he engaged in the grocery busineirs on
Tilden Street, and in the same place continued the
trade for forty years. Few citizens of Lowell have
been so familiariy known. His genial, social nature
gained him many friends.
August 21st. Josiah B. French, mayor of the city
in 1849 and 1850, died at the age of seventy-six
years.
Josiah Bowers French. — In the first quarter of
the present century there were upon the farms and
the hillsides of New England many families of
smart and promising boys who had been reared in
virtuous homes, whose physical powers had been
strengthened by the necessity of labor, and whose
stout hearts .and willing hands only waited for an
opportunity to take up the serious duties of life
and to make for themselves an honorable name.
Such a family was that to which belonged Josiah
Bowers French, the subject of this sketch ; and such
an opportunity was the commencement of the great
manufacturing enterprises of Lowell about seventy
years ago. Luther French, the father of Mr. French,
was a respectable farmer in the town of Billerica,
four of whose sons — Josiah B., Abram, Walter and
Amos B. — came to Lowell in early life and became
men of high standing and enterprise among the
founders of the city.
Josiah B. French was born in Billerica December
13, 1799, and died at his home on Chelmsford Street,
Lowell, August 21, 1S76, at the age of seventy-six
years. His early education was limited to the dis-
trict schools. At the age of eleven years he left
home, not to return, and lived with two of his
uncles, attending school and working upon the farm
for his board and clothing. One of these uncles
resided in Salisbury, N. H. For two or three years
of his minority he worked in a store, and for a
short time he was engaged in trade in Charles-
town.
Mr. French had this advantage in life : that he
was a man of fine personal bearing, tall, erect and
commanding, giving the impression to one who met
him that he was no ordinary man.
At the early age of twenty -four years he seems to
have attracted attention to his merits, for he then
received from Sheriff Nathaniel Austin an appoint-
ment as one of his deputies for Middlesex County.
Upon this appointment he became a resident of
Lowell, where he held the office until 1830, acting,
meantime, as collector, and serving in various
minor offices.
In 1826 he engaged in the service of the Central
Bridge Company, and took part in disposing of its
stock. He was appointed coroner in 1827, collector
of taxes of the town of Lowell in 1829 and assessor
in 1833-34.
In 1828 he was active in the work of organizing
the Old Lowell Bank, the earliest of the discount
banks of the city. Of this bank he was for several
years a director.
From 1831 to 1846 he did an extensive business
in staging on various lines of travel. He had a
contract for carrying the United States mails be-
tween Boston and Montreal. Of the old method of
staging Mr. French gave an interesting account in
a paper read before the Old Residents' Historical
Association on May 4, 1874, in which he said :
■' The number of stages arriving at. and leaving
Lowell, at the time when the Boston and Lowell
Railroad went into operation, in 1835, was forty or
forty-five each day." The railroad greatly inter-
fered with his staging, but he continued to carry
the mails afterwards. It was many years before the
railroad was extended to Montreal.
The talents of Mr. French were recognized by
his frequent appointment to office. In 1835 he was
elected on a citizen's ticket as Representative of
Lowell to the General Court of Massachusetts, and
long afterwards, lin 1861, he was again elected.
In 1836 and in 1842 he was a member of the Com-
mon Council. In 1840 and 1841 he was chief en-
gineer of the Lowell Fire Department. From 1844
to 1847 he was one of the commissioners of Middle-
sex County. He took an active part in the incor-
poration of the City Institution for Savings, and also
of the Appleton Bank. With both of theae institu-
tions, either as trustee or director, he was connected
from the beginning, and shortly before his death he
became president of the Appleton Bank.
Few men have engaged in so great a variety of
enterprises and employments. In 1847 he, with
others, took a large contract in the construction of
44
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the Ogdeiisburg Railroad, which occupied him for
about two years. While engaged upon this contract
and absent from the city, he was, upon a citizens'
ticket, elected mayor of Lowell. In the office of
mayor he distinguished himself as a financier. In
the next year he was re-elected, holding the office in
the years 1849 and 1850. In 1851 he was chosen
president of the Northern Railroad of New Hamp-
shire. This position, however, he aoon resigned in
order to engage with his brother Walter in a large
contract involving three million dollars, in the con-
struction of a railroad in Ohio. His brother having
been killed in the lailroad drawbridge disaster at
Norwalk, Conn., in 1853, the completion of this im-
portant contract fell upon Mr. French. For about
fourteen of the later years of his life he served as
agent of the Winnipiseogee Lake Cotton & Woolen
Company at Lake Village, N. H.
For a period of several months before his death, in
1876, his declining health forbade his acti\e pursuit
of the duties of his busy life.
Mr. French, though not an active politician, was
ranked as a member of the Democratic party. In re-
ligious sentiment he was a Unitarian.
He will long be remembered as among the most
sagacious and enterprising business men of the early
days of the city of Lowell.
1877. Mayor, Charles A. Stott.
July 29th. The First Uuiversalist Church celebrated
its fiftieth anniversary.
Captain Joxathan Tyler was born in East
Chelmsford (now Lowell) January 17, 1790. He was
one of the seven sons of Nathan Tyler, who resided
near the foot of Pawtucket Falls. His father, who
was for the times a man of large estate, was employed
upon the river in boating and rafting, and the son, in
his earlier years, followed his father's occupation.
In those early days, before railroads existed, a vast
amount of lumber was brought in rafts down the
Merrimack. At Pawtucket Falls the rafts were
broken up, and the lumber, having been drawn by
teams to the foot of the falls, was there formed again
into rafts. These operations employed many men
and many teams, and made the vicinity of the Falls
a scene of busy life.
In 1816 Captain Tyler married Civil S., daughter
of Captain Benjamiu Bulterfield, a wealthy farmer
and a prominent man in East Chelmsford. Mrs.
Tyler became widely known in Lowell, having lived
to the great age of ninety-lour years.
Upon his. marriage Captain Tyler began business
for himself, as landlord of the American House, on
Central Street, a house which he owned through life.
After nine years in this position he, for a lew years,
was landlord of the Mansion House, which then stood
near the corner of Merrimack and Bridge Streets.
Public-houses in Lowell's early days were places of
great importance, being frequented by men of every
class, who, from curiosity, or for trade, or tor finding
a home, resorted to the new and thriving town. To
these the hotel was their first home. Here, too, the
wealthy mill-owners from Boston took many a good
meal. Having by his shrewdness and enterprise ac-
quired wealth in his early days, he spent the last half
of his long life in dealing in real estate, in erecting
buildings, many of which are ornaments to the city,
and in wise and profitable speculation. His residence
during these years was upon Park Street.
Captain Tyler was an upright, industrious, enter-
prising man, who thought much and said little.
Though he never sought public honors, yet such were
his ability and worth that his fellow-citizens often
placed him in positions of responsibility and trust. At
difierent times he was one of the selectmen of the
town, a member of the Common Council and of the
Board of Aldermen, and a representative in the State
Legislature. In his will he left $10,000 for the poor
of Lowell.
Captain and Mrs. Tyler, both having been born on
the soil of Lowell, and both having spent there the
whole of their long lives, became to a very remark-
able degree identified with the city itself. Both be-
ing most intimately conversant with the history of
the city, their death robs us of a historic treasure
which can never be replaced.
Captain Tyler died October 14, 1877, at the age of
eighty-eight years. Mrs. Tyler died May 11, 1886, at
the age of ninety-four years.
1878. Mayor, John A. G. Richardson.
April 24th. The Lowell District Telephone Com-
pany began operations.
July 3d. James C. Ayer' died at the age of sixty
years.
September 26th. First annual regatta of the Ves-
per Boat Club.
July 3d. Artemas L. Brooks died at the age of sev-
enty-four years. He was born in Groton, N. H.,
1803, and came to Lowell in 1832. For forty-seven
years he was well known as a house-builder and man-
ufacturer of lumber. He was a conspicuous advocate
of the moral reforms (jf his day, and stood at the
front in every good cause.
December 30th. Electric lights tried in Merrimack
Mills.
May 13th. The Lowell Art Association was formed,
with Thomas B. Lawson as president.
1879- Mayor, John A. G. Richardson.
February 5th. Samuel Batchelderdied at the age of
nearly ninety-five years, an age greater than that of
any other of the founders of Lowell. He was born in
Jatfrey, N. H., in 1784. When a young man he engaged
in trade in Peterboro' and Exeter, N. H. In 1808 he
began the manufacture of cotton in New Ipswich, N. H.
Such were his ability and success in this enterprise
that he was invited to participate in establishing the
great manufactories of Lowell. He was a man of
1 See biugrapUy Id chapter ua Manufactures,
LOWELL.
45
science and invention. Tlie machines he invented
and the offices he held are too numerous to be men-
tioned. He was the most active aj^ent in starting the
Hamilton Mills. He took a very lively interest in
the affairs of the town of Lowell. Even at the age
of eighty-six years he was president of the Hamil-
ton, the Appleton, the Essex, the Everett, the York
and the Exeter Mills. There are few examples on
record of men of such intense mental activity and of
such a vast variety of responsibilities who have at-
tained so great an age. His last years were spent on
his estate in Cambridge, Mass.
July 1st. Morning Mail first issued.
September 2(5th. The Unitarian Church celebrated
the fiftieth anniversary of its organization.
1880. Mayor, Frederic T. Greenhalge. Popula-
tion, 5'J,485.
January 14th. Charles Stewart Paruell visited
Lowell.
September Cth. First Catholic Parochial School
opened.
October 5th. Seventy first meeting of the American
Board of Commissioners for Foreign MiEsions held
m Lowell.
October Cth. Chase & Faulkner's mills destroyed
by fire.
188L Mayor, Frederic T. Greenhalge.
January 31st. The School Committee voted to
supply all the children of the public schools with
frtc text books at the expense of the city. This deci-
sion is now almost universally acquiesced in.
January. Electric Light Company organized.
February 22d. City Council voted to introduce the
high service water system.
April 6lh. Hocum Hosford, mayor of the city in
1SG2-3-4, died at the age of fifty-five years.
May 6th. A'»sociated Charities organized.
September 6lh. " Yellow Tuesday." The darkness
of this day did not probably equal that of the " dark
day " in May, 1780. It was characterized by a gloom
which fell on the earth like a yellow pall.
October 13th. Citizens voted to build Aiken Street
Bridge.
October 31st. John Amory Lowell died at the age
of eighty-three years. He built the Boott and Mas-
sachusetts Mills.
1882. Mrtvor, George Runels.
Josiah Gates died May 4, 1882.
Theodore H. Sweetser' died May 8, 1882.
April 11, 1882. Rev. Dr. Eden B. Foster died at the
age of sixty-eight years.
August 5th. Central Bridge burned. The structure
was of wood and was entirely consumed.
1883- Mayor, John J. Donovan.
February 23d. Fiftieth anniversary of the opening
of the Edson Grammar School celebrated.
May 7th. Vote of City Council to establish a free
1 For biogmiiliy 8:k: chupU.-!' ou Ik-ucli ao<l Bar.
reading-room and to make the City Library a free li-
brary. The great number of men and boys who daily
frequent the free reading-room attest the wisdom of
this vote.
June 25ih. Rev. Dr. Edson died at the age of
ninety years. He was rector of St. Anne's Church
for nearly sixty years.
In 1883 the Erie Telephone Company was organ-
ized with a capital of $5,000,000 ; Wm. A. Ingham
was the first president. The business of this com-
pany is limited to Cleveland, Ohio, and the States
of Arkansas, Texas, Minnesota and South DiJcxta.
The company pays four per cent, annual dividends.
Levi Sprague, president for 1890 ; C. J. Glidden, sec-
retary and treasurer.
Djniel Ayer, from whom the part of Lowell called
" Ayer's City " derives its name, died at Bath-on-the-
Hudsou, December 30, 1883. Mr. Ayer was born in
Canada. He came to Lowell in his youth. After
several failures in Lowell and elsewhere to acquire
wealth by purchat-ing land and selling it in houife-
lots, at length fortune smiled upon him, whert upon
he made a feast for his former creditors in Lowell, at
which each guest found under his plate the full
amount that was due him. Mr. Ayer was a peculiar
man, and had other eccentricities besides that of pay-
ing his honest debts. He once had the honor of rep-
resenting Lowell in the State Legislature.
September 18th. New Central Bridge opened to
travel.
October 10th. The Paige Street Free Baptist
Church celebrated its fiftieth anniversary.
November ISlh. New standard of time went into
efl'ect.
The iron Central Bridge was finished in 1883; cost,
$118,000.
The iron Aiken Street Bridge was finished in 1883;
cost, $190,W0. The Aiken Street Bridge is much
longer than the Central Bridge.
October, 188.^. The New England Telephone and
Telegraph Company was organized under the laws of
the State of New York. It was formed by consolidat-
ing several companies which had formerly operated iu
Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont and most of Mas-
sachusetts. The wonderful invention of the telephone,
and the prospect of its early introduction into all the
channels of business, produced a profound impression
and gave rise to a vast amount of honest and dishon-
est speculation. Enterpribing men and unscrupulous
men alike saw in the invention the promise of untold
wealth suddenly acquired. There was a general craze.
The ignorant and inexperienced, with a wild rush,
followed the acute financiers and the unscrupulous
speculators into the telephone business. New com-
panies sprang up on every side, the stock in which
was eagerly sought. Credulous men and confiding
women freely invested their money and never exactly
knew where it went to.
These numerous companies soon learned that to
46
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
operate a telepbooe was something very different
from simply forming a company and taking in the
money of credulous men. It was found that the com-
panies must combine in order to succe-sful operation.
In this combination the original Bell Company, hav-
ing the power, took the lion's share of the vast capi-
tal of ?12,( 00,000. This capital almost equals the
combined capital of all the great manufacturing cor-
porations of Lowell. These corporations can show
vast and splendid possessions, — lands, buildings, ma-
chinery, canals, which challenge the wonder and ad-
miration of the beholder, but where are the colossal
possessions of the New England Telephone Com-
pany ?
This company, under its present officers, is,
doubtless, well and honestly managed, and it has the
confidence of the community. It deserves high praise
for saving from the wreck so much as it has succeeded
in saving. The wrong lies further back than the for-
mation of this company. The stock of the compjuiy,
if sold to-day, would restore to tho3e who purchased
it seven years ago, a little more than half of the
money invested.
In the earlier days of the telephone Lowell seemed
to be the central city of telephone speculation and
management, and probably the people of no other
city have lost so heavily in purchasing telephone
stock. It is this that warrants the mention of this
subject in a history of this city.
The headquarters of the New England Company
are now in Boston. The company pays aanuaily a
stock dividend of three and one-half per cent. In 1S88
the company paid in dividends, >'284,651. The gross
earnings were SI, 127, 307; expenses, !i85t),.380 ; net
earnings, $270,726 ; number of local exchange con-
nections, 26,520,535 ; number of regular employees of
all classes, 518.
1884. Mayor, John J. Donovan.
Charles Morrill, superintendent of 'the schools of
Lowell for seventeen years, died April 2, 1884. Mr.
Morrill was born in Waltbam and was the son of Rev.
Jonathan C. Morrill, first postmaster of Lowell. He
was educated at WatervilleCollege, Maine, was chosen
princi|)al of the Green School iu Lowell in 1845, and
became superintendent of Lowell public schools in
1867. He died in office at the age of sixty-five years.
Charles P. Talbot died July 6th.
August 30, 1884. Colonel Joseph S. Pollard died at
the age of seventy-two years'. Colonel Pollard was
born in Plaistow, New Hampshire. Before coming to
Lowell in 1854 he had been elected Representative
and Senator to the Legislature of New Hampshire.
He was also a Representative from Lowell in the
Massachusetts Legislature and for two years alder-
man of the city. For fourteen years he was an in-
spector in the Boston Custom-House.
October 30th. Horace J. Adams died at the age of
sixty-six years. He was born in Haverhill, New
Hampshire, and came to Lowell in 1S33. .Is senior
partner in the firm of Adams & North, dealers in
furniuire for many years, he became one of the best
known of the citizens of Lowell. He was a very
prominent member of St. Paul's Methodist Church.
John A. Kuowles' died July 24, 1884.
The Colwell Motor.— The American Triple
Thermic Motor Union, a company formed for the in-
troduction, as a motive-power, of the Triple Thermic
Motor, familiarly known as the " Colwell Motor," had,
in its earlier years, its headquarters in this city, and
for its president and principal manager, the Rev. T.
M. Coiwell, a citizen of Lowell. The laws of Massa-
chusetts do not grant charter.^ to companies who.se
capital, like that of this company, is as large as $25,-
000,000. Accordingly a charter was secured from the
State of New York, and the city of New York is now
the headquarters of the company. But Lowell was
the field of its early operations, and the citizens of
I Lowell have been most deeply affected by the success
or failure of the enterprise.
So much heat is required in the production of
steam, and there is so great a waste of power in ap-
plying it in the propulsion of machinery, that it has
long been the dream of men of inventive talent to
find a vapor which can be produced with far less
heat, and applied with far less waste. Experiments,
with more or less success, have been made for this
purpose with ether, chloroform and bisulphide of
carbon, all of which can be evaporated at a far lower
temperature than water, and all of which are very
volatile liquids and under certain circumstances dan-
gerously explosive.
In the year 1850 the attention of engineers was at-
tracted to an engine invented by Vincent du Trem-
bley, known as the Binanj Vapor Enyinc, in which
steam produced in one boiler was made, by means of
tubes, to evaporate the ether in a second boiler, the
latter vapor being applied to the propulsion of ma-
chinery. Du Trembley's binary vapor engines proved
to be more economical in the consumption of coal
than the common steam engine, and atone time they
were employed in seven ocean steamers, which plied
from France to Brazil, or from France to Africa.
Though every caution was employed in these engines
to prevent the contact of the ether with the fire, it
was found impossible to prevent occasional accidents.
At the very time when preparations were being made
to introduce these engines into five other vessels, by
one of these unfortunate accidents one of the first
seven vessels, the ship " France," was set oa fire and
burned. This disaster was a sad disappointment, and
its result was a return to steam.
Afterwards the Ellis engine presented its claims.
This, too, was a binary vapor engine employing, in-
stead of ether, the bisulphide of carbon. This vola-
tile but inexpensive liquid presents to the engineer
very serious obstacles to its use, among which are its
1 For biography see cbui)lei' ou Bench auil Bai-.
LOWELL.
47
liabiliiv to explosions, its offensive odor, and the diffi-
culty of finding a proper lubricant for the engines in
which it is used. The Ellis engine was also employed
to propel vessels and was used in the Atlantic Works
in East Boston. The Heyer Brothers of Boston in-
vested heavily in this enterprise. But the engine
proved a failure, and the invested money was lost.
Steam again asserted its dominion.
About the year 1879 Mr. William S. Colwell, of
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, an engine-maker by trade,
after long study, believed he had found the means of
obviating the objections to the use of the bisulphide
of carbon, and constructed an engine which he is said
to have run in a quiet way for about one year. An
application for a patent was filed July 2G, 1879. At
length, in August, 1883, an engine was set up and put
to actual service in West Forty-sixth Street, New
York, parties having been induced to invest in the
enterprise in the preceding year.
Not having the means of starting the enterprife
of introducing the new engine without aid, Mr.
Colwell associated with him Mr. J. H. Ca.mpbell, an
attorney, aud Mr. James McLain, a chemist, both of
New York City. His brother, P^ev. Dr. T. M. Col-
well, pastor of the First Baptist Church in Lowell,
became his principal manager and representative be-
fore the public. Dr. Colwell is a man of ability,
having great power over the minds of those who are
jissocia'.ed with him, and he entered upon the new-
enterprise with an ardent zeal and untiring energy
which commanded success. He was president of the
company, formed in 1884, for the development and in-
troduction of the patent, with its office in Shedd's
Block, in Lowell. The friends of the enterprise were
buoyant and ardent. It was claimtd that the self-
same heat which in steam gave a 14 horse power,
would give a 63-hor3e power after passing from the
steam into the bisulphide vapor, and that of the
60,000,000 tons of coal annually used in the United
States for creating sleam, 45,000,000 would be saved.
Many clergymen, especially of the Baptist persuasion,
became officers in the company or shareholders.
Widows and men of small means were approached
and urged to purchase stock. They were told if the
rich had heretofore had all the favors of fortune, now
there w:i3 a chance for men of humbler means also
to become suddenly wealthy. The excitement grew
apace. The story is told of a woman who had 54000
well invested in a bank. She was sorely tempted to
withdraw it and invest it in the stock of the new
motor. The cashier of the bank dissuaded her from
withdrawing it. But after hearing the president
])reach on Sunday she sent into the bank her check
for withdrawing the full amount, declaring thai she
could no longer doubt after listening to the preaching
of so good a man. There was in the persuasive lan-
guage of the president an ardor and positiveness
which begat conviction in the excited mirtds of those
who already wished to believe, and had begun to in-
dulge in the fond dream of wealth. To confirm this
statement it is enough to quote from a speech of Dr.
Colwell delivered before the shareholders in May,
1884, the following sentences: "I believe the har-
vest is now ready for the sickle." " Over 300
engines have been applied for." "If any of you
feel, for any reason, that yon would rather have your
money back, and ten per cent, additional, you may
have it." "The largest amount of leakage in 6
months would not be greater in bulk than a grain of
wheat." "I will pay any man $500 if he will show
me how to explode bisulphide of carbon." The
report that Jay Gould had invested s;l,000,000 in
the enterprise added to the excitement. In the
minds of the faithful the most extravagant expecta-
tions were indulged. Stock which was va'ued at
*G00,000 jumped to $5,000,000, and then to $25,000,-
OUO. It was claimed that the engine saved seventy -five
per cent, of coal, and therefore would and must be intro-
duced into all the places where steam is now employed.
How much the people of Lowell have invested in
Colwell motor stock it is impossible to tell, but the
amount is very large. It is believed that very many
persons of humble means aud credulous nature have
risked their all. After the encine in New York was
abandoned an engine was set up on Jackson Street,
Lowell, in May, 1885. This engine, for a while, was
used to generate a current of electricity for the elec-
tric lights of the city. Ere long it gave place to a
steam-engine, and the Colwell motor slept for many
months. But, in the summer of 1889, Mr. Warren
Aldrich, the owner of the building and part owner of
the engine itself, set it to running to carry certain
machinery. On the afternoon oi July IGth a start-
ling explosion was heard in the building, and the
alarm of fire was rung. The flames, however, were
soon subdued, and it proved that a quantity of bisul-
phide had escaped into a drain and there exploded.
The explosion, without doing much real damage toany-
thing of value, fully proved that this volatile liquid,
when mixed with a certain amount of air, is a dan-
gerous explosive. The engine was not disabled, but
it has quietly ceased to work.
To a heartless looker-on, when he considers that
five years ago this great enterprise with its capital of
$•25,000,000, with its shares at $5000 each, with its
president, a doctor of divinity, announcing that over
300 engines had been applied for, is now unable to
show a single engine in action, and haa not actually
sold one of those 300 engines applied for, the prospect
of success seems truly forlorn and dim. Not so with
those whose fortunes are at stake. They are easily
satisfied, and their hopes are easily kept alive. It is
said that a citizen in passing by the quiet Colwell
motor works on Jackson Street, saw a lone Irishman
digging in the dirt. " Patrick," said he, " what are
you digging that hole in the ground for?" "To kape
the stockholders azy," was the prompt reply of the
son of Erin.
48
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
It is asserted, in explaining the explosion, that Mr.
Aldrich did not have the sanction of the company in
starting up the engine, and that he did not know how
to manage it. The hopeful friends of the enterprise
are fully persuaded that their favorite invention, as
all things great and good have done before, is now
only passing through the Red Sea of public distrust
and scorn, and that by and by they will sing a soug uf
triumph like that of Miriam of old.
1885. Mayor, Edward J. Noyes. Population,
G4,051.
The Tayior Street stone bridge was finished in 1SS5.
Cost, $100,000, including expense for approaches and
land damages.
Feb. 10th. Judge Nathan Oosby died at the age of
eighty-seven years. He was born in Sandwich, N. H.
He came to Lowell, Nov., 1S43, was commissioned
judge of the Police Court May ID, 184(3, and held
the office thirty-nine years, until his death. He was
a man of high character and pure li/e. He was a
geotluman of the old school, and few men have
equaled him in natural dignity and self-control.
Nov. 14, 1885. Edward Tuck died at the age of
seventy-nine years.
December 22d. Dr. John O. Green died at the age
of nearly eighty-seven years. He was a notive of
Maiden, and he came to East Chelmsford (now Low-
ell) in 1822. He was a worthy compeer of Dr. Edson
in establishing and sustaining our public-school sys-
tem. The lives of very few of the citizens of Lowell
are so fully identified with the life of the city itself.
See medical chapter.
1886. Mayor, James C. Abbott.
Wm. C. Gray died Ai)ril 3, ISSC, at the age of
seventy-seven years. He was born in Tiverton, R. I.,
came lo Lowell in 1829, established the Boston &
Lowell Expres<, employing teams for five years, until
the Boston & Lowell Railroad was opened to business.
As an expressman for many years, he was most famil-
iarly known in our streets. He acquired property
and once owned the Washington House. His prop-
erty was mainly lost by speculation. He held the
offices of alderman and deputy sheriff.
Mrs. Civil S. Tyler, widow of Capt. Jonathan
Tyler, died May lltb, at the advanced age of ninety-
four year-<. She was the daughter of Capt. Benj.
Butterfield, of Chelmsford. She was landlady of the
Mansion House in the early days of the city, and
from her birth she was on the ground and was familiar
with all the history of Lowell from its origin. Prob-
ably no other Lowell lady has been so long and so
widely known. She was a lady of great moral and
intellectual worth.
May 4th. Charles Hovey died at the age of sixty-
eight years. He was burn in Acton, 1817, and came
to Lowell in 1832. For fifty-four years he wai an
apothecary on Merrimack Street, and few citizens of
Lowell have been so well known. He grew up with the
city and held many positions of trust in church and
business life. He stood aloof from politics and pre-
ferred the more unobtrusive life of a private citizen.
He was a man of great moral worth.
On April 1st was celebrated the fitueth anniversary
of the incorporation of the city of Lowell, in Hunt-
ington Hall. The hall was tastefully decorated with
Howers and pot-bouse plants and with streamers and
festoons of bunting. On raised seats in front were
400 children of the public .schools, who formed a
chorus for celebrating the day. The forenoon was
occupied with music from the children and the Amer-
ican .Orchestra and by a historical address upon the
schools of Lowell, by C. C. Chase. The alternoon
exercises consisted of an address by His Honor, the
mayor, J. C. Abbott, a poem by Lieut. E. W. Thomp-
son, an oration by Hon. F. T. Greenhalge and music
by the Apollo Quartette and the American Orchestra.
A social levee and reception in the evening closed
the celebration.
1887. Mayor, James C. Abbott.
May 27th. Rev. Dr. Owen Street died, at the age of
seventy-one years.
August 19th. Alvau Clark, the celebrated con-
structor of telescopes, died in Cambridge, at the age
of eighty-three jears. Mr. Clark was born in A.sh-
field, Mass., March S, 1804. He came to Lowell in
1825, and left it in 1827. AVhile here he was an en-
graver for calico printing at the Merrimack Print
Works. His marriage here, at the age of twenty-two
years, was the first marriage in the town of Lowell.
It occurred March 25, 182C, not many days after the
incorporation of the town.
On the last night of 1887 the Worthen Street Bap-
tist Church was burned. For many years before this
no church property iu Lowell had beeu destroyed by
fire.
1889. Mayor, Charles D. Palmer.
January 12th. The engine-houses aud armories on
Palmer and Middle Streets were destroyed by fire.
An engine-house, on the site of that destroyed by
fire, was commenced in 1S8S, and finished m 1889.
This house is equipped with all the most-approved
appliances demanded by the Fire Department for ihu
most efficient means of extinguishing firts. It is
claimed that it is, iu these respects, the most complete
structure in New England. lis cost is $-50,000.
Another engine-house was commenced in 1888 on
Westford Street. It was completed in 1889, at a cost
of $18,000.
Another engine-house, ou High .Street, begun in
1888, and fini-hed in 1889, cost !?23,000.
Lowell takes pride iu the completeness and effi-
ciency of her fire service.
Novem >r 15th. Colonel Fister, commissioner oi
the Post-Office Department for selecting the site of a
new post-office for the city of Lowell, recommended
the site of St. Peter's Church, corner of Appleton
and Gorham Streets. His recommendation has beeu
adopted by the Post-Office Departmcut. Through the
nu^'i yj T^UiveA
i_
LOWELL.
49
efforts of the friends of this site the Government be-
comes the owner of it by the payment of one cent.
The appropriation by Government for the building of
the new post-office is 8200,000.
1889. Mayor, Charles D. Palmer.
Notwithstanding the extraordinary outlays in re-
building the engiaehouse on Palmer Street, and the
erection of two other engine-houses and several
school-houses, the debt of the city was increased in
1889 by only about S9000. The debt at the close of
1889 was as follows : Ordinary debt, S991,502 ; debt
for water works, $1,141,555. Total, $2,130,117. The
erection of a new city-hall and memorial building,
already contracted for at an estimated cost of S500,-
000, together with a new high school building, will,
in the near future, greatly increase the debt of the
city. Still, it is believed that the increase meets the
ajiprob.ation of the citizens.
July 17th. The stable of the Lowell Horse Rail-
road, on East Merrimack Street, was burued. This
fire was notable for the rapidity of its progress, the
lofty height of its spire of flame, and the remarkable
success of the Fire Department in preventing its
spread. In it 117 horses were burned and thirty-one
cars, the loss of the property being about SIOO.OOO,
on which the insurance was about $74,000.
Aug. 23d. Rev. Stedman W. Hanks died, at the
age of eighty years. He was the first pastor of John
Street Congregational Church. For many years be-
fore his death he was secretary of the Seaman's
Friend Society in Boston.
Oct. 8th. The new opera-house of Fay Brothers &
Hosford was opened. The audience was addressed
by Mayor Palmer and Hon. F. T. Greenhalge, mem-
ber of Congress. The poem written by John S.
Colby was a production worthy of the occasion.
This building fills a want long felt by many of
the people of Lowell. More spacious play-houses
may be found in other cities, but it is claimed that
there are none which exceed this in the general
beauty and effect of its interior. It is constructed
wholly of brick an 1 iron, and is as nearly fire-proof
as possible. It is situated between Central and Gor-
ham Streets, not fronting fully upon either street,
and it makes no pretence at external beauty. Its
seating capacity is 1600.
The Training School-house, of Charles Street, was
finished in 1889, at a cost of $28,000.
A.MOo BiNXEY Fkexch was born in Billerica July
3, 1812, and died at his residence on Bridge Street,
Lowell, on March 23, 1890, at the age of seventy-eight
years. His father was Luther French, a respectable
farmer in Biller-ca. Lieut. William French, the earli-
est American ancestor of Mr. French, came to America
in 1G35, and was a leading citizen of Billerica, hav-
ing been, in 1003-04, the first representative of the
town in the Legislature of Massachusetts.
Jlr. French was one of the four sons of Luther
French, who came to Lowell in the early days of the
4-ii
city, and were known as business men of superior
ability. Of these brothers, Josiah B., the old-
est, was once mayor of Lowell. A sketch of his life is
given on another page of this work. Abram, the
■second in age. came to Lowell in 1833, and was long
a well-known merchant tailor in the city. He was a
member of the Common Council, and for several
years on the Board of School Committee. Walter,
the third brother, after keeping restaurants in Low-
ell and in Manchester, N. H., became a contractor in
the construction of several important railroads, and
was killed in 1853 in the railroad disaster at Nor-
walk, Conn., at the age of forty-three years. Amos
B. French, the subject of this sketch, and the young-
est of the four brothers, came to Lowell when about
eleven years of age. His first employment was in the
service of the manufacturing companies of the city.
In 1835 he eslablished a restaurant on Central Street,
and afterward added a dance-hall, which for many
years was a place of popular resort. It always gave
character and re-tpectability to a social event to say
that it was at " French's.''
In 18G3 he was succeeded in the restaurant busi-
ness by Nichols & Hutchins, and he became senior
partner of the firm of French & Puffer, dealers in
crockery, on Central Street. In this firm he con-
tinued until the time of his death, a period of
twenty-seven years, enjoying the entire confidence of
the community as a man of the strictest integrity and
highest character.
Mr. French never sought political distinction, but
he was a man of such courteous and affable address,
and of Buch modest worth and dignity of character
that few men could more successfully appeal to the
suffrages of his fellow-citizens. He was in the Board
of Aldermen in 1870 and 1871, and at the time of his
death he was a director of the First National Bank
and of the Lowell Mutual Fire Insurance Company.
He was also a trustee of the Lowell Institution for
Savings.
The following tribute to Mr. French's character
was furnished, at the writer's request, by his pastor,
the Rev. George W. Bicknell :
" In many respects the life of ;\Ir. French was an
unostentatious one, yet it exerted a great influence
for good. There was always something about his
presence which inspired those associated with him.
In his business relations he was honest, upright and
reliable. His word was as good as his bond. He
took advantage of no man. He accumulated quite a
fortune, but it was the result of straightforward and
legitimate transactions. His generosity and iinsel-
fisbness would never have allowed him to become
rich. His long career among our business men gave
him an enviable position. Mr. French was as mod-
est as he was manly. His was a rich and noble char-
acter. Genial, affable, sympathetic, always kind, he
won the love of companions and associates. His
heart beat for humanitv, manifesting itself so often
50
niSTORV OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
in ministering to the poor and suflTering, in liundreds
of acts of charity, of which the world knows noth-
ing. Truly it may be said of him that he determined
not to let the right hand know what the left h:ind
did, and yet, as occasion called, he kept both hands
active.
" His friendship was rich and valuable. He was
true. Those who confided in him did not misplace
their trust. He had a kind word for all. Many
eyes were dimmed with tears when he passed away.
"Mr. French was a devoted and enthusiastic mem-
ber of the First Universalist Church, reflecting its
great principles of love, kindness and righteousness
in his daily life."
1890. Mayor, Charles D. Palmer.
From Mayor Palmer's inaugural address, at the
organization of the city government for 1890, on Jan.
0(h, we learn the following: The expenditure for
hchools in Lowell for 1S89 was $188,905; the number
of inmates of the alms-house, 602 ; average, 249 ; the
number of alarms of fire during the year, 115. The
number of electric lights was 177; of gas-lights, 959;
of gasoline-lights, 416; total number of lights sus-
tained by the city, 1552 ; the total length of city sew-
ers, 55 miles; total length of city streets, 102 miles;
cost of caring for parks and commons, SS070 ; cost of
caring for public cemeteries, §4200 ; totai length of
main pipes in water-works, 470,747 feet ; total num-
ber of hydrants, 824; expenditures for school-houses
for 1888 and 1889, §107,000.
On April 14th occurred, at Huntington Hall, the
anniversary exercises of the Port Royal Society,
whose members belonged to the land and naval forces
operating in the vicinity of Port Royal, S. C, during
the Civil War. Judge Advocate Charles Cowley de-
livered an address recalling the memories of the
eventful days in which he took part in the operations
of the s-quadron sent to reduce the rebel forts. Rev.
Dr. Chambre, of Lowell, Hon. John Reed, of Cam-
bridge, Eric B. Dahlgren, Frederic F. .Vyer and
others took part in the proceedings. A poem was
read by Lieut. E. W. Thompson.
CHAPTER IV.
LO WELL -{Cunliiiucd).
MAYORS.
In preparing the following sketches of the lives
of the mayors of our city 1 have been greatly aided
by biographical notices of nineteen of their number
published in the Vox Populi, in 1874 and 1875. If
it shall be thought by any that I have too uniform-
ly bestowed upon these men words of praise, I can
only say that my words have been sincere. I have
known all but one of the mayors of Lowell, and I
believe them to be a class of noble men. I think
it highly to the honor of the people of Lowell that
they have had the wisdom to bestow their highest
offices upon men like these. The character of a peo-
ple is indicated by the character of the men whom
they choose to represent them. It is one of the fe-
licities of popular government that even bad men
rarely venture to nominate bad men like themselves
for high office. Though exceptions occur, such,
happily, is the rule. It is in the lower grades of
office that bad men are found, and there, too often,
corruption begins.
The portraits of all but five of the twenty-six may-
ors of Lowell adorn the walls of the City Govern-
ment Building. They are accurate and highly fin-
ished likenesses, most of them being from the skill-
ful band of our fellow-citizen, the late Thomas B.
Lawson, Esq.
Dr. Ei-I.sha Eartlett, the first mayor of Lowell,
was born in Smithfield, R. I., October 0, 1804. His
parents belonged to the Society of Friends. When
twenty-two years of age he graduated as Doctor of
Medicine at Brown University, and after spending a
year in foreign travel and study, he came to Lowell to
enter upon the practice of his profession. His genial
nature, his fine personal appearance and his all'able
manners soon made him a general favorite, and iu
1830, when only thirty-two years of age, he had the
honor of being elected as fir.st mayor of Lowell, and
was re-elected iu 1837. He was not a politician, nor
were the labors of official life specially agreeable to
his nature. He loved his profession and was fond of
literary pursuits. He was the author of valuable
medical works. As an orator he held a high position.
There was a jjoetic charm in his eloquent language
which captivated the hearer. The writer has still a
vivid recollection of bearing his opening lecture in a
course delivered more than fifty years ago before the
Medical School of Dartmouth College. The beautiful
and eloquent language with which he portrayed the
sacredness of the physician's office at the bedside of
the dying and amidst the most tender and solemn
scenes of domestic life, left an impression upon the
mind which can never be effiiced. But another
writer will speak of him as &. physician. It is my
part only to write of him as a citizen whom Lowell
honored by electing him as the first mayor of the
city.
Dr. Bartlett spent his last years as an invalid in
his native town of Smithfield, R. I. He died in the
prime of manhood at the age of fifty-one years.
Ll'ther Lawrence, second mayor of Lowell, was
born in Groton, Massachusetts, September 28, 1778.
He was the son of Samuel Lawrence, an officer in the
Revolutionary Army. He w.as the oldest son of five
brothers who constituted a family of distinguished
name. His brother Abbott, especially, acquired re-
nown as American Jlinister to the Court of St. James,
and as a merchant prince of the most exalted char-
acter. The whole family were interested deeply iu
LOWELL.
51
the manufactures of Lowell. Abbott Lawrence's
name is mentioned in tlie acts of incorporation of the
Tremont, tbt' Boott and the Massachusetts Mills of
our city. Luther Lawrecce graduated from Harvard
College when twenty-three years of age, and having
completed his legal studies, settled as a lawyer in his
native town. His fellow-citizens paid him the honor
of sending him repeatedly to the General Court, and
in 1821 and 1822 he was chosen Speaker of the Lower
House. It was, in part, to care for the great amount
of property invested by himself and his brothers in
our mills that he removed his residence to Lowell in
1831, where he engaged in the practice of his profes-
sion and soon acquired distinction. He was elected
mayor in 1838 and 1839. About two weeks after en-
tering upon the duties of his second term of office
he was, on April 16, 1831), accidentally killed in the
Middlesex Mills by falling into a wheel-pit. His age
was sixty-one years. His sudden and tragic death
was the occasion of universal sorrow. He was a man
of kindly heart, of high honor, of sound judgment
and unselfish and liberal spirit. The citizens of Low-
ell desired to pay him the respect of a public funeral,
but his family declined to accepc the proffered honor.
He was buried in his native town.
Dr. Eusha Huxtisgtos, mayor of Lowell in
IS-lt), 1841, 1844, 1845, 1852, 185G, 1858 and most of
1859 waa born in Topsfield, Massachusetts, April 9,
179G, and was the son of Rev. Asahel Huntington, for
nearly twenty-five years the minister of that town.
At the age of fifteen years he entered Dartmouth
College and graduated in 1815. After attending medi-
cal lectures at Yale College and taking his degree in
medicine, he came to Lowell iu 1824 to enter upon
the practice of his profession — a practice which for
more than forty years he followed with great popu-
larity and success. He was indeed a " beloved physi-
cian." Probably no citizen of Lowell has ever so
long and so uniformly held the honor and affection of
the people. Lowell was never weary of bestowing
honors upon him. For nearly eight years he was
mayor of the city. When in any cause success
seemed doubtful, courage and hoi)e revived if Dr.
Huntington consented to take the lead. He was
born a gentleman, and it was in his very nature to
win men by his kind and affable ways.
Though a modest man, he was always before the
public. The partiality of his fellow-citizens placed
him there. Not only did he fill all the higher grades
of municipal office, but he was a church warden, an
overseer of Harvard College, and in 1852 Lieutenant-
Governor of the State.
His name will not be allowed to pass into oblivion.
One of our streets is Huntington Street and our most
spacious public hall is Huntington Hall. His por-
trait graces the City Government Building and the
reading-room of the Middlesex Mechanics' Associa-
tion. In St. John's Church, of which he was a war-
den, a window has been placed in which there i; a
life-size figure, in his honor, of St. Luke the "be-
loved physician." His only daughter is the wife of
Professor J. P. Cooke, of Harvard College, and one of
his sons is Rev. Dr. William R. Huntington, rector
of Grace Church, New York City. Dr. Huntington
died December 13, 1865, at the age of nearly seventy
years.
Nathaniel Wriqht was born in Sterling, Mass.,
Feb. 13, 1785, and was ihe oldest son of Hon. Thomas
Wright. He entered Harvard College when nineteen
years of age and was admitted to the bar at the age
of twenty-six years, having in Lowell pursued the
study of law under Asahel Stearns, who was subse-
quently a member of Congress and Professor of Law
in Harvard College. Prof. Stearns, when in Lowell,
occupied the house on the corner of Pawtucket and
School Streets, which became the residence and
properly of Mr. Wright. The house has in recent
years been occupied by Mr. Gerrish, the son-in-law of
Mr. Wright. The law-office of Mr. Wright was on
the Dracut side of the river, where he acted as post-
master before 1824, when the first government post-
oftice was established on Tilden Street, in East
Chelmsford (now Lowell). Mr. Wright succeeded to
the business of Prof. Stearns and enjoyed a good
practice, and to a remarkable extent possessed the
confidence of the community. When Lowell became
a town, in 1826, he was chosen on the first Board of
Selectmen and he was the first representative to the
General Cuurt elected by the town. He was three
times re-elected to these offices. In 1842 he was
elected mayor on the Citizens' ticket as a repre-
sentative of the interests of the citizens of Lowell
who believed that the Corporations were exercising an
undue amount of control over public affairs and
were oppressively treating their employees. His
opponent was Dr. Elisha Huntington, the Whig
candidate, who was supposed to favor the interests of
the Corporations. In 1843 the Whigs adspted him
as their candidate and elected him.
Mr. Wright was a man of few words, of decided
action, of clear perceptions and sound judgment.
He was a sound man of business and was averse to
popular display. He died Nov. 5, 1858, at the age of
nearly seventy-four years.
Jefferso:^ B.\xcroft was born in Warwick,
Mass., April 30, 1803. The circumstances of his youth
con>pe;led him to begin very early a life of self-
sujiport and self-reliance. First upon a farm in Athol,
Mass., and then in a blacksmith shop, with few
educational advantages, he spent the first years of
his long and honorable life. Coming to Lowell iu
1824, he found employment in the mills until
1831. His position as overseer in theAppleloo Mills
was in that year exchanged for that of deputy sheriff
under Sheriff B. F. Varnum. This office he held for
twenty years, filling meant' me various other trusts, such
as collector of taxes, chief engineer of the Fire Depart-
ment, and member of the Common Council and Board
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of Aldermen. He bears the title of colonel from
having been chosen the first colonel of the Fifth (now
Sixth) Regiment. He held the office of mayor of
the cily in the years 184(3-7-8. He also represented
Lowell in the State Legislature in the years 1840-41-
50-51. In 1853-4-5 he was warden of the
State Prison. In 1860 he was again appointed
deputy sheriff and performed the duties of th.at
position until 1887, when advancing age compelled
him to retire. The last two years of his life were
spent upon his farm in Tyngsboro', Mass.
Col. Bancroft was endowed by nature with qualities
which have well deserved the honors which have
been bestowed upon him. His dignified personal
bearing and his commanding presence well befitted
his military title and admirably qualified him to per-
form the duties of sheriff in the courts of law. He
died in Tyngsboro', Jan. 3, 1890, at the age of nearly
eighty-seven years.
JosiAH B. French. — (For biography see chapter
on City of Lowell.)
James H. B. Ayer was born in Haverhill, Mass.,
17S8. He was a descendant in the fourth generation
of the celebrated Captain Samuel Ayer, first captain
of the town of Haverhill, who, on August 28, 1708,
when the French and Indians, under the infamous
Hertel de Rouville, attacked the vill.ige of Haverhill,
and killed the minister of the town and many of its
inhabitants, rallied his little company of s^ildiers, pur-
sued the retreating enemy, and sacrificed his life in a
brave attack upon ihem.
Mr. Ayer, when a young man, engaged in trade
and in teaching school in the town of Amesbury. He
subsequently came to Lowell in 1823, while the first
mill of the Merrimack Compauy was not yet com-
pleted, .and was employed by this company and the
Locks & Canals Company to take charge of the lum-
ber department. In this service he was engaged
until 1846, when he was associated for five years with
Horatio Fletcher in the lumber business. He was
next employed as paymaster of the Locks & Canals
Company.
Being one of the earliest employes of the enterprise
of establishing manufactures in East Chelmsford, he
held many offices of honor and trust in the early days
of Lowell. He was one of the selectmen of Chelms-
ford, also one of the assessors both of Chelmsford and
Lowell. He assisted in running the boundary line
between Chelmsford and Lowell. He was for twenty
years warden of St. Anne's Church. He was alder-
man in 184'J and 1850, and was mayor of the city in
1851. During his last twelve years he was paymaster
of the Locks & Canals Company.
He died June 7, 1864, at the age of seventy-six
years, and was buried in Amesbury, Mass.
He was a man of good sense, high character and
sterling honesty.
Sewall G. Mack w.is born in Wilton, N. H., No-
Tember 8, 1813. Kemoviug to Amherst, N. H., in
his boyhood, he there engaged, while yet a young
man, in the business which he has followed through-
out his active life. He came to Lowell in 1840, and,
in company with Mr. Daniel Cushing, established
the well-known firm of " Cashing &, Mack, dealers in
stoves, &c."
Mr. Mack gained the confidence of the community
not only as an honorable business man, but as a citi-
zen who could be intrusted with important responsi-
bilities in conducting municipal affairs. In 1843 and
1846 he was a member of the Common Council, and
in 1847 he served in the Board of Aldermen. lu
1853 and 1854 he was mayor of the city. In 1862 he
was a member of the Legislature. With this last ser-
vice his political career was closed, and he retired to
the more congenial sphere of business life. That may
be said of him which can be said of very few who
engage in trade, that he pursued the same business
and almost in the same place for about forty-six
years.
About three years since he withdrew from active
business life, but ho still finds, at the age of s-eventy-
six years, much to occupy and interest his mind. He
is president of the Lowell Gas Company, and also
president of the Five Cents Savings Bank, and has
long been a director of the Railroad Bank, and of the
Stony Biook Railroad. Besides these there are many
other positions of trust which are wont to be bestowed
upon a man so long and so well-known as he for his
fidelity, ability and knowledge of business. Add to
these also the care of his own large estate. Probably
in his declining years no labors are more congenial to
him than those which pertain to the welfare of Kirk
Street Congregational Church, in which he has long
lield the office of deacon, and of which he is one of
the most liberal supporters.
Dr. Ambrose Lawuexce was torn in Boscawen,
N. H., May 2, 1816. His early years were spent
upon a farm, and he had not the advantage of a lib-
eral education. He came to Lowell when twenty-one
years of age and worked as a machinist for the Suf-
folk Corporation. Soon, however, turning his mind
to the study of dentistry, he opened a dentist's office
in 1S3"J in a building on or near the site of the pres-
ent post-office, where he remained for about thirteen
years. In 1852 he erected for his residence the house
on John Street, which is now known as " Young
Women's Home." He was in the City Council iu
1S40, and in the Board of Aldermen iu 1851 and
1859. In 1855 he was mayor of tlie cily, having been
the candidate of the Ameiicau or "Know-Nothing"
party in its most prosperous days.
Dr. Lawrence took an active part in re-organizing
the Fire Department, iu the iutroduction of pure
water into the city and in making Central Bridge
free. He possesses an active and inventive mind and
through the success of the Amalgam Filling invented
by him, and extensively need by dentists, he has
made himself wealthy. He is a man of mirthful
LOWELL.
53
spirit and it has been said of him that he loves a
joke better than a good dinner. He is not a partisan
in politics, though he was wont to take part with the
Whigs. For more than twenty years he has resided
in Cambridge and Bost3n,his present residence being
Boston Highlands.
Stephen RIansur was bora in Temple, N. H.,
August 25, 1798. At the age of sixteen years he
began to serve as a hired man upon a farm. His am-
bition, however, did not allow him long to occupy an
inferior position. When only twenty-one years of
age he became the proprietor of a hotel and stables
in Boston. Having had some experience in working
upon a canal during a short residence in the State of
New York, he came to Lowell in 1822, when the
work of widening the Pawtucket Canal was begun,
and was appointed as an assistant superintendent of
that undertaking. In 1830 he commenced (with a
partner) the hardware and crockery business. In thi.s
business he continued almost to the end of his life,
occupying for many of his last years a store on or
near the site of the Boston & Maine Depot, on
Central Street.
He gained the confidence of his fellow-citizens,
and was elected in 1S3G, and again in 1850, a member
of the State Legislature. He was twice in the Com-
mon Council and three times in the Board of Alder-
men. He was mayor of the city in 1857. After this
he stood aloof from public office.
Mr. Mansur was a religious man and was closely
allied to the interests of the First Baptist Church, of
which he was a deacon. lu his church relations he
was highly esteemed. He was a pian of good busi-
ness qualities and of sterling common sense. He
died April 1, 18G3, at the age of nearly sixty-four
years.
James Cook was born in Preston, Conn., October
4, 1781. His father was the proprietor of a fulling-
mill, and it was while employed in his youth in his
father's mill that the son gained that knowledge of
the manufacture of woolens for which he was after-
wards distinguished, and in which he 8i)ent his early
manhood. In those early days the New England
farmers raised their own wool, and made it into cloth
in their own families. Cloth thus made was sent to
the clothier's mill to be fulled, colored and dressed.
Mr. Cook was the oldest of a family of seven sons,
and it devolved upon him to learu the clothier's
trade in his boyhood. After the War of 1812 the
three oldest brothers commenced the busine?8 of
manufacturing broadcloth in Northampton, Mass.
But Lowell at that time presented advantages for
manufacturing woolens so much superior to those at
Northampton, that in 1828 the brothers sold out.
Mr. Cook was employed as the first agent of the
Middlesex Company in Lowell in 1830, and under his
management this company inaugurated the manufac-
ture of woolens on a large scale. Mr. Cook's experi-
ence and skill were exhibited in many valuable im-
provements, especially in adapting the Crompton
loom in making woolen as well as cotton fabrics.
So successful were these operations, that in the
third year a dividend of thirty-three per cent, was
declared. For six years, beginning with 184G, he had
charge of the Winooski Mills at Burlington, Vt.,
during which he received the gold medal of the
American Institute for his manufactures. He subse-
quently had charge of the Uncas Woolen-Mills of
Norwich, Conn.
After the disaster brought upon the Middlesex
Mills in Lowell by the gross mismanagement of
Lawrence, Stone & Co., Mr. Cook was a second time
made the agent of these mills, and held the position
one year, leaving the properly greatly improved.
Giving up the business of a manufacturer, he spent
his last years in the insurance business. Though not
a politician, he was twice a member of the Common
Council, and was elected by the American party as
mayor of the city for 1859. My limited space will not
allow me to rehearse his history as a military man in
the War of 1812, in which he skillfully captured a
British barge. He died April 10, 1884, at the ad-
vanced age of nearly ninety years.
Besjamix C. Sargeakt was born in Unity, New
Hampshire, February 11, 1823. From Unity he re-
moved in his boyhood to Windsor, Vermont. When
sixteen years of age he came to Lowell and entered,
as clerk, the book -store of Abijah Watson, his brother-
in-law. About 1842 he went to New York, where he
found employment in a book-store for about three
years. In 1845 he opened a store on Central Street,
on or near the site of the Central Block. Subse-
quentiy he established a book-store in the City Gov-
ernment Building, in which he continued throughout
his life.
Mr. Sargeant was five times a member of the
Common Council and was three times elected presi-
dent of that body. He was mayor of the city in 18G0
and 18G1, and proved himself to be an efficientofficer.
He was known as a religious man and was a vestry-
man of St. Anne's Parish. His manners were cour-
teous and his bearing dignified. He made an excel-
lent presiding officer, and Lowell had a worthy repre-
sentative in him on public occasions. His popular-
ity is indicated by the fact that the Sargeant Light
Guard received its name from him.
He left no children. After a long and painful ill-
ness he died on March 2, 1870, at the age of forty-
seven years.
HoctTM HosFORD was born in Charlotte, Ver-
mont, November 8, 1825. He worked upon his
father's farm until his twentieth year, during the last
three of which he had its entire management. Though
his means for educating himself were limited, he was
appointed teacher of a district school when only
eighteen years of age. When twenty years old he
came to Lowell and found employment in Gardner &
Wilson's dry -goods store at a salary of 1150. After a
54
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
service of a few years as clerk, he sucoeedod Daniel
West, one of his former employers, as proprietor of a
store on Merrimack Street, and continued in the dry-
goods business on this street during the remainder of
his life.
With his partner, Arthur G. Pollard, he erected on
Merrimack Street in 1874-75, the spacious and elegant
building known so well to the citizens of Lowell as
the store of " Hosford & Co." It is a model building
fitted with every convenience adapted to the trade.
Mr. Hosford was a member of the Common Council
in 1860, and of the Board of Aldermen in 1801 and
1867. He served as mayor of the city in 1862, being
the youngest person who had ever served in ihisoifice.
He was re-elected as mayor for the years 1863 and
1864. He was a member of the State Legislature in
1866. His capaciiy for business gained for him ap-
pointments to places of high responsibility. He was
a director of the Boston & Lowell, and the Lowell &
Lawrence Railroads, and in 1875 he succeeded General
Stark as manager of the Boston & Lowell Railroad.
In the latter position he served during the rest of his
life, being at the same time treasurer of the Lowell
Hosiery Company, and of the Vassalborough Woolen-
Mills.
In 1864 he was chosen president of the Jlerchants'
National Bank. In the above and many other posi-
tions, too numerous to be mentioned, Mr. Hosford
exhibited a capacity for business, a soundness of
judgment and a clearness of perception which have
given him a high rank among the first citizens of
Lowell.
His most distinguished honor is that attained as
mayor in the years of the Rebellion. In those years
of sorest trial he served his city nobly and gained the
titleof " War Mayor."
He died April 5, 1881, at the age of fifty-five years.
JosiAH G. Peabody was born in Portsmouth, N.
H., December 21, 1808. In 1824, after having for four
years worked upon a farm in Haverhill, Mass., he
came to Lowell, in order to learn the trade of carpen-
ter and house-builder. Here he engaged in the ser-
vice of Captain John Bassett, then a well-known
builder. He seems to have finished his somewhat
limited education at Atkinson Academy, N. H. In
1833, when only twenty-five years of age, he entered
upon the business of contractor and builder. Among
the buildings erected by him are the bank building
on Shattuck Street, the Kirk Street Church, the Lee
Street Church, the lunatic hospital at Taunton, and
the Custom- House at Gloucester. From 1808 to the
present time he has been engaged in the manufacture
of doors, sashes and blinds at the Wameait Steam-
Mills in this city.
In the Lowell Fire Department Captain Peabody
has seen long and arduous service, and for eleven
years he was iu the Board of Engineers. He was
elected captain of the Mechanic Phalanx in 1S43.
He was in the Massacliu.-etts Legislature in 1837
and in 1855, and was in 1856 a member of the Gov-
ernor s Council under Governor Gardner. He was
twice in the Common Council and once in the Board
of .A.ldermen. In 1865, 1866 and 1872 he was m.ayor
of the city. In this office he served the city most faith-
fully. He is a man of affairs, a true Yankee, abound-
ing in energy, force and courage. The cause of tem-
perance has no firmer friend or a more constant and
consistent worker. His presence is still familiar in
our streets, and he bears with ease and grace the bur-
den of more than eighty years.
George Fraxcis Richardson. — (For biography
see Bench and Bar chapter.)
Jonathan P. Folsom was born in Tamworth, N.
H., October 9, 1820. At the age of five years he re-
moved to Great Falls, where he remained twelve years.
Having afterwards served two or three years as clerk
in a store at Rochester, N. H., he came to Lowell in
1S4U, when twenty years of age. Here lie became a
clerk with the firm of Din-more i; Read, on Merrimack
Street. After two years he went South and entered
as clerk into the service of James Brazer, in Ben.son,
Alabama, where he was appointed postmaster of the
town. Having spent about six years in the South, he
returned to Lowell and entered the service of David
West, having as a fellow-clerk Mr. Hosford, who af-
terwards became mayor of the city.
After two years in the store of Mr. West he went
into trade for himself on Merrimack Street. Since
that time, in different capacities, he has, down to the
present year, been engaged ;n the dry-goods business.
Mr. Folsom was a member of the Common Council
in 1856 and 1S()7 ; a member of the Bojird of Alder-
men in 1859-61-62 and 1873, and mayor of the city
in 1869-70. In 1871-72 he represented Lowell in
the State Legislature. He has also been a trustee of
the Central Savings Bank and a director in the Old
Lowell National Bank.
Mr. Folsom has always been known as a man of
ngreeable presence and afl'able manners. At his
second election to the mayoralty he received every
vote cast but two, — a nearer approximation to unan-
imity than any other mayor has ever attained.
Edward F. Sherman was born in Acton, Mass.,
Feb. 10, 1821. He came to Lowell when a child and
attended school under Master Bassett in the school-
house built and owned by the Merrimack Company.
This building stood upon the site of the Green School-
house, and is the same in which Dr. Edson first
preached on coming to Lowell, ilr. Sherman once
publicly read an amusing account of Master Bassett's
school, the substance of which is fuund in this volume
under the head of " Schools."
Mr. Sherman graduated from Dartmouth College in
1843, and had the honor in a subsequent year of giv-
ing an oration before the college upon taking his de-
gree of Master of Arts. He was for some time en-
gaged in teaching, having been elected preceptor of
the academy in Canaan, N. H., and that in Pittsfield,
LOWELL.
55
Mass. He commenced the study of law about 1846
iu the office of Hon. Tappan W'entworth, and subse^
quently became Mr. Weniworth's partner. In 1855
he was elected to the office of secretary of the
Traders' and Mechanics' Insurance Company, — an
office which he held during the rest of his life.
In ISGl and ISCC he served as member of the Legisla-
ture of Massachusetts, and in 1870 was in the Board of
Aldermen. For several years he served on the School
Committee. In 1871 he was mayor of the city, having
been nominated by the Citizens' party. Though well
qualified for the place, he did not seek it. He had in
previous years been affected with pulmonary disease,
and could ill afford to incur the labors and excitement
attending the performance of his duties in the mayor-
alty. Most unfortunately the small-pox prevailed in the
city in an epidemic form, and from every side his ad-
ministration was severely and, doubtless, often un-
justly, charged with inefficiency in checking it. The
strain was too severe for his sensitive nature. He
went to the sick-bed upon quitting the mayor's chair,
and died In six short weeks. His death was on his
birthday. His age was fifty-one years. He was a
man of kind heart, of very pleasing address, of
scholarly tastes and of superior iutellectual powers.
Fkaxcis Jewett was born in Nelson, N. H., Sept_
19, 1820. His father, who was a farmer, suffered so
severely from a serious lameness, that his son in his
early years was compelled to assume, in conducting
the farm, the responsibilities of a man. Mayor Jew-
ett is by no means the first man whose misfortunes in
youth have laid the fouudations of future success and
made them leaders of men. He seems to have finished
his education at the Baptist Seminary in Hancock.
Young Jewett possessed a robust and powerful
frame, and a mind to match. He early learned to
grapple with the labors and hardships of life with
courage and buoyant energy. His townsmen recog-
nized his merit, and before he was twenty-eight years
of age he was twice elected to the Board of Selectmen.
Before finally quitting his farm he had, in the winter
months, found employment as a butcher in Middlesex
Village, now a part of Lowell. In 1850, with a cash
capital of S200, he started business as a butcher in
that village. Twenty years later he established him-
self in business in the place on Middlesex S:reet
where he now resides. His place of business is now
on Button Street.
Mr. Jewett has always been a favorite among the
voters. His sturdy manliness, his thorough honesty,
his kindly bearing and his sound common sense win
the confidence of the common people, and they like
to give him offices of trust. He has been twice
elected to the Common Council and twice to the
Board of Aldermen. In 1873, 1874 and 1875 he was
mayor of the city, and iu 1877 and 1870 he was State
Senator. He was chosen elector in the Garfield cam-
paign in 1880, and in 1887-SS-8'J he was on the Gov-
ernor's Council. He has filled every office well.
Charles A. Stott was born in Centralville while
it was yet a part of the town of Dracut, August 18,
1835. The annexation of Centralville to Lowell oc-
curred in 1851. No other mayor of the city had
been born within its limits. He pas-sed through all
the grades of our public schools, and has spent his
whole life within the city. His father, Mr. CharUs
Stott, was a man of marked individuality, who came
when a young man from England almost penniless,
and by persistent industry and great energy and strict
economy acquired wealth and an honored name. He
was superintendent of the Belvidere Woolen Manu-
facturing Company, which was established by him,
and was known as a skillful and very successful
manufacturer.
Major Charles A. Stott, the son, upon leaving the
High School, became a clerk under his father, and
several years after his father's death he has become
agent and president of the company, — a company
which has long enjoyed very great success.
Major Stott, in the early part of the Rebellion,
took an active and patriotic part in raising troops,
and served as major in the Sixth Regiment of nine
months' men. This regiment, which was in the ser-
vice from August, 1862, to June, 1803, was stationed
at Suffolk, Va., and was under the command of A. S.
FoUansbee as colonel, and O. F. Terry as general.
After leaving the service, he built a flannel-mill
on Lawrence Street, which was for a time operated
by him. But this property he sold, and became, as
stated above, the agent and president of the mills
established by his father. He occupies an elegant
private residence on Nesmith Street.
Major Stott holds a high position in the Masonic
order. In 1859 and 18G0 he was a member of the
Common Council, and was in the Board of Aldermen
in 1869 and 1870. He was mayor of the city in 1876
and 1877. He enjoys the esteem of his fellow-citi-
zens, and, what is very highly to his honor, he has
the affection and respect of those who are in his
employ.
JoHX A. G. Richardson was born in Lowell,
October 13, 1840, and was educated in the public
schools of the city. On leaving the High School, he
formed a partnership with his brother in the pro-
vision business in Lowell. When thirty-four years of
age (1874), he was elected by Ward 4 a represent-
ative to the General Court of Massachusetts. That
a young Democrat should thus be selected \>j a Re-
publican ward, which had always put Republicans
in office, is a very pleasing indication of the peroonal
popularity of the man. In 1878 and 1879 he was
mayor of the city. Lowell had elected no Demo-
cratic mayor for twenty-eight year?. The very flat-
tering majority received by Mayor Richardson at hia
second election is ample testimony to the acceptable
manner in which he had fulfilled the duties of his
office in hie first year.
In the Rebellion he belonged to Company C of the
56
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Sixth Regiment, and three times went with hia regi-
ment on its southern campaigns.
Mr. Richardson is not a politician. His tastes
lead him to the pursuits of business life. Since re-
tiring from his position as mayor, he has engaged in
the provision business in Lowell, and since 1SS2 in
the wholesale beef trade in Minneapolis, Minn.
He is a gentleman of cordial address and pleasing
manners, and readily wins the respect and favor of
his fellow-citizens.
Frederic T. Gkeenhai.ge was born in Clitheroe,
a parliamentary borsugh of England, in the county
of Lancaster, on July 19, 1842. His father, William
Greenhalge, who had been an engraver in the famous
Primrose Print Works at Clitheroe, came to Lowell
about 1SS4, and was employed at the Merrimack
Print Works to take charge of the copper roller en-
graving. Young Greenhalge was then about twelve
years of age. He passed through all the grades of
the Lowell public schools, in which he was known as
a boy of superior talent. At the examination for ad-
mission to the High School he received the highest
rank of all the candidates, and, upon graduating Irom
the High School, he received a Carney medal, and
was acknowledged as the first boy in his class.
Especially did he excel as a declaimerupon the stage
thus early giving promise of that ability as an orator,
which he has exhibited in recent years. He entered
Harvard College in 1859, but the death of his father
compelled him to relinquish ihe hope of completing
his course, and to return to the serious responsibili-
ties which were placed upon him as an only son.
After teaching school and engaging in other labors
for self-support, he entered upon the study of law in
theofBce of Brown & Alger. In 18(53 he engaged
in the war, and was employed in the commissary de-
partment in Newbern, N. C. While at Newbern he
was seized with malarial fever, which compelled him,
after months of sickness, fo return home. Again he
devoted himself to the study of the law, and was ad-
mitted to the bar in June, 1865. His talents brought
him early success, and made him the object of popu-
lar favor. He served in the Common Council in 1868
and 1869, and in the School Board in 1871. In the
years 1880 and 1881 he was mayor of the city. I have
not the space to mention all the minor otBces which
he has held. He is everywhere recognized as a man
of high promise. He was elected to Congress in
November, 1888, and his many friends contidently
believe that in the arena of political debate he will
gain a high rank among our ablest orators.
George Runels was born in Warner, N. H., Feb-
ruary 3, 1823. During his first sixteen years he
worked upon the farm or in the blacksmith shop of
his father or his brother. In his seventeenth year he
came to Lowell, and for one season engaged in the
work of stone-cutting with Gardner K. Eastman. He
then went to sea in a whaling vessel. His vessel suf-
fered shipwreck near the Fiji Islands, in the South
Pacific Ocean. He escaped in a boat, and after three
days upon the water he was rescued by a passing ves-
sel. He next found employment on a trading vessel,
and was engaged in the South seas in selling tortoise-
shells and beche de mer, a species of slug used as a
delicacy by the Chinese in making soup. At length,
on board an English vessel, he traded in the Indies,
and while in Calcutta was attacked with the cholera,
and was confined to a hospital for six weeks. In
1844, having followed the seas for four years, he re-
turned to his work of stone-cutting in the service of
Mr. Eastman.
April 1, 1846, he engaged in the business of stone-
cutting for himself on Middlesex Street. Four years
after this he spent a few months in California. In
1S51 he purchased a farm in Waterbury, Vt. Re-
maining upon his farm about three years, he returned
to his business of stone-cutting in Lowell, which he
followed for more than twenty years. For the last
ten years he has been engaged in erecting buildings
and caring for his estate.
In 1S62 he was a member of the Common Council,
and in 1S64 and 1S73 he was in the Board of Alder-
men. He served as mayor of the city in 1882.
Mr. Runels is a man of modest merit, sound judg-
ment and strict integrity. Though not a politician,
he is everywhere known as a worthy, upright man,
who in his mayoralty served the city most faithfully.
John J. Dokovax was born in Y'onkers, N. Y.,
July 28, 1843. He came to Lowell when three years
of age, and was educated in the public schools of the
city. On leaving the High School he entered as
clerk into the employment of Mr. Gove, proprietor of
the Chapel Hill Grocery. Upon attaining his major-
ity, he was received as partner in the business, and
so continued until the death of Mr. Gove, in 1869.
The firm, known as Donovan & Co., was then estab-
lished. This firm still continues to do business as
grocers at 266 and 267 Central Street, and is consid-
ered cue of the best-established firms in the city. Its
commodious building is well adapted to the exten-
sive business of the firm. The firm deals largely in
powder, dualin and explosives, and has a store-house
in Tewksbury, in which its explosives are kept. In
1884 Mr. Donovan projected and constructed all the
lines of the Atlantic Telegraph Company east of
Boston. For many years he has been a. prominent
public mau.
In 1883 and 1SS4 he was mayor of the city. In
1886 he was Democratic candidate for the Fiftieth
Congress, and was, in 1888, president of the State
Democratic Convention. On April 30, 1889, he de-
livered the oration at the city's celebration of the
centennial anniversary of Washington's inaugural, and
also the memorial address on Decoration Day, May
30, 1889.
Mr. Donovan is still in the prime of life. He has
already made for himself an enviable record for sa-
gacity in business and for popular talent. His friends
LOWELL.
57
may naturally and confidently expect that still higher
lionors await him in the future.
EnwAED J. NoYES was born in Georgetown, Mass.,
September 7, 1841, and carae to Lowell when seven
years of age. Having passed through the primary
and grammar schools of the city, lie completed his
education at the academies of Groton, Mass., and
Newbury, Vt. While he was at Newbury the War
of the Rebellion broke out, and young Noyes, at the
age of twenty years, returned to Lowell, and entered
upon the service of recruiting soldiers for General
Butler. Under General Butler he went to Ship Isl-
and in 1861, and with him he entered New Orleans
on May 1, 18G2, being at the time temporarily upon
the general's staff. He rose in the service from
lieutenant to major. In 1862 he was appointed cap-
tain of the First Texas Cavalry, made up of Texans
who had been driven out of their State for their Union
sentiments. In this frontier and hostile position in
Texas he was exposed to almost daily encounters and
met with hardships and perils which few of our regi-
ments endured.
In Jlay, 1863, while charging through the enemy's
line of battle, he received a wound in the slioulder,
which confined him for some time to a hospital in
New Orleans. From this wound he has never com-
))letely recovered. When the war was drawing to a
close, in December, 18G4, he returned to Lowell. In
1860 and 1867 lie was engaged in planting cotton. In
18U8 he engaged for a year in the study of law in
Columbia College, N. Y. Until 1881 he was en-
gaged in private business. In that year and in 1882
he was chief of police in Lowell. In 1885 he was
mayor of the city. After engaging for two or three
years in private business he again, in 1888, became
chief of police in Lowell. He now (IS90) holds the
office of superintendent of the horse railroads of
Lowell.
Mayor Noyes bears an excellent record, both as a
brave soldier and as an efficient man of business. He
is admirably qualified for the position of chief of
police on account of his personal bravery and his
knowledge of law. To his new office he brings the
qualities which will doubtless command success.
James C. Abbott was born in Andover, Mass.,
June 3, 1825. Being the son of a widow he early
learned the lessons of industry and self-reliance
which have marked his manhood. He graduated
from Phillips Academy, at Andover, and entered
Dartmouth College, where he remained two years.
At Harvard Law School he laid the foundation of
his success as a lawyer. Having studied law with
I. S. Morse, Esq., in Lowell, he opened an office in
Canal Block, having as his partner Harrison G.
Blaisdell, Esq.
He has now practiced law in Lowell nearly forty
years, and gained the reputation of a careful and
conscientious student, and a wise and faithful coun-
selor. Few men are more punctual in the discharge
of their duties, or more faithful and painstaking in
the execution of the trusts confided to them. Mr.
Abbott has never sought office. His honors have
been thrust upon him. He was a member of the
State Senate in 1887, and was for six years in the
School Board. He held the office of mayor of the
city in the years 1886 and 1887, and was in the Board
of Aldermen in 1880.
Since holding the office of mayor, Mr. Abbott has
devoted himself to the practice of his profession. He
is, however, president of the First National Bank, of
which he had previously been a director. He also
holds the office of commissioner of sinking funds.
He is president of the Lowell Mutual Fire Insurance
Company.
In the business world Mr. Abbott is esteemed a
safe, cautious, judicious man, whom it is safe to
trust. In politics his straightforward honesty and
conscientiousness make him an excellent executive,
but a poor partisan. He is thoroughly respected by
his political opponents as a man who cannot be man-
aged, and who will do the right thing when he sees
it. His practice of his profession has been remunera-
tive, and he has an elegant private residence on Fair-
mount Street.
Chakles D. Palmer was born in Cambridge,
Mass., November 25, 1845. His father, George W.
Palmer, was a book publisher and manufacturer.
The son graduated from the Dwight Grammar School,
of Boston, in 1858. On graduating from the Boston
Latin School, in 1864, he had the honor of receiving
one of the four Franklin medals. He graduated
from Harvard College in 1868.
With the purpose of becoming a manufacturer he
entered the service of the Washington Mills Com-
pany, in Lawrence, in which he exhibited such marked
ability that in 1869 he was appointed by one of the
United States commissioners to the Paris Exhibition
to the service of collecting statistics relating to the
wool industry in Canada.
For about ten years, beginning with 1872, he was
a member of a co-partnership for the manufacture of
woolen shoddy in North Chelmsford.
In 1880 he married Rcwena, youngest daughter of
the late Fisher A. Hildreth, Esq., of Lowell, who died
in 1873, leaving a large estate. It was in managing
the affairs of this estate that Mr. Palmer was em-
ployed from 1880 to the time of his election to the
mayoralty of the city. As mayor he has served the
city two years, 1888 and 1889, and he has now en-
tered upon his third year of office. It is only just to
say that he has more than met the expectations of
his friends. He has exhibited an independence of
action, a devotion to duty, and a correctness of judg-
ment, which give him a high rank among men distin-
guished for executive ability.
58
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
CHAPTER V.
LO WELL—^ ConLinued).
POLITICS.
Lowell, having had its first election under a city
charter, it will be interefting, at this point, to turn
our attention to its political history both as a town
and as a city.
lu iis early elections, as a town, the Whigs had a
very decided preponderance. In the Presidential
election of 1828 John Quincy Adams received almost
three times as many votes as General Jackson, and
at the gubernatorial election of that year Levi Lin-
coln received more than seven times as many votes
for Governor as all his opponents. Gradually the
Democrats gained upon the Whigs until, in 1835, at
the last town election. Governor Everett received but
a bare majority over Marcus Morton.
After Lowell became a city, in 1836, no Democrat
was elected mayor of the city until 1848, when, after
three trials in the same month, Josiah B. French had
a majority of thirty-three over Daniel S. Richardson,
the Whig candidate, and Mr. French svas re-elected
in 1849. The next Democratic mayor was J. A. G.
Richardson, who, in 1877, had a majority of eighty
over Charles A. Stott. Mr. Richardson was re-elect-
ed in 1878 by a very heavy majority. In 1882 J. J.
Donovan, the Democratic candidate, was elected, and
in 1883 he was re-elected by a decided majority. In
1885 and 1886 J. C. Abbott, a Democrat, was elected.
In 1854 Ambrose Lawrence, the American, or Know-
Nothing candidate for mayor, received more than
five-sixths of the entire vote of the city. In every
other year a Whig or Republican has been elected,
either upon a strict party ticket or on a citizens'
ticket. The two parties now, 1890, are nearly equally
divided ; but the probability is that there are more
Democrats than Republicans, the balance of power
being in the hands of the voters who belong to neither
of the two great parties.
A third party has, in some years, acquired a con-
siderable strength in Lowell, conspicuously the
Kuow-Nothings, in 1854. From 1840, when James
G. Birney, the Anti-slavery presidential candidate,
received forty-two votes at the gubernatorial election
in 1852, when Horace ilann received 1202 votes, the
Anti-slavery party increased in strength, but the
Kansas troubles and the war merged them in the
Republican party. Again, the Prohibition party, in
1880, nominated for the mayoralty Hon. J. G. Pea-
body, who received 1279 votes. The fact that there
was no Democratic candidate in a great measure ac-
counts for this large Prohibition vote. This vote has
not often exceeded 200.
Many of the best citizens of Lowell have always
favored non-partisan nominations for city olficera.
Their theory is certainly plausible, and it implies a
high sentiment of patriotism ; but in practice the
people of Lowell have not been induced, for any con-
siderable time, to sustain it. Men are not so consti-
tuted that they can be regularly led to work with and
vote for men in the city eleciions whom they have
bitterly opposed as unfit for ofiice at the State elec-
tion only five weeks before. Non-partisan nomina-
tions are found practicable only when some important
question of public utility baa greater weight in the
minds of the voters than their party affiliations.
However, as will be seen below, in several of our
municipal elections non-partisan nominations have
been successful.
In the following record of the elections in Lowell
for sixty-three years I have omitted to name candi-
dates who have receive"d only a few votes :
In 1826, at the first election for Governor in
the town of Lowell, the result was, Levi Lincoln, of
Worcester, 95 ; James Lloyd, of Boston, 53.
In 1827, for Governor, Levi Lincoln, of Worcester,
89; Wm. C. Jarvis, of Cliarlestown, 22.
In 1828, for Governor, Levi Lincoln, 157; Elijah
H. Mills, of Northampton, 14. For President, John
Quincy Adams, 278 ; Andrew Jackson, 97.
In 1829, for Governor, Levi Lincoln, 127; Marcus
Morton, of Taunton, 21.
In 1830, for Governor, Levi Lincoln, 298; Marcus
Morton, 87. The population of Lowell in 1830 was
6477.
In November, 18!il, for Governor, Levi Lincoln,
264; Marcus Morton, 228.
In 1832, for Governor, Levi Lincoln, i'>75 ; M;ucus
Morton, 441. For President, Henry Clay, 694 ; An-
drew Jackson, 412.
In 1833, for Governor, John Davis, of Worcester,
452 ; Marcus Morton, 395.
In 1834, for Governor, John Davis, 893 ; Marcus
Morton, 668.
In 1835, for Governor, Edward Everett, of Boston,
826 ; Marcus Morton, 768.
In these ten years Messrs. Lincoln, Davis and Ever-
ett were the successful Republican candidates iu the
State elections.
In 1836, Lowell's first year under a city charter,
the elections resulted as follows : For mayor, Elisha
Bartlett, 958; Eliphalet Case, 868. For Governor,
Edward Everett, 864; Marcus Morton, 908. For
President, Daniel Webster, 878; Martin Van Buren,
894. Until 1846 the municipal elections were in the
spring and other elections in the autumn.
In 1836, Edward Everett was elected Governor and
Martin Van Buren President. Dr. Bartlett was a
physician, and Mr. Case an editor. It is proper here
to remark that throughout this political record the
officers mentioned as e!ectied assumed the duties of
their office in the next year after election, with this
exception, that until 1847 the mayors of the city were
LOWELL.
59
elected and entered upon their office in the spring of
the same year.
In 1867, for mayor, Elisha Bartlett, 1018; Elipha-
let Case, 817. For Governor, Edward Everett, 1058:
Marcus Morton, C28.
In 1838, for mayor, Luther Lawrence (Whig),
871 ; John W. Graves (Dem.), 529. For Governor,
Edward Everett (Whig), 871 ; Marcus Morton
(Dem.), 640. Mr. Everett was elected Governor in
1838. Mr. Lawrence was a lawyer, and Mr. Graves a
physician.
In 1839, for mayor, Luther Lawrence, 91C ; Josiah
B. French (Dem.), 215. For Governor, Edward
Everett, 1033; Marcus Morton, 812. Mr. Morton
was elected Governor in 1839. Mr. French was a
contractor. Upon the death of Mr. Lawrence, only a
few days after entering upon the duties of his office.
Dr. Elisha Huntington, who was a member of the
Common Council, was chosen his succesaor.
In 1840, for mayor, Elisha Huntington (Whig),
1093; Josiah B. French, 644. For Governor, John
Davis, 143G ; Marcus Morton, 941. For President,
Wm. H. Harrison, 1470 ; Martin Van Buren, 856.
Mr. Harrison was elected President, and Mr. Davis
Governor. Dr. Huntington received now his first
election. For many years he was the favorite candi-
date to be put forward when, in order to carry an
election, there was demanded a candidate of great
personal popularity. He was a practicing physician
in Lowell for many years. The population of Lowell
in 1840 was 20,981.
In 1841, for mayor, Elisha Huntington, 1032 ;
Jonathan Tyler, 523. For Governor, John Davis
(Whig), 1170; Marcus Morton, 1030. Mr. Davis
was elected Governor. Dr. Huntington had made so
popular a mayor that there was not a serious opposi-
tion to his re-election. A ticket headed by Mr.
Tyler (a Whig) received about one-third of the votes
of the city, the Democrats probably sustaining this
ticket in most case.-!.
In 1842, for mayor, Nathaniel Wright, 967 ; Elisha
Huntington, 94.S. There being no election on the
first trial, a second trial gave Mr. Wright, 1159 ; Dr.
Huntington, 1096. For Governor, John Davis, 1234;
Marcus Morton, 1263. Samuel E. Sewall, of Rox-
bury, candidate of the rising " Liberty " party, 128.
Mr. Jlortou was elected Governor. Mr. Wright was
a Whig. He was put up against Dr. Huntington by
citizens who believed that the corporations had been
exercising an undue influence in city aflairs, by dic-
tating to employees how they should vote, by
threatening to remove from their employ those who
did not vote as required. Messrs. Aiken and Bartlett,
agentsof the Lawrence and Boott Corporations, were
in 1842 special objects of attack. This sentiment led
to the nomination of Mr. Wright, who was elected at
the second trial. The Vux Fopuli was started in the
preceding year as the representative of this senti-
ment. It was designed as ;in expression of the vokc
of the people on the question of Corporation influence
and control.
In 1843, for mayor, Nathaniel Wright (Whip),
1093 ; Elisha Huntington, 224 ; John W. Graves, 577 ;
Josiah B. French, 85; others, 123. For Governor,
George N. Briggs (Whig), of Pitlafleld, 1473 ; Mar-
cus Morton, 1175 ; Samuel E. Sewall, 206. In the
city election party lines were not closely drawn.
There were two Whig candidates and two Demo-
cratic candidates, and many scattering votes. Mr.
Briggs this year received the first of seven elections
as Governor of Massachuetts. He is the last of our
Governors whose terms of office have extended beyond
four years. The normal period seems now to be three
years. Gardner, Banks, Claflin, Rice, Long, Robinson
and Ames each served three years.
In 1844, for mayor, Elisha Huntington, 1477 ;
Jonathan Tyler (Whig), 935. For Governor, George
N. Briggs, 1791 ; George Bancroft, of Boston, 1138 ;
Samuel E. Sewall, 203. For President, Henry Clay,
1742 ; James K. Polk, 1091 ; James G. Birney, 246.
Governor Briggs was re-elected. James K. Polk was
chosen President. Jonathan Tyler was the " Citizen's "
candidate, on a non-partisan ticket.
In 1845, for mayor, Elisha Huntington, 1280 ; Geo.
Brownell (Whig), 198; Jonathan M. Marston (Demo-
crat), 123 ; others, 188. For Governor. George N.
Briggs, 1484 ; Isaac Davis, of Worcester, 655 ; Samuel
E. Sewall, 160. Governor Briggs was re-elected in
the city election. Mr. Brownell was superintendent
of the machine shops and Mr. Maraton was a dealer
in liquors. These two gentlemen received but few
votes because at this election there was no organized
opposition to the re-election of Dr. Huntington.
In 1846, for mayor, on first ballot, Jefl"erson Ban-
croft (Whig), 988 ; Joshua Swan (Whig), 813. On
second ballot, Bancroft, 1307 ; Swan, 196. Both Mr.
Bancroft and Mr. Swan were Whigs. There was some
local opposition to the regular Republican nominee,
Mr. Bancroft, in Ward Four. Complaint was made
that this ward had been neglected in the distribution
of offices. The nomination of Mr. Swan gave expres-
sion to that feeling, and the Democrats probably voted
for him. For Governor, in 1840, George N. Briges,
1576 ; Isaac Davis, 669 ; Samuel E. Sewall, 228. Mr.
Bancroft was a deputy sherifl" and Mr. Swan was a
contractor at the machine shop.
In 1846 there were two municipal elections. Here-
tofore the municipal year had begun in the spring, but
hereafter it is to begin in January. Hence the second
election in December, 1846, for the city government
of the year 1847. At this election the vote was, Ban-
croft, 1307 ; Swan, 196. There was no party conten-
tion, both candidates being Whigs.
Municipal election, December, 1817, and State elec-
tion, November, 1847. For mayor, Jeflerson Ban-
croft, 1032; Josiah B. French (Democrat), 655; Elisha
Huntington, 228. For Governor, Geo. N. Briggs,
60
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
1655; Caleb Gushing, of Newbirryport, 1282; Samuel
E. Sewall, 172.
Disaffection with Mr. Bancroft in Wards 3 and 4
explains the vote for Dr. Huntington. But little in-
terest was taken in this election, and the vote was
very small. Governor Briggs is re-elected. For the
two years the Mexican War had somewhat disturbed
the politics of the country. Even in Lowell, John
P. Kobinson, probably its most brilliant lawyer,
though a stanch Whig, favored the election of Gen-
eral Gushing, the Democratic opponent of Governor
Briggs. This opposition of Mr. Robinson gave biith
to that well-known poem of James R. Lowell, the
keen satire of which well outlines the local cause that
brought it forth :
"GiivenerB. ip a sensible mnn;
lie alftys to homo and looks arter his fulkd ;
He draws liis furrcr ez stniislit uz lit- can,
Au' into nobody's tater-patcb pukca.
But John P.
Robinson, he
Sez, he wouDt go fur Guvcaer B.
"Gineral C, he goc6 in fur the war,
Ho don't vully principle inore'n an old end ;
Wat did God make us raytional crect<*is fer —
But glory aud gunpoMdor, plunder and blooil ?
So, Johu P.
Kobinson, ho
Sez. he shall vote for Gineral C."
Municipal election in December, 1S48, and State
and National election in November, 184S. For mayor,
at first trial, Daniel S. Richardson, 1080 ; Josiah B.
French, 723 ; John W. Graves, C74 ; Oliver M. Whip-
ple, 249 ; Jefferson Bancroft, 88. At the second trial,
Richardson, 1305 ; French, 810 ; Graves, 064. At
the final trial, French, 1577; Richardson, 1544, and
others, 21 ; and Mr. French was elected by a plural-
ity of 33, and by a majority of 6. For Governor,
Geo. N. Briggs, 1976 ; Stephen G. Phillips, of Salem,
1221 ; Caleb Gushing, 441. For President, Zachary
Taylor, 1959; Martin Van Buren, 1096 ; Lewis Cass,
870. Mr. Tdylor was elected President, and Governor
Briggs re-elected. Mr. Richardson was a lawyer. A
comparison of the Presidential election with the city
election would seem to indicate that in the latter the
Anti-slavery party generally voted for Mr. French.
Oliver M. Whipple was a manufacturer of powder, and
one of the oldest and most prominent citizens. The
second and third trials in the city election were de-
manded because, at that time, a plurality did not
elect. Scattering votes could defeat an election.
Municipal election December, 1849, and State elec-
tion November, 1849. For mayor, Josiah B. French,
1521; Geo. Brownell (Whig), 1285. For Governor,
Geo. N. Briggs, 1659; Geo. S. Boutwell, of Groton,
759; Stephen C. Phillips, of Salem, 663. Governor
Briggs was re-elected, and Mayor French is compli-
mented with a second election. Mr. Brownell was
superintendent of machine shop.
Municipal election December, 1850, and State elec-
tion November, 1850. For mayor, James H. B. Ayer,
1811; Abner W. Buttrick, 893. For Governor, Geo.
N. Briggs, 1790; Geo. S. Boutwell, 891 ; Stephen G.
Phillips, 743. Mr. Boutwell was elected Governor.
Mr. Ayer was the paymaster of the Locks and Canals
Company, and Mr. Buttrick was a grqcer. Governor
Briggs meets with his first defeat in a gubernatorial
election. The population of Lowell in 1850 was
33,383.
Municipal election December, 1851, and State elec-
tion November, 1851. For mayor, Elisha Hunting-
ton, 2021; John W. Graves, 1S3S. For Governor,
Robert C. Winthrop, of Boston, 1915; Geo. S. Bout-
well, 1342; John G. Palfrey, of Cambridge, 681-
Governor Boutwell was re-elected.
Municipal election Dec, 1852, and State and
National election Nov., 1852. For mayor at first
trial, Sewall G. Mack, 1961 ; John W. Graves, 1919,
others, 48. Second trial, Mack, 1954; Graves, 1878.
For Governor, John H. Clifford, 1789 ; Henry W.
Bishop, of Lenox, 1236 ; Hor.ice Mann, of Newton,
the Free-Soil candidate, 1202. For President, Win-
field Scott, 2032; Franklin Pierce, 1576; John P.
Hale, 684. Mr. Clifford was elected Governor and Mr.
Pierce President. Mr. Mack was a dealer in stoves,
etc. In this year the Free-Soil vote reached its
highest point. It is probable that Mr. Mann, whose
vote was the highest, received support from the other
parties out of personal considerations.
JIunicipal election Dec, 1853. and State election
Nov., 1853. For mayor, Sewall G. Mack, 1979 ; John
Nesmith, 700; Weare Clifford, 697; Wm. Fiske, 275.
For Governor, Emory Washburn, of Worcester, 1927;
Henry W. Bishop, 942; Henry Wilson, of Natick,
973 ; Bradford L. Wales, of Randolph, 351. At the
city election John Nesmith was the Free-Soil candi-
date and Wm. Fiske the Temperance candidate. Mr.
Washburn was elected Governor. Mr. Nesmith was a
manufacturer and dealer in real estate. Mr. Fiske
was a dealer in lumber. In 1853 the people of the
State were called to vote upon the .icceptance of the
new Constitution formed at the constitutional conven"
tion under the control of a coalition of Democrats
and Free-Soilcrs. The Whigs under Washburn and
the National or Hunker Democrats under Wales suc-
ceeded in defeating most of the articles of the pro-
posed Constitution.
JIunicipal election Dec, 1854, and State election
Nov., 1854. Fur mayor, Ambrose Lawrence, 2651 ;
Joseph Bedlow, 442. For Governor, Henry J. Gard-
ner, of Boston, 2863 ; Emory Washburn, 902 ; Henry
W. Bishop, 353. In the city election, Mr. Lawrer.ce
was candidate of the " American (commonly called
" Know-Nothing") party" and Mr. Bedlow of the
Whigs. Mr. Lawrence was a dentist. Mr. Bedlow
was in the service of the Lawrence Corporation. In
the State election Mr. Gardner was the candidate of
the " Know-Nothing" party. The sudden rise of the
new party and its sudden decline are remarkable phe-
nomena in the history of politics. The wild rush of
LOWELL.
61
politiciana of every shade to join the winning side
rendered the party too unwieldy to be subject to the
control of its wiser leaders, and the misconduct of a
lew soon brought reproach and defeat upon the
whole.
Municipal election Dec, 1855, and State election
Nov., 1855. For mayor, Elisha Huntington, 2290 ;
Alfred Gilman, 1402. For Governor, Henry J. Gard-
ner, 175.) ; Erasmus D. Bench, 1014 ; Julius C. Rock-
well (Whig), of Pitisfield, 971. Mr. Gardner was re-
elected. Mr. Beach was the Democratic candidate
and Mr. Rockwell the Whig candidate. Mr. Gilman
was the American or " Kuow-Jsothing" candidate for
mayor, and Mr. Huntington the Whig candidate.
Mr. Gilman had been postmaster of Lowell in the
administration of Presidents Taylor and Fillmore.
He had also been an editor.
Municipal election Dec, 1856, and State and
National election Nov., 185G. For mayor, Stephen
Mausur, 1915; Elisha Huntington, 1870. For Gov-
ernor, Henry J.Gardner, 2940; Erasmus D. Bench,
1259; Luther V. Bell, of Cliarlestown, 127. For
I'resideiit, John C. Fremont, 3U87 ; James Buchanan,
1248. Mr. Mansur was a dealer in hardware. In this
year there was i)revailing a very strong sentiment in
favor of non-partisan munici))al government. Many
of the b(st citizens of Lowell who were not politi-
cians publicly joined in a movement to elect Dr. Hun-
tington on a non-partisan platform. He was there-
fore i)Ut up in opposition to the Whig candidate, Mr.
Mansur. lu 185lj Mr. Gardner was re-elected Gover-
nor and Mr. Buchanan President. In 1856 the Whigs
generally supported Mr. Gardner. Those who did
not, under the name of "American and Whig party"
supported 51 r. Bell. The three parties were called:
" American Rei)ublican," " Democratic, " " American
and Whig."
Municipal election Dec. 1857, and State election
Nov., 1857. For mayor, Elisha Huntington, 2000;
Wm. North (Rep.), 1449. For Governor, Nathaniel
P. Banks, of Waltham, 1710; Erasmus D. Beach,
1076; Henry J. Gardner, 1151. Mr. Banks was elec-
ted Governor. Dr. Huntington \v;)s the Citizens'
" non-partisan " candidate. Mr. North, the Repub-
lican caudidate, was a dyer at the Middlesex Mills.
Dr. Huntington's long experience aided him as a
candidate in this year of financial distress, when wise
counsel was in great demand.
Municipal election Dec, 1858, and State election
Nov., 1858. For mayor, James Cook (Rep.), 1737;
E|)hraim B. Patch (Dem.), 1209. For Governor, N.
P.Banks, 1754; E. D. Beach, of Springfield, 1070;
Amos A. Lawrence, 397. Mr. Banks was elected
Governor. Mr. Cook had been an agent of the Mid-
dlesex Mills, but for many years he was engaged in
tiie insurance business. Mr. Patch was an auctioneer.
Municipal election, Dec. 1850, and State election
Nov. 1859. For mayor, Benj. C. Sargeant (Rep),
1772; Levi Sprague (Rep.), 1457. For Governor,
N. P. Banks, 1612 ; Benj. F. Butler, 1140; Geo. N.
Briggs, 342. Mr. Banks was elected Governor. Mr.
Sargeant, candidate of the American Republican
parly, defeats Mr. Spragt'.e, candidate of a Citizens'
movement. Mr. Sargeant was a bookseller, and Mr.
Sprague a contractor.
Municipal election Dec. 1860, and State and Na-
tional election Nov., 1860. For mayor, B. C. Sar-
■geant, 2073 ; Francis H. Nourse (Rep.), 1393 ; John
O. Green, 138 ; James K. Fellows, 105. For Gover-
nor, John A. Andrew, of Boston, 2750 ; E. D. Beach,
988 ; A. A. Lawrence, of Brookline, 443. For Presi-
dent, Abraham Lincoln, 2776 ; Stephen A. Douglas,
1002 ; John Bell, 435 ; John C. Breckenridge, 142.
Mr. Andrew was elected Governor, and Mr. Lin-
coln President. In the city election Mr. Nourse, a
Republican, was put up by those who had become
disaffected with Mayor Sargeant's administration in
1859. John 0. Green represented the peace party,
and J. K. Fellows the Democrats. Mr. Nourse was
engaged in railroad business, and Mr. Fellows was a
watchmaker. In the National election Bell was the
candidate of the " Union " party, commonly called the
" Bell and Everett '' party, and John C. Breckenridge
of the regular Democrats. Mr. Douglas had the sup-
port of the Douglas Democrats. The threatening war
had drawn new party lines. The population of
Lowell in 1800 was 36,827.
Municipal election, Dec. 1861, and State election
Nov., 1861. For mayor, Hocum Hosford (Rep.),
1719; John W. Graves, 1664. For Governor, John
A.Andrew, 2139; Isaac Davis, of Worcester, 1003.
Mr. Andrew was elected Governor. Mr. Hosford
was a merchant and was known as Lowell's " War
Mayor."
Municipal election Dec, 1802, and State election
Nov., 1862. For mayor, Hocum Hosford, 1876 ; Ar-
thur P. Bonney (Rep.), 1320. For Governor, John
A. Andrew, 1977 ; Charles Devens, Jr., of Worces-
ter, 1427. Governor Andrew was re-elected. Mr.
Bonney was a Republican, and was the regular Re-
publican candidate. He was a lawyer.
Municipal election Dec, 1803, and State election
Nov., 1863. For mayor, Hocum Hosford, 1231 ; others,
18. For Governor, J. A. Andrew, 1723; Henry W.
Paine, of Cambridge, 669. Gov. Andrew was re-
elected. In this year the war was upon us, and Mr.
Hosford was kept in ofi&ce by common consent. In no
city election had there eve. been so few votes. Two
causes conspired to render the vote small, — first, there
was no party contest, and second, the day of election
was, in the afternoon, very rainy.
Municipal election Dec, 1864, and State and Na-
tional election Nov., 1864. For mayor, Josiah G.
Peabody (Rep.), 1099; Abner W. Buttrick (Dem.),
944. For Governor, John A. Andrew, 2401 ; Henry
W. Paine, 1106. For President, Abraham Lincoln,
2473; Geo. B. McClellan, 1090. Gov. Andrew was
re elected. President Lincoln was re-elected. Mr.
62
HISTOllY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Peabody was a door, sash and blind maker, and Mr.
Buttrick was a grocer.
Municipal election Dec, 1865, and State election
Nov., 1865. For mayor, J. G. Peabody, 1517 ; B. C.
Sargeant, 1513. For Governor, Alexander H. Bul-
lock, 1875 ; Darius N. Couch, of Taunton, 58<. Mr.
Bullock ia elected Governor. At the city election
Mr. Peabody, candidate of the Workingmtn's party,
defeats Mr. Sargeant, candidate of the Union Repub-
lican party, by a plurality of four votes.
Municipal election Dec, 186C, and State election
Nov., 1866. For mayor, Geo. F. Richardson (Rep.),
1923; AlbertB.Plympton, (Rep.), 1089. ForGovernor,
A. H. Bullock, 2602 ; Theodore H. Sweetser, of Lowell,
766. Gov. Bullock was re-elected. Mr. Plympton
was a master mechanic and a Republican. He was
put up by the workingmen and the citizens against
Mr. Richardson, the Republican candidate.
Municipal election Dec, 1867, and State election
Nov., 1867. For mayor, G. F. Richardson, 3214;
scattering, 13. For Governor, A. H. Bullock, of
Worcester, 2395 ; John Q. Adams, of Quincv, 1598.
Gov. Bullock was re-elected. JIayor Richardson had
no opponent.
Municipal election Dec, 1868, and State and Na-
tional election Nov., 1868. For mayor, Jonathan P.
Folsom (Rep.), 2008; E. B. Patch, 1850. For Gover-
nor, \Vm. Claflin, of Newton, 3135; J. Q.Adams,
1622. For President, U. S. Grant, 3152; Horatio
Seymour, 1593. Mr. Claflin was elected Governor,
and Gen. Grant President. Mr. Folsom was a dry-
goods merchant.
Municipal election Dec, 1869, and State election
Nov., 1869. For mayor, J. P. Folsom, 3133; pcatter-
iug, 2. For Governor, Wm. Clatlin, 2306; J. Q.
Adams, 1413 ; Edwin M. Chamberlain, of Boston,
235. No mayor of Lowell has received a vote so
nearly unanimous aa that given to Mr. Folsom in 1869.
Gov. Clatlin was re-elected. Mr. Chamberliin was
the candidate of the Labor Reform party.
Municipal election Dec, 1870, and State election
Nov., 1870. For mayor, Edward F. Sherman (Rep.).
2246; Charles A. Stott (Rep.), 1667. For Governor,
Wm. Claflin, 2002; J. Q. Adams, 1003; Wendell
Phillips, of Boston, 646. Gov. Claflin was re-elected.
Mr. Phillips was the " Labor Reform candidate."
Mr. Stott was a manufacturer. Jlr. Sherman was a
lawyer. He was nominated by the "Citizens" in
opposition to the Republican nominee, Mr. Stott. He
WHS not a politician and did not seek the mayoralty,
but was selected on account of his well-known ability.
But both he and the City Council of 1870 incurred
great reproach and blame for their course of alleged
inaction in checking the spread of the small-pox,
which prevailed to an alarming extent this year.
The population of Lowell in 1870 was 40,928.
Municipal election December, 1871, and State elec-
tion November, 1871. For mayor, J. G. Peabody,
2136 ; Charles A. Stott, 1709. For Governor, William
B. Washburn, of Greenfield, 1598; J. Q. Adams,
1046 ; Edwin M. Chamberlain, of Boston, 237 ;
Robert C. Pitman (Temperance), 97. Mr. Wash-
burn was elected Governor. Mr. Stott was the Citi-
zens' candidate against Mr. Peabody, the Republican
candidate. The Citizens' movement this year was
less popular on account of the fact that the officers
elected by that movement in the preceding year had
incurred so much blame in regard to the prevalence
of small-pox.
Municipal election December, 1872, and State and
National election November, 1872. For mayor,
Francis Jewett (Rep.), 2378; Hocum Hosford, 1968.
For Governor, William B. Washburn, 3474; Frank
W. Bird, of Walpole, 16S1. For President, U. S.
Grant, 3467 ; Horace Greeley, 1673. Governor Wiish-
burn was re-elected. Gen. Grant was also re-elected.
Mr. Jewett was a butcher. Mr. Hosford was the can-
didate of the Citizens' party. At this time very many
citizens favored non-partisan municipal nomnuitions.
In this year the mayor was elected by the Republi-
cans, but the aldermen by the Citizens'. Both can-
didates for the mayoralty were Republicans.
Municipal election December, 1873, and .'?tate elec-
tion November, 1873. For mayor, Francis Jewett,
3390 ; scattering, 3. For Governor, William Gaston,
of Boston, 2150; William B. Washburn, 1584. Gover-
nor Washburn was re-elected. Mayor Jewett was
re-elected almost without opposition.
Municipai election December, 1874, and State elec-
tion November, 1874. For mayor, Francis Jewett,
3221 ; H. Hosford, 1386. For Governor, Thomiis Tal-
bot, of Billerica, 2939; William Gaston, 2655. Mr.
Gaston was elected Governor. .Mr. Hooford was the
nominee of a Citizens' movemtiit.
Municipal election December, 1875, and State elec-
tion November, 1875. For mayor, C. A. Stolt, 2578 ;
J. C. Abbott (Dem.), 2027. ForGovernor, Alexander
H. Rice, of Boston, 2583 ; William Givston, 2533 ;
John I. Baker, of Beverly, 42. Mr. Rice was elected
Governor. Mr. Abbott, the Democratic candidate fur
mayor, was a lawyer.
Municipal election December, 1876, and State and
National election November, 1876. For mayor, C.
A. Stott, 3013; J. A. G. Richardson (Dem.), 2897.
For Govrrnor, A. H. Rice, 3831 ; C. F. Adams, of
Quincy, 2919. For President, Rutherford B. Hayes,
4003; Samuel J. Tildeu, 3089. Governor Rice was
re-elected, and Mr. Hayes elected President. Mr.
Richardson, the Democratic candidate for mayor, was
a provision dealer.
Municipal election December, 1877, and State elec-
tion November, 1877. For mayor, J. A. G. Richard-
son, 3068 ; C. A. Stott, 2988. For Governor, A. H.
Rice, 2808; William Gaston, 2650; Robert C. Pit-
man, of Newton, 727 ; John I. Baker, of Beverly,
223. Governor Rice was re-elected. Mr. Richardson
was the Democratic candidate for mayor.
Municipal election Dec, 1878, and State election
LOWELL.
63
Nov., 1878. For mayor, J. A G.Richardson, 4138; Na-
thaniel C. yanboru (Reji.), 1809. For Governor, Benj.
F. Butler, of Lowell, 4238 ; Thomas Talbot, 377.') ;
Josiah G. Abbott, of Boston, 132. Mr. Talbot was
elected Governor. Mr. Sanborn, the Republican
candidate for mayor, was a photographer.
Municipal election Dec, 187'J, and State election
Nov., 1879. For mayor, Frederick T. Greenhalge
(Rep.), 4092; Jeremiah Crowley (Dem.), 3148. For
Governor, B. F. Butler, 4397; John D. Long, of Bing-
ham, 3332 ; J. Q. Adams, of Quincy, 110 ; Daniel C.
Eddy, of Hyde Park, 55. Mr. Long, Republican,
was elected Governor. Mr. Greenhalge, the Repub-
lican candidate for mayor, and Mr. Crowley, the
Democratic candidate, were lawyers.
Municipal election Dec, 1880, and State and Na-
tional election Nov., 1880. For mayor, F. T. Green-
halge, 4054 ; J. G. Peabody, 1279. For Governor, John
D.Long, 5411; Charles P.Thompson, 3893; Charles
Almy.of New Bedford, 35. For President, James A.
Garfield, 4513; Wiufield S. Hancock, 3917. Gov.
Long was re-elected and Mr. Garfield elected President.
Mr. Peabody was the nominee of the Prohibition
party for mayor. The population of Lowell in 1880
was 50,485.
Munic.pal election Dec, 1881, and State election
Nov., 1881. For mayor, Geo. Runels (Rep.), 3794; J.
A. G. Richardson (Dem.), 2411. For Governor, John
D. Long, 2972 ; C. P. Thompson, 2817 ; Charles
Almy, of New Bedford, 178. Gov. Long was re-elect-
ed. Mr. Runels was a stone-mason.
Municipal election Dec, 1882, and State election
Nov., 1882. For mayor, J. J. Donovan (Dem.), 4257 ;
Francis Jewett (Rep.), 381G. For Governor, B. F. But-
ler, 50C5 ; Robert R. Bishop (Rep), of Newton, 3538;
Charles Almy, of New Bedford, 51. Mr. Butler was
elected Governor. Mr. Donovan was a grocer.
Municipal election Dec, 1883, and State election
Nov., 1883. For mayor, J. J. Donovan, 4952 ; J.
H. McAlvin (Rep.), 4111. For Governor, Benj. F.
Butler, 5445; Geo. D. Robinson (Rep.), of Chicopee,
4373; Charles Almy, 48. Mr. Robinson was elected
Governor. Mr. McAlvin, the Republican candidate
for mayor, was for many years treasurer of the city.
Municipal election, Dec, 1884, and Slate and Na-
tional election Nov., 1SS4. For mayor, Edward J.
Noyes (Rep.), 5012 ; Geo. W. Fifield (Dem.), 4477.
For Governor, G. D. Robinson, 4982; Wm. G. Endi-
cott, 30 13; Julius H. Seely, of Amherst, 127; Mat-
thew J. McCafferty, of Worcester, 800. For President,
Grover Cleveland (Dem.), 3710; James G. Blaine
(Rep.), 4785. Gov. Robinson was re-elected. Mr.
Cleveland was elected President.
Municipal election Dec, 1885, and State election
Nov., 1885. For mayor, E. J. Noyes (Rep.), 4316;
James C. Abbott (Dem.), 4571. For Governor, G. D.
Robinson, 3918; Fred. O. Prince (Dem.), 387C;
Thomas J. Lothrop, 5G. Gov. Robinson was re-
elected Governor and Mr. Abbott mayor.
Municipal election December, 188G, and State
election, November, 188G. For Mayor, J. C. Abbott,
4843; Albert B. Plympton (Rep.),"4022. For Gov-
ernor, Oliver Ames (Rep.), of Eastoc, 4171 ; John A.
Andrew, 4271 ; Thomas J. Lothrop, of Taunton, 1S7.
Mr. Ames was elected Governor.
Municipal election December, 1887, and State elec-
tion November, 1887. For Mayor, Charles D. Pal-
mer (Rep.), 5G05; Stephen B. Puffer, 4520. For
Governor, O. Ames, 489G; Henry B. Lovering (Dem.),
4429; William H. Earle, of Worcester, 90. Gov-
ernor Ames was re-elected ; Mr. Palmer had been
a manufacturer, and Mr. Puffer was a dealer in pro-
visions.
Municipal election December, 1888, and State and
National election, November, 1888. For Mayor, C.
D. Palmer, 5636 ; Nathan D. Pratt (Dem.), 5059. For
Governor, 0. Ames, 5566 ; William E. Russell, 5274 ;
William H. Earle, 128. For President, Benjamin
Harrison (Rep.), 5G30 ; Grover Cleveland, 522G. Gov-
ernor Ames was re-elected, and Mr. Harrison was
elected President ; Mr. Pratt was a lawyer.
Municipal election December, 1889, and State
election November, 1889. For Mayor, C. D. Pal-
mer, 5465 ; J. Crowley (Dem.), 5208. For Governor,
J.Q. A. Brackett (Rep.), 4313; W.E.Russell (Dem.),
4856 ; John Blackmer (Pro.), 284.
Municipal Officebs. — The presidents of the Com-
mon Council have been : John Clark, 1836 and 1844;
Elisha Huntington, 1837-39; Pelham W. Warren,
1840; Tappan Wenlworth, 1841 ; Joseph W. Mansur,
1842; Oliver March, 1843; Daniel S. Richardson,
1845, '46; Joel Adams, 1847 ; Thomas Hopkinson,
1839 and 1848; John Aiken, 1849 ; Ivers Taylor,
1850; George Gardner, 1851; Benj. C. Sargeant,
1852, "56, ' 58; Wm. A. Richardson, 1853, 54 ; Alfred
Gilnmn. 1855; Frederic Holton, 1857 ; Wm. P. Web-
ster, 1859 ; Willi»m F. Salmon, 18(i0 ; Wm. L. North,
18G1 ; Geo. F. Richardson, 1862, '63; Geo. Ripley,
18(34, '65; Gustavus A. Gerry, 1866, '67; Alfred H.
Chase, 1868; Wm. Anderson, 1869; Albert A. Hag-
gett, 1870, 73, '76 ; Henry P. Perkins, 1871, '72 ; Nathan
W. Frye, 1874; Benj. C. Dean, 1876; John F. Kim-
ball, 1876, '78 ; E. B. Pierce,1879,'83 ; Earl A.Thissell,
1880 ; C. C. Hutchinson, 1881 ; Wm. N. 0<-good,
1882; John J. Hogan, 1884; Alfred V/. Chadwick,
1885 ; Walter M. Sawyer, 1886 ; James H. Carmichael,
1887; Edmund B. Conant, 1888; Wm. E. Westall,
1889.
In 1839 and 1876 there were two presidents, each
serving a partial term.
The city clerks have been: Samuel A. Coburn
1836 to 1837 inclusive (he was also town cleik <rcm
1826 to 1835) ; Thomas Ordway, from 1838 to 1853 ;
Wm. Lamson, Jr., from 1854 to 1857; John H.
McAlvin, from 1858 to 1868 ; Samuel A. McPhetres,
from 1869 to 1881 ; David O'Brien, from 1882 to
1884, also in 1887; Samuel M. Chase, from 1885 to
188G ; Girard P. Dadmun, from 1888 to 1889.
G4
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The city treasurers have been : William Davidson,
ISSGto 18S2; John A. Buttrick, 1843 to 1846; Itha-
mar A. Beard, 1847 to 1850; John F. Kimball, 1851
to 1855 ; Isaac C. Eastman, 1856 to 1860 ; Geo. W.
Bedlow, 1861 to 1864; Thomas G. Gerrish, 1865 to
1869 ; John H. McAlvin, 1869 to 1882 ; Van Buren
Sleeper, the present incumbent, 1883.
The city physicians have been : Charles P. CofEn,
1836, '39; Eli3haBartlettl840, '41 ; Abraham D.Dear-
born, 1842, '43; David Wells, 1844-46; Abner H.
Brown, 1847-50 ; Joel Spaulding, 1851-55 ; Lather B.
Morse, 1856. '57 ; John W. Graves, 1858-60 ; Moses
W.Kidder, 1861-63; Nathan Allen, 1864, '65; Geo. E.
Pinkhara, 1866-68 ; John H. Gilman, 1869 '70 ; Wal-
ter H.Leighton, 1871, '72; HermonJ.Smith, 1873-77;
Leonard Huntress, 1878; Edwiu W. Trueworthy,
1879-81; Willis G. Eaton, 1882-84; J. J. Colton,
1885-87; J. Arthur Gage, 1888, '89.
The city auditors have been : John Nesmitb, 1836;
Joseph W. Mansur, 1837 ; Horatio G. F. Corliss, 1S38;
John G. Locke, 1840-48 ; Geo. A. Butterfield, 1849, '50 ;
Wm. Larason, Jr., 1851-53 ; Leonard Brown, 1854, '55;
James J. Maguire, 1856 ; Henry A. Lord, 1857 ; Geo.
Gardner, 1858-74 inclusive ; David Chase, 1875 to
the present time, except that in 1887 Wm. J. Cough-
lin was auditor.
The city marshals have been : Zaccheus Shedd,
1836, '37, '40, '41, '48, '50; Henry T. Mowatt, 183S;
Joseph B. Butterfield, 1839; Charles J. Adams,
1842-47 ; Geo. P. WalHron, 1849 ; James Corrin, 1851 ;
Edwin L. Shedd, 1852-54; Samuel Miller, 1855; Wm.
H. Clemmence, 1856, '58, '74, '77 ; Eben H. Rand,
1857, '59; Frederic Lovejoy, 18C0, '61, '78 ; Bickford
Lang, 1862-71; Charles P. Bowles, 1872, '73; Albert
Pinder, 1879, '80 ; Edward J. Noye^ 1881, '82, '88,
'89; Micha^il McDonald, 1883, '84 ; Jacob B. Favor,
1885, '86 ; Frank Wood, 1887.
CHAPTER VI.
LO \V£LL—{ Contimud).
BAXK.S.
The national discount banks of Lowell are all be-
lieved to be in a sound financial condition. The fact
that the stock of every one of them is fur above its
par value indicates the popular confidence in the
safety of their management. For many years very
few semi-annual dividends have been omitted. Their
general management has been conservative, and all of
them have a surplus suliicieutly large to ensure sta-
bility in times of financial reverses.
For the statistics of the discount banks given below
I am much indebted to the late Mr. Charles Hovey,
who, ou February 4, 1S86, read a valuable article upi'u
these banks before the "Old Residents' Historical
Association.'
Of the Savings Banks of Lowell it may be said that
they all have the confidence of the community. All
are now paying dividends amounting to four per cent,
per annum. But extra dividends are rarely paid.
With the low rates of interest now prevailing in the
business world, savings banks, for years to come, will
hardly be able to pay annually more than four per cent.
The law of the Slate forbidding these banks to in-
vest in Western mortgages tends to keep down the
dividends, while it also tends to give security and
safety to the institutions.
Discount Banks of Lowell — Old Loicell Xational
Dunk. — Thi.s bank, under ihe name of "The Lowell
Bank," was incorporated March 11, 1828, two years
after Lowell became a town. Of the persons named
in the act of incorporation none are living. They
were Phineas Whiting, Samuel Bacheider, Thomas
Hurd, Daniel Richardson, Kirk Boott, Paul iloody,
Josiah Crosby, Nathaniel Wright. The Board of Di-
rectors elected in 1828 were Nath. Wright, Jot^iah B.
French, Kirk Boott, Joshua Bennett, Jonathan Morse
(2d), Phineas Whitirg, Thomas Hurd, Amos Whituey,
Benj. F. Varnura, Daniel trhattuck.
The capital of this bank has been from its origin
5^200,(100, It was authorized to commence business
as a National Banking Association June 22, 1865, and
it has since been known as "The Old Lowell National
Bank." Its first place of business was in the brick
block next west of Worthen Street, which was then
known as the " Bank Block." From 1833 to 1845 its
banking-rooms were in the old Wyman's Exchange
on Central .Street. From 1S45 to 1878 its place of
business was in the second story of the bank building
on Sliattuck Street, erected by "The Lowell Institu-
tion for Savings." Since the latter date it h.ns occu-
pied rooms in the second story of the new Wyman's
Exchange, corner of Meirimack and Central ;^treets.
The new Wyman's Exchange is a sub>tantial brick
edifice; but the old Wyman's Exchange, which stood
for many yeais as a conspicuous land mark of the city,
was a lofty stone building so profusely lighted with
windows as to present to the eye the appearance of
dangerous instability. It was the prevailing belief
that in case of fire it would surely collapse. "There
is a tradition that the first cashier, who was a careful
man, always intended to run into the bank-vault
whenever the building should fall."' The building
was taken down in 1878.
Below are the names of the presidents and cai-hiers
of the bank, with the date of their appointment and
the number of years of service.
Presidents: Nathaniel Wright, 182S (30 year* ) ;
James G. Carney, 1S5S (1 year): John O. Green, 1859
(2 vears); Joshua Bennett, 1861 (4 years); Edward
Tuck, 1865 (19 years) ; John Davis, the present incum-
bent, 1884. Cashiers: James G. Carney, 1828 (17
year-); David Hyde, 1815 (4 years); .John L. Ord-
•jr^-s-^'^-.
(^ t>'i--U'
c^ i-^^ t^c-,^ ty ^i
C^ •■-
A
LOWELL.
65
way, 1849(14 year^); Charles M.Williams, the present
incumbent, 1863. The present board of directors is;
Edwsrd M. Tucke Fhineas Whiting, A. B. Wood-
worth, George F. Penniman, Ed. T. Rowell, John
Davis, Jacob Nichols, Joseph L. Chalifoux, James
F. Puffer.
Edward Tuck belonged to that class of sturdy men
of business who, starting life upon an humble New
England farm, h.ive, by their native force and en-
ergy, iichieved a distinguished success and left an
honorable name. He was born in Fayette, Me.,
March 31. 180(>, and died at his home in Centralville,
Lowell, November 14, 188-'), at the age of nearly
eighty years. He was of pure New England descent,
the following being the direct line of his American
ancestors :
1. Robert Tuck, who, about 11)30, came to America
from Gorleston, a town lying 124 mile-t northeast of
London, .iiid now containing about 4000 inhabitants.
In 1638 he settled in Winnacunnet, (now Hampton),
N. H. He kept the first public-houss in the town,
was a chirurgeon by profe-sion,a selectman and town
clerk, as well as " clarke of the writls." 2. Edward
Tuck, who came to America with his father and set-
tled in Hampton, where be died in 1652. 3. John
Tuck, a carpenter by trade, who was born in 1652,
near the time of his father's death, and lived in
Hampton to the age of ninety years. He erected a
grist-mill and a fulling-mill on Nilus River, and was
probably a man of pro[)erly. He was a devoutly re-
ligious man, who read his Bible through twelve times,
and was deacon of the church for twenty-seven years.
He was also a selectman and representative of Hamp-
ton in the Legislature of the State. 4. Edward Tuck,
a carpenter by trade, who was born in 16(14-95, and
lived to the age of seventy -eight years in Kensington,
N. H. 5. Jesse Tuck, who lived u[)on the paternal
estate in Kensinglon. He was born in 1743, and
died in 1826, at the age of eighty-three years. 6.
Jesse Tuck, father of the subject of this sketch, who
was born in Kensington, in 1773 or 1774, and set-
tled in Fayette, Kennebec County, Me., where he
died in the sixty-eighth year of his age.
Edward Tuck remained upon his father's farm until
he was twenty-one years of age, receiving his educa-
tion from the schools of the town and from theacad-
emv in the neighboring town of Farmington, Me. He
came to Lowell in 1828, while only a few of the mills
were, as yet, in operation, and found employment in
the hotel of S. A. Coburn, which is now known as
the Stone House, on Pawtucket Street, the late resi-
dence of J. C. Ayer. After two years of service in
the hotel and in one of the factories, be engaged in
trade for about eight years. In 1832 he mHrried
Miss Emily Coburn, of Dracut. In 1838, when thirty-
two years of age, he entered upon the express busi-
ness between Boston and Lowell, in which he con-
tinued with marked success until 1855, a period of
seventeen vears. It was in this busine-'-s that he laid
5-ii
the foundation of bis e.^tate. In 1855 be became a
broker in Boston, still retaining bis home in Lowell.
This business he followed until advancing years de-
manded that he should relinquish it.
It was as expressman and broker that Mr. Tuck
became more familiarly known in the streets of
Lowell than almost any other citizen. He was a
marked man. His strong constitution, firm health
and fine physical development left the impression
upon those who met him that he was a man of no
ordinary ability. He was a man of force, will, en-
ergy, dispatch. He kept his object steadily in view.
He meant business. He was never in a hurr)% but
always on time. He was noted for system, method and
punctuality. A writer for the press once playfully re-
marked of him : " Probably there is no man in Lowell
who has been over the Boston and Lowell Railroad
as many times as Edward Tuck, president of the Old
Lowell National Bank. Rain or shine, every day of
the week, excepting Sundays and holidays, he may
be found on his way to Boston. His companion
down is the Boston Post; returning, the Transcri/,t.
He quietly absorbs his paper, giving especial attention
to the financial and commercial department."
On returning from Boston Mr. Tuck brought with
him not on*y the documents pertaining to his busi-
ness, but a hearty good-cheer for his friends, the most
recent news from the commercial world, and the
last good story which he had heard on 'Change and
which he knew well how to repeat and adorn.
Though Mr. Tuck possessed that buoyant and
cheerful spirit which good health and love of action
are wont to bestow, yet few men have drank more
deeply of the cup of sorrow.
Of his three children, hie eldest daughter, Augusta,
wife of Captain T. W. Hendee, shipmaster, died in
1864, on board her husband's ve-rsel in the Indian
Ocean. Her two only children did not long survive
her. Eleanor, the second daughter of Mr. Tuck, be-
came the second wife of Captain Hendee. After four
short years of married life spent in England and
Bombay, the husband died upon his vessel, leaving
his wife thus bereft upon the ocean. Returning to
Lowell, she also died in four years. Thus in the
brief space of a few years the father was bereft of his
son-in-law and all his children and grandchildren,
with only one exception. He bore his deep affliction
with exemplary fortitude.
Mr. Tuck, on account of his marked ability, was
often placed in positions of trust and honor. He
was alderman of Lowell in 1856, 1859 and 1873, a
member of the State Legislature in 1870, and for fif-
teen years president of the Old Lowell National
Bank. In every position he earned the name of an
honest and able man, who had a wholesome contempt
for all pretence and sham.
An attack of paralysis, in 1879, clouded, with phy-
sical weakness and suffering, the last six years of his
long and busy life.
66
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY. MASSACHUSETTS.
His wife survived him, but lias deceased since the
death of her husbaod. Of his family only one now
remains, Hon. Edward M. Tuclce, secretary of the
Traders and Mechanics' Insurance Company, .ind nt
the present time (1890) a member of the Senate of
Massachusetts.
The Railroad Bank. — This bank was incorporated
in 1831. The names of Ebenezer Appieton, Eben-
ezerChadwick, William Lawrence, KirkBoott, Lemuel
Pope and John P. Robinson appear in the act of
incorporation.
These gentlemen, being mostly Boston men and
owners of stock in the manufacturing corporations of
Lowell, had, as their object, the establishment of a
bank for the special use of these corporations. For
nearly forty years the banking business of the cor-
porations was done through this bank. From it also
was for a long time obtained the money for the
monthly pay-rolls of the operatives in the mills.
The first board of directors was: Luther Lawrence.
Paul Moody, Elisha Glidden, Henry Cabot, .Joshua
Swan, Kirk Boott and Ebenezer Appieton.
The names of the presidents and cashiers, with the
date of their appointment and the number of years of
service are as follows:
Presidents: Luther Lawrence. 1831 (S years) ; Pel-
ham W. Warren, l.s.3;» (ti years); B. F. French, 1840
(8 years); S. W. Stickiiey, 1853 (22 years); Jacob
Rogers, the present incumbent, 1875. Cashiers: Pel-
ham W. Warren, 1831 (8 years); S. W. Stickney,
1830 (14 years); John F. Rogers, 1853 (17 years);
James S. Hovey, 1870 (15 year?); Frank P. Haggett,
the present incumbent, 1885.
From 1831 to 183(5 the banking-rooms of the insti-
tution were at the corner of Central and Hurd Streets.
From 1836 to 1845 it occupied a room in the second
story of a building erected by itself, at the corner of
Merrimack and John Streets, and on the site of the
building now occupied by the Five Cent Savings
Bank. From 1845 to 1859 it occupied a room in the
bank building on Shattuck Street. From 1S59 to
1889 it occupied rooms in the Carleton Block on
Merrimack Street, now known as Odd Fellows' Block.
Its present place of business is on Merrimack be-
tween Kirk and John Streets. Its capital at its in-
corporation was $200,000. From time to time die
capital was enlarged as Corporation business increased
until it reached $800,000. When this business di-
minished it was reduced to $400,000, and this is its
present capital. When, in 1885, the capital was re-
duced to $400,000, a dividend of fifteen per cent, was
paid from the accumulated surplus. No semi annual
dividend has ever been omitted.
The names of the present board of directors are :
Jacob Rogers, Sewall G. Mack, George Motley,
George Ripley, James B. Francis, A. G. Cumnock,
James Franci.i.
City Bank. — An institution called "The City
Bank " was incorporated in March, 1836, Jo.-<eph
Locke, Jonathan Tyler and John Nesmith being
named in the act of incorporation. But the financial
distress and panic which came upon the country in
the next year made it so difficult for the ntw bank
to comply with the requirements of law, that the en-
terprise was abandoned.
Appieton Bank. — This bank was chartered in 1847,
si,xteen years after the Railroad Bank began business.
Its capital was at first $100,000, then §200,000, and at
List $300,000. Its first directors were John A.
Knowles, Isaac Farrington, J. B. French, John Nes-
mith, Abner W. Buttrick, Sidney Spalding, George
Bragdou, Ransom Reed, John W. Graves, none of
whom now survive.
Below are the names of its presidents and cashiers,
with date of their appointment and the number of
years of their service :
Presidents: John X. Knovvles, 1847(21 years); J. B.
French, in 1876. who, from ill health, did not assume
the active duties of his ottiies .folin F. Kimball, the
present incumbent, 1876. Cashiers: John .\. But-
trick, 1847 (12 years): John F. Kimball, 185'. (IS
years); E. K. Perley, the present incumbent, 187ii.
The present directors are: John F. Kimball, Addison
Putnam. William E. Livingston, Freeman B. Shedd,
D. W. C. Farriuirton, \ViHiaui Nichols, William S.
Bennett, W. W. Wilder.. The dividends have aver-
aged about ten percent, per annum.
This bank first occupied a brick building, owned
i)y itself, on the corner of Central and Hurd Streets.
on tile site of which the bank erected in 1878 the
elegant four-story building which it now occupies.
PiesroU Ban/:. — This bank was incorporated in
1850 with a capital of •■<200,"00, which, in 1865, when
it became a national bunk, was increased to ?'300.000.
The first directors were : Joel Adams, Samuel Bur-
Ijank, Daniel S. Richard.son, Joshua < 'unverse, Charles
B. t'oburn, Andrew C. Wheelock, .irtemas L. Brooks,
James H. Rand, Elijah .M. Read, Rufus Clement,
Isaac \V. Scribner. The presidents have been ; Joel
Adams, appointed 1850; Charles B. Coburn, 1864;
Daniel .S. Richardson, the present incumbent, 1874.
The cashiers have been ; .Vrtemas S. Tyler, 1850
(twenty-two years); Alonzo .1. Coburn, the press nt
incumbent, 1871. Its banking office was at first in a
building on the site of the present Mansur Block on
Central Street, but in 1865 the bank moved into the
building (Nos. 26 and 28 Central Street) which was
erected by itself. The present directors are : D. S.
Richardson, George F. Richardson, Hapgood Wright,
C. U. (.'obnrn, Daniel Gape, N. M. Wright, C. A.
Stott, W. A. Ingham, A. A. Coburn, J. W. Abbott, J.
.\. Bartlett.
Waniesit Bank. — This bank was incorporated
.\.pril 28, 1853, with .i capital of $100,000. Its pres-
ent capital is $250,000. Its first directors were :
Sidney Spalding, Horace Howard, Ignatius Tyler,
Charles H. Wilder, .\biel Rolfe, Abram French,
Henry C. Howe, Samuel Horn, Alpbeus R. Brown.
LOWELL.
67
In 1865 it was reorganized as a natiooal bank. Its
presidents have been : Horace Howard, appointed in
1853; William A. Richardson, 1860; Charles Whit-
ney, 1867 ; Henry C. Howe, the present incumbent,
1887. Its cashiers have been : John A. Buttrick,
1853; G. W. Knowlton, the present incumbent, 1874.
The pre^ent Board of Directors is: Samuel Horn,
Prescott C. Gates, Seth B. Hall, William H. Wiggiu,
Perley P. Perham, Samuel Kidder, G. W. Knowlton,
Francis Jewett, James W. Bennett, H. S. Howe. Its
place of busines-s is at ISii Uliddlesex Street, near the
Northern Depot, in a brick block owned by the bank.
Meirhants' National Bank. — This bank was incor-
porated in 1851 with a capital of $100,000, which has
been increased three times and is now $400,000. Its
first directors were: Harlan Pillsbury, Thomas Nes-
mith, Albert Wheeler, W. W. Wyman, Daniel Swan,
Joseph Bedlow, Samuel T. Lancaster, George F.
Richardson, Hocum Hosford, Isaac S. Morse, Asa
Hildreth. Its presidents have been : Harlan Pills-
bury, appointed in 1854 (ten years); Royal South-
wick, l-'^iM (eight months) ; Hocum Hosford, 18G4 (two
years); H. W. li. Wi^'htman, lS7t', (four years); Ar-
thur P. Boniiey, the present incumbent, 1880. Its
cashiers have been : Eliphalet Hills, appointed in
1854 (ime year); J. N. Pierce, Jr., 1855 (eighteen
years) ; ("harles W. Eaton, 1873 (eleven years) ; Wal-
ter W. Johnson, the i>resent incumbent, 1884. The
present directors are: Arthur P. Bonney, Samuel T.
Lanca.ster, William H. Andeison, Cyrus H. Latham,
Aina-sa Pratt, William Shepard, Albert F. Nichols,
Frank T. Jaijues, Michael Collins, .Vrthur G. Pollard,
George Kunels. Until 1870 its office was in the sec-
ond story of a building owned by itself (Merrimack
Street, No. 311). Since that date it has been on the
first story of the sitnic building. This bank was
changed to a national batik in 1864.
Firnl Naliimal Bank. — This bank was organized un-
der the national law February 16, 18()4, with a capital
of $250,000, which has remained unchanged. Its first
directors were: James K. Fellows, James C. Ayer,
Gilman Kimball, Isaac Place, James C. Abbott, Ei)h-
raiin Brown, J. W. Daniels, .\. P. Bonney, Joseph
H. Ely. Its presidents have been : Arthur P. Bon-
ney, appointe<l 1864; James C. Abbott, the present
incumbent, 1880. Its cashiers have been: George F.
Hunt, 1864 (two years); George B. Allen, 1866 (four-
teen years) ; Walter M.Sawyer, the present incum-
bent, 1880. The present directors are : J. C. Abbott,
Amos A. French, Ephraim Brown, Samuel N. Wood,
Gilman Kimball, Patrick Derapsey, A. C. Taylor,
Joseph S. Brown, W. H. Parker, John Lennon,
Thomas Costello. Its place of business was at the
corner of Central and Middle Streets until 1884,
when it took possession of the building erected by
itself on Central Street.
Lnwell Co-operative Bank. — This bank was char-
tered by the State of .Massachusetts, April 20, 1885,
with an authorized capital of .?1,000,000. From its
organization its officers have remained the same.
They are as follows : President, A. B. Woodworth ;
Secretary, George W. Batchelder; Treasurer, George
E. Metcalf. The directors are: Joseph L. Sedgley,
Leonard Evans, Jr., Charles T. Rowland, E. G.
Baker, John O. Gulline, John Dobson, Thomas Col-
lins, S. J. Johnson, James E. White, J. D. Hartwell,
George W. Brothers, Edwin S. Bickford, Caleb L.
Smith, James Markland, Samuel A. Byam.
The banking-office is at No. 6 Central Block, Cen-
tral Street.
The profits (interest) credited to shares during the
last year were 7.i per cent.
The monthly meetings are held on the first Thurs-
day after the 10th day of each month. Money is
loaned at every meeting to build a house, buy ahouse
or pay off a mortgage. Motto : " Save your money —
ownyo'tr home."
Savings Banks — Lowell Intlitulion for Savings —
The Lowell Institution for Savings was incorporated
(October, 1829, and was the first incorporated savings
bank of our city. More than two years before this
date the Merrimack JIanufacturing Company had,
without legislative sanction, received money from its
operatives on deposit, with interest on the same con-
ditions as those existing in savings institutions. In-
terest at 6 per cent, per annum was allowed, and this
interest ceased to be paid when the depositor left the
employment of the company. This beneficent plan,
however, being of somewhat doubtful expediency, as
well as doubtful legality, was suspended in Julv,
1829.
In the Hamilton Mills a similar plan for savirgthe
earnings of the operatives from the losses which they
frequently suffered for want of a safe place of de-
posit seemed greatly to be needed, and the agent, Mr.
Samuel Batchelder, opened books of deposit for the
operatives on the savings bank principle. But when
it became doubtful whether the charter of the com-
pany would allow banking business to be done by a
manufacturing company, the agent, with others, pe-
titioned the Legislature for the incorporation of a
savings bank. The petition was granted and an act
of incorpi)ration was passed. But so small was the
number of responsible men who participated in the
work of establishing a bank thus incorporated, that
the petitioners felt compelled to appoint themselves
as trustees of the new institution. Mr. James G.
Carney was induced to act as treasurer, and the ex-
periment began.
The first important transaction of this institution
was the negotiation of a loan of about $17,000 with
the town of Lowell a few months after the bank be-
gan to receive deposits. The refusal of the town au-
thorities, however, to continue to pay the rate of in-
terest required by the bank, and the difficulty experi-
enced by the institution in loaning its depositsapon the
prescribed rates, raised the question, in the next year
(1830), whether it would not be advisable either to
63
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
" close the concerns of the institution or to reduce the
rate of dividends.'' The result was that on Nov.],
1830, the rate of interest was reduced frcm o per
cent, to 4 per cent. At the latter rate the bank con-
tinued to pay dividends for about fifty years. Extra
dividends, however, have from time to time been
paid, but not oftener than once in three years.
The management of this institution has been emi-
nently safe and conservative. It has, throughout
the sixty years of its existence, been almost ab.so-
lutely exempt from loss. Its first treasurer held his
office for forty years, always prescribing to himself
the most rigid and conscientious discharge of duty,
and allowing in others no trifling or evasion of the
rules prescribed. \t no time of financial panic or
peril has the confidence of the people of Lowell in
this institution been shaken.
Its cautious and consei'vative management is indi-
cated by the following by-law: "The funds of the
institution may be invested in loans on mortgages of
real estate within this State, provided that the whole
amount loaned on mortgage shall not at any time ex-
ceed a third part of the whole funds of the institu-
tion at the time of making the loan, and no loan
shall be made lor more than half the value of the es-
tate pledged.''
The amount of deposits in this bank were, in 18.3(1,
§7037; in 1840, j;305,S9.".; in 1S.">(I, #705,7G1 : in LStiO.
?1,14(;,093; in 1870, *;|,.i8S, 128 ; in 1880, .■:'2,'.ni!1,7o3 ;
in 181»0, .$4,384,871.
In 1878 the average amount of each depositor was
■•^401i, while forty years before, in l'^38, it was ^IS'>.
The amount of ^100 deposited in this bank in 182'.'
would, in 1880, be $2471), and in 1890 about i>2SS().
The presidents have been : Elislia ("Hidden, 1820 to
1835; Theodore Edsot:, 183.J to 1883; John (J. (Jreen,
1883 to 188(3; Charles A. .Savory, the present incum-
bent, 188(j.
The treasurers have been : .1. G. Carney, 1829 to
18(39; George .1. Carney, the present incumbent,
1869.
Trustees for 1889 are: George Motley. Franklin
Nickerson, C. A. Savory, S. Kidder, A. B. French,
Frederick Bailey, A. St. .John Chambre, J. W. B.
Shaw, Frederick Taylor, Cyrus .M. Fisk.
James G. Carney, who, for nearly forty years, was
treasurer of this bank, deserves a special notice. He
was born in Boston, February 14. 1804, and was
trained to business in the service of William Gray,
one of the most distinguished of the merchants oi
Boston, who, for two years, was Lieutenant-Governor
of Slassnchusetts. Mr. Carney came to Lowell in
1828, when twenty-four years of age, to fill the office
of first cashier of the Lowell Bank, which was estab-
lished in that year. In 1829 he was elected treasurer
of the Lowell Institution for Savings. He aided in
organizing the Bank of Mutual Redemption in Bos-
ton and was, at one time, its president. He was one
of the originators of Lowell Cemetery and was among
its trustees. He was a man of marked personal dig-
nity, of unusual firmness of character, and was re-
markably accurate and methodical in his official work.
His name will long live in Lowell. He died of pneu-
iionia, February 9, 1S(!9, at the age of sixty-five year.s.
Cili/ /nsfitu/ion for .Suringt. — This bank was organ-
ized 1847. The first president was Rev. Henry A.
Miles, who, in 1853. was succeeded by Rev. Daniel
C. Eddy. In 18.57 Dr. Xathan Allen was chosen,
president and remained in office twenty-two years.
The present incumbent, Hon. F. T. Greenhalge, was
elected president in 1S89.
The first treasurer, .lohn A. Buttrick, held the office
twenty-eight years, and was succeeded, in 1S75, by
his son, Frederic .\. Buttrick.
The banking olHce, ever since the organization, has
been on the corner of Hurd and Central .Streets.
The [iresent Board of Trustees is : Frederic T.
Greoidialge, William E. Livingston, N. M. Wright.
William Nichols, Charles R. Kimball, William S.
Rinnett. Addison I'litnam, John F. Howe, .Samuel T.
LatRa.sler, Edward K. rcrley. (Quarters commence
on the second Saturday of .lanuary, .\pril, July and
•Jctober.
Amount of deposit October o, l.'<89. ?^''.,0S(;,<,)10.
This very large deposit indicates the popular confi-
dence in tlrs institution. Its management has been
luarked throughout with wisdom and fidelity.
Brief mention should be made of John .A. Buttrick,
the first treasurer, to who.se fidelity and ability the
very high standing of this bank is largely due. He
was born in Stetson, Maine, April 14, 181.X. In liis
childhood his family removed to Framingham. in this
State, and his youth was spent upon a farm. .\t the
age of .si.xteen years he was a student in Phillips
-Academy in .\ndover. For several years he taught a
private sihool iti Medford. In 1830 b': came to Low-
ell, and lor fotir years was in the grocery trade with
his brother. From 1843 to 1847 he was trea.-urer of
the city of Lowell. In 1847 he was chosen cashier of
the .V|iplelon Bank and treasurer of the City Institu-
tion for Savings. Having resigned the cashietthip
of the bank in \>^'i'>. he devoted the rest of his life to
the duties tif treasurer of the Savings Bank. This
was his life-work and here he gained a very honor-
able name. His reputation is historic. His fellow-
citizens loved to honor him. He was elected Re[>re-
sentalive and Senator to the State Legislature, and
member of the ."^chool Committee. He was an honest
man of simple manners. He was genial, compassion-
ate and conscientious, and Lowell hiis lost few citi-
zens who will be so afi'ectionately remembered. He
died March .'U, 1870, at the age of sixty-six years.
J.riwell Fi If- Ceil/ .'y'ariiKjs Bun/.. — This bank was in-
corporated in 1854. Its presidents have been : Hora-
tio Wood, 1854 to 1885; Sewall G. Mack, the present
incumbent, 1885.
Its treasurer, Artemas S. Tyler, has been in office
since its organization.
LOWELL.
G9
Trustees for 1889: William F. Salmon, John H.
McAlvin, C. E. A. Bartlett, Dudley Foster, Albion C.
Taylor, Charles Coburn, George F. Pennimau, AsaC.
Russell, George F. Richardsou, George S. Cheney,
Arthur Staples.
Deposits from five cents to $10(10 are received
Hours of bu.sine3s from niae to one o'clock, and on
Saturday evenings from seven to nine o'clock.
Quarters commence on the first Saturday of January,
April, July and October. Amount of deposits on
September 28, 1889, $1,322,740.
The banking-rooms of this bank were the same as
those of the Prescott Bank until the winter of 1874,
when it took possession of the elegant building, with
marble front, erected by itself, on the corner of Mer-
rimack and John Streets.
Tlie Mechanics' Savings Ban/:. — This bank was or-
gaoized in 18(>1. Its presidents have been William
A. Burke, 1861-87 ; Jeremiah Clark, the present in-
cumbent, 1887. Its treasurers have been John F.
Rogers, 1801-70; C. F. Battles, 187(1-71; C. C.
Hutchinson, the present incumbent, 1871.
Trustees for 1889: J. Clark, Jacr)b Rogers, Isaac
Cooper, Alfred (Tilnian, F. RodlifT, J. V. Keyes,
A. G. Cumnock, C. S. Hiklreth, John Davis, James
Francis, W. W. Sherman, E. M. Tuck, James G.
Hill, William D. Blanchanl, James M. Marshall,
Francis Carl, William G. Ward. Edwin H. Cum-
mings, Edward N. Burke.
Quarters commence on the first Saturday of March,
June, September and December.
Hours of business from 9 to 1 o'clock daily, and
from 7 to 9 on Saturday evenings.
Amount of deposits on August 1, 1889, $1,.S80,201.
The first place of business of this bank was in the
rooms of the Railioad Bank in Odd-Fellows' Hall,
the treasurer, ,Iohn F. Rogers, being also cashier of
the Railroad Bank. Rutin 1871 the banks separated.
The Savings Bank, with Mr. Hutchinson as treasurer,
for two years occupied rooms in the rear of the dis-
count bank. In 1873 the Savings Bank took posses-
sion of the first story of the building on Merrimack
Street, which it had erected for its use. It removed
from the first story to the second story of this building
in 1889.
John F. Rogers, the first treasurer of this bank de-
serves a special notice. He was born in Exeter
y. H., December 1, 1819. He fitted for college at
Exeter, but did not pursue his studies further. Learn-
ing the hardware business in New York, he set up a
hardware store in Lowell in 1845. In 1853 he became
cashier of the Railroad Bank, and held the office
through a period of seventeen years. From 1801
until his death, in 1870, he was treasurer of the Me
chanics" Savings B:;knk. Few men have lived a life
so pure and so devout. Few were so much beloved
and few so much lamented. He died in the prime of
manhood, at the age of fifty-one years.
Central Savings Ban/:. — This bank was incorporated
in 1871. Its president from its incorporation has
been Oliver H. Moulton. Its treasurers have been
J. N. Pierce, 1871-72; Samuel A. Chase, the present
incumbent, 1873. Trustees in 1889: O, H Moulton,
E. Brown, Patrick Lynch, Henry C. Church, George
Itunels, J. C. Abbott, E. Boyden, Cyrus H. Latham,
Willard A. Brown, Amasa Pratt, Benjamin Walker,
Joseph R. Hayes, John S. Jaques, J. P. Folsom, A.
G. Pollard, George F. Scribner, Prescott C. Gates,
S. N. Wood, Frederick Ayer, Joseph 8. Brown, Dan-
iel Swan, Robert Court, Charles W. Saunders, Ezra A.
.\dams, George L. Hunloon, George W. Young.
The quarters commence on the first Saturday of
February, May, August and November.
Its hours of business are from 9 to 1 o'clock, and
on Saturday evenings from 7 to 9.
There is a safety-vault in connection with the
bank.
Amount of deposits, October 20, 1889, $1,915,172.
Its place of business is the Merchants' Bank build-
ing, 39 Merrimack Street.
Merrimac/: lilver Savings Ban/:. — This bank was in-
corporated in 1871. Its president, from its incorpora-
tion has been J. G. Peabody. Its treasurers have
been G. W. Knowlton, 1871-74; A. J. Flint, 1874-
79; Nathan- Lamson, the present incumbent, 1879.
Trustees in 1889 : A. D. Puffer, Atwell F. Wright,
Charles Runels, C. J. Glidden, W. A. Ingham, F.
RodlifT, Jr., Crawford Burnham, J. C. Johnson, James
W. Bennett, Horace Ela, B. F. Sargent, C. F. Var-
ntiin, G. W. Knowlton, C. E. Adams, Alfred Barney,
R. G. Bartleti, Setb B. Hall.
The quarters commence on Ihp first Saturday of
February, .May, August and November.
The hours of business are from 9 to 12, and from 2
to 4 o'clock on Mondays. Tuesdays, Thursdays and
Fridays ; and from 9 to 12, and 7 to 9 o'clock on
Saturdays.
' Interest is paid on any sum, from SI to j^lOOO. No
deposit received above S1600.
Amount of deposit, on October 20, 1889, S830,G34.
The place of business is at 189 Middlesex Street,
near the Northern Depot.
Fire IxsrnANCECo.MPANiE.s. — In the early days of
Lowell almost all its fire insurance business was done
by three companies, viz., the Middlesex Mutual Fire
Insurance Company, of Concord, Mass.; the Merri-
mack Company, of Andover, and the Lcuvell Mutual
, Fire Insurance Company, of Lowell. The last of
these three companies was for nineteen years the only
fire insurance company in Lowell.
It was incorporated March 0, 1832, and commenced
business in April following. Its first place of busi-
ness was in the Railroad Bank Building, situated on
the site of the present Appleton Bank Building, on
Central Street. The office was subsequently removed
; to the Mansur Building, corner of Central and Mar-
I ket Streets, where it remained for over forty years.
About five years siuce, in 1884, it was removed to the
70
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACIITTSETTS.
second story of tlie building erected and occupied by
the First National Bank.
Its presidents have been — Luther Lawrence, elected
in 1832; Elisha Glidden, 1834 ; John Nesmith, 1836;
Jonathan Tyler, 1837 ; Horace Howard, 1841 ; J. B.
French, 1851 ; J. H. B. Ayer, 1853 ; J. K. Fellows,
1860; J. C. Abbott, the present incumbent, 1880.
Its secretaries and treasurers have been — Samuel
F. Haven, 1832; Tappan Wentworth, 1835; J. M.
Mansur, 1837; R. G. Colby, 1841; Isaac S. Morse,
1845; Jacob Robbins, 1852 ; George W. Bean, 1860;
Wm. P. Brazer, 18G2 (temporarily) ; James Cook,
1862; Charles W. Drew, 1877; E. T. Abbott, 1883.
The original directors, elected in 1832, were — Kirk
Boott, Luther Lawrence, Elisha Glidden, Aaron
M.insur, Nathaniel Wright, John C. Dalton, Seth
Ames, Benj. Walker, Matthias Parkhurst.
The directors for 1889 were — Wm. H. Wiggin, .1.
K. Fellows, Wm. P. Brazer, Charles A. Stott, Wm.
E. Livingston, J. C. Abbott, Benj. Walker, Amos B.
French, N. M. Wright, A. G. Pollard, E. T. Abbott,
P. C. Gates.
For several of the first years of this company no
premiums were paid, a deposit note being relied upon
for assessment. The business of this company out-
side of Lowell was formerly done by agents, who, for
the sake of the profit arising from their commission,
were found to take risks which ought to have been
rejected. From these risks the company met with
such serious losses by fire, that in 1S53 it was voted
not to take any more risks outside the city. The
result has been most satisfactory. Losses by fire
have now for many years been very few. The com-
l)any is in a liighly prosperous condition. Dividends
are paid of sixty per cent, for five years, fifty i)er
cent, for three years, thirty-three and one-third per
cent, for one year. The fact that all proi>erty in-
sured is in the city of Lowell may, to some, suggest
the d.anger that a disastrous fire in the city would
prove disastrous to the company; but the excellent
Fire Department of Lowell, the cautious manner in
which property is insured, and the conservative
character of the directors an<l othcera of the companv
have gained for it the highest confidence of the citi-
zens. The risks of this company in 1889 were nearly
*3,000,000.
This company employs no agents, the business be-
ing done wholly at the home office under the supervi-
sion of the director.s.
In preparing this article I am indebted for aid to
J. K. Fellows, Esc]., a former president of the com-
pany.
Trailers and Mechiinics' Fire Insurance Company. —
This company was incorporated in 1848, and com-
menced business in June of that year, as a mutual
company. In 1854 a charter was granted the com-
pany to add to the mutual department a stock depart-
ment, with a capital of S50,0O0, which was, in 1870,
increased to $100,000. Business was transacted by '
j both these departments until 1881, when the stock
I department was dissolved and the stock and surplus
divided among the stockholders. The number of
I shares in 1861 was 500.
The presidents of this company have been : Thomas
Hopkinson, elected in 1848; Sewall G. Mack, 1850;
Joshua Converse, 1855; C. B. Cobiirn, 1860; Levi
Sprague, the present incumbent, 1874; James H.
Rand acted temporarily as president in 1855, and again
in 1857.
The secretaries have been : James Dinsmoor, 1848 ;
Edward F. Sherman, 1855; Orrin F. Osgood, 1872 ;
E. M. Tuck, the present incumbent, IS74.
The original directors were : Thomas Hopkinson,
Thomas Nesmith, X. C. Wheelock, Joshua Converse,
E. F. Watson, James H. Rand, Peter Powers. Henry
Read, Sewall G. JIack, Benjamin \\'eaver, Nathaniel
Critchett.
At the great fire in Boston, in 1872, the company
suH'ered a loss of S230,O00, which it ha:* paid in full,
and it is now in a very prosperous condition.
From the Massachusetts Fire Insurance Report,
Dec. 3, 1888, we take the following: Gross assets.
$565,207; gross liabilities, !;li(7,42S; surplus, Suii7,-
778; gross cash income lor 1S88. $143,206.
Amount at risk in 1S8'J, $26,:;70,lii5 ; cash assets,
$565,450. Dividend on five-year policies, 70 per
cent.
The directors in 1880 are: Levi Sprague, C. C.
Hutchinson,. lacob Rogers, Charles H.l^'olmrn, (ieorge
K. Richardson, W. F. Salmon, S. T. Lancaster, Julin
F. Kimball, D. S. Richar(lsf>n. Henry C. Howe.
The place of business of this company was al firsi
on or near the site of the present Appleton Bank
Block; but in 1.S52 it was removed to the lorner of
Central and .Middle .Streets.
Tlie Howard Fire Iii.surniire Coiiijxini/ w.is organized
in September, 1848. (ta first directers were: <Jliver
M. Whii)ple, William Fiske, .Foei Adams, Emory
Washburn, Joshua iMeirill, David Dana, Stephen
Cushing, Elijah .M. Read, Samuel Burliank, Sidney
Spalding, A. W. Buttrick, Thomas Hopkinson, Dan-
iel S. Richardson; jiresident, Oliver M. Whipple;
secretary, Frederick Parker.
Its capital was $;')0,000, which was in a short time
increased to $100,000, and subse(|ueutly to $2oo,000.
Jlr. Whipple, the first president, held the office
until 1851 or 1852, and was then succeeded by Dr.
Nathan Allen, who, in 1862, was succeeded by Joshua
W. Daniels. Ephraim Brown became president and
treasurer in 1865, and remained in office to the close
of the existence of the company, in 1872.
The first secretary and treasurer, Mr. Parker, held
his office until 1852, when he was succeeded by
Joshua W. Daniels. Mr. Daniels became both pres-
ident and treasurer in 1862. He resigned in 1865.
Ephraim Brown became secretary in 1862, and was
succeeded in 1864 by Henry B. White, who in turn
was, in 1867, succeeded by Sewall A. Faunce, who
LOWELL.
remained secretary until the close of the company's
existence in 1872. In 1864 the principal business
office of the companr was removed from Lowell to
Boston.
NotwithsUnding the loss of $19,000 in July, 1866,
by the great Portland fire, the company prospered.
It had paid a dividend in 1865 of 20 per cent, and
from 1868 to 1872 the annual dividends were 10 per
cent. At the time of the great Boston fire, in 1872,
the company was in a prosperous condition. Its
amount at risk was $10,000,000, and its surplus $17ri,-
000, about seven-eighths as large as its capital. In
that fire the loss was $840,000, which swept off all its
assets, and it ceased to exist.
CHAPTER VII.
LOWELI^i Continued).
MAXUF.iCTURES.
There are two reasons why the history of the man-
ufactures of Lowell should be brief: first, like all
things else in the city, they have had a comparatively
brief existence ; and second, the great manufactures
of Lowell are so much alike, that the history of one
is, in many cases, but a repetition of that of another.
In recording the early history of the city we have
already mentioned the small manufacturing enter-
prises which were existing in East Chelmsford in the
early years of the present century. There were the
caw-mill and grist-mill of N.ithan Tyler, near Paw-
tucket Falls, not far from the site of the Lowell Hos-
pital ; the woolen-mills of Thomas Hurd, near the
site of the Middlesex Mills, in which twenty hands
were employed : the glass factory at Middlesex Vil-
lage ; the powder-mills of O. M. Whipple, near the
Concord River ; the mills of Jloses Hale, started in
1801, on River Meadow Brook; and various other
such small manufactories, as in those early days were
found, especially near a water-fall.
It should be remarked that the fulling-mills
which existed in those early days throughout the
country had for their design the finishing of the
cloth which was made by band in the homes of the
people.
The early manufactures of East Chelmsford were
mostly of woolen goods, although, in 1813, Phineas
Whiting and Josiah Fletcher, with a capital of S3000,
had erected a modest wooden building near the site of
the Middlesex Mills, for the manufacture of cotton.
But after about five years the mill was sold to Thomas
Hurd, who began in itthe manufacture of woolen goods
and satinet. It was then a serious question whether
America could compete with England in the manu-
facture of cotton. In favor of England were cheaper
labor, greater capital, superior skill and established
reputation. In favor of America were cheaper cot-
ton, more abundant water-power and the superior en-
terprise of a people in the vigor of youth.
Francis Cabot Lowell seems to have been the first
to inspire in the minds of enterprising Americans the
full conviction of the feasibilitj' of this competition.
As already stated, on a previous page, the power-loom,
improved by the skill of Mr. Lowell, had, in 1814, been
introduced into the cotton manufactory of the town of
Wallham. The success of the experiment in Walt-
ham, on the Charles River, led to the construction of
the mills at Lowell, on the Merrimack River, whose
abundant waters and splendid falls seemed to promise
a power which was almost inexhaustible.
In giving a brief history of the great cotton manu-
factories of the city of Lowell, I propose to avoid
minute statistical items, and to present to the reailer
only a general accountof these great enterprises, with
an occasional notice of the prominent men who have
gained a distinguished name, both as successful man-
ufacturers and as citizens of Lowell.
1. The Eleven Great Mantjfactdring Corpo-
rations.
The Merrimack Manufacturing Company,
whose history, interwoven, as it is, with the early
history of the city, has already been partially given,
was incorporated in 1822 with a capital of S600,000.
The capital has been four times increased, and is now
$2,r,00,000.
Its treasurers have been Kirk Boott (appointed
1822), Francis C. Lowell (1837), Eben Chadwick
(1839), Francis B. Crowninshield (1854), Arthur T.
Lyman (1877), Augustus Lowell (1877), Charles H.
Dalton (1877), Howard Stockton (1889).
The superintendents of the mills have been Ezra
Worthen (1823), Paul Moody (1824), Warren Colburn
(1825), John Clark (1833), Emory Washburn (1848),
Edward L. Lebreton (1849), Isaac Hinckley (1849),
John C. Palfrey (1865), Joseph S. Ludlam (1874).
Of the first four of these superintendents, mention
has already been made in another part of this work.
Emory Washburn was called to his office in the
Merrimack Mills, from his practice as attorney-at-
law in Worcester. On leaving his position in Lowell,
after a service of a few months, he returned to bis
practice of law in Worcester, and became a judge and
Governor of the State.
Edward L. Lebreton had been a practicing lawyer
in Newburyport, and had official connection with
Suffolk Bank, Boston. He died in Lowell only a few
months after his appointment as agent.
Isaac Hinckley, before coming to Lowell, was su-
perintendent of the Worcester and Providence Rail-
road. After a service of sixteen years in the Merri-
mack Mills, he resigned to take the office of president
of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore
Railroad.
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, M VSSACFIUSETTS.
John C. Palfrey was appointed superintendent of
the Merrimack Mills after serving as engineer in the
United States Army. He was in office from the close
of the war in 1865, until 1874, when he resigned to
take the position of treasurer of the Manchester
Mills, in Manchester, N. H. He still holds the lat-
ter office.
Josephs. L'jdlam, before coming to the Merrimack
Mills, was engaged in mining operations in the State
of Michigan.
The superintendents of the Print- Works have been
Kirk Boott (1822), Allan Pollock (1823), John D.
Prince (1826), Henry Burrows (18oo), James Duck-
worth (1878), Robert Leatham (1882), Joseph Lea-
tLani (1885), John J. Hart (1887).
The superintendenls of the Print- Works in Lowell
have generally been selected in England for their
technical knowledge of calico-printing.
Mention elsewhere in this work is made of Kirk
Boott aud John D. Prince.
Allan Pollock, before his appointment as superin-
tendent, waji a maker of mathematical iuxtriiments in
Boston.
Henry Burrows was, before coming t<) Lnwell, an
expert calico-printer in Englan<l.
.Tames Duckworth was a calico-printer in the Mer-
rimack Mills before hi.i appointment as .superinten-
dent.
Robert and Joseph Leatham, father ami son, were
English e.Kperts in the calico-priutinir.
John .1. Hart also w.is invited from England to the
position of superintendent, as an e.xpert in the art of
calico-printing.
Directors for 1 889: Selh Bemis, president; (Jeo.
B. Chase, Arthur T. Lyman, C. Wm. Loring, Charles
H. Daiton, .Vuguatus Lowell, Charles P. Bowditch.
-Vgent: Joseph S. Ludlam.
Preparatory to the beginning of the manufacture
of cotton goods by the Merrimack Company and the
Hamilton Company (wliieli soon followed the Merri-
mack), 500 men were em|)loyed in building a dam
acrns's the Merrimack at Pawtucket Falls, in enlarg-
ing the Pawtucket Canal, and in constructing lateral
canals for conducting water-power from the Paw-
tucket Canal to the mills. These improvements cost
8120,000.
On September 1, 1823, the first mill having been
completed, the water w.as let into tlie canal (con.-itruct-
ed for the special purpose of bringing water from the
Pawtucket Canal to the mills of the Jlerrimack
Company), and the wheels started. The first cloth
was made in November, 1823, and on January 3,
1824, took place the first shipment of goods.
The policy of this company has always been most
liberal. It has rendered valuable pecuniary aid to
churches of different denominations, to schools,
aud various institutions designed to promote the re-
ligious, moral and intellectual interest of the com-
munity. Its boarding-houses, designed lor its opera-
tives, have always been models of neatness and order,
and its long brick block of tenements on Dutton
Street is a building which, for taste and elegance,
compares well with the dwellings of private citizens
of wealth. Hon. Thomas H. Benton, the distinguished
United States Senator from Missouri, on visiting
the boarding-houses, probably those of this company,
declared thai the operatives " live in large, stately
houses, and that one finds in them the same kind of
furniture as you will find in a Congressman's house
in Washington."
On Jan. 7, 1827, five years after the first mill was
erected, it was destroyed by fire.
The number of mills has increased to six. There
are also " immense storehouses, boar<ling-houses,
and stables ; and small buibling'i without number."
The management of the Merrimack Mills, almost
throughout their history, has been conducted with
cousumniflte ability.
The stock of the company has ruled liigli in the
market, and the diviilends have been large. How-
ever, the course pursued by the .Merrimack and most
of the other mills of Lowell during the war of 1861
affords a very conspicuous e.xception. < )n this subject
Mr. Cowley uses the following language in his History
of Lowell :"
"During the late war the .Merrimack (!'onipaiiy
showed great lack of 'sagacity and foresight,' in
stopping their mills, in dismissing their operatives,
in discontinuing the purchase of cotton, and in sell-
ing their fabrics at a slight advance on their peace-
prices, and at less than the actual cost of similar fab-
rics at the time of sale. Instead of boldly running,
as companies elsewhere did, they took counsel of
their fears and their sp.acious mills stooil on the bank,
' As idle x-H A pniuU-il ^liip iipuli ii |»iiiii[etl dfK,'
"Thebluodersof this company were naturally copied
by others. . . . The other cotton companies actually
sidd out their cotton, and .several of them made
abortive e.xperiments in other branches of manufac-
tures, by which they made losses, direct and indirect,
exceeding the amount of their entire capital. It is
but fair to aild that most of these abortive e.xperi-
ments were made in opposition to the judgment of
the local agents."
Most unfortunately, at the very time when a bold
venture would have been rewarded with millions of
dollars, it was confidently assumed and ilanlarcd that
the true policy was one of " masterly inactivity."
The aver.age of the annual dividends paid by this
company for the first forty-five years was about 13
per cent., but for the last twelve years, about 7 per
cent.
The company manufactured 11,000,000 yards of
cotton cloth in 1839, 14,0o(),u00 in 1849, 19,000,000 in
1859, 22,000,000 in 1869, 42,000,00(1 in 1879, and 52.-
000,000 in 1889.
lu 1889 the number of yards dyed and printed web
48,000,000.
I
7
■' f^cC.u ,,cC /to cL
c/f.
LOWELL.
The following are some of the most important sta-
tistics for 1889. Number of mills, 5 ; number of
turbine-wheels, G; number of steam-engines, 97,
equal to 6000 horse-power.
Number of spindles, 156,480 ; number of looms,
4607; number of male operatives, 1000; number of
female operatives, 2000 ; number of yard.s made per
week, 1,000,000.
The Hamilton Manufactukixg Company was
incorporated Jan. 26, 1825, for the manufacture
of cotton goods, with a ca|>ital of 1600,000. Its
capital has been four times increased and is now
$1,800,000. Its treasurers, with date of appointment,
have been Wm. Appleton (1825), Ebenezer Appleton
(1830), Geo. W. Lyman (1833), Thomas G. Gary
(1839), Wm. B. Bacon (]8.i9), Arthur T. Lyman
(1860), Arthur L. Devens (1863), Eben Bacon
(1867), Samuel Batchelder (1869), Geo. R. Chap-
man (1870), James A. Dupee (1870), James Long
ley (1886), Charles B. Amory (1886).
Agents: Samuel Batchelder (1825), John Avery
(1831), O. H. Moulton (1864).
John Avery, after serving as a supercargo of a
merchant vessel for some time, went to Wnltliara,
Mass., as paymaster in one of the mills in that town.
F/om Waltham he came to Lowell to the position of
agent of the Appleton Mills, where he served three
years, after which he was for thirty-three years (from
1831 to 1864) agent of the Hamilton Mills.
Oliver H. Moulton, after serving as overseer in the
Pemberton Mills, in Lawrence, and as superintendent
of the Amoskeag Mills, in Manchester, N. H., was
appointed agent of the Hamilton Mills in 1864.
The superintendents of the Print Works have been
Wm. Spencer (1828), Wm. Hunter (1862), Wm.
Harley (1866), Thomas Walsh, assistant (1876).
Wm. Spencer came from England to take, in 1828,
the superintendence of the Hamilton Print Works.
He held the position for thirty-four years. He had
previously superintended print works in Ireland.
While in Lowell he took great interest in agriculture
and was president of the Middlese-ic North Agri-
cultural Society and of the Horticultural Society. He
was a man of noble public spirit and liberal senti-
ments. Kindred tastes made him a friend of Hon.
Daniel Webster.
Wm. Hunter came from England to Lowell to be
the overseer of the color shop of the Hamilton Print
Works. Subsequently he became, for four years,
superintendent of these works.
Wm. Harley, from Scotland, after serving as calico
printer in Southbridge, came to Lowell to serve for
ten years as superintendent of the Hamilton Print
Works. Thomas Walsh, of English birth, from being
an overseer in the printing-room, became superintend-
ent of the Print Works in 1867.
Directors for 1889 : .Tames Longley, Thomas Wig-
glesworth, C. H. Parker, Henry S. Grew, E. I. Browne,
James H. Sawyer, Charles B. Amory, C. W. Jones.
The plant occupies seven and one-half acres of
land. The motive-power consist* of ten turbine-
wheels and forty-one engines of 2600 horse-power.
Like the Merrimack Mills, the Hamilton Mills have
two departments; (1) The manufacture of cotton
cloth ; (2) The printing of calicoes.
The number of yards of cotton cloth manufactured
by this corporation in 1839 wa.s five million yards ;
1849, about nine millions ; 1859, eleven millions; 1869,
eleven millions; 1879, eighteen millions; 1889,
thirty-seven millions.
In 1889 the number of yards dyed and printed was
thirty-four millions.
In 1889 the number of mills, 6 ; looms, 3035 ; male
operatives, 800; female operatives, 1300; yards of
cloth made per week, 730,000.
The operations of this company began about four
years subsequent to those of the Merrimack Com-
pany.
Besides the mills for manufacturing and printing
goods, this company has erected very extensive store-
houses, boarding-houses and other buildings de-
manded by its extended and extending manufacturing
operations.
The goods manufactured include flannels, ticks,
prints, stripes, drills and shirtings.
The curtailment of the manufacture of cotton goods
by this company during the War of 1861, and the
substitution of the manufacture of woolen goods dur-
ing that period, proved disastrous. The wool and the
machinery for its manufacture were purchased at war
|)rices, and the woolen cloth sold at the greatly re-
duced prices which followed the war. It has cost the
company a long struggle to recover its loss. For the
last twelve years the average of the annual dividends
paid by this company has been less than four per
cent.
Ferdinami RoDl.lFF.— Ferdinand Rodliff, su-
perintendent of the cotton department, was born
February 6, 1806, in Seekonk, Massachusetts. His
parents came to America before the War of In-
dependence, his father being of German, and his
mother of English descent. At that time cotton man-
ufacture had just begun in this country, and a mill
was built at Seekoak, near the place of his birth.
Children were then put to work in the mills at an
early age, the small boys and girls being employed in
tending breakers. At the early age of seven years
Mr. RodlifT was put to work in the Central Mill in
Seekonk, his wages being fifty cents per week, while
the hours of labor were from five o'clock in the morn-
ing to seven o'clock in the evening, with a half-hour
for breakfast and three-quarters of an hour for dinner.
His opportunities for attending school were very
meagre, the schools being kept only a month or two
in the winter and the same time in the summer. He
continued at work in the Central Mill at Seekonk and
in attending school until he was seventeen years of
age, when he received the appointment of overseer of
T4
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHT^SETTS.
spinning. When we consider that he was then
scarcely more than a boy, tiie appointmeut was a high
testimonial of his character and worth.
When twenty years of age he 'vaa appointed general
overseer of ail the departments of the Messinger
Mill in Canton, Mas3achu.setts.
On June 28, 1827, when twenty-one years of age, !
he came to Lowell, and entered the employment of j
the Hamilton Manufacturing Company, as second ;
hand in the dressing department. In the autumu of
the same year he was appointed ;is overseer. After a |
service of twenty-five years as overseer in diB'erent i
departments he was appointed assistant superiuten- |
dent, the superintendent at that time being John
Avery, Esq. By this change he was brought into
contact with not only the manufacturing, but the
mechanical part of the work of the mill. The position
of assistant superintendent he has now held for more
than thirty-seven years.
Thirteen years ago, in 1877, when ilr. Rodlitt" had
completed a service of fifty years with the Hamilton
Manufacturing Company, he entertained serious |
thoughts of resigning his position on account of his i
advanced age, being then seventy-one years old.
Whatever feeling of delicacy he may have felt on !
account of his age. the Directors ot the Corporation
completely dispelled by a remarkable testimony ol
their appreciation of the value of his services.
<Jn the 27th day of .June, 1877, upon the comple-
tion of Mr. RodlitJ-s rtltieth year of continuous ser-
vice, the Directors of the Hamilton Company met at
Lowell, and he was called before them and presented
by the trea.surer, -Mr. Dupee. with a gold watch and
chain and a United States bond of .'SlOoii, together
with the following note :
" tlusli.N, .liioe 'JTtli, IiiTT.
*' tif'ir si> : To-riiurrnw will •'■iiii|iletH ihe tiftielb year itl aer\ ic-l reliijer-
L'tl by yuu lu llie Ilaliiiltoii Mniniluctniin^ < '■.uijiuriy.
'*Aa a testiiiiunlHl i.f their uitiirHc-Litioii of yitiir fanhfulDeS-s, intf yrttv
;ind aelf-Jenial, .inJ Vfur /e.ilitiis ;uiii litany co-operalioo with all the
"tJicera of the t/uinpany, the Dii-ectura ask your acceptaiice of a gold
watch aD'i a L'oiteiJ Stales btiiiil fur uUe thollsauii ijullars.
" With our Wrii uislies (or your health aad liappioeas we have the
pleasure to subscribe ourselves.
** Very cordially your friends.
(Signed) "James Longlev,
" TaoMAS WlfJ^LF-SW'OBTH,
"I'HAi. Henkv Pabkeh,
" Henky Savles,
" Henrv 3. Grew,
" .Tames Ellison,
" ja.1ies a. dcpee.
" To Ferdinand RodlllT, Esci. '
Since the presentation of this generous testimonial I
Mr. Rodliffhas for nearly thirteen years held his posi-
tion, performing with great punctuality and fidelity,
the duties appertaining to it, and receiving from his
superiors, his peers and his friends frequent testimon-
ials of the honor and affection in which they hold him.
Upon the occasion of his eightieth birthday, Feb-
ruary 6, 1886, he received the following letter from
the Directora of the Company :
" BosniN. February 'irh, ISMJ.
** P^-ir .Sir ■ The Direttitrs of the llaniiltuii Mauufactuniig Company
present their earnest coit^latulatiuns on this your eig:litieth birthday.
Wo beg to assure you of theirhigh appreoialiou of yuur services in the
enipluynient of this I'uiiw.ralitm, nearly tifly-niue yeai^, and to accept
their best wiahes for the lon;;er cunliuiiance of your remarkable health
and vi|;or of body and niiod.
" CordialW vour friends,
(Signed) " James LoNui.Er,
" Thumas Whjgleswobth,
" i;has. Henky Pabkeh,
" Henry S. i!rew.
*• Edward I. Browne,
".I. HtBRERT Sawyer,
"James A. Di iee.
•'Tn Ferdinand Rodli/f, Ks.] "
Mr. Rodliffhas now served in manufacturing com-
panies continuously for nearly seventy-seven years.
It would be difficult to find iiiiothei- man in America
who has done the same. Now, in his eighty-fifth
vear, he goes to his daily duties with elastic step,
atl'ording, by the soundness of his body, head ami heart,
an admirable illustration (if coiunlete manhood. He
enjoys the pleasant memories of a wcll-n(ient life —
"And that which ^hi'llM accoliipaliy old at:e,
As honor, love, .ihedielae, tr.io|id of ll ieii-U "
The .\pi'1.etijN Co.mpany was incorporated in
1828, with a capital of Siioo.iHlO, which ha- not since
been increased. Its mills are situated between the
Hamilton and Paw tucket Canals and west of the
Bamilton .Mills.
The treasurers of this company have been as fol-
lows : Win. .\ppleton (appointed in 1S2S). Patrick
T. Jackson (182!l). Ceo. W.Lyman ( ls:!2). Thomas
C. Cary 11841), \Vm. B. I'.acon (IS-'iH), Arthur T.
Lyman (18<11), .\rthur L. I>evens (isii.)). .lolin .\.
Burnham (lsti7), tieo. .Motley i l.sii7), .lames .\. I>u-
pt-e (1>174), Louis Robeson (188<;).
The superinteiidenLs have been .Ii.bii .Vvery (|.S28),
(ieo. .Motley (ls:U). .1. H. Sawyer (lsii7), Daniel
Wright (1881), Wm. H. McDavitt il.ss7i.
Mr. .\very is noticed under the history of the Ham-
ilton Mills, (leo. -Motley, from the office of clerk in
the counting-room of the Hamilton Mills, was, in
18.31, appointed superintendent of the .Vppleton
Mills, and filled the otBce with great ability and fidel-
ity for thirty-six years.
J. H. Sawyer, before his appointment as superin-
tendent of the Appleton Mills, in 1807, was superin-
tendent of the Otis Mills in Ware, Mass. He held
the office in Lowell fourteen years, and i» now treas-
urer of mills in Chicopee, Mass.
Daniel Wright, from the position of assistant of Mr.
Sawyer, became, on the retirement of Mr. Sawyer,
superintendent of the Appleton Mills in 1881.
Wm. H. McDavitt, having held the otlice of super-
intendent of the Globe Mills, in Woonsocket. R. L,
was appointed superintendent of the Appleton Mills
in 1887.
C. H. Richardson, before his appointment, in 1888,
as agent of the .A.ppleton Mills, was superintendent
of mills in Newark, N. J.
;;
/ c/ /lX'
LOWELL.
The motive- power in the Appleton Mills coDBists of
seven turbine-wheels and three steam-engines of 1550
horse-power. The turbine wheels were first success-
fully used in these mills, one of them having been
put in in the year 1844. Since that date the turbine-
wheels, which were introduced in the mills of Lowell
by Uriah A. Boyden, have gradually displaced the
breast-wheels, only a very few of which are still in
use. The main advantage of the turbine over the
breast-wheel is that it can be successfully used in
time of a freshet or very high water upon the river,
when the breast-wheel, on account of back water,
loses all or part of it* efficiency.
This company, sooner than some others, discovered
the mistake of inaction during the War of 1861, and
sooner recovered from it« ill effects. The average of
its annual dividends, however, for the last twelve
years have been less than four and a half per cent.
This company has five mills, 1639 looms, 260 male
operatives, 450 female operatives, and manufactures
350,000 yards per week.
The goods manufactured are sheetings, shirtings
and drillings.
The number of yards manufactured in 1839 was
5,000,000; in 1849,7,000,000; in 1859,8,000,000; in
1869, 8,000,000; 1879, 13.000,000, and in 1889,
16,000,000.
The Lowei-l Manitfacturing Compaxv was in-
corporated in 1828, with a capital of $900,000, which
has since been increased to $2,000,000. Among its
corporators were Frederic Cabot, William Whitney
and Richard C. Cabot. This company was the first
to use for weaving carpels, the power-looms, invented
by E. B. Bigelow, an invention so wonderful that it
seems to be almost endowed with intellect.
The following, relating to thiit company, is taken
from Hill's " Lowell Illustrated " : "The Company
originally commeneed operations with a single mill
four stories in height and about 200 ft. in length,
with a few necessary buildings for storing raw mater-
ials and manufactured goods, sorting wool and dye-
ing. About two-thirds of the space in this mill was
occupied for the manufacture of coarse cotton cloth,
called Osnaburgs, or Negro Cloth, which was largely
sold in the South for plantation wear. The remain-
ing space was utilized for the production of carpeting
on hand-looms, the weaving being done in the fourth
story. It was in one corner of this weave-room, par-
titioned off for the purpose, that the Bigelow power-
loom, which was destined to work such a revolution
in carpet-weaving, was built and perfected in 1842,
or about that time."
In 1848, when it was evident that Bigelow's inven-
tion could be profitably employed, a mill of one story
in height and covering nearly an acre of ground, was
erected and furnished with 260 of these looms for the
manufacture of carpets. About 1883 another spa-
cious mill, three stories high, was erected by this
company for the manufacture of Brussels carpets, and
was furnished with a Hartford automatic engine of
500 horse-power. The works of this company occupy
about ten acres on the south side of Market Street.
The directors of this company for 1889 were Daniel
S. Richardson, S. L. Thorudike, Augustus Lowell,
Israel G. Whitney, Augustus T. Perkins.
The treasurers have been, Frederick Cabot (1828),
George W. Lyman (1831), Nathaniel W. Appleton
(1841), William C. Appleton (1843), J. Thomas
Stevenson (1847), Israel Whitney (1848), Charles L.
Harding (1863), David B. Jewett (1864). Samuel Fay
(1875), George C Richardson (1880), ArthurT. Lyman
(1881).
The superintendents have been Alexander Wright
(1828), Samuel Fay (1852), Andrew F. Swapp (1874),
Alvin S. Lyon (1883).
Samuel Fay was born in Warwick, Massachusetts,
in 1817, and came to Lowell, when fourteen years of
age, to serve as clerk in the cloth-room of the Lowell
Corporation. Subsequently he held the position of
paymaster for six years, of superintendent for twenty-
two years, and of treasurer for six years. He died in
1880, having held positions of trust in the corporation
for forty-nine years.
Andrew F. Swapp was assistant superintendent of
Lowell Mills before his appointment as superintend-
ent. He had previously been overseer of the dye
works of the company. He died while in office.
Alvin S. Lyon, before hi§ appointment as superin-
tendent, had been superintendent of the Durfee Mills
of Fall River.
This company manufactures ingrain, Brussels and
Wilton carpets, worsted goods, and a limited amount
of cotton goods. Number of mills, 5; turbine-
wheels, 2; number of steam-engines, 5; looms, 485;
male operatives, 950 ; female operatives, 1150 ; yards
of carpets made per week, 75,000; number of yards of
carpeting during the year 1839, 130,000; 1849,
338,000; 1859, 1,300,000; 1869, 1,820,000; 1879,
1,924,000; 1889, 3,120,000.
For the last twelve years the average of the divi-
dends paid by this company ha.s been about four and
one-half per cent.
Alexander Wright was born in Arklestone,
near Paisley, in Scotland, May 4, 1800, and died at
his home in Lowell, June 7, 1852, at the age of fifty-
two years. He was the son of Duncan Wright, a
chemical bleacher by trade, who came to America in
1812, during the last war with Great Britain, and was
taken prisoner by Captain De Wolf, of the American
privateer, " The Yankee," and carried into the harbor
of Bristol, Rhode Island.
When De Wolf discovered the occupation of his
prisoner, he employed him as superintendent of a
bleachery, in which he had an interest, in Coventry,
Rhode Island. He is believed to have been the first
chemical bleacher in New England, if not the first in
America. The circumstance of his capture was the
cause of his resolve to settle in New England instead
71)
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COIINTY, MASSACIirSKTTS.
of Philadelphia, where lie had intended to fix his
home.
In 1815 his wife, who was a sister of the American
ornithologist, Alexander Wilson, with three sons,
one of whom was the subject of this sketch, followed
him to America. The father with his family now
located in Smithficld, Rhode Island, but after two
years removed to Waltham, Massachusetts, where he
started a bleachery on his own account. Three years
later the Boston Manufacturing Company, being
about to start a great manufacturing enterprise in
Waltham, bought out the bleachery of Mr. Wright,
whereupon he set up a new bleachery in Medway,
Massachusetts. He at length engaged in calico-print-
ing in Fall River, Massachusetts.
We now resume the history of the subject of this
sketch. Mr. Wright, following his father to America
when fifteen years of age, arrived at Boston in the
first ship which entered that harbor alter the close of
the war. When twenty years of age he commenced
the manufacture of coach lace in Medway, Mass.,
and continued in that business forsix years. He then,
in 1826, first conceived the idea of manufacturing
carpets, of which, up to this time, none had been
made in New England. He went to England to pro-
cure looms ami weavers. Upon his return voyagr-
"The Rival," the ship in which hesailed, was wrecked
on the American coast. But having, at length,
reached home in safety, he set up, in Medway. his
three looms and began the manufacture of carpets.
Misfortune, however, pursued him ; for in two years
his mill was destroyed by tire.
He was induced by Hon. Patrick T. tlackson, of Bos-
ton, to enter the service of the Lowi'll Manufacturing
( 'iiinpany, of Lowell, which was the first of the great
corporations of that city to engage in the iiiaiiufac-
ture of carpets. Mr. Wright was apjiointed the first
superintendent of that company in 18l!8, and he filled
llie ofllce with great ability and success until his
death, in 1852. He proved to be an officer whose afl^a-
bility of manners and thorough knowledge of hisbiis-
iness secured the confidence and respect of the stock-
holders and managers of the company.
Mr. Wright possessed fpialities of mind and heart
which admirably fitted him for bis responsible posi-
tion. He was of a frank and generous nature, which
readily won the affection and respect of all he met.
He was far more than a safe and skillful manager ol
mills — hew.asa public-spirited citizen, a generous and
hospitable neighbor and friend, a noble and bounti-
ful man in all the social and domestic relations of life.
He bore through life that sympathetic, gallant and
ardent na' lire which renilered him very dear to his
friends and made his death, while in the prime of his
manhood, a subject of sincere and universal grief.
Mr. Wright was noted for the ardor and enthusiasm
with which he pursued every enterprise in which he
engaged, and for the cheerful zeal with which he
pressed forward to the attainment of his object.
He was deeply interested in the public welfare.
His fellow-citizens often desired to bestow upon him
the honors of office. He was urged to allow himself
to be a candidate for the mayoralty of the city,
but he declined the honor. He was, however, twice
elected on the Board of Aldermen, and once represent-
ed the city in the Legislature of the .*tate. At the
time of his death he was a member of the Board of
School Committee.
His wife, two sons an<l five daughters survived
him.
The MiPDLESE.x Comp.a..vv was incorporated in
183l>, with a capital of soOO.iMMl, which has since been
increased to ■■>7."fi,(HU>. .Vinong the corporators were
.Samuel Lawrence and William W. Stime. It en-
gaged in the manufacture of broadcloths, cassi-
meres, etc.
The treasurers of this company have been William
W. .'^tone (18W), Samuel Lawreme (H-lnV R. •'^. Fay
(18.-.7), George /.. .'^ilsbee I I.sSl>).
The agents have been .lames (.'ook (is.ioi. Nelson
Palmer (lS4'i), Samuel Lawrence (l>;4i'i\ • >. H. Ppitn
11847), William T.Mann ( is.-,l). .rn^lma Humphrey
(1>!.')21, Janu'S Cook llS-''8i, H. H. Perry ll8,=iS), (uis-
tavus V. Fox (18(;'.i), William C. Avery (l>:4). u. H.
Perry (1882!.
James Cook became mayoi- of Lowell in IS.oO. A
notice of liiiii will he foiiiiil :inioiig ihe sketches nt
the lives of the mayors of the city.
Xelson Palmer, who hail -erved under Mr. L'nok
as wiiol-K(irter in his mills in N..rthampioii, suc-
cee<led .Mr. Cook, in 184.''. as agent i>f the .^li(ldlesex
Mills of Lowell.
i^amiiel Lawrence was brother nf Amos and .\bbolt
Lawrence, of P.iisto;i. .\tter leaving the office of
ireasiirer of the Miitdlesex Mills, in which he was
charged witti gross lulsinaiiagemcnt. In- cnuaged in
the wool business in New York (ity, ami died in
.Stockbridge, Mass.
f). H. Perry was the son of the celebrated naval
commander, Oliver Ha/anl Perry, made illustrious
by his victory on Lake F.rie. He left the office of
agent of the Middlesex Mills to become one of the
firm of Perry. Wendell, Fay it Co., selling agents of
the mills. He died at his residence in Ando\er,
Ma.ss. His son, O. H. Perry, is the present agent of
these mills.
William T. .^Llnn served as paymaster in the Mid-
dlesex Mills before his appointment as agent.
Joshua Humphrey, before his appointment as
agent, was a naval officer. .After leaving his office as
agent, he returned to his home in Virginia, and be-
came an officer in the Confederate Navy during the
War of the I!ebelIion. He died in Virginia.
Gustavus V. Fox is noticed elsewhere in this work.
William C. Avery, on leaving Lowell, went to Cal-
ifornia, and engaged in agricultural pursuits. He
now, however, resides in Dedham, Miiss., where he
has been engaged in the woolen business.
LOWELL.
T7
The present agent, O. H. Perry, graduated at the
School of Technology in Boston, became superin-
tendent of the Middlesex Mills under Mr. Avery,
and is the successor of Mr. Avery as agent.
The directors for 18Sil were Benjamin F. Butler,
tieorge Higgiuson, T. .lefiierson Coolidge, M. E. Wen-
dell, C. P. Curtis, Augustus Lowell, George Z. Sils-
bee.
The plant occupies seven and one-half acres of
land bounded by Warren Street, Concord River and
the Pawtucket Canal.
The goods now manufactured by this company are
indigo-blue coatings, cassimeres, police, yacht and
cadet cloths, ladies' sackings and beavers.
The motive power consists of two turbine-wheels,
three breast-wheels, three engines of 250 horse-power.
Number of mills, 3; number of teasles used per
year, 1,000,000; wool used per week, 20,000 pounds;
number of male operatives, 400; number of female
operatives, oHd; number .of yards of cloth manufac
tured per week, 10,Oilti.
The number of yards of cassimeres and broadcloths
manufactured by this company in 1S39 was -J0O,000;
ill 1S49, l,l;;7,OO0; in 18o'J, 1,500,000; in 18(iy, TSO,-
IIOO; in IST'.i, l,19(i,fM)0; in 1SS!I, G')0,000.
This company has sutl'ered lar more than any other
In the lity from the mismanagement of the men
whom it had entrusted with ofhce. In 1858, the en-
tire capital having be^n lost by its officers^ the com-
pany was re-organized with new managers and new-
subscriptions to stock.
Since the re-organization in IS-iS the company has
had very gratifying success. The average of its divi-
dendf fur ihe last twelve year< has been nearly twelve
per cent.
The turbine-wlieel his entirely superseded the
breast-wheel, excefil in the Jliddlesex Mills, where
three breast-wheels of the old pattern are still in use.
This company has been a pioneer in the successful
manufacture in America of goods which had here-
tofore been im]>orted from Europe. Upon this sub-
ject the following statement of Samuel Lawrence,
treasurer of the company from 1 840 to 1857, is of in-
terest :
" When Uif Mi'ldlpst-x Ct-nil'aiiy ctiirted, in IS:ti'., nioet >»f the woolen
(ro.>ds fonsiinie'l tif re were fri'iii Kngliind, imported Ity n»en from York-
eliire, wh'i for nwuy yeitrh eviided piiyiug the fuH amount uf duties by
linder\Hluulioll. . . . I Hie of the dllticulties in Ihe early (irodlictioii of
wooleoh liere «afi a defect in dyeiiic- Tliis coni|iany was ntoet foniiuate
in early discovering that this evil arose from Ihe Bimpleut cause — the ini-
perfecl cleansing of the wool. . . .
"Mr. Cuinptuii, of Taunton. Mass., became employed by Ihe Middle-
Hex Company to adapt his principle to their looms to produce a fabric
like the Sedan, and wat^ entirely KnireMful. Thus crimnieuced in this
ronntl'y the manufacture of laney cassimeres. The shawl manufiicture
by Ills MiJdlest'X ('onip:iny was commenced in 1M47. I'p lo that time
the fringes were twisted by hand, ami Ihe success dejiended uiajn its l»e-
iDgdoiie bj machinery. At that lime .Mr. Millon D. Whipple was in
the employment of the company, jierfecting a felting machine, and be
was employed lo produce a twisting-machine for fringes, in which he
succeeded iterfeclly, and tliua gave this branch of industry to this
fountrv."
The Suffolk Manufacturing Company was
incorporated January 17, 1831, with a capital of
$600,000, and the Tremont Mills, March 19, 1831,
with a capital of $600,000. The two companies, in
1871, were consolidated and called the "Tremont A:
Suffolk Mills." The plant occupies ten and one-half
acres of land on both sides of the Northern Canal.
The capital of the consolidated company is $1,200,-
000.
The treasurers of the Suffolk Company were : John
W. Boott (1831), Henry Hall (1832), Henry V. Ward
(1859), Walter Hastings (1865), Wm. A. Burke
(1868), James C. Ayer (1870).
The treasurers of the Tremont Mills were : Wm.
Appleton (1831), Henry Hall (1832), Henry V. Ward
(1857), Walter Hastings (1865), Wm. A. Burke
(1868), James C. Ayer (1870).
The treasurers of the Tremont & Suffolk Mills
have been : James C. Ayei (1871), John C. Birdseye
(IS72), Arthur G. Lyman (1886), Alphonso S. Covel
(1887).
Agents of the Suffolk Manufacturing Company :
Robert Means (1831), John Wright (1842), Thomas S.
Shaw (18GS).
Agents of the Tremont Mills: Israel Whitney
(1831 ), John Aiken (1834), Charles L. Tilden (1837),
Charles F. Battles (1858), Thomas S. Shaw (1870).
.-\grnt8 of the Tremont & Suffolk Mills ; Thomas
S. Shaw (1871), Edward W. Thomas (1887). Kobert
Means, before his appointment as agent, was a mer-
chant in Amherst, N. H. He died suddenly in
Lowell, while in the performance of his duties as
agent.
John Wright was born in Westford, Mass., No-
vember 4, 1797. He graduated from Harvard Col-
lege, and was afterwards preceptor of the Westford
.Vcademy. He was afterwards principal of a large
school in Worcester, Mass., where he becytme agent
of a manufactory. He came to Lowell to act as
agent of the Suffolk Mills in 1842. This position he
occupied for the long period of twenty-six years.
His health failed him in 1868, and he resigned his
office. He died in 1869, at the age of seventy-one
years. Mr. Wright was a man of talent. He inter-
ested himself in the welfare of the city, and was a
member of the School Committee and State Senator.
He held various other positions of responsibility and
trust.
Thomas S. Shaw, before his appointment as agent
of the Suffolk Mills, had been superintendent of the
Boott Mills and agent of the Nashua Manufacturing
Company, Nashua. He is now agent of a mill in
Marysville, New Brunswick.
Israel Whitney had been a sea captain before his
appointment as agent of the Tremont Mills. After
resigning his office he became agent of the Great
Falls Manufacturing Company.
See notice of John Aiken as agent of the Lawrence
Mills.
78
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Charles L. Tilden, from serving; as clerk, was ap-
pointed agent of the company. On resigning the
office of agent he retired from active business.
Charles F. Battles was born in Dorchester, Mass.,
in 1818. He came to Lowell when sixteen years of
age, and was employed in the counting-room of the
Tremont Corporation. He became paymaster and
then agent of the corporation, holding the last posi-
tion twelve years. He was appointed treasurer of the
Mechanics' Savings Bank in 1870, but died the same
year at the age of fifty-two years.
Edward M. Thomas, after serving as draughtsman
in Lowell Machine-Shop, became superintendent of
the Willimantie Linen Mills, in Willimantic, Conn.
From this position he was, in 1887, appointed agent
of the Tremont and Suffolk Mills.
Directors of the Tremont and Suflolk Mills 1889 —
Arthur T. Lyman, Fre<lerick F. .\yer, Frederick
Xyer, Jacob Rogers, James W. ('lark, Harrison
Gardner.
This company manufactures cotton flannels, drill-
ings, sheetings and shirtings, dress goods and fancy I
shirtings. Its motive-power consists of eleven ttir- |
bine-wheels, three engines of 20(10 horse-power.
Number of males employed, 500; number of females
employed, 14IMI; number of spindles, 113,0iiO; num-
ber of looms, .'{SOO ; number of yards per week, ,
(500,000. '
Before the consolidation the Suffolk Company made
cotton cloth, in 18.39, 4,ti8tt,000 yards; in 1849,
.''i.-JOO.t.MiO; in 18.^)9,8,008,(1(1(1; in 18()9, (1,500,000, and
the Tremont Mills in 1839, (;,741,iiOO ; in 1849, (!,240,- [
000; in 18.'.9, 11,9^0,000; in 1869, t>,7t30,0O0. '
Since the con.solidation the Tremont and Suffolk
Company made, in 1879, •2C),00O,0OO ; in 1S89, 29,-
O0(»,(_IO0.
The experiment of manufacturing cassimeres j
during the war was made by both these companies,
and to both it proved a disastrous failure and a great
loss of capital.
The average of dividends of the consolidated com-
pany during the last twelve years has been nearly six [
and one-half per cent.
In recent years very great changes and improve-
ments have been made in the buildings of this com- I
pany. The original buildings can scarcely be recog- j
nized in the spacious and substantial structures of
to-day. !
The Lawrence Manufacturing Company was
incorporated in 1831, with a capital of *1, 200,000, '
which has since been increased to 11,500,000. The
plant is on the Merrimack River, west of the Merri-
mack Mills.
The treasurers of this company have been : Wil- !
liam Appleton (1831), Henry Hall (1832), Henry V. '.
Ward (1857), T. Jefferson Coolidge (1868), Lucius M. i
Sargent (1880). |
The agents have been: William Austin (1830),;
John Aiken (1837), William S. Suuthworlh (1849), '
William F. Salmon (1865), Daniel Hussey (1869),
John Kilburn (1878).
Capt. .\u3tin, before his appointment as agent of
the Lawrence Mills, was warden of the State's Prison
at Charlestown, Mass. John Aiken was born
in Bedford, N. H., graduated from Dartmouth Col-
lege, practiced law in Manchester, Vt. (where he
also was a teacher in Burr Seminary), was for three
years agent of the Tremont Mills, in Lowell, and for
twelve years agent of the Lawrence Mills, and after-
wards treasurer of the ( 'ochecho and Salmon Falls
Mills. He held various civil offices, and was a man
of commanding influence and marked ability. He
died in .-Vndover, Mass., in 1864.
William S, .Southworth, before he became agent of
the Lawrence Mills, was a practicing lawyer in Ben-
nington, Vt. Upon leaving Lowell he returned to
liis practice of law at Bennington.
William F. Salmon, before Lis appointment as
ngent of the Lawrence Mills, had been paymaster and
superintendent of the Lowell Mills. Since being
agent of the Lawrence Mills he has been manager of
the Lowell Hosiery (_'i*rapany.
Daniel Hussey, before coming to Lowell, was agent
of the Nashua Mills, of Nashua, N. H. After leav-
ing Lowell he w.is treasurer of the (ireat Falls Manu-
facturing Company, of Great Falls, N. H.
John Kilburn, while ageijt of the Naumkeag
.Mills, in Salem, -Mass., wjis appointed agent of the
Lawrence .Manufacturing Company in 1878.
From IS'Il to |S(i4 the manufactures of this company
consisted of the various grades of cotton cloth, but
-ince 1864 one of the most important of its manu-
factures has been cotton hosiery for women. .Vnother
lirancli of business has been knitted underclothing.
The following statistics are for 1889, instead of
1890, as in other cases :
The motive-power consists of twelve turbines and
five steam-engines. Number of mills, 5 ; of spindles,
120,000; of looms, 3432; of males employed, 1051 ;
of females employed, 2089; firoducts per week, 696,-
526 yards of cotton cloth, 17,046 dozen hosiery, 900
ihirts and drawers.
The various manufactures are shirtings, sheetings,
cotton fiannels, cotton and merino hosiery.
The average of dividends paid by this company for
the last twelve years has been nearly nine per cent.
The introduction of the manufacture of hosiery, in
the time of the war, was attended with the loss of
about ?oOO,000, but in recent years this manufacture
has yielded a large ])rofit.
This company has kept abreast of the times, hav-
ing erected substantial and spacious store-houses and
other buildings, and having promptly introduced the
most approved machinery.
The Lawrence Company manufactured, in 1839,
10,400,000 yards of cotton cloth; in 1849, 13,520,000 ;
in 185a 18,720,000; in 1869, 15,600,000; in 1879,
23,100,000.
CL^ ^ en L, C
^
LOWELL.
79
The Lowell Bleacheey was incorporated in
1833, with a capital of $50,000, which has been in-
creased to ^00,000.
Its treasurers have been John Clark (1833), James
C. Dunn (1834); Charles T. Appleton (1835), Samuel
G. Snelling (1859), Percivnl Lowell (1886).
The agents of the company have been Jonathan
Derby (1833), Joseph Hoyt (1834), Charles T. Apple-
ton (1835), Charles A. Babcock (1849), F. P. Apple-
ton (185.i), Fordyce Coburn (1880), F. P. Appleton
(1882), James N. Bourne (1886).
Messrs. Derby and Hoyt served the company only
about one year each.
Charles T. Appleton had been connected with the
Bleachery in Waltham, Mass., before coming to
Lowell. On leaving the office of agent he became
treasurer of Lowell Bleachery.
Charlen A. Babcock, before his appointment as
agent of the Bleachery, was paymaster in one of the
corporations. <.^u resiguing his office as agent he be-
came a member nf the tirm of A. & A. Lawrence, in
Boston.
F. P. .\ppletoc, before becoming agent of the
Bleachery, officiated as a Unitarian clergyman. On
resigning his office as agent lie retired from active
busines.s.
Fordyce Ooburii, from the position of overseer on
the Corporation, was made agent. He died while in
the office.
James N. Bourne, the present incumbent, before
his appointment as agent, had been the superintend-
ent of the Bondsville Bleachery, and had been con-
nected with Kitson's Machine Company.
Directors for 1889: Auirus'.us Lowell, Harrison
Gardner, Daniel S. Richardson, Percival Lowell,
Charles F.. Whitin.
The buildings of this couipany are the bleachery
and the dye-works. Tne motive-power consists of
one turbine, six engincsof 1200 horsepower. Number
of males employed, 3fi0 ; number of females em-
ployed, 40; number of yards dyed per year, 15,000,-
dOO : number of pounds bleached per year, 10,000,000.
The Boott C()TTf)N-MlLL.« were incorporated in
1835, with a capital of .•?1.200,00((, which has not
been increased. Among the corporators were Ab-
bott Lawrence and John A. Lowell.
The treasurers of this company have been John A.
Lowell (1835), J. Pickering Putnam (1848), T. Jeffer-
son Coolidge (1858), Richard D. Rogers (1865), Au-
gustus Lowell (1875), Eliot C. Clarke (1886).
The agents of this company, Benj. F. French (1836),
Linus Child (1845), Wm. A. Burke (1862), Alexan-
der O. Cumnock (1808).
Benj. F. French was educated for the bar and had
practiced his profession in Amherst, N. H. He en-
gaged in the business of manufacturing in Nashua,
and from Nashua was invited to Lowell. He served
the Boott Company as agent from 1836 until 1845,
when he accepted the presidency of the Railroad
Bank. He was a man of high character and liberal
culture.
Linus Child was born at Woodstock, Conn., in
1802. He graduated from Yale College in 1824,
studied law in New Haven and engaged in the prac-
tice of law at Southbridge, Mass, He was six times
elected to the Senate of Massachusetts. For seven-
teen years (from 1845 to 1862) he was agent of the
Boott Mills. While in Lowell he was prominent in
promoting the interests of the city in religious, civil
and political matters, holding city offices, and exer-
cising a large and beneficent influence. After leaving
Lowell he practiced law in Boston. He died in 1870,
at the age of sixty-eight years.
A. G. Cumnock, the present agent, has risen to his
position through all the grades of service in the
Boott Mills.
Directors in 1889: Augustus Lowell, Eliot C.
Clarke, C. Wm. Loring, Arthur T. Lyman, Edward
\V. Hooper, Augustus Flagg, Edward I. Browne.'
The plant is on the south side of the Merrimack
River, and is separated from the Concord by the
.Massachusetts Mills. The mills have, since 1861,
been extensively altered, and all the buildings of
this company are substantially constructed. Before
the war the stock of this company, for several years,
was mucli depressed and for a season paid no divi-
dends, but in recent years it has seen greater pros-
perity. For the last twelve years the average of
annual dividends has been over eight per cent.
The motive-power consists of nine turbines, and
four steam-engines of 1750 horse-power. " The com-
pany has [seven] mills of modern style in full opera-
tion, and the interior arrangements and machinery
are the best that can be devised."' The plant occu-
pies about nine acres of land, a part of it being in
Centralville, where it is proposed in due season to erect
new buildings. The goods manufactured by this
company are sheetings, shirtings and printing cloth.
The number of mills is seven ; number of spindles,
148,412; number of looms, 4002 ; males employed, 478;
females employed, 1500 ; yardsof cloth made per week,
800,000 ; number of yards of cloth made in 1839.
8,061,000; in 1849, 10,273,000; in 1859, 15,579,000;
In 1869, 16,715,000; in 1879, 27,106,000; in 1889
40,300,000.
Alexander G. Cumnock. — The great manufac-
turing corporations of Lowell were not institutions
of slow and gradual growth, but they sprung into
being at once, full-grown and strong. They were
founded by wealthy merchants of Boston who had
counted the cost and knew well what they were do-
ing. They were men of noble aims and comprehen-
sive views, and acted upon wise and benevolent prin-
ciples.
In the early years of these corporations, so great
was the desire to promote the general welfare of the
manufacturing community, that it was the custom to
select, as agents and managers, men who, without any
80
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS
special and practical knovvledge of maDufacturiag,
had acquired a high reputation and influence in the
business in which they were already engaged. But
in later years the problem of management has become
more difficult. The capacity of the mills, the amount
of work performed and of money invested have be-
come greatly increased. Competition has sprung up
00 every side. The margin of profits has been grow-
ing less and less. In order to insure dividends the
most approved methods of manufacturing must be
introduced, and goods must be made at the lowest
possible expenditure.
Hence it has come to pass in recent years that
agents and managers must have, in addition to the
high character, liberal views and business ability
formerly possessed, another qualification, namely, a
thorough and intimate knowledge of the best meth-
ods of manufacturing.
To this class of manufacturers belongs Alexander
G. Cumnock, the present agent of the Boott Cotton-
Mills, and the subject of this sketch.
Mr. Cumnock was born in Glasgow, Scotland, Sep-
tember 28, 188t. His facher, Robert L. Cumnock,
was a freeholder of Glasgow and a man of fair estate.
Four years after the birth of the son the family re-
moved to Johnstone, thirty miles from Glasgow,
where the father engaged in manufacturing. Eight
years later the father resolved to relinquish his busi-
ness in Scotland and seek hia fortune as a farmer in
the ne'sr world. .Accordingly, in 1848, with his wife
and his two children, he came to America, and after
a brief sojourn in Lowell he settled upon a farm in
Mason, \. H., where he reared a family of eleven
children.
Of the eight sons, five have been remarkably suc-
cessful in manufacturing. It is believed that no
other family in America has the practical control of
such extensive manufacturing operations.
Alexander <t. Cumnock went to Lowell at the age
of twelve years and entered the Edson Grammar
School. He spent three years in this school, which
terminated his school life. He began, in his early
years, the work of preparing himself for promotion.
He devoted his evenings to study. For several win-
ters he took lessons in draughting. For two winters
he look lessons in book-keeping and general business
in JlcCoy's Commercial School in Lowell, and also
for one winter he studied in connection with a com-
mercial college in Boston. The patient toil and ap-
plication, of which he was an example, were the
secret of his success.
After leaving school he entered the Hamilton Milis
and was employed in the spinning-room. From this
point it is interesting to trace the rapid |)rogress of
the enterprising mill-boy, step by step, up to his
present enviable position. In 1854, when twenty
years of age, he was appointed third hand in the
spinning-room on the Boott Corporation, then under
Hon. Linus Child as agent. Three years later he be- '
came second hand. .\t the age of twenty-five years
he was invited by Mr. Straw, agent of the Amoskeag
Mills in Manchester, N. H., to take the position of
overseer of a spinning-room in those mills. To pre-
vent his acceptance of this otfer, Mr. Child promoted
liim to the position of overseer in the spinning-room.
.\fter si.\ years he was appointed superintendent of
the Boott Mills, an office next to that of agent. In the
next year he was chosen agent of the Quinneboag Man-
ufacturing Company, of Danielsonviile, Conn. After
holding this position two years, he was, in IStiS, upon
the resignation of William A. Burke, chosen to suc-
ceed him in office as agent of the Boott Cotton-Mills,
one of the most extensive manufacturing corporations
in New England.
This position oi high responsibility he has now
successfully filled for twenty-two years. Meanwhile
the operations of this great corporation, with a cap-
ital of $1,200,000, have been greatly enlarged, the
number of epindles having been increased from ti4,-
nO(( to 1-51,000.
Outside his official station, Mr. ('uninock has occu-
pied various positions of tnist in civil life. He is a
trustee of the Mechanics' ."Savings Bank, a director of
the Lowell Gas-Light Company, and a director of the
Railroad National Bank. In 1872 he was in the
Board of Aldermen, and held the imjiortant position
of chairman of the (.'oinmittee on Water Works,
when the policy of the management of these works
was in process of formation.
Mr. Cumnock is a man of generous nature, with a
hearty sympathy with all that pertains to the virtue
of society and the welfare of the city. Foriune has
favored him, and he has been remarkably successful.
His success, however, has not been attained without
patient toil, unremitting efibris, and a high purpo.se to
" ilo lii.1 bent iilwaijs.''
The MA.ssACHfsETTS CoTTON-Mn,L.s were incor-
porated in 1839, with a capital of §1,200,000, which
has since been increased to $1,800,000, by the absorp-
tion of the Prescott Company.
The Prescott Company was incorporated in 1844,
but was soon abso.-bed in the Massachusetts Company.
The trejisurers have been John A. Lowell (1839),
Homer Bartlett (1848), Geo. Atkinson (1872), Charles
L. Lovering, 1890.
Agents: Homer Bartlett (1840), Joseph White
(1849), Frank F. Battles (185t)), Wm. S. Southworth
(1889).
Homer Bartlett was born in Granby, Mass., in
1795, and graduated from Williams College in 1818.
He was a Presidential elector in 1844 anfl member of
the Governor's Council in 1854. In 1849 he left the
office of agent of the Massachusetts Mills to accept
that of treasurer. The latter office he held until 1872,
when he was seventy-seven years of age. He died in
1874, at the age of nearly seventy-nine years.
Joseph White, upon leaving his position as agent,
serveil for several years as secretary of the Massachu-
y.' y\
\ n
/f
/o
LOWELL.
81
setta Board of Education. He now resides in VVil-
liamptown, Mass.
A notice of Mr. Battles is found on another page
of tbis work.
Mr. Southworth, the present agent, bad served as
superintendent of the mills before his appointment
a.s Hgent.
Directors for 189(1 : Augustus Lowell, Edward L
Browne, Benj. W. Crowninshield, Robert Treat
Paine, Charles P. Bowditch, Augustus P. Loriug,
Charles L. Lovering.
The plant of the Massachusetts Cotton Mills
since the purchase of the I'rescott Mills, in 1847,
covers eight acres. The motive power consists
of thirteen turbines and four steam-engines of 1250
horse-power. Number of males employed, 560;
number of females em[)loyed, 1250; number of spin-
dles, 12<).(i48 ; number of loom.s, 372H ; number of
yards of cotton cloth made per week, ftOO.OOO ; num-
ber of pounds of cotton used per week, 300,000.
The good* made by this company consist of sheet-
ings, shirtings and drillings.
The original buildings of this corporation have been
very greatly enlarged and impnived. The basement
stories, which were formerly occupied with the pon-
derous breast-wheels, are now used for the manu-
facture of cloth.
The following extract from Hill's " Lowell Illus-
trated," will show the e.'ctent of the operations of
this company :
" By the substitution of flat for pitched roofs and
the adaptation of basements for manufacturing
purposes, when the lircast-wheels were discarded, six
full stories are obtained in nearly all the principal
buildings of this Company ; and their aggregate
lenirth is twcnty-tive hundred feet and a total floor
area of fifteen and one-half acre.s (now increased to
eighteen acres). These figures include store-houses,
but e.\clude several minor buildings, as shops, waste
and wheel-hou-^es, stables, etc., from one to three
stories in height."
The number <<\' yards of cotton cloth made by this
company in l>!4'.i was lo,;^,73,000 ; in 18-i'.», 28,172,000;
in 18611, 17,40<;,OW; in lS7;t, 38,714,000; in 1880,
47,.'230,0ii().
The average of dividends for the last twelve years
has been about five and one-half per cent.
Fraxr F. Battles. — The great manufacturing
corporations of Lowell have no worthier represen-
tative, no man more fully identified with their interests,
in mind and heart, than Frank F. Battles, the late
agent of the Massachusetts Mills.
Mr. Battles was born in Dorchester, Mass., Feb. 12,
1820, and died at his home on .Mt. Washington Street,
Lowell, Sept. lit, 1S8',I, at the age of nearly seventy
years. He was of New England descent. His grand-
father, Jonathan Battles, was a farmer in Stoughton,
M:iss., a stern and sturdy man of the early days. His
father, Joseph Battles, held the position of overseer
6-ii
ID a manufacturing establishment in Dorchester.
When Mr. Battles was twelve years of age he came
to Lowell with his father, who, on account of his ex-
perience as a manufacturer, had been invited to aid
in starting the new mills of the Tremont Corporation
of that city. After leaving the service of the Corpo-
ration he spent his last years upon his farm in
Derry, N. H., where he died in 1845.
Mr. Battles, on coming to Lowell with his father's
family, became a pupil in the North Grammar School
(now Bartlett), and afterwards entered the High
■School, which was then under its first principal,
Thomas M. Clark, now Bishop of Rhode Island.
Among his schoolmates were Gen. Benj. F. Butler
and Capt. Gustavus V. Fox.
Upon leaving the High School he was appointed
clerk in the Railroad Bank, then under the preai-
dency of Benj. F. French. When the Dwight Mills,
of Cabotville (now Chicopee), were started, Mr. Battles,
upon the recommendation of Hon. Homer Bartlett,
was appointed paymaster of that Corporation. When
twenty-six years of age he was invited back to
Lowell to the position of paymaster of the Prescott
Mills. He subsequently became superintendent of
those mills, and in 185G, when the Massachusetts
Mills had absorbed the Prescott, he was appointed
agent of the combined Corporations, a position which
he filled with great ability and success until 1880,
when his declining health demanded his retirement.
He held this latter oftice forty-three years.
Upon leaving his official position he found for
himself 8 pleasant home on Mount Washington
Street, where his friends fondly hoped, and even be-
lieved, that his former health was returning; but
upon the evening of September 10, 1889, after retir-
ing for the night, he suddenly died of apoplexy.
The news of his sudden death produced a profound
sensation. Probably Lowell had no citizen who was
ever more sincerely mourned. Especially that very
large number who, in his long ofKcial career, had
served under him, and had experienced the generous
kindness of his noble nature, heard the sad tidings
with feelings of filial tenderness and grief. The rela-
tions of Mr. Battles to his employes were of a peculi-
arly interesting character. He seemed t«j take pride
in his workmen. He recognized them politely on
the street. He dealt generously with those who
erred. When a charge was made before him he was
wont to ask : "Are there not some extenuating cir-
cumstances?" At his death the feeling was univer-
sal that a ffood man had fallen. But his goodness
did not consist in doing no harm, but was that of an
intelligent, thoughtful, just man, who believed that
goodness is the highest attribute of humanity.
He was favored by nature. He had a fine personal
bearing, and was of genial, courtly manners. In his
conversation and intercourse with others there was a
natural charm which did much to win for him their
affection and respect. By those who knew him best
82
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
it is asserted that his unostentatious benevolence in
the bestowment of gifts of charity was one of his
most marked characteristics.
Mr. Battles uever sought civil office. He was,
however, a director of the Railroad National Bank,
and he served aa alderman in 1870 and 1871.
Lowell Machine-Shop. — The following record
of this corporation is in part taken from an .irlicle
in " Lowell Illustrated," by Frank P. Hill :
"The building of cotton machinery was first begun
by the Merrimack Manufacturing Company, to equip
their second mill, it being then impossible, by reason
of stringent laws imposed by England, to import it.
They erected for this purpose a four-story building
similar to a cotton-mill, and after having completed
their machinery, early in 1826, sold the business and
tools to the Proprietors of Locks and Canals.' The
latter company continued to do a large business in
building machinery for cotton-mills till 1845, a period
of nineteen years. They also engaged in building
locomotives and making machinists' tools.
But in 1845 a new company, with the title of Low-
ell Machine-Shop, was incorporated, which pur-
chased the plant of the Proprietors of Locks and
Canals, and this company has continued the building
of cotton machinery up to the present time.
The original corporators of the company were Ab-
bott Lawrence, Nathan Appleton and John A. Low-
ell. The capital, which orginally was ••?500,000, is
now increased to :!;900,000.
The treasurers have been ; J. Thomas Stevenson
(1845), William A. Burke (1876), Robert H. Steven-
8on*(1884), Charles L. Pierson (1889).
The superintendents have been : William A.
Burke (1845), Mertoun C. Bryant (1862), Andrew
Moody (1862), George Richardson (1870), Charles L.
Hildreth (1879).
M. C. Bryant, before his appointment as superin-
tendent, was a civil engineer, having taken an import-
ant part in starting the works of the Lowell Gas Com-
pany. He died in office.
Andrew Moody, before being superintendent, had
been a machinist and contractor in the machine-
shop. On resigning the office of superintendent he
retired from active business.
George Richardson had been a draughtsman and
contractor in the machine-shop before his appoint-
ment as superintendent. He died while in office.
C. L. Hildreth, having been in service in the ma-
chine-shop for forty-five years, is now superintendent
of the works.
Directors for 1889 : Richard D. Rogers, J. Hunting-
ton Walcott, Augustus Lowell, Robert H. Stevenson,
George P. Upham, Arthur J. Lyman, Charles L.
Pierson.
The shops and foundry of this corporation are
located between the Pawtucketand Merrimack Canals,
and the whole plant, including boarding-houses, oc-
cupies nearly thirteen acres.
" The Lowell Machine-Shop has facilities for turn-
ing out annually complete cotton machinery repre-
sented by 160,000 spindles. The floor surface of the
shops, foundry, etc., exceeds nine acres."
This company manufactures every kind of machine
used by manufacturers of cotton or paper. The num-
ber of shops is seven, together with the foundry
and the smithy. The number of men employed is
1600; number of tons of wrought-iron annually con-
sumed, 11(»0; of cast-iron, 8500; pounds of brass
composition, 55,000 ; tons of anthracite coal used an-
nually, 3500; of smithy coal, 500.
The motive-power consists of seven turbines of 500
horse-power, three steam-engines of 410 horse-power.
The average of the annual dividends paid by this
company for the last twelve years has exceeded nine
per cent.
William Alvord Bi'RKE was born in Wino^^or,
Vt., July 7, 1811, and died at his home on Nesmith
Street, Lowell, May 28, 1887, at the age of seventy-
six years. He was a descendant of Richard Burke,
of Sudbury, Mass., who came to this country about
the ye;ir 1660, and who?e great-grandson, Solomon
Wait Burke, was one of the earliest settlers of Wind-
sor.
Mr. Burke's early education was obtained in the
public schools and in the Academy of Windsor, where
he very early exhibited unusual powers for the ac-
quisition of knowledge, having at the age of six years
attained to a considerable acquaintance with the
Latin language. It was the ambition of his early
years to pursue a collegiate course of study, but cir-
cumstances forbade it, and at the age of fifteen years
he entered the machine-shop of the Nashua Manufac-
turing Company, at Nashua, N. H., whither his
family had now removed.
Mr. Burke exhibited such ability and fidelity in his
new calling, that at the age of twenty-three years he
was placed in charge of the machine-shop owned by
Messrs. Ira Gay A Co., of Nashua. But still further
promotion awaited him, for at the end of two years
lie was put in charge of the repair shop of the Boott
Cotton-Mills of Lowell, and was also appointed master
mechanic of these mills.
In 1S39, when twenty-eight years of age, he was
elected agent of the recently-erected machine-shop of
the .\mo8keag Manufacturing Company of Manches-
ter, N. H. This position he held until 1845. During
all these years he had been educating himself in the
management of large bodies of men, and in the me-
chanical construction oi' machinery used in cotton-
mills. The education thus obtained was of the high-
est service to him in the positions of great responsi-
bility in which he was yet to be placed.
In 1845 the new corporation, known as the "Low-
ell Machine-Shop," purchased of the " Proprietors of
the Locks and Canals" their large machine-shop, in
which had been built most of the machinery for the
mills of Lowell. These works were then, and still
■/-'/.-i--t-
/
■'Jy/t 2/'^^
^'-/?,
-C-^/^ />-/ ^
LOWELL.
83
are, the largest works of the kind in America. Over
tbem the company appointed Mr. Burke as superin-
tendent when at the age of thirty-four years. To
• commit so important a trust to bo young a man
seemed to many a hazardous experiment. But Mr.
Burke proved equal to the demand. The ta>-k was
arduous, and the difficulties great, but he brought
with him a well-trained mind, a sound judgment and
an indomitable will. He rose above every obstacle
and held the position with honor for seventeen years.
In 1862 he was appointed agent of the Boott Cot-
tou-Mills, in which he had previously been master
mechanic. This year was to the mills of Lowell a
year of perils and disasters. The war had raged for
one year and had brought confusion and dismay.
Many mills had been closed ; operatives had left the
city; to obtain cotton was almost impossible, and all
things demanded a leader of astrongwill and asteady
hand. Mr. Burke wa.s called to tread a |)ath before
untrodden. But he went boldly forward. He de-
manded the substitution of new machinery for the
old. and the adoption of the most approved methods
of manufacture. The change inspired new life. Con-
fidence and ho])e revived. The stock, which b.ad fal-
len below par, now gradually rose high upon the
scale of manufacturing stocks of the country, and the
administration of Mr. Burke proved an eminent suc-
cess.
In 1S<!8 he resigned his position in the Boott i\Iill,~
to accept the office of treasurer of the Tremonl Mills
and Surtblk Manufacturing Company. After holding
this office two years he resigned it to take the position
of assistant treasurer of the Great Falls Manufacturing
Company, in Great Falb, N. H., and of the I)wighl
Manufacturing Company, of Chicopee, Mass., botli ol
which were among the largest mills of the kind in the
country.
As treasurer of these mills he was in a position of
high authority. His policy wa.s never timid. Even
against the remonstrances of stockholders he insisted
that the first step to be taken by these mill.* — all of
which were in an unsatisfactory condition — wa.s to
expend money freely to place them in the most efl'ec-
tive condition. Old machinery must give place to
new. Old structures must be rebuilt. The latest in-
ventions and imjirovements must be introduced. To
do this against the opposition of the timid, reijuired
both firmness and courage. But the work was done,
and time proved the wisdom of the [)olicy.
In 187G Mr. Burke, now sixty-five years of age, re-
ceived his host appointment to a |)osition of high re-
sponsibility. He was elected treasurer of the Lowell
" Machitie-Shoi>," in which, in Ins early years, he had
been the efficient and successful superintendent. This
position he held until I8S4, when the infirmities of
age and declining health demanded his retirement.
After three years he closed liis long and busy and
honorable life.
Mr. Burke possessed qualities which admirably
adapted him to the command of other men — a strong
will, a fixed purpose, a firm Bell-control and a sound
judgment. His mind was conservative. He indulged
in no speculations, and took no part in the faiscinating
schemes of visionary men. He had no taste except
for things permanent and substantial.
He was a director in several of the institutions of
the city, was president of the Mechanics' Savings
Bank for twenty-six years, and for two years during
the Civil War was a member of the Board of Alder-
men.
In 18.37 he married Catharine French, of New Bed-
ford, N. H., who died in 1870. In 1872 he married
Elizabeth M. Derby, who still survives. His surviv-
ing children are Catharine Elizabeth, Annie Alvord
and Edward Nevins Burke.
Chakle.<! Lewis HiLniiETH is a descendant of
Richard Hildreth, who belonged to that company of
thirty-nine persons — most of whom were inhabitants
of Woburn and C!oncord, 5Iuss. — who, in ltj.j.3, pe-
titioned the Legislature of Massachusetts for a grant
of land bordered by the Merrimack and Concord
Rivers, and lying near Pawtucket Falls. This tract
embraced the site of the city of Lowell. Their peti-
tion being granted, they formed a settlement, to which
they gave the name of Chelmsford. In this devout
and sturdy band of farmers were the progenitors of
many of the founders of the city of Lowell.
It is an interesting fact in regard to Richard Hil-
dreth, that, upon his petition, the Legislature of Mas-
sachusetts granted t« him a lot of laud containing 100
acres, for the reason that he " had a wife and many
small children, and, being a husbandman, he was
greatly disadvantaged partly by the hand of God de-
priving him of the use of his right hand, whereby he
was wholly disabled to labor." This lot of land, lying
in Westford — which was formerly a [lart of Chelms-
ford— has now been in the hands of Richard Hil-
dreth and his descendants for seven generations, and
is the projierty of Charles L.. Hildreth, the subject of
this sketch.
Mr. Hildreth was born in Concord, N. H., October,
9, 1823, and is the son of Elijah Hildreth, a farmer,
who, after his sou's birth, became a resident of New
Ijiswich, N. H.
Mr. Hildreth, having finished his education at the
academy at New Ipswich, at the age of twenty-two
years, came to Lowell almost an entire stranger, and
began work in the Ijowell Machine Shop. After a ser-
vice of three years as a workman he became a con-
tractor in the machine-shop, and continued in the lat-
ter position about ten years.
In 1858, on account of the great depression of bus-
iness, which began in the preceding year, he engaged
as foreman in the Industrial Works of Bement &
Dougherty in Philadelphia, where he remained about
two years. Having returned to Lowell, he became,
in 18G5, foreman in the machine-shop, a position
which he held for fourteen vears. In 1879 he was
84
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY. MASSACHUSETTS.
elected superintendent of the machine-shop, an office
whose importance is indicated by the fact that tlicsi-
works are the largest of the kind in America, and in
them is manufactured most of the machinery of the
great manufacturing corporations of the city of Low-
ell. This position he has now held for eleven years.
In addition to his regular official duties, Mr. Hil-
dreth takes a deep and active interest in various
beneficent institutions of the city. To the Jliddle-
sex Mechanic Association he has been especially de-
voted, giving to its affairs much of his time and
thought. In remodeling and rearranging its lilirary
he took an active interest, and in 1873 he served as
president of this association.
From 1868 to 1871 he wjis a member of the Bunnl
of Aldermen of Lowell, and, as chairman of the
Committee on Lands and Buildings, he took puit in
the erection of the Green School-house, the iiiosi
elegant and imposing of the school-houses of tlie city.
Mr. Hildreth is a man of broad synipiithies, til
cordial addre.ss, of sound judgment and of lirm pur-
pose. As the manager of one of the most important
institutions of the city he has the all'ection and re-
spect of those in his employ, and the entire conlidence
of the community. Having served during almost his
entire business life in the works of which he now has
the oversight, he is thoroughly conversant with all
the duties appertaining to bis office.
The following table of the statistics of the [ireccd-
ing eleven great manufacturing companies ot ]>owell,
is taken from the " Year Book " for 1889, i)ublisheil
by the Jlorning Mail Company :
Tiilal cnpitiil iiivpsted 81 1,i.')",i"mi
" iiunilter oC cpiinlles ^ti'.",_*'.:ii
" " luutiia .;l,t^'.il
'■ " feniHlee enipli'j'wl, It.^iii:; ; nrnka,
T.Tli'J l:i. |r,j
•• " ynrd^ cottuii clotli witv.-ii |i»t
week .'», 11115, 7.",r»
" '* " priDled \>er week l.tioU.'HH)
'* " " iljed per Huuutii lr.,iHHi,(ru)
" " " rarpeting per u-^ek . . . T5,<»"t
*• " " wtiitlen ilulli per week . . l'.!,."i"'>
" *' poiiDja hleiiclied [>er HHiiun) . . . lo,(«m,iMMt
" " " mttori L-uttbiiDied per week 1.0<>4,JU.J
" ■* " clean wool per week . . l"JiP,iirri>
** *^ tons coal per anuuni (iiivliuliue
smithy T'i. liii;
*' '* bnsliels cliarconl Iter aiiuiiiii . . . lo.JiHi
*• " t^alloiiH oil |>er aotMiiii I^T.ntl'j
" " ponnUs starch {ler aiiniliii . . . :;,'.nV>,Mr,
" " tonti wnni^ht-irim (ter aiiiiuiii . . 1,'JIKI
" " '* cast-iron per uliiiiiui .... >»,;".tm
" " " aleel |>er auiiinii ;j(ii)
" " pounds bntfis compositii-ii per
nniiiini -S.^juKl
" " turbine-wtieels ^."l
'* " ateuui-eagiuea liih
" weekly pay roll (exclusive of Lowell Bleach-
erv) Sll.l,":!*
" taxes paid ?l(t;l,7;i.'KjS
From this table it appears that the number of yards
of cotton cloth woven annually in these mills is more
than 260,000,000. To enable the mind more clearly to
comprehend this vast amount, it may be said that
this cloth would encircle tht- earth nearly six times,
and if stretched in a straight line, would extend over
a distance so great that a man traveling forty miles
per day would not reach the end of it in ten years.
2. Minor M.^scf.^ctures.
FlBRH MASUFACTrRE.*. — The Belridere Woolen-
M//s.—The life of Charle.s Stott, the late agent
and principal proprietor of the Belvidere Woolen
Manufacturing Company, is so intimately blended
with the history of the mills themselves that both
should be written on the same page.
These mills have a history running further back,
perhaps, than that of any other of the nulls of Lowell.
Thomas Hurd, who began the inanufactiire of satinet
on the Concord River in l.Sl.'i, ownetl the water priv-
ilege at the mouth of tlKit river, both on the east and
west sides. He sold the [irivilcge on the east, or l!(-l-
videre side, to Win'hrop Howe, a man.ifncliiier of
tlaunel by hand-looms, who in l.'*27 s(dd it to Harri-
.son (r. Howe, who introdiiccil the power-loom, in
lS.i2 .Mr. Howe sold it to Warren. Rarry A Park, of
Bosion, who in 18;^4 sold it to Wliitwell, Bonil it
.Scaver, who in 18.';.'i scdil it to FarnswortI), Baker iV
Hill.
It was under the latter cimipany that Mr. Stott be-
came connected with these mills, and for many years
was so identilied with them that in common parlance
tliey are known as " Slotts .Mills."
Charles r?tott was born .4iignst 21, 179;!, at Roch-
dale, a parliamentary borough ill i.,ancashire, England
famed, even in the days of <iueen Elizabeth, lor iis
manufacture of woolen goods. His parents being in
humble life, he was at the early age of seven years
put to work in a woolen-mill in wliicli the service
was so exacting as to leave him only the opp<irtiiiiity
of ac<]uiring the most limited education. The hours
of labor extended from five o'clock in the morning to
nine o'clock in the evening. When the years of
manhood came his ambition pidni|iteil him to leiive
the ranks of the day laborers and to begin business
on his own account. But fortune did not smile upon
him in England, and at the age of tweiity-.seven years
he resolved to begin life anew in America. In 1.^26
he lantlefl in Boston with two shilling pieces in his
pocket, his only riches. One of these shillings he kept
through life as a souvenir of his early struggles. It
still remains in the hands of his son, Hon. Charles \.
Stott, ex-mayor of Lowell.
In .\merica Mr. Stott first found employment in a
manufactory in .Viulover, Mass. In 1828, with three
associates, he began to operate the Jlerrimack Mills
in Dracut, Mass. After seven years in this business
he became, in 18.35, agent of the Belvidere Woolen-
Mills, then owned by Farnswortli, Baker & Hill.
This company having become bankrupt, Mr. Stott
formed a partnership with Mr. Farnswortli, one of the
company, and under the firm-name of Farnsworth &
Stott they engaged in runnlug the mills.
^^ % x^^
LOWELL.
85
Misfortune, however, pursued Mr. Stott into the
new world, for within the space of about one year the
mills were twice burned. After these di8.ister3 a new
company was formed called the Belvidere Woolen
Manufacturing Company, of which Mr. Stott became
the president and the active manager. Under the
sagaciou.-; and energetic control of Mr. Stott the en-
terprise was crowned with remarkable success. In
1862 a new mill was erected by the company on Law-
rence Street. Both these mills during tlie la-it nine-
teen years of his life Mr. Stott managed with a sa-
gacity and skill which have been rarely equaled.
Mr. Slott, by his long connection of forty-six years
with the Belvidere Mills, acquired a very high and a
very honorable reputation among the successful
manufacturers of the country. He was a man of de-
cided character and very marked characteristics. He
led a pure and simple life, and he cared not for office
or honors, for dress or fajihion, for equipage or dis-
play. He loved his business heartily, and to it lie
devoted all his powei's. It is said of him that when
age had rendered him too infirm to move with his
wonted activity from room to room in his mills, it was
his delight to sit for long hours near some rew and
curious manulacturing machine to admire the skill of
its construction and the beauty of its o|)eration.
(jutside of bis chosen sphere Mr. Stott rarely par-
ticipated in the afl'airs of civil or of social life. He
was, however, a director of the I'rescott Bank from its
orgai:ization. He was a member of the Pawtucket
Lodge of !M:isiius, having received his degree in
Lodge of Hope, Rochdale, England, in l.S2.'i. He was
a constant and exemplary worshiper in High Street
Congregational Church
He died on June 14, 1881, at his residence on
Cliesluut Street, at the age of eighty-iwo years.
At bis funeral, in High Street Church, there was a
large concourse of citizens by whom he was honored
and revered. It was an interesting and touching in-
cident of the solemn occa-sion, that he was borne to
the grave by workmen in his mills who had long
known him and had toiled by his side.
Hon. Charles \. Stott succeeds his father as agent
and president of the Belvidere Woolen Manulacturing
Company, Mr. John Stott being superintendent of
Mill No. 2. In its two mills the company employs
2o0 hands, and manufactures tlanneU and dress-
goods. The oldest mill of the company is situated on
Howe Street.
The Stirling Mi/Is were built by Charles Stott, agent
of the Belvidere Woolen-Mills, as a private enterprise.
They were run by his son, Charles A. Stott, for eight
years, when they were purchased by a corporation,
the principal owners being Parker, Wilder i Co., of
Boston. The agent of the Stirling Mills is Edward
I). Holden. The mills have seventy-two looms, 5000
spindles and employ 13o hands, making 2.000,000
yaids of flannel per year.
F/aiinel Mills, etc., of C. P. Talbot 1- O;.— The ex-
tensive manufacturing plant of this company is in
North Billerica, but from the fact that their store is
in Lowell and that the senior partner was long one
of the most prominent citizens of Lowell, a sketch
of his life containing an account of the manufac-
tures of the firm is here inserted.
Charles P. Talbot belongs to that class of ster-
ling men, who, by their courage and energy have
turned the adversities and defeats of their early
years into the very means of final success and tri-
umph.
He was of English extraction and was born in
Templemore, Ireland, May 19, 1807, and died at his
home on Chestnut Street, Lowell, July C, 1884, at the
age of seventy-seven years. He was the lineal de-
scendant of John Talbot, first Earl of Shrewsbury,
who, in 1458, at the age of eighty years, died at the
battle of Chatillou, leaving estates in Ireland, on one
of which, in Templemore, the ancestors of Mr. Tal-
bot resided.
In 1807, William Talbot, the grandfather of Mr.
Talbot, with his family, came to America, and in con-
nection with his son Charles, the father of the sub-
ject of this sketch, eng.-iged in the manufacture of
broadcloth in Cambridge, N. Y. Charles Talbot, the
father, wius evidently a man of property and culture;
for he brought with him a large library, in which
were several editions of Shakspeare. His enterprise
ill Cambridge was probably unsuccessful, for in 1819
he removed his business to Danby, Vt., where, after
four years, he died, leaving his wife with a fiimily ot
eight children without means of support. The two
oldest sons, Jidin and Charles P., the latter being then
sixteen years of age, were removed from school and
put to work in aid of the support of the family. The
mother w:is a woman of great energy and possessed
those sterling qualities which afterwards character-
ized her son.
In 1825, two years after the death of her husband,
she removed to Northampton, Mass., with the hope
of finding employment for her older sons in the
woolen-mills of that place, and for the better educa-
tion of the family. Mr. Talbot, after working in the
mills at Northampton, came to Lowell, to act as over-
seer in the Middlesex Mills of this city. In 1834,
when twenty-seven years of age, he went from
Lowell to Williamsburg, near Northampton, where
he engaged in woolen manufacture on his own ac-
count. But the business panic of 1837 proved ruin-
ous to his enterprise, and he disposed of his businesf
in Williamsburg in 1838, and returning to Lowell, he
soon rented of the Middlesex Canal Company certaiu
buildings in North Billerica, where he commenced
the manufacture of dye-stufl"s.
And here fortune seems first to have smiled upon
him, for he soon purchased and enlarged the estab-
lishment, and in 1839 formed a partnership with his
brother Thomas, under the title of C. P. Talbot &
Co For twelve years the brothers operated the dye-
86
HISTORY OF JITDDLKSEX COUNTY. MASSACIirSETTS.
wood mills with such marked succes"*, that in 1851
they purchased of the canal coinpaii}' the water-
power and other property and erected mills for the
manufacture of Hannels.
Before this, in 1849, they had started their chemi-
cal works in North Billerica, and they had also, as
early as 1842, opened a store in Lowell for the sale
of dye-stuffs and chemicals. This store was first
located on Central Street, opposite the Washington
House, subsequently for many years in the Market
House on Market Street, and recently in tlie Talbot
Block on Middle Street.
And here it is interesting to compare the humble
beginning of the enterprise in IS'iS with its present
coudiiion. We see ilr. Talbot in 1838, his former
business having been luiricd by the linancia! panic of
the previous year, beginning in a rented building and
in a small way a new manufacture, with nothing to
aid him but hia firm will, his admirable self-reliance
and his fi.xed resolve to retrieve his fortunes.
In order to mark the contrast, it is enough to set
before the reader a summary of the present condition
of the two great manufacturing companies which
have arisen out of that humble beginning. 1st. The
Talbot Dye-Wood an<l Chemical Company man-
ufactures sulpburic, muriatic ami nitric acids, oil of
vitriol, extract of imligo, blue vitriol, solutions of
tin, 7.inc and antimony, tin crystals, drugs, dye-woods,
etc., employing thirty men. 2d. The Talbot Mills
make all-wool flannels and dress goods, using twenty
seta of cards, IGG looms and employing '2~'> men.
But the reputation of Mr. Talbot doea not <lepen(l
alone upon his business talents and the courage with
which he has met the reverses of life, but also upon
the noble qualities of his heart, his generous sympa-
thies, his indignant scorn of every act of o|)pression,
his charity for the poor and his open and hearty es-
pousal of every gooil cause. His convictions were
positive, and the friends of humanity knew where to
find him.
In all that paternal and generous treatment of the
employes of the firm which has already been de-
scribed in the sketch of his brother Thomas, found
on another page, the elder brother was in hearty
sympathy and generous co-operation.
The two brothers were alike and r^fforded an admi-
rable example of fr.iternal sympathy. In both the
moral nature predominated. In both the love of
honor, justice and kindness rose nobly above the love
of gain.
The earlier years of the elder brother were in-
tensely occupied with the unsolved problem of busi-
ness success and he had no time and acquired no
love for political honors, while the younger brother
came later upon the stage when the prospect of suc-
cess in business seemed already .-ussured, and very
naturally his active mind turned upon the important
questions of Civil Government and led him to accept
the exalted position which he so honorably filled.
Both had their battles in life, both fought with equal
bravery and both came out of the cnnHict with e<iual
honor.
Mr. Talbot loved his liojne. In the domestic circle
he was most tender and indulgent. Me was fond of
books and was a thoughtful reader. Hi.s reading took
a wide range, but he was especially familiar with the
English CliUfsics.
His wife survives him. Of bis two sons, Edward
R. died in 1872 and Julian resides in Lowell. His
only daughter is the wife of Richard H. Ewart, a
merchant in New York. The sketch of the life of
Mr. Talbot would not be complete without further
reference to his excellent wife and to the memorial
chapel which she erected in \^Si> to her husband's
memory.
Jlrs. Harriet E. Talbot was born Sept. 7, ISIG, and
was the daughter of Captain John and Polly Rt>gers,
of Lempster, New Hampshire. She became the wife
of Mr. Talbot May Z, I.S:j.'.. In the year following
the death of her husband, wishing to erect some me-
morial of his name which would at once be an honor
to the city and a fitting monument of his worth, she
devised and erected in the Lowell Cemetery a modest
and beautiful cha[)el. It is constructed of stone, hav-
ing before the entrance a graceful arch adorned with
flowering plants and climbing ivy. The structure
ailmirably comports with the well-known tastes of
her departed husband. It was dcdicateil on Novem-
ber 1, 1881). .\n ap|>ropriate eulogy of Mr. Talbot
was pronounced by Rev. Mr. Seward, his Ibrmer pas-
tor and friend, and it was formally dedicated by the
Rev. Dr. Street in language impressive and solemn,
in which he called down the benediction of God
'■ upon her who had cau.sed it to be erected."
L(jivell Felling-Mith, Pawtu<ket Street, manufacture
•ill kinds of hairf'eltlng lor uon-conducting, lining
and packing purposes. About I,200,(J0it pounds of
American and Runsian cattle-hair consumed annu-
ally. Fifteen hands are employed.
Moses A. Johnson in lS.'>y started the felting busi-
ness on Howe Street. In 18G5 Mr. Johnson and his
partners, George Bruerton and Williau) E. Bloodgood
purchased a aaw-mill on Pawlncket Street and trans-
formed it into a felting-mill. This firm in IStiS sold
out to William H. Thompson, Mr. Jounson taking
the position of manager. On the death of Mr. John-
son, in 1874, Henry M.Thompson, son of the jiroprie-
tor, became manager. The latter bought out his
partner in 1881 and is now sole proprietor.
Nocelly Siispeiiiler Worl.:i, Hale Street, manufacture
elastic and non-elastic webs, web-straps, braid, cords
and suspenders, employing thirty-five hands. The
proprietors, Josiah and John Harriman, removed their
business from Tanner Street to Howard Street in 1881
and to Hale Street in 1886. These works have been
twice enlarged.
FaiilLntT Mills.— In 1863, Alfred H. Chase erected
a large brick mill between Lawrence Street and Con-
LOWELL.
87
cord River, for the manufacture of woolen goods,
and, in 1864, L. W. Faulkner also erected a similar
mill in the immediate neighborhood for a like pur-
pose. On October G, 1880, a fire caught in the dry-
room of the Chase Mill, and both mills were con-
sumed. The loss upon the Chase Mill was $185,000,
and upon the Faulkner Mill over $100,000. Both
were fully insured. As to amount of loss this was
Lowell's largest fire. The Faulkner Mill was rebuilt
in 1881, and, in 1886, the Chase Mill property was
purchased by L. \V. Faulkner and his sons, Fred-
erick and John A. Faulkner, and a large mill erected
on its site. The two mills are known as " The
Faulkner Mills." The manufactures are dress goods,
fabrics, flannels and gents' suitings. The firm also
operate the Livingston Mill, on Thorndike Street.
The machinery in both mills embraces 13,000 spindles
and 184 broad fancy looms, the product being $900,-
000 per year, and the number of operatives about 500.
Both water and steam are used as motive powers.
T%e Siiyden Bagging Company, Mechanics^ Mills,
Dutton Street, manufactures press bagging used in
the process of obtaining cotton-seed oil. Five looms
are run and 100,000 to 125,000 pounds of worsted are
used annually. Five hands are employed. Thomas
Sugden started this business about 1873. Mr. Sugden
died in 1888. The business is now managed by
James Brown and Edward Craven.
J. M. Spurr, oc Shattuck Street, manufactures cus-
tom shirts, shirt-bosoms, cufis, etc. He started
business in the place which he now occupies, in 1870.
He employs four hands.
The Kew England Bunting Company has its origin
in the small manufactory for press-dyeing flannel,
started by John Holt, in 1852.
John Holt was born in Dorchester, N. H., Decem-
ber 26, 1812. When eighteen years of age he came
to Lowell and worked at cabinet-making from 1830 to
1852. In ihe latter year he commenced the work of
press-dyeing flannel in a small wooden building on
Davidson Street. In 1863 he began the manufacture
of flannel in the stone mill on Davidson Street, now
occupied by the New England Bunting Company. In
December, 1875, Mr. Holt commenced the manufac-
ture of flags and bunting. In 1880, E. S. Hylan, the
son-in-law of Mr. Holt, purchased the business. lu
1889 the business was transferred to a joint-stock com-
pany, consisting of E. S. Hylan and Ferdinand Rod-
lifl", Jr.
This company employs forty-five hands, runs
twenty broad and fifty narrow looms, producing fancy
worsteds for dress goods, Turkey red awning stripes,
bunting, flags and carriage robes or dusters.
Whittier Coltnn-AIills. — For the history of these
mills see sketch of life of Moses Whittier. The
mills are on Stackpole Street, and have 5000 spindles
and employ seventy-five hands, making yarns, twines,
bandings and cord, and using six bales of cotton per
dav.
Mo.sES Whittier belonged to that class in the city
of Lowell, of which but few now remain, who early
became identified with the manufactures of the city,
and who spent a long and busy and honorable life
amidst its thriving industries. He was born in
Canaan, N. H., April 16, 1795, and died at his home
on Kirk Street, in Lowell, March 14, 1884, at the age
of eighty-nine years. He belonged to the pure New
England stock, his most remote American ancestor,
Thomas Whittier, having, in 1638, come from South-
ampton, England, in the ship " Confidence," of Lon-
don, and settled in Salisbury, Mass.
Beginning with Thomas Whittier, the direct gene-
alogical line of descent is as follows: 1. Thomas Whit-
tier, of Salisbury, afterwards of Haverhill, who was
born in 1620, and died in 1696, at the age of seventy-
six years. 2. John Whittier, of Haverhill, who was
born in 1649, and died in 1721, at the age of seventy-
two years. 3. William Whittier, of Methuen, who
was born in 1688, and died in 1729, at the age of
forty-one years. 4. Richard Whittier, of Methuen,
who was born in 1718, and died in 1778, at the age of
sixty years. 5. Richard Whittier, of Methuen, af-
terwards of Canaan, N. H., was born in 1755; died
in 1813, at the age of fifty-eight years, and was the
father of the subject of this sketch.
Thomas Whittier, the earliest of this line of ances-
tors, held an honorable position in " church and
state," as is attested by the fact that he was admitted
" Freeman " by the General Court in 1666. Among
his numerous descendants inNew England is included
the poet Whittier.
Moses Whittier lived upon his father's farm until
1813, when, at the age of eighteen years (his father
having died), he removed to Hallowell, Me., to live
with an elder brother, where he learned the trade of
machinist and jeweler, and for several years was en-
gaged in mechanical pursuits. During these years
he was so much an invalid in health that he hardly
dared to venture upon any arduous duty or serious
responsibility. But when about thirty years of age
he was appointed superintendent of a cotton-mill in
Winthrop, Me., and assumed the position with the
remarkable result that his new service in the cotton-
mills had the efl^ect to confirm his health and give him
new strength and courage, so that almost to the end
of his long life of eighty-nine years, though always
in delicate health, he was able to perform, with great
regularity, the many important duties that devolved
upon him.
In 1829 he came to Lowell and was employed un-
der Warren Colburn, superintendent of the Merri-
mack Mills, in starting one of the dressing-rooms of
that corporation. Upon the organization of the
Boott Mills, in 1835, his skill and experience were in
requisition for starting also one of the dressing-rooms
of that corporation. In 1852, while still retaining his
connection with the Boott Company, and having
charge of all the belting in its mills, be began, on his
88
HISTORY OF MTDPLESFA' COUNTY. .MASSACIITTSETTS.
own account, the manufacture of loom-haruesses ami
twine.
So successful (lid this adventure prove, that in 1807
his son, Henry F. Whittier, left his business in Bos-
ton, and. coming to Lowell, entered into partnership
with his father in the manufacture of twine.
Henry F. Whittier was born in Lowell, August 4,
1833, and was educated in the schools of the city.
On leaving the High School he engapied, for seven-
teen years, in the insurance business in Boston. At
the end of this time he came to Lowell and formed
the partnership with his father, as stated above.
So remunerative was this enterprise that in 187S
the spacious and substantial building on Stackpole
Street was erected to accommodate the increasing;
business of the firm. This mill has l)een twice en-
larged. The remarkable success of this firm and its
high reputation are due, first to the uprightness and
integrity of the father and next to the enterprise and
ability of the son.
In 1887 the establishment wa.s incorporated under
the name of the "Whittier Cotton-Mills," with E. JI.
Tucke as presideut and Henry F. Whittier as treas-
urer.
Since the death of Henry F. Whittier, in 1888, four
years subsequent to the death of hi.s father, Jliss
Helen A. Whittier, the only survivor of the children
of Moses Whittier, has, as treasurer, had the general
supervision of the atl'airs of the corporation, with
Nelson Whittier, his nephew, as practical manager.
The articles now manufactured are cotton twines,
bandings an4l ropes, which, on account of the reputa-
tion of the firm, find a ready sale. The business
gives employment to about seventy hands.
As a citizen, Moses Whittier was verj- widely
known and very highly re.'pected. The taste which
he early formed for farming, I'ollowed him through
life. He had a special tbndness for the cultivation of
grapes and fruit-trees, and for keeping bees, and for
such other occupations .as an .igriculturist of culti-
vated tastes loves to engage in. He was also a lover
of books and kept abreast of the literary progress of
the times. He took a lively interest in the library of
the Mechanics' .Association, and at one time wa.s ils
treasurer. Perhaps no trait of his character is more
worthy of record than the benes'olence of his nature.
The poor always found in him a cheerful giver, and
the many workmen in his employ loved and honored
him for the considerate and generous kindness which
they received at his hands. In his death Lowell
lost a citizen of refined taste, of blameless life, and of
great moral worth.
E. S. Wheeler, Fletcher Street, makes double-
knotted loom harnesses and harness-machines. Em-
ploying six hands. He started the business in the
present location in 1888, having previously done busi-
ness on Arch Street, with Thomas F. Burgess as
partner.
The United Stales Buntiny Company, with Gen. B.
F. Butler, D. W. C. Farrington and others as jiropri-
etors, and Walter H. McDaniels, as manager, com-
menced operations in ISiiO, and have since experi-
enced very little change, either in man.ageuient or
operation. Their mill is of brick, and is situated on
Crosby Street. It has nine sets of cards, six combs,
5000 spindles, 220 looms and employs (JOO hands.
About (jOOO pounds of wool are consumed per day.
The manufactures are bunting and worsted cloths.
Tlie Lowell Goring Wnrl.s were started in 1S88, by
W. F. Copson, who remains sole |)roprietor. He man-
ufactures shoe-goring and braid, having ten em-
ployees. The works are at Mechanics' Mills, Button
Street.
(Jrnsslcy Miiiiii/dctiiriin/ (.'niiipaiiii, manufacturers of
indigo-blue Hannels, ladies' diess-goods, and fine
cloakings.
This business was begun in 1SG4 by W'm. Walker
& Sons, in a brick building at Mitssic FalU, on Law-
rence Street, owned by C. B. Richmond. .V:- business
increased, Mr. Richmond erected Ibr the conii)any
another building of stone. Both these buildings were
used by the company until the death of Mr. Walker
ill 1888. The sons, after continuing the business fur
over a year, sold it out to W. M. ('rossley, who is the
i present proprietor. The mills contain six sets of
cards, llioO spindles, twenty-lour looms and give em-
ployment to about one hundred hands.
Mac Stockinij Co)iij>ani/. — Mr. Benjamin F. Shaw,
having invenied a new knitting-loom, for the nuinii-
facture of seamless stockings, a com[>any was incor-
porated in 1S77, with a capital of i-;!u,000 for the pur-
pose of putting the invention into successful opera-
lion. Work was begun promptly upon the construc-
tion of nine of these machines, and one of them was
so far completed in the autumn of 1878 .as to allow of
its exhibition at the lair of the JIassachusetts Charit-
.ible Mechanic Association, heid in Boston in that
year.
Contrary to the predictions of exjierts in the hos-
iery manufacture, the new knitting-loom, on actual
trial, proved its superiority. The capital, theretbre.
was increased, in 1870, to j^lGU.OUU. Six acres of land
were procured for the plant, and in ISSd a new brick
mill of three stories W!is constructed. Success fol-
lowed. In 1880 the capital was increased to .^240,000.
The new knitting-loom was called for in Europe. Mr.
Shaw spent several months in London in exhibiting
his invention to knitters from almost every European
country. A company was formed to start a manufac-
tory in Leicester, England, for using the new knitting-
loom.
Meanwhile the increased demand for the " Shaw-
knit " goods in America was so great, that the capac-
ity of the mill was still further enlarged. The success
of this enterprise is due both to the superiority of
the loom and the excellence of the goods produced.
The company has now (1890) a capital of $360,000.
F. J. Dutcher is presideuti Josiah Butler, treasurer;
LOWELL.
89
B. F. Shaw, manager. The company employs 500
operatives and runs 273 stocking looms, producing
daily 8400 pairs. They manufacture the patent Shaw-
knitstockings. "Since the discovery of the remarkable
dye, trade-marked Sitov blait by the company, a dye-
bouse has been added to its plant, for dyeing all the
variety of goods turned out, whether wool, merino or
cotton." The mill, dye-works and office are on Smith
Street.
Josiah Butler, Gorham Street, manufactures batting
and deals in waste, employing fifteen hands, consuming
1500 pounds of cotlon daily. He started the bu.siness
in its present location in 1871.
Wiltiaiii H. Carter, in his mill on Congress Street,
in which, in former years, A. J. Richmond, and, after
him, Geo. Ri()ley had manufactured batting, now
makes ladies' dress goods and union ca.ssimeres. He
has four sets of cards and thirly-four broad looms.
He also does a wool-scouring business, using Sar-
gent's latest improved seouring-machine. He em-
ploys about forty hands.
Tlie Thonidikc Manti/actiirinij Company, on Thorn-
dike Street, produces about 500 dozen pairs of sus-
penders per day, employing 150 to 175 hands, run-
ning thirty-five looms and twenty-five sewing-ma-
chines. This business was started in 1870 by Dav-
id C. G. Field, who early received a? partners Luther
J. Eames, Asa C. Russell and James G. Buttrick.
The company was incorporated in 1889. Mr. Butt-
rick is treasurer and agent.
The Lowell Hosiery Com/>aii;/ was started in 1809,
mainly through the efforts of W. F. Salmon. A char-
ter was granted to \V. F. Salmon, Thomas Nesmith
and Hocum Hosford May 20, 1809.
Starting with a capital of §10u,000, the company
afterwards increased it to Sl75,000, which is mostly
owned in Lowell.
The plant is situated on Mt. Vernon Street. This
company manufactures annually 275,000 dozen wom-
en's plain cotton hose, 150,000 dozen women's and
children's fancy cotton hose, consuming 800,000 ib.s.
of cotton and yarn yearly, and employing 100 male
and 200 female operatives.
The Pickering Knitting Company, on Tanner Street,
was started by C. C. Pickering, Edwin Lamson and
E. A. Thisseli in 1882. J. W. C. Pickering, son of
the senior partner, was admitted into ihe firm In 1883,
Mr. Lamson retiring at the same time. The firm
manufactures knit underwear for men and women,
employing 500 hands. The works are located on
Tanner Street.
M. li B. Rhodes began the manufacture of worsted
yarns for carpets of all kinds on Wall Street in 188C.
They consume 350 to 400 pounds of wool daily and
employ thirteen female operatives.
Waller Coburn d- Co., dealers in cotton waste. —
About 1852 Alanson J. Richmond started, on Con-
gress Street, the manufacture of cotton batting. Mr.
Richmond having died at the end of about eight
years, George Ripley succeeded him in 1860, and for
eleven years made wadding and batting. Mr. Ripley
was succeeded, in 1871, by the Wadding and Paper
Company, which held the plant till 1877, when the
larger mill was occupied by William H. Carter (men-
tioned elsewhere), and a part of the building has
since been used by Walter Coburn & Co. This latter
company purchases and sorts cotton-waste, and sells
it both in home and foreign markets, where it is used
in the manufacture of yarns, grain-bags, satinets,
horse-blankets and paper. The company employs
about forty -eight hands.
Wahh Worsted Mills, Meadowville, manufacture
worsted yarns. The new mill has ninety looms and
5000 spindles and 150 employees. The business was
removed to its present location from Middlesex
Street in 1882. The proprietors are M. T. Stevens &
Sons, successors of John Walsh & Sons.
Lowell Worsted- Mills, James Dugdale, proprietor,
on Willie Street, manufacture worsted yarns for cas-
simeres, knit-goods and coatings, employing eighty-
five hands. Mr. Dugdale started the business in 18G0,
and is a pioneer manufacturer of fine worsted yarns.
He was born in England, 1820, and came to America
in 1847. Since 1872 his son has been his partner.
The Lladnek Mills. — The proprietors of these mills,
R. W. Kendall & Co., seem to have found a name for
this manufactory by spelling the principal proprie-
tor's name from right to left. Mr. Kendall's first
manufactorj' was a small wooden building in the
yard of the Wamesit Power Company, where, for six
years, beginning with 1878, he was employed simply
in dyeing cotton flannel. In 1884 Kendall & Co.
erected, for their business, on Lawrence Street, near
the cemetery, a spacious wooden building 200 by 60
feet, and three stories high, having two large exten-
sions. The work of the mill consists in printing and
dyeing both cotton and woolen flannel. The firm
has selling agencies in Boston, New York, Philadel-
phia, Chicago and Detroit. H. D. Kendall is superin-
tendent, and Walter B. Perkins, paymaster. The
firm employs about sixty hands and prints and dyes
from 15,000 to 25,000 yards of cotton flannel per day.
The United Statet Cord Company commenced, in
1880, the manufacture of solid braids of cotton, linen
and worsted for all purposes. The works are on
Lawrence Street, and employ fifteen hands and con-
sume about 500 pounds of cotton per day. Among
the articles of manufacture are railroad signal cords,
window-sash cords, curtain cords, chalk lines, etc.
The officers of the company are : Prestisa Webster,
president; Paul Butler, treasurer; Charles Gray,
superintendent.
Tlie Cutter & Walker Manufacturing Company. —
The business of this company was started in 1852, by
G. W. Walker and Dr. Stephen Cutter, and conducted
by them until 1875, \. hen a stock company was formed
with a capital of $40,000. Mr. Walker died in 1876
and Dr. Cutter died in 1881. Jacob Xichols is now
90
HISTORY OF MIDPLKSEX COTTNTY, AlASSACnU.-^ETTS.
president and treasurer of the company. The manu-
factures are shoulder-braces, suspenders, abdominal
supporters, shoe-linings and paper stock. The works
are located on .Middlesex Street and thirty hands are
employed.
W. L. Davis, in Davis & Sargent's building on 5Iid-
dlesex Street, manufactures elastic and non-elastic
webbing. Employing twelve to fifteen bauds. He
started the business in 1881, and is the successor of
RoUason & Sherman.
John M. Pevey, on Walker Street, manufactures cot-
ton yarns, single and twisted, suspender and other
yarns and suspenders to order. This business was
started in 1882, the proprietor having previously
been partner with his three brothers in the brass
and iron foundry business. He is also the proprietor
of the American Improved Foss and Pevey Cotton
Card.
The Crilcrwn Knitllug Company was started by
Edwin Lamson and W. C. Hamblet in 1888. Before
the end of the year 1888 the company became incor-
porated, there being four stock-holders, namely, Jaines
F. Puft'er, Stephen B. Puft'er, Warren C. Hamblet and
Edwin Lamsini. The works are on Tanner Street.
The company employs eighty hands, and manufactures
ladies' Jersey vests, 100 dozen being produced daily.
Metal Maxltfactures. — The American Boll
Company. — In 1847 James Meadowcroft and George
C. Smith started the manufacture of iron bolts anrl
nuts, in a building hired of O. M. Whipple, in what
is now the Wamesit yard. It was the tirst bolt man-
ufactory in the United States. The work was all
done by hand and the process slow. In 1854 D. S.
Sherman was admitted partner, and in 1855 the pres-
ent main building of the company was erected. Sub-
se<iuently Jonathan Hope, Richard Dewhurst, Robert
H. Butcher and James Minter at different times be-
came members of the firm. Mr. Minter's invention
of a heading-machine seems to have finally secured
the success and permanency of the manufacture. In
1881 the American Bolt Company, which was incor-
porated with a capital of $200,000, succeeded to the
business.
Success followed. Fifteen hundred tons of iron are
now consumed annually. The manufacture consists
of bolts for railroads, bridges and other purposes ; also
nuts, screws and washers. One hundred and fifty men
are employed. The company has a high reputation
and very extensive patronage.
To a novice the works are of great interest. " A
hole is punched through a cold iron plate U inches
thick as easily as if it were a s'.ice of cheese. Everj*
thing is done with dies. A die cuts the hole in the
nut, cuts the nut itself and shapes it, and gives it its
thread. The bolts are headed in a machine, threaded
in a lathe, and polished in an emery barrel."
The officers of this company are : James Minter,
president; Percy Parker, treasurer; and Miles Bren-
nau, general manager.
K'ltson Marhine Coinpani/, Dutton Street. — Richard
Kitson came to Lowell from England in 1849, and,
building a shop in what is now Broadway, started
the manufacture of the first needle-pointed card-
clothing in this country. He invented various ma-
chines for opening and cleaning cotton fibre, on
which he secured patents. From these small be-
ginnings the present extensive works — probably the
largest in America for a similar pur|)ose — were de-
veloped. Mr. Kitson was sole proprietor until 1874,
when the Kitson Machine Company was organized,
the president of which is now Jacob Rogers, and the
treasurer Haven C. Perham.
The company manufactures cotton-openers and
lappers, wool-washers and dyers, employing 225
men.
Parsons li- Meuley, Fletcher Street, make copper
stamps and stencils for cotton and woolen and hosiery
mills, bleacheries, etc. This business was started in
1843 by R. J. Dewherst, Wui. Parsons becoming a
partner in 1S45. In 1S57 the firm liecaine Parsons
& (iibby, and in 1881 Pars(ii3 & Mealey. Parsons
having now retired, Mr. Mealey is .sole proprietor.
Tlie Perey Brothers, on Walker Street, iron and
brass founders, employ seventy men, and annually
use 1500 tons of iron. The f.iur brothers, Jnhn M.,
George E., Franklin S. and James \. Pevey, started
the business of iron and brass founders in 1871.
In 18S2 John A. Pevey retired from the firm to
enter upon other business. The business is thriv-
ing under the other brothers. Their manufac-
ture includes brass, composition, copper, bronze ami
white metal castings, also water-works and sewer-
c:i3tings, lamp-posts, grates, window-weights and rail-
road supplies. They al;:o manufacture zincs for tele-
graph, telephone and fire alarm batteries.
UiiioK Brass Fnimdry, Wnrthen Street, produces
all kinds of brass and composition casting*, liabbit-
metals, etc., employing six men. This foundry has
been in operation since 1881. Alfred L. .Smith is the
proprietor.
Daniel Cushingii Co., 5Iid<llesex Street, manufacture
plain and ornamental galvanized iron and copper
work, employing fifteen men. The company an-
nually consumes twenty to thirty tons of galvanized
sheet-iron, and from eight to ten tons of cast and
wrought-iron.
David Cushing started this business in 18()',», with
G. W. and F. Smith, of Boston, as partners*. He had
been a partner of S. G. Mack, in the stove business,
from 1835 to 18t;9, the firm of Cushing & Mack being
one of the best known throughout the city.
Mr. Cushing ilied in 1887, and his son. Joseph L.,
succeeds him, the old firm-name being still retained.
John Dennis li: Co., NS'estern Avenue, manufacture
presses for every variety of work, roll-coverers' tools,
etc., employing twelve men. The firm consists of
John Dennis and his son, J. Nelson Dennis. The pres-
ent firm started in 1882. The father had previously
LOWELL.
91
carried on the business from about 186G to about
1879.
Siannell d- Wholty manufacture steam boilers, stand-
pipes and reservoirs, steel and iron-plate work and
fire-escapes, employing thirty to fifty men, and con-
suming forty to fifty tons of iron |)er month. This
business was started in 1880. Tbe works are on Tan-
ner Street.
Middlesex Machine Company. — This company was
started by F. G. Perkins and W. G. Wright in 1888.
In 1889 the firm was changed to C. S. Shepard and F.
G. Perkins. They are contractors for heating and
ventilating buildings, and employ eighteen men.
Their works are on Western Avenue.
A. Nourbourn, corner of Gushing and Willie Streets,
manufactures steam, iron and wood-working ma-
chinery, employing ten men. He started the busi-
ness in 1877.
Wm. C/eivortIt ti- Sons, manufacturers of weavers'
reeds, on Middle Street, employ five men. This
business was started by Wm. Cleworth & Son at
Mechanics' Mills in 1860. It was removed to Middle
Street in 1868, where it is still conducted by Wm.
Cleworth and his two sons, David aud Edwin Cle-
worth.
Oeo. W. Harris, at his mill on Pawtucket and Per-
kins Streets, manufactures loom-harnesses, running
one English, nine double-knot, one double machine
and sixteen Harris machines, his own invention,
employing thirty-five hands. In 1860 Mr. Harris
started this business in a wooden building on Perkins
Street. In 1880 he removed to the spacious brick
manufactory which he now occupies.
In 1867 W. \V. Carey started the manufacture of
shafting, hangers and pulleys. Soon Geo. W. Harris
was received as partner, and the firm of Carey & Harris
continued the manufacture until 1879, when Harris
retired from the firm. Since that time the business
has been carried on by W. W. Carey. The manufac-
tory is on the corner of Broadway and Mt. Vernon
Streets. Number of hands employed, fifty.
Lowell Spring-Bed Company manufactures the
Lowell Bed-Spring in Nesmith's Block, Merrimack
Street. The proprietor, J. L. Severance, started the
business in his present location in 1887.
Lowell Rubber Type Company, Nesmith Block, Mer-
rimack Street, manufactures rubber stamps, etc. The
business was started by J. L. Severance on Central
Street in 1880. In 1884 he removed to big present
location.
IF. H. Bagshaic, Wilson Street, manufactures and
exports comb, gill, hackle and card pins, circles for
combing-machines, fallers, gills, hackles and porcu-
pines, weavers' combs, and manufacturers' supplies,
employing twenty-five hands. The business was es-
tablished in 1873.
Charles E. Oee, Fletcher Street, manufactures
worsted and wood-working machinery, employing five
hands. He started the business in 1888, succeeding
Wm. Robinson, who had long done business in the
same place.
Samuel E. & Thomas Stott, Meadowcroft Street,
manufacture needle and diamond-pointed wood and
leather card clothing, machine wool combs, circles,
gills, fallers, hackles, shoddy and waste-pickers, rag-
dusters, etc., employing from forty to fifty hands.
This business was removed to its present location
from the yard of the United States Bunting Company
in 1886. Before 1881 it had been located on Market
Street.
W. B. Glover. Hurd Street, stencil-cutter, engraver
and lock-smith, started the business as stencil-cutter
in 1853, and has since enlarged it by becoming an
engraver and, later, lock-smith.
Ariston Grocer, steel letter, stamp and stencil-cutter
on Market Street, has worked at the business about
forty-five years. After having had his place of busi-
ness on Middlesex Street for twenty-five years, he
came to his present location on Market Street in 1888.
His son, Charles O. A. Grover, is now the manager of
the business.
Lowell Steam-Boiler Works manufacture steam-
boilers, bleachers and bleaching kiers, tanks for
all purposes, penstocks, flumes and quarter-.forns
for turbine-wheel work.
These works were started on Button Street, by
Stephen Ashton, in 1856, and sold to Wm. Dobbins in
1804. Wm. Dobbins was killed in 1873, being
crushed by a boiler (which had not been properly
supported in its place). In 1875 Charles Cowley
purchased the works. In 1877 they came into the
hands of Richard Dobbins, the present proprietor,
who employs forty to seventy men and uses about fifty
tons of iron and steel per month.
The New England Wire Goods Company at
Holt's Mills, Belvidere, manufactures every descrip-
tion of wire-ware. This business was started by J. W.
Kenvin & Co., in 1882, and was then called The
Lowell Wire Works. In 1889 it was purchased by
W. F. Kenneson, who is the present treasurer and
manager. He employes twenty men.
Wm. d- Hartley Wadsworfh in 1888 started the
manufacture of tempered cast-steel card wire on
Bridge Street, also high grade cast-steel wires. They
employ five men.
Jeremiah Clark, dealer in cotton and woolen
machinery, began business in Middle Street in 1867.
In 1888 he removed to his new and spacious building
on Dutton Street. He has a mach'ne-shop and store-
house on Perrin Street, employs eighteen men, and
uses an electric motor of ten horse-power.
A. Haltowell, Market Street, manufactures brass
goods, also Hallowell's spray-nozzle, fountain
stands, mill hydrants, fire department supplies, etc.
This business was begun by A. Hallowell in 1863, on
Middle Street, with C. L. Willoughby as partner.
Subsequently it was carried on in Franklin Square by
Reed & Hallowell, having been removed to Market
112
IITSTORY OF MIDDLKSEX COrLNTY, IMASSACnUSKTTS.
Street about 1879. It is imw conducteil by A. Hallo-
well as sole proprietor.
M. A. Mack it Co., oil Sliattiick Street, manu-
facture gal vauized coruices, wimlow-caps and brackets,
iron and tin roofs; they are also tin, sheet-iron, brass
and copper workers. This firm succeeds to a business
long since established. Sewall G. Mack came to
Lowell in 1840, and, in company with Daniel Cash-
ing, established the well-known firm of Gushing &
Mack, dealers in stoves, etc. On the retirement of
Mr. Gushing, the firm became S. O. JIack & Go. The
senior partner having retired, a new firm was formed
in 1880, consisting of \V. .\.. Mack and Geo. H. Wat-
son, who started bu.siiiess in their new and elegant
building on Shattuck Street. The firm employ.s
eighteen men and uses sixty to r<eventy-(ive tons of
galvanized iron, and twenty-five tons of black iron
per year.
D, H. Ul/noii cL- Co., Gushing Street, manufacture
slasher cylinders, silk and dresser cylinders, ccdor and
dye-kettles and all kinds of copper work for mills,
euiploying seven men. The business nf the firm was
first on Central Street about 1872. It was removed
to Gushing Street in 1880, and in IS'Jd it is U< be re-
moved to the spacious and commodious brick Ijlock
erected for 'ton Dutton Street.
Mr. Wilson wa.s the first man in .Vmerica to make
the copper slasher cylinders.
The KiKiicles r>ciile Wurks, on Fletcher Street, were
started in 18.'57 by \Voods& Nute, who were succeeded
by John A. Knowles, .Ir. Mr. Jvnowies ilieil about
1883, and the business was purchased by Williaiu Jrl.
Tliomps<iii, of Salem, who is now the proprietor.
These works manufacture all varieties of standard
scales, and also all foreign slandard-s. .Vliout tiiiuo
are annually made. Twelve men are employed.
Large sales arc made in Southern and Western States,
and in Mexico and Brazil.
I'ke Union Iron Fnicndry, W. P. Edwards, proprie-
tor, oil Lincoln Street, consumes about 7l'0 tons of
iron annually, employing about thirty men. The
company started business in 1872. In 1889 Mr. Ed-
wards became sole proprietor.
A. L. Wright, corner of Rock and Fletcher Streets,
has for his specialty the nianufaeture of engine-
lathes. Mr. Wright started in business for himself
eighteen years ago. His increasing business required
him to move, first from Dutton to Gushing Street, and
then to his present quarters, where he has a Moorage
of 10,jOO feet. He employs thirty to thirty-five
hands.
.S'. C. it G. H. Smith, Broadway, manufacture cap
and set-screws, employing fifteen men. In 1884 they
succeeded S. C. Smith, who had commenced the busi-
ness in 1808.
Benjamin Lnwrtnce, on Broadway, manufactures
engioe and hand lathes, planers and shapers ; also
combined index and milling machines, employing
twelve haudu. He started the business on Fletcher ;
Street in 18o4. Subsecpiently he removed to Mt.
Vernon Street, coming to his present location in
1870.
Jo-irph Tarntr, Broadway, manufa<tiires jack,
cotton, sugar, rigger, planking, locomotive, claw-jack
and large jiress screws, boiler-punches, turn-buckles
of all sizes, ic, employing eight men. He started
the business, as sole proprietor, in lS7o succeeding
Thomas Atherton & Sou. Mr. Turner came from
j England in 18')4, worked nine years ;us engineer lor
: ihe Pacific Mills in Lawrence, became partner with
I .Vlherton & Son in Lowell in 18i)4, and bought out
I his partners in 1875. The business was formerly
1 conducted near Stott's Mills in Belvidcre.
The Sn'tiin Tiirhinf tliitl Mmmjitrtuiiiiii CimijKint/,
, corner of Dutton and \Villie Slivils, lioes work bv
j contract. The wheels of the company arc wt-ll-known
j throughout the country, being used in many large
I nianufacturicg coni|i:inies. It was established in
1804.
' Fniiil: Cn/rert. .l.'ickson Street, maniifaclures ami
repairs machinery, cniployiuL' three to six men.
When President Lincoln called for 7-'i,ii(Hi loen in
1801, Mr. (.'alvert was living in Alab.ima. Me claims
that he was the only man of llial State who answered
the call. He suliseqiieialy lame north, and in lsil4
started his present biisincss.
His father, Francis A. (alvert. was a British sol-
ilier who came to Lowell in IS:!:l. and became dis-
' linguished as an inventor. He was said to have been
the first man in .Vjiicrica to make m.icliiiiery for
spinning worsted. I'.efore this invention we were in-
debted to England lor worsl<d yarn. It is alxi
claimed that he received ibe lirsl paleiil in the world
for combing Wool liy macliincry. In his cnlerprises
be bad the aid of liis brother W. W. I ';ilven. Like
many other inventors lie failed lo :iii|uire wcallli.
'. He returned to Eoirland, where he diid in the city of
.Manchester.
l>. C. Brown, on Warren Street, manufactures
reeds, harne.sses and patent wire !u<ldlcs lor cotton
and woolen-mills. The business w.is established in
1830. He employes thirty hands anil makes lin,-
000,(100 heddles per year.
ir. //. Hope iL' Co., Gushing Street, manufactures
milled machines, cap and ^^et screws and jack sjiool
journals. The firm consists t)f Wm. II. Hope and
Ale.xaiider GuUilaiid. They are the successors of
Elliot it Go.
The Lou'i'll Card Co/n/iani/ was started as a private
enterprise by a firm consisting of .Icremiab Clark. ( '.
L. Harmon and Levi Edgell. Siibseiiuently J. W.
Whittier was adinitteil into ihe firm. An act of in-
corporation was secured ill 1873. The company has
ninety-five machines for the manufacture of card
clothing for carding wool and cotton and employs
twenty-two hands. The plant is on the corner of
Market and Shattuck Streets.
F. a. Per/dns started the business of making ma-
LOWELL.
n:'.
chinists' tool sand lathes at Mechanics' Mills in 1859.
After about two years he removed to Middlesex
Street, then to Middle Street, where be remained
about three years, and then to his present place on
Fletcher Street. He employed about forty-five men
His specialty is engine lathes.
T. C. Entn-isUc, in Gates' Block, Worthen Street,
manufactures patent \var[>ers, balling, linking and
chaining macliines, Entwistle's patent expansion
comb and common combs for warpers, beamers and
slashers. Mr. Entwistle was formerly with the Hope
dale Machine Company in Hopedale, Mass. He
started business on his own account in 1887 in Gates'
Block in Lowell.
//, J. ■'<-nrycr manufactures machinery on Broad-
way, employing two hands. Mr. Sawyer, as member
of the firm of Smith, Lawrence & Co., began the
business on Fletcher Street in 18.'i4. He came to his
present location in 187(». The large brick manufac-
tory which he now ciucupies (in part) was erected for
hi^ business and that of Benjamin Lawrence.
Geor;i'' L. <''uli/, curner of Wejteru Avenue and
Fletcher Street, manufactures machinists' tools and
loom-harness hooks and eyes. He has occupied his
lirespnl location about eight years, having previously
done Imsine-s in PerkiMs' building on Fletcher Street,
and in Davis and Sargent's building on Jliddlesex
Street.
T/i'- Aiiieii'-'iii Wire GooiU Oniijininj^ Payne Street,
near Schor)l Street, manufactures patented and special
wire hardware, and makes a specialty of bronzing,
platingand japanning, em ploying from twenty to thirty
hands. The company started business in 18.S8.
Pltillips (f •S'liihoni, Western Avenue, manufacture
files and rasps. Tlie firm consist of ,1. L. Phillips
and A. 1). Sanliorn, who are successors of .Fohu
l)Mckwortli. The firm also iloes business in Salem,
.Mass., having set up the bramli of business in Lowell
in isssi.
JViii. K'linirl,:^^ ( 'iisliing Street, manufactures hand-
cut files and rasps of every description, emjiloying
four men. He started the business at his present
location in is.ss, having previoti-ily carried it f)n for
ten years on Miildlese.x Street.
C A. J)o'li/'\ Payne Street, manufactures shoddy-
j)icker machines and pins, and covers shoddy-pickers,
employing eight hands. He started the business of
making s!ioddy-|iicker pins in 18S2, in Davis and Sar-
gent's building on Middlesex Street. In 1889 he
moved into the building on Payne Street erected by
himself for accommodating his biisinesg.
iSainne/ (!. Cooper, Central Street, manufactures
copper stamps, stencils for cotton and woolen-mills,
lileacheries, hosieries, etc., employing six hands. He
liegan the l)UsiMcss in 1872, having J. H. C<inier for
partner, who had conducted it for a few months be-
fore the partnership was formed. Since the death of
Mr. Corner in 188), Mr. Cooper has been sole j)ro-
prietor .
Joet Knapp <{• Son, machinists and manufacturers
of nuts, bolts, screws, etc., and wood- work machinery.
This business was established by Geo. L. Richardson,
who, in 188.5, was succeeded by Joel Knapp & Son.
Mr. Knapp learned his trade as machinist at the
Lowell Machine-Shop. This firm makes special ma-
chinery to order, and materials for bridges and all
kinds of buildings are manufactured by them. They
employ ten skilled workmen.
I). Cole and A. F. Xichols started the manufacture
of iron and brass castings in 18.'i8, and still continue
the business on the corner of Willie and Dutlon
Streets. They give special attention to the casting of
pulleys and hangers, iron pipe and columns. Their
operations include turbine water-wheel work and
machinery castings. They employ fifty men.
Daniel Lorejoy (0 Son, manufacturers of machine-
knive.=, on Rock and Cushing Streets. This business
was started as early as 1S.S8. The firm employs
twenty-five hands.
Gen. ir. Fifield started the business of making
machinists' tools and lathes in 1874. The works are
on Fletcher Street, and sixty hands are employed.
Ci/n/s /"fr/f/ix manufactures machinists' tools, cm -
ploying five men. He started the business in 18S2,
on Dutton Street, his present place of business being
still on Dutlon Street.
Woods, Shenrood it Cnmjiany, manufacturers of
lustral wire-ware of every description. This busi-
ness was started by E. P. Woods, and Daniel
Sherwood in 1861. In ixiiii Cyrus H. Latham was
received as partner. Mr. Sherwood died in 1877, and
since that time the business has been conducted by
E. P. Woods and < 'yriis H. Latham. The factory is
on Bridge Street at f^iol of Seventh Street. Number
of employees, sevciiiv-five. iS'ickel and gold-plating
is a part of the business, and the firm has a high
reputation.
Riee A Co.'s Wire iro(7-.«.— In 1849 S. L. Hildreth
began the manufacture of wire work, in a small way
on John Street. He was, about 18()0, succeeded by
Henry A. Hildreth, who moved the business to Cen-
tral Street, and was succeeded by Hildre'h A: Rice,
on Middle Street, about 1872. Hildreth retired in
1874, and the business is now in the control of Frank
E. Rice. The firm title is Rice & Co., Mt. Vernon
Street. The firm manufactures wire cloth, nettings,
office-railiugs, bird-cages, rat-traps, etc., employing
fifty men.
Lowell Steam and Gas-Pipe Works, established by
Horace R. Barker, are among the most successful and
important of the business enterprises of the city.
Horace R. Barker was one of those men of
sterling intrinsic worth, wiio, having risen from a.
childhood and youth of hardship and toil, have
fought a good fight and attained an honorable name.
He was of English descent, his early American an-
cestors having settled in Pomfret, Conn. His grand-
father, John Barker, went from Pomfret to Stratford,
94
HISTORi'' OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
N. H., where his father, Albermarle Barker, was born.
His father removed to Lexington, Mass., where the
subject of our sketch was born on June 27, 1829.
While he was yet a child the family moved to Xew-
ton, Mass., where the father pursued his trade as
maker of cutlery and other implements of steel.
It was the father's misfortune, at the age of about
forty- four years, to be almost fatally injured by fall-
ing down a precipice. This injury he survived in a
helpless condition for about five years. His wife and
eight young children were thus thrown upon their
own resources, not only for their own support, but
for that also of the invalid father. It was in this
struggle that Horace Barker learned that self-reli-
ance and efficiency in business which characterized
his future career.
At the age of eighteen years he entered the ser-
vice of the New England Gas-pipe Company, in Bos-
ton, and proved to be a workman most highly prized
by his employers for the fidelity of his service. On
one occasion, in case of fire, there was the imminent
danger of the explosion of a boiler, unless some one
would take his life in his hands and prevent the dis-
aster, young Barker did not hesitate to encounter
the fearful risk, and, after accomplishing his object,
he was drawn insensible from his perilous situation.
In 1851, with the aid of his employers in Boston, he
started the business of steam and gas-fitting in Low-
ell. His machine-shop for three years was on Howe
Street, but afterwards on Middle Street, in a spacious
building erected by him.self. He also opened a store
in Barrister's Hall, on Central Street, for the sale ot
steam and gas-fixtures. This extensive business he
carried on during the last thirty-five years of his life,
gaining for himself a handsome amount of property,
as well as the name of a business man of the highest
character.
Mr. Barker never sought political honors, though
he was often nominated for office, because his name
gave strength to the ticket. He was in the Board of
Aldermen in 1877-79, and he served the city with
great ability and fidelity. On .several occasions he
was importuned to be a candidate for the mayoralty,
but this honor, on account of the urgent demands ol
his business, he felt it his duty to decline.
Mr. Barker was greatly interested in the pursuits
of agriculture, and he owned a highly-cultivated
farm in Dracut. H.e wa.s at one time president of the
tru.'stees of Lowell Cemetery, and at the time of his
death he was a director of the Merchants' Bank. He
was a man of broad and liberal views, and of a gen-
erous, benevolent nature.
In the pride of his manhood and in the midst ol
his successful career there came upon him a fatiil dis-
ease, the enlargement of the heart. He struggleil
bravely against it. He sought renewed health at his
.Measide cottage, but all in vain. As the inevitable
hour approached he begged to be carried back to his j
home in Centralville, which he hud himself erected.
and which contained all that he held most dear. And
here, in a few short days, he quietly passed away.
He died on Sept. 8, 1886, at the age of fifty-seven
years. His wife and his two daughters, and also his
aged mother, now in her ninetieth year, survive him.
Wood Manufactubes. — .1. L. Brooks A Co., Me-
chanics' Mills, corner of Fletcher and Dutton Streets,
! manufacturers of packing cases, moldings, gutters,
I doffing-boxes, filling-boxes, etc. This is one of Low-
' ell's oldest and best-known firms.
j This company consumes about 2,000,000 feet of
; lumber annually, employs nearly sixty men, and runs
j a saw-mill in Middlesex Village.
1 Artemas L. Brook.'; was born in Groton, N.
H., September 20, 1803, and died at his home on
Fletcher Street, Lowell, ,Iuly 3, 1878, at the age of
seventy-five years. He was the son of Peter Brooks,
a farmer in Groton, who removed soon after his son's
' birth to the neighboring town of Hebron. His early
American ancestors belonged to Middlesex County,
Massachusetts.
Jlr. Brooks received his elementary education in
the common schools of Hebron. For a short time he
attended the academy at Pembroke, N. H. His early
years were mainly spent upon his father's farm. He
also learned the carpenter's trade and served as
teacher of a district school. When twenty-five years
of .age he went to Boston, and in that city and in the
navy yard at Charlestown he worked at his trade as
carpenter and in other employments for two or three
years. .Subse(|uectly he returned to Hebron and en-
gaged in farming for one year. It was in this year
that he married Mi.ss Sarah Philips.
In 1831 he came to Lowell while it was yet a town,
and worked as carpenter and general builder. Houses
constructed by him in this early period arestill stand-
ing, and are occupied as dwellings. After one year
he formed a partnership with Thomas P. Goodhue
(afterwards postmaster of the city), for the introduc-
tion of Woodworth's planing-machine. Subsequently,
this partnership having been dissolved, he conducted
the business alone 'n a shop which stood near the
site of Stott's Mills, in Belvidere. At length, with
William Fiske sis partner, he carried on the lumber
business in the yard of the Jliddlesex Manufacturing
Company, having there a planing-mill. About this
time he invented the double surfacing planing-ma-
chine, for which he obtained a patent.
In 18-lii, with Ignatius Tyler as partner, he erected
the Mechanics' Mills, at the corner of Fletcher and
Dutton streets, and engaged in the manufacture of
lumber. It was in these mills that Mr. Brooks,
through the remaining th"rty-one years of his life,
carried on a very extensive and very successfiil lumber
business, gaining for himself an enviable name for
ability and integrity. Even to the present day the
familiar firm-name, A. L. Brooks & Co., is au honor-
ed name among the citizens of Lowell.
At different times Mr. George W. Shattuck, Wil-
%-'^<STW^---'^i'\
LOWELL.
fl5
liam C. Brooks and George H. Ames were partners
of Mr. Brooks. '
In 1872 Mr. A. B. Woodworth, his son-in-law, be-
came a member of the firm, and during the twelve '
years since the death of Mr. Brooks he has continued
to conduct a very large and successful business in a j
great variety of lumber manufactures.
But the history of Mr. Brooks has by no means
been written when he has been described as a suc-
cessful man of busine^.s. It is as a good citizen, as a
hearty friend of every work of philanthropy, as a I
whole-souled Christian gentleman that he will be j
longest and most afiectiouately remembered. j
Mr. Brooks was long connected with the Fire De-
partment of Lowell, and served upon the board of '
engineers. He was for several years in the Board j
of School Committee. In 1849 and in 1855 he was 1
in the Board of Aldermen. He also held the office of ,
trustee of the City Institution for Savings, and direc- [
tor of the Prescott Bank. |
It was, however, as a religious and philanthropic '
man that he was best known. As a member of the j
Appleton Street (now Eliot) Church for six years,
and of the John Street Congregational Church for
thirty-six years, he was actively and officially en-
gaged in all works of benevolence and philanthropy.
Especially ardent were his anti-slavery sentiments.
Mr. Brooks' chosen field of religious effort, however,
was with the young men of the city. For twenty-
five years, in the Sabbath-school of his church, he
had a large class of young men, in leaching whom he
is .said to have taken a " wonderful delight."
The writer cannot do better than to close this brief
sketch with an extract from an address delivered soon
after the death of Mr. Brooks, at the fortieth anni-
versary of the John Street Church, by George Ste-
veus, Esq., who had in church work long been associ-
ated with him :
" His manly, nolile presence, his brave, honest,
generou> heart, full ot all high, holy and honorable
aspirations, his ever-abounding hope and implicit
faith in the final triumph of truth and justice, his
rugged training and wonderful success in business,
which carried hiui on from the beginning of a jour-
neyman carpenter, dependent upon his daily earnings,
to the pi'sition of a leading business man in ourcity —
all combined to fit him for a teacher and leader of
young men. No young man ever came in contact
with him, whom he did not lift and encourage, and
who did not learn to respect and love him.''
Mil/oil Aldrirh c(mimenced in 1842, with E. Hap-
good a.s partner, the manufacture of power-loom and
carpet shuttles. They were at first located near the
site of the .Middlesex Woolen-Mills, but in 1843 re-
moved to Middle S'reet, and in 1844 began the manu-
facture of wooden screws. The firm removed to
Howe Street in 184G. In 1848 they sold out the shut-
tle business, and dissolved the partnership. Mr.
Aldricli co'ilinued the making of wooden screws, and
was burned out in Howe Street in 1851. In 1865 he
came to Mechanics' Mills, where he is still engaged in
making wooden screws and clamps. He employs
seven to t«n hands.
J. S. Jaquef Shuttle Company manufactures power-
loom shuttles for every description of work. Factory
at Whipple's Mills. This business was started by E.
& R. Douglass in 1833, over the old saw-mill in the
yard of the "Machine Shop," Mr Jaques being one
of the workmen of the firm. At length Mr. Jaques
was admitted partner. One of the Douglass partners
having died, the business was removed to Middlesex-
Street, and carried on by the firm of Coburn &
Jaques. On July 20, 1863, Mr. Jaques, having be-
come sole proprietor, a fatal accident occurred, by
which, through the explosion of a boiler, four
of the workmen were fatally injured. Mr. Jaques
then removed to the present location, where he has
erected a spacious and elegant manufactory, and, in
company with his son, John L. Jaques carries on a
very extensive and profitable business, employing
thirty-five hands.
G. W. Bagley, on Middle Street, manufactures Bur-
rows' dryair refrigerators, doors, signs, window-
screens, etc., employing ten to twenty men. This
business was started by W. L. Floyd about 1878, on
Prescott Street, who sold it to Bagley about 1882.
Mr. Bagley removed to his present location in 1887.
' Marshall d: Crosby, Middlese.T Stieet, manufacture
cabinet-furniture, side-boards, roll-top desks and
I book-cases, etc., employing forty hands. This company
I started business in 1864. Mr. Marshall had carried
I on the business in Tewksbury ten years before the
' partnership in Lowell was formed, and he left the
j firm in 1885, Crosby now having no partner.
' J. G. Peabody A- Edvard Fifield started the manu-
' facture of doors, sashes, etc., at the Mechanic Mills,
j on Warren Street, near the site of the Middlesex
Woolen-Mills, in 1844, and removed to the corner of
, Dulton and Fletcher Streets in 1846. Mr. Fifield
' left the firm in 1854. Since 1873 the business has
been conducted by the company known as J. G. Pea-
body & Sons. The manufactory is in Wamesit Mills.
' The business amounts to $(J0,000 per year. Sales are
made mostly in New York and Boston. Twenty-five
i or thirty bands are employed.
1 J. B. Goodwin & Co., manufacturers of house and
I office furniture, started business on Western Avenue
i in 1889. They employ ten men and give attention to
the^nterior finish of offices, banks and stores. F. J.
Farr is the partner of Mr. Goodwin.
Silas W. Fletcher, manufacturer of doors, sashes,
blinds and window-frames, on Western Avenue,
started his business at Wamesit Mills in 1863. He
employs thirty men.
W. H. Kimball, stair-builder. The business of this
manufactory was started by Thomas Pratt in 1840.
Pratt was succeeded, about 1870, by Griffin & Ste-
vens. About 1877 Gordon i^ Kimball became the
96
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, JfASSACHUSETTS.
proprietors. Gordon having left the firm in 1885, W.
H. Kimball remains the sole proprietor. The manu-
factory is on Diitton Street and employs three men.
Davis <f- Sargent, manufacturers of packing-boxes,
on Middlesex Street. Stephen C. Davis, the senior
member of this firm, is a veteran in his line of busi-
ness. From 1852 to 1866 he was, with Otis Allen, en-
gaged in making boxes. In 1866 he formed a partner-
ship with Mr. Storer, who soon retired, and the firm
became Davis & Melendy. Upon Mr. Melendy's re-
tirement, in 1873, Benjamin F. Sargent, of Nashua,
who had long been in the same business, took his
place, and the firm of Davis & Sargent la (me of the
most successful in the city, doing a very large and a
very lucrative business. Besides box-making, a very
large business is done in bringing lo^s from the north-
ern forests and making thera into lumber. Their
saw-mill turns out 3,500,000 feet of lumber annually,
and the firm employs forty-five men. In box-making,
etc., they use 225,000 feet per month.
Olis Allen, the veteran manufacturer of boxes, is
the father of Charles H. Allen, recently member of
Ccipgress. He commenced the business in 1850. lu
l>i51 he enlarged his liusine.ss by purchasing a saw-
mill, and, in 1852, bought a tract of land in the Fran-
conia Mountains, and engaged in running logs down
the Merrimack. From 1862 to 1872 Mr. Allen was
out of business, but in 1872 resumed, in partnership
with his son, the manufacture of boxes. ft wa.« to
meet the demands of their thriving busine.ss that the
son has recently retireil from political office.
The firm employs about one hundred men. They
make Allen's lock-cornered filling-boxes, dotting- '
boxes, roving cans anil mill work generally. The
machinery is driven by an engine of 150 hfirse-power.
1>. H. Bemii it' Co., Mechanics" Mills, designers antl
manufacturers of artistic furniture. Mr. Bemis, the
head of this firm, in 1880 came to this city from
Brattleboro', Vt., and after wcirking fur C. I. Taylor
as a machine hand for four years, became partner in
the firm of Carter i*e Bemis. Since 1885, Mr. Bemis
has been sole proprietor. He employs ten hands and
does a large business in the manufacture of all kinds
of house finish, brackets, balusters, stair-work, bank,
store and ofiice fittings, mantels, sideboards, etc.
Anwsa Pro/I d- Co., manufacture doors, sashes,
blinds, mouldings, church furniture, etc. This com-
pany's business was started by M. C. Pratt, in 1848.
The establishment was burned out in 1865. Mr.
Amasa Pratt, in this year, came into the firm. 'His
brother, M. C- Pratt, the original owner, died in 1884,
since which time .^masa Pratt hsus been the only pro-
prietor. He employs forty men, and consumes
5,000,000 feet of lumber annually.
Tiiijlor A Co. started the manufacture of furniture
on Middlesex Street, in 1877, and were burnt out in |
1878. On starting, the firm consisted of ('. I. Taylor
and Charles F. Heard. The manufactory is at the
Wamesit Mills, and the firm consists of C. I. Tavlor
and J. T. Carter, who are designers, carvers and man-
ufacturers of all kinds of store and office furniture,
interior finish, wood-work, mantels, etc. They em-
ploy thirteen men.
The Union Stopple Compumj, Western Avenue, has
facilities for turning out twenty-two barrels of bungs
per day. Lowell seems to have been the head-
quarters for this manufacture, which was .started in
this city by Josiah Kirby. John Batchelder, the
proprietor of the Union Stopple Company, was first
established in the business in 1858. After being three
times burned out, and after a prolonged absence from
Lowell, about 1886 he resumed his business in this
city.
John L. Cheney i(- Co. established the manufacture
of bobbins, spools and shuttles of every description
on Payne Street in 1888. They pay special attention
to making Cheney's patent spools. They employ
seventy-five hands. The manufacture of true-run-
ning bobbins lor patent spindles is a specialty of
their manufucture. Previous to 1887 Mr. Cheney
had been, for twenty-two years, a partner of Wm. H.
Parker in the same business. Edwards Cheney, his
son, i.s MOW his partner in business.
The Mtrrimarl: Croqnet Coin/mni/, on St. Hyacinth
Street, manufactures croquet .sets, ten-pins, ring-toss,
Indian I'lubs, base ball bat.s. and castor wheels, and
employs sixty hands. In 1875 Whitney it Willard
took this biisiuess from .Vddison Hadley, who had
previously run it in a small way. In two years Blair
it Son took it, and were followed by Moulton it Co.,
whr.solil it to Pease iVt Ames. In 1879 B. F. Colby
look the business and increased it to its present
magnitude. He took S. P. Griflin as partner in
18.S!I.
IT/zi. H. I'arLer <f Son, at Wamesit Slills, Dutton
Street, make bobbins, spindles, spools, shuttles, etc.,
for the manufacture of cocton, wool, silk, flax and
jute. They employ 2"0 hands. Wm. H. Parker and
Everett Nichols started the busine.ss of making shut-
tles, bobbins, etc., in 1859. Subsefjuently John L.
Cheney became a partner, but since 1887 the part-
nership has been that of Parker & Son.
Tlie Cohurn Shuttle t'ompany, comer of Tanner and
Lincoln Streets, manufacture shuttles, bobbins and
spools. The business was started by .lohn H. Co-
burn in Brooks' Building on Dutton Street in 1866.
Mr. Col)urn had previously been associated with J. S.
Ja(|iics in the shuttle manufacture. Coburn sold to
Boardman it Morse in 1869, the works having, in 1867,
been removed to First Street, Centralville. In 1S70
the firm of Lamson, Thissell & Pickering became
proprietors. They were made an incorporated com-
pany about 1885, with a ca|iital of $100,000, with Ed-
win Lamson president.
Sturterant <C' (laler, manufacturers of post-rails,
balusters, stairs and wood-turning. This business
was started by Fred. .V. Sturtevant in 1884. Mr.
Galer became his partner in 1888. The firm attends
LOWELL.
97
to all kinds of house furnishing, and employs four
men.
A. Bachelder & Co., on Mt. Vernon Street, are pro-
prietors of the New England Bung and Plug Factory,
employing ten hands. They started businessabout 1868.
S. Baker, Fletcher Street, makes tanks and vats for
tanneries, bleacheries, breweries and dye and chemical
works, also harness frames. Employs two men. Since
the death of his son, W. S. Baker, in 1886 (who had
been his partner), S. Baker has been sole proprietor.
Mark Holmes, Jr., <t Son, at Wamesit Mills, started
their business as wood-turners and house-finish manu-
facturers in 1887. The firm does general jobbing in
the wood-turning and finishing line. EmplojssLs men.
L. W. Hawkes, furniture and mattress-maker. Mid-
dle Street. Mr. Hawkes started business in 1882, in
East Merrimack Street, having James Sexton as part-
ner. He removed to Prescott Street in 1883, and to
his present location on Middle Street in 1890. Mr.
Sexton was his partner only for a brief period. Mr.
Hawkes gives attention to upholstering and repairing
all kinds of furniture. Hair mattresses are made over
and put in good condition. He employs twelve hands.
If. E. Hatch, at Wamesit Mills, manufactures
brackets, stair-posts, newels, balusters, scrolls, win-
dow-frames and house-finish, employing three hands.
Mr. Hatch started this business on Gushing Street in
1884, and came to Wamesit Mills in 1886.
John Welch, manufacturer of furniture, started his
business in 1885 on Button St. His place of sale is on
Middlesex St. He employs twenty men. He manu-
factures furniture for churches, libraries, stores, etc.
Win. Kelley »t Son, Mechanics' Mills, manufacturers
of doors, sashes, blinds, window-frames, etc. This
business was started by Wm. Kelley in 1845. Mr.
Kelley died in 1887, since which time the business has
been in the hands of his son, Frank F. Kelley, who
had become partner three years before his father's
death. Twenty men are employed, and from 300,000
to 400,000 feet of lumber are annually used.
A. P. Bateman manufactures sash, blinds, mould-
ings, window-frames, etc., on Mt. Vernon Street, near
Broadway. He started this business in 1879. In 1889
he was burned out, and having no insurance he lost
S5000. But he was able to pay his debts, dollar for
dollar, and is now (1890) with new buildings doing
business again. He employs thirty men.
Edward A. Allen and Frank P. Cheney are starting
on Western Avenue a manufactory of boxes and
cloth-boards. The firm-title is Allen & Cheney.
E. G. Cummings, at Wamesit Mills, manufactures
plain and fancy boxes, employing six men. The bus-
iness was started about 1878.
iJ. J. Colcord, Wamesit Mills, manufactures refrig-
erators and furniture, employing fifteen to twenty
men. He began the business about 1880, at his pres-
ent location .
Allen Howard began the manufacture of coffins and
caskets at Mechanics' Mills in 1888. Employs four men.
7-ii
John Remick, Fletcher Street, makes patterns and
models, employing two men. He started the business
in 1887, and was the successor of Pierre Cagnon.
Badger & Kimball, Mechanics' Mills, manufacture
office and store fittings and furniture of all kinds, em-
ploying twenty-five men. They started the business
in 1889.
Stone Manxtfactukes. — Sweai & Davis, granite
workers, on Thorndike Street, employ thirty men,
and during the year use 15,000 cubic feet of stone.
They make fronts of buildings a specialty. This firm
started in business in 1877, succeeding Clough, Davia
& Sweat, who began the business about 1852 on
Western Avenue.
Andrews & Wheeler, Thorndike Street, at their
Monumental Granite and Marble Works, employ
twenty-five to thirty men. They started the business
in 1857. The firm consists of C. H. Andrews and C.
Wheeler.
Carl C. Laurin, Gorham and Anderson Streets,
makes all kinds of granite monuments and tablets,
employing five men. He started business in 1889.
James Mahan, marble and granite worker, opposite
the Fair Grounds. He began business in 1876. He
is mostly confined to monumental and cemetery
work, employing five hands.
LewU D. Oumb, off Maple Street, prepares granite
for cemetery and building purposes, using steam-
power for polishing, and employing fifteen men.
These works have been in operation since 1873.
Charles Bunels, Congress Street, general granite
worker. This establishment has had many changes
in its proprietors. It started under George Runels,
Clough & Co., in 1855, the senior partner being ex-
Mayor Runels, the father of Charles Bunels. In
1873 the firm became Runels, Davis & Foster, and in
1877 Runels & Foster. In 1879 Charles Runels be-
came sole proprietor, and still continues the business.
Among the buildings erected by this firm have been
the State Prison at Concord, Mass., the New England
Life Insurance Building, the Girard Bank in Phila-
delphia and the stone-work of Aiken Street bridge.
The number of hands varies from twelve to one hun-
dred according to the contracts on hand.
The Staples Brothers, School Street, manufacture
sewer gratings and back-water valves, and are agents
for the Akron Sewer and Drain Pipe, and are also
dealers in fire-bricks, chimney-tops and fire-clay
goods. The brothers, R. H. and W. H. Staples, suc-
ceeded N. T. Staples & Sons in 1880. N. T. Staples,
the father of the Staples Brothers, started this busi-
ness about fifty years ago, taking his sons as partners
before 1880, and selling out to them in 1880.
C. A. Kendall, near Davis" Corner, manufactures
hydraulic cement drain, sewer and culvert pipe from
three to twenty-four inch bore, also chimney-tops
and well-pipe, employing ten men.
Leather Maxufactcreks. — Whitney <£- Weston
manufacture leather belting, worsted aprons, loom
98
HISTORY OF MILBLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
strappiDgs, rubber belting, finished belt leather and
raw hide and patent lace leather, employing eight
men. This business was started by Whitmarsh &
Adams in 1857. From 1862 to 1880, Phineas Whit-
ing conducted it. He was succeeded in 1880 by his
son, H. F. Whiting, who has for his partner J. F.
Weston. The location of this business has been from
the beginning in or near the Savings Bank Building,
on Shattuck Street.
Josiah Gates & Sons, 137 Market Street, manufac-
turers of belting, hose, lace-leather, loom straps and
pickers, banding, harness leather, etc. For the his-
tory of this firm, see sketch of life of Josiah Gates
in this work. The firm consumes 20,000 hides for
belting annually, have a tannery on Chelmsford
Street and employ thirty hands.
Josiah Gates. — The inauguration of the great
manufacturing enterprise in East Chelmsford (now
Lowell), in 1822-23, was regarded throughout New
England with peculiar interest. Upon the farms on
the hillsides there were many young men, in humble
life, who had high aspirations and willing hands, and
who only waited for an opportunity. Of this number
was Josiah Gates.
He was born in Townsend, Vt., August 31, 1805,
and was the son of a farmer. On account of the
death of both his parents, he was early called to en-
dure hardships and take responsibilities which,
though grievous to be borne, doubtless laid the foun-
dation of his future success.
He labored upon a farm until eighteen years of
age, when he entered the service of a clothier in
Townsend, and for three years was employed in the
work of carding and finishing.
In 182fi he came to Lowell and found employment
in the fulling-mill of Daniel Hurd, and afterwards in
the service of the Merrimack Company. This com-
pany, owning a fulling-mill on Cape Cod, put it in
charge of Mr. Gates. But at length, preferring to re-
aide in Lowell, he returned to his service in the Merri-
mack Mills, and after about one year was employed
as overseer in the weaving and dressing department
of the mills of the Lowell Company.
In 1845 Mr. Gates went into business on his own
account, still retaining, however, his relation to the
Lowell Company. He rented a store on Dutton
Street and commenced the manufacture and sale of
leather belting and other manufacturers' supplies.
The enterprise proved a decided success, and he was
several times compelled to enlarge his facilities for
manufacturing. In 1861 he added the manufacture
of leather hose for the Fire Department, and did a
large business in that line.
In 1858, for the purpose of furnishing leather for
his manufacture of hose and belting, he started an
extensive tannery on Chelmsford Street. In 1866 he
admitted into partnership his two sons, J. E. and P.
C. Gates, and in 1870 his third son, R. W. Gates.
In 1869 Mr. Gates became interested in the manu-
facture of the Markland carpet power-loom, of which
he owned the patent. In the interest of this latter
enterprise he went to Europe in order to introduce his
power-loom into foreign manufactories of carpets.
In 1881 he erected a fine brick block on the corner
of Market and Worthen Streets, for the manufacture
and sale of hose and belting, a business which is still
successfully prosecuted by Prescott C. & Royal W.
Gates, the sons who survive him.
The able management of the affairs of this firm
from its beginning, and the excellent quality of its
goods, have gained for it a wide reputation and
brought an ample reward.
Mr. Gates was a man of liberal views and widely
extended sympathies. He took an active interest in
the welfare of the city, having served in the Common
Council in 1863, in the Board of Aldermen in 1865
and 1866, and in the State Legislature in 1868. He
was a director of the Wamesit Bank, of the Lowell
and Andover Railroad, of the Lowell Hosiery Com-
pany, of the Turner's Falls Manufacturing Company,
of the John Russell Cutlery Company of Turner's
Falls, and of the Hillsboro' Mills at Milford, N. H.
He had a special fondness for agricultural pursuits,
and at agricultural shows many of the products of his
highly-cultivated lands on Gates Street, on which was
his residence, were wont to appear on exhibition.
Mr. Gates did much to build up the city of Lowell.
He was a man of strict integrity, of sterling common
sense, and of unsullied character. He died on May 2,
1882, at the age of nearly seventy-seven years. Two
sons and five daughters survived him.
Wm. Parr began the manufacture of belting, etc.,
on Middlesex Street in 1868, and removed to Dutton
Street in 1881. He makes worsted aprons, leather
belting, lace leather, and employs three men.
John Pilling established the manufacture of
women's, children's and misses' boots, shoes and slip-
pers for Southern and Western trade on Worthen
Street in 1887. He employs seventy-five male and
fifty female operatives.
Arey, Maddock & Locke, Lincoln and Tanner
Streets, tan and curry grain, buff, wax and split
leather, employing 125 to 150 hands. This firm
started in business in 1878, succeeding Shepard&Co.,
who had succeeded E. G. Cook. The business has
been carried on in this place for about thirty-eight
years, and has suffered much from fires. It was
started by Lund, Clough & Co. in 1852.
Israel Bent, manufacturer of belting, trunk handles
and dealer in card clothing on Market Street, started
the business at his present location in 1866. He em-
ploys three hands.
White Brothers li Co., on Howe Street, inventors
and sole manufacturers of ooze leather, and dealers
in organ, piano and fancyleathers, buck, chamois and
wool skins, employ 250 men. They have a salesroom
in Summer Street, Boston. The brothers are E. L.,
H. K. and W. T. White. Their father, William H.
a.
c^
LOWELL.
99
White, who is aleo connected with the firm, estab-
lished the business in 1868.
William Heney White was born in Woburn,
Massachusetts, October 26, 1829, and is the son of the
late Colonel Samuel B. White, of that town. His an-
cestors on both sides were of the pure New England
type, possessing in a marked degree the energy, cour-
age and inflexible principles that characterized the
earlier settlers of this country. His father, a true,
earnest citizen, was the first treasurer of the town of
Winchester and also took the most forward part in
establishing a public library in that town. He was
the first commander of the " Woburn Mechanics'
Phalanx," a military organization of prominence for
the past fifty-five years.
From his father Mr. White inherited many of the
traits which have made his life a success.
On his mother's side the record is the same. His
maternal grandfather. Deacon Calvin Richardson, pos-
sessed great intellectual and moral worth, and was
blessed with a family of ten children, all of whom,
together with all their respective wives and husbands,
were, at the same time, members of the church of
which he was an honored officer.
Mr. White received his elementary education in the
common schools of Woburn, and for one year attended
the academy in that town.
Beginning with the sixteenth year of his age he
devoted himself for four years to learning the trade of
a machinist. When twenty years of age he was em-
ployed in the locomotive works of the Boston &
Lowell Railroad and was soon promoted as overseer of
the locomotive repair-shop of the Western Division of
the New York and Erie Railroad at Hornellsville,
N. Y. At the age of twenty-two years he was
appointed superintendent of the repair-shop of this
road at Dunkirk, N. Y., where he had under him about
seventy-five men engaged in starting the works.
After one year's service at Dunkirk he was induced
to return to Woburn (now Winchester) to engage in
the manufacture of mahogany and other fancy woods,
which was then a very thriving and profitable busi-
ness in that town. It was here that he suflFered his
first reverse ; for after a successful business of three
years his works were destroyed by fire.
In 1855 Mr. White, being now twenty-six years of age,
began the work of tanning and manufacturing leather,
a business which he has now followed for thirty-five
years. In the third year of his new business came
the financial crisis of 1857, by which his enterprise
was completely prostrated. Finding no sale for his
large stock of hides, he was compelled to settle with
his creditors as best he could.
In the following year Mr. White was employed by
a Boston firm as superintendent in building and es-
tablishing an extensive tannery in Montreal. After
four or five years in this employment, preferring to
reside, and educate his family, in New England, he
came to Lowell in 1863, during the Civil War, and
started the business of manufacturing gloves from
leather prepared by himself. After eight years he
relinquished the manufacture of gloves and devoted
himself exclusively to the more remunerative busi-
ness of leather manuiacture, a business in which he is
still extensively engaged with remarkable success.
For twelve years a brother of Mr. White was his
partner, but the firm now consists of Mr. White and
his three sons, Edward L., Henry K. and William T.
White, under the firm-name of White Brothers & Co.
The firm has an extensive tannery in Lowell and a
large store in Boston. They employ about 300 hands.
Their manufactures consist of the finer grades of
leather for boots and shoes and for a great variety of
fancy leather goods. The firm has a very extensive
business, making sales, not only at home, but also in
Europe. They are among the largest users of calf-
skins in the country, and in their mantifacture of col-
ored leathers occupy the very foremost position in
the trade. They also tan many varieties of kid and
goat-skins, and are daily receiving at their works skins
collected by their buyers in every part of the globe.
Mr. White is a gentleman of high character, gen-
erous nature and refined taste. Though he has been
a member of the City Council of Lowell, he has little
fondness for public life or for the numerous societies
which invite him to their membership. He finds his
chosen pleasures in the retirement of home and the
felicities of domestic life.
He has been twice married — in 1854 to Miss Maria
Theresa Towle, and in 1888 to Mrs. Maria C. Lyon,
daughter of the late Judge Nathan Crosby, of Low-
ell. His family consists of the three sons already
mentioned, and one daughter, Maria Theresa White.
Mr. White has purchased and now occupies the
house and grounds formerly owned and occupied by
the father of £is present wife, where, upon, the hUl-
side overlooking the city, he delights in his fine gar-
den adorned with comely shade-trees and winding ter-
races, and rich with a vast variety of fruits and flowers.
L. S. Kimball, on Shattuck Street, roll-coverer and
manufactnrerof leather loom-pickers and card-leather
belting. He employs six men. Moses F. Kimball,
the father of the present proprietor, started the busi-
ness in 1866 on Market Street. It was afterwards re-
moved to Middlesex Street and then to Middle Street.
It was burned out January 1, 1874, and was started
anew in 1874, on Shattuck Street. Upon the death
of the father, in 1872, the business was managed by
his widow, M. E. Kimball, and his son, L. S. KimbalL
For some years L. S. Kimball has been sole proprietor.
John Tripp & Co., roU-coverers, in the yard of the
Massachusetts Cotton-Mills. This business was es-
tablished in 1853 by John Tripp, who came to Lowell
in 1825. After serving for several years as an over-
seer in the Appleton Mills and in the belting business
in company with Josiah Gates, he engaged in the
roll-covering business in the yard of the Massachu-
setts Mills, where it is still carried on, having been in
100
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
the same location for thirty-seven years. Mr. Tripp
died in 1888. The business is now conducted by a
company consisting of A. C. Pearson, S. C. Wood and
jVIts. E. a. Mansur, the latter being a daughter of Mr.
Tripp. This company employs sixteen hands and
their customers are the several corporations and other
manu&cturers of cotton throughout New England.
William Wilby, Wilson Street, manufactures leather
belting and worsted aprons, employing two men. He
started in business on Middlesex Street in 1878, re-
moving to Market Street in 1880, and to his present
location in 1888. He succeeded Thomas Wilby.
Paper Majs-ufactuees. — C. F. Hatch <i- Co., man-
ufacturers of paper-boxes. Mr. Hatch, who had been
connected with Charles Littlefield in making boxes,
started his present business in Prescott Street in 1881.
About 1885 he entered his new and elegant quarters
in the Hoyt & Shedd Block, on Church Street, where
he employs from eighty to one hundred girls and
twelve men, producing 300,000 boxes per month.
Charles Littlefield & Co., Middle Street, paper-box
makers. Mr. Littlefield, after being engaged for about
twelve years in box-making, on Warren Street, re-
moved to his present locution in the new Talbot
Block, on Middle Street, in 1889. At one period C.
F. Hatch was a partner of Mr. Littlefield.
The firm manufactures about 6000 boxes per day
and employs forty hands.
Bacheller, Dumas dc Co., Central Street, do book
and pamphlet binding of every description, paper-
ruling and lettering in gilt on books, albums, pocket-
books, traveling bags, silk, leather, etc., employing
about twenty hands. The company began this busi-
ness in 1869. Ernest G. Dumas, son of one of the
firm, was several years since admitted as partner.
Samuel Du Moulin, paper-ruler and book-binder in
Hildreth's Block, Merrimack Street, started business
in 1889.
Haworth & Wation, Lincoln and Brooks Streets,
manufacture paper cop tubes for mule-spinning, large
paper tubes for use on bobbins, full-length tapered
tubes, paper cones, and tubes for cones and parallel
winders. This business was started by Mr. Haworth
on Arch Street, in 1875. Mr. Watson became his
partner in 1877. The business was removed from
Arch Street to Market Street and afterwards to Cen-
tralville, and then to its present location. It was de-
stroyed by fire in 1888.
The company bought out the Conical Cop Tube
Manufactory in 1889, and the Acme Cop Tube Com-
pany in 1879.
Richmond Mllh. — Among the earlier business en-
terprises of Lowell was the well-known manufactory
of paper and cotton batting on the Concord River,
established by Perez 0. Richmond in 1834.
Perez Otis Richmond was born in Westport,
Mass., February 22, 1786. He was the son of Perez
and Hannah Richmond, the former being an influen-
tial and prosperous farmer in Little Compton, R. I.
John Richmond, the earliest American ancestor of
Mr. Richmond, came to this country from Ashton
Keynes, of Wiltshire, England. His son Edward,
born 1632, settled in 'Little Compton, R. L, married
the daughter of Henry Bull, Governor of Rhode Is-
land, and held the oflSce of Attorney-General. Syl-
vester, the son of Edward, died in 1754, at the age of
eighty-two years. Perez, the father of the subject of
this sketch, was the son of Sylvester, and a descend-
ant of John and Priscilla Alden, of the Pilgrims of
Plymouth.
Mr. Richmond entered upon a business life in the
store of Mr. John Bours, of Newport, R. I., whose
daughter he married, by whom he had six children,
only two of whom. Rev. John B. Richmond, of Med-
ford, Mass., and Miss Mary L. Richmond, of Lowell,
Mass., are living.
Subsequently, with his brother Alanson as part-
ner, he engaged in mercantile business in Newport,
R. I., and afterwards in Providence, R. I. The part-
nership being subsequently dissolved, his brother de-
voted himself to farming in Livingston County, N. Y.,
while Mr. Richmond engaged in manufacturing in
Windham, Conn., and afterwards in Providence.
In 1834 he came to Lowell, and at his mills, on the
Concord River, commenced the manufacture of vari-
ous kinds of goods, among which were woolen fabrics,
cotton batting and paper. In subsequent years the
woolen department was put into other hands, while in
the Richmond Mills only paper was manufactured.
Mr. Richmond's superior ability and great energy
and enterprise secured for him an ample estate. He
was a man of large stature and commanding personal
presence. He died very suddenly at Nashua, N. H.,
where, in the later years of his life, he had fixed his
home, on Sept. 23, 1854, at the age of sixty -eight years.
His son, Charles B. Richmond, who, for fourteen
years before the death of his father, had been engaged
with him in his business, succeeded him in the man-
agement and ownership of the paper-mills. He was
born in Providence, R. I., November 25, 1816. He
inherited his father's talent for business.
He was a man of quiet, unobtrusive nature, and
was highly respected. He was not a politician, and
had no love for public life. He was, however, a trus-
tee of the City Institution for Savings, and a -director
of Appleton Bank.
But his tastes led him to the quiet of home and the
congenial endearments of domestic life. His elegant
residence, commanding most delightful views of the
Merrimack, might well allure him from the turmoil of
business to its peaceful retreat.
In his last years his strength was enfeebled by a
very severe affection of the lungs. He died at the
residence of his father-in-law, Mr. Amos Heywood,
in Beverly, Mass., whither he had gone for the bene-
fit of the sea-air, August 25, 1873, in the fifty-eighth
year of his age.
Carriage MA>T:FACTuaER9. — John H. Swett,
2_
/
< y^y^ ^:. yjuTj
^^/^/>^^
LOWELL.
101
Arch Street, manufactures all kinds of carriages, and
also does carriage, sign and ornamental painting.
In 1874 ilr. Swett bought out Joel Jenkins, a
veteran carriage-maker, and has since run the busi-
ness at the old stand on Arch Street. Joel Jenkins
had been in the business for about forty years, first
for sixteen years on Pawtuckei Street, and afterwards
for twenty-four years on Arch Street.
T. IT. Hill, Bridge Street, manufactures wagons
and sleighs, employing two men. He began the bus-
iness in 1884, succeeding John Drew.
C. F. Hill, Middlesex Street, manufactures wagons,
sleighs and pungs, employing ten men. He started
the business in 18G6, having for three years H. B.
Hill as partner, but being sole proprietor for about
twenty-one years.
Snwyer Carriage Company, Tanner Street, was
founded in 188-3 by T. C. Sawyer & Sons, of Merri-
mack, Mass., where they had acquired a reputation
as carriage-makers. The present company, organized
in l^SG, is under the management of T. C. Sawyer.
The i)roprietors are G. K. Chandler and E. H. Morse.
The company occupies a manufactory having three
stories and a floorage of 12,i.i00 square feet. They
manufacture fine carriages of every description, em-
ploying twenty-two men.
Ediciii Sanborn, carriage-builder, corner of An-
dover and Pleasant .Streets, started business iu 1867
and is still engaged in the same location.
Fo// Brothers li' Hos/ord, in the old Convers factory
on Central Street, build carriages, wagons, sleighs,
pungs, etc., eni|)loying fourteen men. This firm started
in ISSG, succeeding the well-known firm of Day, Con-
vers i Whitredge, which was established in 1857.
E P. Bryant, West Third Street, manufactures
licht and heavy wagons of all kinds, employing ten
men. He started the business in 1S8G.
Medicine Masufactcres. — TUe J. C. Ayer Com-
pany whose laboratory is on Market Street and ofliceon
Middle Street, manufactures Ayer's Cherry Pectoral,
Ayer's Sarsaparilla, Ayer's Ague Cure, Ayer's Hair
Vigor and Ayer's Pills, employing nearly 300 per-
sons iu the various departments of the business. The
firm issues annually l.S,000,000 of Ayer's Almanacs in
ten languages and consumes 800 tons of paper.
In 1877 the firm of Dr. J. C. Ayer & Co., was suc-
ceeded by the J. C. Ayer Company, of which Mr.
Frederick Ayer, brother of the founder of the busi-
ness, was and is treasurer and manager.
James Cook Ayer.' — Among the sons of old
Connecticut who have been identified with the past
life of Lowell, James Cook Ayer, unquestionably,
stands the foremost. He was born May 5, 1818, in
that part of Groton which, as a separate town, now
bears the name of the famous traveler, Ledyard.
His father, who died in 1S25, was Frederick Ayer, a
soldier in the War of 1812 ; son of Elisha Ayer, a
1 By Hon. Charles Cowley. LL.D.
soldier of the Revolution. His mother was Persis
Cook Ayer, who died in Lowell, July 23, 1880, at the
home of her eldest surviving son, Frederick Ayer, Esq.
The Honorable James Cook, for many years agent
of the Middlesex Company's woolen-mills in Lowell,
and in 1859 mayor of Lowell, was Mr. Ayer's moth-
er's brother ; and his wife, Mrs. Lovisa Ayer Cook, was
his father's sister.'
In 1836, by arrangement between his widowed
mother and his uncle and aunt, James C. Ayer re-
moved to Lowell, and made his home with Mr. and
Mrs. Cook, who, having lost all their own children by
death, henceforth treated their nephew with as much
affection as if he had been their own son. He ac-
quired a good academic education in the South Gram-
mar School (now Edson) in Lowell, in the Westford
Academy, and in the Lowell High School. He not
only completed the course of studies required of those
entering Harvard College, but he actually prosecuted
for three years the studies prescribed in the college
curriculum. The Rev. Dr. Edson acted as his tutor in
Latin, but for the most part he pursued his studies
alone, without the advantages of college teachers or
college associates.
In 1838 he entered Jacob Robbins' apothecary
shoj) in Lowell as clerk and student. By assiduous
study during four years he not only made himself
master of the business of an apothecary, but also
made a special study of chemistry, and became a
practical and analytical chemist. He devoted much
time to the study of medicine, first under Dr. Samuel
L. Dana, and afterwards under Dr. John W. Graves.
His proficiency in medical science was recognized by
eminent physicians, and the LTniversity of Pennsyl-
vania gave him the degree of Doctor of Medicine.
In April, 1841, he purchased Mr. Robbins' apothe-
cary shop for S2486.61, paying for it with money bor-
rowed from his uncle, whom he repaid in full in three
years. This was the nucleus of the vast establish-
ment of the J. C. Ayer Company, of which an ac-
count will be found elsewhere in this volume. There
is scarcely a machine in the whole establishment
which was not either invented or greatly improved by
the mechanical genius of its founder. That genius
also found expression in the invention of a rotary
steam-engine, and a system of telegraphic notation, not
inferior to the recording telegraph of Prof Morse.
On the 14th of November, 1850, he married Miss
Josephine Mellen Southwick, whose father, the Hon-
orable Royal Southwick, was for many years a promi-
nent wooien manufacturer, and political leader in
Lowell. Soon after his marriage Mr. Ayer purchased
from Colonel Jefferson Bancroft, the "Stone House "
on Pawtucket Street, which has since become his-
toric. Here he enshrined his household goods, and
delighted to dispense a baronial hospitality.
The abuses which existed iu the management of
2 See Cook's "Genealogy of FanillieB bearing the name Cooke or Cook.'
102
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
onr manufacturing corporations became known to
Mr. Ayer prior to the epoch of " hard times'" of
1857. But the collapse of the Middlesex Company
in Lowell, and of the Bay State Mills in Lawrence,
which signalized that year, roused his ire and stimu-
lated his energies to practical efforts for root-and-
branch reforms. How these abuses arose he thus ex-
plains in a pungent pamphlet: —
"These institutions were originally organized by a
few men, who united their capital like co-partners,
and obtained such charters as they desired from the
State government. Under charters thus granted, —
which were well suited to their early condition, — our
manufacturing companies, so long as that condition
continued, were well managed and very prosperous."
" But a generation has passed away. Time has
changed the relations of owners and managers. The
originators — large stock-holders, or principal owners,
as they were called — of these institutions have died ;
their estates have been distributed to their heirs, and
sold out to the public. They subscribed for and held
their stocks in lots ranging from $25,000 to $100,000 in
a corporation. Now the average ownership is about
three $1000 shares to one individual. The present
stockholders, intead of having, as the original owners
did, a personal and intimate acquaintance, rarely
know each other at all. They are scattered all over
New England, and even other States."
Under such circumstances, inviting the directors to re-
elect themselves and to fill all the offices with their own
friends, coteries were formed ; sons and nephews were
provided with places paying them large salaries for
small services. One man became a director of thirty
companies, and president of nineteen ; and this is
but a single example of the manner in which the
control of manufacturing corporations was monopo-
lized by a few. An account of the successive legisla-
tive acts mitigating and largely correcting these evils
will be found in Cowley's " Reminiscences of Jamea
C. Ayer," etc., of which twenty pages are devoted to
this subject.
Mr. Ayer soon found able allies in these efforts for
corporation reform. Of course he also found able
opponents, for the abuses were of long standing, and
wealthy families owed all that they had or were
thereto. A third classappeared, which he despised more
than his extreme opponents, composed of men who
" meant to serve the Lord, but to do it so diplomati-
cally as not to offend the devil." These men favored
Mr. Ayer's reform in the abstract, but affected to de-
plore his methods as causing unnecessary irritation.
They would rejoice to see the walls of Jericho blown
down, but Joshua's ram's-hom was too harsh an in-
strument. Why did he not try a silver trumpet,
playing the gentlest of tunes? The contest was long
and bitter, but it was won.
This battle for corporation reform was not his own
battle merely. " It was the battle of the people — the
battle of the widow, the orphan, the invalid, and ev-
ery small stock-holder — against a coterie that had
captured their property and also their profits."
Had his own gain alone been his object, he
might have attained that end without making a
single enemy, by keeping quiet until two or three of
the corporations had been wrecked by their incompe-
tent managers, and then buying the entire property
of these corporations for a comparatively small sum.
But he scorned the rolt of the wrecker and delighted
in that of the reformer.
In 1865 Mr. Ayer secured from the United States
three letters-patent for processes invented by him
for the disintegration of rocks and ores, and the de-
sulphurization of the same by the application of
liquid and liquid-solutions to them while in a heated
state. But as the Chemical Gold and Silver Ore Re-
ducing Company had better facilities than himself for
introducing these inventions and making them avail-
able to the people, Mr. Ayer transferred all his rights
therein to that company. Another enterprise in which
he embarked, was that of supplying the people of
Rochester, New York, with water. The perfect suc-
cess of the Rochester Water Works demonstrates the
soundness of Mr. Ayer's plan, notwithstanding the
disastrous litigation which delayed it. Many and
various enterprises occupied his attention — more than
were ever known, except to his immediate associates.
The people of Middlesex and Essex Counties see
before them daily one product of Mr. Ayer's mind, —
the Lowell and Andover Railroad, — diminishing the
cost of travel and transportation between Lowell and
Boston. But the people of Michigan who enjoy the
profits of the Portage Canal behold, in that canal
and the railroad therewith connected, a far greater
product of Mr. Ayer's mind — " a monument more en-
during than bronze." The origin of the Lake Su-
perior Ship Canal Railroad and Iron Company was
as follows : In 1865-66 Congress granted to the State
of Michigan four hundred thousand acres of mineral
and pine lands, situated in the upper peninsula of that
State, in aid of the construction of a ship-canal on
the northern shore of Keweenaw Point, to open the
navigation of Portage Lake and Portage River
through to Lake Superior, and thus facilitate the nav-
igation of the great lakes by allowing vessels to avoid
Keweenaw Point, one of the most dangerous passages
for vessels known to navigation. By opening a canal
a mile and a half long, connection was made with the
Portage River, affording a short cut across the point,
lessening the distance that vessels had to make
around the point by not less than one hundred and
ten miles, besides affording an excellent harbor on
the route from Duluth to Buffalo.
"This inestimable advantage to transportation
through the lakes was secured, it may be said, wholly
through the forethought of Mr. Ayer."
Attempts were made to induce Mr. Ayer to invest
in the Panama Canal ; but a little examination satis-
fied him that those who invested in that enterprise
LOWELL.
103
were ignorant of its magnitude, and would ultimately
lose their investments. The excellent work of Dr.
J. C. Rodrigufs, the friend of Mr. Aver, published in
18S5, proves the soundness of this prediction that the
plan of M. De Lesseps would fail.
Shortly after the capture of Port Royal and the
Sea Islands by Admiral Dupont, in November, 1861,
J. C. Aver and Company obtained four plantations on
Hilton Head, one of the islands that bound that bay,
and engaged in the cultivation of cotton by free black
labor. The first experiments were unprofitable, but
later experiments met with success. The enormous
crops of cotton picked since the elevation of the
slaves to the condition of hired servants, have dis-
pelled all doubt that cotton can be cultivated with
abundant success by free labor. Had John C. Cal-
houn believed such crojjs possible without slavery,
his grandson says, there would have been no war.
In 1S72 the Congressional district.* of Massachusetts
were reconstructed. Lowell and Lawrence were
placed in the Seventh District, and many citizens
were found in both those cities, as well as in the contig-
uous towns, wlio desired to elect !Mr. Ayer to Congress.
Another candidate, however. Judge E. R. Hoar, re-
ceived the nomination of the Republican District Con-
vention, and Mr. Ayer gave him a cordial support.
Judge Hoar's pretensions to superiority over others
of the 8on^ of men Mr. Ayer never conceded ; but
the judge had used no unfair means to obtain the
nomination ; and though a man of many prejudices
and overprone to vote with the contrary-minded, he
had done nothing to provoke a " bolt." His career
in Congress was not brilliantly successful, and in
1874 he wisely declined a re-nomination. It seemed
to be generally understood that Mr. Ayer's time had
come, and he received the Republican nomination,
but was defeated. John K. Tarbox, the Democratic
candidate, received 8979 votes; Mr. Ayer, 7415; and
Tarbox's plurality was 15tJ4. Mr. Ayer had to en-
counter, what no other Republican candidate for
Congress had to encounter in that year, not only the
Democratic candidate, Tarbox, but also an " Inde-
pendent Republican candidate," so called. Judge
Hoar, then sitting in Congress as a Republican and
regularly elected as such. But it required more than
that to defeat Mr. Ayer, though his health was at that
time so broken that he was compelled to seek rest in Eu-
rope, where he could do nothing for his own success.
The year 1874 was the year of "the great tidal wave,"
which overwhelmed the Republican party in many
of its strongholds. It was the same year in which
Samuel J. Tiiden defeated John A. Dix as candidate
for Governor of New York, and in which William
Gaston defeated Thomas Talbot as candidate for Gov-
ernor of Massachusetts.
It was because of the discredit into which the Re-
publican party had fallen, not because of any per-
sonal odium which attached to Mr. Ayer, nor because
of any superior merit in Tarbox, that Mr. Ayer failed
to be elected. Ten years later, when James G. Blaine
was defeated in the Presidential election of 1884, Sam-
uel Hoar, Esq., son of Judge Hoar, was pleased to refer
to the defeat of Mr. Ayer as having "compelled the
future," and led to the defeat of Mr. Blaine:
But Mr. Hoar was mistaken alike as to the cause
and the consequences of Mr. Ayer's defeat.
The cause which defeated Mr. Ayer was the same
I cause which, on the same day, in the same State, de-
' feated Mr. Frost in the Fourth District, Mr. Gnoch in
I the Fifth, General Butler in the Sixth, Mr. Williams
in the Eighth, Mr. Stevens in the Tenth and Mr. Alex-
ander in the Eleventh, by adverse majorities gener-
ally greater than that of Mr. Ayer.
Had Mr. Ayer's health and life been spared, he
would doubtless have been elected to Congress in
1S7G, and re-elected in 1878, and would have won
honorable distinction there.
Liberal donations to meritorious public objects^ere
given by Mr. Ayer. When the chime of bells was
placad in St. Anne's Church, Lowell, in 1857, he and
his brother^ Frederick, made a gift to that church of
the "F" bell. After Monunem Square had been
laid out as a public mall in 1S66, Mr. Ayer, who had
been traveling in Europe, made a gift to the city of
the winged statute of Victory, which has ever since
adorned that square. It was publicly dedicated July
4th. 1SC7.'
When the town of Ayer was incorporated, in 1871,
and its citizens, with extraordinary unanimity,
honored him by assuming his name, he made to that
town the gift of its beautiful Town Hall.
The organization of the town took place March G,
1871, and was followed by a public dinner, speeches in
the afternoon, and a magnificent ball in the evening.
Mr. Ayer made a very felicitous address. After ex-
plaining the circumstances which created the necessity
for proprietary medicines, and briefly referring to his
own efforts to supply that necessity, he closed his ad-
dress, saying : "Thus have I striven in my humble
sphere to render some service to my fellow-men, and
to deserve, among the afflicted and unfortunate, some
regard for the name which your kind partiality hangs
on these walls around me. Oppressed with the fear
that I do not deserve the distinction you bestow, I
pray God to make me worthier, and to smile upon you
with His perpetual blessings."
Upon his return from his second tour in Europe,
February 4, 1875, Mr. Ayer received a cordial " Wel-
come Home " from more than two hundred of his
friends at a public dinner at the Parker House in
Boston. In replying to Mayor Jewett's address of
welcome on this occasion, Mr. Ayer remarked, "Such
1 Mr. .Tver's letter of donation to Major Penbody appears in "Beml
Diaceoces of JaDie9 C. Aver asd tbe Town of .\yer." The same volume
contains Mr. .\yer'B speech at the inauguratioo of the town. Persons
applying to F. F. Ayer, Esq., for copies of these " Reminiscences" have
been supplied by him gratia. For J. C. -Oyer's speech at the unveiling
of the statue of ^■ictory, see Cowley's ** History of Lowell," page 210.
104
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
a greeting as this, from such a gathering as this, is
worth a dozen elections to Congress."
A month later, March 5, 1875, the President ap-
proved an act passed by Congre?s, authorizing Lieu-
tenant-Commander Frederick Pearson, a gallant offi-
cer of the United States Navy, who afterwards mar-
ried Mr. Ayer's only daughter, to " accept a decoration
of Companion of the Military Division of the Order
of the Bath, tendered to him by the Queen of Great
Britain, as a testimonial of the appreciation of Her
Majesty's government of the courage and conduct dis-
played by said Lieutenant Pearson in the attack upon
the Japanese forts by the combined fleets of Great
Britain, France, the Netherlands, and the United
Stateji, in September, 18G4, because of which said
Pearson received the thanks of the British Admiral,
the senior oflicer commanding."
Coming from long-lived ancestors, Mr. Ayer might
have attained old age ; but, like thousands of his con-
temporaries, he overtasked his powers; and before he
had completed his fifty-seventh year he felt the ap-
proaches of paralysis, and was compelled to withdraw
from every form of active work. The best medical
advice was sought, but the progress of that fatal dis-
ease was only retarded. The inevitable end came
July 3, 1878, in his sixty-first year. An autopsy of
the brain showed its weight to be fifty-three ounces,
four or five more than the average.
At his grave in the Lon-ell Cemetery the attention
of the visitor will be arrested by the unique and im-
pressive statue chosen by the widow and children of
Mr. Ayer as a monument to his memory. It is the
statue of a lion, of colossal size, cut in Sicilian marble
by the famous English sculptor, A. Bruce' Joy. The
head of the lion rests upon his paws, and his face
wears an expression so mournful and so sad, that he
has been called the Weeping Lion.
Soon after Mr. Ayer's death Judge Abbott wrote :
" He possessed very great capacity, as his success
in all his many and various enterprises and undertak-
ings very clearly shows ; as that success depended en-
tirely upon his own sagacity, foresight and efforts,
without help from others. I seldom, if ever, have
known one with greater business capacity, or more
foresight, judgment and sagacity upon all business
questions he was called to act upon. He was a most
remarkable instance of what can be done in this
country by intelligence, industry and capacity. Alone
and unaided, he was able to accomplish results most
remarkable, and build up a fortune among the very
largest in the country ; and this, too, by his regular
business, without resort to the hazards and tempta-
tions of speculation."
General Butler wrote : " 5Ir. Ayer's remarkable
business ability, his untiring energy and devotion to
his pursuits in life, hardly ever taking a vacation un-
til failing health and age required it, may well be a
subject for the contemplation of our young men who
wish to succeed." The more so (we may add) because
in the various enterprises which Mr. Ayer set on foot
to enrich himself, he always sought to render some
substantial service to the public, and never engaged
in the spoliation of hia fellow-men.
Mr. Ayer not only possessed great powers of mind,
he also had the capacity to exert those powers in va-
rious and diverse forms of action. Nor were his ex-
traordinary intellectual powers applied to business
alone, various and diverse as were the business enter-
prises in which he engaged. His mind was equally
acute, equally grasping, equally tenacious of its pur-
poses, when applied to matters purely intellectual.
He loved the physical sciences, especially chemistry.
He was a good Greek and Latin scholar, as his notes
on the margins of his copies of Greek and Latin au-
thors abundantly attest. One of the authors contain-
ing such marginalia is Lucretius, who is not included
in the curriculum of any college. He wrote and spoke
French with facility. He learned Portuguese after he
was fifty years old, and read in the original the
Lusiad of Camoens.
He was particularly fond i)f Horace, and loved to
quote from his Epistles that. famous line, "/, bone, quo
virtus tua te vocat ; I pede fausto." ("Go, my dear fel-
low, wherever your faculties direct ; and success go
with you.") To the last of his active life he loved to
sit in his library and refresh his mind with its choicest
treasures. For ephemeral literature he cared noth-
ing; from boyhood to declining years his favorites
were "the Immortals." He loved art in all its forms
— music, painting, sculpture, architecture, oratory,
poetry — and he loved the society of those who were
adepts therein. At Munich he met Pilotli, whom he
describes as " the Choate of artists — a skein of nerves,
without a frame," and he endeavored to procure from
Pilotti a copy of that immortal painting which adorns
the Cologne Gallery — Galileo in Prison — intending it
as a present to the city of Lowell for the City Hall.
But for the premature eclipse of his faculties and his
premature death, the Memorial Hall of Lowell would
doubtless have been enriched with a copy, by Pilotti's
own hand, of this renowned painting, so striking and
impressive that when Mr. Ayer first saw it he said,
" It took my breath away."
To a friend who asked him what he considered the
principal cause of his success in life, Mr. Ayer re-
plied: "First, my own good star; and second, always
adhering to the rule, ' Undertake what you can accom-
plish, and accomplish what you undertake.' " If there
was any one trait in his character more marked than
any other, it was the quickness and the clear-sighted
sagacity with which this self-centred man discerned
what he could accomplish ; and such was the sound-
ness of his judgment that in his larger undertakings
he was scarcely ever known to make a mistake.
More than once, during the last sixteen years, have
the men of Lowell sighed for a leader with the force
of will, the organizing power and the genius of Mr.
Ayer, as the Scota, in an agony of a need of general-
^a.
/,
LOWELL.
105
ship, once cried, " O for an hour of Dundee ! " When
the generation which knew James C. Ayer has passed
away, history will relate to the generations that are
to come, what he was, and what he did, during his
active life of forty years in Lowell.
Frederick Ayer, the subject of this sketch, was
born in Ledyard, C!onn., December 8, 1822. He re-
ceived his elementary education in the district
schools of the town, afterwards pursuing his studies
at Jewett City, Conn., and completing his course at a
private school in Baldwinsville, N. Y.
Mr. Ayer's first business employment was as clerk
in the general country store of John T. Tomlinson &
Co., Baldwinsville, N. Y. From this place he went,
to Syracuse to take general charge of a store belong-
ing to the same firm. After being at the head of that
establishment for three years, a portion of the time as
partner, the partnership beginning when Mr. Ayer
was twenty years of age, he formed a partnership
with Hon. Dennis McCarthy, who for two terms was
the Republican representative to Congress from that
district. This firm was under the name of McCarthy
& Ayer, and continued about eleven years. The
house thus established is still doing business under
the name of D. McCarthy, Sons & Co., and is one of
the largest and most successful dry-goods houses in
Central New York.
Mr. Ayer relinquished his interest in the above-
named firm in the spring of 1855, for the purpose of
joining his brother. Dr. James C. Ayer, the formula-
tor of "Ayer's Proprietary Medicines," the firm tak-
ing the name of J. C. Ayer & Co. This firm con-
tinued in active business until 1877, when it was in-
corporated under the name and style of "J. C. Ayer
Company." At this time Frederick Ayer was elected
its treasurer, an office which he still holds.
During his administration of the afiairs of this
company iu business has much more than doubled,
and is now extended over the entire habitable globe.
In addition to the above, Mr. Ayer has been a di-
rector in the Old Lowell National Bank, and is now
vice-president of the Central Savings Bank. He has
also been a director of the New England Telephone
Company since its organization. He was on the Board
of Aldermen in 1871, and distinguished himself as
chairman of the Board of Health, in controlling the
small-pox contagion which was then raging in the city.
His sharp criticism of the inefficiency of the Board
of Health then in office was the occasion of the res-
ignation of all its members. A new board was chosen
and Mr. Ayer placed at its head. At this time the
disease had been extending and increasing for eight
months. Through his prompt and vigorous action,
and with an efficient corps of physicians and city
officials thoroughly organized, the disease was in six
weeks wholly eradicated from the city. The whole
number of cases, according to the report of the city
physician, was 567, and the number of deaths 177.
In 1871 James C. and Frederick Ayer purchased a
controlling interest in the stock of the Tremont Mills
and the Suffolk Manufacturing Company, which were
standing idle and in a bankrupt condition, and effected
the consolidation of the two companiesunderthename
of the Tremont and Suffolk Mills. This Corporation,
of which Mr. Ayer is still a director, is one of the
most successful of the cotton-mills of New England.
In the construction of the Lowell and Andover
Railroad Mr. Ayer took an active and important
part, first as a director and soon after as president of
the road. The latter office he still holds.
Mr. Ayer was at one time president of the Portage
Lake Canal, running from Portage Lake to Keweenaw
Bay, in Michigan, aud he has now been for many
years its treasurer. He is also a director of the Lake
Superior Ship Canal, Railway and Iron Company, of
which he was for several years both secretary and
treasurer. The capital of this company is S4,000,000.
In June, 1885, Mr. Ayer purchased, at auction, the
entire property of the Washington Mills, Lawrence,
Mass., and reorganized the Corporation under the name
of the Washington Mills Company, of which for one
year he was president, and has since been its treasurer.
Mr. Ayer's first marriage was in December, 1858,
at Syracuse, N. Y., to Miss Cornelia Wheaton, by
whom he had four children. His second marriage
took place in July, 1884, to Miss Ellen B. Banning,
at St. Paul, Minnesota, by whom he has two children.
Mr. Ayer is a man of remarkable administrative
and executive ability, and of great skill and tact as
an organizer and manager in business enterprises.
These qualities, together with his indomitable will
and courage, place him in the front rank of the
business men of New England.
Frederick Faxnixg Ayer ' was born in Lowell,
September 12, 1851. His father was James Cook Ayer,
whose life, in its broad outlines, has been traced in
previous pages of this work. His mother, Mrs.
Josephine Mellen Ayer, is the daughter of Royal and
Direxa (Claflin) Southwick. Through her he inherits
the blood of Lawrence and Cassandra Southwick,
members of the Society of Friends, who suffered per-
secution for their religious principles in Colonial Bos-
ton, and whose heroic endurance has been immortal-
ized in one of the poems of Whittier. Mr. Ayer is
also related through his mother to the great commer-
cial house of Horace B. Claflin and Company, of New
York ; her mother and the founders of that house
being alike children of Major John Claflin, of Mil-
ford, Massachusetts.
The first twelve years of his life were passed at the
paternal home on th»» Merrimack River's bank, and
within sound of its many-voiced waters, and at the
public schools of Lowell. In 1863 he went to St
Paul's School, at Concord, New Hampmhire, under
the Rev. Dr. Coit, and remained there four years.
His father owned large numbers of shares of the cap-
1 By Bon. Cbarlea Cowlej, LL.D.
106
HISTORY OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.'
ital stock of various manufacturing companies, some of
which had suffered immense losses in consequence of
the ignorance of their managers touching the methods
and processes of their business. Mr. Ayer early
adopted his father's views of the necessity of acquir-
ing a practical knowledge of the details of any busi-
ness in which he might be engaged, or in which he
might invest his capital. Upon quitting St. Paul's
School, therefore, he cheerfully entered the employ
of the Suffolk Mills as an operative, beginning with
the picker in the cotton-room, and working his way
up through the carding, spinning and weaving de-
partments, successively, to the machine-shop. Thus
he can say, as General Banks has often said, " I have
worked in every room in a cotton-mill from wheel-pit
to belfry." Thus he acquired personal knowledge of
every process through which cotton passes from the
loose fibre to the finished cloth. Having learned all
these processes in their order, he left the mill, and fitted
for college at Cambridge, passing his examinations in
the summer of 1869. For the last twelve years he has
been a director of the Tremont Suffolk Mills.
In the month of July, 1869, with the co-operation
of several other bright young men in Lowell, be or-
ganized the Franklin Literary Association. As this
association has since developed into two distinct bod-
ies, both political, it is proper to say that the origi-
nal Franklin Literary Association was wholly free
from political character or political purposes ; it was
simply a debating club. Its first meeting was held
in the basement of Phineas Whiting's belting store,
and in the absence of chairs its first president was
installed upon the head of a barrel. At the meetings
of this body, Mr. Ayer acquired a habit of no small
value, "the habit of thinking upon his legs" (as
Macaulay once defined it), and at the same time ex-
pressing his thoughts in a clear and orderly manner.
In 1873 Mr. Ayer graduated at Harvard College
with honor. He then went to Europe with his father,
combining study with his travels ; and on his return
in 1874 entered the Law School at Cambridge. After
pursuing the study of the law there for two terms, he
was admitted to practice as an attorney and coun-
selor-at-law. In 1875, taking as his law partner Lem-
uel H. Babcock, Esq., he opened an office in the
Transcript Building, at the corner of Washington and
Milk Streets, Boston, where the two friends practiced
law with success under the firm-name of Ayer &
Babcock. Ordinarily, a lawyer has neither the op-
portunity nor the capacity to argue complicated ques-
tions of law before a court of law with much satisfac-
tion, either to himself or to his client, until after sev-
eral years' practice before a single judge or before
juries.
" The heights by great men reached and kept,
Were not attained by sudden flight,
Bnt tbej, while their companions slept,
Wera toiling upwards in the night."
But whatever Longfellow may have said or sung to
the contrary, "the heights" have sometimes been
reached " by sudden flight." Lawyers have some-
times sprung to the front at a bound by being ready
to take advantage of " the occasion sudden." Mr.
Ayer had an exceptional experience of this kind. It
happened in this way. His father owned a control-
ling interest in a company incorporated under the
laws of New York Tor the purpose of supplying the
city of Rochester with water from Hemlock Lake.
Litigation arose between the company and the city.
Notwithstanding the intricacy of the legal questions
involved, Mr. Ayer, who was then at the Law School
of Harvard University, took pains to study them
thoroughly, and to make himself familiar with them ;
not with any intent to participate in the argument of
the case, but from an intelligent curiosity touching a
matter in which his father had a great interest. Judge
Henry R. Selden was his father's counsel, and when
the case came on before the General Term of the
Supreme Court, Mr. Ayer went to Rochester to attend
the argument. He afterwards wrote the following
modest account of the complete surprise which was
there given him :
" I accompanied Judge Selden to the court-room,
and when our case was called, without a word or look
of previous warning to me, he arose and proceeded
to introduce me to the court as his associate counsel
from Massachusetts, announcing, to my gaping aston-
ishment, that I would open the case. With thump-
ing knees I faced the court — for the first time in my
life — and stated the facts, arguing one or two points,
talking about half an hour."
Notwithstanding the suddenness of this call, Mr.
Ayer acquitted himself with much credit. The case
was won, and his father was so well pleased at the re-
sult, that he presented him with a check for S10,000.
This was his first professional fee. This incident
gave him an insight into the peculiar ways of senior
counsel, which made him for some time shy of court-
rooms. In 1876, in consequence of his father's health
having broken down, he was obliged to abandon the
practice of law to look after the lawyers. He re-
cently wrote : " I am sorry to say I have never gotten
entirely rid of the law. I have been more or less ex-
tensively involved in it ever since, but, like Micaw-
ber, ' principally as defendant on civil process.' My
father's estate was left in a complicated and hazard-
ous condition, and it took me some twelve years to
extricate it from the dangers to which it was exposed.
My time has been more or less largely occupied with
this duty ever since the death of my father, in 1878."
On the 26th of October, 1876, the Town Hall of
Ayer, the gift of Mr. Ayer's father to that town, was
dedicated with appropriate services. In delivering
to the town's committee the keys of this edifice, in
behalf of his father, Mr. Ayer spoke with marked fe-
licity, preserving his self-control under circumstances
which might have unnerved another man. Very
tender and impressive were his allusions to his father,
whose life was then drawing to a close : " This cheer-
LOWELL.
107
fill hall, this large assembly, these bright faces buoyant
with life, only serve to remind me bitterly, that he who
raised this roof and these walls, and who so much an-
ticipated this opportunity to join you hand in hand,
cannot be here. It was ac occasion he had long
looked forward to, with the abiding hope and inten-
tion of being present himself to tell you the lasting
obligations he is under to the good people of this
town." His address, and others made on this oc-
casion, were printed entire in Cowley's " Reminiscen-
ces of James C. Ayer, and the Town of Aver."
The justice and expediency of the doctrine that
representative bodies, charged with political func-
tions, should contain representatives of the minori-
ties, as well as the majorities, of their constituents,
have been appreciated by many of the best thinkers
of our times. A little reflection will satisfy any im-
partial mind that this principle is equally applicable
to the government of manufacturing, mining and
other joint-stock companies. Mr. Ayer was among
the first to see the wisdom and expediency of minority
representation and cumulative voting in industrial
corporations. In 1885 a bill, embodying these prin-
ciples was presented to the Legislature of Michigan.
As a director of the " Lake Superior Ship Canal Rail-
way and Iron Company," and of the "Portage Lake
and River Improvement Company," and as a stock-
holder in these and other joint-stock companies in that
State, Mr. Ayer had large interests at stake, and he sub-
mitted to the Michigan Legislature an argument in
favor of the bill, which was simply unanswerable.
The bill became a law in Michigan. Similar meas-
ures have been passed in other States and are agitated
in many more. The brief of this argument, which has
been printed and widely circulated, shows that, in the
struggle between " the masses and the classes," the
sympathies of Mr. Ayer are with the people at large.
The 14th of April, 1890, being the twenty-fifth
anniversary of the formal restoration of the Federal
flag over Fort Sumter, was celebrated by the Port
Royal Society, by a reunion of military and naval
veterans who served in the Department of the South
and South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, in Hunt-
ington Hall, Lowell. Mr. Ayer was present, with
other invited guests, and made an address which was
widely published. Old Bostonians remember well
the surprise which Charles Sumner gave them in
1845 by his Fourth-of-July oration on the " True
Grandeur of Nations." Instead of expatiating on
war before the representatives of the army and navy,
the State Militia and the city fathers there assembled,
Mr. Sumner astonished them with an oration against
war and in favor of universal peace. Mr. Ayer treated
his audience to a similar surprise. " The heroes of
the future," he said, " will not be found on the fields
of slaughter, and the destruction of human life to
settle national disputes will cease to be glory."
His speech on this occasion contracted pleasan^y
with those made by the veterans of the war. They
dwelt on perils through which the country had
already passed ; Mr. Ayer turned his back upon the
past and discoursed of perils which becloud the fiiture.
By his advocacy of universal peace, of the settlement
of international difliculties by arbitration, of a life
tenure of office for all deserving officers in the civil
service, Mr. Ayer showed that he has the power to
anticipate the future,
*' ForeruD his age and race, and let
Hie feet mlUeDiums bence be eet
la midflt of koowledge dreamud not yet."
Very gratifying to his own friends and his father's
friends in Lowell was the following passage in this
address: "Lowell is always my home — I am only
visiting New York. Lowell is all the more attractive
to me when I come here from the crowded, noisy
streets of that fretful metropolis. It affords me a world
of pleasure to see you all face to £ace — to stand once
again on the banks of the beautiful river where I
wandered as a boy, and where my memory and aflec-
tion wander still."
The Literary Society of Ayer having presented
their collection of books to that town as the nucleus
of a public library, Mr. Ayer, in April, 1890, made a
gift to the town of five thousaiid dollars to be ex-
pended in the purchase of books — a sum more than
sufficient to place their library upon a level with that
of any other town of similar size in Massachusetts.
On May 3d the people of the town, in public meet-
ing assembled, extended to Mr. Ayer, by a resolution
unanimously adopted, " the expression of their full
appreciation and heartfelt thanks for his handsome
and timely remembrance ; " recognizing in this mu-
nificent act " a noble and loving tribute to the memory
of the man whose name their town bears." This
library will be formally opened before the close of the
year, Mr. Ayer giving an address on that occasion.
The care of the vast properties left by his father in
different States engrosses much of Mr. Ayer's time.
Besides the companies already mentioned he is one
of the directors of the Lowell and Andover Railroad,
of the J. C. Ayer Company, and of the New York
Tribune. But in the midst of all these enterprises
and employments he has found time for generous
studies. He has given much attention to various
branches of economic science. He has opposed by
voice and pen successive schemes for debasing the
silver coinage and inflating the currency. He has
advocated the reform of the tarifi" and the civil
service and the maintenance of a sound currency re-
deemable in coin.
C. I. Hood & Co., prepare Hood's Barsaparilla,
Hood's Vegetable Pills, Hood's Tooth Powder and
Hood's Olive Ointment. Their laboratory on Thom-
dike Street, is of brick and is four stories in height,
with basement. They possess machinery for produc-
ing 75,000,000 books and pamphlets per annum, to be
used for advertising. They employ 275 bands. The
whole establishment is admirable for its system, neat-
108
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ness and adaptation to the extensive business of the
firm. Mr. Hood is one of the most successful and en-
terprising citizens of Lowell. He was born in Vermont
in 1845, and was apprenticed to Samuel Kidder, an
apothecary in Lowell, at the age of fifteen years.
Subsequently he became partner in an apothecary
store at the corner of Central and Merrimack Streets.
While in this store he first offered to the public a new
medicine, Hood's Sarsaparilla. The enterprise
proved a success and the medicine became famous.
The business was very rapidly extended, constantly
out-growing its accommodations. At length, in
1883, the spacious laboratory now in use wsis erected.
The building is constructed throughout in the most
substantial manner. The massive tanks for the
sarsaparilla have a capacity of 90,000 bottles. The
firm does its own printing, and its advertising has
reached immense proportions. The character and
quality of the articles produced by the firm are of the
highest order, and Mr. Hood, who is only forty-
four years of age, is in the midst of his honorable
and very successful career.
A. W. Doioa ib Co., Central Street, manufacture
Dows' Cough Cure, Diarrhoea Syrup, Dows' Soothing
Cordial, &c. The company started the business about
1877, being successors of A. W. Dows, Sr., who had
been in the business for about thirty-five years. The
firm consists of Charles N. and A. M. Dows, sons of
A. W. Dows, who founded the business.
Lowell is said to be the birth-place of the modern
soda-fountain. In 1861 Gustavus D. Dows, brother
of A. \V. Dows, received a patent for the marble soda-
fountain, now so generally used, and the first fountain
made under this patent was set up in the store of his
brother, A. W. Dows, in Lowell. The inventor set up
his business in England as well as in Boston. But
he was pursued by disaster. The five-story building
in Boston, in which was his drug-store, was blown up
by an explosion, and soon after a bronchial affection
ended the inventor's life, at the age of seventy-six years.
Geo. -S. Mowe, South Loring and D Streets, manu-
factures Dr. Mowe's Cough Balsam, used in Dr.
Mowe's private practice fifty years ago, and for thirty
years extensively used by apothecaries generally.
Dr. Daniel Mowe, the originator of this widely
known medicine, was born in Pembroke, N. H., in
1790, came to Lowell in 1831, after having been a
practicing physician in New Durham, N. H., for
several years. In Lowell he was for twenty-nine
years a highly respected physician. He died in 1860
at the age of seventy years.
TTie Moxie Nerve Food Company was organized in
1885. It manufactures a medicine called Moxie
Nerve Food, after a recipe said to have been for
several years in the possession of Dr. Augustin
Thompson, of Lowell. The business has had a re-
markably rapid development, and the medicine is al-
ready extensively known and sold throughout the
country. The Highland Skating Rink, with a floor-
room of 19,060 feet, has been purchased for this
manufactory, where 30,000 bottles of the medicine can
be made in a day. Dr. Thompson is the general
manager. The company employs fifty hands and
five horses. It has a branch office in Chicago.
George S. Hull, on Merrimack, corner of John
Street, manufactures Lyford's Magic Pain Cure,
Harvard Bronchial Syrup, Hall's Veterinary Lini-
ment; also makes essences, syrups, flavoring extracts,
etc. This business was started by S. (r. Lyford in
1877. About 1880 George S. Hull entered the firm.
At the present time George S. Hull is sole proprietor.
A. C. Stevens, Middlesex Street, is the originator
and proprietor of Stevens' Sarsaparilla and Stevens'
Dandelion Pills, and manufacturer of strengthening,
porous, belladonna and rheumatic plasters, cough
mixture and tooth powders, employing three hands.
The business was started in 1875.
Dr. J. A. Masta, Varney Street, manufactures Dr.
Masta's celebrated Cough Balsam. The business was
established in 1854, the medicine having been used
as early as 1852.
Tweed's Liniment for man or beast, prepared by the
S. E. Tweed Company, Middlesex Street. This com-
pany started about 1886, and was reorganized in 1890.
It employs four men.
MiSCELLAXEOUS MAXUFACTrRES. — Whithed dcCo.,
corner Middlesex and School Streets, manufacture
hard, soft and mill soaps, and deal in hides and calf-
skins, employing ten men. They are the succes-
sors of Samuel Horn & Co., one of the oldest and
most respectable firms of the city.
Samuel Horx. — In every populous city and
thriving community in the New England States
there is a class of men, growing more numerous
every year, who possess wealth and culture and an
lionorable name, who love their business and are
known and honored in the social world, but who
have no taste for public life. They are content with
their elegant homes, their gardens and their lawns,
their fruit-trees and shrubbery, their pleasant libra-
ries and their shady walks. Such men are the bene-
factors of society. They set a noble though silent
example before the young, showing them that the
highest happiness in human life is not to be sought
in political honors or public display, but rather in
the retirement of domestic life, and the humane and
rational enjoyments of a cultured home.
To this class belongs the subject of this sketch, the
venerable Samuel Horn, who, at the age of eighty-
three years, still remains in vigorous health among
us, an honored representative of that sterling class of
business men who are recognized as the founders of
the city of Lowell. Samuel Horn was bom on Dec.
31, 1806, and was the son of Windsor and Matilda
(Nichols) Horn, of Southboro', Mass. He received
his early education in the district schools of South-
bctfo'. After leaving school he was engaged, until the
age of twenty-two years, in the management of the
, ,i^?-^J>*^
^^o-y/^u cc/ :^/-/<
LOWELL.
109
farm of Col. Dexter Fay, of Southboro,' in driving
cattle to the great cattle market at Brighton, and in
other such employments as are wont to engage a
thrifty young farmer. But resolved to seek a wider
and more profitable field of enterprise, he came to
Lowell in 1828, when the great manufactories, just
starting, invited new laborers from the surrounding
country, and having learned the art of soap-making,
he formed a partnership, in 1830, with Orin Nichols,
of Southboro', for' the manufacture and sale of soap
in Lowell, and for dealing in tallow and candles,
under the firm-name of Nichols & Horn. The place
of business of this firm was on Central Street, on
land now occupied by Tyler Street, the laying out of
that street requiring the removal of their shop. After
one or two years Otis Allen took the place of Mr.
Nichols as partner, and the firm-name became Horn
& Allen. About 1833 the business was removed to
the comer of Middlesex and School Streets, where it
continued for fifty-three years.
For fifty-eight years, with the exception of about
four years, in which his health demanded a tempo-
rary retirement, Mr. Horn carried on the soap busi-
ness in Lowell, having had as partners, at various
times, Grin Nichols, Otis Allen, Martin N. Horn, his
brother, and Alfred S. Horn, his only son. During
this long period Mr. Horn made all kinds of fancy,
domestic and manufacturers' soap, supplying not only
families and traders, but many private industries and
corporations in Lowell. He also sent large quantities
to other cities, having customers of fifty years' stand-
ing.
He was also largely engaged in the purchase and
sale of hides and skins. He shipped large quantities
of tallow to Liverpool, where, on account of his high
commercial standing and honorable dealing, he com-
manded a higher price than other shippers. He also
sent large quantities of candles to California, Cuba
and other places. So high a reputation did he ac-
quire in the commercial world, that, at one time, a
counterfeit article was placed upon the market with
the false label, " Horn's Tallow."
Mr. Horn, having been a citizen of Lowell almost
from its origin as a municipality, has taken an active
interest in its growth and prosperity. He was one of
the founders of the Wamesit National Bank and of
the Merrimack River Savings Bank, and has been, from
the start, a director of one and a trustee of the other.
In 1839 he was a member of the City Government,
devoting to the duties of the position much time
which, he believed, should be given to his business.
Accordingly, he has since refused all political and
public office. In 1886 he retired from business, hav-
ing accumulated an ample amount of property, and
having reached the eightieth year of his life.
Mr. Horn is a gentleman of high character, of dig-
nified bearing and commanding personal presence
His elegant residence on Smith Street, in the suburbs
of the city, with its shade-trees and walks, and its fine
lawn extending over several acres, affords a most eli-
gible retreat for the repose of his declining years.
0. D. Wilder, Western Avenue, uses one run of
stones, principally for grinding corn. He employs
four men. He started the business about 1880, with
Frank B. Sherburne as partner. Sherburne left the firm
about 1881. The firm succeeded Sherburne & Morse.
P. M. Jefferson, Charles Street, manufactures fam-
ily, laundry, ammonia, chemical, factory, scouring
and soft soaps. He started the business about 1870.
The location of Mr. Jefferson's business has a his-
tory. Adam Putnam, long known to the people of
Lowell as a soap manufacturer and senior member of
the well-known firm of Putnam & Currier, was born
in Stow, Mass. He came to East Chelmsford (now
Lowell) in 1822 and took charge of a part of Hurd's
Woolen -Mills. After several years in this service he
became a dealer in paints, oils and glass, on Central
Street. In 1846 he formed a partnership with John
Currier in soap-making, which continued for twenty-
two years, until the death of Mr. Putnam, in 1868, at
the age of sixty-nine years. Addison Putnam, the
son of Mr. Putnam, is a well-known and enterprising
dealer in clothing in Lowell. John Currier, the ju-
nior partner, was born in Amesbury June 10, 1810;
came to Lowell December 4, 1830, and died Novem-
ber 28, 1881, at the age of seventy-one years. His
last years were spent in retirement from business at
his elegant residence, built by himself, on Broadway.
W. A. DickiTuon, Howard and Tanner Sts., manufac-
tures mill soaps, making a specialty of scouring and
milling soaps, and deals in alkalies and prime tallow,
employing five men. Business was started about 1883.
The Lowell Crayon Company, Ford Street (Sam.
Chapin, manager), manufactures colored chalk crayons
expressly for use of cotton-mills and other mill supplies.
Wm. Manning manufactures corn-cakes on the cor-
ner of Broadway and School Streets, using one hogs-
head of molasses per day during the manufacturing
season. He employs an average of thirteen men.
He started the business in 1868, and has been engaged
in the business in Chelmsford, Billerica and Lowell
for about forty years.
The Lowell Gas-Light Company was incorporat«td
in May, 1849, Seth Ames, Ransom Reed and Samuel
Lawrence being among the incorporators. The capi-
tal, which at first was $80,000, is now $500,000.
Gas was first introduced into the city Jan. 1, 1850.
Although this company has had a monopoly of the
business, it has pursued a generous cotirse, and has vol-
untarily, from time to time, reduced the price of gas
to the consumer as the increase of business and im-
proved methods enabled them to do it. It is asserted,
probably with truth, that the price of gas in Lowell
is less than in any other city of New England. The
price in 1850 was $4 for 1000 cubic feet ; in 1889, $1.10.
A part of the work of this company in recent years
has been the introduction of gas stoves into families
for cooking purposes.
110
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
By pursuing an ealightened and liberal policy the
company has so far gained the confidence and trust
of the community that it is now one of the most
prosperous and influential corporations in the city.
This company employs the West Virginia coal for
manufacturing gas.
During the year ending Jan., 1889, this company
has supplied 227,338,000 cubic feet of gas. It has
6500 meters in active use, and employs about 130 men.
Its president is Sewall G. Mack. The manufacturing
plant is on School St., and the oflSceis on Shattuck St.
L. A. Derby & Co., electricians, on Middle Street.
The business of this company was started in 1883 by
L. A. & F. H. Derby, in a small shop on Prescott St.
Later they moved to larger quarters in Central Block,
on Central St. In 1888 they came to their present lo-
cation on Middle St. It is the leading establishment in
this section engaged in wiring for incandescent lights,
gas-lighting, automatic fire alarms, watch-clocks, medi-
cal batteries, etc. They employ eleven men.
The United States Cartridge Company was started by
Gen. B. F. Butler in 1869, and is a private enterprise.
This company and the United States Bunting Com-
pany have the same president, but are entirely inde-
pendent of each other. The officers of the Cartridge
Company are : B. F. Butler, president ; Paul Butler,
treasurer ; C. A. R. Dimon, superintendent, and James
B. Russell, paymaster. The manufactures are metallic
cartridges, paper shells for shot-guns, and primers.
The company produces 12,000,000 cartridges, 2,000,000
paper shells and 2,000,000 primers per month.
E. N. Wood & Co. grind corn, rye and oats, from 200
to 300 bushels per day. Salesroom on Market St. They
employ twelve men. Their mill on Chambers St. is run
by water, and is of twenty-five horse-power.
This business was started about fifty years ago by
Samuel Wood, the grandfather of E. N. Wood.
Samuel Wood, soon after beginning business, took
Joseph Tapley as partner, and in about fifteen years
his son, S. N. Wood, took control of the business.
S. N. Wood, in 1868, took as partner his son, E. N.
Wood, and retired from the business in 1882. About
1884 George C. Evans became partner, and the style
of the firm is now Wood & Evans.
William E. Livinggton, Thorndike St., is proprietor
of a mill having seventy horse-power and four runs of
stones for grinding corn, rye, plaster and cop cracker.
He grinds about 350 bushels of com and rye per day.
This mill was erected by William Livingston, the
father of the present proprietor, and started in 1845.
Warren Clifford, silk, cotton and woolen dyer,
Andover Street. Clifford Weare, the father of War-
ren Clifibrd, came to Lowell in 1834. He started an
establishment for dyeing on Lawrence Street. In
1839 he started the well-known dyeing establishment
on Andover Street, now carried on by his son. The
father died in 1872. The business is chiefly job-
dyeing. Five hands are employed, and over 3000
parcels are handled annually.
F. F. Howe <i- Co. dye and finish hosiery and under-
wear, making a specialty of " clean black " on ho-
siery, employing eight hands. Mr. Rowe's partner is
Fred. L. Green. The company started business on
Hale Street in 1889, Mr. Rowe having before carried
on the business on Broadway.
TTie Spindle City Dye- Works, on Broadway, dye and
bleach hosiery-yarn and cloth, and employ ten hands.
The works started in 1889.
Bay State Dye-House, Prescott Street. E. W. Gould
started this establishment in 1884, and in 1886 sold
out to C. A. Reynolds, the present proprietor. All
kinds of job-dyeing are done to order. About 7000
parcels were handled during the past year.
Jonathan Holt d Co. began the manufacture of hard
glue in 1879. The firm, of which F. J. Sherwood is
the junior member, is located on Tanner Street. Six
men are employed, and the annual product is about
sixty tons of glue.
S. Bartlett, Middlesex Street, manufactures soda
and mineral water, tonic beer, ginger ale, nerve food,
etc., employing fourteen hands. During the past
year he has made and put up about 15,000 dozens of
quart bottles and 12,000 dozens of half-pints, also
charged 2069 soda fountains. He started the busi-
ness in 1859, with George and John Gushing as part-
ners, but is now the sole proprietor. Mr. Bartlett is
the successor of George Gushing, who succeeded
Hancock & Melvin, manufacturers of the well-known
" Melvin Beer."
Albert S. Fox, Central Street, makes ice cream and
confectionery, employing four men and three women.
This business was started by C. A. Thorning. in 1877,
on Central Street, who sold it to Fox in 1887. Mr.
Fox removed to his present location in 1888.
C. A. Thorning, Highland Hall, Branch Street,
caterer and manufacturer of confectionery and ice
cream. He started business at his present location
in 1888, having previously been located on Central St.
Sovelty Plaster Works, established by George E.
Mitchell, proprietor, in 1864, manufacture medicinal,
porous, rubber, isinglass, blister, mustard, corn, bun-
ion and surgeon's adhesive plasters of all kinds, and
employ thirty hands. The building of this company,
on Elm Street, was erected in 1866. John H. Mc-
Alvin is the business manager.
Page it Nunn, Merrimack Street, manufacture cake,
ice cream and confectionery. This business was
started by Dudley L. Page, on Middle Street, in 1867.
He moved to the Museum Building, on Merrimack
Street, about 1869. After a sojourn in Boston, he re-
turned to Lowell and started the business anew in
1880, on Merrimack Street, taking (one year later)
F. T. Xunn as partner. This firm has gained a high
reputation as caterers. They employ fifteen men and
nine women.
E. Hapgood <£• Son, manufacturers of all kinds of
mattresses. Office on High Street. Mills on Law-
rence Street. This business was started by the firm
LOWELL.
lU
on Rock Street, ia 1870, and removed to its present
location in 1871. Ephraim Hapgood, the father,
having died, Edgar Hapgood, his son and partner,
continues the business. Thehrm has a mill at North
Troy, Vt., for the manufacture of excelsior. Num-
ber of hands employed thirty-five to forty.
The Spring-Bed and Shade-Roller Company, Worthen
Street, was incorporated in 1881. The principal
manufacture isShorey's Improved Spring-Bed. Presi-
dent, James Duckworth ; treasurer and clerk, Charles
Kimball.
John Cross, Button Street, manufactures awnings,
tents, horse and wagon-covers, etc., and employs six
hands. He started the business in 188G, as successor
of JI. Meany.
John McAskie, Middle Street, manufactures tents
and awnings. He started business in the building
which he still occupies in 1883. He also attends to
making horse-covers, and splicing and fitting falls.
Henry Edwards, Middle Street, manufactures ma-
chine-brushes, employing four men. Mr. Edwards
started this business in the town of Andover about
1877, where he remained five years. On coming to
Lowell he started the business in Market Street, and,
in 188G, removed to his present location.
The Lamson Consolidated Store Service Company
manufactures the Lamson Cash and Parcel Carriers,
employing 230 men. The manufactory is on Walker
Street. The company was organized in 1881 and
chartered in 1888, with a capital of ^,000,000. Pres-
ident, Frank M. Ames ; treasurer and general man-
ager, AV. S. Lamson. This is the first company to es-
tablish successfully the business of cash and parcel
carrj'ing systems in stores. It was organized in 1881
by W. S. Lamson, a merchant of Lowell. This com-
pany owns more than 200 patents and has a very
large patronage throughout the entire country.
Lovejoy Store Service Company was chartered in 1889,
with a capital of $56,000. Joseph S. Ludlam, presi-
dent ; Walter W. Johnson, treasurer ; and a board of
directors. Works at Mechanics' Mills.
Patrick Kelley, Davidson Street, manufactures soda,
ginger ale, root beer, lemon cream and mineral water.
He employs nine men, and bottled about 20,000 dozens
the last season. He started in business in 1882.
James Calnin, River Street, manufactures tonic,
ginger, root, raspberry, lemon cream, and nectar
cream, Belfast ginger ale, lager beer and cream mead,
employing six men and bottling 6000 dozens yearly.
He started the business on Market Street in 1882,
succeeding Thomas Torney. In 1884 he removed to
his present location.
C. E. Carter, corner of Branch and Smith Streets,
manufactures Allen's Root Beer Extract, Carter's
Blood Syrup, Carter's Tooth-Ache Drops, and Electric
Nerve Pencils. Mr. Carter started this manufacture
at Davis' Corner in 1876, removed to Central Street
in 1S7S, and to his present location in 1879.
E. \V. Hoyt d- Co. manufacture Hoyt's German
Cologne and Rubifoam, the latter a beautiful liquid
substitute for tooth-powder. They put annually upon
the market about 2,000,000 bottles. Twenty hands
are employed.
Eli W. Hoyt was born in Alexandria, N. Y.,
Sept. 5, 1838, and died in Lowell Feb. 9, 1887, at
the age of forty-eight years. He belonged to the
pure New England stock. John Hoyt, his most re-
mote American ancestor, was one of the original
settlers of Salisbury, Mass., and was a prominent
man, having held the offices of " moderator " and
" selectman " of the town.
The direct genealogical line, beginning with John
Hoyt, is as follows : (1) John Hoyt, of Salisbury,
who came to the town about 1639 and died in
1687-88. (2) Thomas Hoyt, of Amesbury, who was
born in 1640. (3) Lieut. Thomas Hoyt, of Amesbury,
who was a farmer and representative to the Gen-
eral Court, and died in 1740. (4) Timothy Hoyt, of
West Amesbury, who was born in 1700. (5) Timo-
thy Hoyt, of West Amesbury, who was born in 1728.
(6) Ephraim Hoyt, who, in 1841, died in Alexan-
dria, N. Y., at the age of eighty-three years. (7)
Daniel S. Hoyt, now of Lowell, who was born in
1808, and is the father of the subject of this sketch.
Mr. Hoyt, when eight years of age, came to Low-
ell with his parents, and was educated in the pub-
lic schools of the city. At the age of about four-
teen years he became a clerk in the drug-store of
E. A. Staniels, on the corner of Central and Mid-
dlesex Streets, and at length was received as part-
ner in the business. Upon the death of Mr. Stan-
iels, in 1861, Mr. Hoyt, th^n twenty-three years of
age, became sole proprietor. About 1866 he began,
in a small way, the manufacture and sale of cologne,
declaring that the first thousand dollars he should
earn he would devote to that enterprise. This pur-
pose he fulfilled. In 1870 Freeman B. Shedd, who,
for several years had served as clerk in the store,
was received as partner, and the firm began the ex-
tensive manufacture and sale of " Hoyt's German
Cologne." The article was in itself so valuable, and
the business of the firm was so ably and honorably
conducted, that the confidence of the community
was rapidly gained and the enterprise proved a re-
markable success. The drug business was given up
and the firm erected a spacious and commodious
building on Church Street for the accommodation
of its extensive and increasing buainess.
Few firms have gained so honorable a name and
few enterprises have been crowned with so complete
success. Wealth followed ; and the two partners,
whose mutual relations were always those of the
most confiding friendship, from a humble begin-
ning, found themselves in a few short years among
the wealthiest men of the city.
It has been well said of Mr. Hoyt that his saccesa
did not change his demeanor and that his bene-
factions kept pace with his prosperity. He remain-
112
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ed through life that same gentlemanly, modest,
unassuming man that he was before fortune smiled
upon him. His gentle, winning ways won the hearts
of all who met him. Lowell has had many citi-
zens who have been as highly honored, but few who
have been so much beloved.
Though Mr. Hoyt had decided political principles,
it was hard to persuade him to accept a civil office.
In 1878 and 1879 he served in the City Council,
but, though often importuned, he steadily refused
to enter the Board of Aldermen or to be a candi-
date for the mayoralty. He served, however, as
chairman of the Republican City Committee, and
was a generous supporter of his political principles.
His charities abounded. His church found in
him a munificent giver, and the poor shared free'y
in his bounty. To his aged parents he was a most
noble son. His delight was in his home. His ele-
gant residence on Andover Street was adorned with
paintings and works of art, which his fine taste had
selected, and nothing was wanting to make it the
happiest of homes.
In the midst of his fortunate career, when he had
so much to live for and was daily so great a bless-
ing to all around him, there came to him the sad
premonition of declining health. For two years he
struggled bravely for life, but consumption had
claimed him for its own. His long sojourn in Cal-
ifornia and Colorado were unavailing. At length,
when he saw the approach of the inevitable hour,
he desired to be conveyed to his delightful home
and the scenes which he so tenderly loved. And
here, surrounded by his dearest friends, and cheer-
ed by every kindness which love could suggest, he
peacefully resigned his life. His wife and his aged
father still survive him.
F. E. Jewett & Co., Button Street, manufacture
cider vinegar, employing twenty-five men in the busy
season, and bottling about 6000 dozens yearly. He
succeeded Charles A. Gould about 1887, having at
first W. E. Stuart as partner, who is now no longer
in the firm.
Lowell Oiler Company, office in Northern Depot,
Middlesex Street, William H. Ward, president. This
company manufactures the Humphrey journal box
and oiler combined. It started in 1885 and succeeded
H. P. Humphrey, who originated the Automatic
Oiler Company.
Clinton S. Bruce, Salem Street, manufactures med-
icinal and surgical plasters, porous, blister, mustard,
corn, court, surgeon's adhesive, isinglass and dressing
plasters of every description. He started the busi-
ness on Coolidge Street in 1877, and removed to his
present location in 1888.
The Lowell Creamery commenced business in 1885.
It has seven milk routes and one route devoted to sale
of butter and cream. About 700 cans of milk are
handled daily. Between 200 and 300 cans of milk
are separated each day, and the cream extracted by
the De Laval Separator. Nineteen men are employed.
The works are located on Hildreth and Hampshire
Streets.
Aaahel Davis manufactures magneto-electric ma-
chines and wood-working machinery on Middlesex
Street. He started the business in 1855 on Market
Street. He is a veteran in the business. He has
taken out eighteen patents for his own inventions.
Samuel Young, Electrician, Savings Bank Building,
Sbattuck Street, started business in the repair-shop of
the Merrimack Mills about 1872, and came to Shat-
tuck Street about 1886. He made alarm clocks for
mills and electric work generally.
CHAPTER VIII.
LO WELL—( Continued).
SCHOOLS.
Ox the 1st day of March, 18^4, in the private car-
riage cf Hon. Kirke Boott, the first agent of the
founders of the Merrimack Mills, the earliest of the
great manufacturing corporations of our city, there
came to Lowell the Rev. Theodore Edson, a young
clergyman who had been employed by the directors
of the Merrimack Company to " preach and perform
pastoral duty to such persons in their employ as
might desire it." It was he who became the founder
and father of the school system of our city. On the
twilight of the evening of Saturday, the day of his
arrival, the carpenters were still at work on a new
building of two stories, just erected on the lot now
occupied by the Green School-house, in the upper
story of which was a hall constructed by the com-
pany for religious worship, the lower story being de-
signed for the first school established by the new
manufacturing colony. On the next day. Sabbath,
March 7, 1824, in the new hall, public divine worship
was held in Lowell for the first time in a place de-
signed for such worship. The young clergyman
preached to a crowded and attentive audience. Low-
ell was but a small village then of about 600 inhabit-
ants, and it had not yet received its present name.
Very diflferent was the aspect then of our city from
that which now greets the stranger's eye. Swamps
and bogs covered large portions of Market, Tyler,
Charles, Worthen, Anne, Kirk and several other
streets, and at the lower end of Market Street, and
near Kirk and Anne Streets, were ponds of water.
Woods covered a wide area, stretching far in the
rear of the Green School-hoube. The reservoir heights
on Lynde Hill, in Belvidere, were also covered with
woods. In the rear of the site of our post-office rose
a considerable swell of land, which long ago was
leveled down to fill the low marsh which then spread
out where now are KLrk Street, Anne Street and the
LOWELL.
113
High School lot. A pond filled the site of the High
School-house. One of our old citizens, still living,
says he distinctly remembers the following remark of
the Hon. Luther Lawrence, second mayor of our city,
in criticism of Dr. Bartlett, the first mayor, under
whose administration the High School lot was pur-
chased : " What do you think of a man who will lo-
catf a High School in a pond of water?"
We have already described the aspect of the quiet
village which stood on the site of Lowell in the be-
ginning of the century ; but now, after twenty-five
years have passed, a new order of things begins. The
days of invention and enterprise have come, new
structures begin to rise, and the whole scene begins
to change. Let us glance at the new asi)ect. Most
conspicuous was the new Merrimack Mill with its
boarding-houses adjoining it. Next on the swell of
land in the rear of our post-office rose the new and
elegant mansion of Kirk Boott, with lofty columns
in front and a fine lawn stretching down to the Con-
cord River. At the junction of the Merrimack and
Concord Rivers, where now stand the Massachusetts
Mills, wai a hotel called the " Mansion Houi>e," kept
by Captain Jonathan Tyler, long a well-known citi-
zen. Over the Concord River, on the site of the St.
JohnV Hospital, >till rose consiiicnonsly. as at the be-
ginning of the century, the spacious mansion of Judge
Livermore, already referred to. In the vicinity of St.
Patrick's Church, east of the North Common, were
ranged the low huts of the first Irish people of the
city, some of which, after the fashion of the old
country, had walls of mud and were covered with
slabs, with a barrel for a chimney. This settlement
was formerly known as " The Acre." There was
Mi.xer's tavern on Central Street, from which the
stages for Boston started, and Blake's tavern on Gor-
ham Street, two rival houses, the adjacent streets
being conspicuously ])lacarded to make it sure that
the traveler did not put up at the wrong house. The
stone house near Pawtucket Falls, afterwards the
residence of Dr. J. C. Aver, wa< then a hotei and a
favorite resort of the wealthy. Close by Pawtucket
Falls, ill reiir of the site of the mansion of Frederic
Ayer, Esip, was an old saw-mill, then the sole i)08-
sessor and occupier of the vast power which these
falls supplied. On the bluff near the falls stjll stood
the old red school-house, as at the becinning of the
century. Here and there were scattered farm-houses,
almost all of which have now disappeared.
Gen. B. F. Butler, who first came to Lowell when
ten years old, in 182S, has given us a lively account
of the straggling and scattered village, when it first
burst upon his view as he approached the place and
stood on Christian Hill, where now is the Central-
ville Reservoir. The general playfully mentions a
large spreading oak which stood near Tower's corner,
not far from the Washington House, under which, on
the first morning after his arrival, he found for sale
and ate the first ovsters he had ever seen. But verv
S-Ji
many and even most of the land-marks of that early
day have been removed or destroyed. Kirk Boott's
mansion has long since given place to the encroach-
ments of the manufacturing establishments, and is
now known as the City Hospital near Pawtucket
Falls. The low Irish huts have given place to more
substantial residences, and the two-story building on
the site of the Green School-house, where the first
public-school was kept, and where Dr. Edson first
preached to the [leople of the new city, has been re-
moved to Cabot Street, where it now stands.
In giving the history of the Lowell Schools, I
hardly need to mention the old Chelmsford district
schools, long before established ; for they bore only a
very remote relation to the schools of the city of Low-
ell. They were soon absorbed in the school system
of the new and enterprising manufacturing village.
The history of the Lowell schools properly begins
when, in 182C, the first School Committee of the town
1 of Lowell established two new school districts in ad-
I dition to the Chelmsford school districts already men-
1 tioned. The two new districts were established for
j the special use and benefit of the manufacturing
I population of the rising village. These districts were
] known as No. 1 and No. 5. It was in this year, 182G,
' that Lowell became an incorporated town. For
I about two years before this a school had been sus-
tained at the expense of the Merrimack Company,
under the sole supervision of Dr. Edaon in the two-
story building already mentioned. For the first few
summer months the school was taught by a lady.
The first male teacher was Joel I^ewis, a young man
of much modest worth, who, after a service of about
one year, went into the employment of the Locks &
Canals Com[)any, and was greatly interested in the
erection of Mechanics' Hall. He died at the age of
thirty-four years.
The first School Committee (which was chosen in
1826) consisted of some of the first men of the town
and deserve special mention.
They were, first of all. Rev. Theodore Edson, a
man of iron will, who knew the right and never
shrank from standing alone. He justly deserves the
title of father and founder of the school system of
Lowell; second, Warren Colburn, Esq., a graduate of
Harvard College and afterwards teacher of a select
school in Boston, who, though called to the important
position of superintendent of the Merrimack Mills,
still remained enthusiastic in the cause of education.
A part of the labor of preparing the three mathe-
matical works, which have made his name famous,
was performed amidst his arduous duties in the ser-
vice of the Merrimack Company ; third, Samuel
Batchelder, Esq., a many-sided man of high literary
culture, a devotee of science, and, above all, of the
highest inventive genius; fourth. Dr. John O.
Green, a model School-Committeeman, whose wont it
was to visit the schools under his care once a
week, and in the most unobtrusive manner learn
114
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY* MASSACHUSETTS.
their condition and supply their wants. The teacher
and the school had no firmer, truer friend. For
many years Lowell honored itself by placing him
upon its school committee ; fifth, Dr. Elisha Hun-
tington, a graduate of Dartmouth College, a man of
high social and literary culture, whose polished and
graceful bearing, whose kind and affable nature made
him always a favorite with the people of Lowell.
To such men, in her earliest years, did Lowell in-
trust the precious interests of her public schools.
The longevity of these five men — this first School
Board of Lowell — is remarkable. Mr. Bitchelder
died at the age of ninety-five years; Dr. Edson at
the age of nearly eighty-nine years; Dr. Green at
the age of eighty -six years ; Dr. Huntington lived
out almost the allotted three-score years and ten,
while Mr. Colburn alone was cut down in the midst
of his years.
The town of Lowell continued the district system
of schools, from its incorporation, in 182G, to the year
1832, when the graded system nuw in vogue was,
amidst much contention and opposition, adopted.
For the benefit of my younger readers, I ought, per-
haps, to say that the district system consi^^ted in hav-
ing in each territorial district one school only, and
this school was attended by pupils of every age, and
of every degree of advancement. I might also add,
what was very often true, that uuder this .system
every pupil used as text books such books as he saw
fit to bring to school. Even in Lowell, Dr. Edson
tells us that in Di.strict No. 2, at the Pawtucket Falls,
a pupil wnt sent to school with an arithmetic not
approved by the School Board, and demanded to be
taught therein. Xt the refusal of the board to allow
this book to be used as a text-book, great offence w.is
taken and a lawsuit was instituted. An action of
trespass was brought against the teacher for refusing
to teach the pupil. But the case never came to trial.
This old district system was exceedingly defective,
and it is only to be tolerated in cases where the popu-
lation is so thin and so scattered as to preclude the
possibility of establishing graded schools, like those
of the present day in all our cities, in which different
schools are established for pupils of different ages,
and the text-books and courses of study are fixed by
authority of the School Board.
But the old district school with all its faults is not
to be despised. It was the school of our fathers. In
it were educated the best and noblest men of
America — men who fought for our liberties and
founded our free institutions. The great defect of
these schools was an almost absolute want of system
and of law. The school from year to year was
simply what the master made it. As King Louis XIV.
said: " I am the State," so the di.strict schoolmaster
could say: "lam the srhool." Of one of these auto-
cratic old masters it is said that, being once reproved
for going to his school too late in the morning, he
coolly replied : " When I am late in the morning, I
leave off enough earlier in the afternoon to make it
up."
" Old Master Gile,'' of Essex County, a man of huge
equatorial dimensions, was wont to keep the mis-
chievous little boys of his school in subjection by
solemnly assuring them that the cau.se of his remark-
able rotundity of form was that he " hnd fnten so
inaiuj little boijx.'' The little boys gaped, and won-
dered, and obeyed.
The old masters devised their own penalties and
fought their own battles. The victory was usually
with the master, but sometimes with the pupils. In
the latter case it only remained for the master to
walk out or to be carried out. I myself have seen a
master take his hat and leave. The Rev. Warren
Burton, who wrote the pleasant little book entitled ;
"The District School as it was," tells of one of his
masters whose name was Augustus Star. Master Star
was a hard and cruel man and the boys rose in their
rage and might to dT'pope him. They carried him
bodily to the brow of a hill, whose sloping sides were
slippery as glass from being used by the boys in slid-
ing ilown-hill. Without sled or toboggan the naughty
boys shot Master Star down the slippery way. while
the wag of the school shouted ; "There goes n shootiny
.Star!"
Mr. Sherman, formerly mayor of Lowell, who at-
tended the district school in the two-story building
(already described) which stood upon the site of the
present Green Sihool building, has given us some
very amusing reminiscences of that early school.
'"The time of the teacher," he says "was about
equally divided by drilling in ('olburu's 'First
Lessons," anil punishing the boys." One of the punish-
ments consisted in sending the oH'enders through a
trap into the dark cellar to remain there till close of
school. " We always had a good lime down there,"
says .Mr. Sherman, "the principal fun being see-saw,
for which game some old planks and the wood-pile
atlorded us facilities, and so being sent iiito the cellar,
like being compelled to sit among the girls, came to
be denominated as ctipital punishment. One (iay,
using the sticks of wood ;i8 levers, we removed one of
the large stones in the wall at the rear of the building,
and after that we used to crawl out and roam over the
woods and swamps, which extended westerly from
the building up to ' the (cre.' It was an unlucky day
for us when our master discovered out mode of
egress — some boys not getting back from the woods in
season to go up when called at the close of the half-
day. Among the i>unishments resorted to, one was
to require unruly boys to seize a long iron staple
fastened to the ceiling for holding up the stove-pipe and
hang upon it with no other support; another to hold
out heavy books horizontally; another to stoop down
and with the fingers hold down a nail in the
floor ; another to have clothes-pins put astride the
nose ; and another, worst of all, to sit upon pointed
sticks. Master Baasett, who taught the school about
LOWELL.
115
three years, had ten or twelve of these stools of peni-
tence, and would frequently have as many boys out
on the floor at a time, bent in a sitting posture and
balancing themselves upon the sharp ends of the
sticks. These sticks were pyramidal in form, about
one foot hij;h and three inches square at the base."
Those old district school days were far from being
days of peace and harmony to the excellent School
(Joinmittee. We at this day read with surprise the
violent opposition made to the introduction into these
schools of Colburn's first lessons, and other school-
books prepared or recommended by Warren Colburn.
This remarkable contest between the School Com-
mittee and the people of Lowell 1 will describe in a.s
few words as possible. The Swiss philosopher, Pesta-
lozzi. had recently published to the world his new
theory of the science of education. He taught that
undcrttaniUng should take the place which memory
had occupied, and that in giving instruction we
should proceed from the concrete to the abstract, and
not, as heretofore, from the abstract to the concrete.
I cannot, perhaps, more clearly give a popular view
of this question than to propound and solve before
the reader, by both the old and the Pestalozzian
method, the following »im|)le mathematical problem :
" Ij two poiiii'ls nf hf^ef cost forty cents, what wilt three-
tilths of a pound cost .' "
By the old method, we are taught to go by the rule
and place the forty cents as the third term, the three-
fifths of a pound as the second term, and the two
pounds us the first term, then to multiply together
the second and third terms and divide the produce by
the first, and, presto ! we have the answer. It is not
too far from the truth to say that neither the old
arithmetics nor the old teachers were wont to give
any reo-son why this trick of legerdemain, the old
" llule of Three," gave the true answer.
]5ut I'e.staloz/.i would teach us to throw aside all
abstract rules and appeal directly, in the following
manner, to the jiupil's understanding; "If two
pounds of beef cost forty cents, one pound will cost
half of forty cents, that is, twenty cents. If one
pound Cost twenty ceuts, one-fifth of a pound will
cost one-fifth of twenty cents, that is, four cents. If
one-fifth of a jiound cost four cents, three-fifths will
cost three times four cents, that is, twelve cents,
which is the result sought."
When I was a boy, I studied arithmetic according
to the old method. I learned the rules and went
strictly by them, and the answers came out as if by
magic. I do not recollect that I ever recited a lesson
in arithmetic or gave a reason for any of my proces.ses.
I well recollect my surprise and embarrassment when
a new master asked me the novel question, if I could
tell why, in applying the " Bute of Three," the product
of the last two terms divided by the first gave the true
result.
I was confounded, and, though I had studied arith-
metic several winters, I had never thought it to be the
province of the teacher to est, or of tire pupil to
answer, such novel questions.
The merits of the Pestalozzian theory of iDBtruction
are now so fully conceded that it is hard for us to be-
lieve that our fathers so angrily opposed the new
philosophy, or that they should regard it as imperti-
nent and unjust that a pupil, who had obtained a
correct answer by a rigid application of an abstract
rule, should be called upon by the teacher to go be-
yond the rule and give a reason for his process.
As I have already said, one lawsuit even was once
instituted in Lowell to avenge the violated honor of
the old modes of instruction, and it required all the
wisdom and forbearance of the excellent members of
the School Board to reconcile the people to the new
methods of instruction. Even teachers were some-
times found in the opposition, and Mr. Colburn him-
self sometimes took charge of a class in school, in
order to exhibit the best method of applying the new
and improved theory of instruction. So violent was the
opposition that when the committee's report recom-
mending the use of Colburn's books was laid before
the town-meeting, a motion was made and passed to
put the report under the table, and then followed
another motion that the School Committee be put
under the table ! The moderator, however, refused
to put the latter motion as being, perhaps, somewhat
too personal — so unwilling were our fathers to ex-
change a system which demanded the memory of ab-
stract rules for one which awakened the thought and
appealed to the understanding of the pupil.
It is remarkable how little thought our fathers
were wont to put into their mathematical processes.
Prof Quimby, of Dartmouth College, has told us of a
man whom he discovered up in New Hampshire or
Vermont, who possessed the most intense enthusiasm
for mathematical science. The professor was de-
.lighted with his discovery. "Surely," thought he,
" here is another example of the poet's mute, in-
glorious Milton." But the professor's enthusiasm
was somewhat dashed when, on one occasion, in dis-
cussing some abstract question in mathematics, his
newly-discovered genius remarked that there was one
thing he could never quite understand, and that was
why in addition we must carry one for every ten.
" But," added he with decision, "you've got to do it,
or the answer won't come out." The friendship of
the two scholars was short-lived.
But the great historic contest in regard to the Low-
ell schools occurred in 1832, when, after trying the
district system for six years, and learning its inade-
quacy to meet the wants of the people, the School
Board resolved to establish, instead of the six district
schools, two large graded schools completely classified
after the manner of the graded schools of Boston and
Newburyport. To accomplish this object required
the erection of two large school-houses, at the ex-
pense of about $20,000. To this proposition there
arose, even among the first men of the town, the most
116
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
determined opposition. Mr. Kirk Boott, the most
influential citizen of the town, protested that the
town was already in debt and could not aHord so
great an outlay, — that sufficient and suitable provis-
ions had already been made in the public schools for
the poor, and, as for the rich, they would never pa-
tronize the public schools, but would for their
children seek better modes of instruction. Hon.
Luther Lawrence, aftenx-ards mayor of the city, Hon.
John P. Robinson, the most talented lawyer of the
town, and other leading men arrayed themselves
against the School Board. At the town-meeting,
called to take action upon the expenditure of $20,000
for the erection of two large buildings for graded
schools, in a long protracted and violent struggle,
Dr. Edson, single-handed and alone, advocated the
expenditure, and triumphed over all opposition by a
majority of eleven votes. Almost immediately
another town-meeting was called in order, if possible,
to rescind the vote. Lawrence & Robinson, both
eminent lawyers, appeared in opposition ; but there
was no flinching, and Dr. Edson still triumphed by
a majority of thirty-three votes. The opposition sur-
rendered and the two school buildings now known as
the Edson and the Bartlett School-houses were
erected. Such was the inauguration of our present
system of graded grammar schools.
It was with evident and justifiable pride that Dr.
Edson, in his address delivered at the opening of tlic
Colburn School, recalls the fact that within thirteen
months after this violent contest was ended, upon the
visit of Henry Clay and Governor Lincoln to Lowell,
both Kirk Boott and Mr. Lawrence waited upon these
distinguished men into the South (now Edson). *?chool,
and showed them the schools in very successful
operation. The doctor's victory was complete.
Having thus spoken of the inauguration of our
school system, we will turn to the history of individ-
ual schools.
Edson School. — Of the grammar schools the
most interesting and best preserved record is that ol
the Edson School. The history of this school de-
serves the first mention, for it reaches back almost to
the incorporation of Lowell as a town. Its name
has several times been changed. First, it was known
as the district school of " District Ao. 5.'' Its earliest
teacher was Miss Anna W. Hartwell, of Littleton,
whose humble salary was $1.93 per week and board.
She was an amiable and accomplished lady. Her
term of service was. short, but it was long enough for
her to capture the heart of a member of the School
Board, Hon. J. S. C. Knowlton, editor of the Lowell
Journal, and one of the first citizens of the place.
BIr. Knowlton subsequently removed to Worcester,
where he was elected State Senator, mayor of the
city and sheriff of the county. The second teacher
of the school was Joshua Merrill, who for many
years bore an honorable name as an instructor, and
whose death in Nov., 1889, at the venerable age of
eighty-seven years, has removed one of the most con-
spicuous of the founders of the Lowell schools. To
him I am indebted mainly for the history of the
Edson School.
Mr. Merrill began to teach on Nov. 5, 1827, in a
small house standing on Middlesex Street, near the
spot on which the Free Chapel now stands. He had
at first about seventy-five pupils on the humble
salary of S6.23 per week, out of which he paid his
own board. It was in truth a day of small things.
But Master Merrill was a man of the right mettle,
and he entered upon his work with enthusiasm, and
hoped for better things. And better things came, for
in 1830 he received the munificent salary of $300 per
year, with which he was so contented and so happy,
that he took to himself a wife, whom he felt abun-
dantly able to support, and who still lives in the city
of Lowell.
Let me again in passing speak of the small house
in which Mr. Merrill first taught. It was originally
designed and used as the counting-room of the Hamil-
ton & Appleton Companies. It was the building occu-
pied by our High School when it was first opened in
December, IsSl, under the prim.'ipalship of Thomas
Clark, now Bishop of Rhode Island. The building
was long since removed, and is now on the south side
of Middlesex Street, and i.s the third house west of
Howard Street. It has been enlarged and rai.sed
ui>on a brick basement, and has been divided up into
several small tenements.
In November, 1829, the Edson School, still under
.Miister Jlerrill, took pos.session of the new brick,
building, now known as the Free Chapel, and was
called the Hamilton School, from the prominent part
which the Hamilton Company took in sustaining it.
The school-room was a curiosity. It had been fin-
ished under the directi<in of J\Ir. Beard, a member of
the School Board, who, in architecture, was an origi-
nal genius. The pupils sat with their backs towards
the teacher. Master Merrill was obliged to occupy a
sort of high pulpit, for, when he stood down upon the
floor, he could barely see the heads of the larger pu-
pils rising above the tall desks. The benches were
sanded to save them from being cut by the boys, but
the rough surface made such havoc with the clothes
of the children that the mothers compelled Mr.
Beard to remove the sand and repaint the de.sks.
The apparatus for heating had this remarkable pecu-
liarity : that the aperture through which it was ex-
pected that the hot air would enter the school-room
simply conveyed a current of cold air from the school-
room out into the chimney. Al"ter running the fur-
nace day and night for some time in vain, a stove for
burning wood was substituted in its place and all was
quiet again.
Many a fierce battle about text-books, discipline,
etc., did Master Merrill wage in those troublous times,
but he was sustained by the School Board and he
firmly held his position. He accepted the situation,
LOWELL.
11^
aad when he could not do what he would, he cheer-
fully did what he could. When he could not ride, he
was contented to go afoot.
At this point it will not be amiss to turn our atten-
tion to the contrast between the present time and
sixty years ago in regard to the labors and rewards of
a faithful teacher in the public schools. The teacher
of the present, with his salary in the neighborhood of
S20(i0 annually, with his vacation of nearly one-fourth
part of the entire year, with his pupils classified ac-
cording to age and attainments, with his well-trained
assistants, convenient and spacious school-room, with
a thousand devices to promote the cleanliness and
comfort of his apartment, and the quiet and order of
his pupils, would find it hard to return to the days of
good Master Merrill.
Of those days, in addition to what I have already
written, I will give below an extract from Mr. Mer-
rill's own account, premising, however, that Mr. Mer-
rill's lot was not an exceptionally hard one for those
early days, for lie was in the service of some of the
most progressive and cultivated men of the country.
Of these men were Rev. Theodore Edson, Warren Col-
burn, Dr. John 0. Green, Hon. J. f^. (/. Knowltim,
all of whom in 18l!7 were members of the Superintend-
ing School Committee. They were men of liberal
culture. It should also be added that Mr. Jlerrill
began to teach in Lowell nearly five years after the
work of building the great manufactories bad begun.
But the following extracts will show that if men did
not hesitate to invest liberally and even munificently
in great industrial enterprises, they were hardly to
be accused of extravagance in their supjiort of public
schools.
" In the afternoon," says Mr. Merrill, October 23.
1827,"! returned to New Hampshire. As I could
not go by car or stage, I walked."
On the preceding day he had made the following
agreement with the School Board, as certified to by
I. A. Beard, district clerk :
"The L'ummitlee agxeed with Joshua Merrill to teacli school m
weeks, -^ days eacli week (omittiog Saturiiuv), ami to pay liis own
board, for SHO He is altio to be at the exi>ense of coming and retlirn-
iug."
"On Nov. 5 I commenced my achool. The second day I received a
formal visit from the Superintending Couimlttee. Mr. Colburn in-iuired
if I was familiar with the use of his Orst leasoue. I informed him I wh.s
not, never having used it in school. He was then requested (1 think by
Dr. EdsoD) to eserclde a class in it for my benefit, which he did."
"During the five months I bad 91 different scholars. [Mr. fli., it
seems, bad no assistant.] "
In 1831 Mr. Merrill was offered an increase of five
dollars per month in his pay if he would leave the
Hamilton School and become, the teacher of the Mer-
rimack School. It would seem from the following
reflection that this tempting offer sorely perplexed
his mind : " I thought if I should leave the Hamil-
ton, where I was giving satisfaction, and should not
be successful at the Merrimack School, it would be a
serious disappointment. When or where could 1
expect to get another yearly school with such a gen-
erous salary, — $300 per year? "
It was specified, in his formal agreement with the
committee, dated February 22, 1831, that "the vaca-
tions in the course of the year should be left to his
discretion, but not to exceed one month." By this
arrangement neither party gained or lost, for he was
paid for the time which he actually taught, and so
the more vacation, the less pay.
The following indicates the attitude of some of the
citizens towards the School Committee and the
schools :
"The door.bell rane. I went to the door. There stood a stranger
to me, although an old citizen. Holding up his whip, be said : ' la
your name Blerrill '.' " 'It is,' I responded. 'You are not vary large,'
haid he, 'neither am I ; but I will horse-whip you. What did you pnn-
ish my boy so for?' This s(ieech waa mingled with terrible oatlis,
which I will not name. I inquired his lx>y's name, and then told him
that I had punished his boy for disobedience to'the rules of the School,
made by the School Committee, and that I should certainly do the
xame again in like circumstances. 'If yon are dissatisfied, go to the
■ ommittee with your coniplainti^.' After l>estowing a very liljeral
iimount of curves n|ion the committee and myself, he left, and I
escaped the promised whipping."
"Dr. Kdson came in one day, and said to me with a good deal of
earnestuesp : 'Well, ftlr. Merrill, what do you think ^ Can you manage
the schiKd*.'' I replied unhesitatingly; 'I r.au if I have good health
Hud a giHKl School Committee to Iwck me up.' He onid : ' The Commit*
lee you ahull have.' "
I give the above exti-acts as, perhaps, my best
means of defining the status of a schoolmaster sixty
years ago. It was in accordance with the spirit of
the times. It is only in more recent years that public
school-teachers have felt assured of liberal and gen-
erous treatment at the hands of the parents of their
pupils and the patrons and supervisors of their
school. Of course, there were noble exceptions ; but
loo many of the old teachers looked upon their posi-
tions as if held by a doubtful tenure, and even upon
the times of peace as a sort of armed neutrality.
; On the 23d of February, 1833, the school moved
Into the building now known as the Edson School-
house, where it waa made a graded school, and was
I first known as the South Grammar i^hool, then as the
First Grammar School and, finally, as the Edwn School.
The latter name is surely most appropriate, for this is
one of the two graded schools for the establishment
of which Dr. Edson so persistently and so bravely
fought. Master Merrill continued the teacher, with a
salary, at first, of $500, which was subsequently, from
time to time, increased. He resigned his position in
1845, and was succeeded by Mr. Perley Balch, who,
in 1870, was succeeded by Mr. Ira Waldron, who, in
1872, was followed by the present principal, Mr. Cal-
vin W. Burbank. On December 22, 1888, this school
contained 457 pupils, and for 1888 the percentage of
attendance was 90, and the number of assistant teach-
ers in constant service 11.
Bartlett School.— The BartlettSchoolnextclaims
our attention. I have already referred to its estab-
lishment, for it was one of the two over which there
was, in 1832, such a violent contest in town-meeting.
118
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
In its first years it occupied the two-story building
(already referred to) on the site of the present (Treen
School-house. It was then called the Merrimiicl:
School, and was first taught, for a short time, by a
lady, who was paid by the Merrimack Company, and
who was succeeded by Mr. Joel Lewis, who, after a
service of about one year, was succeeded, in 1825, by
Mr. Alfred N. Bsssett, from Atkinson, N. H., the
teacher whose peculiar modes of punishment, as
given by Mayor Sherman, we have already described.
Mr. Bassett resigned in 1829. His successor, ilr. Wal-
ter Abbott, of Milford,N. H., taught only one year, and
was followed by Mr. Reuben Hills, of Hancock, N.
H., who was the teacher of the school when, in 183.S,
it was moved into the house near the North Common,
which it now occupies, and became a graded school,
known as the North Grammar School. Mr. Hills
resigned in 18.35. Mr. Jacob Graves was the princi-
pal of this school from 1835 to 1841, and again from
1843 to 1847 ; Mr. G. O. Fairbanks from 1841 to 1S42 ;
Mr. O. C. Wright, from 1842 to 184.3; Mr. J. P. Fisk,
from 1847 to 185G, the school, from 1S49 to 1S50, being
called the " Hancock School." The Hancock School
and the Adams School being united in 18.50, under
the name of the Bartlett School, Mr. Bement, the
present incumbent, wa-s then made principal of the
consolidated school.
This school received its present name from Dr.
Elisha Bartlett, the first mayor of Lowell, a man of
such exalted character that I might, perhaps, call
him not only the first mayor of Lowell, but also the
first citizen of Lowell.
On December 22, 1888, this school contained .344
pupils. The percentage of attendance for 1888 was
91. The number of assistant te.ichers in constant
service was 8.
High School. — Our High School was opened in De-
cember, 1831, under the principalship of Thoma.» M.
Clark, now Bishop of Rhode Island, in a sm.all build-
ing, on Middlesex and Elliott Streets, in which Mr.
Merrill first taught. Mr. Clark was only nineteen
years old, and the house was so small and the teacher
so young that the bishop once playfully remarked
before a Lowell audience that the reasons why he
flo^^i! his l)oys so seldom were, first, the house wjm
too small for the operation ; and, second, he was
afraid the boys would turn round and Hog him.
For a long time the High School lived a very no-
madic life. We find it first in the lowerroom ofwiiat
is now the Free Chapel, on Jliddlesex Street; next in
the upper room in the present Edson School-house ;
next in Concert Hall, which was near the site of the
store of Hosford & Co., on Merrimac Street; next in
the present Bartlett School-house; next in the attic
of St. Mary's Church, on Suffolk Street, a room now
used for a Catholic parochial school, and next, for a
second time, in the Free Chapel. Thus, for its first
nine years, like the ark in the wilderness, it wan-
dered from place to place, till at last, in 1840, it
" pitched its moving tent " on Kirk and Anne
Streets, where, for forty-nine years, it has enjoyed a
peaceful, quiet home.
Its first principal. Bishop Clark, who served from
1831 to 1833, still lives. Next followed Rev. Dr.
Nicholas Hoppin, who served from l'<33 to 1S35, whu
died four or five years since; next, from 1835 to
1830, Franklin Forbes, Rsq., who became, after leav-
ing Lowell, the very successful agent of the Lancas-
ter Mills, and died in 1877 ; next, from 18.30 to 1841,
Hon. Moody Currier, recently Governor of New
Hampshire; next, from l.'<41 to 1842, Nehemiah
Cleveland, Esci., who devoted his last years to literary
pursuits, and died in Westport, Conn., in 1877 ; next,
from 1842 to 1845, Mr. Forbes a second time ; next,
( 'harlt's C. Chase, the writer of this article, from 1S45
j to 1883, a term of service of thirty -eight years, almost
I three times !is long as that of all his predecessors,
I and next, Frank F. Coburn, Esf]., the pjesent princi-
I pal of the school.
The teachers of the school at the presi-nt time are
as follows: Principal. Frank F. C'liluini ; .Vssistaiits,
Frank B. Sherburne, Cyrus W. Irish, Mary A. We'.i-
I ster. Marietta Melvin, lOlizabeth McDaniels, Harriet
C. Hovey, (.'harlotte E. Draper, Alice J. Chase, Susio
L. D. Watson, Adelaide Baker, Jennie L. Allen.
1 Maud Hadley. Besides these regular teachei-s the oc-
c:isional teachers are : Thomas W. Graves, in i>en-
manship, Walter E. Owen, in music.
The statistics of this .school most recently i)iib-
I lished are those of 1888. They show the whole num-
ber of pupils l)elonginir, on Dec. 22, 1888, to be:
Males, 204 : females, 224; total, 428; and the per-
' centage of attendance to lie 04.
I The pupils occupy ten dill'erent rooms, both sexes
I reciting in the same chisses, sitting in the same rooms
! and pursuing the same studies. The same is true of
' all the other schools of Mie city.
! However, from 1840 to 1807, the sexes were sejia-
I rated, and the school occupied only two rooms, cal!e<l
j the male and female departments. The principals nf
! the female department were as follows : Lucy E.
Penh.illow, 1840 to 1S4(! ;Sn.san F. Burdick, 1840 to
185(1; .\nne B. .Sawyer, IS.'iO to 18.52. After the con-
solidation of the two departments under one head the
teachers who presided over the young ladies, and who
were called sub-principals, were Jonathan Kimball,
1.S52 to 1857, subsequently superintendent of .schools
in Chelsea, Lloyd W. Hixon, a graduate of Dartmouth
College, and sub.sequently teacher of a private school
in Newburyport.
My space wiil not allow me to record the long list
of excellent teachers who have assisted in the in-
struction, but the friends of the school would not
deem its history complete if the following teachers
should not be mentioned : James S. Russell, still
living, at the age of eighty-three years, truly a vet-
eran teacher, who was instructor in mathematics for
forty-three years; Rev. George B. Jewett, a graduate
LOWELL.
119
of Amherst and subsequently tutor in th&t college,
and pastor of a church in Nashua, N. H.; David C.
Scobey, 1842 to 1850, a grkduat* of Dartmouth Col-
lege, who died while in service, at the age of thirty-
four years; Ephraim W. Young, 1849 to 1856, now
judge of Probate of Sauk County, Wisconsin, and liv-
ing at Baraboo ; John J. Culton, 1857 to 1865, a gradu-
ate of Amherst College, afterwards city physician and
member of the School Committee in Lowell ; Joseph
H. McDaniels, 1865 to 1868, a graduate of Harvard,
now Professor of Greek in Hobart College, Geneva,
X. Y.; Gorhani D. Williams, graduate of Harvard,
1865-66, afterwards attorney-atlaw in Deer6eld,
Mass.; Levi S. Burbank, 1807 to 1873, afterwards
principal of Warren Academy, Woburn, Mass.; Ed-
win H. Lord, a graduate of Bowdoin, now principal
of the Brewster Academy, Wolfsborough, N. H.
Moody School. — The Moody Grammar School was
established in 1841, and is the first and only grammar
school in Belvidere. It received its name from Paul
Moody, one of the jiioneers in the great manufactur-
ing enterprises of Lowell. It is situated at the cor-
ner of East Merrimack and High Streets, on a very con-
tracted and very irregular lot, so small, indeed, as
to compel the boys of the school to find their play-
ground in the streets of the city.
Its first principal was Seth Pooler, who served in
his office from 1841 to 185G. He is still living, a
very aged man, in Rutland, Vt. His successor was Mr.
Joseph Peabody, who was principal from 1856 to
18,S3. Mr. Peabody died in Lowell in Nov., 1886. Upon
the resignation of Mr. Peabody, in 1883, Mr. William
S. Greene, the present incumbent, was elected.
On December 22, 1S88, the number of pujjils in this
school was 239, and in 1888 the percentage of at-
tendance was ninety-two. The number of assistant
teachers was seven. The great waut of this school is
a ])iay-ground worthy of a grammar school of a great
and wealthy city.
Gkees School. — This school was opened in 1842,
in a brick building on Middle Street, now occupied by
the firm of J. C. Ayer & Co. The house was es-
teemed at the time of its constraction as well adapted
to the uses of a grammar school, and in the School
Report of 1842 it is called a "beautiful grammar
school house." In process of time, however, iis
dense surroundings rendered the building an unfit
place for a large public school. The house was sold
for business purpo.ses and the school was removed to
the new and costly and elegant building on Merri-
mack Street, which it now occupies, in the year 1871.
This building, far the most costly of the Lowell
school buildings at the time of its erection, was
erected in 1870 at the expense of $106,000.
At the opening of this school, in 1842, Mr. Samuel
C. Pratt was elected principal. In 1843 Mr. Aaron
Walker succeeded Mr. Pratt and served as Principal
till 1845, when Mr. Charles Morrill, who had been for
about four years an assistant teacher in Lowell
schools, was elected priocipal, holding the position
till 1867, when he was elected superintendent of the
schools of Lowell. Mr. Charles A. Chase succeeded
Mr. Morrill in 1867, and resigned in 1868. The next
principal was Mr. George F. Lawton, who was in of-
fice when the school removed into the new and ele-
gant building on Merrimack Street.
In 1874 Mr. Lawton resigned his position and was
succeeded by Mr. Albert L. Fisk. Mr. Fisk's feeble
health required him to relinquish his position, and
he died January 13, 1830. His successor, Mr. Albert
L. Bacheller was, in 1880, transferred from the Colburn
School to this school, and he still fills the office of
principal.
The Green School received its name from Dr. John
O. Green, who, as supervisor of LowelJ schools for
very many years in the earlier part of the city's his-
tory, has done for them a greater service, perhaps,
than any other citizens. He lived to a great age to
witness the fruits of his generous labors.
On December 22, 1888, the number of pupils be-
longing to the Green School was 402. In the year
1888 the percentage of attendance was ninety-one.
The number of assistant teachers was eight.
Colburn School. — The Colburn School-house,
built on the banks of the Concord River, was erected
in 1848 and dedicated on December 13th of that year.
At its dedication an address of great historical value
was delivered by Rev. Dr. Edson. The school re-
ceived its name from Warren Colburn, an early agent
of the Merrimack Mills, an ardent supporter of the
Lowell schools in their first years and the distin-
guished authorof that remarkable school-book known
to every teacher as " Colburn's First Lessons."
The first principal of this school was Mr. Aaron
Walker, who resigned in 1864 and was succeeded by
Mrs. Fidelia O. Dodge. Her successor was Mr. Per-
ley Balch, who became principal of the school in
1870. Air. Balch had before this been, for twenty-five
years, the principal of the Edson School. He was
succeeded in the Colburn School, in 1874, by Mr.
Albert L. Bacheller, a graduate of Middletown (Conu.)
University, who, after a service of six years, was
transferred to the principalship of the Green School.
In 1880 Mr. Geo. W. Howe, a graduate of Bowdoin
College, succeeded Mr. Bacheller as principal of the
Colburn School, and is the present incumbent.
On Dec. 22, 1888, the number of pupils belonging
to this school was 321. For the year 1888 the per-
centage of attendance was ninety-one, and the num-
ber of assistant teachers was eight.
Vaencm School. — This school occupies an ele-
vated and commanding view in the suburb of Central-
ville, which is that part of Lowell which was set off
from the town of Dracut in 1851. In former years
there had stood near the spot a time-honored institu-
tion known as the " Dracut Academy," one of those
" old academies " which in the early part of the present
century, long before the modern High School was
120
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, IMASSACTIUSETTS.
known, crowned so many of New England's hills, and
gave to the noblest and best of her sons and daugh-
ters their only means of pursuing the branches of a
higher education than that afforded by the district
school.
This school received its name from Major-General
Joseph B. Varnum, who was the most distinguished
citizen of whom the town of Dracut could ever boast,
having held the high office of president pro tempore
of the United States Senate.
This school was opened in 1851, in the upper room
of the old academy building, with Mr.- A. W. Board-
man, a graduate of Harvard College, as principal.
Mr. D. P. Galloupe succeeded Mr. Boaidmac in 1853,
having been, for many years before, the principal of a
grammar school in Salem. The new brick building
on Myrtle S'.reet was first occupied by this school in
1857. Mr. Galloupe, after a service in thi.s school nC
twenty-five years, resigned his position in 1878. His
successor was the present incumbent, Mr. Arthur K.
Whitcomb, a graduate of Diirtmouth College.
On Dec. 22, 1888, the number of pupils belonging
to this school was 452. For the year 1S8S the per-
centage of attendance was ninety-two, and the num-
ber of assistant teachers was ten.
Fra.nki.in .\XDHi(inr,ANi) ScHOOi,. — This school
was called the Franklin School in the School Report
for 1849, and subsequently till, in 1882, it was remov-
ed from Jliddlesex Street to the new and elegant
building in the " Highlands," wheuittook the name
of the Highland School.
It is pro|)er here to remark that before 1840 the
grammar schools were known in the School Reports
and in common parlance ;ls Grammar School No. 1,
Grammar Sciiool No. 2, etc., but in that year it ap-
pears that the names of men of national reputa-
tion, like " Washington," " Franklin," etc., were ap-
plied to most of them, while in later years they gen-
erally have the names of citizens of Lowell who
have most distinguished themselves as the patrons
and friends of her schools. Such names are " Edson,"
" Green," " Bartlett," " Colburn."
. In 1840 this school, under the name of " Grammar
School No. 4," was opened in a school-house on Mid-
dlesex Street, with Mr. George Spaulding as princi-
pal. He was succeeded, in 1844, by Mr. Nason H.
Morse. The new brick building, erected for the
school on Middlesex Street, wxs first occupied in 1845.
lu 1848 ill health compelled iMr. Morse to resign,
and Mr. Ephraim Brown temporarily filled his place.
In July, 1847, Mr. Ephraim W. Young, a graduate of
Harvard College, Wius elected principal of the school,
but was tran.sferred to the High School, as teaclier of
sciences, in a few months after his election. In 1849
Mr. A. B. Heywood became principal of the school,
and in 1870 he was succeeded by Mr. Stephen G.
Bailey, a graduate of Yale College. In 1874 Mr.
Perley Balch succeeded Mr. Bailey, and in 1878 Mr.
Frank F. Coburn, a graduate of Amherst College, suc-
ceeded Mr. Balch. In 1880 Mr. Coburn, having been
transferred to the High School ;xs teacher of sciences,
was succeeded by Mr. Ch.irles \V. Morey, a graduate
of Amherst, and the present incumbent. On Jan. 1,
1882, this .school took possession of its new and ele-
gant building on West Pine Street, erected at llie ex-
penseofabout$43,000, and became known as the High-
land School, a name derived from its location in the
Highlands. On Dec. 22, 1888, the number of pupils
belonging to this school wa-s 5."4. In 1888 the per-
centage of atti-ndance was 91, and the number of as-
sistant teachers was twelve.
Bi^Tl.liK School. — This school receives its name
from Lowell's distinguished citizen, Gen. Benj.
F. Butler. The building, which is on Gorbam Street,
is an elegant brick structure, erected in 188.'!, at the
expense of about s!ot;,00O. It was opened in 188:5,
having as its ]>riiicipal Mr. (ieo. H. Conley, who re-
mfiined in office till April, 1884, when he was elected
superintendent of the [Mitilic siliooU of Lowell. Mr.
('onley was etlncated at the College of the Holy
Cross, in Worcester, Mas-. He is now one of the
supervisors of the schools of Boston. His successor in
the Butler School was Cornelius I'. Callahan, a grad-
uate of the College of the Holy Cross. He entered
upon his services in 1884, and is the present incum-
bent. On Dec. 22, ]8Ss, the number of pupils be-
longing to this school was 442. In the year 1888
the percentage of altendiiiice was ninety-one, and
the number of Jissistant teaciiers was nine.
PaWTIk'KET Sfiiooi,.— This school is sitiiated on
the Jlammotli road, in I'awtucketville, on land set off
I'rora the town of Dracut. The house was erected in
1.S84, at the expense of nearly s5.'?,()ii0. Tliis is the
only grammar school in Lowell which bears the old
Indian name of its location. It was organized in
September, 1884, with .Mr. Oliver C. Semple, a gradu-
ate of Amherst College, .as its principal, who was
succeeded in 1885 by Mr Cyrus W. Irish, a graduate
of Harvard College, who, in 188(5, was transferred
to the High .'School, as teacher of sciences. Jliss
Nellie McDonald temporarily served in his place in
the Pawtucket .School. In 1887 Mr. William P.
Barry became |>rincipal of the school and is the pres-
ent incumbent.
On December 22, 1888, the number of pupils in
this school was 110. In the year 1888 the percentage
of attendance w.as ninety, and the number of assistant
teachers was four.
Having given a short sketch of the history of the
present gr.amniar schools of Lowell, I will add a brief
account of those that have, from various causes,
ceased to exist.
Mann School. — This school received its name
from Hon. Horace Manu, the distinguished secretary
of the Board of Education of Massachusetts. This
was the first grammar school established exclusively
for the children of Catholic parents under the agree-
ment between the School Board and the parents,
LOWELL.
121
which I more fully explain under the head of " Calh-
olic Parochial SchooU." This school was established
in 1838, and was formed by uniting two of the Catho-
lic schools already existing. It was originally called
the Fifth Grammar School, and was first set up
in Liberty Hall, under Mr. Daniel Mclllroy as prin-
cipal. In 1841 Mr. James Egan succeeded Mr.
Mclllroy, and Mr. Egan, in 1842, was followed by
Mr. M. Flynn. In 1844 the school was removed to
the new brick building on Lewis Street, and Mr. Geo.
W. Shattuck became its principal.
In 1852 nearly all the girls of this school were
withdrawn by their parents and transferred to the
new Catholic private school under the instruction of
the Sisters of Notre Dame, and under the supervision
of Father O'Brien.
Mr. Shattuck resigned in 18.'J2, and was succeeded
bj- Mr. P. W. Robertson, who was succeeded by Mr.
A. T. Young, who held the office only a few months
in 1853. Mr. Samuel A. Chase succeeded Mr. Young
in 1853, and served as principal till 1873, when he
was succeeded by Miss Nellie M. Gallagher, who had
been first assistant teacher in the school. In lS7(i
Mr. Geo. H. Conley succeeded Miss Gallagher. In
1883 Mr. Conley was transferred to the Butler School,
and Mr. Oliver C. Semple, a graduate of Amherst
College, succeeded him. On September 1, 1884, Mr.
Semple was transferred to the priucipalship of the
new Pawtucket School, and the Mann School no
longer existed as a grammar school.
The average number of pupils belonging to thi.s
school in 1851 was 25G.
Washington School.— In 1834 a second grammar
school was opened in the building now known as the
Bartlett School-house, with Mr. Nathaniel D. Healy
as principal. This school was called the "Third
Grammar School." In the year 1838 it was removed
into the South Grammar School-house, now known
as the Edson School-house. Before its removal,
however, Mr. S. S. Duttnn had been its principal for
a few months in 1835, and Mr. Isaac Whittier for a
few mouths in 1830. At the time of its removal Mr.
John Butterfield was principal, liia term of service
extending from 183tj to 1840, when Mr. Jonathan
Kimball was elected principal. In 1851 Mr. Kimball
was succeeded by Mr. A. T. Young, who, after a few
months, was succeeded by Mr. P. W. Robertson, who
remained its principal till, in 1856, it was merged
into the Edson School in the same building. This
change consisted in remodeling the entire house so
that instead of two large rooms with a male principal
at the head of each, eight small school-rooms were
constructed, in one of which the principal presided
and in the other eight rooms, female teachers.
In 1855 the average number of pupils belonging to
this school was 162.
Adams School. — This school was opened in 1836 in
the lower story of the building now occupied by the
Bartlett School. Its first principal was Mr. Otis H.
Morrill. In 1851 he was succeeded by Mr. Samuel
Bement. The school in the upper story of this build-
ing was known as the " Hancock School " as long as
there was a separate school in the lower story called
the Adams School ; but when the house was re-
modeled in 1856, the two schools were united in one,
and were called the Bartlett School. Mr. Fisk, prin-
cipal of the Hancock, having resigned, Mr. Bement
became principal of the consolidated school.
The history of the Hancock School is not separate-
ly given, but has been treated of under the head of
the Bartlett School.
The changes in the names of our grammar schools
sometimes makes their history slightly involved. For
example, the names applied to the school (or schools)
in this building have been, first, "Merrimack
School;" second, "North Grammar School ; " third,
"Hancock and Adams Schools;" fourth, "Bartlett
School."
In 1851 the average number of pupils belonging to
the Hancock School was 235. and to the Adams 222.
Primary Schools. — Many of the best things in the
world are those of which but little is to be said. The
silent forces of nature are the forces that change
the world. Indeed, a blessing has been pronounced
upon the land which has no history. " The short and
simple annals " of our primary schools do not measure
their priceless value in our system of education.
Even without the other grades of schools, the primary
schools alone would be to any land an inestimable
blessing. They can live without the other grades, but
the other grades cannot exist without them. They
stand at the threshold of life and guard the portals of
the temple of knowledge.
But their history is necessarily a meagre history.
With every change of teachers a primary school
changes its character and becomes another school,
and thus in one sense it has no history. Not so with
the higher and Iftrger schools which have many
teachers and more fixed courses of study. They do
not lose their identity and they have a continuous
history.
In the year 1888 (the report for which is the latest
report published) Lowell had ninety primary schools
(proper), in thirty-two separate buildings. In each is
a single teacher, and each is subject to the supervision
of a single member of the School Board.
Of the primary schools of Lowell it may, in general,
be said that they are excellent. In cases in which
the teacher has been elected upon her merits this
praise is alm()st always due.
Catholic Parochial Schools. — There is, doubt-
less, a wide and honest difierence of opinion among
Christian men in regard to giving religious instruction
in the public school. Some believe that so great is the
difierence of doctrine among the various religious
sects, the only religious instruction which it is
practically possible to give in public schools is the
inculcation of the general principles of morality,
122
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
while others believe that distinctive doctrinal in-
structions should be regularly and systematically
taught. It is probably fair to assert that the Protes-
tant Churches generally adopt the former view and
the Catholic Churches the latter.
The people of Lowell have thus far had the good
fortune, as well as the wisdom, to avoid any serious
conflict on this subject. The children of Protestants
and Catholics have sat side by side in the public
schools for many years, scarcely conscious of any
religious difference. The writer of this article w.is
for about thirty-eight years at the head of one of the
Lowell schools, in which many of his pupils were
Catholics. He read every morning from King James' ^
translation of the Bible before the assembled pupils
and repeated a short form of prayer, ami he recollects
no case in which any pupil refused to attend the
exercises or in which any parent offered a complaint.
These amicable relations between the two parties
seem to have been in great measure the result of ii
mutual agreement made in the earlier days of the ex-
istence of our school system. Of this agreement I
will give a short account, as found in the report of a
sub-committee of the School Board appointed in
1S43 to consider the subject of the relations of
Catholics to the public schools :
" In the first settlement of the town," says this re-
port, "owing to .several causes, the Irish were col-
lected, and built their dwellings chiefly in one quar- ;
ter, ou a tract of land familiarly known to all by the
name of '77/f .lire.' A large population was here i
gathered, destitute of nearly every means of moral
and intellectual improvement so generally enjoyed in
New England. It was not to be expected that a com-
munity thus situated and neglected, so near the cen-
tre of a populous town, could be viewed with indif-
ference; on the contrary, it would be watched with
great anxiety and apprehension. Accordingly, by
the advice and efforts of philantbropic individuals, a
room was soon rented and supplied with fuel and
other necessaries, and a teacher placed in this school,
who was to be remunerated by a small voluntary tax
from the parents. From the poverty and indirt'er-
ence of the parents, however, the school very soon
languished and became extinct. It was, from time to
time, revived, but, after months of feebleness, again
failed.
" Up to the year 1830 the attempts to establish a
school in this neighborhood were sustained by indi-
vidual benevolence chiefly."
At the May meeting of 1830 the town took the
matter up, and appropriated fifty dollars to establish
a separate school for the Irish. This school, like
other district schools, was in session only a part of
the year. It seems, however, that this arrangement
proved unsatisfactory, for we find that in 1S34 liev.
Father Conolly kepta private school under the Catho-
lic Church, thus clearly indicating that the public
school was not meeting the wants of the community.
The various attempts to exttiid the benefits of the
public schools to the Irish population had thus far
failed. In speaking of these attempts and failures
tha School Committee of 183(3 use the following lan-
guage: "These attempts have been hitherto frus-
trated, chiefly, perhaps, by a natural apprehension on
the part of parents and pastors of placing their ihil-
dren under Protestant teachers, and, in a measure,
also by the mutual prejudices and consequent dis-
.igreement among the Protestant and Catholic chil-
dren themselves."
When Father Conolly sought the aid of the com-
mittee in his work of educating and improving the
children under his charge, the committee entered
readily into his views, and a plan of establishing one
or more separate schools for the children of Catholic
l)iirents was matured, and put into successful opera-
tion.
Ou the i>artof the committee the followini; condi-
tions were insisted on a.s indispensable:
" 1. That the instructors must be examined as to
their i|ualifications by the committee, and receive
their appointments from tlicin.
"2. That the books, exercises and studies should
be all prescribed and regulated by the committee,
and that no other whatever should be taught or al-
lowed.
" :!. That these schools should be |>laced. as respects
the examination, inspection and general supervision of
the committee, on precisely the same ground as the
other schools of the town." Father (_'onolly, on his
part, urcrcd, " in order to render the scheme acceptable
to his parishioners, that the instructors must l>c of
the Roman (':itholic faith, and that the books pre-
scribed should contain no statements of tacts not ad-
mitted by that faith, nor any remarks ivllecting inju-
riously upon their system of belief " "These condi-
tions," says the report, " were assented to by the com-
mittee as reasonable and proper, and the books in
use in our schoiils were submitted to his inspection,
and were by him fully approved.'"
Accordingly, in September, two schools for the
Irish children were established under the Catholic
Church, and (me in the vicinity of Chapel Hill.
In March, lS-14, there were one gr^immar school
and five primary schools, composed exclusively of
Irish children.
By degrees, a^ time pa.ssed on, the children of Irish
parents freely entered the High School and other
schools of every grade, and no religious discrimina-
tion has been recognized. For a long period both
parties have seemed satisfied, and complaints of any
undue interference with the religious rights of the
pupils have seldom, if ever, been heard.
The rapid increase of Catholic parochial schools in
Lowell rluring the last ten years is uot to be attrib-
uted toany rupture of the harmonious relations of the
Protestants and Catholics of the city, but to the
policy of the Catholic Church in America, which, in
LOWELL.
123
recent years, demands, more imperatively than ever,
that the children of the Church must be educated by
the Church, and that as religious instruction so far
. transcends in importince all other instruction, Catho-
lic parents must no longer intrust the education of
their children to schools in which no such instruction
is given.
Four of the Catholic Churches of Lowell now sus-
tain parochial schools. These schools are i)iaced un-
der the instruction of the Xaverian Br6ther8, the
Sisters of Notre Dame, the Grey Nuns of Ottawa and
the Dominican Sisters. These teachers are ap|(ointed
by officials of high authority in the Church who are
not only men of su|>erior ability, but who are ]>laced
in a position which enables them to act independ-
ently of local prejudice or popular favor. The result
is, that the teachers of these schools are a superior
chiss of instructors — gentlemen devoted to duty and
to the service of the Church, and ladies of refined
manners and high intellectual culture. The school-
building.-i are almost new, and are substantial and well
equipped with the aiipliances demanded by modern
schools.
There are three schools connected with .St. Patrick's
Church : (! ) The Fenialf .Vcademy, which was estab-
lished in IS.i:!, and which has eleven teachers and
about IdO pupils, and in which the French lan^ruage
is taught and a somewhat higher grade of studies is
pursued. (2) The Parochial School (for girls), which
is devoted to the common English branches of study,
having eight teachers .and about 300 pupils.
Both of these schools are nuder the instruction of
the Sisters of Notre Dame, the Superior being Sister
Clare, of the Sacred Heart. !
The substantial bjick building which accorarao- i
dates both schools is situated on .•Vdanis Street.
(3) The St. Patriilc Parochial School (for boys) is
situated on Sull'olk Street, and is in a brick building
formerly known as St. ALiry's ('liurch. This church
was buiit and originally owned by the Worthen Street
Baptist Church, but has long been in the possession
of the Catholics. This sclior)! lias eleven teachers
and about "):'..'> pupils. It is under the instruction of
the Xaverian Brothers, with Brother .^ngelus as di-
rector. In this school music i« made a subject of
special attention. It has a brafs band and orchestra
of twenty-four pieces, under the instruction of the
Brothers. It also has four companies of cadets, sup-
plied with uniforms.
The three schools are under the general supervi-
sion of Father Michael O'Brien, jiastorof St. Patrick's
Church.
The Parochial School of the Immaculate Concep-
tion is situated on High Street, in Belvidere. It was
established in 18S1, and has seven teachers and about
47J pupils. It is under the instruction of the Grey
Nuns of Ottawa, the Superior being Sister M. An-
gela. The school is for both sexes, and only the
common English branches are taught, including mu-
sic, drawing and calietheDics. The echool building
is particularly attractive, both for its construction
and the beauty of its location.
St. Joseph's Parochial School, on Moody Street,
is designed for the children of French Catholics,
most of whom have, in recent years, come to Lowell
from the British Provinces. It is under the general
supervision of Father Andre M. Garin, pastor of
St. Joseph's Church, on Lee Street. It has seventeen
teachers and about 1000 pupils, and is under the in-
struction of the Grey Nuns of Ottawa. The children
come from homes in which the French language is
spoken, but in the school instruction is given both in
French and English. It is worthy of remark that
the pupils prefer the English, and think it a language
more easily acquired than the French. .Mary Ann
Roby is Sister Superior of the school. A stranger, on
visiting this institution, is struck with the spirit of
politeness and courtesy which pervades every depart-
ment.
St. Michael's Parochial School, on Sixth Street, in
Centralville, has but recently been opened, having
been organized in September, 1889. It has five teach-
ers and about 180 pupils, all being girls. The com-
mon English branches are taught, together with vo-
cal and instrumental music. It is under the instruc-
tion of the Dominican Sisters and the general super-
vision of the pastor of St. Michael's Church.
Trainixg-School. — A training-school has re-
cently been established by the School Board for the
better instruction of young candidates for the posi-
tion of teacher, and also as a means of testing the
aptness and ability of the candidates for their work,
and thus aiding the board in their selection and
choice of new teachers for the schools.
The pupils of this school do not differ from the pu-
pils of the primary schools, but their immediate in-
structors are candidates before the School Board for
positions as teachers, who are denominated ''pupil-
teachers," and are ])laced on trial under the super-
vision of an experienced principal, whose duty it is
to observe the methods of the teachers under her
charge, to point out their defects and errors, to sug-
gest better methods and give them general instruc-
tion in the art of teaching. The most apt and skill-
ful of these "pupil-teachers" have the best reasons
to expect appointments, by the board, to permanent
positions as teachers in the public Bchools. However,
no pledges are given beforehand, nor does the board
think it just, in all cases, to reject the claims of other
conapetent persons who have not served in the train-
ing-school. «
Perhaps the greatest benefit to be derived from this
school will be the elimination from the list of candi-
dates for teachers' positions ofthose who, by their failure
in the work of the training-school, clearly chow that
they possess no natural aptness and ability for the
teacher's work. It is well known that in all our cities
there are many persons of high character and moral
124
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, IMASSACHUSETTS.
worth, who have secured situations as teachers, but
who on trial prove to have no natural tact in their
work. Through an excess of kindness such unsuc-
cessful teachers are allowed, for long years, to retain
their positions, to the detriment of the schools and
with great injustice to the pupils and their parents.
It is hoped the training-school will often save the
board from such unfortunate and embarrassing ap-
pointments. The principal of this school is Miss
Julia M. Dewey.
On Sept. 13, 1889, in the new building on Charles
Street, erected specially for this school, the six rooms
were occupied by 236 pupils. The number who had
presented themselves as pupil-teachers was thirty-two.
These were variously employed under the direction of
the principal, some in teaching the pupils in the
building, some in temporarily tilling the places of
absent teachers of other schools, and all in daily drill
and practice in the work of instruction.
Free Evenint; Schools.— In 1855, in consequence
of an alteration in the Constitution of the State, it
was found necessary to bring under the direct super-
vision of the School Committee those free evening
schools which had for several years been sustained by
the Lowell Missionary Association, aided by annual
appropriations from the City Government. From
this date they became a part of the school system of
the city.
My space will not permit me to trace their history
or to tell of their bent»ticent mission. They help
where help is most needed, and their existence and
support do honor to our free institutions.
These schools are net in session <luring the spring
and summer months. For the term beginning in
Oct., 1887, and ending in Feb., 1888 (the last re-
ported), the number of these schools was ten, the
average number of pupils belonging to them was
1917, the percentage of attendance being 78A.
These schools are in session lour evenings per
week.
One of their number is devoted to instruction in
the higher branches of study, and is denominated the
" Evening High School."
The whole number of teachers in service in the
term reported was, on the average, seventy-six.
Free Evening Drawing-School. — In 1870 the
Legislature of Massachusetts enacted a law requiring
that free instruction in industrial and mechanical
drawing shall be given to persons over fifteen years of
age, and that drawing shall be taught in all the pub.
lie schools. In accordance with this law, drawing
was made one of the regular studies of the schools,
and provisions were made for free instruction in
drawing, outside the public schools, to persons over
fifteen years of age. In 1872 three evening classes in
drawing were formed — one in free hand, one in archi-
tectural and one in machine drawing. This free in-
struction has been since continued with gratifying
success and with increasing favor. The Committee
on Drawing in 1878, say : " Drawing, as taught in our
schools, is not a mere accomplishment, nor is it an
amusement. It is the language of all industrial arts.
Buildings and machines must have plans, elevations,
sections and drawings of parts. Carriages, furniture,
jewelry, implements, pottery make their first appear-
ance in drawings. Conceived in the mind, they take
visible form on paper. All the varied designs on
carpets, calicoes, muslins, silks must be drawn before
they can be wrought."
j In 1889 the unoccupied Mann School-house wa.s,
i at an expense of SI 125, fitted for the accommoda-
j tion of all the departments of this school. With
1 these more commodious quarters the Free Evening
i Drawing-School started on a new career of usefulness
and success. 0( the composition of this school the
committee of 1888 say : " A visit to the classes while
at work shows us carpenters, cabinet-makers, stone-
cutters, masons, mechanics, teachers, book-keepers,
clerks, house-keepers, domestics, operatives, students
— all engaged in an educational process that means
developed and improved powers for them in the prac-
tical work of life."
The following statistics are for the year 188S : Total
number in architectural classes, ()4 ; total number in
machine classes, 112; total number in free-hand
class, 138 ; total number in practical design cla*8, 3l! ;
total number in modeling class. Km; ; aggregate. 320.
The total expense of the school for IS88 was .y)04i>.
SiPERiNTEXDEXT OF StuooLs. — The subject of
superintendent of schools has fared rouL'hly in the
city of Lowell. It has been driven to and fro like a
shuttlecock between the .'^chool <_'i)inmittee, the Com-
mon Council and the people, each in turn giving it
a hostile blow.
As early, perhaps, iia 1850. some of the best friends
of our schools began to agitate the question of elect-
ing such an officer, but the School Board were slow
to move in the matter. In 1854 the (ieneral Court of
Massachusetts enacted a law authorizing the Cit\'
Council to require the School Committee annually to
elect a superintendent of public schools, with such a
salary as the City Council should determine. In the
same year the City Council of Lowell passed an ordi-
nance makingthe requisition which thestatuteauthor-
ized. After long discussion upon the validity ofthis law,
in June, 1858, the Lowell School Board elected as sup-
erintendent, General Henry K. Oliver, of Lawrence,
subsequently treasurer of the Sta'e of Massachusetts.
But the Common Council had voted no salary, and
General Oliver refused to accept the office under such
conditions, .\gain, in December of the same year,
Hon. Joseph White, subsequently secretary of the
State Board of E<lucation, was elected to the office,
but refused to accept on account of insufficiency of
salary.
At length, in February, 1859, Mr. Geo. W. Shat-
tuck was elected to the office and promptly entered
upon its duties. But the office had too few ardent
LOWELL.
125
friends and far too many open or secret foes. The
question of abolishing the office was left to a popular
vote at the annual municipal election in December,
1859. By a vote of U)4<) to 1069 the people instruct-
ed the City Council to repeal the ordinance requiring
an election of superintendent of schools, and this was
accordingly done. But the subject would not real.
Other cities, generally, had such an officer, and the
friends of schools, with so much unanimity and earnest-
ness, demanded a superintendent for the Lowell
schools, it was resolved by the authorities to conform
to the popular demand.
Accordingly in Feb., 1864, after the office had been
vacant about four years, Mr. Abner J. Phipps, super-
intendent of schools in New Bedford, was elected to
the same office in the Lowell schools. On account o(
the insufficiency of the salary offered, Mr. Phipps did
not assent to accept the office, until Mr. Hosford,
mayor of the city, pledged himself to make up the de-
ficiency in salary from his |)rivate purse. He then
entered upon its duties aud served until near the close
of 18(>6. Soon after the resignation of Mr. Phipps,
Mr. Charles Morrill, princijjal of the Green School,
was elected to the position. Upon the death of Mr.
Morrill, in 18S4, after the long service of seventeeii
years, Mr. Geo. H. Conley, principal of the Butler
School, was elected to the place. Upon the appoint-
ment of Jlr. Conley to the office of supervisor in the
Boston schools, Mr. Geo. F. Lawton, an attorney in
Lowell, and once principal of the Green School, be-
came superintendent of the Lowell schools and is the
present incumbent of the office.
To sustain this office seems now to be the settled
policy of the city ; still, there are doubtless those who
regret that the parents of the children and the most
influential and public-spirited citizens do not, as in
earlier years, particijjate in the management and ex-
aminations of our public schools. As in domestic
life no hired nurse or governess, however expert,
can till a mother's place, so in our public schools the
children of a larger growth need a love and care more
tender than a salaried officer, however skillful, can
bestow.
All will concede that the vast amount of clerical
work demanded in the management of our schools
calls for the services of the expert and skillful hands
of well-paid officers, but when the parents desert the
schools and intrust the dearest interests of their
children to hired experts and paid officers, one may
well sigh for the return to our schools of the
more tender care and supervision of those who love
the children most.
Still there are very great advantsges in the super-
vision of our schools by "Superintendents," I only
plead that these advantages shall not be lost, and
more than lost, by the withdrawal from their manage-
ment of those who by the ties of nature are most
deeply interested in their welfare.
Carney Medals. — The Carnev Medals are the
gift of James G. Carney, Esq., the first treasurer of
the " Lowell Institution for Savings," the oldest sav-
ings bank in the city. In a letter addressed in 1858
to the mayor in regard to this gift, Mr. Carney says:
" 1 am desirous of contributing somewhat to the
benefit of the public schools of Lowell, where my
children have received their school education. I
therefore send the enclosed check, that the annual
interest thereof may be appropriated to the purchase
of six silver medals to be annually distributed to the
six best scholars in the high school forever — three in
the girls' department, and three in the boys' depart-
ment."
The description of these medals is as follows:
"The outer circle on one side bears this inscrip-
tion : The fear of God is (he beginnning of wisdom.
Within this circle is a cluster of flowers, under which
are the words : Presented to for excellence of
character and scholarship. On the reverse, upon the
outer circle, is the inscription: James G. Carney to
the f.owell schools. Inside of this is another circle in-
scribed : Gel inisdom, gel understanding, and within
this circle is a Grecian lamp."
In accordance with the request of the giver, these
medals have been annually distributed, beginning
with the year 1859, when at the head of the list of
" Carnev ^ledal Scholars" stands the name of Fred-
eric T. Greenhalge, now Representative in the United
States Congress.
The School Committee of Lowell consists of four-
teen members, viz., the mayor, the president of the
Common Council, and two members from each of the
six wards of the city, who hold office for two years,
and are elected by the wards in which they reside.
The general teachers and officers are a superinten-
dent of schools, a supervisor of the evening schools, a
teacher of penman.ship, a teacher of drawing, a teach-
er of music, a militan.' instructor and three truant
commissioners.
ScHooi, Statistics for 1888. — Estimated popula-
tion of Lowell, 75,000 ; valuation of real and personal
property, $57,646,775 ; Number of children from five
to fifteen years of age on May 1st, 12,296; number of
teachers in Dec, 1888, 191 ; expenditures for schools,
§181,930; salary of the superintendent of schools,
$2600; salary of the supervisor of evening schools,
$1300; salary of the principal of High School,
$2200 ; salary of the principal of Grammar Siihool,
$1800 ; salary of male assistant in High School, $1800 ;
salary of female assistants in High School, $700 ;
salary of female assistants in Grammar School, $600 ;
salary of teacher of Primary School, $600.
Diplomas are awarded to the graduates both of the
High and (Jrammar Schools. In 1888 the number
of diplomas awarded in the High School was 61.
Central Villaoe ArAPEMY. — This institution,
familiarly known as " Dracut Academy," was incor-
porated in 1833. -The Academy building of two
stories, standing near the side of the present Vamuni
126
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
School-house, was first occupied by a school in 1836.
The first catalogue of this Academy gives the names
of ninety-oHe pupils. The name of Joseph Bradley
is given as president, that of Jefferson Bancroft as
secretary, and that of Isaac Withrell, A. M., as prin-
cipal.
Other teachers in this institution were: Benjamin
F. Butler, Rev. M. Cutler, William G. Russell, Rev.
J. C. Ingalls, Charles Morrill and Rev. Cyrus Mann.
Especially in the administration of Mr. Ingalls the
school was in a flourishing condition, the spacious
building once used as a "Water-Cure" establishment
being erected and u^ed as the boarding-house for the
pupils.
But the purposes for which the New England
academies of the first half of the present ceniury
were established have been fully met by the modern
High School. Hence this academy, like the rest,
ceased at length to be needed, and was abandoned as
early at least as 1851, when Centralville was annexed
to Lowell. The building then became the property
of the city, and the Varnum School was opened in it.
When, in 1857, the Varnum School took possession
of its new brick building, the old academy was
moved from Myrtle to Read Streets. It now stands
on Bridge Street and is used as a manufactory of
wire goods by Woods, Sherwood & Co.
As this academy was established and flourished
before Centralville became a part of Lowell, its his-
tory does not properly belong to the history of Low-
ell schools, but as the building stood on ground now
belonging to Lowell, and was for so many years, as it
stood upon the hillside, a cons|)icuous object tu the
people of our city, it seems to deserve a brief notice.
CHAPTER IX.
LOWELL-(Conli)iufK)
ECCLESIAfcTICAL HI>TORY.
In preparing a brief history of the churches of
Lowell, I have mainly relied, for my material,
upon historical addresses delivered upon anni-
versary occasions, upon churi-b manuals and re-
plies from pastors and others kindly given to my
inquiries. In regard to the Pawtucket < 'hurch, the
only one of them whose record goes back into the
preceding century, I am indebted to the valuable
history of that church by Atkinson C. Varnum, Esq..
whose researches have saved me much labor. My
labors have brought nie to a somewhat intimate knowl-
edge of the interior operations of onr Christian
churches, and I am protoundly impressed with the
inestimable blessings which they bestow upon society.
The value of a church to the community is too
often judged by the character of its Sunday services,
and especially by the elo(|uence of its pastor. This
criterion of judgment may have been almost just tor a
century ago, but it is very unjust when applied to the
churches of the present day. The Sunday-school,
with its corps of faithful teachers; the meetings for
prayer, in which the spiritual life of the members
gains new insjiiration and strength ; the >ewingcircle,
where skillful hands make garments tor the poor ; the
Society of Christian Endeavor, in which the young
Christian first puts on his armor; the " Busy Bees,"
whose little fingers first [>ly the needle in the cause of
the children of want : the " Daughters of the King,"
whose holy vows call them lo rescue the perishing, and
many other instrumentalities by which the Christiuu
church of to-day fulfils its hallowed mission of charily
very greatly lranscen<l in importance the eloi|uence of
the preacher and the stately and formal services of
the sanctuary.
And yet in my history of the churches of Lowell
I have said but very little in regard to these humble,
but beneficent instrumentalities. The reason is
obvious. From the very nature of the case there is
little to be said. Their " record is on high." It
is made by an angel's pen, not mine.
In respect to these subordinate works our churches
of all denominations ;ire very much alike. The record
of one Sunday school is very much like that of
another. To state forty times, in iriving the liistory ot
forty churches, that each one has its Sunday-school
and its sewing circle, would be too much like stating
forty times in describing their houses of worship that
each has its roof and windows without and its pulpit
and pews within.
I have therefore mostly contented myself with
giving an account of the origin of each church and
the cause and [uirpose of Its establishment, of the
erection of its house of worship, and of the changes
in its pasiors, together with a few brief sketches of the
pastors' lives. While Sunday-schools are very much
alike pastors, are often very unlike, and hence each
pastor calls for his s|iecial history.
St. .\xxe's CHfKfU. — The history of this church
is well defined. It is a (lart of the liistDry of the city
itself, and is interwoven with all its nienu)ries. I
find no lack of material for my short sketch of St.
Anne's Church. Especially have I drawn from the
historical sermon of its rector, "Sir. Chambrc, deliv-
ered on the church's si.xtieth anniversary, and from
the article of Charles Hovey, E^(|., read on February
J6, 1885, before the " Old Residents' Historical Asso-
ciation."
The founders of the great manufacturing establish-
ments of Lowell were men of far-seeing minds and
generous hearts. They thought of something besides
dividends. They knew full well that the 1200 peojile
of every shade of social character and religious belief
could not be moulded into a well-ordered community
without the benign influences of education and re-
ligion. Accordingly, after their first mill had been
LOWELL.
127
erected, they proceeded to erect a building of two
stories, on the spot where now stands the Green
School-house, for the purposes of a school and a
house of worship. It was in the upper story of this
building that, on March 7, 1824, the Rev. Theodore
Edson delivered the first discourse ever preached in
a public hall in the city of Lowell. The room was
filled with an attentive audience. On the preceding
day the young clergyman, then in deacon's orders,
had been brought from Booton to Lowell in the
chaise of Kirk Boott, arriving on Saturday eveuiug.
He found the carpenters, in the hours of twilight,
hastily giving the finishing strokes in prei)ariDg the
new hall for public worship on the morrow The
form of worship was that prescribed in the Book of
Common Prayer. The responses were feeble, the
voice of K^rk Boott rising above all the re.st.
Only about three weeks before this occasion, a so-
ciety called "The Merrimack Religious Society" had
been organized under the auspices of the Merrimack
Manufacturing Company, a majority of the members
of which wore Unitarians in their religious belief.
The employment of Mr. Edson was simply temporary
and tentative. It was far from being certain that the
heterogeneous population whom the nev; enterprise
had drawn together, most of whom had been accus-
tomed to the siruple and barren worship of the New
England counlry churches, would readily engage in
the more formal and im|>osing liturgical services of
the Episcopal Cluirch. But a trial of a few weeks
persuaded the new society that they were warranted
in employing tlie young clergyman for a lull year, —
a year which proved to be the first of nearly sixty
years of a pastorale eviT tn be memorable in the his-
tory of our city. The salary fi.xed at first w;ls i^liDO,
wiih an increase of ^'^•hi and a house, if he should be
married. "This increase,"' Dr. Edson once pleas-
antly said, " came in about two years.''
Upon the settlement ol' a pastor, the Merrimack
Company resolved to erect a cliii'-ch, and apjirojiriated
S^'JOOO for the jiurpose. The site of the Cireen
School-house hid its claims as the site of the new
cliurch ; but the .spot on which the church now
stands was finally selected. The first stone was laid
May 20, 1S24, and the house was consecrated March
IG, 182o. It was the same stone church which we
now see, excejit that an addition' of thirty ftet was
made at the north end about 1843.
In the early days of this church the Merrimack
Com|)any had pursued towards it a very liberal and
generous policy. It had erected for it the first small
house of worship, had for two years directly paid the
salary of its rector, and had given to it a lease of the
church property without rent for fifteen years, ending
in November, 1842, and in various ways contributed
to its support. The parsonage was erected in 1825.
The harmonious relations between the church and
the Merrimack Company seem to have been inter-
rupted at the expiration of the lease in 1S42, for at
that time the Merrimack Company claimed $12,000
for the church property and that the parsonage
should be vacated before March 1, 1843. To this de-
mand the " Religious Society," known since 1831 as
the "Congregation of St. Anne's Church," yielded,
the church was purchased by individual subscrip-
tions and the pastor removed to the stone house near
Pawtucket Falls, afterwards the residence of Mr. J.
C. Ayer.
The course of the Merrimack Company seemed so
unjust to the church, that in February, 1856, a suit
was brought against the company before the courts to
recover the possession of the church building and the
parsonage. Distinguished counsel were employed on
both sides. For the church were Hon. Joel Parker,
Hon. John P. Robinson and Benjamin F. Butler, and
for the company were Hon. Rufus Choate, Hon. F.
B. Crowniushield and S. A. Brown, Esq. The final
decision of the Supreme Judicial Court, after a delay
of about four years, sustained the claim of the Merri-
mack Company, which received for the parsonage
nearly 117,000, raised by private subscriptions, and the
rector re-entered the house on March 21, 1806, and
there spent the remainder of his life.
There was a strong conviction on the part of many
that the conduct of the Merrimack Company towards
the church was oppressive and unjust, and it is said
that the distinguished Patrick T. Jackson, having
met the treasurer of the church on his way to pay
over the money to the company, declared the trans-
action " no better than highway robbery."
In the above narration to avoid the numerous long
names by which the St. Anne's religious society was
called at difl^erent times, I have used the word
" rhnrcli " with perhaps too little precision.
From the close of this contest with the Merrimack
Company to the end of Dr. Edson's life, in 1883, the
affairs of this church present not many things de-
manding historical record, and my record will be
brief, and in .somewhat detached statements.
March 8, 1874, was observed as the fiftieth anniver-
sary of the introduction of religious worship in
Liiwell.
The St. Anne Sabbath-School, for almost sixty
years, had two sessions every Sabbath, and was cate-
chised by the pastor every month.
In 1830 a building was erected north of the church
at a cost of l<500 for the use of the Sunday-School,
and a second building in 1839. These gave place in
1868 to the present stone chapel, which was erected
at the cost of $12,000. The number of scholars in
1840 reached 655. In 1873 the choir-room and sac-
risty were buiit at a cost of $5000.
St. Luke's church, an off-shoot of St. Anne's under
the Rev. A. D. McCoy, erected a house of worship in
Belvidere, which before its completion, was sold in
1845, to the High Street Congregational Church, and
the enterprise was relinquished. Rev. Mr. McCoy had
been employed in 1839 as an assistant to the rector of
128
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
St. Anne's for one year, and services were held by
him in Chapel Hall. This vas warranted on account
of the large attendance at the mother church. Out of
this movement came the formation of the society of
St. Luke in Belvidere.
On October 17, 1857, took place the dedication of
the chime of eleven bells which, by the generous sub-
scriptions of private individuals, had been placed in
the tower of St. Anne's. Mr. George Hedrick had,
by persistent effort, raised the subscription of more
than $4000, and had pushed the work to its comple-
tion. " Rich and poor, high and low, men of every
shade of religious opinion," contributed to the pur-
chase of the bells. With great propriety this chime
of bells was placed in the tower of St. Anne's, the
oldest of the churches in the city proper, nnd that in
which the fathers of the city first joined in religious
worship. The bells were founded in the city of Troy,
N. Y., and on each bell was an appropriate inscrip-
tion. To make my account more brief, I will men-
tion only (as an example) the inscription on thesi.xth
in order, whose pitch is on B :
" B, r,«,l lbs. MuslciHiis' B«M.
To the memorj- of Hanclcl. Born A. P. HiM . .lie.l A. V. ITJS. Pre-
sented by the principal niiibical professore and .-iniateutfl of Lou'ell, X.lK
1857.
To ninsic ! Noble art divine,
King forth, ye belle, a merry chime."
The total weight of the eleven bells is 9899 pounds.
An orphanage, located near the church, was insti-
tuted in 1875. This institution was dear to the hearl
of Dr. Ed.'<on. On Jan. 1, 1890, it had two teachers,
and supported twenty-one children. Children are
received who are from two to seven years of age.
At the death of Dr. Edson, who owned Ihisorphan-
age, it became the property of his daugliter, .Mis>
Elizabeth Edson, who has generously donated it tf.
the church.
Of thememorial windowsalready placed inSt. Anne's
Church, the first is given by Dr. John O. Green and
William A. Burke, in which two female figures.
" Charity " and " Devotion," are designed to repre-
sent, respectively, the most marked characteristics of
the departed wives of the givers.
The second, representing "The Annunciation," is
placed by the widow of the late George H. Carleton,
in memory of her husband, who for many years was
a warden of the church.
The third was placed by Mrs. Eliza C. Davis, aa a
memorial of her father and mother.
The fourth was placed by Mr. Elibu S. Hunt and
his son-in-law, Mr. Albert G. Cook, in memory of
their respective wives.
After the death of Dr. Edson the parish was in
charge of Rev. A. E. Johnson and Rev. F. Gilliatt.
The church was without a rector for nearly one year.
Having brought the history of St. .Inne's Church
down to the time of the death of its first rector, I
pause to give a brief account of his life. It would be
impossible to write a history of this church, or even
of the city itself, with Dr. Edson left out. His long
life, his intense individuality, his high official posi-
tion, his iron will and hi.s tireless energy make him
stand out alone as a marked man who can be com-
pared with no one else. " We shall not look upon
his like again."
Theodore Edson was born in Bridgewater, Mass.,
.\ugust 24, 1793. Though he learned the carpenter's
trade, his tastes led him to a life of study. He en-
gaged in school-teaching for the whole or part of two
years. Subsequently, in 1816, he went to Phillips
Academy, at Andover, and spent two years in prepar-
ation for college. He entered Harvard College in 1818,
at the age of twenty-five years. In college rank he
was the fourth scholar in his class of sixty members,
among whom were Charles G. .\therton, Nathaniel
I. Bowditch, Rev. Dr. Worcester and Rev. Dr. Hill,
of Worcester. Having assumed deacon's orders after
his graduation, he was supplying St. Matthew's
Church in South Boston when Kirk Boott came to
his humble study to invite him to come to Lowell.
In accepting the invitation he as-sures us he did not
even think of his remuneration, but was filled with
the thought of his own unworthiness of so sacred an
office. I quote his own words; " I entered the min-
istry with a very deep sen.se of unworthiness of so
great an honor, and with intense gratitude to God for
putting me into the sacred calling."
In the early years of his ministry he took an .ictive
and responsible part in every eH'ort of the benevolent
in promoting the religious and intellectual welfare of
the new settlement. Far from limitine: his labors to
the bounds of his own parish, his voice was uplifted in
public halls antl in the pulpitsof other denominations
in the defence of every good cause. In his last years,
when the bounds of religious societies liad become
more distinctly defined, and when the burden of years
pressed upon him, he very naturally confined himselt
more strictly to his own parochial duties, but it was
not so in his earlier days. To no man is Lowell more
indebted for starting things aright than to him.
Dr. Edson's long pastorate of nearly sixty years
presents an almost unparalleled devotion to duty. He
never spared himself No form was more often met
in the streets, but he was never obeying the call of
pleasure, but always that of duty. There was some
widow who needed bread, some troubled soul who
called for sympathy, some dying man who needed the
consolations of religion. On this subject Bishop
Clark made the following eloquent remarks in 1865
in reference to Dr. Edson : " The sun has not been
more regular in his rising and setting than he has
been in his daily round of duties. No storm has ever
raged which he would not cheerfully face when the
call of the suH'erer called him from his fireside. No
Sunday ever dawned when the doors of St. Anue
have not been opened to the worshiper. No heavy-
laden sinner ever asked his counsel and was sent un-
LOWELL.
129
comforted away." It is said that throughout his long
ministry he never sought a. summer vacation, though
on one occasion he received a gift from a parishioner
of SIOOO to defray his expenses on a voyage to the old
world. This voyage, however, was his " strange
work," and even in this he was probably obeying the
call of duty.
V^ery few clergymen have been so often called as he
to officiate at the burial of the dead. On such occasions
the solemn and beautiful burial service of his Churchy
though so often repeated, seemed always fresh and
new. With what solemn awe he always approached
the mystery of death. We, who have so often lis-
tened to his voice at the burial of the dead, can never
forget with what tender, pleading pathos he was wont
to utter the words : " O God, most mighty, O holy and
merciful Saviour, thou most worthy Judge Eternal,
sufiier us not, at our last hour, fur any pains of death
to fall from Thee." This prayer, so often uttered,
was abundantly fulfilled in his own case, for his physi-
cian and life-long friend, who watched by hi= bedside
during the long weeks of severe suffering which closed
his life, testifies that these sufferings " were borne
with the sweetest submission and calmest resignation."
When he saw that the end was near he asked that the
"sacrament" be no longer delayed, and " he sank
Bereuely and gently, in the conscious presence of his
mental powers and with cheerful submission of his soul
to God." He died of congestion of the lungs, June 25,
1SS3. He left one daughter, his wife having died ten
years before.
Rev. A. St. John Charabre, the second rector of St.
Anne's Church, assumed the duties of bis office May
15, 1884, and he worthily fills his high position.
The House of Prayer. — This Episcopal Church,
which is far more ritualistic in its form of worship
than any other in the city, was organized in 187G by
Rev. B. F. Cooley. Services had previously been
held in Highland Hall and in private parlors by the
Rev. Mr. Roberts, pastor of St. John's Church. Mr.
Cooley entered upon his work with great energy and
enthusiasm. He acted as architect in designing the
new church building, and as artist in decorating its
wall:?. He also embroidered many of the vestments,
and, by conducting the music, he secured a very ex-
cellent choral service. He was succeeded by " Father "
Brown, of Methuen.
Rev. J. J. Cressy was rector of this church from
1881 to 1887. The present rector. Rev. A. Q. Davis,
came to the church in March, 1888. There are 107
persons connected with the parish.
" The services, being in music and ritual, are as
much in advance of what is now common as the
present services have advanced beyond those of forty
years ago."
The church edifice, on Walker Street, was opened
for worship December 29, 1876. The corner-stone
was laid by Rev. Dr. Edson in September, 1870. On
this occasion several of the clergy and the choirs of
9-ii
the House of Prayer, of St. John's (Lowell), St.
John's (Lawrence) and the Advent (Boston) were
present and assisted in the services. The church edi-
fice, with the land, cost about $4000.
St. John's Parish. — The organization of this par-
ish of the Episcopal Church was effected July 30,
1860. Preliminary to its organization Rev. Charles
W. Homer, of Cambridge, who in 1859 had come to
Lowell as an assistant of Dr. Edson, had held Sunday
services in the chapel of St. Anne, beginning on Feb.
27, 1859. Subsequently, for want of sufficient room
in the chapel, these services were transferred to Me-
chanics' Hall.
The connection between the Rev. Mr. Homer and
St. Anne's Church was dissolved Oct. 1, 1860, and
steps were immediately taken to establish a new par-
ish. This parish was organized, ^ stated above, July
30, 1860.
Rev. Charles W. Homer, first rector of St. John's
Parish, was chosen to his sacred office July 29, 1860.
On the first Sunday in October, 1860, the Sunday ser-
vices were transferred from Mechanics' Hall to
" Wyman's Church," a hall in a building which stood
on the site of the present Edson's Block, in Merri-
mack Street.
The erection of a house of worship was promptly
begun, and the corner-stone was laid on Monday,
April 15, 1801, with Masonic ceremonies. The pastor,
by his winning manners and affable address, was re-
markably successful in raising funds from all denomi-
nations of Christians for the erection of the church.
The new church was first occupied for religious
worship on the first Sunday of October, 1861. This
house, with the chapel, was erected at a cost of
$17,000. Its walls are of Weatford granite.
The first rector resigned Nov. 22, 1862, and Rev.
Cornelius B. Smith assumed the pastoral office on
May 24, 1863. Under his rectorship the debt of the
church was paid.
The Rev. Charles L. Hutchins succeeded Mr.
Smith as rector Nov. 1, 1865. During his term of
service the west window, with the figure of St. Luke,
the beloved physician, was placed in the church in
honor of the first warden. Dr. Elisha Huntington, a
citizen whom, perhaps above any other, Lowell has
delighted to honor. Another window was also placed
in the church in honor of Mr. Samuel Burbank, a
most worthy man.
Rev. Daniel C. Roberts succeeded to the rectorship
June 1, 1869, and served the church four years.
The present rector. Rev. L. C. Manchester, assumed
the pastoral office October 1, 1873.
One of the marked features in the worship of this
church is its tasteful and excellent music, the credit
of which belongs very greatly to Mr. Charles H. Bur-
bank, librarian of the City Library, who, for nearly
thirty years, has devoted much time to this part of
sacred worship. A boychoir has been successfully
employed for more than twenty years.
]30
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Pawtucket Chuech. — The Pawtucket Church is
far the oldest within the present territori- of Lowell.
It is siluated in that part of the city which in 1874
was set off from the town of Dracut. But as St.
Anne's Episcopal Church was the tirst established
withi n the original limitsof the city, the honor of being
the first church in Lowell justly belongs to St. Anne's.
The town of Dracut is supposed to have received
its name from the town or parish in England from
which came Samuel Varnum, who, about 1(575, one
hundred years before the War of the Revolution,
bought land of the Indians on the north side of the
JCerrimack River and thus probably became the ear-
liest English settler of the town. It was incorporated
as a township in 1701, one of the provisions of the
act of incorporation being this : "That the inhabit-
ants of said land jissist in ye maintenance of the
ministry of the town of Chelmsford, as at present
they do until they are provided with a minister as
the law directs."
In 1711 the inhabitants of Dracut in general town-
meeting voted to build a meeting-house of tlieir own,
and in the tame year they chose as their minister Mr.
Amos Cheever, who, four years before, had graduated
at Harvard College. He was to have a.s bis salary
tifty pounds per year, and also eighty pounds for
building a house. This offer was declined. A simi-
lar offer was made to Mr. Wigglesworth in 1712,
which was also declined. The salary was probably
too small to warrant a settlement. It was not till
171S that the meeting-house was completed, although
it was dedicated two years before this date. Nor w:us
it till 1720 that the church secured the services of a
pastor.
By vote of the town this first meeting-house was to
be thirty feet long and twenty-five feet wide (about
the dimensions of a large parlor). The pay of the
workmen on the edifice was, by vote, to be " two shil-
lings one man a day for getting timber; four cattle
and a man a day five shillings and so according ; the
trustees to get the work done as cheap as they can."
" The locality," says Mr. Varnum (to whom I have
already expressed my obligations), " was on what is
now called Varnum Avenue, about a half a mile
above Pawtucket bridge, on the southerly side of the
street, on land owned by Deacon Abel Coburn, and
just east of hia present residence. The spot still re-
tains the name of the old ' meeting-house lot.' We
are informed by Mr. Coburn that there appears also
to have been a ' Noon-house,' in which the people
assembled between services to warm themselves and
partake of a lunch."
As to these " Noon-houses " or " Sabba' day houses "
Mr. Varnum makes the following quotation from Ed-
ward Abbott's work called " Revolutionary Times " :
" Comfort, being carefully shut out of the meeting-
house itself, was only thus rudely provided for insuch
subordinate structures. The ' Sabba' day house '
was a family affair generally comprising but a single
apartment, perhaps fifteen feet square, with windows
and a fire-place. It was very plainly and sparsely
furnished. Chairs for the old people and benches
for the children stood round the walls, and a table in
the centre might hold the Bible and a few religious
books and pamphlets, while on one side shelves con-
tained dishes for cooking and eating. A group of
such cabins standing about the meeting-house added
not a little to the picturesqueness of the spot, and
their use conduced greatly to the convenience and
comfort of Sabbath worship, especially in winter.
The family able to keep a Sabba' day house, drove
directly thither on Sabbath mornings, warmed them-
selves up by a not fire without and quite likely by a
hot drink within, and here spent the intermission
with further wholesome regards to the wants of the
inner man."
Rev. Thomas Parker was the first settled pastor of
the church. He was evidently a superior scholar, for
he graduated at Harvard when only seventeen years
of age, and settled in the ministry at Dracut at the
age of only nineteen years. The vote to extend a call
to Mr. Parker was passed on Dec. 28, 1719, in general
town-meeting, and his salarv' was then fixed at eighty
pounds per year.
It must not be supposed that before the settlement
of Mr. Parker the people of the town were without
religious instruction and privileges, for as early as
1711 the town appointed a committee to employ a
minister at five shillings a day (temporarily, of course),
and Mr. Wigglesworth and Mr. Hail were so em-
])loyed. The following town record on the subject of
employing temporary preachers is a noteworthy
record, as presenting, in its form of language, an inter-
esting puzzle :
"Also it is voted that Mr. Wigglesworth should
come to preach for a time, in a way to making a
settlement after Mr. Cheevers has been treated with,
and don't come to preach and in a way to making a
settlement."
Mr. Parker's pastorate of forty-four years seems to
have been an ideal one, for he spent his whole remain-
ing life with his people, dying after a year of declin-
ing health in the sixty-fourth year of his age. The
records leave no trace of anything but affection for
their pastor, and the town voted the generous sum of
twenty-four pounds for a mourning drcfs for his
widow and six rings to the pall-bearers who conveyed
the sacred dust to the grave. A few years since, by
order of Mr. Varnum, the remains were removed from
the field in which they were first placed to the Wood-
bine Cemetery in Lowell.
During a part of Mr. Parker's pastorate the
harmony of early years seems to have been broken ;
for the little, old meeting-house, which the builders
were ordered to make as cheap as they could, had be-
come too small and too much decayed for further use,
and the location of a new church became a subject of
somewhat acrimonious dispute.
LOWELL.
131
However, in 1748, a new church, with front and side
galleries, ■■as erected, in the style of the times, with
square box pews arranged arouad the walls for the
dignitaries who could pay for them, and benches in
the centre of the church for those who could not
purchase pews. Eight seats of " digaitie " were
established by vote of the town, thus quaintly defined
iu the order of rank, to wit:
" Fore seat below, second seat below, fore seat in
front gallery, fore seat in the side gallery, third seat
below, second in the front gallery, fourth seat below,
second in side gallery."
Kev. Nathan Davis was the second pastor of the
church. His ordination occurred Nov. 20, 17G5. His
salary was fixed at eighty pounds, like that of his pre-
decessor, but to defray his expenses in changing his
residence and beginning a new pastorate, a special
grant of loO pounds was given him. Such a grant
was customary in those days and was denominated a
"settlement." Mr. Davis resigned his oflice in 1781
after a service of sixteen years.
In 1785 a call to settle as pastor was extended to
Rev. Timothy Langdon. This call was given just
after the close of the Revolutionary War, when the
country was most deeply suffering from a depreciated
currency and the evils of poverty were almost as hard
to be borne as had been the dangers and hardships of
war. Only by slow degrees did the thrift and energy
of the American people, aided by the financial policy
and wisdom of Alexander Hamilton, dispel the gloom
which rested upon the hopes of the American people.
The pcoijle of Dracut had made a noble record of
sacrifice during the war, but their poverty forbade
them to ofl'er such a salary to Mr. Langdon as he
could accept.
Two years after Mr. Lar.gdon had refused to as-
sume the office of pastor, a call was extended to Mr.
Solomon Aiken, offering a settlement of £150, a
salary, of £91 and twenty cords of wood. This call
was accepted, and for twenty-five years he " proved
himself to be an efficient and faithful pastor."
In 1793 a violent contest arose in regard to divid-
ing the parish into two parts on account of the great
inconvenience to which many were subjected in
reaching the church, the two extremes of the old
parish being so far apart. The result was that the
church now known as the Centre Church was erected
iu what was claimed to be near the geographical cen-
tre of the town. The people of the west part of the
town, where the old church had stood and where the
pastor resided, were far from being satisfied that the
new church was erected so far away, and resolved
that they would have a church of their own near
Pawtucket Falls. A new religious society was formed
a lot of land for a new church was purchased of
Jamos Varnum, a large land-owner, the deed bearing
the date of Jan. 7, 179C. The church erected upon
this laud by the newly-formed society is the same
church building which now stands near the Paw-
tucket Bridge. The location was very favorable for a
churcli, for besides being near the bridge across the
Merrimack, it was situated upon the Great Mammoth
Road, which had been laid out foiu years before.
Mr. Varnum also adds iu regard to the choice of this
location : " There may have been a bit of romance
considered, for this was the Ancient and Capital
Seat of the Pawtucket tribe of Indians, and the spot
where John Eliot first preached the gospel to them
in 1647 and for many years afterward, as they gath-
ered to obtain their supply of fish at the falls."
The new society was called " The West Congrega-
tional Society in Dracut," and the act of its incorpora-
tion is dated June 22, 1797. Their house of worship
was a plain structure, having square pews, with seata
around the sides of the pew, so that as many hearers,
if the church were filled, faced from the pulpit as
towards it. There were galleries on three sides, and
the deacons' seat directly in front of the pulpit.
There was the decorated sounding-board hanging
over the preacher's head. This sounding-board seems
to have been the object of a most unaccountable affec-
tion of one at least of the worshipers ; for when,
about 1828, it was removed from its place, this devout
man, on entering the church and perceiving that the
object of his affectionate regard had been removed
from its sacred position, soliloquized thus: "They
have taken away the ark of the Lord and I will go
too." He then left the church and returned no more.
A box-stove, purchased by individuals for warming
the church, was set up first in the winter of 1820-21,
the foot-stove, a small square box of tin or iron, en-
cased in a wooden-frame and containing within a dish
of coals brought from home, having heretofore been
the only means of protecting from freezing the aching
feet of the worshipers. In 1820 the steeple of the
church was erected, and the first bell, at a cost of
S700, was purchased.
But I must be pardoned for dwelling so long upon
the early history of this oldest of our churches. Our
city is intensely modern, and has but very few objects
which we love because they are old. I fancy I hear
some cynical critic say, "The people of Lowell can
boast of so small a number of things which are an-
tique and picturesque, that they feel bound to use the
few that they have for all they are worth."
It is remarkable that for twenty-three years after
the incorporation of the new society the church had
no settled pastor. A large number of temporary
preachers were employed, among them President
Lord, Rev. Humphrey Moore, Bishop Parker, Dr.
Edson and Rev. Jacob Coggin. Slndents from An-
dover Seminary came up on horse-back and preached
two sermons " for two dollars and found."
But on January 31, 1821, Rev. Reuben Sears was
installed as the first settled pastor of the new Paw-
tucket Church. Mr. Sears graduated from Union
College in 1798. He is remembered as a man of
good abilities and kindly spirit. After eerving the
132
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
church six years he resigned his oliice, went West
and died in 1837 or 1838.
Rev. Sylvester G. Pierce, the .second pastor of this
church, waa installed in April, 1829. when he was
thirty-two years of age. Leaving Union College in
Ilia senior year with the purpose of going as mission-
ary to Bombay, he changed his purpose so far as to
defer his work as a missionary until he had taken a
course of study at Andover. In 1828 he began to
supply the pulpit of the Pawtucket Church, where he
was ordained as an Evangelist. So much were the
members of the church pleased with him as a
preacher that they gave him an invitation to settle
with them as their pastor. He accepted the office,
and during the four years of his ministry fifty-tliree
members were added to the church. In 1832 he was
installed as pastor of the church in Jlethuen, where,
after a very successful pastorate of seven years, he
(lied of consumption in the prime of manhood. Mr.
Pierce was an ardent, earnest, eloquent man, who left
behind him a blessed memory.
Kev. Tobias Pinkham, the third pastor, about a
year after his graduation from Andover Seminary,
was installed in the sacred office May 18, 1836. He
served as pastor only three years, and became a Bap-
tist minister. He died in Tioga, Peuu., at the age
of forty-two years.
Kev. Joseph Merrill, the fourth pastor, graduated
from Dartmouth College. After having for several
years been engaged as teacher or pastor elsewhere,
he was installed over Pawtucket Church April 20,
1842. In the years 1840 and 18.30 he represented the
town of Dracut in the State Legislature. He had
resigned his pastorate in 1848, having served six
years. His last years were spent in Lowell. He was
"a sincere, earnest and faithful preacher."
Rev. Brown Emerson, the fifth pastor, was a grad-
uate of Yale College. His service extended from
1850 to 1854. He died in Wyoming, N. J., at the
age of nearly eighty years.
Rev. Perrin B. Fiske, the sixth pastor, served the
church only two years, from 18G3 to 1865, afterwards
becoming pastor of the church in Peachara, Vt.
Rev. Joseph Boardman, the next pastor, graduated
at Amherst and the Andover Seminary, and was in-
stalled Sept. 1, 1870. He was in office four years and
is now preaching in Barnet, Vt. He was an earnest,
faithful pastor, leaving behind him many warm
friends.
The present pastor. Rev. Charles H. Willcox, was
ordained Nov. 6, 1884. He is a graduate of Yale
College and of the Yale Theological Seminary, and
has spent two years of study in Germany. He is a
young man with bright prospects before him.
To the above list of pastors of this church we will
add the name of the Rev. William Allen, who was
acting pastor for several years, closing his service in
18G8, and Rev. Elias Nason, who was acting pastor
from 187G to 1884.
In 1SS8 this church had 131 members.
First Cosueegatioxal Church. —The first germ
of the history of this church is found in a meeting of
three men, carpenters by trade, on Jan. 7, 1824, for
the purpose of organizing a iirayer-nieeting among
the Christian men and women whom the new manu-
facturing enterprise had called together from all the
region round. More than a year before, the Merri-
mack Company had begun the erection of its mills,
and they had also erected boarding-houses for the ac-
commodation of the operatives. It was in one of
these boarding-houses. No. 21. that the three car-
penters met. Their names were: Wm. Davidson,
James 51. King and Nathaniel Holmes. After sing-
ing a hymn, reading the Scriptures and joining in
prayer, they proceeded to the work for which they
had met. The prayer-meeting thus organized was a
I'nion meeting, being participated in by Congrega-
tionalists. Baptists and Methodists. At the first
meeting after the organization only seven persona
were present. But as they continued to meet from
house to house their numbers grew, until in the
autumn of 1825 it was by mutual consent agreed that
the diiferent denominations should hold separate
meetings. The new meetings held by the Congrega-
tional brethren were, in a spiritual sense, remarkably
lervid, and it is told that on one occasion a brother
became so exalted in his prayer, that his voice (or iia
echo) reachtd the ears of Kirk Boott,the agent of the
Merrimack Jlills, who at once despatciied a note de-
manding that no more meetings of the'kind should
be held upon the Corporation. Unexpected opposi-
tion aUo arose fnmi the pastor of the church in Dra-
cut. near the falls, who protested that the new meetings
withdrew from his ministrations many who ought to
attend them. He seemed to suppose that Lowell be-
longed to Dracut, not dreaming that in a few short
years Dracut would belong to Lowell. The meetings
grew apa''e so that in two years, after the meeting of
the three carpenters 388 persons were found who
favored the Congregational form of Christian wor-
ship. The result was that an ecclesiastical council
met at the residence of William Davidson, No. 14
on the Merrimack Corporation, June (3, 1826, and
formed the First Congregational Church of Lowell
with fifty members.
The meetings of the new church were held in the
same building (on the s^ite of the present Green
School-house) in which the Episcopal Society of St.
Anne had worshiped two yearn before. But on Dec.
25, 1827, a "new brick meeting-house," erected by
the society, waa dedicated — a bouse which long stood
as a well-known landmark of the city until, in 1884, it
was demolished to give place to the elegant edifice in
which the church now worships.
(3n July IS, 1827, a few months before the dedica-
tion of the house, Rev. Geo. C. Beckwith waa ordain-
ed and installed as the first pastor of the church.
But after a service of less thau two years his health
LOWELL.
133
demanded the resignation of his office. He was a
mau of high culture and earnest piety. He died in
lioston in 1870, while in the service of the American
Peace Society.
On Dec. 25, 1829, Rev. Amos Blanchard was or-
dained and installed as second pastor of this church.
His pastorate continued more than fourteen years. Of
Dr. Blanchard I shall speak more in detail in connec-
tion with my record of the Kirk Street Church, with
which his life was more closely identified.
Dr. Blanchard's successor was the Kev. Willard
Child, who was installed Oct. 1, 1845. His pastorate
continued nine years. Dr. Child is affectionately re-
membered by the church as a faithful pastor and a
man of large heart. It has been said of him that he
" preached the law and lived the gospel." Before
coming to Lowell he had been a pastor in Norwich,
Conn., and after leaving Lowell, he was settled in
Castleton, Vt.
The fourth pastor of this church was Rev. J. L.
Jenkins, who, coming from the Theological Seminary
at Andover, was ordained and installed Oct. 17, 1855.
After a ministry of six years he resigned his office,
and entered into the service of the American Board
of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. He was a man
of superior talent and of " earnest, progressive faith."
He is now pastor of a church in Pittsfield, Mass. His
successor was Rev. Geo. N. Webber, who was install-
ed Sept. 17, 1802. After a service of four and one-
half years he resigned his office to accept a professor-
ship in Middlebury Colleo'e, Vt. He was a man of
finished scholarship and keen mind.
The sixth pastor was Rev. Horace James, who was
installed Oct. 31, 1SG7, and was in office three years.
He was a man of marked ability and great energy,
radical in his opinions and independent in his meth-
ods. On resigning his office he became secretary of
the American and Foreign Christian Union. He died
in Worcester, Mass., in June, 1875.
The present pastor is the Rev. Smith Baker, who
was installed Sept. 13, 1871.
The new brick house of worship, dedicated June
18, 1885, at a cost of about SJT.OOO, is a most elegant
and commodious structure, having a seating capacity of
about 1500. The fine organ placed in the new church
cost about S6000. The large audiences which assem-
ble in this church on Sunday evenings to listen to the
popular lectures of the pastor form so remarkable a
feature in the work of the church that they deserve a
special mention.
The Eliot Church. — This church was first known
as the Second Congregational Church. After enter-
ing its house of worship on Appleton Street, it was
known as the Appleton Street Church. But since the
erection of its present house, near the spot where
once, in a log chapel, preached John Eliot, the apos-
tle to the Indians, it has been called, from him, the
Eliot Church.
Ad early as 1830 the house of worship of the First
Congregational Church had become so crowded, and
the growth of the city towards thesouth and west was
so great that there was an obvious call for a new
church near the Appleton and Hamilton Mills, which
were already in full operation.
At a regular monthly meeting of the members of
the First Congregational Church, held Aug. 31, 1830,
the first steps towards the formation of a new church
were taken. The enterprise had ita origin, not in a
desire to leave the mother church, but in a serious
sense of duty to meet the wants of a rapidly-growing
city. A religious society was formed and a place on
Appleton Street, then a bed of rocks, was selected for
building a house of worship. The erection of the
house began in 1830, and the house was dedicated July
10, 1831. This house, after being the home of the Eliot
Church for forty-two years, was sold for $15,000 to
the First Presbyteriau Church and Society, and it ia
still a well-known land-mark of our city.
Rev. William Twining, the first pastor of the Ap-
pleton Street (now Eliot) Church, was ordained Oct.
4, 1831. He proved an earnest, devout aqd scholarly
man, and the new church prospered under his minis-
try. He had previously been pastor of a church in
Great Falls, N. H, and, after serving the Eliot Church
three years, he was chosen to a professorship in Wa-
bash College, Ind.
Rev. Uzziah C. Burnap, the second pastor, was in-
stalled July 6, 1837, the church having been without
a pastor nearly two years. He came to Lowell after
a pastorate of thirteen years in Chester, Vt. His
pastorate in Lowell continued fourteen and one-half
years. He was a man of decided convictions and
earnest zeal, and he was often compelled to disagree
from those around him. He died in Lowell in 1854,
at the age of sixty years, leaving behind him, among
those to whom he had been a spiritual father, a
precious memory.
The third pastor. Rev. George Darling, a graduate
of Union College and Princeton Theological Semi-
nary, was installed December 30, 1852. He had been
the pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Hamilton,
Ohio. He was an attractive preacher. His pastor-
ate continued two years. For twelve years, since
leaving Lowell, he was pastor of a church in Hudson,
Ohio.
Rev. Dr. John P. Cleaveland, a graduate of Bow-
doin College, was settled over the Eliot Church Oct.
2, 1855. He had been pastor of churches in Salem,
Detroit, Providence and Northampton before coming
to Lowell. His pastorate continued more than six
years. He was dismissed in 1862 to become chaplain
of the Thirtieth Massachusetts Regiment, and went
with this regiment to Ship Island and New Orleans.
In this office he served only a few months. He died
March 7, 1873. He was a man of versatile mind
and undoubted ability. He possessed keen wit and
a buoyant, sympathetic nature.
The fifth pastor, Rev. J. E. Rankin, a graduate of
134
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Middlebury College and Andover Theological Semi-
nary, was installed Dec. 17, 1S62. He had been pas-
tor of a church in St. Albane, Vt., and after a pastor-
ate of nearly two years in Lowell he was settled
successively over the Winthrop Church in Charles-
town, and the Congregational Church in Washing-
ton, D. C. Dr. Rankin is an orator and scholar,
having acquired a national reputation as a writer
both of prose and poetry.
The sixth pastor. Rev. Addison P. Foster, a grad-
uate of Williams College and of Andover Theological
Seminary, was ordained Oct. 3, 18G6. Here in his
first pastorate of two years he gave promise of that
eminent ability and success for which he has since
been distinguished. He is now pastor of thelmman-
uel Church in Boston. Rev. Dr. J. M. Greene, the
present pastor, was installed July 20, 1870. He
graduated at Amherst College, and studied theology
in Bangor Theological Seminary. Before ciming to
Lowell he had been pastor of churches in Hatfield,
Mass., and in South Hadley, ^L^8S. The present
house of worship of the Eliot Church is a beautiful
and commodious edifice of brick, situated in a com-
manding position on Sumner Street, overlooking
the North Common. Its spire rises conspicuous to
the view among the other structures of the city. This
house was dedicated Dec. 2, 1S80.
JoHX Street Church. — Beginning with the
starting of the great manufactories, the growth of
Lowell was very rapid. Within the space of two and
a half years its population was trebled, and ten
Protestant Churches were formed. As early as 1S38
the first two Congregational Churches — the " First,''
and the " Appleton Street " — had so far " outgrown
themselves" that it became apparent that a third
church of the same order was needed. At a meeting
of gentlemen belonging to both of these churclie.s,
held on Dec. 3, 1838, a committee was appointed to
take into consideration the formation of a new church.
This committee reported favorably in regard to the
enterprise, and also recommended that the proposed
church building should be erected on John Street.
The recommendation being approved by the friends of
the enterprise, a substantial brick church was erected
at a cost of nearly i?lS,000, and was dedicated June
24, 1840.
The church which was to worship in the new
building had been formed more than a year before
the completion of their new building, worshiping
meantime in the Cily Hall. It consisted, when
formed, of 243 members. Rev. Mr. Seabury, subse-
quently a pastor of the church, said, in 1879, of this
original band : "It was a large and auspicious be-
ginning— forty-nine brethren, 194 sisters. They
were full of faith and courage; men and women of
strong character and humble piety, they loved the
cause of Christ.'"
The first pastor. Rev. Stedman W. Hanks, was in-
stalled March 20, 1840, the sermon being preached by
Rev. Joshua Leavitt, of Providence, R. I. ilr. Hanks
was a man of earne>t C'hristian character, an ardent
devoteeofthe beneficent reform movementsof hisday.
The formation of the Kirk Street Congregational
Church in 1845, and of the High Street Congrega-
tional Church in 1846, drew away many of the mem-
bers of this church and somewhat checked its growth.
After a service of twelve years Mr. Hanks rtsigned
and became secretary of the Seaman's Friend Society,
with its office in Boston. In this last position Mr.
Hanks remained until his death, in 1889, at the age of
eighty years.
Soon after the resignation of Jlr. Hanks, ajoung
preacher who was supplying the pulpit "thrilled the
whole congregation with emotion " by a sermon which
he preached from the tex t, " liun, upeaL to this yovng
man." The people took him as he didn't mean, for
the young man they ran to speak to wr.s the preacher .
himself, the Rc-v. EJen B. Foster. Dr. Fosier was
installed February 3, 1853, aul, after a service of
eight and one-half years, retired from the office on ac-
count of ill health. After four years, during which
the church enjoyed the minis'raliona of another pas-
tor, Dr. Foster was recalled and reinstalled in 18i)G.
This second pastorate continued twelve years.
Dr. Foster was a most earnest student and a ser-
I monizer of remarkable power. His style gushed with
I emotion and overflowed with striking illustrations
' and eloquent diction.
i Rev. J. W. Backus was installed over this church
September 24, 18t)2, and after a pastorate of four
[ years he resigned his office, carrying away with him
the affectionate remembrance of his people.
On September S, 1875, Rev. Joseph B. Seabury was
installed as associate pastor with Dr. Foster, subse-
<iuently assuming the full work of the pastorate. He
served the church eight years.
The present pastor. Rev. Henry T. Rose, was in-
stalled October 10, 1883. The splendid organ placed
in this church in 1887 cost over ^GOOO.
Kirk Street Congrehatioxal CnrRfH. — In
1845 the Rev. Dr. Blanchard, pastor of the First
Congregational Church, with about one hundred
members of the church, who were bound to him and
to one another by social sympathy and kindred tastes,
united to form a new Congregational Church in Low-
ell. This organization, first known as the Fourth
(."ongregational Society, secured as a place of worship
Mechanics' Hall, which would seat nearly 500 per-
sons. The first service was held on May 25, 1845.
Alter a few months, a larger hall being needed, the
City Hall was secured as a place of worship.
The official organization of the church and also the
installation of the Rev. Amos Blanchard as pastor,
took place May 21, 1845. The work of erecting a
house of worship was early entered upon and their
new brick church on Kirk Street was dedicated on
December 17, 184G. The cost of the house was nearly
!?23,U00. The name was now changed to that of
LOWELL.
135
"Kirk Street Church." Dr. Blanchard remained
pastor of this church until his death, January 14,
1870, a period of twenty-five years. His two pastor-
ates in Lowell covered a period of forty years.
He was born in Andover, Mass., March 7, 1807.
He entered Yale College when sixteen years of age,
and, subsequent to his graduation, studied in An-
dover Theological Seminary. From this seminary he
was called directly to the pastorate of the First Con-
gregational Church in Lowell, when less than twenty-
three years of age. He was greatly loved and honored
by the church, and his sudden death at the age of
sixty-three years produced a profound sensation.
Perhaps no citizen of Lowell ever possessed so wide a
range of erudition as he. His ready and retentive
memory enabled him to call at will upon his vast
store of knowledge, and those who heard him speak
without previous warning were often astonished at the
extent of his learning and the brilliancy of his intel-
lect. His noblest efforts were those in which a sud-
den emergency and a sympathizing audience arou-ied
the energies of his cultivated mind, and his great
learning supplied the material for the highest oratori-
cal effect.
Rev. Charles D. Barrows was ordained as pastor of
this church July 13, 1871. Mr. Barrows had not com-
pleted his theological course of study when he became
the choice of the people of the church. But in order
to secure him as their pa-stor ihey waited for him an
entire year. He proved to be a man of superior
executive ability and acknowledged popular talent.
A high reputation as a successful pastor was soon ac-
quired, and led to an invitation to the pastorate of
the First Church in San Francisco, and he is now the
pastor of that church.
His successor. Rev. Charles A. Dickinson, was
installed Jan. 3, 1883. He had been the pastor in
Portland Me., of the church where, in former years,
had preached the celebrated Edward Payson. Mr.
Dickinson is a man of superior talent and devout
piety. His desire to establish a church organization
by which the masses in a large city can be more
effectively reached and brought within the direct in-
fluence and sympathy of a Christian church, led him
to accept the pastorate of the Berkley Street Church,
in Boston, in which he is now carrying into successful
operation his benevolent design.
The present pastor, Rev. Malcolm McGregor Dana,
was installed on Oct. 11, 1888. He had been the
pastor of a church in St. Paul, Minn.
High Street Church. — This church was organ-
ized in 1846. It is the only church of any Protestant
denomination on the east side of Concord River and in
that part of Lowell known as BelviJere. The absence
of any church organization in so large a field seemed
to invite the zeal and enterprise of Christian men to
"go uj) at once and possess it." Other causes also
conspired to help on the work. It was urged that the
John Slreet Church had become so large and strong
that some of its abundant power ought to be devoted
to Eome new enterprise. The Rev. Timothy Atkinson,
an English clergyman, who had formerly preached in
Quebec, being a man of wealth, had offered pecuniary
aid, if the work should be undertaken.
The first public meeting of the friends of the cause
was held at the John Street Church in July, 1845. It
waa at this meeting proposed to purchase the un-
finished church in Belvidere, recently erected by a
new and short-lived Episcopal Society, known as St.
Luke's. After considerable negotiation the Church of
St Luke was purchased for ?7500, and meetings lor
divine worship were commenced in the vestry of the
church, the main audience-room being unfinished.
The ofiicial organization of the new church took
place in John Street Church, Jan. 22, 1846, when the
names of seventy-one persons were enrolled, most of
whom had been members of the John Street Church.
In the next month, Feb. 26, 1840, Rev. Timothy
Atkinson was installed as the first pastor. Mr. Atkin-
son was a man of high culture and devout Christian
character. He remained pastor for nearly two years.
On Dec. 15, 1847, Rev. Joseph H. Towne was in-
stalled as the second pastor of the church and con-
tinued in the office six years. He had been the pastor
of the Sdlem Street Church in Boston, and was widely
known as a man of eminent pulpit talents. If others
could excel Mr. Towne in executive affairs, few men
were his equals in the grace of eloquence and delicacy
of taste. His reading of the Scriptures and of hymns
charmed his hearers and found many admirers. Mr.
Towne still lives, an aged man, in Andover, Mass.
His successor, the Rev. Orpheus T. Lanphear, was
installed September 5, 1855, his pastorate continuing
one year. He preached what may be denominated
strong sermonf. He possessed a logical mind with a
trenchant and incisive style, which did not please all,
but which challenged the attention of intellectual
men. Mr. Lanphear still lives iu Beverly, Mass.,
where he was once a settled pastor.
The Rev. Owen Street was installed pastor of High
Street Church, September 16, 1857, and continued in
ofBce till his death, in 1887, a period of thirty years,
which was longer by ten years than that of all his
predecessors. Mr. Street was a man of sterling com-
mon sense, of tender and gentle nature, of high in-
tellectual culture, and he was one of those few men
whom all seemed to revere and love. Both his char-
acter and his long pastorate warrant me in giving a
very brief account of his life.
He was born in Eist Haven, Conn., September 8,
1815. He could trace back his genealogy through a
long lice of clergymen. He entered Yale College in
1833. Among his classmates were Samuel J. Tilden,
William M. Evarts and Chief Justice Waite. After
his graduation from the theological seminary at
Yale, he found a temporary employment as the pre-
ceptor of an academy in Clinton, Conn. As a teacher
he was very successful, hLs work being congenial to
136
HISTORY OF 5IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
his nature. In 1842 he was ordained as pastor of the
Congregational Church in Jamestown, N. Y. After
a successful pastorate of nine years, ill health com-
pelled him to resign his charge. In September, lSo2,
he was installed over the church in Ansonia, Conn.
From consideration of health he resigned his office
here, and was subsequently installed as pastor of the
High Street Church in Lowell, in 1857. In this pas-
torate the best of his years were spent. His work
was crowned with eminent success, for few men were
ever more revered and loved, and few men were ever
more tenderly mourned. The history of his last days
is peculiarly touching. It was well known that the
mutual love betwen Dr. Street and his excellent wife
was unusually tender and strong. When the husband
slowly approached the time of his departure, the
heart-stricken wife, foreseeing the anguish of the
approaching separation, declared that if her hus-
band departed, she should go with him. Her
words were prophetic, for in death they were not
divided, and they were both buried on the same day
and in the same grave.
Dr. Street had reached the age of seventy-two
years. His successor, the Rev. Charles W, Hunting-
ton, was installed February 29, 1S8S, having been
pastor of the Central Church in Providence, R. I.
The house of worship, when purchased of St. Luke's
Society, attracted observation and criticism for its
peculiar style of Gothic architecture. The walls were
surmounted with pinnacles, and its whole aspect was
novel in the extreme. The poet Whittier is quite
severe in his remarks upon it. I quote from his
" Stranger in Lowell ": " The attention of the stranger
is also attracted by another consecrated building on
the hill-slope in Belvidere — one of Irving's ' Shingle
Palaces,' painted in imitation of stone — a great
wooden sham, 'whelked and horned' with pine
spires and turrets, a sort of whittled representation
of the many-headed beast of the Apocalypse."
But the horns have been removed, and the building
is now a modest and attractive house of worship.
HuiHLAXD COXGREGATIONAL ChuRCH. — The
"Highlands" of Lowell, extending westward far
away from the older Congregational Churches of
Lowell, and being rapidly occupied by the new resi-
dences of a thrifty and enterprising class of citizens,
seemed, as early as 1883, to call for a new church in
that part of the city. In accordance with this senti-
ment the "Highland Congregational Association"
was formed in February of that year. Under the
auspices of this association religious services began
to be held in Highland Hall, March 11, 188.S. Until
a church was formed meetings were held in this hall,
the pastors of other churches giving their services m
preachers in aid of the new tnterprise.
On January 1, 1SS4, "The Highland Congrega-
tional Church " was duly organized by an ecclesias-
tical council, the services of recognition being held
in the Eliot Church. Rev. Dr. C. \V. Wallace, of
Manchester, N. H., was the acting pastor of this
church for the first six months. The fir^t pastor, the
Rev. S. Winchester Adriance, was educated at Dart-
mouth College and the Theological Seminaries of
Andover and Princeton. His installation took place
January 1, 1885. The first house of worship erected
by this church was a wooden edifice, first occupied in
December,1884. But the rapid increase in cumbers soon
demanded larger accommodations, and in 1888, a new
edifice of brick, capable of holding 800 worshipers,
was erected. This elegant house, on Westford Street,
(erected at a cost of about $85,000), surrounded, as it
is, by private dwellings recently erected in modern
style, with fiae lawns around them, may well be
called, " beautiful for situation, the joy '" of the High-
lands of the city. The number of members of this
church, which was only fifty-three in 1884, haa
rapidly risen to 223 in 1889. A bright prospect lies
before it; but its history is short, because its days
have been few.
Third Co^•GREGATIO^■AL CHVRnr.— Disbanded
churches also have a history. As early as 1832 the
worshipers at the First Congregational Church found
themselves too numerous tor proper accommodation
in their house of worship. On June 25, lb32, a meet-
ing was held in the vestry of this church, with the
view of forming a new Congregational Church. A
council was called to meet July 2, 1832. This council
sanctioned the enterprise, and the third Congrega-
tional Church was duly organized.
The first and only pastor of this church, Rev.
Giles Pease, of Coventry, Rhode Island, was installed
October 2, 1833. The place of worship was the large
wooden building erected by the Methodists on the
corner of -^Iarket and Suffolk Streets, now no longer
used .as a church. The financial irregularities of its
treasurer compelled it to give up its house of worship
in 1S33, and hold its meetings in the Town Hall.
Subsequently this church purchased the " theatre
building," the second building above Worthen Street
on the north side of Market Street, at the cost of
$4000. At the dedication of this building as a
churcli it is said that the unusually iarge audience
was due in part to the fact that a wag had given no-
tice that a performance would be given that evening
at the theatre.
In 1834 this church tried the free church system.
But the enterprise languished and was given up in
1838. There is no record of its last days, but the tra-
dition is that the members voted themselves letters of
dismission to other churches of their choice.
Tde French Protestant Church. — This church
is, in its government and creed, of the Congregational
order. It had its origin in the religious wants of the
great number of French people who, in later years,
have come to the city from the British Provinces.
Fifty years ago almost all the operatives in our
mills were of New England origin. By degrees Irish
help was very extensively employed. And then fol-
LOWELL.
137
lowed the French from Canada and elsewhere, until
now, as I am told by an overseer in one of our mills,
the French operatives even outnumber the Irish.
Tiiey prove to be intelligent and quick to learn.
The French who have come to Lowell are mainly
Catholic. They seem to be a devout people and they
throng St. Joseph's Church, on Lee Street. Already
a second church of spacious dimensions is being
erected on Merrimack Street for the accommodation
of our French Catholic population. Its name is to be
St. Jean Baptiste Church.
But among the French inhabitants of Lowell there
is a goodly number of Protestants. For these the
French Protestant Church was established. Its or-
ganization touk place July 3, 1877. Worship, which
has always been conducted in the French tongue, was
maintained in the hall of the Young Men's Christian
Association and perhaps eUewhere, until the erection
of the elegant French church on Bowers and Fletcher
Streets. This church, including the land, cost $14,000.
It is of brick and was erected about seven years ago.
Rev. T. S. A. Cot6 was pastor from July 3, 1877, to
March 1, 1884 ; Rev. C. E. Amaron, from May 1, 1884,
to November 1, 1886 ; Rev. Joseph Moiin, from De-
cember 1, 188G, to July 1, 1888; Rev. T. A. Derome,
acting pastor, from October 15, 1888, to April 15, 1889;
Rev. Joseph H. Paradis has been pasior since Sep-
tember 16, 1889. The resident membersnip is seventy-
one.
Swedish Evangelical Lutheran Chukch. —
This new church enterprise aflbrds an illustration of
the well-known fact that people of any nationality,
when in a strange land, love to unite in a religious
worship which recalls the memories of their early
home.
This church was organized in 1882. For about five
years it had no settled pastor, its pulpit being sup-
plied by theological students and other clergymen.
Until 1885 the place of worship was in the First Pres-
byterian Church on Appleton Street, and perhaps in
other places. In 1885 a church was erected on Meadow-
craft Street at a cost of about S6000. It is of wood,
and is capable of seating 400 persons.
The first pastor, Rev. L. H. Beck, was settled in
1887. Rev. J. V. Soderman became pastor August
29, 1889, and is still in service.
Swedish Evangelical Mission. — This mission
was organized June 13, 1885. Its methods are those
of the Congregational Churches. It worshiped at
first in Parker Hall, on Gorham Street, and subse-
quently in the church of the Primitive Methodists, on
Gorham Street. The house of worship which the
mission first erected was dedicated May 21, 1886.
This building was burned November 6, 1887. Their
present house, on London Street, was promptly
erected at a cost of S4000. The seating capacity of
this church is 300 in the auditorium, and 165 in the
vestry, which is in the lower story. This mission has
received valuable aid from the Kirk Street Congrega-
tional Church in furnishing its house of worship. It
is almost free from debt.
Its pastors have been Rev. Fritz Erickson, whose
pastorate began May 21, 1886, and Rev. Emil Holm-
blad, the present pastor, who assumed the duties of
his oflBce January 6, 1889.
The First Presbyterian Church. — This church
was organized June 23, 1869. It is the only Ameri-
can Presbyterian Church in Lowell, and is under the
Presbytery of Boston and Synod of New York of the
Presbyterian Church in the United States.
The roll of the church contains the names of 250
members, some of whom are non-residents. The roll
of the Sunday-school contains 270 names, the average
attendance being nearly 200.
The congregation worshiping with this church is
composed largely of citizens of Scotch descent.
The first pasior was Rev. John Brash, who was in-
stalled October 26, 1869. He was succeeded by Rev.
Alfred C. Roe, brother of the novelist, who was in-
stalled November 1, 1870. The third pastor. Rev.
Soltan F. Calhoun, was installed in October, 1871.
The present pastor. Rev. Robert Court, D.D., was in-
stalled May 6, 1874.
Dr. Court was born in Glasgow, Scotland, and is an
alumnus of Glasgow University and also of the Free
Church Theological College, Glasgow. Before coming
to Lowell he was settled at Malcom, la., for five
years. He is distinguished for his scholarship, for
his vast accumulation of knowledge, and for a re-
markable memory, which readily affords him abun-
dant material for the discussion of almost any subject
in the range of human learning.
In its early days this church worshiped in Jack-
son Hall and in various other places. It purchased
its present house of worship, on Appleton Street, of
the Appleton Street Congregational (now Eliot)
Church for 815,000, and begin to worship in it about
January 1, 1874.
Westminster Presbyterian Church. — This
church is in its infancy. Its members are an excel-
lent class of citizens, mainly of Scotch and provincial
origin.
The church was formed February 22, 1888. Its pas-
tor, Rev. F. H. Larkin, was inducted into the sacred
office September, 1888. He was educated in Mon-
treal. The church worships in Mechanics' Hall, ita
membership being about 100.
First Baptist Church.— This church was organ-
ized February 6, 1826. It was the second church
formed in the original territory of the city, St. Anne's
Episcopal being the first. From the organization of
St. Anne's Church in 1824 until two other churches
(the First Baptist and the First Congregational) bad
been formed, in 1826, a certain amount was regularly
deducted from the pay of the operatives in the Mer-
rimack Mills to support religious worship at St. An-
ne's. To many of the operatives this tax was dis-
tasteful, and to some it seemed oppressive. The tax
138
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
was abandooed, the public opinion against it being
very strongly expressed.
As early as 1825 the Baptists began to consider the
question of forming a church of their own persuasion.
Prayer-meetings were held in private houses. It is
even asserted, and probably with truth, that one and
perhaps two Baptist clergymen preached sermons in
private dwellings before the first sermon of Dr. Ed-
son was preached, on March 7, 1824. The house of
Jonathan C. Morrill, the Srst postmaster of Lowell,
seems to have been the place in which most of these
early devotional meetings of the Baptists were held,
and for this reason it has been styled a tent in the
wilderness. These earnest and crowded meetings
seem to have given offence to Mr. Kirk Boott, agent of i
the mills, but the Baptists bravely held their ground. |
Only nine months after the organization of the |
church their first house of worship was dedicated. |
The dedication of the house and the installation of j
their first pastor. Rev. John Cookson, took place on
the same day, November 15, 1826. This first house,
situated on Church Street, is the same as that in
which the church now worships. Great alterations
and improvements have, however, been made in it.
The selection of the spot on which the church stands
has a somewhat romantic interest. A young lady,
who was baptized and admitted to the church soon
after its organization, was importuned by Mr. Thomas
Hurd, an early manufacturer in Lowell, to enter
his mill as an operative. She had objections on ac-
count of the distance of the mills from her home, but
finally said: "I will come- and work for you if you
will give our little church a lot of land to build a
meeting-house on." " I will,'' was the prompt reply,
and the rtsult was that the present site was selected.
The land thus donated by Mr. Hurd had not a high
value, perhaps about $150, and was rather low, hav-
ing between it and Central Street a marshy spot,
over which a dry path was made by means of boards
and shavings which the brethren brought to the spot
on their way to the Saturday evening meetings. The
church members must have been a feeble band at
first, for when the first pastor was called only nine
votes were cast, and three of those in the negative.
From such small beginnings has sprung one of the
strongest church organizations in our city. It seems,
however, that the " society " was stronger than the
church. The members of the " society " embraced
some of the most prominent and worthy citizens, and
with these men the pastor chosen by the church was
far from being popular. The result was that Mr.
Cookson, yielding to the many charges made against
him, as being an unfit man for his position, resigned
his office not many months after his settlement. He
seems to have been a good pastor, and in his short
pastorate many new members were added to the
church. He was born in England, and after acting
as pastor of churches in Maiden and Lowell, Mass.,
aud in Morrisauia, N. Y., he returned to England.
But the resignation of Mr. Cookson did not restore
harmony. The man selected by the church as second
pastor did not plea?e the " society,'' and so for months
there was no pastor of the church.
At length Rev. Enoch W. Freeman was selected
for the sacred office, and was installed June 4, 1828.
The pastorate of Mr. Freeman was one of great
prominence and importance in the history of the
church. He was a man of marked aud peculiar
character. He graduated from Waterville College in
1S27, at the age of twenty-nine years, and in only one
year after his graduation he became pastor of the
church in Lowell.
The signs of disaffection which had existed early
in Mr. Freema'i's ministry became very apparent
upon his marriage to his cousin, a woman who had
been divorced from her husband, and had a tarnished
reputation. As time passed, new causes of sttspicion
and scandal arose. One Kenney, of Boston — i man
of intemperate habits and a gambler, who had once
been a lover of !Mrs. Freeman — was wont to frequent
the parsonage in Lowell. On one Sunday afternoon
Mr. Freeman began the religious services in the
usual way ; but, on reading the second hymn, he was
attacked with sickness of a peculiar nature, and was
borne tenderly from the church to his home, where
he died on the succeeding Tuesday. His widow ere
long married -Mr. Kenney. About four years after
this marriage Mr. Kenney died undtr such suspi-
cious circumstances tha^ his wife was strongly '•tis-
pected of poisoning him, and she was tried for mur-
der. The body of Mr. Freeman was exhumed, and
found to be .'surcharged with poison. The two hus-
bands, as well as the father of Mr. Freeman, had
died with similar symptoms and under very 3us|)i-
cious circumstances, and there were many who fully
believed that the suspected woman was a second Lu-
cretia Borgia. The absence of a suBicient motive for
the commission of such horrid crimes was probably
the only consideration that secured her acquittal.
The sensation occasioned by this painful affair
produced a feeling in the church destructive to all
Christian fellowship and harmony. Religion and
scandal cannot live together in peace. The fearful
wrong by which the pastor's life was taken away
created in those who loved him and believed him a
murdered man the profoundest .sympathy. This sym-
pathy prepared them to be dissatisfied with his suc-
cessor, whoever he might be. Nobody could fill the
place of the beloved, the murdered Mr. Freeman.
His successor, the Rev. Joseph W. Eaton, a recent
graduate of Newton Seminary, and a young man of
great promise, was ordained February 24, 1836. But
the hearts of the people seemed shut against him.
" He felt the shadow of Freeman falling evervwhere."
He was charged with preaching an imprudent ser-
mon, and was asked to resign. Only one short year
before, he had received an almost unanimous vote,
inviting him to come, and now an almost unanimous
LOWELL.
139
vote invites him to leave. The church was without
a pastor during most of 1837. The dissensions were
not healed. A council was called to settle difficul-
ties. Men who had been set aside for their opposi-
tion to Mrs. Freeman were restored to fellowship.
At length the true character of the suspected woman
appeared ; she was excluded from the church, and
the dark shadow passed away.
The third pastor, Rev. Joseph Ballard, was installed
December 25, 1837. He proved to be the man most
needed by the distracted church. "He brought ex-
perience, character and firmness. It needed just
such a man to adjust matters and restore quiet and
order. Under him the church flourished, and in
1840, 137 new members were added."
It was in Mr. Ballard's ministry that the extensive
revival occurred under the preaching of the great revi-
valist, Rev. Jacob Knapp, whose services were held
in the First Baptist Church. " No such revival ever
occurred in Lowell. It was general, deep, permanent
in its results. The records of the church that year
were like the bulletins of a conqueror."
Mr. Ballard, on coming to Lowell, was in the prime
of manhood, being thirty-eight years of age, and he
did a noble work in bringing to the church harmony
and strength and great prosperity. His pastorate in
Lowell continued eight years. He had been settled
over churches in Medfield and Hyannis, Mass., and in
South Berwick, Me. After leaving Lowell he preached
for several years in Yorkville, N. Y.
On January 29, 1846, Rev. Daniel C. Eddy was or-
dained as pastor of this church. He was only twenty-
three years of age, and this was his first pastorate.
He bad been educated for the min'stry in the New
Hampton Theological Seminary, and came to Lowell
with fresh zeal and bright promise of future useful-
ness and distinction in his sacred calling. This prom-
ise he has abundantly fulfilled. Few clergymen
have gained a more commanding influence or risen to
a higher position as orators or as men than he. He
gave strength to his church, and though very young,
he soon proved himself the peer of any clergyman in
the city. His pastorate continued eleven years. Since
leaving Lowell he has been the pastor of churches in
Boston, Fall River and Philadelphia.
Rev. Wm. H. Alden, a graduate of Brown Univer-
sity, was installed as pastor June 10, 1857. He had
been settled in Attleborough before coming to Low-
ell, and since leaving Lowell he has been settled in
Albany, X. Y., and in Portsmouth, N. H. He proved
a very acceptable pastor, especially in social life and
pastoral duty.
Rev. Wm. E. Stanton was ordained to the sacred of-
fice November 2, 1865, and continued in service until
1870, when ill-health compelled him to resign. He
was a young man of excellent spirit and devout
Christian character. He was a graduate of Madison
University and Theological Institution.
Upon leaving Lowell he sought health iu Florida,
where he labored successfully for the Home Miaaion-
ary Society.
Rev. Norman C. Mallery was settled July 1, 1870,
and continued in the pastorate four years. He was a
graduate of Madison University and Theological Sem-
inary. He had previously preached in Morrisville,
N. Y., and in Manchester, N. H. On leaving Lowell
he took charge of a church in Detroit, Mich. He filled
his office well and especially excelled as a sermon-
izer.
Rev. Orson E. Mallory was settled in March, 1875.
It is an interesting fact that the three pastors last
mentioned were classmates in Madison University,
and graduated the same day. Mr. Mallory is now
pastor of the Branch Street Baptist Church in
Lowell.
On May 1, 1878, Rev. T. M. Colwell was installed
as pastor. Dr. Colwell was a man of marked ability,
and he gained, while pastor of the church, a command-
ing influence. His connection with the well-known
"Colwell JLotor" enterprise, in the minds of some,
greatly impaired his reputation, while others still
cling to him with affection and with faith in the hon-
esty of his conduct and the uprightness of his char-
acter.
Rev. John Gordon was installed as pastor in Feb-
ruary, 1885. He was a man of Scotch descent, and
of decided talent, but as a pastor he proved a man so
positive in his convictions and so blunt and dogmatic
in the expression of them, that he failed to gain the
favor of his parishioners.
Rev. Alexander Blackburn, the present pastor, was
ordained October 23, 1887. Under his administration
the church is in a prosperous condition, the " known
list" of members being 629. This church sustains a
Sabbath-Bchool of 580 members, and is engaged in
other benevolent enterprises.
WoRTHEN Street Baptist Chdech. — The his-
tory of this church apparently begins with a meeting
held on September 6, 1831, in the vestry of the First
Baptist Church, in order to take measures for the for-
mation of a second Baptist Church in Lowell. As
the result of this and a subsequent meeting an eccle-
siastical council met on September 13, 1831, at the
house of Deacon S. C. Oliver, and duly formed a new
sister church of " Baptist faith and order." In the
Town-Hall, which had been engaged by the new so-
ciety as a place of worship, a religious service was
held on the evening of the same day, at which Rev.
Mr. Barnaby, of Danvers, preached, and the new
church was duly recognized.
Rev. James Barnaby, the first pastor of this church,
was installed on July 5, 1832. In these early days
the church grew rapidly in numbers. It took high
ground on the great moral questions of the day, espe-
cially on that of temperance. The first house of wor-
ship, a neat and commodious building of brick, situ-
ated on Suffolk Street, was completed as early as July,
1S33. This building is now in the hands of the
140
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTV, MASSACHUSETTS.
Catholics. Afterserving in the sacred office three yearj,
Mr. Burnaby resigned the pastorate. It is worthy of
remark, in regard to him, that over cue church, that
of West Harwiclc, he was settled four times, and that
during hia life aa a pastor he baptized over 2800
persons.
On October 29, 183-i, Rev. Lemuel Porter, of the
Newton Theological tjeminary, was recognized as the
second pastor of this church. He proved a sliillful
and capable leader of his flock. During his pastorate
of more than fifteen years the church was eminently
prosperous, the number of members in 1847 being
estimated as high as nearly 900. In 1S51 Jlr. Por-
ter's resignation was accepted. He died in October,
186i, while in service aa secretary of the American
Tract Society.
The Kev. James W. Smith, a student from Newton
Theological Seminary, became pastor of this church
in 1851, and served in the sacred office two years.
After leaving Lowell he was a pastor in Philadelphia
for twenty-six years. The Lowell church gave him
up with deep regret.
Rev. D. S. Winn, also from the Newton Seminary,
was, on September 14, 1853, ordained as pastor, and
entered heartily and hopefully upon his work. After
about two years of service he accepted a call to a
church in Salem.
Rev. T. D. Worrall, from Mt. Holly, N. J., became
pastor in 18.55, and served the church till 1857.
Rev. J. W. Bonham was pastor from 1857 to 1S(J0.
He was an earnest and faithful pastor, and his church
gave him up with regret.
Rev. Geo. F. Warren, of Attleboro', was installed
in October, 1860. Under Mr. Warren's efficient ad-
ministration of seven years the flagging courage of
the church returned, the church debt was cleared
away and his pastorate was marked with union and
strength. In 1867 he accepted a call to Maiden, Mass.
Rev. S. R. Morse, of East Cambridge, was pastor of
this church from 1867 to 1870. His faithful labors
and the kindness of his heart are still tenderly recol-
lected by those who enjoyed his ministrations. It
was in his pastorate that the Branch Street ilission was
started, the Third Baptist Church and the Central
Baptist Church having become extinct.
Rev. Henry Miller, of Elizabeth, N. J., came to
this church aa pastor early in 1872, and remained two
years. To the great regret of his chsrch in Lowell
he accepted a c.iU to the Plymouth Baptist Church in
New York City. For about one year previous to
April, 1873, the church was without a pastor.
Rev. E. A. Lecorapte, of Syr.icuse, was installed as
pastor on Sept. 9, 1874. He found much to discour-
age him in performing the duties of his office. The
church had had no pastor for many months, the mill
operatives were no longer Protestants and worshipers
in Protestant Churches, and it was difficult for the
most faithful pastor to sustain the interests and pros-
perity of the church.
Mr. Lecompte died March 2, 1880. He was much
beloved, and the words of James have been ali'eciiou-
ately applied to his character: "First pure, then
peaceable, gentle and easy to be entreated, full of
mercy and good fruits." The vacancy in the pastor-
ate following the death of Mr. Lecompte, in March,
1880, was filled by Rev. J. C. Emory, under whose
successful ministration of five years the church debt
was paid, and 170 new members were added.
Rev. W. S. Ayers, of Newton Theological Semi-
nary, was ordained June 4, 1885, and is still the faithlul
pastor of the church.
On the last day of the year 1887 the wooden church
in which wor.-hip had been maintained lor nearly fifiy
years was burned to the ground. The church cnulil
iil aflTord to meet so great a loss, but with admirable
generosity, courage and despatch a new and elegant
house of brick has been erected. The new house is of
the Romanesque style, and provided with every mod-
ern convenience to meet the wants of a church.
The cost of the old church was $8000. The new
church, which was dedicated Feb. 26, 1890, cost about
$40,000. This sum includes the organ and all the in-
terior equipments of the church.
The Third Baptist Church was organized in 1840,
and in 1840 the edifice on John Street, now occupied
by the Central Methodist Church, was erected for its
occupancy at the cost of i^l4,000. This church, after
a struggle of twenty-one years for success, was com-
pelled to disband in 1S61. Its pastors were: Rev.
John G. Naylor, Rev. Ira Person, Rev. John Duncan,
Rev. Sereuo Howe, Rev. John Duer, Rev. J. Hubbard.
Baptist Fkesch Missiox. — This organization is
under the auspices of the American Baptist Home
Mission Society. It is not a church, but a mission.
Those who labor in it are members of various Lowell
churches. Its main design is to bring French Ro-
man Catholics under the influence of Protestant
churches. As early as 1871 Rev. N. Cyr commenced
holding French services in Lowell, and a colporteur
was employed to labor among the French people of
the city. Rev. J. N. Williams succeeded Mr. Cyr.
The services of these missioncries were conducted in
the French language, the meetings being held in the
rooms of the Young Men's Christian Association and
in the vestry of the First Baptist Church, and else-
where, probably. The missionaries have not always
resided in Lowell while conducting the mission.
Rev. G. Aubin followed Mr. Williams in charge of
the field. Mr. N. N. Aubin for some time had the
oversight of the work. Then followed Rev. E. U.
Brun. After Mr. Bruc, Mr. N. N. Aubin, having
completed his theological studies in the Newton Serai-
nary, again, as a regularly appointed missionary, as-
sumed the charge, under the auspices of the Baptist
Home Mission Society.
As the result of the labors of this mission fifty-one
French converts are reported to have joined the vari-
ous Baptist churches of the city.
LOWELL.
141
Branch Street Baptist Church. — This church
was organized July 1, 1869. Its house of worship,
dedicated Jan. 16, 1872, is in a rapidly-growing part of
the city. The auditorium is remarijable for its
acoustic qualities, few, if any. large halls in the city
equaling it in this respect. Its seating capacity is
1500. Present number of members, 419.
The first pastor of this church, Rev. E. A. Whittier,
assumed the pastoral office at the organization of the
church, July 1, 1869; Rev. G. F. Warren, Sept. 24,
1873; Rev. H. S. Pratt, Feb. 4, 187G ; Rev. 0. E.
Wallory, the present pastor, was settled March 3,
1878.
The seats in this church are free, weekly offerings
being relied upon to meet expenses.
Fifth Street Baptist Church.— This church
was organized March 17, 1874. It had its origin in
the religious wants of the part of the city in which it
is situated.
Before the erection of its hou?e of worship religious
services were held in a chapel built in 1872.
Its house of worship on Fifth Street in Centralville
was erected in 1879-80, and dedicated March 6, 1880,
its cost, land included, being $20,000. It has a seat-
ing capacity of 450.
The property is well situated as to its surroundings,
with a roomy chapel iu the rear of the church, in ihe
second story of which is a large social hall with a
kitchen.
Like nil other suburban churches, it has heretofore
suflered from the tendency of church-goers to seek a
bouse of worship on Sundays near the business cen-
tre of the city, where they go to trade on week-days.
The church begins to feel the influence of the in-
crease of the number of inhabitants in its vicinity,
and is, ou the whole, iu a prosperous condition.
Its pastors have been as follows : Rev. T. J. B. House,
settled March 17, 1874 ; Rev. M. C. Thwing, March
1, 1877 ; Rev. N. C. Mallory, Januarj- 1, 1882 ; Rev.
J. J. Reader, June 12, 1886; Rev. L. G. Barrett, Jan-
uary 1, 1888. Present number of members, 249.
Highland Baptist Church. — Since June, 1889,
Myron D. Fuller and John J. McCoy have held Gos-
pel services in Highland Hall, Branch Street. A Sun-
day-school has been formed. In October, 1889, it was
resolved to form a church, and steps are being now
taken to complete the organization. It is to be known
as the Highland Baptist Church.
Mdliodiit Churches. — The pastors of other denomi-
nations frequently remain so long in office, and their
lives are so intimately interwoven iu the lives of
their churches, that it has seemed almost a necessity,
in giving the history of the churches, to give also a
brief personal notice of the pastors. But in regard
to pastors of Methodist Churches these personal no-
tices are nearly precluded by the great number of
pastors and the shortness of their periods of service.
And yet the Christian Churcn has been blessed with
no more eloquent and devout men of holy lives and
exalted character than are found in the Methodist
denomination. The lives of such men well deserve
even more than a brief record, but this short history
cannot afford the space in which to give it. I am
therefore obliged to do what I am not pleased to do^
and to make the history of the Methodist Churches
far too statistical to interest the general reader.
St. PauPs Church. — In the churches in any city
and of any denomina'.ion it is worthy of remark that
the number of women far exceeds the number of
men. And it is not in numbers alone that they de-
serve most the love and honor of the Christian
Church. Such love and honor the Methodist Church
has never failed to give, and it is to a devout woman
that St. Paul's Church loves to trace its origin. This
woman, Miss Phebe Higgins, is said to have been
the first Methodist in the city of Lowell. She was a
woman in humble station, but eminent for the parity
of her life and conversation. She kept a journal of
her experience and lived to the great age of eighty-
seven years.
Mr. James R. Barnes, who came to Lowell in 1824,
and who had been previously ordained as a local
preacher, seems to have been mainly instrumental in
forming the first Methodist Church in the city. In
1824, about the 1st of June, he formed i "class" of
eleven persons in his own house in Dutton Street, on
the Merrimack Corporation. Of this " class " he be-
came the religious teacher, and this class was the
germ from which sprang Si. Paul's Methodist Church
and also the Worthen Street Methodist Church. Until
August, 1826, the Methodists of Lowell, though few
in number, kept up religious meetings and enjoyed
the occasional service of a preacher whenever such
service could be secured. One of these occasional
preachers. Rev. H. S. Ramsdell, says that on his com-
ing to Lowell to preach on one occasion Rev. Dr. Ed-
son " very kindly opened his church for our accom-
modation. He went to church with me and conduct-
ed me into the desk." The Old Red School-house
near Ha'e's Mills was the favorite place of meeting to
the early Methodists. Mr. Jonathan Knowles kindly
opened his hou=e for class and prayer-meetings,
"with a large cane keeping the bad men and boys
quiet without, while the Methodists sang and prayed
and exhorted within.''
In the Conference year ending in June, 1827, 135
sermons were delivered in Lowell by no less than
eleven clergyman, a record of them having been kept
by a son of Mr. Knowles.
The number of worshipers at length outgrew the
Old Red School-house, and a house of worship was
erected. This house, situated near the site of the
Court-House, on Chapel Hill, was dedicated on
Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 29, 1827, two and a half
years after the dedication of St. Anne's, and a few
days before the dedication of the First Congregation-
al Church on Merrimack Street. From this church
or chapel the place took the name of " Chapel Hill."
1-42
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Though other denominations formed " religious soci-
eties " earlier than the Methodists, the Methodists
claim that to thera belongs the honor of being the
first to form in Lowell a Christian Church.
About June 13. 1827, Rev. Hiram Walden was sta-
tioned by authority as a preacher and pastor in Low-
ell. Oq Dec. 14, 1827, Mr. Walden was succeeded by
Rev. A. D. Merrill, under whom the church greatly
prospered. On July 30, 1828, Rev. Benj. F. Lam-
bord became pastor. On June 17, 1829, Rev. Aaron
D. Sargeant was stationed in Lowell. On May 27,
1830, Rev. Ephraim K. Avery was appointed, under
whom the membership rose from 227 to 451.
I need to do scarcely more than briefly to refer to
the fact that in a few months after Mr. Avery had re-
moved from Lowell to Bristol, R. I., in 1832, a young
woman, Sarah M. Cornell, who was a member of his
church in Lowell, followed him to Rhode Island, and
was, on Dec. 20th, foully murdered by some unknown
Laud. Circumstances painfully suspicious pointed to
Mr. Avery as the murderer, and he was tried for the
crime and acquited. The New England Conference re-
solved that he was innocent. I cannot trace the subse-
quent career of Mr. Avery, but cau only state that
uearly thirty-four years after this affair he was a
highly respected citizen of Pittsfield, Ohio, and oc-
casionally preiiched wiih great acceptance.
lu 1831 an attempt was made to form a new ilethod-
ist Church, and a house of worship for the new or-
ganizatiou was erected on Lowell and Suffolk Streets,
— a large square, wooden house, without a s.eeple, —
but in a few months the enterprise failed for want of
pecuniary support. It was called TUe Second Metho-
dist Church. In 1832 Rev. George Pickering and
Rev. David Kilburn were appointed over the two
churches.
In 1833 Rev. Abram D. Merrill was appointed.
Under him the Methodists required two places of leli-
gious worship — their chapel on Chapel Hill and the
hall of the present City Government Building on
Merrimack Street, then called the Town Hall. Low-
ell was not yet a city. In 1834 the Methodists se-
cured as a place of worship the large house on Low-
ell Street, which they had vacated not long before,
and worship was uo longer held in the chapel or the
Town Hall. In this new house of worship there
came a very powerful revival. About Jan., 1835, the
chapel was re-opened, and during this year there
were two places of worship. Under Mr. Merrill's
ministrations, the membership increased from 390 to
724. And now follow in aucces-iion as pastors : Rev.
Ira M. Bidwell andJlev. Charles Noble, in 1835 ; Rev.
Orange Scott and Rev. John Parker, in 183G ; Rev.
E. \V. Stickney and Rev. John Lovejoy, in 1837.
Of the clergymen just mentioned. Rev. Orange
Scott became widely known and celebrated as an anti-
slavery lecturer in those stirring days of anti-slavery
agitation.
In 1837 the large brick church on Suffolk Street,
built by the Baptists and costing 320,000, was pur-
chased by the Methodists md occupied in place of the
wooden house on Lowell I now Market) Street. It is
now owned by the Catholics.
It was on June 13, 1838, that Bishop Waugh divi-
ded the one church worshiping in two separate places
into two distinct churches, to be called respectively
the Chapel Hill Church and the Wesley Chapel
Church, appointing Mr. Stickney as pa.stor of the
former, and Mr. Lovejoy pastor of the latter. From
the former sprang the St. Paul's Church, and from the
latter the Worthen Street Church. As the St. Paul's
Church occupied the first house of worship erected
by the Methodists of Lowell on Chapel Hill, it may
in a popular sense, be called the "Mother Church,"
but in reality, both the St. Paul Church and the
Worthen Street Church have the same origiu and the
same age.
Leaving for the present the history of the newly-
formed Wesley Chapel Church worshiping on Lowell
Street, we will trace that of the mother church on
Chapel Hill. The chapei becoming too much
crowded, a hall on Hurd and Central Streets was
hired to receive the ovei How till the new church, now
being erected between Hurd and Warren Sts., could
be completed. This church was dedicated on Nov.
14, 1839, its incorporated name being " The St. Paul's
Church. In the year of this dedication Rev. Orange
Scott, having relinquished his employment as an
anti-slavery lecturer, wa= for a second time the pastor.
The new church was erected on a somewhat romantic
spot where there was a sandy knoll, a burial-place of
the Indians, some of whose skeletons were found in
removing the knoll.
In 1841 a very serious conflict arose between the
bishop of the diocese and the church. The church
had requested the appointment of Rev. Schuyler
Hoes, of Ithaca, N. Y., as pastor. This the bishoj)
refused to grant, and appointed Rev. Joseph A. Mer-
rill. The people and the church rebelled, and Mr.
Merrill was denied admission to the pulpit. The re-
sult of the conflict was that Bishop Hedding came to
Lowell, and through his conciliatory course peace
was restored, Mr. Hoes receiving the appointment.
Under Mr. Hoes the church's membership W9s in-
creased by 175, there having been a revival following
the preaching of the Evangelist, Elder Knapp, in the
neighboring Baptist Church.
In the pastorate of Mr. Hoes also occurred the
"great secession " from St. Paul's Church, under the
leadership of Rev. Orange Scott, a secession in which
more than half the male members of the church
united. The seceding members formed a new church
called the Wesleyan Methodist Church, purchased
the vacated Methodist chapel on Chapel Hill,
and moved it to Prescott Street for their house of
worship. Here the church had for pastors. Rev. E.
S. Potter, Rev. James Hardy, Rev. Merritt Bates,
Rev. Wm. H. Brewster and Rev. Daniel Foster, the
LOWELL.
143
last of whom entered the army and was killed in bat-
tle at Fort Harrison, while in command of a company
of the Thirty-seventh Colored Troops.
The occasion of this Wesleyan secession was the
neglect of the National M. E. Church to discipline
members in the South who peristed in holding slaves,
and for alleged complicity with slavery. The subse-
quent course of the national church, however, was so
satisfactory to anti-slavery men that, by degrees,
most of the seceders returned to the fold, and the se-
cession movement was one of short duration.
The space allowed for the history of St. Paul's
Church is so far exhausted that I have room only to
mention the list of pastors since 1842, a list which
contains many gifted men of commanding eloquence.
1 give the date of appointment in connection with
each name. Rev. Wm. H. Hatch, in 1843 ; Rev.
Stephen Remington, in 1845; Rev. Charles K. True,
D.D., in 184G; Rev. Alphonso A. Willetts, in 1848;
Rev. Wm. S. Stud ley, also in 1848; Rev. John H.
Twombly, in iS49; Rev. Gershom F. Cox, in 1851;
Rev. L. b. Barrows, D.D., in 1853; Rev. Daniel E.
Chapin, in ISoJi; Rev. George M. Steele, in 185G ;
Rev. Henry M. Loud, in 1858; Rev. Wm. R. Clark,
in 18G0; Rev. Daniel Dorchester, in 18G2 ; Rev. Sam-
uel F. Upham, in 18G4 ; Rev. Sylvester F. Jones in
1867 ; Rev. D. C. Kuowles, in 1870; Rev. T. Burton
Smiih, in 1872; Rev. Wm. S. Studley, in 1875 ; Rev.
Merritt Hulburd, in 1877; Rev. Charles D. Hills, iu
1879; Rev. Hiram D. Weston, in 1882; Rev. Charles
F. Rice, in 1885; Rev. Charles E. Davis, in 1888.
Worthen Street Mcthotlist Church. — For the history
of this church prior to June 13, 183s, I refer the
reader to my account of St. Paul's Methodist Church,
for up to that date the two churches were one and
the same church. The original church, before its di-
vi.siou, had worshiped in the Old Red School-house,
in the chapel on Chapel Hill, in the Town Hall, in
the wooden church on Market Street, and in the
brick church on Suffolk Street. As the exigency de-
manded, it had had sometimes one pastor and some-
times two, sometimes one house of worship and some-
times two. But after the division of the original
church into two distinct churches, called the Chapel
Hill Church and the Wesley Chapel, the latter, now
the Worthen Street Church, worshiped for three
years in the brick house on Suffolk Street.
In tracing the history of the Worthen Street M. E.
Church, I begin with a list of all its pastors from 1838
to the present time, after which, with this list before
us, I shall give a brief account of the church. The
pastors, with the date of their appointment, have
been as follows:
1S38, Johu Lovejoy ; 18.in, Jotham Horton ; 1841, A. D. Snrgeant ;
184.1, A. D. Merrill ; 1845, J. Springer, J. Sanborn ; 1817, I. A. Savage ;
IWa, C. .Wilms ; 18,il, I. J. P. Colljer ; 1S-.3. M. A. Hone ; 185% J. W.
SuilniuM; 1857, A. 1'. snrgeant ; 1S58, AY. H. Hatch ; Iwill, A. D. Sar-
geaut ; 1801. L. U. Tli.ijer, Chester Field ; 18(3, \V. H. llutch ; ISM. J.
0. Peck ; 1807, George Wliiltaiier ; lS7n, George S. Clmdblirue ; 187C,
1). 11. Ela; 1670, F. J. Waguer ; \il^, George Collyer ; 1S81, N. T.
Whitakcr; 1884, E. E. Thorndlke ; 1887, W. T.Worth; 1888, W. T.
Perrin.
From 1834 to 1841 peace aud harmony reigned.
But in 1841 came the great conflict between the
bishnp and the two Lowell churches on the subject
of slavery. The Lowell churches, believing that the
National M. E. Church had truckled to the slave
power, were unwilling to accept as pastors the cler-
gymen appointed by the bishop. To the Wesley
Chapel the bishop had appointed, in 1841, Rev. A. D.
Sargeant. The church refused to receive him, and
elected Rev. Wm. H. Brewster as their pastor. Mr.
Sargeant, with 173 members of the church, held relig-
ious services in Mechanics' Hall until the new house
of worship on Worthen Street was completed in the
following year. This house of worship, dedicated io
1842, still remains the house of worship of the Wor-
then Street M. E. Church. Its original cost was
$9000.
Respecting the general character of this church, I
can do no better than to quote the language of Rev.
N. T. Whittaker, its pastor in 1884:
"The Worthen Street Church has always been a
revival church. More thau 10,000 have been enrolled
upon her records as members. More than 15,000
souls have professed conversion at her altars. The
church is remarkable for her harmonious, benevolent
aud progressive spirit, and is thoroughly consecrated
to the service of Christ."
The present pastor, Rev. W. T. Perrin, is a clear-
thinking, genial man, and a successful pastor.
In 1889 and 1890 the church edifice was almost
entirely reconstructed at an expense of S13,000.
Central Methodist Church. — The years of 1851 and
1852 were years of unusual religious interest in the
Methodist Churches of Lowell. Crowds gathered at
the houses of worship. Rev. Mr. Collyer, of the
Worthen Street Church, seemed to be endowed with
great power over the minds of his hearers. This state
of things naturally suggested a new Methodist Church
to meet the growing numbers and the kindling en-
thusiasm.
Accordingly anew church organization was formed,
and the building opposite our post-office now known
as Barristers' Hall was hired for a place of worship.
This building had been erected for the Third Uui-
versalist Society, formed in 1843 and subsequently dis-
banded.
The first pastor of the new church, the Rev. William
Studley, an eloquent man, was appointed in April,
1854. His successor, Rev. I. S. Cuahman, pa8r.or of
the church in 1856-57, filled the sacred office under
great discouragements. These years were yeajs of
financial distress. Many mills closed, their operatives
leaving the city for their homes in the country, and
these causes depleted the number of worshipers and
brought gloom and discouragement.
Next follows Rev. I. J. P. Collyer, a man of ardent
zeal and skilful leadership. The church revived
144
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
again. Rev. Chester Field came to the church as
pastor in 1860, amidst the rumors of war. The num-
ber of the young men worshiping in this church
who enlisted in the army, seriously impaired its ef-
ficiency and property.
Next follows in 1861, Rev. L. R. Thayer, who
infused new life into the church. Its numbers in-
creased. It was during Mr. Thayer's pastorate that this
church purchased of the Baptists the house on John
Street which it now occupies, tor $8000. Mr. Thayer
had a large place in the hearts of his people.
In 1863 Rev. J. H. Mansfield was appointed to the
pastorate of the church, and in 1865 the Rev. Andrew
McKeown. Uuder both these pastors the prosperity of
the church continued, the debt of $4000 being
paid off.
In 1867 Rev. Wm. High began a ministry of three
years, in which $5000 was expended in improving the
house of worship.
In 1870 Rev. Fred Woods became pastor, and in
1872 Rev. Daniel Dorchester, a man who has since
attained a high reputation, having been recently ap-
pointed by President Harrison a commissioner to
the Indians.
Rev. J. H. Mansfield, in 1874, was a second time
appointed pastor of this church, and was in the sacred
office three years.
Then follow Rev. M. B. Chapman, Rev. Geo. L.
AVeslgate, Rev. W. W. Foster. Jr., Rev. I. H. Packard,
Rev. S. B. Sweeter, Rev. J. N. Short.
Mr. .Short is the present incumbent. The member-
ship of the church is about 300.
Centralville Methodist Church. — The village of Cen-
tralville, which constitutes all that part of Lowell
which was in 1851 set off from the town of Dracut, on
the north side of the Merrimack River, contained at
the last census about 8000 inhabitants. Since that
time the population has rapidly increased. Up to 1886
only one church of any denomination had been erected
in the village. In the latter part of that year, Rev. C.
V. Dunning, presiding elder of the Dover District, New
Hampshire Conference, carefully looked over the
ground and fixed his eye on a desirable location for
a church, and reported the whole matter to the en-
suing Conference in 1887. Accordingly the Bishop
of the New Hampshire Conference, to who^e Episco-
pal jurisdiction the village belonged, advised the for-
mation of such a church, and in May, 1887, he ap-
pointed Rev. Sullivan Holman as its pastor.
The church was organized with only four members
on June 19, 1887. A lot for a church edifice on Bridge
and Hildreth Streets was purchased, and divine wor-
ship was held for one year in a cottage standing on
the lot.
The work of erecting a house of worship was
promptly begun, and at the present time the vestry in
the basement story is finished and is used for the
meetings of the church.
The enterprise is still in itj infancy. It occupies
an important position, and is surrounded by a rapidly
increaj-ing population. The fact that the member-
ship has already increased from four to sixty or sev-
enty, bears witness to the fidelity of the pastor and the
zeal of the people.
The house of worship is to be of brick and will
probably cost about $18,000.
The Berean Frimithe Methodist Church. — In 1884
the population of Lowell had extended so far up the
Concord River, that there .seemed to be an evident
call tor the work of a church in that quarter of the
city. Accordingly a mission school was established
by the Methodists on October 3, 1884, and a small
hall was built for its use on land owned by Mr. James
Dugdale, on Lawrence Street. The leaders of this
enterprise were Rev. J. A. McGreaham and Mr.
Thomas Leland.
After two years the hall on Lawrence Street was
sold, and the church, which was first organized as a
mission school, moved into il.s new house of worship
on Moore Street, near Lawrence Street. This house
was first occupied in December, 1886, but was dedi-
cated May 7, 1S87.
The first p.istor of this church. Rev. G. J. Jeffries,
was appointed May 10, 1887.
The second and present pastor, Rev. T. G. Spencer,
was appointed May 8, 1889. The cost of the house
of worship was $2500. Its seating capacity is 300.
First Frimitice Mctho'list Church. — This church
was organized in 1871. Like other Primitive Meth-
odist Churches, it dilfers from the Methodist Episco-
pal Churches in rejecting Episcopal con.rol and in
adhering to what is believed to be the primitive apos-
tolic methods of the early Christian Churches.
The church was organized in a hall near Davis'
Corner, where worsliip was held. The present hou=e
of worship on Gotham Street was erected in 1871, at
the cost of $8J00. It wi.l seat 400 persons and large
congregations attend its services.
The present number of members is 195. Since the
erection of the church, a parsonage has been built on
Congress Street, in the rear of the church.
The following are the names of the pastors of this
church as appointed by the Conference: Rev. William
Kirby, Rev. Joseph Parker, Rev. George Parker, Rev.
Charles Spurr. No successor to Mr. Spurr was ap-
pointed for three or four years, the church mean-
time being disbanded.
On January 5, 1879, it was reorganized, and Rev.
N. W. Matthews appointed pastor. He served four
years, and was succeeded by Rev. J. A. McGreaham,
and then by the present pastor. Rev. T. M. Bateman,
under whom tlie church prospers.
Highland Methodist Episcopal Church. — This church
was organized March 12, 1875. Until June, 1876,
divine service wis held in Highland Hall, on Branch
Street. The house of worship now occupied by this
church is situated on L:ring Street and was dedicated
June U, 1876.
LOWELL.
145
Services preparatory to the formation of a church
were held in Highland Hall as early as September,
1874, the desk being occupied generally by 8tadent«
from the Boston Theological School. But early in
1875 Rev. G. W. H. Clark became the pastor and con-
tinued in office until September, 1875.
From September, 1875, to April, 1877, Rev. J. H.
Mansfield, pastor of the Central Methodist Episcopal
Church, assisted by the other Methodist pastors of
the city, supplied the pulpit.
The following is the list of pastors since appointed
to this church, with the dates of their appointment:
Rev. Abner R. Gregory, April, 1877; Rev. G. H.
Clark, April, 1878 ; Rev. Austin H. Herrick, April,
1879 ; Rev. E. A. Smith, April, 1881 ; Rev. W. H.
Meredith, April, 1884; Rev. W. W. Colburn, April.
1887 ; Rev. Alexander Dight, the present pastor,
April, 1889. Present membership, 200.
This church occupies a position of much import-
ance in one of the most beautiful and most rapidly
increasing parts of the city, and it was to meet the
wants of this thriving and attractive section of
Lowell that the church was e.stablished.
South Congregational Society. — This is familiarly
known as the Unitarian Church. Its first germ of re-
corded history is found in a meeting held on August
30, 1829, in the house of Thomas Ordway, well known
in after years as the clerk of the city of Lowell, to
consider the expediency of forming a Unitarian So-
ciety. The result was that such a society was organ-
ized at a s'^bsequent meeting, held on September 26,
1829, in the stone house near Pawtucket FalliJ, long
known as the residence of Dr. J. C. Ayer. Among
the founders of this society were many of the most
distinguished men of the city. I need mention only
the names of Judge Thomas Hopkinson, Judge Jo-
seph Locke, Samuel L. Dana, LL.D., Dr. John C.
Dalton, Judge Seth Ames, Dr. Elisha Bartlett, first
mayor of the city, Samuel Batchelder, Hon. Luther
Lawrence, second mayor of Lowell, and James G.
Carney, a well-known banker.
Rev. Wm. Barry, the first pastor of this church,
was ordained November 17, 1830, the services of ordi-
nation being held in the First Baptist Church. Up
to this time the society had worshiped in the Free
Chapel on Middlesex Street. Mr. Barry's pastorate
continued four years. He was a graduate of Brown's
University and of the Harvard Divinity School.
After leaving Lowell he was settled over a church in
Framingham, and afterwards he returned to Lowell
and became the pastor of the Lee Street Unitarian
Church. He was a man of thorough education, re-
fined taste and pure life. He recently died in the
city of Chicago. Though not a man of vigorous
health, he attained a great age.
On December 14, 1836, Rev. Henry A. Miles was
installed as second pastor of this church. Dr. Miles
graduated at Brown University in 1829, and at Har-
vard Divinity School in 1832, and had, before coming
10-ii
to Lowell, been settled for four years over a church
in Hallowell, Me. His pastorate in Lowell continued
nearly seventeen years. Since leaving Lowell he has
served for six years as secretary of the American Uni-
tarian Association. He has also engaged in literary
work, having written several theological books.
While in Lowell he wrote the first published history
of the city, a work of much merit, and entitled,
" Lowell As It Was and As It Is."
Two years after the resignation of Mr. Miles a call
was extended to Mr. Theodore Tebbets. He accepted
the call, and was ordained as pastor September 19,
1855. At the time of receiving this call he had not
yet completed his course in Harvard DivinitySchool.
Only ten days after entering upon his charge he was
attacked by a violent and long-lingering fever, which
compelled him to resign his office in order to restore,
if possible, his impaired health, but he never fully re-
covered. He died in Medford in 1863, at the age of
thirty-two years. He was an accomplished man,
having in college taken a high rank and having grad-
uated with high honors.
Rev. Frederick Hinckley, a graduate of Harvard
Divinity School, was installed as pastor of this
church November 12, 1866. He had, before coming
to Lowell, been settled over churches in Windsor,
Vt., and Norton and Haverhill, Mass. His ministry
closed in 1864, after a service of eight years. He was
subsequently pastor of churches in Boston and Wash-
ington, D. C.
Rev. Charles Edward Qrinnell, the fifth pastor of
this church, before his ordination in Lowell, gradu-
ated at Harvard College, and studied in the Yale
Theological School, the Harvard Divinity School,
and- the University of Gottingen in Germany. He was
ordained February 19, 1867. He was a man of wide
culture and literary taste. He published several
philosophical and theological essays. In 1871 he had
the honor of preaching the annual election sermon
before the government of the Commonwealth in the
Old South Church in Boston. Upon leaving Lowell,
in 1869, he became pastor of the Harvard Church in
Charlestown, and also served as chaplain of the Fifth
Regiment, Massachusetts Volunteer Militia. He re-
tired from the ministry in 1874, and entered upon the
practice of law in Boston.
Rev. Henry Blanchard, the sixth pastor of this
church, graduated from Tufts College. Before his
settlement in Lowell he had been pastor of a Uni-
versalist Church in Brooklyn, N. Y., and had preached
in a Unitarian Church in Indianapolis, Ind. He was
ordained in Lowell, Jan. 19, 1871, and was in office
two years. Since leaving Lowell he has preached in
Worcester and Portland, Me., where he now resides.
Rev. Josiah L. Seward, the seventh pastor of this
church, graduated at Harvard College and at the
Harvard Divinity School. He was ordained in
Lowell, Dec. 31, 1874. After a pastorate of fourteen
years he resigned his charge and was settled over the
146
HISTORY OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Unitarian Church iu Waterville, Me. Mr. Seward is
distinguished for his wide range of scholarship and
his great acquisitions of knowledge.
Eev. George Batcheior, the present pastor of this
church, was ordained Feb. 27, 1889. He has pre-
viously been settled over churches in Salem, Mass.,
and Chicago, 111.
Second Uxitaeiax Society. — This organization,
familiarly known as the Lee Street Unitarian Church,
was instituted Aug. 2, 1845.
As this society was abandoned more than twenty-
eight years ago, I can scarcely give more of its history
than the names of the pastors and the dates of their
settlement. The first pastor. Rev. M. A. H. Niles,
was installed April 8, 1846. Rev. Wm. Barry
preached his first sermon Dec. 12, 1847, having waived
a formal installation. Rev. Augustus Woodbury com-
menced his services as pastor Sept. 1, 1853. Rev.
John K. Karcher was ordained March 30, 1858. Rev.
Wm. C. Tenney was installed Oct. 26, 1859.
On June 24, 1861, the society disbanded. Among
the causes of the failure of this enterprise was the
great loss which it suffered both in membership and
financial support by the War of the Rebellion.
The Lee Street Stone Church, of Gothic architecture
was erected for this church in 1850.
After the dissolution of the church, in 1861, this
house of worship was occupied by the Spiritualists for
several years, and about 1868 sold for $11,500 to the
St. Joseph's Catholic Church.
The Ministky at Large, a charitable Institu-
tion, formed in 1843, under the auspices of the Uni-
tarian Church, deserves a passing notice. Its design
has been somewhat modified since its first establish-
ment, and I shall speak of it only as at present con-
ducted. A recent report defines the object of this
institution in the following words : ''To befriend and
help the unfortunate but worthy working poor, who
are likely soon to be able to help themselves." Those
" who do nothing and want to do nothing " receive
no aid. A deserted wife, struggling to support a
large family of small children, is an object of special
favor. The honest and industrious poor man, when
sickness cornea upon him, finds a friend in this benefi-
cent institution. Its object is not alone to give, but
to encourage also, and advise.
The annual expenditure of this institution is some-
thing less than $3500, which is derived in part from
the interest on funds donated to it or to the city for
such charitable purposes, and partly from the con-
tributions of the friends of the cause.
Under Rev. George C. Wright, the present Minis-
ter at Large, there are sustained, in the building owned
by this institution, and situated on South and Eliot
Streets, a children's sewing-school, a school of dress-
making and a cooking-school. Religious services are
held on Sundays, attended by about forty families.
Of the worthy Ministers at Large who have served
this beneficent institution during the forty-six years
of its existence, special mention should be made of
the Rev. Horatio Wood, whose faithful and ethcient
ministry continued for twenty-four years.
FiEST Universalist Church. — The First Univer-
salist Society in Lowell was formed on July 23, 1827,
by John Bassett and ninety-eight others. During the
year 1827 meetings of Uuiversaiists were held in the
Old Red School-house, near Davis' Corner, a house
which was also a favorite place of meeting to the
Methodists of those early days. Four Bassett bro-
thers, one of whom was teacher of the school kept iu
the house erected by the Merrimack Company, were
at that time the efficient and acknowledged leaders
of the Universalists of the city. In 1828 Judge
Livermore offered them the use of a convenient hall
in Belvidere. This hall was probably in the Old
Yellow House, which had once been a hotel, and in
which Judge Livermore resided.
The first church built by this society was erected
on Chapel Hill, and dedicated November 27, 1828.
This location, however, was at so great a distance
from the homes of most of the worshipers that it was,
in 1837, removed to a more populous part of the vil-
lage and placed upon the site of the Boston and
Maine depot. Here it stood for many years one of
the well-known landmarks of the city.
On the same day of the dedication of the house of
worship. Rev. Eliphalet Case, a recent convert from
Methodism, was installed as pastor of the society.
Soon after the dedication and installation a church
organization was effected, which has ever since en-
joyed uninterrupted harmony. Mr. Case was in office
about two years. He was an outspoken and able
defender of the doctrines of his church. " He came
not to bring peace, but a sword." In September,
1830, Rev. Calvin Gardner was invited to the pastor-
ate of this church. He continued in office about
three years. The society would gladly have kept
him longer.
The Rev. T. B. Thayer was the next pastor of the
church. His letter of acceptance is dated March 25,
1833. He was an eloquent young man of unusual
promise, and he served the church for twelve years.
It was in his pastorate in 1837 that the house of wor-
ship was removed from Chapel Hill to the spot where
now stands the Boston & Maine Depot on Central
Street. On leaving Lowell, in 1845, Mr. Thayer was
settled in Brooklyn, N. Y..
Rev. E. G. Brooks, the successor of Mr. Thayer, re-
mained as pastor only one year.
In 1846 Rev. Uriah Clark accepted a call to the
pastorate of this church and served the church four
years. He was a man of good talents, but not of un-
sullied character. The church can hardly be said to
have prospered under him. For a year after Mr.
Clark left the pastorate the church was without a
shepherd.
In 1851, to the joy of all, Mr. Thayer again re-
turned to the office he had resigned in 1845. His
LOWELL.
147
second ministry continued six years. They were
years of prosperity. In 1857 Mr. Thayer resigned to
take charge of the fifth society in Boston, and for two
years the Lowell church was without a settled pastor.
In September, 1859, Kev. J. J. Twiss, who came
from New Bedford, succeeded to the pastorate. The
twelve years of the ministry of Mr. Twiss were years
of material prosperity, and the church became the
possessor of the house of worship, which heretofore
had been the property of a corporation distinct from
the church.
The seventh pastor of this church was Rev. G. T.
Flanders. During his pastorate of seven years the
old house of worship was demolished to give place to
the Boston & Maine Railroad Station, and the beauti-
ful brick church on Hurd Street was erected, at the
cost of 880,000. This house was dedicated February
10, 1875.
Rev. G. W. Bicknell assumed the office of pastor
December, 1879. He is an eloquent and popular
man and the church is in a flourishing condition.
Shattuck Street Uxiversalist Church. — It is
evident that in the early days of our city theUniversal-
ists of Lowell gained a large share of popular attention.
This denomination then had in Massachusetts men
of unusual eloquence and power, who won the pop-
ular ear wherever they preached. As early as April
13, 1826, Dr. Thomas Whittemore preached in Lowell,
in a hall connected with the Washington House.
Rev. Hosea Ballou, in 1828, preached the sermon at
the dedication of the chapel erected by the Universal-
ists on Chapel Hill. Subsequently, in 1836, Rev. Dr.
Thayer, pastor of the First Universalist Church,
preached to immense audiences in the City Hall. So
great was the popular favor that the Rev. John G. Ad-
ams was invited from New Hampshire to come to the
aid of Dr. Thayer. This state of things seemed to war-
rant the formation of a second Universalist Society.
Such a society was formed, and the TVumpet and
Freeman of September 24, 1836, made the following
announcement respecting it :
" A Society of Universalists, consisting of fifty
male members, was formed in Lowell, Mass., on the
4th inst., called the second Universalist Society in
Lowell. They commenced with a zeal worthy of the
good cause they espoused."
Rev. J. G. Adams received and declined a call to
become the first pastor of the new society. The
society for some time relied upon various preachers
to supply its pulpit. One of these was W. H. Knapp,
who was an eccentric man, who believed in good eat-
ing and drinking — particularly the drinking. The
services, it seems, were held in Town Hall, which
was in the second story of our present Government
Building. At length, after listening for more than a
year to occasional preachers, a pastor, the Rev. Z.
Thompson, was secured.
Rev. Zenas Thompson was installed pastor of this
church Feb. 5, 1837. He preached in the City Hall,
heretofore called Town Hall, to a congregation of
more than a thousand persons, most of whom were in
the early prime of life. Of this congregation he said,
many years afterwards : " I do not remember but a
single head that showed gray hairs."
A new house of worship was speedily erected and
dedicated Nov. 15, 1838. This is the house now known
as the Shattuck Street Universalist Church. The
work of erecting a new church bore heavily upon
the pastor, and from weariness he felt compelled to re-
sign a position which demanded such severe labor,
and return to his former position in the State of
Maine — leaving a salary of $1200 for one of $600.
Soon Rev. Abel C. Thomas was invited to the pas-
torate. He has been styled the " Quaker Universal-
ist." His ordination took place Aug. 26, 1839, and he
remained in office three years. He fell upon stirring
times which demanded all his energies. Millerism was
then rife in Lowell, and Mr. Thomas delivered lec-
tures against that heresy. Elder Kaapp, the revival-
ist, came to Lowell, and Mr. Thomas became involved
in the excitement attending the revival. He said
hard things about Elder Knapp. He declared that
the Elder's " familiar acquaintance with the devil en-
abled him to present him in probably faithful por-
traits, and his success in frightening children and
weak-minded men and women was beyond all ques-
tion." On the other hand hard things were said
against Mr. Thomas. It was asserted that he entered
a revival meeting where he found his own wife and
dragged her out by the hair of her head. To this
charge he made the following witty reply : "1. I never
attempted to influence my wife in her choice of a
meeting. 2. My wife has not attended any of the re-
vival meetings. 3. I have not attended even one of
them. 4. Neither my wife nor myself has any incli-
nation to attend them. 5. I never had a wife."
Rev. Alonzo A. Miner came to the pastorate in
July, 1842, and held the office during six prosperous
years. Dr. Miner was an eloquent preacher and a
man of superior eodowments. Since leaving Lowell
he has been president of Tufts College, and many
years pastor of the Second Universalist Church in
Boston. At the present time he is everywhere known
for his able and persistent advocacy of " prohibitory
legislation against the sale of strong drink."
Rev. L. J. Fletcher commenced his ministration in
May, 1848, but served only a few months, and was
succeeded by Rev. L. B. Mason, whose " stay was very
short."
Rev. I. D. Williamson, who entered upon his pas-
toral duties in September, 1849, was very soon com-
pelled by ill health to leave his charge.
Rev. Noah M. Gaylord was pastor from 1849 to
1852, when he accepted a call to Columbus, Ohio.
Rev. Joseph S. Dennis served the church as pastor
from 1852 to 1854.
Rev, Charles Cravens served for one year, resigning
in 1855.
148
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
In 1855 Rev. C. H. Dutton commenced his pastor-
ate of three years.
Inl859Rev. J. L.Fletcher again became pa^jtor, and
in liis pastorate of three years, by his faithful and
popular preaching, revived the drooping spirits of the
society. But it was a time of war, and the society be-
came embarrassed with debt. Mr. Fletcher retired,
and there was no settled pastor for about one year.
On July 1, 1864, Rev. F. E. Hicks began his brief
ministry. In November, 1865, Rev. John G. Adams
commenced a pastorate of nearly seven years.
Rev. VV. G. Haskell became pastor in April, 1873,
and remained three years.
The present pastor, Rev. R. A. Greene, came to
this church from Northfield, Vt, which was his first
parish, and was settled in April, 1877, the church
having been without a pastor for one year.
Under the efficient administration of Mr. Greene
the church is now stronger than ever before, and the
sum of about $9000 has been expended upon the
church edifice.
A Third Universalist Church was formed in 1843.
The building now known as Barrister's Hall, on Mer-
rimack Street, was erected for its use. Its pastors were
Rev. H. G. Smith, Rev. John Moore, Rev. H. G.
Smith (again) and Rev. L. J. Fletcher.
This disbanded church seems to have left very little
recorded history. Mr. Cowley gives us, in his " His-
tory of Lowell," the following account of it : " After
a languid existence it was dissolved. The two last
pastors of this church were not in full fellowship
with their denomination, but preached independently
as ecclesiastical guerrillas."
Paige Street Free-Will Baptist Church. —
The origin of this church is found in a prayer-meet-
ing, established about 1830, by the Free-Will Bap-
tists of the city, at the house of Dea. Josiah Seavy,
father of one of the postmasters of Lowell in later
years. This house was situated on Merrimack Street,
near John Street. For about three years no public
meetings for preaching were held on the Sabbath.
But on May 19, 1833, such a meeting was first held in
Classic Hall, on Merrimack Street, Rev. Nathaniel
Thurston, of Dover, N. H., being the officiating cler-
gyman. Only about twenty persona were present.
Subsequently the Free Chapel on Middlesex Street
was engaged for Sabbath services, and in that place a
church was organized Aug. 15, 1833, of which Mr.
Thurston was elected pastor. He did not, however,
enter upon his duties until April, 1834, the pulpit
being supplied meantime by Rev. Benjamin S. Mansur
and Mr. J. L. Sinclair. Classic Hall, on Merrimack
Street, was for several months the place of worship
for this church.
Under Elder Thurston the church greatly pros-
pered, the number of members on Sept. 1, 1838, being
470. The wife of the pastor was a lady of ability and
culture, and occasionally assisted her husband by
preaching in his pulpit.
The first house of worship of this society, a spa-
cious brick edifice, erected on Merrimack Street,
on the site of the present Hildreth Block, was
dedicated Nov. 15, 1837. The corporation which
erected this building, having the pastor at its head,
acted as a savings bank, receiving deposits aud pay-
ing interest on these deposits. The management of
this corporation became one of the sensations of the
time. The pastor was esteemed a man of such sin-
cere piety and good sense that many mill girls and
other depositors of humble means intrusted their
money to his hands with the most implicit confidence
in his integrity and ability. The new building arose
apace, but the afiairs of the corporation were con-
ducted with an almost total disregard of all business
principles. The pastor, who was the principal man-
ager, seemed to be infatuated with the idea that if he
meant well all things must turn out well, and so set
at naught the plainest maxims of business men. The
result was that litigation ensued, depositors lost their
property, and the whole enterprise ended in a disas-
trous failure. The house was abandoned in July,
1846, and the church was compelled to occupy rented
quarters. Until the new house of worship on Paige
Street was erected, in 1853-54, the church worshiped
in the chapel on Prescott Street, which had been
moved there from Chapel Hill, and in Welles' Hall,
on Merrimack Street.
We will notice in passing that in 1840 Elder Thurs-
ton, after resigning his office as pastor of the First
church, proceeded to form a second Free-Will Bap-
tist Church. A chapel was erected for the new
church on Colburn Street. But the new enterprise,
after having had two pastors, Elder Thurston and
Rev. J. L. Sinclair, was abandoned in 1843, on ac-
count of the elder's fiuancial embarrassment.
The second pastor of the parent chiuch was Rev.
Jonathan Woodman. In his pastorate there was, in
1842, a remarkable revival of religion in the city, 100
being added to this church on the first Sabbath in
May. He was pastor from Sept., 1840, to March, 1844.
Mr. Woodman, much to the regret of the church,
resigned his charge March 1, 1844, and was succeeded
by Rev. Silas Curtis, who became pastor March, 1844,
and was succeeded by Rev. A. K. Moulton, in June,
1849. The labors of Mr. Moulton, in connection with
the erection of the new house of worship on Paige
Street, are gratefully remembered. This house, erec-
ted at a cost of nearly S16,000, was dedicated Feb. 1,
1854. Mr. Moulton resigned his office in June, 1855,
and was succeeded by Rev. J. B. Davis, whose pastor-
ate terminated in 1859.
Rev. Darwin Mott, an able preacher, was called to
the pastorate April 1, 1860, and remained in service
two years.
In May, 1863, Rev. G. W. Bean was called to the
pulpit of this church and continued its pastor nearly
two years. He proved a faithful pastor, whose memory
is held in high esteem.
LOWELL.
149
Next follows the pastorate of Rev. J. B. Drew, who
was in the pastoral office from 1865 to 1868, making
an honorable record.
Rev. D. A. Morehouse, the next pastor, was in
service less than two years, resigning Dec. 31, 1869.
For five years, beginning in 1870, Rev. J. E. Dame
held the pastoral office. His pastorate was marked
by a revival spirit. It was during Mr. Dame's pastor-
ate that the Mt. Vernon Church was formed as a
mission enterprise. The Mt. Vernon Chapel, erected
at the cost of S8700 on Mt. Vernon Street, was dedicated
July 10, 1873. The new church was organized Dec.
29, 1874, with Rev. Geo. S. Ricker as pastor.
In Dec, 1875, Rev. E. W. Porter became pastor of
this church. He was a faithful and able pastor and
held the sacred office about nine years, a period longer
than the pastorate of any one of his predecessors.
Rev. Geo. N. Howard, the present pastor, was in-
stalled March 11, 1885.
There have been connected with this church since
its organization 3092 persons. It is estimated that
more than 20,000 persons have been connected with
the Sabbath-school.
This church has at all times taken high grounds
and an advanced position on all the great moral enter-
prises of the day, and has faithfully and zealously
labored for the spiritual good of the city.
The house of worship abandoned by this church in
1846 had a history which should be recorded. It was
converted into a museum and theatre by Noah F.
Gates, who purchased the museum belonging to Moses
Kimball, which had been started in 1840 in Wyman's
Exchange, on Merrimack Street, and removed it into
the church edifice. The building was subsequently
licensed as a theatre, though the license met with
opposition from the community. Disaster betided it.
Three times it was ravaged by fire. The museum and
theatre departed and the building was reconstructed
and made into stores and offices. At length it was
demolished and the splendid Hildreth Block erected
on its site.
jNIount Veexojt Free Baptist Church. — This
church had its origin in the mission spirit of the first
Free Baptist Church on Paige Street. Its location, on
the corner of Mt. Vernon and Butterfield Streets, was
selected because within a half-mile of that spot there
had been no church of any denomination established)
and the thriving and industrious residents of the
neighborhood were fully able to welcome and sup-
port a new religious organization in their midst.
As the first step the mother church on Paige Street
in 1872 resolved to erect a chapel on the spot desig-
nated above, and proceeded promptly to carry out its
plan. The chapel was completed at a cost of $10,000
and consecrated on July 10, 1873. Following the con-
secration of the chapel was the organization of a
Sunday-school, which, with the regular meetings for
prayer and the preaching services on Sunday even-
ings, made the new chapel the home of an active and
enthusiastic religious enterprise, an enterprise which
has ever been attended with harmony and prosperity.
The enterprise rapidly grew and soon warranted the
employment of a regular pastor. To this end the
Rev. Geo. 8. Ricker, of Richmond, Maine, in May,
1874, was invited to assume the charge, and in Decem-
ber of the same year a church was formed and Mr.
Ricker chosen as its pastor. Under the pastorate of Mr.
Ricker the church was blessed with spiritual interest
and healthy growth. In its first five years the mem-
bership had increased from twenty-six to one hun-
dred and fifty-five.
The second pastor. Rev. C. E. Cats, was settled Dec.
20, 1882. His successor, Rev. E. G. Wesley, was
settled Oct. 29, 1884. The present pastor. Rev. J. L.
Smith, was settled in Oct., 1888. The membership is
about 120.
Chelmsford Street Free Baptist Church. —
In October, 1880, Mr. A. L. Russell opened a mission
Sunday-school in the Sherman School-house. In a
few Sundays it outgrew its home, and Mr. Russell, in
two months' time, had built a chapel for its needs.
Later, the chapel was moved ofi", and the present
brick church, on Chelmsford Street, was built, Mr.
Russell contributing one-half the entire cost of the
church and the lot. This church edifice was dedi-
cated September 24, 1882.
The cost of the house of worship was about $8000,
the seating capacity being 450. The present number
of members is 142.
The pastors, with date of settlement, have been as
follows: Rev. J. Malvern, November 1,1882; Rev.
L. W. Raymond, November 1, 1884; Rev. W. J.
Halse, the present incumbent, October 1, 1887.
This church meets a long-felt want in the south-
west portion of our city, in which there has been, in
recent years, a rapid growth in population and busi-
ness. This is an active and aggressive church, and
is doing good service in a location in which a
church is greatly needed. The ladies of the church
support two native teachers in India.
Advent Christiak Church. — This church was
organized about 1846. The records of its earlier years
are incomplete.
The church worshiped in various halls until the
erection of its house of worship on Grand Street.
The cost of this house was $6500. The number of
members is 101.
Among the pastors of this chnrch have been Elder
Cole, Elder Williams, Elder Thurber, Elder Thomas,
Elder Emerson, Elder Couch. The terms of office of
some of the pastors have been brief, and dates are
very generally wanting.
The society at the present time is in a flourishing
condition, with a good Sunday-school.
The present pastor is Elder J. Hemenway.
Catholic Churches. — The work of starting the
great manufactories of Lowell began in the spring of
1822. The quiet village of East Chelmsford then
150
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
became a scene of intense activity. In four years it
waste become the town of Lowell, and in only ten years
more it was to receive its charter as a city. The vast
amount of labor required in digging canals and erect-
ing the mills and the boarding-houses adjoining them
invited laborers even from the Old World. The town
became a centre of attraction to the Irish laborer.
Mr. Hugh Cummiskey, a pioneer in the work, came,
with thirty men, from Charleatown, all on foot, to
work on the canals. " Kirk Boott met them at what
is now the American House, and gave them money to
refresh themselves."
They began their work April 6, 1822. Soon, other
Irishmen came in great numbers. In those days al-
most all the ground between the American House
and Pawtucket Falls was an open common. On this
ground the Irish laborers put up their rude habita-
tions. The spot on which they gathered was known
as " The Acre." These exiles from home were not
forgotten by their Church. Even in 1822, their first
year in Lowell, Father John Mahony, of Salem, came
to them and celebrated Mass. The Bishop of the
diocese came to Lowell in person, October 28, 1828,
and religious services were held in the hou.se which
stood on the site of the Green School-house, and in
which so many other religious societies had worshiped
in their early years. After that, Father Mahony
came from Salem once a month to celebrate Mass.
But numbers rapidly grew, a larger house of worship
was needed, and the building of churches begins.
St. Patriclc'a Church} — It is safe to conclude that
amongst the early pioneers of Lowell, a few, at least,
were Catholics — Irish Catholics, no doubt — driven
from home and country, perhaps, because of partici-
cipation in the brave but unsuccessful attempt of
1798 to win independence for their native land ; an
attempt whose strongest encouragement had, doubt-
less, been the success of the Americans in a similar
cause, and the important part the Irish race had taken
Ln achieving that glorious result. Yes, they were prob-
ably here. Wherever earnest, enterprising men came
together throughout the land, and the laborious and
hazardous work of the early settler had to be done,
there the strong, willing sons of Erin have been
found, with the noble simplicity and confiding trust
of their country's faith still in their brave, generous
hearts. They were needed, and because needed, wel-
come. The bone and sinew, " the muscle and the
mind that spring fi-om Irish soil," were helpful in
such emergencies; years of toil and endurance, with
little more than mere existence as requital, had in-
ured them to the privations of a pioneer life ; and,
never disheartened, they determined to win from the
stranger what their Motherland was often debarred
from providing — a home. If any such there were,
however, it is more than probable that they received
little encouragement in the practice of their religion.
> By Eatbarine A. O'Eeeffe.
Even at the comparatively recent period of Lowell's
early development, Massachusetts' towns were not
very liberally disposed towards Catholics. Many of
the severe laws and bigoted customs that had pre-
vailed during Colonial times had, perforce, been set
aside when Catholic aid was found so essential and
so ready in the Revolutionary crisis ; but " prejudice
dies hard," and is often resuscitated in " the piping
time of peace." In many cases, it was long before
the few Catholics that were scattered here and there
were in a condition to assert themselves, and meet
together openly for the practice of their religion. As
soon as it was possible, we may be certain they did
so; and that period in Lowell appears to have been
about the year 1822, when, according to the most re-
liable accounts, Mass was for the first time celebrated
here in what was known as the " Irish Camp,' on
ground now occupied by Wheeler's Block, Tiiden
Street, for the benefit of a number of workmen em-
ployed on the canal, under the direction of ^Ir. Hugh
Cummiskey. From that time forth, different clergy-
men attended them as often as was possible, consider-
ing the small number of jiriests and the large district
in their charge. In the latter part of 1827, however,
their spiritual care was assigned to Rev. John Ma-
hony, who had charge also of the Catholics of Salem,
in which latter place he, for some time, resided.
Rev. Father Mahony, Lowell's first pastor, was
born in Kerry, Ireland, 17S1. After his ordination
he came to this country, where he faithfully labored
six years in the Maryland, and eight years in the
Virginia diocese, prior to his affiliation to the diocese
of Boston in 1826. After a visit to Lowell, the 8th
of October, 1827, he reported to Rt. Rev. Bishop
Fenwick, of Boston, that there were twenty-one fami-
lies and thirty unmarried men settled here. These
were visited by Bishop Fenwick' himself, the 28lh of
October, 1828, when the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass
was offered in the Merrimack Company's School-
house on Merrimack Street. Father Mahony, though
still living in Salem, visited Lowell occasionally for
the discharge of his pastoral duties ; and, at length,
in 1830, encouraged by the increased number of Cath-
olics— who, as a result of Lowell's rapidly developing
industries, numbered then about four hundred — com-
menced, in July of that year, the erection of a frame
building, seventy by forty feet, on land donated for
religious purposes by the Locks and Canals Company.
In just a year it was completed, and the exUed chil-
dren of St. Patrick dedicated to God this first monu-
ment of their religion, under the patronage of that
Apostle who had blessed their native land with the
light of faith. This dedication — an event long re-
membered by Lowell's first Catholics — took place
July 3, 1831, the ceremony being performed by Rt.
Rev. Bishop Fenwick, who, on the same day, adminis-
tered Confirmation to thirty-nine persons.
Meanwhile, the increasing duties of both places,
Salem and Lowell, having rendered a resident priest
ST. PATRICKS CHURCH AND PAROCHIAL BUILDINGS,
LOWELL, MASS.
LOWELL.
151
in each place a necessity, Father Mahony was ap-
pointed for Lowell ; and the erection of the church
was immediately followed by that of a pastoral resi-
dence close by, which was finished in 1S32.
Soon after, in 1833, Father Curtin was sent to
Father Mahony's assistance, and remained here until
1836, when he was transferred to the cathedral at Bos-
ton, and his place at Lowell filled by Rev. James Con-
nelly, who had come some time previous. It was
largely through the efforts of the latter, under Father
Mahony's direction, that two wings were added to the
church.
From his first advent in Lowell, Father Mahony
had taken steps towards educating the children
of his parish, who were brought together for
that purpose as early as 1828 ; but the pov-.
erty of their parents and the scanty means
at his disposal, rendered aid from some other
quarter necessary. From the school records we learn
that " At the annual town-meeting in May, 1830, an
article was inserted in the warrant for the appoint-
ment of a committee ' to consider the expediency of es-
tablishing a separate school for the benefit of the
Irish population.' The committee reported in favor
of such a school ; the report was accepted, and the
sum of SoO was appropriated for the establishment
and maintenance of a separate district-school for the
Irish. It was kept only part of the time and sus-
pended. All the arrangements hitherto were unsatis-
factory. In 1834 Rev. Mr. Connelly carried on a pri-
vate school in a room under the Catholic Church. In
June, 1835, this gentleman made application to the
School Committee for aid, and an arrangement was
entered into between them."
Xow that this subject of Catholic schools has been
mentioned, it may be as well to continue it for a brief
period, though it somewhat anticipates other points
of our sketch.
The School Committee appears to have, under this
arrangement, assumed supervision of a private school
already existing in a room under the Catholic Church,
and elected its teacher, Mr. Patrick Collins, as a mem-
ber of the corps of public instructors. The following
September, another Catholic school, in the vicinity of
Chapel Hill, was adopted as a public trust, and its
teacher, Mr. Daniel Mcllroy, confirmed as a teacher
in the town's employ. The school term of 1837 saw
still another room under the Catholic Church prepared
for educational purposes ; and another school, with
conditions similar to the first two, was opened with
Miss Mary Ann Stanton as its teacher. The following
June Mr. Collins' and Mr. Mcllroy's schools were
united under the name of the Fifth Grammar School,
with Mr. Mcllroy as principal, and moved to Liberty
Hall, on Lowell Street. January 8, 1844, this school
was moved to a new building on Lewis Street, ever
since called the Mann School. The arrangement that
the teachers of schools made up of Catholic children
should be Catholics, but subject to examinations and
visitations of the School Committee, like all the other
public schools and teachers, continued some time; till
finally, " in 1848 a large private school which had
been kept in the basement of the Catholic Church
was disbanded, and most of the pupils entered the
public schools."
In 1833 the charity of the Irish Catholics led to the
organizing of the Lowell Irish Benevolent Society,
whose first president was Mr. Michael Cassidy, who
was also president when it was incorporated in 1843.
The gentleman holding that office for the current year
(1890) is Mr. John Dougherty.
An idea of the increasing numbers and influence of
the Lowell Catholics may be gleaned from the fact
that St. Patrick's Day, 1838, was appropriately cele-
brated by them, not only by a High Mass in the morn-
ing, at which Father Mahony preached an eloquent
panegyric of the saint, but also by a procession and
banquet under the auspices of the Lowell Irish Be-
nevolent Society, on which occasion the mayor. Dr.
Elisha Bartlett, made an address in which he com-
mended their industry and their fidelity to their reli-
gion and country.
Lowell's first pastor labored most faithfully for the
spiritual and temporal welfare of the Catholics here,
until, in February, 1830, he was placed in charge of
St. Augustine's Church, South Boston, where he con-
tinued his good work until his death, December 29,
1839. Bis remains, with those of many others of the
Catholic pioneers of Boston, rest in the old cemetery
of St. Augustine's, which is looked upon " as a shrine
of historic interest and of reverent pilgrimage."
Father Mahony's successor at Lowell was Rev. E.
J. McCool, who remained from February 14, 1836, to
August 24, 1837, when he was succeeded by Rev.
James T. McDermott.
Father McDermott was ordained by Rt. Rev.
Bishop Fenwick, in 1832; and, after a short time in
Hartford, was sent to aid Rev. James Fitton in at-
tending New Haven, Bridgeport, Norwalk and other
places in Connecticut, besides several missions in the
western part of Massachusetts, all of which were then
included in the Boston diocese. Having built the
first Catholic Church in New Haven, and had it ded-
icated in May, 1834, he continued his duties in that
part of the diocese untU August, 1837, when, as has
been stated, he came to Lowell. Owing to the increase
in the congregation in Lowell, and the neighboring
places attended from there, an assistant became neces-
sary, and Rev. James Conway was, in December,
1839, appointed to that position, after having spent
several years on the Maine missions, and, subsequently,
some time at the Cathedral in Boston.
On St. Patrick's Day, 1841, we again find mention
of a celebration of the event, when High Mass was
offered by the pastor. Father Mahony, and an able
discourse delivered by Father Conway. At a banquet
in the evening, at which were present many of the
leading citizens of other denominations, one of the
152
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
toaafa proposed gives some indication of the spirit of
the time. It referred to an event that disgraces the
annals of Massachusetts — the burning, by a mob of
bigots, of the Ursuline Convent at Charlestown, and
was as follows : " The Convent Ruins of Mt. Bene-
dict.— Massachusetts may yet boast of a Legislature
with spirit and liberality sufficient to blot from her
escutcheon that disgraceful stigma. But while there
is a Lindsey to vindicate them, there will be a rabble
to desecrate the most sacred institutions of the
country."
Et. Rev. Bishop Fenwick having visited Lowell in
1841, found the Catholics here so numerous, that he
directed Father Conway to set about erecting a second
church. Before the bishop's departure a parish meet-
ing was held in St. Patrick's Church, at which he was
present, and at which $8000 was contributed or
pledged as a beginning by members of the congrega-
tion, in sums of $100 each. That August a lot of
land, on the corner of Gorham and Appleton Streets,
was purchased from the Hamilton Company ; and on
this the brick church, ninety by sixty feet, afterwards
known as St. Peter's, was built at a cost of $22,000.
That Christmas the building was so far advanced
that Divine service was held there, and it was com-
pleted less than a year after, when it was dedicated
October 16, 1842, and Father Conway, who had su-
perintended the work from its inception, was ap-
pointed its first pastor, a position beheld until March,
1847, when he was transferred to the Church of the
Immaculate Conception at Salem, which he very con-
siderably enlarged.
To return to Father McDermott's pastorate. In
1846 he deemed it advisable to purchase an edifice
near the corner of Lowell and Suffolk Streets, in the
near neighborhood of St. Patrick's. This had been
built and dedicated for religious services July, 1831,
by the Second Baptists, and sold in January, 1838,
■ for $12,000 to the Methodists, who called it Wesley
Chapel, and who afterwards sold it, as above stated,
to Father McDermott. The latter, having had it
handsomely prepared for Catholic worship, it was
dedicated as St. Mary's by Rt. Rev. Bishop Fitzpat-
rick, Sunday, March 8, 1847, on which occasion an
appropriate sermon was delivered by Very Rev. Dr.
Ryder, then president of the College of Holy Cross
at Worcester. Father McDermott became pastor of
the church, and so remained for several years, when,
the increased accommodations at the enlarged St.
Patrick's having rendered St. Mary's no longer ne-
cessary, it was closed, and remained so until it was
purchased by Rev. John O'Brien from the heirs of
Father McDermott, who had meanwhile died, in
September, 1862. It was then again opened for ser-
vices until 1879, and in 1880 the present rector. Rev.
Michael O'Brien, commenced remodeling it into a
parochial school for the boys of St. Patrick's Parish,
which will be described later on.
On Father McDermott's appointment to St. Mary's,
Rev. Hilary Tucker, of the Cathedral, was sent,
March 17, 1847, as his successor, to St. Patrick's. In
the fall after his coming, the citizens of Lowell,
Catholic and Protestant, manifested their charity by
contributing nineteen hundred and ninety dollars
towards the relief of Ireland, then stricken by one of
her most appalling famines, — famines caused not so
much by crop failure — for in her worst years she has
produced more than enough for all her children —
but by the rapacity and injustice of tyrannical land-
lords.
Father Tucker remained until December, 1848,
when he returned to the Cathedral, and was succeeded
by a pastor whose memory time has but rendered
dearer and more revered by the Catholics, — indeed,
by all denominations in Lowell, — Rev. John O'Brien.
As the details of his edifying life will be given else-
where, here will be mentioned only those particularly
i connected with the pastorate of St. Patrick's.
One of the raemorable events in the early days of
Catholicity in this city took place the year following
Father O'Brien's advent, — the visit of Rev. Theobald
Mathew, the famous Apostle of Temperance.
The Lowell Courier, dated Monday September 10,
1849, thus announced his coming :
"The Committee of ArmDgementB tor the receptioo of Father
SlatJiew beg leave to anoouuce that he is expected to arrive at the de-
pot of the Lowell and Lawrence Railroad, on Middlesex Street, at eight
o'clock to-morrow (Tuesday) morning. lie will then be received by the
CoQimittee and such other gentlemen ns may unite with them, and
thence be escorted through Middlesex, Central to Tyler, through Tyler,
Lawrence, Church, Andover, Nesniith, Merrimack, Dutton, Lowell,
Cabot and Merrimack Streets to the ^lerrimack House.
" Father Mathew will remain in the city three days, and spend a por-
tion of each day at the Catholic Church. During his visit an •opportu-
nity will be offered to such of your citizens a3 may desire it, for an in-
troduction to him, of which due notice will be giTen.
" EL15UA HuNTIN'lTON, Chairman.
"E. B. Patch, Sec'y."
The programme, as thus announced, was carried
out. An immense crowd gathered at the railway
station to welcome him ; but, owing to Father Math-
ew's desire, because of indisposition resulting from
his extraordinary labors in the temperance cause,
his reception was as quiet as possible. After arriving
at the Merrimack House, as the crowd insisted on
hearing him, he addressed them briefly. During his
stay he was the guest of Rev. Father O'Brien, who
rendered him valuable assistance in his noble work.
That day. Father Mathew administered the pledge at
St. Patrick's Church, after which he visited the mills,
accompanied by Father O'Brien, and attended by
members of the committee and prominent mill offi-
cials, and was everywhere received with the greatest
courtesy. Returning again to St. Patrick's, although
he worked until after ten o'clock that night, and ad-
ministered the pledge to over a thousand people,
many were still obliged to go away without it, owing
to the lateness of the hour. Wednesday, he spent at
St. Mary's, where he waa fully occupied the greater
portion of that day ; Thursday, the same at St. Pe-
/,^/t^H.^t
LOWELL.
153
ter's, until three in the afternoon, when he went to
the City Hall, where a large audience had gathered
to meet him. Short addresses were given by Dr.
Huntington and Father Mathew ; and the latter,
after being introduced, shook hands with large num-
bers of citizens, and administered the pledge to all
who desired it.
It was estimated that in all, he administered over
five thousand pledges. Friday, he was obliged to
depart for Lawrence, owing to other engagements.
The Lowell Daily Journal and Courier, dated Thurs-
day, Sept. 13, 1849, contained the following tribute to
his worth and successful endeavors :
"Our citizens are under lasting obligations to
Father Mathew for the amount of good he accomplish-
ed and will yet accomplish. Although there has been
no strong public demonstration — owing to a wish ex-
pressed on his part that he might be allowed to work
— there is a deep feeling of respect for him pervading
our community, whose hearty good wishes for his
future prosperity will accompany him wherever he
goes."
The following letter, written the evening before
Father Mathew's departure, may be of interest not
only as a souvenir of the great temperance advocate,
but also as recording the impressions of an experi-
enced and cultured stranger on a visit to Lowell,
more than two score years ago.
" Lowell, Thursday Night, 13th Sept., 1849.
" To Ha Honor y the Mayor :
" Mt Dear Sib :— The high enim&tion that I had always entertained
of the rapid growth of Commercial enterprise and Industry, for which
Lowell is BO pre-eminently distinguished, is in no small degree enhanced
by the gratification afforded roe of personally inspecting your extensive
and flourisbing Blanufactories. I have l)een equally delighted and
astonished at the Fabrics subtuitted to me as specimens of Native Manu-
facture.
"The spirit of laudable emulation to develop to their fullest extent
your industrial resources affords the best earnest that, at no distant day,
America will have reason to be as j ustly proud of the products of her
looms, as she now is of her widely-spread and rapidly.«xtending com-
merce.
*' But to the Moralist, the aspect of your factory population pos-
sesses a still deeper interest. You have proved to a demonstration, the
important fact, that, the busiest operations of industrial activity are per-
fectly compatible with a high standard of Christian morality, of intel-
lectual refinement and conscious self-respect.
*' Your factory operatives, amounting to nearly fourteen thousand,
may fairly challenge comparison on these points with any similar class
In the world. The air of comfort, happiness and health, so visible in
the appearance of the men ; and the taste, industry and intellectuality,
which cbaractenze the female assistants in those busy hives of national
wealth and industry, are features as novel as they are interesting to the
friend of human progress.
" It was the boast of Italian royalty that it annually bestowed a
marriage dowry on a few unportioned females. Into what paltry in-
significance does this puny specimen of R^-gai munificence sink, when
compared with the great modem fact that many of the ladies of Amer-
ica, who now, as wives and mothers, adorn the domestic circle, have laid
the foundation of their wealth and comfort, not by debasing dependence
on Prince or Noble, but by the exercise of their own industry and labor
in those extensive manufactories of which not only your city, but the
whole Republic, may feel justly proud.
*' I feel honored by ray public introduction to the enterprising citizens
of Lowell. To you, dear Sir, and to my esteemed friends. Doctor Hunt-
ington, Mr. Patch, Judge Crosby, Judge Washbume, Ex-Mayor Ban-
croft, and the other gentlemen of the Committee, permit me to convey
my grateful thanks for your kindness aud courtesy ; and to Messrs.
Wright and Perry, agents of the Lowell and Middlesex Mills, and to
Mr. Prince, of the Merrimack Print Works, for the high gratification
1 experienced in inspecting the Carpet Works, and visiting their splen-
did factories, at which eetabllshmeots I have been paid the politest at-
tention and coorteey.
" I have the honor to he, my Dear Sir,
" Tour devoted servant,
" Tbbobaiji Matbzw.**
The 27th of June, 1851, another much beloved and
highly respected priest came to Lowell, Rev. Timothy
O'Brien, an elder brother of Father John. A brief
sketch of him, also, is given elsewhere ; suffice it here
to say that he bravely encouraged and ably assisted
his brother through the trying period of 1854 and
1855, in which latter year he died the 11th of Octo-
ber, deeply regretted.
Since 1848 the Catholic children of Lowell had at-
tended the public schools. Desirous of securing for
them not only a secular, but also a religious educa-
tion— a training of heart and soul as well as mind —
the Eev. Fathers O'Brien by their united efforts es-
tablished the Convent and Girls' School, the land and
first frame building for which were donated by Rev.
Father Timothy. The school was committed to the
judicious care of the Sisters of Notre Dame, a com-
munity of religious women devoted exclusively to
teaching, which had been introduced into this
country — at Cincinnati — about twelve years before;
and into New England — at Boston — soon after,
through the efforts of Rev. John McElroy, S. J.
The Sisters, five in number, sent from Cincinnati
on the Lowell mission, under the direction of Sister
Desiree, reached Boston, Friday, September 17, 1852.
Having remained with Sisters of their order estab-
lished there on Stillman Street until the following
Monday, September 20th, they came thence to Lowell,
accompanied by Rt. Rev. Bishop Fitzpatrick and
Father McElroy, and were established in their little
wooden convent on Adams Street. Two days after
their arrival, the classes in the parish school were'
opened and three hundred children enrolled as pupils.
In addition to the free-school, a pay-school was soon
after established for the accommodation of those who
desired to pursue more advanced studies.
In a Catholic Directory, at the beginning of 1854,
we read of " An Academy and Free-School by the
Sisters of Notre Dame in a spacious and handsome
building erected near St. Patrick's Church, Lowell, by
Rev. Timothy O'Brien. It is in contemplation also
to build an hospital and asylum in connection with
this establishment."
The boarding-school — a now flourishing institution
numbering about one hundred pupils pursuing a high
order of studies — had a very simple beginning. The
mothers of many of the pupils of the parish school
were obliged to spend the day working in the mills,
which often necessitated the absence of the elder
children to take care of the younger ones. In order
that the former might not be deprived of school bene-
fits, the Sisters opened a small and unpretending kin-
154
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, .MASSACHUSETTS.
dergarten for the little ones, the good results of which
led their mothers to urge the Sisters to keep their
little charges altogether. Permission was given by
their superior, and went into effect the 2d of Novem-
ber, 1854, when three applicants were received as
regular boarders, and St. Patrick's Boarding-School
thus established.
This last event, however, somewhat anticipates
events in the history of the church itself, which we
now resume.
The successful development of Lowell industries
having effected a marked addition to the population,
a proportional increase in the Catholic congregations
was the result, and in none more so than in St.
Patrick's ; so that the frame building erected 1S30 —
even with its several additions since then — was inade-
quate to their needs.
With a wise foresight, plans were then commenced
by Rev. John O'Brien for the present splendid granite
edifice, whose corner-stone was laid on the Fourth of
July, 1853, by Rev. Timothy O'Brien, assisted by Rev.
John and Rev. Michael O'Brien, the latter their
nephew, and now the respected rector of St. Patrick's
Church, who, from 1851 till his appointment to Low-
ell, was an occasional visitor of his reverend rela-
tivps. From that time until Oc tober 29, 1854, when the
church was dedicated, the work went steadily on, not-
withstanding many threatening attacks upon it during
thetroublous timesof that year,thetwo brothers, whose
devotion to each other was only excelled by their
devotion to their divine vocation, generously giving
thousands of dollars to the noble task of erecting a
suitable temple to the service of the Living God.
Few calls for help in the work were made upon the
congregation, who, at the time, were not much favored
with this world's goods, seven thousand dollars being
about the amount contributed by them, outside of
their regular church dues. Probably, the most impor-
tant assistance was rendered by the generous working-
girls of the parish, many of whom deposited their
savings with their pastors, with the understanding
that they would accept no interest, but devote the
latter to a co-operation with them in the good work.
A visitor to the building, a few days before its dedi-
cation, described the " New St. Patrick's, on Adams
Street," as a " most magniScent church. Its length,
including tower, is one hundred and seventy feet, its
width through transept, one hundred feet. Its style
is Gothic of the thirteenth century. The arch
through the nave is perfect ; the distance from the
floor to the centre of arch ia seventy feet. The
arches on the sides are supported by fourteen large
pillars. There is a large stained glass window back
of the altar bearing the inscription, ' Contributed by
ladies of Lowell to St. Patrick's Church, 1854.' The
cost of the window was SIOOO. In its centre is a
figure of Christ ; on whose right appears Mary ; on
left, St. Joseph. Around these are represented Saints
Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter and Paul. The
windows throughout are stained glass. The church
is calculated to seat two thousand persons. Its cost
has been about $G0,000."
I The above are the dimensions of St. Patrick's at
; present writing, the only changes being in the win-
j dows, the ceiling, the altar and general improvement
1 in the interior ornamentation of the church.
The ceremony of dedication, which, according to
the Roman Catholic ritual, was most impressive, took
place Sunday, Oct. 29, 1854, the ceremony being per-
formed by Rt. Rev. Bishop Fitzpatrick, of Boston.
There were present over two thousand five hundred
people. Every available seat was occupied, and
there were four or five hundred standing or
kneeling in the aisles. In addition to the pre-
late above mentioned, there was present Rt. Rev.
Bishop O'Reilly, of Hartford, Conn., afterw^ards, in
January, 1856, drowned on the ill-fated steamer " Pa-
cific." There were also present eighteen other cler-
gymen, in addition to all the priests of the city.
Mass was celebrated by Very Rev. Jolin J. Williams,
then Vicar-General of the diocese of which he is now
Archbishop, with Rev. Michael O'Brien, then of Ro-
chester, N. Y., deacon ; Rev. Thomas H. Shahan,
then of Salem, now of Arlington, sub-deacon, and
Rev. Nicholas J. O'Brien, since deceased, as master
of ceremonies. The sermon on the occasion was de-
livered by Rev. Dr. Moriarty, O.S.A., of Philadel-
phia, who took for his text Hebrews 1:1-3 verses.
In the eloquent discourse that followed, the Rever-
end Doctor congratulated those who had been the
means, in the hands of the Almighty, in aiding in
the erection of the beautiful temple which was that
day dedicated to the honor and glory of the Most
High.
At Vespers, in the evening, the church was agaia
crowded. The sermon then delivered was by Rt. Rev.
Bishop O'Reilly, after which the Sacrament of Con-
firmation was administered to three hundred and
twenty-five children by Rt. Rev. Bishop Fitzpatrick.
While this noble work in the cause of religion had
been advancing to completion, religious bigotry — of
all prejudices the most unreasonable, the most un-
conquerable, the most degrading — was exerting its
bitterest malice, in different parts of the country,
against Catholics. As a writer, who has made a
study of the subject, has said, '"The Anti-
Catholic agitation breaks out periodically in the
United States, and the symptoms of the malady are
the same from the colonial times down to our own."
For two decades it had seemed an intermittent fever,
whose worst stages were reached in the years '34, '44,
and now '54, in each of which anti-Catholic delirium
had fiercely raged, its haunting spectre being " the
bug-bear Romanism, ready to glut itself with the
blood of honest Protestants." Rev. Mr. Goodman,
an Episcopal clergyman, said on the subject : " Con-
gregations, instead of being taught from the pulpit to
adorn their profession by all the lovely graces of the
LOWELL.
155
Gospel, by kind and afiectionate bearing in the world,
by earnest and ever-active endeavors to secure for
themselves and others the blessings of peace, were
annoyed with inflammatory harangues upon the ' great
apostasy,' and upon abominations of the Roman
Church."
The year 1834 had witnessed, " in the very part of the
country which boasts most of its culture and self-com-
mand, men who dishonored the religion they professed,
preached falsehood against Catholicity, and hounded
on their dujtes to violence." It had seen a convent
burned, its inmates, nuns and pupils, turned out
homeless on the streets at midnight — one of them to
die, thus adding murder to arson. It had seen whole
neighborhoods of Catholics thrown into consterna-
tion, churches threatened and the graves of the dead
ransacked.
1844 had witnessed still greater devastation in va-
rious places, noticeably in Philadelphia, the " city of
brotherly love." The Episcopal clergyman before
quoted ttus summed up the vandalism in that one
city : " Nativism has existed for a period hardly
reaching five months, and in that time of its being
what has been seen ? Two Catholic churches burned,
one twice fired and desecrated, a Catholic seminary
and retreat consumed by the torches of an incendiary
mob, two rectories and a most valuable library de-
stroyed, forty dwellings in ruins, about forty human
lives sacrificed, and sixty of our fellow-citizens
wounded; riot and rebellion and treason rampant on
two occasions in our midst; the laws boldly set at de-
fiance, and peace and order prostrated by ruffian vio-
lence I These are the horrid events which have taken
place among us since the organization, and they are
mentioned for no other purpose than that reflection
be entered upon by the community which has been
so immeasurably disgraced by these terrible acts."
18o4 saw another anti-Catholic delirium agitate the
country, and in no place did it run higher than in
New England. The houses of Catholics were
wrecked and their lives endangered; in nearly every
city churches were threatened and many attacked,
blown up and burned down ; the lives of priests men-
aced, and one of their number tarred and feathered
and left for dead on the roadside.
In many instances these midnight orgies had been
performed under the inspiration of Orange airs, and
had been particularly active against Irish Catholics,
indicating that the unrelenting hate that had driven
them from their native land had pursued them to a
country, one of whose fundamental principles is re-
ligious toleration and equal rights to all. There were
too many of these Irish Catholics in Lowell to allow
them to pass unmolested. The bigots known as
"Natives," in 1844, were, in 1854, known by the ap-
propriate title of " Know-Nothings ; " and showed
that the same virulence actuated them under a difier-
ent name; they had " learned no truths and forgotten
no fable."
A part of the programme of this attack consisted in
employing " mad preachers to declaim against Popery
in the public streets and squares, in hopes of provok-
ing the Catholics, and especially the Irish Catholics,
to resent their insolence." This was carried out to
the letter in Lowell. The advent of one of these — a
fanatic named Orr, who blasphemously assumed the
name of the Angel Gabriel — was soon heralded. The
Loicell Advertiser of Saturday, June 10, 1854, stated
that Orr would come that evening " tooting a tin
trumpet and talking to the rowdies in the streets."
His coming, however, was delayed. The same paper
stated, June 15th, "We have 'Know-Nothings'
among us ; " and Saturday, June 17th, " Orr, the
tooting angel, arrived in town to-day with his tin
trumpet." He had come that noon and gone to the
Washington House. At seven that evening he went
to the South Common, and there, mounted on a bar-
rel, had harangued the thousands that had gathered
around him, some through curiosity, some through
sympathy, some through malice.
Nine o'clock Sunday morning — the day that should
be a " Truce of God," a rest from earthly labor and
turmoil, a feast of religious truth and brotherly love
— once again saw him, " a British subject on American
ground," insulting the religion, ridiculing the race of
thousands of Lowell's citizens, nearly half of whom
were American born. However, much to his cha-
grin, and to the disappointment of the " Know-
Nothings," he did not succeed in stirring up any
marked disturbance, notwithstanding the treasonable
and insulting motto with which every discourse was
prefaced: "Rule Britannia! Hail Columbia! and
Down with the Mother of Abominations ! " a motto
which conclusively proved whence came the animus
that dictated his utterances.
An editorial of the Lowell Daily Advertiser of Wed-
nesday evening, June 2l8t, wrote thus of the attitude
of the Catholics of Lowell during this exasperating
episode : " Let us suppose that some native American
Catholic should come in our midst, and, after sound-
ing his horn, should gather about him an audience of
thousands, and then proceed to harangue that audi-
ence, composed of Catholics and Protestants — men,
women and children — by calling the Protestants a
race of cowards, blackguards and 'Mickeys.' Not
content with this, let us suppose him to point out, per-
sonally, a member of the crowd and ask the audience
to ' look at his ugly mug.' Under such circumstances
no one could deny that he was disposed to enjoy great
/reerfom of speech, and if he was permitted to leave
the grounds unmolested, great credit would be
claimed for our Protestant population on the score of
toleration and liberality. But when, added to all
this, he should happen to be a foreigner, adopting for
his motto the words : ' Rule Britannia ! ' we very
much question whether the vigilance of our police,
and the influence of all our clergy combined, could
prevent a serious and bloody riot. But all this, and
156
HISTOKY OF xMIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
much more, the Catholics of Lowell have endured,
and not for fear, but because principle and respect for
law and order guided their actions ; and they are en-
titled to as much credit for their forbearance as Pro-
testants would have been had they exhibited as much
Christian virtue under like circumstances."
The moderation of the Catholics was, however, of
little avail. Acts of violence must be attributed to
them, whether or no. Most improbable reports be-
came current to inflame the wrath of their Protestant
fellow-citizens against them, if possible. Tuesday,
the 28th of June, the absurd canard was spread that
five Irish companies from abroad were expected to
assist the "Jackson Musketeers" — a chartered mili-
tary company of American citizens, mostly of Irish
blood — in cutting the throats of the people of Lowell.
Where these " Irish companies " were to come from no-
body knew. They were to " come at seven that even-
ing." It is needless to say that this spectre of a diseased
imaginatiou did not materialize. An anti-Catholic mob
did, however, not long after, with direst menaces
against every thing Catholic.
The good Sisters did notescape from these maniacal
threats and fiendish onslaughts. From one of them,
then, as now, a resident of the convent, we received
the following account :
"Almost two years had paaaed aince the opening of the convent, when
the peace was broken and terrifying rumors came to the ears of the lit-
tle community. The lawlaas marauding of the Know-Nothings was
then rife in Massachueetts ; churches had been mobl>ed and convents
threatened, a band of the fanatics had even forced an entrance to our
convent in Roxbury, then in its first days of existence, and the effect of
these reports upon the siblera of Lowell was anything but reassuring.
Soon, to their terror, they heard that the enemy was upon them ; some
of the band had come to this city, and an attack upon church and con-
vent was expected hourly. The sieters had dismisiied the classes, telliug
the children to remain in the safety of their own homes. Then, gather-
ing their few belongings, they bundled them together, and each sister
was allotted her portion to carry, should they be compelled to Hee. A
watch was setin the church-tower, and one peal of the church bell was
to let priests, sisters and people know that the godless band was upon them.
It had been agreed, that, at the first warning, a board from the fence
that enclosed the convent yard was to be wrenched away, and the sisters
were to escape through the opening thus made, and pass to a neighbor's
bouse, until the work of destruction had been wrought upon the de-
fenceless little building they bad called their home. Days passed in this
state of suspense. The sisters held themselves ready for all emergen-
cies, and lietened from hour to hour for the boding bell. Meanwhile,
faithful-hearted friends gathered around them, and, after their day's
hard labor, the factory girls congregated in the parlor, carrying stones
for want of better « eapons. Men came nightly to watch with the sis-
ters, hiding in the cellars, and in a eturdy way declared that if a finger
were laid upon the convent, there would be bard blows dealt in its de-
fence. Just at dusk, one quiet evening, the ominous peal Bounded forth
from the belfry. Fear and consternation in many hearts, but trustful
prayer iu the little convent. The self-constituted defenders stood with
arms uplifted, ready to burl their missiles at the first assailant. Tea,
the Rnow-Nuthiugs were approaching the church, but they had not
counted sufficiently upon Irish loyalty and vim When just within
sight of St, Patrick's, they were attacked by some strong-armed Irish-
men and women,— ay, women ; the latter led the attack. The march
became a melee, and the street was completely filled by the motley
crowd. They reached the bridge that spans the canal just within sight
of the convent. There was a halt, a splash, and a ringing cheer — a
sinewy matron, unable to restrain her indignation, had seized upon one
of the leaders of the gang, and dung him over the railing, floundering
into the water below. The rest of the band made the best of their way
out of the mob ; and, although the 6i:iter8 were stilt iu a state of anx-
iety, yet the attitude of their assailants grew less and less threatening.
[ " At last, on the fifteenth of June, came the dreaded ordeal. Between
I eleven and twelve in the morniog a carriage drew up before the convent,
j and five well-dressed men alighted, and sought admission. The sisters
I were just Bitting down to dinner, when the alarm of ' Know-Xolhings .' '
f was given; and, according to previous directions, a speedy message was
1 seut to Rev. Timothy O'Brien. While the sisters were still parleying
with the new-comers at tiie entrance, the Reverend Father made his
I appearance, and in his fearless strength seemed an overmatch for the
I five iotrudeis. ' ^^'hat Is your business in this bouse?' asked the wor-
( thy priest. * We wish to inspect the premises,' they answered. 'You
may follow me, and see what is to be seen, but I warn yuu not to lay
your band upon anything in this holy dwelling,* The so-called Com-
mittee conformed strictly tu orders and were led , through several
community rooms. When the.v reached the dormitory, the reverend
guide paused, and informed them that the privacy of the sleeping
apartments of the religious Bbould be respected. To their insistint^, be
stoutly declared that they should uot set foot within them ; and short-
ly after they took their leave, much to the relief of the community."
This, however, did not end the annoyances and dif-
ficulties of the Catholics of Lowell, either Sisters or
people. The Know-Xothing fever had not yet reached
its turning-point. " It would seem, indeed," says
Colonel Stone, a Protestant editor of the Aw York
Commercial Advertiser, " as though these people had
yielded themselves to this species of monomania, and
from mere habit they give a willing credence to any
story against the Roman Catholics, no matter what
or by whom related, so that it be sufficiently horrible
and revolting in its detail of licentiousness and blood."
The elections of November, 1854, sent to the Legis-
latures of several States many members of the new
party whose influence was immediately felt. Massa-
chusetts, in addition, elected a Know-Nothing Gov-
ernor, Henry J. Gardner, of whose policy we may
glean an idea from the following extract from his
inaugural address, delivered early in January, 1855 :
*' The honor of the American Flag should be confided only to those
who are born on the soil hallowed by its protection : They alone can
justly be raquirad to vindicate its rights. One of my earliest official
acts, then, will be, if sanctioned as the laws require, by the advice and
consent of the executive council, whom you will select, to disband all
military companies composed of persons of foreign birth."
That the executive council did consent, and more-
over added that " admission of an adopted citizen into
a military company would deprive that company of
the bounty of the government," we have testimony
from the Boston Atlas, bearing date January 11, 1855,
which contains the order of Henry J. Gardner, Gov-
ernor and commander-in-chief, ordering that the Co-
lumbian Artillery, Webster Artillery, Shields Artil-
lery and Sardfield Guards, in Boston (respectively.
Companies B, F and H, of the Fifth Eegiment of
Artillery ; and Company C, of the Third Battalion of
Light Infantry), Jackson Musketeers in Lowell (Com-
pany A, Fifth Regiment of Light Infantry), Union
Guards in Lawrence (Company G, Seventh Regiment
of Light Infantry), and the Jackson Guards of Wor-
cester (Company D, Eighth Regiment of Light In-
fantry), all of either " foreign birth " or extraction,
be disbanded.
The Jackson Musketeers, manfully determined not
to obey this order, considering themselves " a mili-
tary company of American citizens, organized pre-
cisely like any other military company, that had done
LOWELL.
157
no act as a company, nor as individuals, unbecoming
soldiers, good citizens, or gentlemen of the nicest
honor."
In this determination they were encouraged, per-
haps led, by the colonel of the regiment, Benjamin
F. Butler, who wrote the following letter :
•* Headqvabtebs 5th Reot., Lt. Ikt.
" LowEiL, Jan. 22, 1855.
" General : A t night, on the 20th instant, ' Brigade Order, Number 2,'
tranimitting 'Division Order, Number 3,' with a copy of ' General Order
Number 2 ' and * Council Order advisory thereto,' waa received.
" I am therein charged with the duty of disbanding Co. A of this
Regiment. Upon consideration, lam of opinion that the order is one
not required or authorized by law, and therefore 'respectfully decline to
execute it.
** 1 have the honor to be
" Your obedient servant,
"Besj. F. BoTtm,
" Col. Commanding 6th Reg. Lt. Infantry.
"To Brig. Ge.v. James Jones, Ja.,
"Commanding 3rd Brigade, 2nd Division, M,V.M."
On the Ist of February, Col. Butler was removed
from command by the Governor's order, without
having officially served on the company the order to
disband ; hence, when, on the 15th, the armory of the
Jackson Musketeers was broken open, and the musk-
ets seized by order of Gen. Stone, they were still —
which made the act more glaringly unlawful — a reg-
ularly organized company.
Having uttered various protests, the members, at
last convinced that neither the Chief Executive nor
Legislature of Massachusetts, as then constituted,
would give them justice, allowed the matter to rest,
and did not again attempt to resume arms until six
years after, when their country needed them for the
preservation of the Union.
March 29th, 1855, saw the convent once more in-
vaded. Again we quote from the Sister's account :
"Nearly a year had passed since the terrible days of threatened
attack from the Know-Nothings. The sisters still spoke of those hours
of dread thev spent during the eventful June of fifty-four, and prayed
God they might never know the like again. All seemed peaceful, when
lo ! the clouds gathered threatening as before. The report reached
Lowell that another band of fanatics was making raids upon convents ;
and under the name of 'Smelling Committee,' had appointed to them-
selves the task of dragging dark secrets forih to the light of day. They
had already visited the convent of our order in Eoibury, succeeding in
putting the sisters to great annoyance. Now, they announced their in-
tention of making a thorough search of the Lowell convent. Back to
the minds and hearts of the sisters came the terror that had harrowed
their very souls just a year b«fore ; but their brave defender. Father
Timothy O'Brien, bade them be of good cheer. ' For,' said he, 'they
■ball not harm a hair of your heads, the black-hearted villains.' He
counseled the sisters not to let one of them in, until he arrived. Soon
the expected committee came, seven in number, accompanied by some
Lowell officials, and headed by no leas a personage than the Mayor of
the city. According to the pastor's instruction, the sisters refused them
admittance until they saw Father Timothy, who escorted the Committee
through the bouse, asking them whether they met the extraordinary
sights they had expected. They insisted upon all the closets being
opened for their inspectiin, which waa accordingly done ; the children's
dormitories were visited, and lest anything should escspe observation,
the worihies raised the spreads, and examined the beds. When, how-
ever, they were about to enter the dormitories of the religious, the Rev-
erend Father forbade them to cross the threshold as they valued their
own safety. They desisted, and in taking their leave, expressed them-
selves satisfied with the result of the visit. Neither Mayor nor commit-
teeman made his appearance at Notre Dame again."
The men that formed this committee were : Messrs.
Streeter Evans of Essex, Gilbert Pillsbury of Hamp-
den, John Littlefield of Foxboro', Joseph Hiss of
Boston, Nathan King of Middleboro', Joseph H.
Lapham of Sandwich, Stephen Emery of Orange.
The Catholic historian, John G. Shea, thus character-
izes it : ' The infamous conduct of this committee,
and the examinations to which it led, covered with
opprobrium the instigators of this inquisitorial mea-
sure. In their visit to a house of sisters of Notre
Dame, at Roxbury, the members of the committee
acted with the grossest indecency ; in their excursion
to Lowell, one of the committee was accompanied by
a loose woman [Mrs. Moody, aliat ' Mrs. Patterson '],
whose expenses he charged to the State ; and these
very fair samples of Massachusetts' guardians of pub-
lic morals, going to see whether any disorders existed
in Catholic convents, themselves gave every example
of dishonesty and debauchery. The whole Know-
Nothing party blushed at the dishonor they had
drawn upon themselves ; and to satisfy the public
clamor expelled Mr. Hiss, one of their members,
making him the scape-goat." Mr. Charles Cowley, of
this city, in his " History of Lowell," relates the " Pat-
terson" episode still more plainly, thus summing up
his account: "The results of the visit were, to make
Hiss notorious, aud the Legislature ridiculous, and to
furnish some sensational cuts for the comic and pic-
torial newspapers."
However, as has been well said, " Man cannot be
kept in a state of constant fury against his fellow-
man, especially when the latter is inoffensive and
innocent ; and when the passions are no longer ex-
cited by the leaders of the movement, natural benev-
olence resumes its course. There are moments when
apostles of error stop from weariness, and others,
when political reasons make it prudent to wheedle
Catholics by presenting real toleration and not a
sham. And lastly, God wishes to give his Church
some days of repose amid the trials of the crucible in
which the faithful are purified."
The Know-Nothing frenzy subsided ; and it be-
came evident that Catholics were ready to at least
forgive its injustice and malevolence ; and to forget
them, unless recalled by similar outrages, which — God
forbid !
To return again to St. Patrick's school. The num-
ber in the different departments, free-school, acad-
emy and boarding-school, rapidly increased, and,
with them, necessarily the number of Sisters, so that
school and convent accommodations in a short time
became inadequate, and once again evoked assist-
ance from the ever-generous hand of Father Timothy
O'Brien, who seems to have taken the schools under his
special care. Soon after the dedication of the church,
work was commenced for the erection of a large
frame school building. Father Timothy's intention
had been that it should be finished for the opening
of the September term of 1855, but he was disap-
158
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
pointed not only in that, but in ever witnessing its
completion ; for he was called to the reward of his
labors, as has been said before, on the 11th of Octo-
ber, 1855.
Shortly after his death a handsome granite monu-
ment was placed over his remains. A Lowell paper
dated July 10, 1856, thus commented upon it : "On
leaving the church-yard we noticed that the monu-
ment to the late Rev. Mr. O'Brien, which has been
in the course of erection for some time past, is com-
pleted and placed over his remains immediately op-
posite the main door of the church. . . . The
monument has that suitable appearance and grand
solemnity about it which the granite alone can give,
making it in all respects an appropriate testimonial
of the respect in which the late clergyman's memory is
held. It was built and placed where it now is by the
congregation of St. Patrick's."
Soon after Father Timothy's death Rev. Thomas R.
McNulty was sent from St. Augustine's Church,
South Boston, as assistant to Father John O'Brien,
and remained in Lowell until February, 1857, when
he was transferred to Milton, where he founded St.
Gregory's Church, Dorchester Avenue.
Another assistant. Rev. T. P. McCarthy, was sent
to St. Patrick's, November 26, 1856, and remained
till May, 1858, when, his health failing, he retired ;
and soon after died in a religious retreat in the West.
The school building in which Father Timothy had
been so deeply interested was completed in the fall of
1855, and immediately occupied.
The convent, also — intended for five Sisters where
now there were twice that number — was not large
enough. The fall of '56 saw the beginning of a
brick convent, which still remains, though with later
additions considerably larger than the first building,
which latter, at the time of its completion, seemed ex-
travagantly commodious. Soon, owing to the rapid
increase of pupils in the difierent departments, every
available space was occupied. In 1864 the building
was again enlarged, and in 1865 the Academy was in-
corporated under the title St. Patrick's Academy. It
seemed, however, a difficult matter to keep the ac-
commodation proportionate to the ever-increasing
pupils. A short time after the foundation-stone of
the present building was laid, and before many
months, a substantial structure of brick, finely pro-
portioned and handsomely finished, was completed,
needing nothing but an extensive play-ground and
pleasant surroundings to make it an ideal boarding-
school. In these last it was for a time lacking ; but,
gradually, some unsightly buildings that surrounded it
were purchased and removed ; and, at length, sufficient
land had been procured and handsomely laid out to
make the surroundings correspond with the Academy
itself.
The one most closely connected with Father John
in all these improvements — Sister Desiree, the worthv
Superior who had led the little band of five to the
humble convent in 1852 — wa.s cut down in the midst
of her usefulness on the 16th of October, 1879, re-
gretted by the people of Lowell as one who.se dearest
aspiration had been for God's glory and the spiritual
and temporal welfare of all : a comfortress and assist-
ant in poverty, sutTering or sorrow ; a watchful and
loving mother to the young committed to her care ; a
kind friend and wise counselor to the many who had
sought her guidance.
In addition to the pupils at the different schools,
hundreds of women and girls had been gathered
together in religious societies, largely through her
efforts under the direction of the pastor. Of these,
the Sodality of the Immaculate Conception was organ-
I ized as early as 1854, with the following officers:
Prefect, Miss M. O'Connor; Secretary, Miss Georgiana
Cummiskey. It now numbers six hundred and fifty
members, with Miss Ellen Dinneen as Prefect, and
Miss Elizabeth Johnson as Secretary ; and is a source
of encouragement and assistance in every good work
in the parish. The Sodality of the Holy Family, for
married women, was formed about the year 1861, with
Mrs. Catherine Haviland, Prefect, and Mrs. Catherine
Ring, as Secretary. It now numbers over three hun-
dred members, with Mrs. Marcella Courtney as
Prefect, and Mrs. Sarah Kelley as Secretary. This
latter Sodality has taken upon itself " the praise-
worthy task of clothing poor children and rendering
destitute homes more comfortable."
1857, " the year of the panic," was a sad one for the
poor throughout the country ; and nowhere did they
suffer more than in manufacturing cities and towns.
In Lowell, several mills were closed and much poverty
and suffering resulted, which the priests and the sisters
at St. Patrick's did all in their power to alleviate. In
many instances, whole families were kept for weeks
by their bounty ; food being dispensed at all hours
from parsonage and convent to men, women and
children without regard to race or creed.
The opening of the mills, in the spring of 1858, soon
restored prosperity and happiness, which remained
undisturbed until the spring of 1861, when the Catho-
lics of Lowell, in common with all their fellow-citi-
zens, felt the shock and the grief of the attempted
dissolution of the Union.
Notwithstanding the slur that had been cast upon
the loyalty and military abilities of the Irish race in
Massachusetts six years before, we find some of them
— Catholics, as the Irish and their descendants gener-
ally are — in the militia which responded to the first
call of the President, when the "gallant Sixth Mas-
sachusetts," containing four Lowell companies, started
April 17, 1861, for the defence of the Nation's capital.
One of these, Timothy A. Crowley, may be taken as
indicative of the calibre of most of the others. He
was Lowell born, but of Irish descent. At the depart-
ure of the company, a local paper said of him : " The
color-bearer of the Sixth Regiment is Timothy A.
Crowley, a private in the Watson Light Guards of
LOWELL.
159
this city, a gallant and patriotic soldier, well-known
to our citizens. The flag will be sate in his hands
[vide Gov. Gardner's inaugural, sis years before],
and he will dei'end it with his life." He went out as
corporal in the Watson Light Guards in their three |
months' campaign, and bore the colors of the Sixth
Kegiment during the Baltimore riot of 1861 " with a
steady courage that attracted the admiration of all."
During the struggles of that regiment he won from a
war correspondent of the Boston Journal the tribute
of being " as noble a fellow as ever wore a uniform of
the old Bay State." Having returned with his regi-
ment, he soon organized a company, which he led
forth from Lowell; and having displayed even greater
bravery as an oflBcer than as a private, he met his
death at New Orleans, October 5, 1862. His remains
were brought to Lowell, and a High Mass of Requiem
offered for the repose of his soul at St. Patrick's
Church, from which he was buried with public hon-
ors, in St. Patrick's Cemetery, October 26, 1862.
That the Catholics of Lowell, a majority of whom
were of Irish birth, were fully awake to the demands
of the hour, we learn from the following "Call"
which appeared in the local papers the very evening
on which the first blood was shed in the Union cause :
"Adopted citizens, arouse! The cry of war resounds
throughout the land ! The flag of our country, which
we have sworn to support and defend, has been assail-
ed I Now is the time to prove our devotion to the be-
loved Constitution of our country. Therefore, all
those who desire to join a militia company will assem-
ble at the hall of the Independent Guards, corner of
Lowell and Suflblk Streets, this Friday evening, to
afiix their signatures to a document for the above
purpose."
It is needless to say that the call met with a ready
response. Sixty-six men that evening, and four more
next morning, enrolled themselves as defenders of the
Union. Saturday morning the company was accepted
and the charter received, and the following officers
appointed : — Captain, Patrick S. Proctor ; First Lieu-
tenant, Matthew Donovan ; Second Lieutenant, David
W. Roche ; Third Lieutenant, Thomas Ciaffey ; Fourth
Lieutenant, Edward Murphy.
This company, afterwards known as the Hill Cadets,
is thus referred to in Cowley's " Histc^y of Lowell : "
— " The Hill Cadets — the first company organized in
Lowell during the Rebellion — were principally men
who had belonged to the Jackson Musketeers, — who
had been deprived of their arms by the Know-Noth-
ing Governor Gardner, — and who had been calumni-
ated even as late as the preceding January, as being
ready to take part with South Carolina against their
own adopted Commonwealth. It was not until they
received the shock of a bloody civil war, that the na-
tive and foreign-born began alike to feel that, in spite
of all their little differences, they were all Americans
at heart — loving their country with a warm and equal
love, and ready to peril all in her defence."
Of the officers of the Hill Cadets, Matthew Dono-
van's bravery led to his promotion to the rank of ma-
jor; David W. Roche was subsequently transferred to
Company A of the same regiment, and promoted to a
captaincy. He was killed at Gettysburg, July 3, 1863;
his remains brought to Lowell and interred, as had
been Captain Crowley's, August 3, 1863. Thomas
Claffey's career is thus described by a local historian :
— " On December 13, 1862, the Army of the Potomac
under General Burnside advanced on the defences of
Fredericksburg, but only to be driven back, after a
sublime exhibition of its courage and a lavish outpour-
ing of its blood, to its original lines. Among the
killed in this engagement was Captain Thomas Ciaf-
fey, of Lowell. He was born in Cork, Ireland, and
came to Lowell when a boy. At Fredericksburg, the
command of his company devolved on him, and here
his gallantn.- won him a commission as brevet captain.
This honor, however, was conferred too late. Early
in the engagement, he for whom it was intended fell,
shot through the mouth and neck, and so, amid the
cloud and thunder of battle, the impetuous spirit of
Thomas Ciaffey took the everlasting flight; His body
was not recovered."
This was not the only company made up of Lowell
Catholics of Irish blood. Before the close of that
same first month of the war, still another call was
issued, and answered, to form a company to be at-
tached to the Irish Brigade of Boston ; and, on the
1st of May following, the Butler Rifles — Co. G of the
Sixteenth Infantry — was organized, including a large
number of men of either Irish birth or parentage,
and with Thomas O'Hare its first lieutenant, and
afterwards its captain.
Nor were the Catholic women of Lowell lacking in
patriotism, and loyalty to the Union. Side by side
with their Protestant sisters, and with devotion by no
means less marked, did they work in their own wo-
manly way for their country's defenders, as the follow-
ing extract will show : — " The ladies named below,
belonging to the different Catholic churches in this
city, have patriotically volunteered their services as a
committee to furnish the soldiers of Captain Proctor's
company with flannel garments, and invite the co-op-
eration of other ladies who may wish to unite in the
same benevolent work.
" The committee will meet in the vestries of the
several churches to-morrow afternoon, for the purpose
of making further arrangements. We learn that the
city government have granted the use of their rooms
in the government building as a workshop for the
ladies engaged in this enterprise. The following are
the names of the committee: — St. Patrick's Church,
Mrs. Hogan, Mrs. P. Haggerty, Mrs. T. D. Smith, Miss
B. Proctor, Miss M. A. Doyle, Miss M. Shea, Mrs. D.
Crowley, Miss L. Enright. St. Mary's, Miss B. Car-
roll, Mrs. T. Lucas, Miss M. Pender, Mrs. J. Warren,
Mrs. P. Lynch, Miss M. Deehan, Mrs. J. Heland. St.
Peter's Church, Mrs. J. Quinn, Mrs. B. Costello, Miss
160
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
J. McEvoy, Miss L. McEvoy, Misa M.. McGuiggan,
Miss M. McNulty, Miss Kate McEvoy.
Well, indeed, might the Lowell Advertiser of Thurs-
day, May 2d, state: "The fidelity of the Irish to the
general government is indisputable. No class of our
people excel them in patriotic devotion to the land of
their adoption." And with confidence did the pioneer
Catholic organ of the State, the Boston Pilot, of the
preceding week assert : " The Irish adopted citizens
are true to a man to the Constitution. No exception
to the ancient character of their race will now be dis-
covered. This is their real country. The govern-
ment of the United States is their favorite system of
national policy. They have taken a solemn oath to
be loyal to America against all other nations in the
world. Here they flourish in all their undertakings.
Here they are deeply fixed with their wives and fam-
ilies, whom they support from profits of their perma-
nent engagements in the various pursuits of bubiness
in the State. Here are rooted all their hopes of hap-
piness, honor and emolument from farming, from
commerce, from artisanship, from public toiling, from
politics and from the professions. They have too
much at stake here — too much of their honor and too
much of their other interests — to be traitors to the
country."
In an editorial in the Lowell Advertiser of that time
reference is thus made to the Irish volunteers and to
their treatment a few short years previous : " We can
conceive of no more withering rebuke to the State of
Massachusetts, than is paid it in the promptness with
which the men who compose these companies have
come forward, in the dark hour of our country's peril,
to defend it from the attacks of domestic traitors, to
uphold our flag, and under its protecting folds to bat-
tle for the right. What better evidence is wanted to
satisfy Americans of the error they have committed
Ln doubting the patriotism of these men, and denying
them the same political and social rights enjoyed by
aU other classes of citizens. Let us hear no more of
such illiberal sentiments from Massachusetts. They
have too long been a disgrace to the intelligence of
the State, both at home and abroad ; and may we not
hope that the extra session of the Legislature about
to be called, will take, at least, the initiatory steps in
purging out all unjust laws affecting their rights.
"At any rate, we cannot doubt, that in whatever
post of danger or of peril they may be placed, in the
fearful struggle through which we are now passing,
they will do their duty bravely, with honor to them-
selves, and credit to our city ; and that they will show
to us, of the manor born, that the love and patriotism
which Irish adopted citizens have always claimed to
cherish for our country and its free institutions have
been no idle boast. They will show us, too, the in-
justice of the disbanding of the so-called Irish mili-
tary companies of Massachusetts by a Know-Nothing
administration, for the poor reason alone, that they
happened, perchance, to be born upon another soil
and exercise the constitutional right to ofler up their
prayers to God before a Catholic altar."
The Hill Cadets made their first appearance in
their new uniform on Sunday, May 5, 1861, when
they assisted at Mass at St. Patrick's Church. The
Mass was celebrated by the pastor. Rev. John O'Brien,
and when, at the Consecration, the drum beat and the
men presented arms before the Lord of Hosts, the God
of Battles, it was a most impressive scene, reminding
one of the Ages of Faith, when the Crusaders dedi-
cated their arras to the Holy Cause, and sought at
the altar of God inspiration and encouragement to
battle for His Holy Land and Holy Name.
Their next public appearance was the following
Thursday evening, when they marched to the
residence of Paul Hill, Esq., a gentleman who had
been very active in their behalf and in whose honor
they took their name. They were presented on that
occasion with a handsome flag, the presentation ad-
dress being delivered by John F. McEvoy, Esq.
We next hear of them the 23d of June, and also of
a delegation of the Butler Rifles, as attending, at St.
Mary's Church, the funeral services of Rev. Joseph
Gray, a highly esteemed priest, who died suddenly,
June 21st, at the residence of Rev. Father McDer-
mott, and whose remains now lie in St. Patrick's
Cemetery, where a monument has been raised in his
memory " by the Catholics of Lowell, under the au-
spices of the Young Men's Catholic Library Associa-
tion." A few days after, Monday, July 8, 1861, the
Hill Cadets and the Butler Rifles left Lowell for
Camp Cameron, Cambridge, and were attached to the
Sixteenth Regiment, with which they soon went to
the front, and bravely and honorably served for three
years, returning July 21, 1864, after having taken
part in the battles of Fair Oaks, Malvern Hill, Chan-
tilly, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Gettysburg,
Locust Grove, Wilderness, Spottsylvania, Cold Har-
bor and Petersburg, — " a record their children and
their children's children may look back upon with
pride."
And so we might continue a roll of honor from of-
ficers and privates, in army and navy, radiailt with
the loyalty and bravery of the Catholics of Lowell,
some of whom sleep in unknown graves on Southern
battle-fields, " Southern dews weeping above them as
gently as though they lay in their Northern village
church-yards ; " some of whom repose this June
morning 'neath flag-marked and flower-strewn graves
in St. Patrick's Cemetery ; some of whom we, hap-
pily, have yet amongst us; and still others of whom
have been called hence to serve again their country
in various positions of honor and trust.
During all these years several worthy priests had
been sent to Lowell to assist Father O'Brien. In
June, 1858, came Rev. M. X. Carroll, and remained
until February 28, 1859, when he went to Mansfield,
and after some time was transferred to his present
place at the Boston Cathedral ; Rev. P. O'Donoghue
LOWELL.
161
W£is alsi here from December, 1858, to February, 1859,
when his place was filled by Rev. E. O'Connor, who
remained until June, 186U and not long after died in
the Milwaukee Diocese. Rev. EmilianoGerbi, O.S.F.,
next came to Lowell in June, 1861, and, having
served until April, 1862, was sent to St. Mary's,
Charlestown, and thence to the Gate of Heaven
Church, South Boston, where he died. In June,
1862, Rev. Peter Bcrtoldi came to St. Patrick's,
whence he was transferred, July, 1864, to St. Peter's
Church, Sandwich ; Rev. Peter Hamill came soon
after, September, 1864, and remained until Decem-
ber, 1864, a short time before his death. Rev. James
McGlew, the present respected pastor of the church
of St. Rose, Chelsea, spent a few months at St. Pat-
rick's, from January, 1865, to July 1st of the same year,
when he was appointed to St. Mary's Church, Ran-
dolph, and afterwards, as has been stated, to Chelsea.
Rev. Charles F. Grace next succeeded, in July, 1865,
remaining until July, 1868, when he was transferred
to Great Harrington. About a year after his coming,
the congregation, which had greatly increased, re-
quired the presence of another priest, and Rev. Den-
nis C. Moran, having been appointed in August,
1866, remained until March, 1868, when he was
placed in charge of St. Mary's, Uxbridge, also of
AVhiliusville, where he built a fine church, the pres-
ent St. Patrick's, after which he was appointed to the
l>a8torate of St. Charles' Church, South Adams, which
position he still occupies.
Meanwhile another care had come to the priest
of St. Patrick's — that of the Catholics of Chelms-
ford. Finding them quite numerous, and realizing
the distance they had to come to Mass, Father
O'Brieu purchased a Protestant Church in East
Chelmsford, which he moved to a central posi-
ion in North Chelmsford, where it still remains,
under the patronage of St. John the Evangelist, at-
tended by priests from St. Patrick's Church, Lowell.
Before Father Moran's departure it was found that
two assistants would be necessary; and, at the earnest
solicitation of Father John, his nephew, Rev. Michael
O'Brieu, St. Patrick's present rector, came from
Rochester, N. Y., to Lowell, June 29, 18C7. The de-
tails of Father Michael O'Brien's career, previous to
this event, will be found elsewhere ; but from this
time forth little can be said of him apart from the
history of St. Patrick's Church, to whose welfare atd
advancement — spiritual and temporal — all his best
energies have been unselfishly devoted.
The year following Father Michael's coming saw
another good work of Father John O'Brien's com-
pleted— a hospital for the sick and suffering. In the
fall of 1866 he purchased the "Livermore Place," in
Belvidere, the "Old Yellow House," built by Timothy
Brown, 1770, and later occupied by Judge Livermore.
Together with the adjoining land, the cost was
$12,000. This he presented to the Sisters of Charity,
and had it incorporated under their auspices March
11 -ii
29, 1867, with the name St. John's Hospital, at the
Sisters' reques^, in order that it should allow, at least,
its title to pay him some tribute of appreciation and
respectful remembrance. In 1868 the building was
completed and opened. The report for 1879 says of
this noble institution : "Its doors are always open to
cases where individuals are suddenly stricken down
or injured by accident in the mills, or on the railroads,
or by any other means."
Shortly after the establishment of the hospital — for
its benefit, and also for the benefit of persons living
in its neighborhood, which is quite a distance from
St. Patrick's Church — a chapel was erected close by,
and for a while attended by priests from St. Patrick's.
Not long after this, the spiritual care of the French-
speaking Catholics having been committed to the
Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, fathers of
that society came to Lowell, and also took charge of
the little hospital chapel, which has Hiuce developed
into the beautiful Church of the Immaculate Con-
ception.
Sometime previous to this, Father John had made
extensive additions to St. Patrick's Cemetery, which,
when he came to Lowell, consisted of only a few
acres that had originally been set apart for burial
purposes by Lowell's first Catholic pastor. Father
Mahony. For this purpose, a large tract of land in
the vicinity of the first one was purchased, and it has
since been greatly increased by the present rector,
who has continued Father John's admirable arrange-
ment and appropriate ornamentation, until St. Pat-
rick's Cemetery — the only Catholic one in Lowell —
now consists of about seventy acres, is excellently
laid out, has numerous handsome monuments, and is
second to none in the city. Within its sacted enclos-
ures lie the remains of Rev. Fathers Gray, McDer-
mott, Crudden, Phaneuf, Trudeau and Ryan, over
each of whom a monument haj been raised — that
over the last-named clergyman having been erected
by the kindly remembrance of Rev. Michael O'Brien.
There, also, repose several of the good Sisters of
Notre Dame and of Charity, the greater part of whose
pious lives was devoted to the welfare of the Catho-
lics of Lowell ; besides all the laity of the city who
have died in the Catholic communion, realizing, be-
yond a doubt, that " Blessed are the dead who die in
the Lord."
And now, to once again resume our sketch of the
church. On the departure of Father Moran, already
referred to. Rev. Arthur J. Teeling, then recently
ordained, was appointed in his place in July, 1868,
and remained till August, 1871, when he was trans-
ferred to the Church of the Immaculate Conception,
Newburyport, of which he is now permanent rector —
thus, by something of a coincidence, reversing the
condition of things, twenty-three years IJefore, when
Newburyport provided Lowell with a pastor, as
Lowell now did for Newburyport. In connection
with Father Teeling's term in Lowell, and subsequent
162
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
career, a sketch of the Catholic Church in Newbury-
port states : " It may be a not uninteresting fact that
Newburyport's present pastor, Rev. Arthur J. Teel-
ing, was for three years assistant to Rev. John
O'Brien, of Lowell, Newburyport's first pastor. Per-
hap.s, from the one whose brief sojourn in that town
had been so successful, and who had given the good
work such a strong impetus on the right road, Father
Teeling, in the impressionable days of his early
priesthood, imbibed some of the zeal that during his
pastorate had crowned the church of Newburyport
with a success almost unprecedented in the eccle-
siastical records of Massachusetts, and equal to that
of any church in the country similarly situated."
It was while Father Teeling was in Lowell — and
largely through his assistance and that of Father
Michael O'Brien — that the pastor, in 1869, organized
the St. Patrick's Temperance Society, which soon
after became one of the largest in the State, num-
bering thirteen hundred members — about seven hun-
dred men and six hundred women. Its first ofiicers
were: President, Rev. Michael O'Brien; Treasurer,
Rev. Arthur J. Teeling; Secretary, Mr. James J.
Shea. The society still exists, though with some-
what diminished numbers, and consists of men only.
Its present officers are: Spiritual Director, Rev. R.
S. Burke; President, Mr. William E. Broderick ;
Secretary, Mr. Henry Johnson ; Treasurer, Mr.
Michael Rourke.
The additional priests at St. Patrick's having ren-
dered the pastoral residence as inadequate as it had
always been unsuitable. Father John had it removed,
and the present commodious one erected, at liis own
expense, in 1869.
Having now provided, not only for all the present
needs of the parish, but for many of those for years
to come ; and beginning to feel the weight of ad-
vancing age upon him. Rev. John O'Brien resigned
the pastorate of St. Patrick's in 1S70, and Rev.
Michael O'Brien became pastor de facto, though
always under Father John's guidance. Hale and
liearty, and scarcely less active than ever, did the
zealous priest remain for four years more, when he
was suddenly called, October 31, 1S74, to enjoy the
reward of his noble and edifjirig life. After most
impressive funeral rites, his remains were placed
beside those of his beloved and revered brother.
Meanwhile, other changes had taken place amongst
the priests at St. Patrick's. After Father Teeling's
departure, in 1871, a worthy successor came in the
person of Rev. Michael T. McManus, who remained
from May, 1871, to April, 1876, when he was trans-
ferred to West Newton ; and, after six years, was ap-
pointed to the spiritual charge of the large and pros-
perous congregation of St, Patrick's Church, South
Lawrence.
A few months before Father McManus left Lowell,
two other assistants having become necessary for the
increasing pariah, Revs. William and Martin O'Brien
came in Sept., 1875. Of these reverend father.", the
former. Rev. William O'Brien, most faithfully minis-
tered to St. Patrick's congregation until June, 1884,
when he was placed in charge of the then recently
formed congregation of St. Michael's Church, Cen-
tralville, of which he is still the esteemed pastor.
Rev. Martin O'Brien remained in Lowell about a
year and a half, when he was sent to the Church of
the Immaculate Conception, Salem, whence, after
nine years of valuable service, he was transferred to
the pastorate of St. Mary's Church, Newton Upper
Falls.
In September, 1876, Rev. William M. O'Brien came
to Lowell, and, after a twelve years' stay, which is
pleasantly and gratefully remembered, was appointed
pastor of St. Mary's Church, Winchester, Massa-
chusetts.
Rev. John J. Shaw, happily still at this, his first
mission, came here January 16, 18S3 ; and, about a
year alter, January I'J, 1S84, came Rev. James W.
Hickey, whose health obliged him, in September,
1887, to seek tlie more genial clime of Calilornia.
Rev. Richard S. Burke came to take his place here
soon after, and St. Patrick's is still favored with his
services.
With the assistance of these zealous priests — under
the wise and fatherly guidance of the rector — several
excellent societies have been formed in addition to
those already mentioned. Amongst these is one very
important in the advancement of religious affairs and
the general good of the community — the Holy Name
Society, organized in May, 1879, with the following
officers: Spiritual Director, Rev. M. O'Brien ; Presi-
dent, Mr. Michiel Meally ; secretary, Mr. John J.
tjhea ; Treasurer, Mr. William Downey. The society
now numbers three hundred and fifty members, with
Rev. Jlichael O'Brien, spiritual director ; Mr. Michael
McDermott, president ; Mr. Michael Moran, secretary,
and Mr. John Whilty, treasurer. Another society this
present year established, is for the benefit of the poor
and sufiering — the Conference of St. Vincent de
Paul. Its Spiritual Director is Rev. Michael O'Brien ;
President, Mr. James O Sullivan ; Secretary and Treas-
urer, Mr. John P. Mahoney.
To revert again to the sad event of October, 1874.
After Father John's death it soon became evident
that his mantle had, indeed, fallen upon his chosen
successor. Rev. Michael O'Brien, whom Bisho]) — now
Archbishop — Williams immediately confirmed in that
position.
To give an idea of what St. Patrick's Parish owes
to these two zealous workers in God's vineyard — in-
deed, to the three ; for Father Timothy was equally
generous — is next to impossible. From the present
rector, who is truly one that ' lets not his right hand
know what his left hand does,' one can get only a
meagre account. But, " actions speak louder than
words, " and "figures will not lie." Ask the par-
ishioners when contributions were solicited for such
LOWELL.
163
and such improvements and additions — they cannot
tell you — they cannot remember. So quietly and un-
ostentatiously has everything been done, that it is
taken almost as a matier of course — " Father John
did it " — " Father John gave it ; " and the same with
Father iVIichael.
The time, however, for something of a reckoning
had come. When Father Timothy came to Lowell,
everything he then possessed, and everything he after-
wards received, were generously placed at the dispos-
al of Father John for the building of the church and
school ; BO that, at the time of his decease, a large
debt was virtually due him, which amount reverted
to Father John as his heir. The latter, however,
followed his brother's example, everything that be-
longed to him, that came to him, he seemed to regard
as belonging to his church and his flock. The Christ-
mas before his death he made a statement to that
effect, as many of the older parishioners can, proba-
bly, remember. Out of what others would consider
his own private resources, the parochial residence,
worth ten thousand dollars, had been built; from
them also, thousands of dollars had been expended
on the school building, and three thousand had
been left as a fund, the interest of which was to pur-
chase textbooks for needy pupils; and three thousand
more had been expended on repairing St. Mary's
Church. These, and other figures, which might be
presented by his successor. Father Michael, showing
the indebtedness of the church and parisli to them
and to him, would be almost incredible. They were,
however, submitted, with confirmatory vouchers, in the
report of the standing of the church for the year end-
ing December 31, 187-1, to one who understood their
truthful showing, the Right Reverend Bishop of
the Diocese, accompanied, out of the generosity of
Father Michael's heart, by the statement that all that
had been used for the benefit of church, schools,
etc., by both his predecessors, he, as their heir — inter-
preting the condition of affairs as he believed they
would wish him to do — now presented to St. Patrick's
Church.
Of this report and statement the Rt. Rev. Bishop
sent the following acknowledgment :
" Boston, Feb. 8, 1675.
" Rev. Deah Sm ; — Tour report for 1674 is receivtKl with llit, deed of
the LouBC. It is not necessarj" to say th.it the Report is very satisfac-
tory. Tlie p«opk- of Sf. Patrick's owe .i debt of gratitude to Father JoLd
and to yourself, whicb I Lope tliey will uot forget.
*' With best wislies fortbe year,
" Yours very Bincerely,
" -r John J. Williams,
*' Bp. of Bu&tOD.
"Bev. M. OBbie-V, Lowell, Ma»."
Soon, Father O'Brien's zeal began to manifest
itself. Anything that time had impaired, or that had
heretofore been overlooked was soon attended to.
Amongst the former wa.s the basement of the church,
which he renewed and greatly improved in 1878,
making of it a large and handsome chapel, of the
game dimensions, except height, as the church above,
for the celebration of Mass on week-days, for con-
fessions, and for the accommodation of the Sunday-
school, and of several religious societies that meet
there at different times; while two good-sized and
convenient apartments were set off, one for a vestry,
the other for a library.
Not long after the completion of this, he commenced
ed preparations for the crowning glory in St. Patrick's
record — the consecration of the church. Devoting to
this purpose his strongest energies, and giving to-
wards it — as in many other instances — tliousands of
dollars of his own private resources, more, indeed, than
he will ever acknowledge, he went on with the uoble
work of clearing the church wholly from debt, and
making the alterations and repairs necessary to render
it worthy of that distinction. With this end in view, he
had handsome new seats and fine, massive new doors
put iu ; also a most chaste and beautiful marble altar
erected. This last is a magnificent specimen of art.
It is built in the Gothic style to correspond with the
church, and is composed of gray and white marbles,
and inlaid with rich specimens of precious Mexican
onyx, and rare marbles from Ireland and Portugal.
At its base it measures twenty feet, and from its base
to the top of the central pinnacle, the messurement
is twenty-three feet. On the Gospel and Epistle
sides of the altar are niches ; in the former of which
is placed a marble statue of the Blessed Virgin, and
in the latter, a statue of the same material of St.
Patrick, the patron of the church. Describing it the
week after the consecration, the Boston Pilot said :
" Altogether the altar presents a most imposing ap-
pearance, and is one of the finest in the country."
The walls and ceiling he also greatly beautified. ♦V'o
whole interior having been frescoed with a delicate
purple tint and embellished with rich gilding. Under
his direction, too, the old windows were removed,
and beautiful new stained-glass ones — a series of edi-
fying and instructive lessons presented in lovely tints
and colors by the sunshine — substituted for them,
through the generosity of members of the congrega-
tion and a few others.
Following is a list of the windows and their donors.
The first on each side facing each other, are orna-
mental windows presented — that on the left or Gospel
side, by James J. McCafferty, Esq., in memory of his
father; that on the Epistle side, by Mary and Katie
Griffin. Second, Gospel side, an allegorical repre-
sentation of Temperance with its good, and Intem-
perance with its evil results, designed expressly for
and presented by St. Patrick's Temperance Society ;
second, Epistle, pictures of St. Michael the Archangel
and St. James the Apostle, presented by Rev. James
McGlew. Third, Gospel, the Miraculous Draught of
Fishes, donated by Miss B. C. Proctor in memory of
her brother. Captain Patrick S. Proctor; third. Epistle,
a picture of the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes
given by the Sodality of the Immaculate Conception.
Fourth, Gospel, pictures of St. Mathew and St. Mark,
1G4
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
given by James Collins; fourth, Epistle, pictures of
St. Luke and St. John, presented by the Holy Name
Society. Fifth, Gospel, picture of The Raising of
Lazarus,- tlie gift of the Rosary Society ; fifth, Epistle,
representation of Christ Restoring Sight to the Blind,
gift of Mr. Timothy O'Brien. First in Gospel trans-
sept, pictures of St. Jerome and St. Augustine, pre-
sented by Rev. Arthur J. Teeling; first in Epistle
transept, pictures of St. Gregory and St. Ambrose,
given by Mrs. A. F. Jewett, in memory of her hus-
band, Andrew F. Jewett. Second Gospel transept,
pictures of St. Patrick and St. Bridget, given by
Patrick Mead ; second Epistle transept, pictures
of the Blessed Virgin and St. Anne, given by
Anne Hallinan. On left side of altar, picture of the
Nativity of Christ, presented by Dr. F. C. Plunkett;
right side, picture of the Resurrection, presented by
Patrick Lynch. Above these in left transept, picture
of the Annunciation, gift of the Sodality of the Holy
Family ; above in right transtpt, one of the Ascension,
gift of the Sisters of Notre Dame. In the choir, also,
are two handsome windows — at the left, one repre-
senting St. Rose and Si. Agnes, presented by John
Donovan ; and one at the right, representing St. John
the Baptist and St. C'uluiiibkille, presented by Mrs.
Terence Hanover, in memory of her husband, Terence
Hanover. Above the altar is the masterpiece of all
— a representation of the solemn and sublime mystery
of the Crucifixion of Christ — donated by Rev. Michael
O'Brien in memory of Revs. Timorhy and John
O'Brien.
Everything being now in rcadines?, even to the
placing of the twelve anointed crosses that always
mark a consecrated church, the solemn act of conse-
cration— one of the most impressive ceremonies of the
Catholic Church — was performed Sunday, September
7, 1S79.
The following extracts are taken from the full ac-
count of the ceremoiiy which appeared in the Boston
rUol of that week :
"A Rare Ceiiemoxy.
** Consecnifiaii of n Church in LofeJl.
"A rare Catholic tereniony w;i» pcrfuiiiieil on tfiiiiilay, the 7th inst.,
1)V the 31oat Kfv, Arciihiihup Willi.iii]S, ihu uci-iiaiuu Ik.*iij(; tlit- luiist^ ni-
tiuli of St. Patrick's Chtirdi. Luwi^ll, SInnH. '1 liiii i^ ilm tliiiil l-Iiimx-Ii
tliut hiiH uow beiMi constcnxted iu the anltdiocfsd of Itotiloli. the otlii-r
twobeiiiRthu Church uf the lulltidculute rouccpliuu, iu Uustuu, auJ
the church uf the sumo ualue iu Keuhurypurc."
"THE COXbECRATiuN.
"The ceremonies of consecration, uliicli were very long, began at
snven A.M., thu Mo3t IlovereuJ Consecrator heiiifr u^aialcil by the fol-
lowiiii; clergymen : First ileucon. Rev. Thoniiu ^hiilinn, Boston; bec-
oiid deHCon, Uev. .luhii Gny, SiiUm ; snhdeucuu, Rev. 31. McMunus,
West Newton ; Masters of Ceremonies, lieVi. .\ J. Teehng, Newbury-
jwrt, and John Gilmore, O.S. A , Lawrence. This ptirtioD of the cere-
monies occupied three boiirs, and was prirate. Thu church was ojiened
to the congregation, who were udniitied only by tickets, at ten o'clock ;
and in a short time every available ^p^ce was occupied. The Solemn
Pontltical Mass was comnienced at muirter-past ten, His Grace, the
Archbishop, being the celebialit ; Very Uev. Father Byrne, V.iJ., act-
ing aji .\rchprie8t; deacons of honor, Rov. Jatues McGlew, Chelsea;
Uuv. James Huurigan, Biughamtuu, N. V. ; deacon of the Mas^, Rev.
Father Smith, rector of the Uofttou Cilliedr.il ; sub-dciu.'ou, Uev. Father
^lorris, Brookline ; Masters of Ceremonirs, Rev. Fathers ?Ietcalf, Bos-
tou, and William O'Crien, St. Patrick's, Lowell.
" The entire ceremonies were caiTied out strictly in accordance with
the Rouiau Catholic ritual, and were impressive iu the extreme, the
rich goldr n vestmeuls of the ofticialiiig clerf;yman blenJin^ beaulifnlly
with the uiagnilicent surroundings of the sanctuary. Quite a iiuuiber
of the local clergy were present, and also many from different parts of
the archdiocese. The followijig Bishops were piesent : Ut, Rev. Biebop
Ryan, of Uuff.tlo, N. Y., who preached a nuigniticeut sermon in the
morning; Ut. Uev. Bishop Healey, uf Purtlaud, 3Ie , the preacher at
the Vesper service ; Rt. Rev. Bishop Lynch, of Charleston, S. C. ; Ut.
Rev. Bishop Shaiiahan, of Ilarrisburg, I'a. ; Ut. Rev. Bishop 31c31aboli,
of Hartford, Conn. ; Ut. Rev. Bishop O'Reilly, of Springfield, ilats ;
and Ut. Uev. Bishop Conroy, of Albauy, X. Y.
" Bishop Ryan's text for the mornint; sermon was as follows: 'And
the Lord appeared unto Solomon by night and said, I have heard thy
pniyer and 1 have choeeu this place to ni>seir for a house of siciihce.*
.\t the CQUdilsion, the Rt. Reverend prea-lier cougratulated the i.atho-
lics of Lowell in an especial manner upon the si^utticaut ceremonies
which had been pertormed that day iu at. Patrick's Church. Hecou-
glatulated them for their zeal and, iu closing, ur{^ed iLem 10 ever bo
prouil of their Catholicity.
"The music sung was Ilaydu's Sixfeenlh, and was ndmimbly ten-
dered by the choir of the cliurch under the dil ectiun of 31r. E. F. Faulk-
ner, with 3lr. Michael Jidinson as organist. At the end of the Mass,
and after the Archbishop s blessing, the Tn L'entn was sung by the whole
congregation, led by Father Teeling, of Newbuiy])ort. To a lox-r of
congregational siugillg the effect was gland. To hear a v;ist multitude
offering up a hv mu ot praise tu Alniighiy God is, indeed, the acme uf
devotional music.
" In the evening. Solemn Pontifical Vespers were sung by Ut. Uev.
Bishop t-'ouri»y, of .Vlhany ; nitd the sermou was pieacued by IU. Uev.
BlsllLip liealey, of Portland, Me."
Hardly was this last work completed when another
important one w;t3 undertaken by Father O Biien.
St. Mary's Church, to which we have already referreil,
having been for some time closed, he now determined
to utilize as a school for the boys of his parish. For
that purpose he had it transformed into a model
school building, with two line halls, and ten large,
well-ventilatsd and convtniently-provided school-
rooms, all ready fcr occupancy in September, 1881,
though the school was not opened until the following
year, owing to the difficulty of obtaining a sufficient
iiumljerof suitable instructors. By September, lbS2,
however, he had procured as teachers one of the most
succes.->lul religious-teaching societies in the country,
the Xaverian Brothers, a congregation that had been
introduced into the United Slates in 1854. Five iu
number came to Lowell, with Brother Joseph as t?ii-
perior for seven months, alter which he w;is oucceedeil
by Brother Dominic, who remained in charge until
18SG, when Brother Augelus, the present Superior,
wa.s appointed. The original number has now in-
creased to eleven. The number of pupils, which was
was at first JOO, has increased to 5G0, blessed with
that teaching of all most essential, moral and relig-
ious; and pursuing a course of mental training sec-
ond to none in the city, supplemented by physical
drill and military discipline, making a grand combi-
nation of educational requisites, which cannot fail to
produce strong, intelligent, loyal and conscientious
citizens. In coanectiou with the school are a variety
of societies, amoiigst them the St. Patrick's Cadel.s,
two hundred and filty in number; aloo, a fine or-
LOWELL.
165
chestra, and St. Patrick's School Brass Band, of
twenty-six pieces.
An interesting event in connection with this school
took place March 17, 1890, when our country's flag
was raised above it, with most impressive ceremonies.
The school hall, decorated for the occasion with na-
tional emblems and the Irish colors, was inadequate
to accommodate the large number of people gath-
ered to witness the exercises. The school orchestra
made its first appearance, and its fine rendering of
national airs won enthusiastic applause from the
audience, as did all the other participants. The flag
was presented with an appropriate speech by Rev.
Father Burke, on behalf of the St. Patrick's Tem-
perance Society, and was accepted by the rector.
Father Michael O'Brien, in behalf of the school.
Mayor Palmer also made a short address.
A few days before there had been erected on the
school building a substantial flag-pole, surmounted by
a gilded cross — " the cross, not as the emblem of so-
called Romanism, or Anglicanism, or any other ' ism,'
but as the emblem of man's salvation." After the
presentation all adjourned to the sithool-yard, whence
to watch the raising of the flag, and, as the " Star
Spangled Banner" was thrown to the breeze, all the
pupils sang " The Flag Above the School," a song,
written for the occasion by Henry F. O'Meara, of
Boston. A few days after, a somewhat similar cere-
mony took place at the Academy.
The interest of the Catholics of Centralville, that
part of taecity across the river, who had been obliged
to come quite a distance to attend Mass, next engaged
Father O'Brien's special attention; and, the Arch-
bishr>p having decided that they were entitled to a
church, formed of Centralville and Dracut a separate
parish, and committed to Father O'Brien the building
of a church for their benefit in the former place. The
site of this building is central and well adapted to re-
ligious purposes. It has a frontage of ninety feet on
Sixth Street, and is one hundred and eighty feet deep,
extending to Seventh Street, with the s.tme frontage on
this as on Sixth Street, making it altogether most de-
sirable. On the 10th of December, 1883, ground was
accordingly broken for the beginning of the work on
the basement. From that time forward, work was
pushed rapidly, and on the 21st of the following April
the corner-stone was laid with impressive ceremonies
in the presence of over twenty thousand people. The
Most Rev. Archbishop and other clergymen, of whom
there were about twenty, were escorted from St. Pat-
rick's to the site for the new church by a long pro-
cession composed of the various Catholic societies of
the city, with Mr. Michael Corbet as marshal of the
day. After all had taken their places, and the Veni
Creator had been intoned by the clergy present,
Very Rev. Jeremiah O'Connor, S.J., president of
the Boston College, preached a most eloquent ser-
mon, which was listened to with uncovered heads by
the vast multitude on all sides. He was followed bv
Rev. Arthur J. Teeling, of Newburyport, who spoke
briefly but forcibly on the objects and necessities of
church-building in this young and rapidly-growing
country.
The ceremony of laying the corner-stone was then
performed by Most Rev. Archbishop Williams, with
Rev. Fathers Tortelle, of Lowell, and McGlew, of
Chelsea, as attendants ; Rev. Father Shaw as master
of ceremonie8„and Rev. Martin O'Brien, of Newton
Upper Falls, as cross-bearer.
In the corner-stone was placed a box containing a
copy of each of the Lowell papers, and one of each of
the principal Catholic papers of the country ; and
some of the current coins of the United States. Writ-
ten on parchment and placed in the box is an inscrip-
tion in Latin, of which the following is a translation :
" For the preater glory of God.
Leo XIII., Chief Pontiff.
Chester A. Arthur, Praeident of the American Repablic.
Ueorge D. Robinfioo, Governor of Miissacliusetts. ,
John J. Donova,n, Mayor of Lowell.
Michael O'Brien, the hnt puator.
" The Moet ReTerend and Illiiatnoiu Archbishop of Boston, on the
21st of April, 1884. laid tliis corner-stone. In the city of LrfjwctI, in tho
presence of an immense concourse of people, under the iuvocutiou of
8t. Michael, Jesue, Mary and Joseph."
From that time forward, the work was pushed with
incredible rapidity, until, the basement having been
made ready for religious services, it was dedicated by
Archbishop Williams, as St. Michael's Church, on
the 22d of June of the same year, with Rev. William
O'Brien, whom we have already mentioned, as its
pastor. Mass on the occasion was celebrated by Rev.
Wm. Blenkinsop, South Boston, and an appropriate
dedication sermon preached by Rev. Joshua P. Bod-
fish. Vespers in the evening was sung by Rev. Ar-
thur J. Teeling, who preached an eloquent sermon on
devotion to St. Michael, the Archangel.
Divine service is still held in the basement. It
is provided with three altars, of which the prin-
cipal is a very handsome and costly marble one, pre-
sented by Mr. Timothy O'Brien. The two others are
of cherry wood, finely finished and polished. The
place is well ventilated and lighted by twenty-four
large windows, and there is a seating capacity of
about eleven hundred. The church, which is to be
Romanesque in architecture, is to be built of brick,
wiih granite trimmings, and, when completed, will
be very handsome. It will be seventy feet in front,
and one hundred and thirty-five feet deep. The tower
will be one hundred and seventy feet high, and will
contain a belfry. The windows will be the finest
qualil^ of stained glass. The interior will be finished
in hard ash. There will be two hundred and thirty-
five pews, and the seating capacity of the church will
be over fifteen hundred. There will be three hand-
some marble altars, and a finely-finished cherry pul-
pit. The architect's estimate of constructing the
building is one hundred thousand dollars.
Of its esteemed pastor, Rev. William O'Brien, a
166
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
local paper says : " He is genial and kindly in tem-
perament and mach loved by all his parishioners. His
management of the church has been excellent; and
under his careful guidance the parish is destined to
become one of the largest in the city." His present
assistant is Rev. John J. Gilday, a native of Lowell, a
most zealous and highly esteemed clergyman.
A handsome parochial residence was purchased
soon after the dedication, and a fine parochial school
was then built — a school said to be possessed of every
convenience, and, in point of architectural beauty, un-
surpassed by any building of its class in the city. It
is of wood, sixty by sixty, and two and a half stories
high, or sixty-two feet from the first Hoor to the bell-
tower. There are six rooms, which, altogether, will ac-
commodate over four hundred pupils. In the top
story, will be a large hall which will be u.sed for
lectures and entertainments. The basement can be
used aa a recreation hall on stormy days. Beinir ready
for occupancy in September, 1880, the Girls' School
was opened with two hundred pupils, in charge of five
Dominican Sisters. The coming September the Boys'
Department will be opened with about the same num-
ber, and under Sisters of the tame order.
The education of all committed to his care having
been attended to, through the provision of parochial
schools and the Academy, Father O'Brien was next
desirous of providing for the theological training of
poor but deserving young men of his parish, whom
God might bless with a vocation for the priesthood.
Accordingly, on the opening of the Diocesan Ecclesi-
astical Seminary, at Brighton, he contributed a burse
t)f five thousand dollars to that institution, with the
understanding approved of in the following acknowl-
edgement which he received from the Ari'libishop:
"BusToN, June lo, lS?iS.
" Ueceived from Rev, Slichnel O'Brit-n, P.It., St. r;Uriek's Clmrcli,
l.u^^t-ll, t]%'u tiloiiKiiud dulLili* furu tiill blime il two liulf Uiirsea in tlic
Uurttuti Efclesiiiaticiil Si-niiruir>, lliightun, \MIli ri;;hls uf [iifBent;iliun
liy the ret-tor uf St. I'atiick's (.'liiiitli, Luwt-II, uf otuiients for tlie bni^e,
uuU uilL iTcft^rvuce tu l^c ^ivcii tu sttiileiils fiuni lite siiitl {jiiri^b.
" -!- Jno .1. WtLLtAMS,
" Archbisliop of Boston, frcs.''
And now to return finally to " the parent church "
of all Lowell's Catholic temples of divine worship —
St. Patrick's — after having given somewhat of a de-
scription of all the buildings connected with it — the
Parochial Residence, the Convent, the Sisters' cLapel,
the Academy, and Girls' School, the Boys' School,
and the Brothers' House— all of which appear in
the accompanying engraving.
In describing its beauties and recounting its ex-
cellent qualifications for the sacred purpose of its
-erection, it seemed diflicult to specify anything in
which St. Patrick's Church seemed lacking. There
was one thing, however, that presented itself to the
minds of the zealous and active assistant priests there,
when the approach of the fortieth anniversary of the
ordination of the honored rector, February 17, 1889,
suggested a celebration of the event, and a preseu-
tation of some gift that would, in a measure, bespeak
the reverence, atlection and appreciation of them-
selves and of the congregation. This was a chime of
bells to be placed in the church-tower in his honor.
The absence of Father O'Brien, who had gone to
Palmyra, N. Y., to attend the funeral of an old friend,
Rev. Thomas Cunningham, gave them an opportunity
to carry out their plans. Calling the congregation
together, the project was no sooner mentioned than it
was •entered into with the greatest enthusiasm. Com-
mittees were formed and the parish canvassed with
most gratifying results before Father O'Brien's return ;
which, however, did not occur until after the anni-
versary ; and they, in consequence, were obliged to
postpone the celebration of the event until Sunday,
February 24, 1SS9. That wiu", indeed, a gala-day at
St. Patrick's. The religious commemoration of the
event commenced in the morning, when Solemn High
Mass was celebrated by the reverend rector himself.
The Very Rev. John B. Hngan, D.D., president of
St. John's Ecclesiastical Seminary, Brighton, and
Rev. L)uis S. Walsh, also of the seminary, were
present at the ilass.
The exercises connected with the presentation took
place in the evening after Vespers, which commenced
at half-past seven, when the church, ablaze with lights
and fragrant with flowers, was crowded to its utmost
capacity. Describing the event, the Loircll JJaihj
('oiiriiT said : " It was an occasion unique among the
Catholic community, and it was improved to the ut-
most, with an outpouring of good wiliand substantial
appreciation that could not fail to impress all who
participated as it did the honored recipient. St.
Patrick's Parish is a good deal like a gigantic family.
The pews to-day are largely occujtied by thos^e whose
fathers and grandfathers preceded them in the same
places, and there is naturally that leeling which,
while in no way exclusive or reseived towards the
new-comers, warms into a glow on an occasion like
this, when the thousands to whom St. Patrick's is the
cradle of faith, gather to do honor to u beloved pastor
and friend. The affection between the shepherd and
the flock was never more cordially exhibited, and on
both sides there were the most touching evidences of
mutual good will, respect and love." And the Zojw/^
6'(/?i gave the following tribute to the worthy recipient
of all these honors: "The friends of Father Michael
found it hard to convince themselves that that young-
looking priest had been a worker in the Church dur-
ing forty years. It is safe to say that hardly a dozen
members of St. Patrick Parish were aware one month
ago that Father Michael was about to reach his for-
tieth sacerdotal anniversary. And his review of his
early days as a priest astonished them still more, as
he presented for their inspection the scenes he acted in
as a missionary in the frontiers of New York and
Pennsylvania. The missionary days of Father
Michael O'Brien had been carefully concealed by that
gentleman, and his retiring disposition kept in the
LOWELL.
167
backgrouu 1 deeds of which any priest might be proud.
These were brought to the front at this late day on a
flood of tender emotions raised by the unexpected
tribute from hiu congregation.*'
In the front pews of the middle aisle were seated
His Honor, Mayor Palmer, a contributor to the bells
fund, the Xaverian brothers, delegates from the sodal-
ities and other religious societies, memberd of the
committee, and several prominent citizens.
Vespers were chanted with Rev. M. T. McManus,
South Lawrence, as celebrant; assisted by Rev. D. J.
Gleeson, of St. Patrick's ; and Rev. William M.
O'Brien, of Winchester; and with Rev. John J.Shaw,
of St. Patrick's, as master of ceremonies. In the
sanctuary, were all the other priests of St. Patrick's,
besides Revs. William O'Brien and John J. Gilday.
of Centralville ; and Rev. J. J. Foley, of Lowell.
After A'espers, while Father O Brien knelt before
the altar in silent prayer, the choir sang Vivat paator
bonus, on tbe conclusion of which he took his seat
in front of the altar with Fathtr Shaw beside him.
John J. Hogan, Esq., then advanced to the altar rails,
and, on behalf of the congregation, delivered an elo-
quent address, in the course of which he reviewed the
priestly hfe of the beloved pastor of St. Patrick's on
hi.> various missions before coming to Lowell, and
then thus spoke of his services in this city :
*' Tu the people of St. TatricU's pill idli you Imve niiniatered fur more
tUiiu twdity-tWij years. In tlmt pfrii)d, how uiuiiy uf (lie fclurdy, up-
right and houest iiitu of our coiit'iepatiun huve pnaaed away, uhu, with
yuiir saintly predec-esaorB, Fathers .luhD aud Timothy, built this sacrtd
L-ditit-'i-, and uow tlio Bona and duughtci's of those men revetx', respect
and honor you, their worthy eutct-ssor.
" By your efforts WHS ti.ischurch freed from dt-ht and consecrated to
the service of (Jod. li stands lor future generations to giize ujKjn, Riving
lebliuiony of an earnest and loyal people, proud in Laving ho zeuloub
and iudefatigable a pastor.
*' To you w e arc indebtod for this l>eaiitiful marble nltar, a vork of art
and beauty, and enibleniutic of the purity of our church. Tlifr mugnili-
ceut wlndow^, which portray the mysteries of uur religion, are the
reniilt of your hihor; and our enicient bchouls, founded by you, are fur-
ther proofs of your anxiou-i caic and Wiitchfulnees.
" For these priceless favors we, your parishionerE, arc most deeply
grateful, and in appreciation thereof we have assembled here to extend
to you uui best wishes and heartiest congrutulations. This is a gmnd
and niaguiticeut outpouring of your jwople, all itctuiited by the sinjile
purpu^e to do titling honor to you. whom, with profound faith aud
willing obedience, we look up to as our spiritual guide.
"And now, [{evereiid Futliei, in behalf of youi in-ople, it is my pleai-
ure to present to you this most beautiful chalice, symbolic of the ju iet-t-
hottd. made of the purest metals, aud ornamunled ami designed with
the finest art of the goldsmith. It telU of the sufTeringw of tuir feavionr
vheuhesaid, ' Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me,' aud
being the cup in which the tncharistic Victim, Christ, the spotless
Lamb, is to reiH'Se, it is thus the most holy of the sacred vesaeln.
" Beloved pablor, while you were visiting tlie sceties of your early
priestly labors, your cougregrttion, aa one harnionious wboJp, resolved to
crowu this liallowed temple with a chrnie of bells We feel that this
noble structure in which you and your devoted people take a just
pride should have located in its lofty tower tongues ol music, that will
proclaim to hejiven the love of the flock for the bhepherd. As their
joyous peals resound in the skies above, the melody of their tones will
ifverberaie through the hearts of the faithful here below. Their merry
chimes will ring out a glad welcome to the Sunday Mass, while theii
Bulemn cadeuce will foretell ihe time for evening ]n-ayer. Their pwert
music will ofltinies cause the hearts of the faithful to leap with joy and
the sinner to return to his mother Church. 1 herewith phice in your
hands a purse of money, the sum of five tlious.in>t dollars, subscribed f>'t
the purjHJse.
" In conclusion it is oar wish upon this aDDiversary to assure yon of
our afTectionate attachment to your person, and toofTerupa sincere
prayer that Almighty God may preserve you in health and strength
in these coming years in order that you may live to celebrate your
golden jubilee."
Mr. Hogan also informed Father O'Brien that, in
due season, he would be asked to accepta bronze bu;it
of himself as a token of the esteem of the clergy and
relatives.
Mrs. Mary Calvert then addressed Father 0*Brien
in behalf of the Holy Family, of which she was then
prefect; and Miss Nellie Foley, for the Sodality
of the Immaculate Conception, in which she held the
same office. Both ladies presented handsome bou-
quets of rare flowers. Mr. Michael McDermott spoke
for the Holy Name Society, and James H. Carmichael
for the Young Men's Sodality, whose offering to their
pastor was a gold-headed cane.
We quote a brief extract from the eloquent address
of the gentleman last mentioned as an epitome of
what had preceded :
•'Forty periods of time called years have elapsed since you became a
minister of God. During thotr years you have seen churches reared in
former wildernesses ; you have seen dioceses spring up in almost an un-
disc(»vered country ; you have se-n universities and colleges estAblisbed
and srhoolrt built in every part of thij; vast country ; and more wonder-
ful (liau all, you hove seen your people increase from a few thousand to
millions. You, reverend sir, have proved true in periods of pereecution
and oppression, have seen your people persecuted on account of their
Frtith, prohibiting them from enjoying all the privileges and political
rights gi-anted them by the Constitution of our country.
"You have heard your people's devoiion to the Constitution atid laws
of these United States questioned by corrupt, ignorant and lawless fa-
natico and bigots ; and you have seen your people give the lie to the(*e de-
fumers when the nation was in its liour of peril. They proved their
devotion to the Constitution and their loyalty to the iiuttltutlons of tlio
countrj* by Siicrificing their lives for its defence.'"
Father O'Brien then ascended the pulpit, and
though much overcome at first, recovered strength
as he proceeded in an eloquent response to this re-
markable demonstration of his people's esteem. We
do not give here his address in full, as it was main-
ly reminiscences of his life, which will he presented
elsewhere. He thanked them for their uniform devo-
tion to him. He said he took all their praises less as a
tribute lo himself personally, than as a testimony of
the reverence in which they held the holy office of
the priesthood. He closed by expressions of grateful
feeling to his fellow-citizens, Catholics and Protestant
alike, for the uniform courtesy and goodrwill they
had always manifested towards him.
At the conclusion, the congregation rose and joined
with the choir in singing, to the air of ** America," the
following hymn written for the occasion, by Mips
Katherine E. Conway, of the Boston Pilot editorial
staff, formerly of Kochester, N. Y., where, when an
infant, she had been baptized by Father O'Brien,
then its pastor :
Oh, lift glad heart and voice,
And to the Lord rejoice
In hymns of cheer,
Thjt to our love and care.
And to our daily pniyer,
His tenderness doth sjiare,
Our Father dcuj- 1
168
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Tlie diiy that glads the priest
Id church and home a feast
Hi3 people keep —
He sowed in bygone yeare
God's seed in giief and fears,
And nuw the ripened cais
In joy we reap.
AVliat need of praising word ?
Lo I his works pmiso hiui, Lord :
His fruilfu] days —
Long records fiiir and whito
And brave in all men's Eight
The eyes of Heaven delight —
How poor our praise !
The following Tuesday most pleasing celebrations
of the auspicious event took jiluce in the Academy
and in the girls' department of the parochial school ;
and Wednesday the same in the boys' department, on
all of which occasions gifts were presented. A few
days after, members of the Sodalities of the Holy
Family and Immaculate Conception informed Father
O'Brien that they intended, as soon as possible, to
present an altar shrine to the church in commemora-
tion of the happy anniversary — an intention, wliich,
as wc write, is approaching realization, and is to be
supplemented by a similar gift from Father O'Brien
and the congregation. To this end, plans have been
drawn, and specifications made out, whose execution,
next October, will provide St. Patrick's Church with
two most beautiful marble side-altars, one in each
transept, each to be surmounted by large groups of
sculptor work, thirteen feet higli and eight feet wide.
That to be presented by the sodalities is to represent
the Apparition of Our Holy Lord to the Biessed Mar-
garet Mary ; and the one by Father O'Brien and the
congregation to represent St. Dominic receiving the
Ilosary from the Blessed Virgin. Tiiese are to be
made of alabaster, in full alto-relievo, and finished iu
old ivory.
In less than a year from the presentation of the
bells fund, the chime of bells was finished and set up
in the belfry, all but ihe principal one — St. Mary's —
which, representing the whole thime, was yet to be
blessed.
This ceremony, which is a most impressive one,
took place on Sunday, the 9th of February, 1890.
The Lowell Sun thus graphically described the sur-
rounding circumstances: "The thousands who at-
tended St. Patrick's Church on Sunday last will re-
member the experience as one of the most inspiring
of their lives. All the space in the church that could
hold a spectator was filled at both morning and after-
noon services ; the vsist crowds gathered to attend the
ceremonies of the blessing of the chime of bells pre-
sented to the church to mark the fortieth anniversary
of the ordination of Rev. Jlichael O'Brien, the perma-
nent rector of the church.
"Tickets were in great demand for the two weeks
before, and the fathers tried to accommodate all the
friends of the church. A large number of Protestants
were eager to attend the cereiponies, and they were
well treated by the clergymen and members of the
committee. Everybody realized that the baptism of
the bells would be a series of events as grand as the
profound ceremonies of the Catholic Church could
make them. They were not mistaken, for all who at-
tended the ceremonies were greatly impressed.
" The day was a succession of beautiful and inspir-
ing events. Noble sermons, powerful music, the sol-
emn Pontifical Mass and Vespers, the kneeling thou-
sands, the chanting of the bishops and clergymen, all
these were there for the glory of God."
Solemn Pontifical Mass was celebrated in the morn-
ing, at which 3Iost Rev. Archbishop Williauis was
present, with Rev. John Flatley, of Cambridge, and
Rev. L. J. Morris, of Brookline, as deacons of iKjnor.
Rt. Rev. Bishop Bradley, of M.-mchester, N. H., cele-
brated the ilass, with Rev. Arthur J. TeeliuL', of
Xewburyport, assistant priest. Rev. William O'Britn
of Centralville, deacon ; Rev. James Walsh, of Lowell,
sub-deacon; Rev. L.S.Walsh, of St. John's Seminary,
and Rev. J. J. Shaw, of Lowell, masters of ceremonies.
Rt. Rev. Bishops MtQuaid, of Rochester. X. Y.,
Healy, of Porlland, .Maine, and O'Reilly, of Spring-
field, Mass., Rev. Fathers Joyce, O.M.I., and Ronan,
of Lowell, O'Reilly, O.S.A., and McManus, of Law-
rence, were present in the sanctuary.
An eloquent sermon was preached by Rt. Rev.
Bishop O'Reilly, on the Gospel of the day, which
was Luke viii. 4-15.
A still larger congregation crowded the church
at Ve-'pcrs, in the afternoon, when the blessing or
baptism of the bells took place. Pontifical Vespeis
were celebrated by Mo^t Rev. Archbishop Williams,
with Rev. Arthur J. Teeling, deacon ; Rev. Jarae> T.
O'Reilley, O.S.A., sub-deacon ; Rev. Fathers Walsh
and Shaw, masters of ceremonies. Besides the clergy
present in the morning, there were at the afternoon
services, Very Rev. James McGrath, O.JI.I., of
Lowell, Rev. J. J. Gild.\v, of Centralville, and Rev.
William M. O'Brien, of Winchester. The music on
the occasion — as is always the case at St. Patrick's —
was most excellent.
After the singiugof the psalms, the bell was blessed,
with all the solemnity possible, by the Archbishop
and attendant clergymen, while twenty-five boys of
St. Patrick's school and the same number of girls
from the academy stood as sponsors.
Another eloquent sermon, explanatory of the use
of bells and the ceremonies attendant on their dedi-
cation to divine service, was delivered by Rt. Rev.
Bishop Healy, from the text " I am the voice of one
crying in the wilderness."
In the course of his explanation the Rt. Rev.
preacher spoke in substance, as follows :
" Tlie Chiircli uses notliing wiiliont making it sacred by lier hlesniiig.
Yuii Dinst be iiBtuliislied lo see Iliut tlii? 1k;II uiiderwetit so mnliy differ-
ent funii^ of cereiHony. Vun would almost have Kiitl it was tlie urdina-
lion of lite preaclier. You know, or you bliould know, that it whs
naslied with consecrated water, tliat the metal within and uilliout was
puiilied by It ; you kiiuw, or you bhould know, that iu Ihu iuvocutiuu, the
'-zP
/<^^^^^'
LOWELL.
169
Church pravcd that the mntter profiine might be consecmted to
God, uiid in this praj'er alt implored that the spirit of darkucua in it
Uiiglit be froiii lliiit tiDle diHlM>lled.
*' Yuu §ee that tlie reverend brethren went nronnd consecrating it by
repeated slgiiH of the crosa, first with water and then with repeated
unction of consecrated oil, and, at ludt, you saw that they placed in it
the sniokin;; tluirible, Bhuwiug thereby wlmt should he the sacrednese
of the ficuind ilifT-ised by the bell in the upper realms. Thus the church
makes evi;rytliin" sncre-l, and thus hhe blesaei* this instrument in order
turonsidtT it freed of oil prolanity, ami tliut for the first time its voice
is to be like that of one crying in the desert, and that you will hearken
to its sound as to the Toice of the servant of God in all the lessons It
brings to you.
** ' I am the voice of one crv'ing in the desert,' and this bell, when
elevated in the tower of the church, will be to you a preacher; and
when I look upon this congregation and remember the old bell that
souuded uu so many days ,of gladness and of sorrow in this church in
yeiii-b pa*it, I cannot but wish that this voice that cries in the wilderness
may he to yoii a faithful pre.icher and keep in your miii<ls the divine
diameter of the cliurch and her leaching. And I cannot but hope, too,
that it will be many yeaiu before the bells erected hero to coninieniorute
the foitielh anniveiiniry of the ordination tu the priesthood of your
dear pastor— wilt toll the sad uulea tbut will follow Liui tu the liouie of
his predecessors."
On the conclusion of the cUscourfe the Archbishop
gave the Benediction of the Most Blessed Sacrament
10 the kneeling multitude, in which every heart
thrilled with the triumphant inspiration of Catholic
])iely as Father O'Brien rang out the consecrated
bell's fust peal in honor of the Ileal Presence of our
Lord.
A few days later, this bell also was raised to its
jilace in the belfry beside tlie other sixteen. Thurs-
day evening of that week Mr. Barbourka gave a roost
pleasing concert upon them, the first number of
which was, most appropriately, a hymn to St. Pat-
rick. This was followed by various sacred and patri-
otic airs. Mr. Barbourka's place has since been well
supplied by Mr. Cosgrove, whose manipulations are
most satisfactory.
And thus the chimes have continued ever since, and
will so continue long after they have tolled a re-
quiem for all who now listen to their summons — in-
creasiiig in strength and harmony, gladdening priests
and people as they raise their hearts and souls hea-
venward; a call to God's worship, a proclamation cf
the glory and splendor of His holy temple, and a re-
minder of the devoted priest more than half of whose
consecrated years have been unselfishly given to the
Catholics of St. Patrick's Parish.
The year 1890 presents, indeed, a pleasing retro-
spect in the history of St. Patrick's Church. She has
been assailed by many enemies and conquered them ;
loved and respected by many friends, and been true
to them ; mother of many devoted and worthy chil-
dren whom she has tenderly nurtured, and for whom
she has won the blessing of her Divine Spouse.
She sees now, in place of the few exiled, poverty-
stricken, but whole-souled and faithful sons of St.
Patrick forty thousand Catholics of various ances-
tries, but all devoted and loyal to this noble country,
whose justice and liberality have allowed their
Cburch such phenomenal growth. She sees them
gathered around many altars of the one True Living
God, in the numerous temples of Catholic worship iu
Lowell, all of whom look upon her as the parent
church ; and she congratulates herself and them that
the three-score years of Catholicity in their city that
have rolled on, with their changing seasons, their
varying sunshine and storm, have but caused her
Heaven-inspired organization to wax stronger and
stronger, and become a more and more potent factor
in the temporal, educational, moral and spiritual
advancement of the people of Lowell.
Key. John O'Brien.'— In the honored list of pas-
tors of St. Patrick's Church, Lowell, none, probably,
will hold a higher, none, certainly, a dearer place,
than Rev. John O'Brien, whose devoted toil of up-
wards of twenty-six years made for that parish a
most honorable record, and won for Catholicity most
glorious results.
Descended from a noble family of ancient Thom-
ond, whose records are amongst the most illustrious in
Ireland's annals, John O'Brien was born in the year
1800, in BalRna, County Tipperary, Ireland. Blessed,
as had been his brother. Timothy, who was nine years
his senior, with a vocation for the priesthood, he was
carefully educated for that highest of all professions;
and, having honorably completed his studies, was or-
dained at Limerick the 28th of December, 1828, for
the Diocese of Killaloe. He was stationed for some
time at Clare, near Ennis, and was there highly es-
teemed ; as, indeed, he was wherever the duties of his
profession led him.
After about twelve years of faithful and zealous ser-
vice, he ex pressed to his bishop an srdent desire to once
againsee his brother, Father Timothy O'Brien, who had
left Ireland when John was only sixteen years old, but
for some time his request for permission to visit him
was not granted. Meanwhile, accounts from Father
Timothy and others of the scarcity of priests in this
country, and the great work to be done here, inspired
him with a desire not only to visit, but to remain with
his brother. At length, permission was given him to
do so ; and about the year 1840 the two brothers, sep-
arated for twenty-four years, were re-united at Rich-
mond, Va., where Father Timothy was for several
years stationed. They did not remain so long, how-
ever. In about a year Rev. Richard V. Whelan, who
had been pastor of Martinsburg and surroucdiug
missions, was consecrated Bishop of Richmond, March
21, 1841 ; and, having a high appreciation of Father
John's energy and zeal, as also of his great -physical
strength and vigor, urged him to take his own place
in the extensive missionary field to which Martins-
burg belonged.
Interpreting the request as the will of God, Father
John complied with it, and for about seven years led
a most laborious and self-sacrificing life, spending a
considerable portion of his time on the road, going
from one station to another, riding oftentimes many
>By KatLarine A. 0'E.neBe.
170
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
miles to administer the rites of the Church to the
sick and dying. Well might it be said of bim, as of j
his predecessor, Father VVhelan, " He traversed hills
and mountains, through rain and shine and cold and
heat; many a death-bed was cheered by his pres-
ence, many a heart made glad, many a soul saved
through his labors. Great and grand wai his charity,
sincere his life, and disinterested his sacrifices. . . .
Though a stranger to us, in a strange country, his
life's work challenges our admiration."
In addition to Martinsburg, Father O'Brien had the
spiritual care of Winchester, Harper's Ferry and sev-
eral other places. In a collection of sketches of the
churches in that vicinity, we find the following, with
regard to the former place : " For four long years
they [the people of Winchester] had not the happi-
ness of being present at the Holy yacrifice. At last,
in 1844, their dear Saviour had compassion on their
loneliness and sorrow, and sent them Rev. John
O'Brien, then stationed at Harper's Ferry, who visited
Winchester once in three months, and offered the
Holy Sacrifice for the half-dozen Catholics present.
It was not until 1847 that things began to change for
the better. In that year turnpikes were being built,
on which many Irishmen and Catholics worked. A
priest from Harper's Ferry now came regularly once
a month.
Father John, as also his brother, always kept up a
close intimacy with the Jesuits ; and it was by one
of these, the venerable Father McElroy, that the
Boston diocese was suggested to the former as a more
fertile field for his pious labors. He, r.ccordingly
turned hiiher his steps in 1848, and was cordially
welcomed to this diocese by Rt. Rev. Bishop Fitzpat-
rick, who commissioned him to take charge of the
Catholics in Newburyport, Chelsea and other eastern
districts in this State, the former of which he chose
as the headquarters of his mission. Father O'Brien's
first visit is well and pleasantly remembered by many
persons still in Newburyport. During his brief stay
there, he did everything possible to advance the
cause of religion ; his genial manner, cultured mind,
pious zeal, and interest for the good of the general
public, both Catholic and Protestant, being very
powerful in softening the asperities with which those
who differ from them in religion are apt to look upon
the first Catholic [)riest that takes up his residence
amongst them. His superior abilities and marked
success in Newburyport led to his being called to the
more important pastorate of St. Patrick's Church in
this city.
Of the good works he accomplished during his
quarter of a century and more in Lowell, we have
already spoken, but by no means done them justice,
in our sketch of the church. Neither did we do so
to the able assistance and unbounded generosity of
his brother. Father Timothy, who joined him in
Lowell, in 1850. As an account of one is incomplete
without a brief sketch of the other also, we will here
digress to say a few words about this good priest,
whose five years' ministrations in this city so endeared
him to the people of Lowell, particularly to the
Catholics of the older generation.
Timothy O'Brien was born in the year 1791, in Bal-
lina. County Tipperary, Ireland. Having, at an early
age, manifested a vocation for the priesthood, he was
educated with that noble end in view ; and, after
completing a most creditable course in the classics,
finished his theological studies at St. Patrick's Col-
lege, Carlow. With the design of becoming a Jesuit,
on the American mission, he came to this country in
ISIG, and entered the Jesuit novitiate at Georgetown,
D. C, where he remained about two years; when,
wilh the approbation of hisspirituil directors, he laid
aside his long-cherished desire of becoming a member
of that society, and was'orJained a secular priest in
1818, at Baltimore, by Archbishop Marechal. His
intention at th^ time, and theirs also, wjs that his en-
trance into the Society of Jesus was to be simply de-
ferred for a few years ; and, though Go 1 appe:ired to
will otherwise, he always retained his prelilection for
the.Iesuits, to whose warrior-like spirit in fighting the
battles of Religion, his own brave, zealous disposition
seemed akin ; while they, in turn, continued their in-
terest in the earnest, devoted priest, so much sd, that
the Provincial Rt. Rev. Dr. Ryder had made ar-
rangements that Father O'Brien should be received
into the society even on his death-bed if he so desired.
His first mission was to St. Patrick's Church, Fell's
Pjint, Baltimore ; and he also for some time oHiciated
at Carrollton Manor, where a church, St. Joseph's,
had been built in 1820, mostly througli the generos-
ity of Charles Carroll, of Carrollton, who gave the
lot and a considerable portion of the funds for its
erection. Thence he was transferred to Richmond,
Virginia, but soon after absented himself from that
place for about a year, having volunteered to minis-
ter to the wants of the Catholics of Baltimore, who
at the time were — priests and people — stricken with
a plague.
After this period of heroic and self-sacrificing de-
votion to his sacred calling, he returned to his charge
at Richmond, and labored there faithfully and zeal-
ously for nearly twenty-nine years. When he went
to that city but tew Catholics were to be found there,
and they were unable even to provide a place of wor-
ship. In no wise disheartened, however. Father
O'Brien went to New York and elsewhere collecting
for the benefit of his people, uutil, at last, through
his untiring exertions, an elegant and substantial
church — St. Peter's, now the Cathedral — was built.
As the Catholic population rapidly increased, he
became able to supplement this by other good
works; and, accordingly, he built an asylum and a
girls' school, both of which he placed in charge of
the Sisters of Charity, who are still there. The
school-house — a very fine one — he built from his own
private means, at a cost of thirty thousand dollars.
LOWELL.
171
At the appointment of Bishop McGill, in 1850,
Father Timothy retired from Richmond, and carried
out a long-cherished wish to spend the remainder of
his life with his hrother. Father John, in Lowell. Of
his assistance and encouragement to the latter during
the most trying period of his pastorate, and of his
earnestness in the cau.se of education, we have already
spoken. A scholarly man and an eloquent preacher,
bis abilities commanded universal respect, while his
charity, his kind, genial disposition won him the
affection of all who came in contact with him.
In March, 1855, he was threatened with pneumonia,
but soon recovered and the warm weather found him
apparently as well as ever. Early in October of that
year his intense interest in the progress of the school,
which he was building, led him to expose himself to
cold and dampness, which brought on a fresh attack
of pneumonia. He was confined to his bed the 6th,
and died Thursday afternoon, the 11th of October,
1855, at the age of sixty-four.
Appreciation of his good work in Lowell and regret
at Ilia departure were expressed on all sides. The
following is quoted from the Lowell Daily Journid and
Oiuricr, Saturday, October 13, 1855 : " He has been
in this city five years and has won the personal es-
teem of all who have known him. He was a good
and useful citizen, and in his death the community
has met with a loss. Unchristian, indeed, must be
the feeling that would withhold from such a man of
any faith the posthumous praise due his character."
Extracts from a lengthy tribute in the Evejung Ad-
wr/;so- of Friday, October 12, 1855, are as follows:
" For nearly five years past he has oflaciated in this
city, nor has be been idle during this time. The new
church on Adams Street, which h, perhaps, one of
the finest in the country, was built partly through his
exertions, and it stands a proud monument to his
memory, and an everlasting testimony of his zeal in
the cause of religion. While the Catholics of this
city have, by his death, sutl'ered the loss of one of the
best and most tender Fathers, the community at large
has been deprived of a good and useful citizen ; one
who took a warm interest in everything that concern-
ed the public good
"In all his acts he exhibited the true Christian;
and, although he has passed from our midst, he has
left behind him works that speak his virtues more el-
oquently than any words of ours. In his intercourse
with society he was most kind and affable, a bene-
factor to the poor, a friend to the erring, and gener-
ous to the afflicted."
Rev. Father Timothy was buried the Saturday
following his death, after a Solemn High Mass of
Requiem had been celebrated, at which Right Rever-
end Bishop Fitzpatrick and about twenty priests were
present. His remains were then buried in St. Patrick's
Church-yard, where, in a few months, the Catholics of
St. Patrick's Parish erected a monument, already
described, in grateful commemoration of his virtues.
To return now to his brother, Father John. From an
address of welcome to his nephew, the present rector,
several years afterwards, on bis return from a visit to
his native land, we copy the following tribute paid to
Father John's memory by one who knew him well and
long, Hon. John Welch : — " How our thoughts return
to-night to the fast receding past, to the past fraught
with events of so much importance to the parish and
its people ! How we wonder when we reflect, that —
not so many years age, but that many in our midst
can recall to mind the time wheu the Church of St.
Patrick's was the only Catholic Church in Lowell,
and the Catholic people but a handful ! Where we
now stand, stood a poor wooden structure, and where
we are now numbered by the thousands, there were
but a few hundred. Then it was that Father John
was sent by a kind Providence. He was filled with
the ardor and zeal of youth and religion, and soon,
aided by the untiring efforts of Father Timothy, this
noble structure towered to heaveu. But was this the
only monument he left to posterity ? Ask the unfor-
tunate, the needy ! More lasting than pile of stone
or brazen column is his memorial in the hearts of all ;
for his great charity, like the circling sun, was for all
without distinction. How his grand, stately form
now looma up before our eyes ; how his earnest, kind-
ly voice rings in our ears, as it was wont when urging
his beloved people to ' love one another.' Deeply
had he imbibed of the fountain of love from the lips
of the beloved disciple whose name he bore, whose
words he bo loved to utter, and whose life he bo strove
to imitate. ' As a man lives, so shall he die,' was his
oft-repeated exhortation ; and in him, how truly was
it exemplified. But shall we ever forget the grief that
wrung our hearts when it was told us that ' Father
John was dead,' that that pure and noble soul which
had labored so indomitably for our welfare was gone
from outof our midst! that that great and generous
heart which beat with such affection and love for us was
forever at rest! That was the saddest hour for us
ever experienced, and the gloom that settled over the
entire Catholic population was heavy and deep and
dark indeed."
The sad event here referred to took place the eve of
the festival of All Suinte, Saturday, October 31, 1874.
A few years previous, in 1870, realizing that he had
reached his " three-score years and ten," though, ap-
parently, little enfeebled by them, he had resigned the
charge of the parish to his nephew. Father Michael.
For Eome time after, he seemed almost as energetic,
and, to the end, remained just as interested as ever,
his departure being most sudden. It was All Saints'
eve, and some of the oldest of his parishioners were
gathered, where they had bo often been for over a
quarter of a century on similar occasions, around his
confessional, and there they had kept him the greater
part of the afternoon occupied. His duties, therefore,
bad probably amounted to an over-exertion, and he
entered the dining-room of the pastoral residence at
172
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
six o'clock greatly fatigued. Seated at the table,
however, he rallied, and was conversing freely with
Fathers Michael O'Brien and McManus, who were
present, when, suddenly, raising his hand to his
head, he complained of being ill, and, with a few
words, in reply to his alarmed companions, he fell
back in his chair. Father McManus immediately ad-
ministered the Sacraments to him ; and in a few mo-
ments he breathed his last. The cause of his death
was supposed to be apoplexy.
As soon aa his death became known, the streets
leading to his residence became crowed by his parish-
ioners and others anxious to learn whether or not the
sorrowful news was true. The next day, Sunday, the
sad event was toucbingly announced in all the Cath-
olic churches of the city ; and when, at one o'clock,
the remains were laid in the parlor of the parochial
residence, it was estimated that over five thousand
persons came to pay their last tearful tribute of respect
to their deceased i'riend and pastor. Members of the
O'Connell Literary Institute acted as ushers.
At a special meeting of the Lowell City Govern-
ment, held Monday evening, November 2d, to take
action upon the invitation extended by Rev. Michael
O'Brien to attend the obsequies, the following com-
munication from the mayor was presented :
"Mavok's OrricE, Nov. 2, 18T1.
** Ce^Ulemen tifthc City Council:
"I liuve cnlk'd you to(:ctlior .it tliis time that you may take mich
notion on tlie invitation wliich I liave itliis day recuiveii, for the (.'ity
Council to attend iu a Iwdy the funeral oljaequies of the lute Rev. John
O'Brien, as you may tliiiil^ just and proper ULder the circumstances.
" Tlie Rev. Jolill O'Brien, who was taken frt)ni this to the spirit
world, witliout a nionienl's warning, vvaa one of our old aud respected
citizens, who had performed Iiis part well as a citizen ; and, ju? a
preacher and niiniater, lias eudcared himself to hi^ parishioners Liy his
kind acts of beDuvoIcuce ; and their kind hearts are made sad by this
Buddeu dispetuiatioo of Di\ lue rrovideuce.
" Ftt.\NCIS Jewett, .l/uyur."
On motion of Alderman Huntoon, the invitation
was accepted. Alderman Crowley, in seconding the
motion, addressed the board as follows :
"I would that the pronouncing of a proper eulogy
upon the life and character of the beloved deceased
were left to some one in this board be.«ide myself. I
have known Rev. Father O'Brien from my boyhood,
and have sat under his ministrations since that time
as a Catholic. He was a warm-hearted friend, and
much loved the city of Lowell and its people. A
year ago he received an invitation to visit Ireland.
Lhe land of his birth, and to view the scenes of his
childhood once again. He declined the invitation
in fear, as he expressed himself, that he might die
there; for he desired to die in Lowell, where he had
so many ties of interest. He was a friend to me in
boyhood, and an esteemed and beloved counsellor at
all times."
At the conclusion of Alderman Crowley's remarks,
he moved that a committee, consisting of the mayor
and Alderman Huntoon, and such members of the
Common Council aa might join, be appointed to take
The
action with regard to attending the funeral,
motion was adopted.
Wednesday morning, the funeral services took place
in St. Patrick's Church, which the Sisters of Notre
Dame had draped in mourning. The beloved re-
mains, vested in clerical robes, lay in a handsome
casket before the altar in the main aisle. At the
right of the altar were seated the members of the so-
dalities of the Holy Family and of the Blessed Vir-
gin, each with appropriate mourning badges ; while
beyond, in the recesses of the school-room of the
convent, between which and the church the sliding
doors had been opened, might be seen the Sisters of
Notre Dame and the children of the school, whom
Father John had cared for so tenderly. The Sisters
of Charity were also there, accompanied by nearly
fifty orphans, towards whom his fatherly heart had
ever been most kind.
The Catholic organizations of the city formed the
line of march on Market Street about nine o'clock,
with Mr. D. J. Sullivan as marshal, and Messrs. John
Grady, John Sullivan, Patrick Lynch, P. J. Court-
ney, J. McLoughlin and J. Healy as aids, and
marched through Central, Merrimack and SufTulk
Streets to the church, the bands accompanying the
diflereut organizations playing, meanwhile, their sol-
emn funeral dirges. At Merrimack Street, the mem-
bers of the City Council were received at the City
Government Building and escorted to the church,
where they were given the seats reserved for them.
The venerable Dr. Theodore Edson, fifty years pastor
of St. Anne's Protestant Episcopal Church, and an
old friend of the deceased, also occupied an honored
place in the congregation. The church was crowded
to its utmost capacity.
All the societies having been seated, at ten o'clock
the clergy entered, and the OIBce lor the Dead was
intoned, the principal chanters being Revs. A. Sher-
wood Healy and John Delahuiity — both since de-
ceased— while five bishops and over one hundred
priests occupied places in the sanctuary. At liio
Solemn High JIass of Requiem which followed, in
presence of Rt. Rev. Bishop Williams, with Revs.
William Blenkinsop and E. H. Purcell as deacons of
honor, the celebrant was 'Very Rev. P. F. Lyndon,
Vicar-Geueral of the diocese ; deacon. Rev. James
A. Healy, then of Boston, now Bishop of Portland ;
sub-deacon. Rev. J. B. Smith, of the Cathedral, Bos-
ton ; and masters of ceremonies. Rev. .V. J. Tteling,
of Newburyport, and Rev. J. J. Gray, of Salem.
The choir was under the efficient direction of the
organist of the church, Mrs. James Marren.
At the conclusion of the Mass, Rt. Rev. Bishop
Williams, D.D., spoke as follows :
" Beloved People :^It is a sad duty we are called upon to fultil this
morning;, to pay our last res|iects to the remainsof your beloved Father
Jidm. You had all hoped that ho would have been Ixng spared to pre-
side over the parish and enjoy tho fniits of his work, but a satisfied God
called him suddenly to his reward. We cannot reciill hiiu ; we can only
luin^le our tear% with yours, for the sorrow you feel Li coiujuou to all.
LOWELL.
173
Of all the clergy, none was more endeared It waaa recreation to listen
to liis genial converBUtion, biu humor without guile, to enjoy bis gener-
oiiK huepitiility. He lived with you a qnarler of a century-, and
worked with you and for your KOod. and wtiere he labored his su-
jierior fell in* aniit-ty. All know what he found here — what he left.
The old church, built when Catholics were few, was then stauding,
and he determined to erect one ?i}uh1 to the best, lie did not begin
at once; he saw around bini the immediate want of religious iuBlruc-
tiou. He tlierefore called faithful women about him, who might
teach, not only the science of the world, but the Bcience of Ileuven.
Uelying on God and your generosity, uo one ever heard of money for
hot church, no buildiug went up with so little noise — so few collec-
tions. All that came to liim was put into this bouse, and it was only
after finishing it that the old pai>torute was changed for the new.
We hud hoped he would have been spared to enjoy it — to see his
pood work curried on. God willed otherwise, and he was t^iken from
you suddenly. Too often hud he said Eternity, to be found unpre-
pared himself. Those who knew hiui in Retreat, knew that no cull,
however sudden, could find bim uuprepjired. You will not forget
hiiii, you will pray for bim. As you reuieiuber Father 'I'imolhy, re-
member Father John. As you prated for one, kneel now and pray
foi both, wbit will look upon you uud bless you. You have been
blessed Willi two such men ; pniy that Ibeir succeasol. Father Allcbael,
may be sjwred to curi-y on the good v\ork, and, like them, to fight
the good fight. Pray that the mercy of God will permit you to join
them in Heaven for all eternity,"
Final absolution was then given by Rt. Rev. Bishop
Williams, assisted by Rt. Rev. Bishops Lynch, of
Charleston, S. C. ; O'Reilly of Spriugtield, Mass.;
Heudricken, of Providence, R.L ; and Conroy, of Al-
bany, N. Y., after which the remains were borne to
the tomb in the church-yard, on the shoulders of the
lay pall-bearers, Dr. Plunkett, and Messrs. Richard
Cumerlbrd, P. Dempsey, James Collins, James Owens,
and Patrick Lynch ; while the following clericai pall-
bearers immediately followed: Revs. Ji>hn O'Donnell,
V. G., of Na.sliua, N. H.; Peter Blenkintop, S.J., of
Worcester; E. H. Purcell, of Pittstield; James Mc-
Glew, of Chelsea; Bernard Flood, of Wallham ; P.
Crudden, of Lowell ; \Vm. Hally, of Salem; T. B.
McNulty, of North Bridgewaier, and John Delahunty,
of Roxbury.
Rt. Rev. P. T. O'Reilly, Bishop of Springfield,
Mass., blessed the grave, and the casket was lowered
into its final resting-place by the sideof Father Tim-
othy, amidst the tears of thousand of his parish-
ioners and friends who stood around. The monu-
ment which Father John had erected to the memory
of his brother now serves lor both. Standing as it
does in the heart of the parish, in sight of all, it will
prove a constant reminder of his great labors and a
])erpetual claim upon their prayers. During the
hours of the obsequies, business seemed suspended ;
it appeared as if the greater number of the inhabit-
ants of Lowell had gathered in the church or aionud
the church-yard aa mourners ; and the whole city bore
the appearance of having sustained a deep loss.
The press of this and neighboring cities teemed
with tributes of respect and esteem for the venerable
departed pastor of St. Patrick's. .The Boston Pilot
announced " with the most sincere regret the death
of one of the best and most beloved clergyman in the
diocese of Boston." A friend who had known him
well from his coming to Lowell wrote of him,
" Father John was greatly beloved for his genial,
warm-hearted cordiality, as well as for his zealous,
priestly character, He was the ctiurteous Irish gen-
tleman, and a truer, warmer friend it would be hard
to find ; " and the Lmotll Daily Courier testified :
" For his liberality, his goodness of heart, and his
many other virtues, deceased will ever be held in
cherished memory as a citizen, and as a priest he
was universally beloved by both the Catholic and
Protestant people who knew him."
Rev. Michael O'Brien,' permanent rector of St.
Patrick's Church, Lowell. Were it not that more
than half the sacerdoUl life of Rev. Michael O'Brien,
permanent rector of St. Patrick's Church, Lowell,
was passed in most eventful service elsewhere, there
would be but little to mention concerning him out-
side of her successful and edifying record ; for, as is
true of every faithful priest, his history is indentical
with the history of the church committed to his taire,
his life is dedicated to her welfare and advancement.
Already eighteen years a priest when he came to Low-
ell, however, there is much honorable mention of him
to be selected — more, indeed, than we have space to
give — from the records of other churches, where his
career was signalized by the same earnest but unos-
tentatious piety, executive ability and generous devo-
tion to the interests of religion that have marked it
in this city.
He was, as has been already stated, nephew of Rev.
Fathers Timothy and John O'Brien, and was, on both
the paternal and maternal sides, an O'Brien, his
mother, Bridget, being their sister, and his father,
John, a member of a different branch of the same
family — a family that has given a remarkable number
of priests and nuns to the service of God. Of these,
in addition to several deceased, and also a number
still living in Ireland, there are in this country
at present, besides Father Michael himself, eight
priests, holding various important and honorable
positions in the Church. Four of these are his
nephews — Rev. Michael Bonfield, and Rev. Michael
O'Brien in the Chicago diocese ; Rev. Martin A. Cul-
bert, in the Buffalo diocese, and Rev. Daniel J. Glee-
son, in the Bosion diocese, at Lowell. Four are his
cousins — Rev. Michael O'Brien, in the diocese of
Peoria, 111., and his brother. Rev. William O'Brien,
in the Bosion diocese, at Cenlralville, Lowell; Rev.
Martin O'Brien, at Newton Upper Falls, and his
brother, Rev. William M. O'Brien, at Winchester,
both also in the Boston diocese. Of the many mem-
bers of the family, here and in Ireland, who have be-
come nuns, there are still living in this country his
sister, Madame Ellen O'Brien, a member of the order
of the Sacred Heart, at Manhattanville, N. Y., and
three nieces — Madame Julia and Bridget Gleeson, iu
the same order at Kenwood, near Albany, N. Y., and
Margaret Culbert, (in religion. Sister Thomasina), of
> By Katharine A. O'Kct ffe.
174
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the Franciscan Order, at St. Elizabeth's Convent,
Allegany, N. Y.
The subject of our sketch was born the 1st of May,
1825, at Ballina, County Tipperary, Ireland, and, hav-
ing completed his classical studies at Killaloe, deter-
mined to dedicate himself to the service of God in
the priesthood. He accordingly entered upon his
theological studies at All Hallows College, Dublin,
where he remained for four years ; and then, desiring
to devote himself to the American mission — where,
from 1840 to 1850, work for the clergy had been
greatly increased, owing to the marvelous Catholic
immigration of those years — he came to this country
in 1848. After spending a few months under the im-
mediate direction of Bishop Timon, of Buffalo, he
was ordained there by that prelate on the 17th of
February, 1849, at which time he is described as hav-
ing been " a delicate, boyish-looking priest, over whom
his companions shook their heads and said he was in
consumption."
In no wise disheartened by his apparently delicate
health, this young priest, after a few weeks a; the
Buffalo Cathedral, cheerfully started out upon the ar-
duous duties of a missionary life, having been given
charge of the counties of Allegany and Steuben, in
New York State, with his headquarters at Greenwood,
in the latter county. Soon after, at the request of
Bishop O'Connor, of Pittsburgh, Pa., McKean and
Potter Counties, in that State, were added to his par-
ish, thus leaving him the only priest to attend to a
district of over one hundred miles square. At that
time, this vast territory was little more than a wilder-
ness— no churches, no railroads, and with poor and
uncertain means of communication. Like many other
Catholic congregations of the time, his people were poor
and humble, mostly emigrants from his own country,
honestly and industriously struggling for the success
which was afterwards theirs, and which has left their
descendants of the present generation amongst the
foremost citizens of the country. Amidst these people
he toiled nearly two years, meeting sincere piety, sub-
lime faith and disinterested generosity amongst the
Irish exiles, as well as great kindness at the hands of
many of the Protestants with whom he came in con-
tact.
Whilst on this mission, he built a neat and commo-
dious frame church and house in Greenwood, from
which place, aa a centre, he often had to travel nearly
thirty miles a day in discharge of his various priestly
duties; and, even with those effortsito accommodate
the people in his charge, many of them had fre-
quently to travel twenty-tive miles to at end Mass.
From a recent biographical sketch we learn that
" Father O'Brien made his journeys in rough wagons,
over roads that led for miles through forests or over
mountains. Night often came on while he was miles
from a settlement. The Catholics were very devout,
and the joy with which they received the travel-
stained priest was a balm that soothed every pain he
suffered in their interest. One of his stanchest
friends was the pious father of the present Senator
Kiernan, of New York. A Mr. McCorraick often ac-
companied Father O'Brien on his journeys. Mass
was said in log-cabins, court-houses, and in a few
Protestant churches, the use of which was generously
given to the poor Catholics."
Soon, learning that the Erie Railroad was to be
laid at Hornellsville — " now a flourishing city, but then
only a village, with forests standing where at present
stand granite blocks" — he began preparations for a
church there, knowing that Catholic settlers would
soon follow the road. It was during one of the se-
vere storms that often came down from the neighbor-
ing mountains, threatening the village, that. Father
O'Brien reached the place, after a day's journey of
forty miles over roads almost impassable. because of
deep ruts, heavy logs and fallen trees. From the
very beginning, his course was beset by difficulties
and obstacles that would have disheartened a less
courageous priest. To him they were but vapors
that were dissipated before the warmth of his ardor,
shadows that fled before the sunshine of God's om-
nipotence.
On reaching Hornellsville, he found shelter at a
little inn kept by an old man named McGee, who
was disposed to be most kind and respectlul to him,
but soon appeared quite helpless in his regard. Be-
fore he had been in the plate an hour, a number of
rough, ignorant bigots, having heard of his arrival,
came to the inn with the avowed intention of tarring
and feathering the " popish priest;" but their evil in-
tention was thwarted by the prompt action of the
chief engineer cf the railroad, Mr. Emmet, a grand-
son of Thomas Addis Emmet, and grand-nephew of
the Irish patriot martyr, Robert Emmet. Mr. Em-
met, although a Protestant, was too truly a "son cf
his sires'' to tolerate such cowardly injustice, and,
suddenly appearing on the tcene, hurled the ring-
leader down the steps of the inn, dispersed the others,
and thus secured the young missionary from present
and future molestation. In that place also, notwith-
standing its unpropitious beginning, he built a fine
brick church and house which met the demands of
the place for several years.
Continuing along the line of the railroad for a dis-
tance of about one hundred miles, from Corning to
Cuba, he occasionally found himself in the midst of
stirring scenes. We quote one instance of many from
the sketch before referred to. " On one occasion he
broke up a 'shanty ' where the laborers were intoxi-
cated and fighting like animals. For breaking in the
heads of three whiskey barrels, this delicate priest,
who was told one year before that he was going into
consumption, was placed under arrest by a constable.
He was brought before the judge of the district, who
was busy digging potatoes. The case was not pressed,
however. Vigorous measures had to be taken at
times, and the rough men of all creeds ere long learned
LOWELL.
175
to respect and love the young priest whose courage
and zeal were so great."
While on this mission, he also built a little frame
church at Scio; and, after being allowed by the au-
thorities of Angelica, New York, to use the court-
house there for divine service for a year and a half,
he had just purchased the old jail, on the site of which
it was his intention to erect a church, — since built
and still in use, — when he was transferred to the less
arduous, but more important parish of Geneva, New
York, on the 1st of January, 1851.
At Geneva, Father O'Brien built a fine brick church
which had just been commenced by his predecessor,
Father Bradley ; and also built a pastoral residence
He had the basement of the church well fitted for a
parochial school which he there opened — one of the
first in the State. He also purchased and tastefully
laid out a good cemetery.
His remarkable success in this parish led, in less
than four years, to a still higher promotion — the pas-
torate of St. Patrick's Church, Rochester, to which he
was appointed in October, 1864, as successor to the
Vicar-Cieneral of the diocese. Very Rev. William
O'Reilly, who left Rochester for Hartford, Conn.,
whither he came to assist his brother, the Rt. Rev.
Bishop of that diocese.
A broader field, a more important position meant,
to Father O'Brien, only stronger endeavor and more
unselfish devotion in God's service. Accordingly, we
find hira almost immediately hard at work. A pa-
rochial school for girls had already been founded by
Rev. Bernard O'Reilly, afterwards the bishop already
referred to, who had been Father William's imme-
diate predecessor; but the boysof the parish were un-
provided for until Futher O'Brien's advent. With his
never-failing interest in Christian education, their
needs in that respect engaged his first attention. For
the sum of eight thousand dollars, he purchased one of
the finest sites in the city for a boys' school, and soon
erected thereon a handsome and excellently provided
building. He then obtained from Montreal seven Chris-
tian Brothers — oneof the firstcommunities to come to
the United States — all excellent teachers, and soon had
in running order one of the best parochial schools in
the country — a school to which Father O'Brien has
every reason to look back upon with a commendable
pride; for its graduates till many of the highest posi-
tions in the State, some being greatly esteemed cler-
gymen, others talented editors whose influence is felt
far beyond iis limits, while others again have won
credit in the medical and legal professions, or stand
amongst the most successful in commercial life; and
all are upright, honest citizens, and good Christian
men.
After this important matter had been attended to,
he founded St. Mary's Hospital, which he placed
under the direction of the Sisters of Charity, led by
Sister Hieronymo O'Brien. These Sisters still have
charge of the inslituuon, which is one of the best ap-
pointed and largest in the State. In connection with
it is a most admirable department, known as St.
Mary's Retreat, for the benefit of persons who may
desire a quiet and healthful place of sojourn during
periods of weariners or convalescence. The bospitul
was liberally patronized by the city, and the State
gave large sumstowards its support. During the war
it was a most valuable place for the wounded sol-
diers.
In Jane, 1859, Father O'Brien was appointed Vicar-
General of the diocese, which necessitated his removal,
for some time, to Buffalo. His stay of five years at
Rochester, and the great good he had, during that
time, accomplished there, had so endeared him to the
people that his departure from amongst them was re-
garded with universal sorrow, and by none more sin-
cerely so than by the pupils of the schools after whose
interests he had always so carefully looked. An ex-
tract from an address presented him, together with
a handsome present, by the pupils of St. Patrick's
Academy, may give some idea of the estimate in
which he was held :
" Deae Beloved Pastor :— We, the pupils of St. Patrick's Acarteniy,
have rome this evening to congratulate you on your promotion to the
ven,' hooomble and most important office of Vicar-General of thin dio-
cese, tu wbicli God, in liiH all-wisu FrovideDce, hiis seen fit to call you.
But we do QBsure you that onr joy isgreiftly clouded by the sad thouglit
that this promotion will cause ue to be deprived of your much loved
presence auiongst ua Ttiis, iudeed, ie most soirowful news for the
Catholic romiuunity of Iloctiester in general ; for your unliounded zeal
and generuus devoteilneas during the too eliort a time Gud has willed
you to be in our midst, have, we may say, reached all the difftrent
classes — the rich and poor, young and old, widow and orphan, and poor
suffering huuianity~all, all have felt the effects of your vigilance' and
charity,"
His stay in Buffalo was as fruitful in good works as
had been his previous missions. He had just success-
fully negotiated for another band of Christian Broth-
ers for a boys' school, who soon after came, when he
was recalled to Rochester, after an absence of about
a year and a half.
The sorrow of the people of Rochester at his de-
parture was only exceeded by the joy with which
they welcomed him back, as ready as ever, to take up
his interrupted good work amongst them.
Soon after his return, a pressing caII for help came
across the waters from Ireland to the Irish race in
this prosperous country. It was immediately an-
swered, on the part of Rochester Catholics, by Father
O'Brien, who first calltd a meeting in the church,
which was afterwards adjourned to the City Hall,
where, on Father O'Brien's invitation, the mayor of
the city presided. The result of the movement was a
subscription of seven thousand dollars which Father
O'Brien immediately sent to the sufferers.
As the Catholic congregation of St. Patrick's Church
had greatly outgrown the accommodations of the
church which he found there, his next step was towards
beginning the erection of a splendid granite church to
take its place. Various circumstances, for some time,
impeded this great and much needed work. Mean-
176
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
while, the direful calamity of Civil War came upon
the country, rendering prayer and religious consolation
more than ever necessary from God's chosen ministers
of peace; and cherished, indeed, in many grateful
hearts is the memory of the loving kindness with
which he encouraged and sustained them during that
sad period. Memorable, too, is the noble generosity
and disinterested patriotism he manifested in connec-
tion with that time that so " tried men's souls." No
appeal for encouraging words, for substantial aid to
the soldiers, was ever unheeded by him. Many of
the more than fifteen thousand people present at the
camp-grounds, outside the city of Rochester, still re-
member the inspiring address he there delivered, at
the invitation of the genera! in command, to one of
the regiments of Meagher's Irish Brigade, on its de-
parture for the battle-field ; and many, too, can recall,
as well, the patriotic and consoling funeral sermons
he delivered at St. Bridget's Church, over the remains
of the brave and deeply regretted General O'Rourke,
and also over those of the gallant Captain Sullivan and
other soldiers at St. Patrick's. The war happily
over, plans for the church building were being pushed
rapidly forward. Inspired by his energy and gener-
osity, the parishioners became as earnest as himself;
and he succeeded in procuring, for the contemplated
church, sixty thousand dollars in cash or its equivalent
before laying a stone. All during its erection, how-
ever. Father O'Brien had been pressing a request for
his transfer to Lowell, where his uncle. Rev. John
O'Brien, was very desirous of his presence and assist-
ance in the heavy work which he saw before him in
this city. Loath to part with so devoted and able a
priest, the Bishop long deferred acceding to his wish.
Uncertainty, however, did not deter Father O'Brien
in the good work at Rochester which he pushed
on as energetically as ever. At length the church,
St. Patrick's — uow used as the Rochester Cathedral —
was well on its way to completion, when, soon after
the death of Rt. Rev. Bishop Timoo, came the long-
desired permission ; and, immediately on receiving
it. Father Michael hastened to his reverend uncle.
Once again his congregation was called upon to
suffer the loss of their esteemed pastor. As a token
of their appreciation of his virtuous endeavor.^ and
of their sorrow at hif. departure, they presented him
with an eloquent address, accompanied by a valu-
able gold chaiice, ciborium and remonstrance. The
first he still uses ; the remonstrance he returned to the
Cathedral at Rochester, and it is now used by the
Bishop of that diocese.
Received most cordially by the venerable pastor of
St. Patrick's Church, Lowell, on his arrival, June 29,
1867, he soon won the respect and esteem, not only of j
St. Patrick's Parish, but of all the well disposed I
citizens of Lowell of whatever denomination, so
edrnest and helpful were his efforts for the good of
the entire community. The condition of affairs on
his arrival and his subsequent course here have been
already recorded, and we will not repeat them, but
confine ourselves to a few events of his personal
history.
We have already mentioned his active and success-
ful assistance towards his suffering native land, while
in Rochester. He has been, while iu Lowell, no less
interested in her welfare, and no less ready with aid
in her present struggle for national independence. In
the threatened famines of 1879-80, St. Patrick's
Parish was amongst the first to send aid. On Christ-
mas Day of the former year, he announced a collec-
tion for that purpose, the results of which enabled
him to send to Ireland two thousand two hundred
dollars. A few weeks later, January 13, 1880, on the
visit of Messrs. Parnell and Dillon, to Lowell, both
received a cordial welcome, a::d valuable co-operation
at his hands. From the Lowell Sun, of Saturday,
January 17, 1880, we learn that, after the meeting in
Huntington Hall, where these two distinguished
guests appeared, had been called to order, " Rev.
Michael O'Brien was announced as the president of
the evening, and the reverend gentleman came to the
front amid great applause." At this meeting also his
customary generosity was manifest in the large con-
tribution presented. Mr. Dillon was his guest dur-
ing bis stay in the city, and returned soon after and
gave a lecture here for the benefit of the Brothers'
School.
Several times since coming to this country, Father
O'Brien has visited his native land, whose history, re-
sources and general condition few better comprehend.
His travels in Europe have been quite extended on
the Continent, whose principal countries he visite<l in
1876, bringing back with him a fund of information
that years of home study would not have accumulated.
It was during this visit that he enjoyed the pleasure of
a short stay in Rome, and the honor of a most satis-
factory and encouraging interview with his Holiness,
Pope Pius IX.
During another European trip a well-deserved
honor was conferred upon him, in September, ISSL
He was one of the first three in the diocese to be ap-
pointed permanent rector, the other two being Rev.
Patrick Strain, of Lynn, and Rev. Thomas Scully,
Cambridgeport. On his return, he was received with
a most hearty welcome, and most sincere congratula-
tions by the congregation, and by the several religious
societies which he has founded and fostered. We
have also, in the sketch of the church, referred to the
splendid demonstration in honor of the fortieth anni-
versary of his elevation to the priesthood ; and we
theu quoted from the different addresses, extracts
that were particularly connected with his career as
rector of St. Patrick's Church. Those that now fol-
low seem most appropriate here. The first is from
the address of John Hogan, Esq., representing the
congregation :
*' Forty years ago you received the oH of unction that you miplit
abcoud Ciud'b iiltiiv uud ulTur tjucrilicc fur the living uud tliu duud. Fur
LOWELL.
177
forty years yoo have been a faithful priest of the holy Bomac Catholic
Church, aod It hu beeo your pleasure to lift np, day by day, the ud-
tpotted Hoat, the Price of our aa^Tation ; to aDDOuoce with authority
the Word of God; and to exerriae the diviDe power of forgiving alna.
Tbii iB, indeed, a great grace and a aublime privilege.
*' As yoQ stand here in the presence of your fluck,jour mind will recall
the day of your ordination, when, in the prime and vigor of manhood,
you dedicated your life to saving the souls of your fellow-men. What is
more noble, more heroic, or more worthy of emulation 7 During these
foriy years, how many are the infants on whose heads you have poured
the waters of regeneration and made them children of our holy Church '
Uow many the orphans you have sheltered, the works of charity, of
flelf-sacrifice, and of self-denial, you have peifonned, and how many
poor sonlfi, ere they departed this life, you have ministered to and
spoken words of consolation and comfort ! "
The secoDd brief extract is from Mra. Mary Cal-
vert's address, representing the Holy Family Sodal-
ity:
"We thank yon for the care yon take of our owo 10018, bnt, oh I how
•very mother's heart moves towards you for your special care of our
little ones, training theui by the aid of religious Instruction, and by the
examples of religious teachers which your fatherly interest has pro-
vided for them. Hay they one day rise up and call you blessed."
Another brief extract is from Miss Nellie Foley's
address, representing the Sodality of the Immaculate
Conception :
" As children of Holy Mother Church, we gladly yield you the fealty
of true Catholics to God'e chosen priest; as members of St. Patrick's
parish, we rejoice in having so true-hearted a pastor, so vigilant a
guide ; and as children of Mar}' Immaculate, we claim a special share>
in this demonstration, for to us you are the spiritual father, who,
through our consecration^ has led us to Mary's feet."
Still another is from Mr, Michael McDermott's ad-
dress, representing the Holy Name Society :
"To embellish the dignity, the character and the mission of a true
priest, we must needs borrow neither from rhetoric, nor from flattery.
As the ambassador of Divine Providence to redeemed mankind, the
priest speaks to God by prayer and to the people by exhorting them to
the practice of the saving truths of salvation. For forty years such,
dear Father, has been your two-fold office ; and in the discharge of the
aacred duties of tbe ministry, by the wisdom which regulated your zeal
and tbe prudence which tempered yuur piety, you have been an honor
and credit to tbe Church, and the pride and glory of her loyal sons and
daughters in the city of Lowell."
The following we take from the address by James
H. Carmichael, Esq., representing the Young Men's
Sodality :
" This occasion must, indeed, be a happy and glorious one for you,
surrounded, as you are, by your congregation ; the old and the young,
all vieing with each other to make this a plfasantand memorable epoch
in your life. We who have known you in our midst for years, know of
your unostentatious and holy life ; know of your couiitless acts of char-
ity ; we who have received consolation and hope from you In the dark
boars of sorrow and affliction ; we who have seen you share our joy and
happiness in the bright hours of pleasure ; we who have seen you like
a ministering angel ponrtng words of coDBOlation and heavenly hope
into the ears of the sick and dying, and pointing out to them the
straight and narrow path which leads to eternal life. We are now as-
sembled in this holy temple to manifest to you our love and devotion on
this, th« fortieth anniversary of yonr ordination. It is not for the cele-
bration of any worldly exploits that we come together on this holy Sun-
day night, but to celebrate the anniversary of the consecration of your
life to the service of the Lord— a life dedicated to his work among the
poor and the humble ; to commemorate a life ol self-sacrifice and
denial ; a hfe given to teaching us the divine truths of religion and
spreading tbe light of tbe Gospel of Christ among his chUdren on
earth."
And so' we might continue, were space allowed,
quoting elofjuent tributes not onlv from the exercises
12-ii
of that evening, bnt from equally appropriate ones at
the schools the next day — all more than confirming
any encomiums we have given.
Of all the objects of Father O'Brien's interest, there
is none dearer than the proper education of the young
committed to his care, for whom he has provided
such excellent instruction. Of his stand on the im-
portant question of parochial schoolc, the following
extract from the synopsis of an address delivered by
him at the last graduating exercises of the Boys*
School gives a good idea:
" HaviDg DOW coDgretalated teachen aod pupils on the excellsDce of
thlseTOQlDg's exflrciwa, 1 have a word to tay to tbe audience oo the
general subject of education, inasmacb as some people of little Judgment
bave lately been eqjoyiDg quite a diacusaion especially on tbe meilta of
secular and religious education. 1 consider tbe religious queatlon •et'
tied, and I see no room for controTersy between the public and the paro-
chial schools. I think they can both lire together in the moat amicable
relations and actuated by honorable riTalry as to which will do th»
better work- I firmly believe, and I bold we have just reason for
thinking our schools surpaie the public schools. In the flrat place, we
lay a splendid moral tfouudatioD for the edifice of education ; and yon
know that without a subetaotiat foundation, an edifice ie in danger of
falling when it meets the shock of the cyclone. We lay as the founda-
tion stone the commandments of God and the precepts of the Church,
which require us to loTe our neighbor aa ouraeWes — that is, men of all
conditions and professions — to love God who created us, and do hie will
in all things. On this foundation we raise the superstructure of educa-
tion, and we think we impart as good a secular education aa can be-
given by any other school."
Father O'Brien then referred to the victories won
in New York by the pupils of the parochial school ;
where, on the occasion of an examination for a cadet-
ship at West Point, for which there were about seventy-
five competitors and only ten obtained the required per-
centage, eight of the ten successful ones were pupils
of the parochial schools. In Bufialo, N. Y., a similar
examination has been held for a number of years,
and in every case, a pupil of the parochial schools has
been successful. He also reverted to a recent exam-
ination in this city in which a place was won in a
competition by a young man, a graduate of our paro-
chial school.
In conclusion he said :
"These cases, with the high percentage gained by our school children,
together with the excellence of the exercises you have seen here this
evening [Monday. June 23, 1890], should be sufficient to convince every-
body of the success of our schools. We are determined that they aball
surpass tbe public schools ; and if they do not equal those schools, we
will cloee them altogether."
Kor has Father O'Brien's interest been confined to
those of Lowell of his own race and creed. Becom-
ing, as soon as the law allowed, an American citizen,
he feels that no other country has now equal claims
on his love and allegiance. A most devoted Catholic,
pious and ardent in his sacred calling, and allowing
no interference with the discharge of his religious
duties, or of those of his people, he never interferes
with the religious opinions of others.
A friend to humanity in its broadest and most
charitable sense, any work for the benefit of the com-
munity. Catholic or Protestant, receives from him
most cordial encouragement, and the ready aid of
178
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
purse, voice, or influence. A keen reasoner, the wis-
dom of his judgment is only excelled by its charity;
and the devotion and earnestness of his piety are
«qually manifest in his exemplary life, and in the
edifying, soul-reaching discourses with which he is
ever ready when duty and occasion require. Quiet
and scholarly in his tastes, he is, none the less, most
public-spirited ; and keeps abreast of the times in
everything that concerns the interest of his church,
his schools, and the general public.
As to the rest, see his own simple, honest words, in
response to one of the grandest demonstrations of re-
spect and affection with which a pastor could be
honored.
His life in Lowell is an open book, which all may
read. Some pages, perhaps, might be better written
but such as they are, they stand for his best efforts.
Surely those efforts will win for him the commenda-
tion, "Well done, good and faithful servant!" and
will be crowned with rich and enduring results in
this city to whose spiritual and temporal interests he
is so devoted.
St. Peter's Church. — As early as 1841, ten years
after the dedication of St. Patrick's Church, the num-
ber of Irish people living in the neighborhood of Gor-
ham, Green and William Streets had become so great
that a new Catholic Church was evidently called for
in that part of the city. Rev. James Conway, assist-
ant of Father McDermott in the Church of St. Pat-
rick, was chiefly instrumental in planting the new
church. A lot of land was secured in 1841 on Gor-
ham and Appleton Streets and a substantial brick
building was erected as a house of worship. This
house was dedicated October 16, 1842. It is proper
to state, in passing, that this is the house recently
purchased by the United States Government in order
that its site may be used for the erection of a building
for the Lowell post-office.
The church edifice was erected at a liberal expen-
diture for the times, and it has served the church for
forty-six years.
Rev. Father Conway, the first pastor of this church,
removed to Salem in 1847, and the Rev. Peter Crud-
den was his successor.
In August, 1883, Rev. Michael Ronan, from St.
James' Church, Boston, became pastor of this church.
He is still the beloved and faithful pastor of St.
Peter's Church, having three assistants. A new house
of worship will soon be erected.
St. Peter's Orphan Asylum, which adjoins the
parochial residence, now freed from debt by the ef-
forts of Father Ronan, is in charge of the Sisters of
Charity of Nazareth.
St. Joseph's Church. — Rev. Andre JI. Garin, a member
of the Society of the Oblate Fathers of Mary Immacu-
late, came to Lowell in April, 1868, and entered upon
his work of the religious instruction of the French
Catholics of this city. He soon purchased of the
Second Unitarian Society their stone church on Lee
Street for $11,500. This house, since twice enlarged at
an expense of nearly $60,000, is still the house of wor-
ship of the French Catholics of Lowell, the genial
and excellent Father Garin being still their pastor.
The enterprise has had great success. Notwithstand-
ing the enlargement of the church, it has proved too
small to accommodate the crowds who flock to it, and
a lot on Merrimack and Austin Streets has been pur-
chased for the erection of a new church for the
French Catholics of the city. This new church, which
is already in the process of erection, is to be of gran-
ite quarried at North Chelmsford and of the Roman
style of architecture. Its name is to be St. Jean Bap-
tiste Church. The new church is to be in St. Joseph's
Parish, which is one of the most flourishing in the
United States.
Father Garin, the pastor of this parish, has six as-
sistants.
The basement of the new church was opened for
worship and dedicated on February 2, 1890, by
Bishop Clut, of the Order of Oblate Fathers, a mission-
ary among the Indians on Mackenzie River.
Immaculate Conception Church. — The wooden chapel
of one story situated near St. John's Hospital, in Bel-
videre, and called St. John's Chapel, having been
erected by the Sisters of Charity of St. John's Hos-
pital, was in 1869 purchased by ihe Oblate Fathers
and made the temporary place of worship for a new
Catholic Church. Rev. Andre M. Garin was, in 1870,
appointed first pastor of this new organization, hav-
ing for his assistant Rev. J. 31. Guillard. Steps were
promptly taken towards erecting on Fayette Street
the massive and imposing stone structure now known
j as the Church of the Immaculate Conception.
The first pastor of St. John's Chapel, Eev. James
McGrath, was appointed in October, 1870. On
November 30, 1871, Archbishop Williams laid the
corner-stone of the new church edifice. The base-
ment, which was for some time used as the place ot
worship, was blessed July 7, 1872, and the church it-
self was dedicated by Archbishop Williams, June 10,
1877.
The translation of the relics of the martyr, St. Vere-
cunda, took place on November 24, 1878, and the an-
niversary of this translation is still observed at this
church on the second Sunday of September, every
year.
The church is of the Gothic style of architecture
and is surmounted with spires and pinnacles. The
seating capacity is 1932.
July 1, 1883, Rev. C. J. Smith succeeded Father
McGrath as pastor of this church.
The present pastor. Rev. W. D. Joyce, assumed his
sacred office in July, 1886.
St. Michael's Church. — The city of Lowell was eccle-
siastically divided by the Archbishop of the diocese
into Catholic parishes in 1883. Each parish takes its
name from the name of the church within it. Oneot
these parishes, St. Michael's, includes the village of
LOWELL.
179
Centralville, in which the Irish population has in late
yeare rapidly increased. A church to be known as
St Michael's is already in the process of erection. It
occupies a lot which extends from Sixth Street to
Seventh Street. The corner-stone was laid by the
Archbishop in April, 1884, in the presence of " no less
than 15,000 persons." The basement, which is already
completed and dedicated, will accommodate 1100 per-
sons.
The church is to be of the Romanesque style of ar-
chitecture. The material to be used will be thefinest
quality of pressed brick with granite trimmings.
There will be 235 pews with a seating capacity of
1600.
Rev. William O'Brien, the first pastor, was born in
Ireland and educated at All Hallows Seminary. He
is still in service, having one assistant. The parochial
school connected with this church was opened in
September, 1889, and is under the instruction of the
Dominican Sisters.
Church of the Sacred Heart. — This church, still in
its infancy, was organized in 1884, under the auspices
and government of the Oblate Fathers. Measures
were promptly taken to erect a house of worship, and
in 1885 the basement was completed. It is situated
on Moore Street and has a seating capacity of about
1400. The church will be of brick and will accom-
modate 2000 persona. The first pastor, Rev. W. D.
Joyce, was appointed in 1884. He is now the pastor
of the Church of Immaculate Conception. The
present pastor is Rev. J. C. Lavoie, who assumed his
sacred ofiice in 1885. He has one assistant.
The Lowell Yocxg Men's Christian Associa-
tion was organized February 4, 1867, and incorpor-
ated in 1868, " for the purposes," as expressed in its
charter, " of providing for the physical, moral and
spiritual welfare of young men." The number of
members in April, 1889, was 498, of whom 303 were
active members and 195 associate members. Any
young man who is a member of an Evangelical
Church, in good standing, may become an active
member by paying one dollar annually, and any
young man of good moral character can become an
associate member by paying one dollar annually.
There is a standing committee of four from each
church whose duty it is to seek out young men who
come to Lowell, to bring them under good moral and
religious influences, to aid them in finding boarding-
places and employment, to secure their attendance at
church and to surround them with Christian associ-
ates. At their headquarters they have a reading-
room and library, intended as attractive resorts of
young men in boarding-houses. Here also they have
Bible-classes, prayer-meetings and social gatherings.
Prayer-meetings are also held in various parts of the
city. Under their auspices are held out-of-door ser-
vices on the Commons, at which sermons are preached
by the Lowell clergymen and others. Literary,
classes are formed at their rooms, the sick are visited
and in a word, every efibrt is made to encourage
young men in virtuous living, to strengthen the weak
and rescue the fallen. In a work so beneficent they
find support in all the churches, and sympathy from
all good men.
Until 1889 the headquarters of this association
were in Barristers' Hall, opposite the post-office,
where rooms in the third story were rented. But by
the liberality of friends, a building on Hard Street
has been purchased for the association, which, with
necessary improvements and the addition of a new ball
having a seating capacity of 350, will cost about $32,-
000. The new building was entered in 1889, and the
hall dedicated December 17, 1889. The presidents
of this association have been : I. W. Beard, Sullivan
L. Ward, William W. Sherman, C. W. Sleeper,
George F. Willey, N. W. Frye, A. C. Rnssell, Phile-
tuB Burnham, E. P. Woods, J. G. Buttrick, A. W.
Woodworth, Wm. H. Ward, W. F. Hills. The gen-
eral secretaries have been : Dauphin Osgood, G. C.
Osgood, G. E. Lovejoy, Henry J. McCoy, C. K. Flan-
ders, George S. Avery, D. A. Gordon, C. P. Harlow.
The general secretary and his assistant are salaried
officers, and are the active agents and managers of
the Association.
CHAPTER X.
LO WELL-{Continued).
MILITARY.
No part of the honorable military record of the
town of Chelmsford in the War of the Revolution or
in the War of 1812 can be properly credited to the
town or city of Lowell. Nor was Lowell's part in the
Mexican War in 1846-47 worthy of extended historical
record. As a city, Lowell sent no troops to wage war
against the sister republic. The army, which, on Sept.
14, 1847, captured the city of Mexico, consisted of a
small division of the regular army of the United
States and 50,000 volunteers. All New England con-
tributed but a single regiment to this war, and Lowell
raised no companies and paid no bounties. Her citi-
zens, though proud of the success of our national
arms, had at heart but very little sympathy with the
spirit which precipitated this war or the purpose for
which it was waged. The noble part, however, which
Lowell took in the great Rebellion of 1861 is abund-
antly worthy of historic record.
With the cause of the National Government in
crushing this gigantic rebellion, Lowell was in fiill
sympathy, and had taken her full share of the respon-
sibility of electing a President pledged to its suppres-
sion.
The cause of this momentous conflict can, doubt-
less, be fcund in the incompatibility of slavery with the
institutions of freedom. Two elements so utterly
180
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
discurdant could not peaceably dwell together. The
compromises of the Constitution, the Missouri Com-
promise, and other devices of patriotic statesmen
did not remove the evil, but only concealed it from
the sight. The Missouri Compromise, which opened to
slavery a part of the territory of which all belonged
to freedom, was received with sadness and borne with
discontent by all who loved liberty ; but when even
that compromise was repealed and the whole laid open
to slavery, their indignation could no longer be sup-
pressed. Still they met the issue with only legitimate
and honorable efforts to settle the fertile fields of
Kansas with Northern free men, and thus secure them
for liberty. But when this honorable action was met
with bloodshed and the murder of innocent settlers,
the wrath of the North was fully roused. The time
for tame submission was past.
The slave power had made alarming encroachments.
In every branch of the National Government slave-
holders were intrenched in power. President Buchan-
an, if in sentiment a friend of liberty, was utterly un-
able to withstand the imperious domination of the
slaveholders by whom he was surrounded. Brecken-
ridge, the Vice-President, was a slave-holder. In the
Cabinet, Floyd, the Secretary of War, and Cobb, the
Secretary of the Treasury, were slave-holders. In the
Senate, Jefferson Davis, Slidell, Benjamin, Mason,
Toombs, all were party leaders, and all were slave-
holders. The chairman of almost every important
committee of the Senate was a slave-holder. In places
of power not a Northern Republican and scarcely a
Northern Democrat could be found.
It was under such provocations that the people of
the North resorted to the fair and justifiable efforts to
place, by their ballots, the government of their coun-
try in the hands of the friends of freedom. And
hence the war, with all its carnage and all its fearful
horrors.
Several important events in the summer and au-
tumn of 1860 clearly foreboded the near approach of
war. Conspicuous among them were the disruption
of the Democratic party, which, at the Charleston
Convention, failed to unite upon a common platform
or to nominate a common candidate for the Presi-
dency, and the election of Lincoln, an avowed oppo-
nent of the slave power. To these should be added
the firing, on January 9, 1861, upon the "Star of the
West," a vessel commissioned by President Buchanan
to provision the garrison in Fort Sumter, in the
harbor of Charleston. Still forbearance reigned. But
when the startling news ran like wild-fire through
the nation, that on April 12th this national fort had
been fired upon by insurgent batteries on the shore,
every sentiment of patriotism made it cowardice and
treason longer to wait. Seven States had already se-
ceded. The Southern Confederacy had already been
formed. Treason in Buchanan's Cabinet had crippled
the martial resources of the North, and now, by the
firing upon a National fort, war was actually begun.
On April 14th the fort surrendered, and on April
loth President Lincoln issued a call for 75,000 troops.
The call came upon our city with startling effect.
Citizens who had read in the newspapers with eager
interest the exciting accounts of Southern outrages,
now, when the inevitable time had come to part with
fathers, brothers and friends, experienced emotions
never felt before. It was a day of teais and sadness.
A cloud seemed to hang over the fair city.
At the time of the opening of the Rebellion, Low-
ell had four organized military companies, viz. : the
Mechanic Phalanx, formed in 1825, while Lowell was
a town, the City Guards (1841), the Watson Light
Guard (1851) and the National Greys (1855). When,
on April 15, 1861, Col. Edward F. Jones, of the Sixth
Regiment, to which the Lowell companies belonged,
was commanded to muster his regiment to march to
the defence of Washington, these companies promptly
obeyed their countn,''8 call. They met the duty and
the danger with patriotic zeal. They were not un-
prepared. Three months before Gov. Andrew had
issued his famous General Order No. 4, requiring the
militia of the State to be forthwith put into a state of
etficiency, and on January 19th the field officers and
commanders of companies of the Sixth Regiment
had met at the American House in Lowell, and Col.
Jones was commLssioned to tender the services of the
regiment to the commander-in-chief, whenever the
country should call. By this prompt and patriotic
act the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment had the proud
distinction of being the first regiment in the nation
called into action. The conduct of Col. Jones on
this memorable occasion was beyond all praise. Hap-
pening on that day to be in Boston, instead of his
place of residence, Pepperell, Mass., he received the
news of the President's call upon the very day of its
promulgation. He forthwith issued orders by tele-
graph to the companies of the Sixth Regiment, to
assemble at seven o'clock on the next morning in Hunt-
ington Hall, Lowell, uniformed and ready to proceed
to Washington.
Within seventeen hours after Col. Jones had re-
ceived his marching orders the following companies
were assembled in Huntington Hall ready for duty :
Company C, the Mechanic Phalanx of Lowell, Capt.
Albert S. Follansbee, 56 men, including officers;
Company D, the City Guards of Lowell, Capt. James
W. Hunt, 53 ; Company H, the Watson Light Guard
of Lowell, Capt. John F. N'oyes, 53 ; Company A,
the National Greys of Lowell, Capt. Josiali A. Saw-
tell, 52 ; Company I, Capt. Pickering, of Lawrence,
52 ; Company F, of Lawrence, Capt. Chadburne, 62 ;
Company E, of Acton, Capt. Tuttle, 52 ; Company B,
of Groton, Capt. Clark, 74. With these companies,
also came the Lowell Brigade Band, with sixteen pieces.
Upon the arrival of the above eight companies at Bos-
ton, the following three companies were to be added :
Company L, of Stoneham, Capt. Dike, 67 ; Company
G, of Worcester, Capt. Pratt, 100 ; Company K, of
LOWELL.
181
Boston, Capt. Sampson, 62; making a total of 699
men.
The 16th of April was a cold and dismal day. The
rain and sleet were falling. In Huntington Hall was
assembled the flower of the manhood of the city.
Fathers, brothers and friends had been suddenly
called to meet the perils of war and the dangers of
death. The tocsin of war had never been heard in
the city, and when its fearful notes resounded, the
mothers, wives and children of the soldiers were
struck with a terror never felt before. But a patriotic
enthusiasm filled the hearts of the soldiers, and it
seemed a glorious thing tu march to the defence of
the capital of their country.
Before the regiment left Huntington Hall to pro-
ceed to Boston, the Rev. Dr. Blanchard read the
eightieth Psalm: "Thou that dwellest between the
cherubim, shine forth. Stir up thy strength and come
and save us." Patriotic addresses were made by the
mayor, Honorable B. C. Sargeant, A. R. Brown, Esq.,
Theodore H. Sweetaer, Esq., Colonel G. F. Sawtell
and others. Republican and Democrat uttered the
same sentiments of patriotism from the same plat-
form.
As the companies departed for Boston, throngs of
citizens gathered around them. The soldiers' fami-
lies became the objects of tender regard. The mayor
assured them that they should not suffer. It was a day
of noble sacrifice. Lucrative positions, profitable trade,
extensive professional practice, all were forsaken to
march to the defence of the capital.
On their arrival at Boston thousands of the citizens
escorted them to Faneuil and Boylston Halls. On
the next day their old muskets were exchanged for
modern rifles. Governor Andrew addressed them
with words of patriotic fervor. As the Governor pre-
sented to Colonel Jones his regimental colors he
tenderly and eloquently said to the assembled soldiers:
" We shall follow you with our benedictions, our ben-
efactions, and our prayers. Those whom you leave be-
hind you, we shall cherish in our heart of hearte."
Colonel Jones replied : " You have given me this flag,
which is the emblem of all that stands before you.
It represents my whole command, and, so help me God,
I will never disgrace it." The daughter of the colonel
was adopted as the daughter of the regiment.
The regiment in the evening left Boston upon the
Worcester Railroad. Along the route could be heard
the firing of cannon, the ringing of bells, and the
shouts of patriotic pxeu. In New York the streets
were filled with a sympathizing and excited populace.
At noon on the 18th the regiment left New York by
way of Jersey City. Its progress was a grand ovation.
At Philadelphia the enthusiasm was intense. The
soldiers were quartered at the Girard House, where,
after prolonged excitement, they spread their blankets
and enjoyed the welcome blessing of sleep.
At one o'clock on the morning of April 19th, ever
memorable day, they were waked from their slumbers
to start for Washington. And now, as they proceed,
muttered threats begin to be heard, and predictions
of stormy times in the streets of Baltimore. To these
startling rumors Colonel Jones replied: "My orders
are to reach Washington at the earliest possible mo-
ment, and I shall go on." The regiment reached Balti-
more at ten o'clock in the morning and began to
cross the city in cars. Their enemies did not expect
them until noon. So early and so unexpected was
their arrival that the populace had not yet filled the
streets. It has been since discovered that had the
regiment arrived at the hour they were expected by
their enemies, there would have been a fearful
slaughter.
Thus favored by their early and opportune arrival,
seven of the eleven companies were conveyed across the
city to the Washington depot in cars drawn by horses.
Only one of these companies met with serious resist-
ance. This was the Boston company. Captain Samp-
son, which joined the regiment at Boston on its arrival
from Lowell. It occupied the rear car and had a most
perilous passage. Three times the car was thrown
from the track and the soldiers were assaulted with
paving stones and clubs. But none were killed and
only four were wounded.
But the main interest of that eventful day centres
in the four remaining companies, which, being in the
rear, and finding that the crowd had torn up the rail-
road track, were compelled to march across the city.
These companies were the Mechanics' Phalanx, of
Lowell, Capt. Follansbee ; the City Guards, of Low-
ell, Capt. Hart ; Company I, of Lawrence, Capt. Pick-
ering, and the Stoneham Light Infantry, Capt. Dike.
Of this detachment of four companies Capt. Follans-
bee was, by his fellow-ofiicers, selected as comman-
der.
Soon after beginning their march they were at-
tacked by a mob bearing a secession flag. The flag
was captured by the indignant soldiers and trampled
upon the pavement. As they proceeded, mingled
volleys of oaths and yells, showers of missiles and
shots from muskets and pistols filled the air. On
reaching a canal bridge, on Piatt Street, the planks
had been torn up to form a barricade, and cannon
planted to sweep the street. But before the cannon
could be discharged the agile soldiers had scaled the
barricade and crossed the bridge. And now. as they
proceed, at double-quick step, they are attacked from
streets and houses as they pass. They were ordered
to return fire, and many of the mob fell. Capt. Fol-
lansbee reported that he saw, at one time, four fall
upon the sidewalk, and that " where a man in Balti-
more showed his pistol, or axe, or palmetto flag, he
was about sure to drop."
When the four battered companies joined their
companions at the Washington depot several of their
number were missing. Capt. Dike, of the Stoneham
company, had been wounded and left behind. Sum-
ner H. Needham, of the Lawrence company, had
182
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
been killed, and he was the tirat victim. But the
City Guards, of Lowell, bringing up the rear, suffered
most severely. Of this company Luther C. Ladd,
Addison O. Whitney and Charles A. Taylor were
killed. In the four companies four were killed and
thirty-six wounded.
After three hours thus spent in crossing Baltimore,
the regiment, being now re-united at the depot, Col.
Jones gave the order for the train to start for Wash-
ington. The number left behind, including the band
and field music, was 130. The band, being unarmed,
refused to cross the city, and were conveyed back to
Philadelphia. As the train moved forward the crowd
preceded and followed it, tearing up the rails and ob-
structing it with telegraph-poles and rails of fence.
But the workmen on the road and policemen who ac-
companied the train for several miles removed the
obstructions, and the regiment, after a long delay at
the Relay House, reached Washington at about six
o'clock in the afternoon. They were received by
Major (afterwards Major-General) McDowell, and
escorted to their quarters in the Senate Chamber in
the Capitol.
This regiment, four of whose eleven companies be-
longed to the city of Lowell, had now become the
first to volunteer in the great Rebellion, the first in
the field of war, the first to shed its blood, and the
first to come to the defence of the capital.
And now, the Sixth Regiment having reached its
destination, it is well to return upon our steps and re-
cord a few personal notices and a few interesting
events of that memorable day at Baltimore.
Capt. Dike, of Stoneham, upon being shot through
the thigh, was, by a Union man, Dorsey by name,
conveyed to a remote room in a public-house and
nursed and cared for for several days. He was be-
lieved to have been killed by the mob, .and at Stone-
ham the sensation and excitement among his towns-
men was most intense. But the ball, though coming
very near an artery, did not sever it, and his recovery
ensued.
Corporal Needham, of the Lawrence company, on
leaving the car to march across the city, remarked to
a fellow-soldier : " We shall have trouble to-day, and
I shall never get out of it alive. Promise me, if 1
fall, that my body shall be sent home." Upon being
wounded he was conveyed to an inSrmary, where,
after lingering eight days, he died. The soldier's re-
quest was fully granted, for his remains were conveyed
to the City Hall in Lawrence, where, before a vast
concourse of people, most solemn and impressive fu-
neral services were held, and they were buried be-
neath a granite monument in the beautiful cemetery
of that city.
Addison O. Whitney, of the Lowell City Guards, was
a workman on the Middlesex Corporation, and was a
young man held in high esteem. He was born in
Waldo, Maine, and when killed was twenty-two years
of age. Hia remains, and those of hb comrade, Ladd,
lie in Monument Square in Lowell, near a beautiful
monument erected in their honor.
Luther C. Ladd, of the Lowell City Guards, was
born in Alexandria, X. H., and was a young Lowell
mechanic — a mere lad of seventeen years. He was
full of patriotic ardor, and when he fell his comrades
heard him utter the words: "All hail to the stars
and stripes ! "
Charles A. Taylor, of the Lowell City Guards, was
killed. He enlisted in Boston not many hours before
he fell in Baltimore, and no trace of his family and
friends has ever been discovered. Having upon him
no uniform, he was supposed to have been a civilian,
and was buried in Baltimore.
As the four companies were marching through Balti-
more the mayor of the city took his position beside
Commander FoUansbee and assured him of a safe
transit; but when the missiles began to fly thickly
about his head, he remarked that it was getting too
hot for him, took a gun from a soldier and shot down
one of the insurgents, and disappeared from sight.
Timothy Crowley, the standard-bearer of the regi-
ment, bore himself most gallantly. He might have
rolled up his colors and escaped the special notice of
the enemy, but he nobly kept them unfurled to the
breeze, and to the last stood by the flag which he had
sworn to defend.
In Capt. FoUansbee's company was Jeremiah Crow-
ley, Esq., one of Lowell's most distinguished lawyers,
whose brother, Timothy B. Crowley, was major in the
Tenth New Hampshire Regiment and fought under
Gen. Grant in the campaign beginning with the battle
of the Wilderness.
Capt. Follacsbee, in the march through the city,
exhibited a coolness and bravery worthy of a veteran
warrior. At one place, being in doubt which of two
streets to take, and seeing Marshal Kane, chief of the
Baltimore police, posted in one of them and declaring
that he would shoot the first man who should enter
that street. Col. FoUansbee shouted: " That is the
street for us," and gave the order: "Forward,
march ! "
Nor should the patriotic conduct of Gov. Andrew
be unrecorded. When the startling news reached him
that Massachusetts soldiers had fallen, he transmitted
the following dispatch to the mayor of Baltimore :
'• 7b ftte honor, the Mayor :
" I pruy you to cauM the bodlea of our MaasachuBette aoldien, dead
ID Baltimore, to be immediately laid out, preaerred with ice and teuderly
sent forward by express to me."
The mayor acceded to the request, but, in his reply,
alluded to the passage of the troops through Balti-
more as " an invasion of the soil of Maryland." To
this the Governor replied: "I am overwhelmed with
surprise that a peaceful march of American citizens
over the highway to the defense of our common
capital should be deemed aggressive to Baltimore-
ans."
It is impossible to report the number killed by the
LOWELL.
183
soldiers on the passage through Baltimore. It has
been set as high as 100, and as low as forty. Many
more would have fallen had not the indignation of the
soldiers been held in check by their commanders, who
ordered them to fire as little as possible. Moreover,
there was a strong desire to avoid alienating the
people of Maryland from the cause of the Union, and
a patriotic purpose, on the soldiers' part, to fcrego the
avenging of their own wrongs in order to hasten to
the defense of the capital.
For about two weeks the regiment enjoyed their
stately quarters in the hall of the Senate of the
United States. The colonel was wont to sleep in the
Vice-President's chair, and the soldiers, with their
muskets by their sides, indulged in peaceful slumber
upon the floor. Their duties by day were not severe,
and letters to their friends at home were written upon
the desks of the Senators.
On May 5th, other troops having come to the de-
fence of the capital, the Sixth Regiment was ordered
to the Relay House, at the junction of the Baltimore
and Ohio and the Baltimore and Washington Rail-
roads, for the defence of this important position. On
May 13th, for the purpose of checking the plans of
rebels in Baltimore, they were sent to that city, but
soon were ordered back to the Relay House. Again
the regiment, on June 3d, is ordered to Baltimore to
protect the polls during an election, and again re-
turned to the Relay House, where they celebrated
the Fourth of July, receiving a magnificent silk ban-
ner from the loyal citizens of Baltimore.
On July 22d the three months for which the regi-
ment had enlisted expired, and after voting to pro-
long their term of service by a few days, on account
of the special emergency, their homeward progress
began on the 29th of July. Once more they marched
through Baltimore, receiving a cordial welcome.
On August Ist Boston was reached, where a collation
was given them, and where they found quarters for
the night in Faneuil Hall. The next day they were
mustered out of service upon the Common, and pro-
ceeded to their headquarters in Lowell, where, after
the heartiest greetings from the entire population, and
a bountiful collation, the " gallant fellows" returned
to the endearments of home. In April, 1862, the
General Assembly of Maryland appropriated $7000
for the relief of the families of the soldiers of the
Sixth Regiment who were wounded or killed in pass-
ing through Baltimore. The intense interest with
which this regiment, the first to shed its blood, was
followed, is an ample apology for so minute and pro-
tracted a record.
The Sixth Regiment will be heard from again.
So intense a martial spirit was kindled in Lowell
by the firing upon Fort Sumter, and especially by
the attack upon the Lowell companies in their pass-
age through Baltimore, that within two weeks after
this attack four new military companies were formed
in the citv.
These companies were the Hill Cadets, composed
mostly of citizens of Irish birth, commanded by Capt.
Patrick S. Proctor; the Richardson Light Infantry,
Capt. Phineas A. Davis; the Abbott Greys, Capt.
Edward G. Abbott ; and the Butler Rifles, recruited
under Capt. Eben James, but mustered into service
under Capt. Thomas O'Hare. Let us briefly trace
the history of these companies.
The Hill Cadets and the Butler Rifles were at-
tached to the Sixteenth Massachusetts Regiment,
and took part in the battles of Fair Oaks, Glendale,
Malvern Hill, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, Get-
tysburg, the Wilderness, Spottsylvania, the Pamunkey
and Petersburg. After a service of three years they
returned under Captains Donovan and O'Hare.
The Sixteenth Regiment had for its colonel the
gallant Powell F. Wyman, of Boston, who was killed
at the battle of Glendale, and for its chaplain, Rev.
Charles W. Homer, rector of St. John's Church, in Low-
ell. Capt. David W. Roche, of Company A, who had
entered the service from Lowell as second lieutenant
of the Hill Cadets, fell at Gettysburg. " He was one
of Ireland's most noble sons, possessed of the real
Irish impetuosity and courage." Lieut. James R.
Darracott, of this regiment, who enlisted from Bos-
ton, fell at the second battle of Bull Run. His wife
was daughter of Alexander Wright, one of Lowell's
prominent citizens. " He was a faithful officer, and
won for himself the respect of both officers and
men.''
The Abbott Greys were recruited for three years'
service in the brief space of three days by Edward G.
Abbott, son of Judge J. G. Abbott, of Lowell, a young
man of leas than twenty-one years of age. He was
chosen captain of the company and proved a
most gallant officer. This company went into
camp at West Roxbury, and was the first of the ten
companies which constituted the Second Massa-
chussets Regiment, raised by Col. Geo. H. Gor-
don, of Boston. The regiment left camp July
8th, and joined the forces under Gen. Patter-
son at Martinsburg, Va., and did service in the
Shenandoah Valley, covering Gen. Banks' retreat and
engaging in the battle of Winchester in May, 1862.
In Pope's campaign in Virginia this regiment partic-
ipated in the diaastrons battle of Cedar Mountain,
Aug. 9, 1862, in which Gren. Banks, with 7500, wa»
totally routed by Gen. Stonewall Jackson, with 25,000.
In this battle Capt. Abbott fell, and more than halt
of his company were killed or wounded in less than
one hour. The regiment by re-enlistment served til)
the close of the war, leaving a noble record. It en-
gaged in the battles of Antietam, Gettysburg and
Atlanta, and attended Sherman in his march through
Georgia. The well-known Rev. Alonzo H. Qoint was
its chaplain.
Capt. Abbott was one of Lowell's most gallant sons.
He graduated from the Lowell High School and from
Harvard College. When Fort Sumter was fired upon
184
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, xMASSACHUSETTS.
he was engaged in the study of law in his native city.
With patriotic zeal he entered the service of hia
country. He was a young man of sterling merit,
truthful, manly, generous, brave. He possessed the
qualities for a commander. He loved his company
and was proud of it. He was a model disciplinarian,
and had bis life been spared, he would have attained
high military honors. The city of Lowell has rarely
mourned so deeply and so tenderly for the loss of a
favorite son. The funeral honors paid to his remains
attest the love borne for him by his native city. He
was buried in the Lowell Cemetery, by the side of his
equally brave and noble brother.
The Richardson Light Infantry received its name
from Hon. Geo. H. Richardson, one of the mayors of
Lowell, who bore a very prominent part in raising
and equipping it. This company, afterwards known
as the Seventh Battery, on May 22. 1861, took passage
on steamer " Pembroke " for Fortress Monroe. It had
a great variety of service — on provost duty at Fortress
Monroe, in the advance on Norfolk, in May, 1862, at
Newport News, Yorktown and Suffolk, Va. It
fought at Franklin and Providence Church Road, and
was stationed at various points in Virginia, and in the
city of Washington. In Jan., 1864, it was sent to
New Orleans, and served in the Department of the
Gulf, taking part in the various engagements in front
of Spanish Fort, until the fall of that stronghold.
It served through the war.
It should be here remarked that the first impulse
of patriotic enthusiam sufficed to secure a ready en-
listement of soldiers in the companies first raised for
the war, but something more than that was demanded
to arm, and equip, and keep in service the vast army
which was at length called into the field. In
answer to the first call of the President for 75,000
three months' men, Lowell furnished 223 men at an
average cost of only $2.68.
In reply to the two calls of the President, viz. : for
50,000 in May, 1861, and 600,000 in July, 1861, Lo-
well raised 2390 men at an average cost of S27.48
per man. Lowell's quota was 2098 for three years.
We may here, by way of anticipation, state that dur-
ing the war Lowell is credited with furnishing 4763
men at an average cost to the city per man of $53.32
for recruiting and bounties. The above does not
include the State bounty, which, in case, for example,
of the Twenty-sixth and Thirtieth Regiments, in which
were seven Lowell companies, was, for re-enlistment,
$325. The amount of bounties greatly varied, how-
ever, according to the exigencies of the service.
Of the Thirty-third Regiment of Massachusetts In-
fantry about 250 were Lowell men. It was mustered
into service in May, 1861. Few regiments saw so
much hard fighting, or lost so many men, or gained
so high renown. It fought at Fredericksburg, Chan-
cellorsville, Gettysburg, Lookout Mountain and Mis-
sionary Ridge, and was with Sherman in his march
through Georgia. The charge of this regiment up
Lookout Mountain will be recorded in history as one
of the most splendid of military achievements. Gen-
eral Hooker says of it: "It is the greatest charge of
the war, but no more than I expect of Massachusetts
troops." Its commander, General Underwood, was
one of the heroes of the war. The regiment engaged
in so many hard-fought battles that at one time it
was reduced almost to a skeleton. It appears from
the report of the adjutant-general of Massachusetts,
that of the more than 1200 soldiers of this regiment
less than 350 belonged to the regiment at the expira-
tion of service, so sadly had it been decimated by loss
in battle and the various vicissitudes of war. At the
battle of Resaca, Georgia, this regiment lost eighty-
eight in killed and wounded — eighty-eight out of 240
men. Among the wounded was ex- Alderman Charles
H. Kimball, of Lowell, orderly sergeant, who still
carries the bullet.
In August, 1861, the Twenty-sixth Regiment of
three years' men was formed. After spending three
months in camp in Cambridge and Lowell it left
Camp Chase in November and proceeded to Ship
Island, in the Gulf of Mexico, about sevecty-five miles
from New Orleans. Companies A, D and H of this
regiment were mainly enlisted from the citizens of
Lowell. Its colonel was Edward F. Jones, of Pep-
perell, who led the Sixth Regiment through Balti-
more, and Lieutenant-Colonels Farr and Sawtell had
served as officers in the Sixth Regiment under Colonel
Jones. Indeed, the Twenty-sixth has been styled the
legitimate offspring of the '' Old Sixth."
This regiment left Ship Island in April, 1862, and
participated in the capture of Forts Jackson and St.
Philip, below^ New Orleans, by cutting off the commu-
nication between the forts and New Orleans. Subse-
quently it was, for several months, on duty in New
Orleans. After the service of three years had ex-
pired about two-thirds of the regiment re-enlisted and
did service in the Shenandoah Valley, in Virginia,
participating in the battle at Cedar Creek under
Sheridan. On April 2, 1864, this regiment, having
come to Lowell on a furlough of thirty days, partook
of a collation in Huntington Hall.
In December, 1861, the Thirtieth Massachusetts
Regiment was organized at Camp Chase, in Lowell,
under General Butler. Companies B, C, F and H of
this regiment were composed mainly of Lowell men.
It was under the command of Acting Lieutenant-
Colonel Jonas H. French, and its chaplain was Rev.
Dr. John P. Cleveland, pastor of the Appleton Street
Church (now Eliot Church) of Lowell. It was des-
tined to be a part of General Butler's expedition to
Ship Island, which it reached on the 12th of February,
where it soon received as its commander Colonel N.
A. M. Dudley. This regiment did service in Louis-
iana, being at the battle of Baton Rouge and aiding
in the reduction of Port Hudson.
At the expiration of its service of three years nearly
three-fourths of the regiment re-enlisted.
LOWELL.
185
Having, in February, 1864, returned to Massachu-
setts on furlough of thirty days, it subsequently served
under Gen. Sheridan in Virginia, and engaged in the
battles of Winchester, Fisher's Hill and Cedar Creek.
It was in service till the close of the war.
Mr. Crowley, in his " History of Lowell," pays the
following tribute to Capt. Crowley, of this regiment ;
" Oct. 5, 1862, Capt. Timothy A. Crowley, of Com-
pany A, 30th Infantry, died at New Orleans of inter-
mittent fever. He was born in Lowell, Feb. 14, 1831,
and after quitting school, was long employed as a ma-
chinist in the Lowell Machine Scop. For several
years he was connected with the city police, and in
1858 was Deputy Marshal of Lowell. He subse-
quently studied law and was admitted to the bar in
1860. He bore the colors of the Sixth Regiment
during the Baltimore riot of 1861, with a steady cour-
age that attracted the admiration of all. He then
gathered the company of which he was captain at his
death. He displayed fine abilities as an ofiicer, and
won the entire respect of all with whom he came in
contact in the Department of the Gulf. He left a
widow and two children. His remains were brought
to Lowell and buried with public honors, Oct. 26,
1862."
Here may be mentioned another gallant young
Irishman, Thomas Claffey, who was born in Cork,
Ireland, came to Lowell when a boy, and was edu-
cated in a Lowell grammar school. He was a young
man of studious habits and high promise. He en-
listed in July, 1861, in the Kineteenth Massachusetts
Regiment, in which were but few Lowell men. From
first sergeant he rose to second lieutenant. He was
killed at Fredericksburg, in December, 1862. He
was made captain by brevet for gallant conduct, but
did not live to enjoy the honor.
The Twentieth Massachusetts Regiment was re-
cruited at Camp Massasoit, Readville, and left for the
seat of war in command of Col. Wm. Raymond Lee,
September 4, 1861. It contained very few Lowell
men and its officers belonged mainly to Boston and
vicinity. But Lowell was represented in that regi-
ment by one of her nobieit men, Henry Livermore
Abbott. He was son of Judge J. G. Abbott, and
brother of Capt. Edward G. Abbott, who fell at Cedar
Mountain. He was educated in the Lowell schools
and at Harvard College, graduating from the college
in 1860. When the Rebellion broke out he was en-
gaged in the study of law. With generous alacrity
he gave himself to his country. Having first enlisted
in the Fourth Battalion of Infantry, he wa^ commis-
sioned second lieutenant in the Twentieth Regiment
in July, 1861, at the age of nineteen years. He eariy
displayed such splendid qualities as a soldier, that he
rose rapidly through the various grades of ofiice to
that of brevet brigadier-general. His regiment
fought at Fair Oaks, Antietam, Fredericksburg, Get-
tysburg, the Wilderness and many other places. It
was at the battle of the Wilderness that Major Ab-
bott fell. While he was gallantly leading on his vet-
eran troops, already fearfully decimated in battle, he
was struck down. Major Abbott to a remarkable de-
gree combined those qualities which make the highest
order of manhood — high birth, personal beauty, bright
intellect, conspicuous gallantry and untarnished
honor. He sleeps by his elder brother's side in the
beautiful cemetery of the city, in which there are no
more sacred spots than the graves of these two gallant
young soldiers.
On Jan. 2, 1861, three companies of cavalry left
Camp Chase, in Lowell to proceed to Ship Island in
theGulf of Mexico. This island had been selected
by General Butler as a rendezvous of troops for offen-
sive operations under his command in Louisiana, and
other Southern States. These were unattached com-
panies until they were, in June, 1863, merged in the
Third Massachusetts Regiment of Cavalry. The
captains of these companies were respectively S. Tyler
Reed, James M. Magee and Henry A. Duravage.
Subsequently Edward F. Noyes (late mayor of Lowell)
was assigned to the command, for a season, of the
second company, on account of the ill-health
of Capt. Magee, and Capt. Duravage, of the third com-
pany, having been drowned in the Mississippi on the
expedition for the capture of New Orleans, Lieut.
Salon A. Perkins, of Lowell, became its commander.
Subsequently Capt. Noyes was placed in command
of a company of the First Texas Cavalry, and was
promoted to the rank of major, while the company
under Lieut. Perkins was ordered to a most perilous
and arduous service in the western part of Louisiana.
In the battle at New Iberia, April 16, 1863, Lieut.
Jared P. Maxfi^d, of Lowell, who had gained a high
reputation as a brave and skillful officer, received a
wound which disabled him for life, and on June 3,
1863, Lieut. Perkins, in a battle at Clinton, near Port
Hudson, was mortally wounded.
Lieut. Perkins was one of Lowell's bravest sons. The
city had no more costly sacrifice to lay upon the altar
of patriotism. He was the son of Apollos and
Wealthy Perkins, of Lowell. He fitted for college in
the High School, and was a fine classical scholar.
After several years spent in mercantile employment
in Boston and afterwards in South America, he re-
turned to Lowell, and early in the Rebellion entered
the service of his country. As commander of cavalry
he exhibited an intrepidity and daring which won the
admiration both of friend and foe. It is when we
contemplate the loss of a life so precious and so full
of promise that we feel most tenderly and most pain-
fully the inestimable cost at which our liberties have
been maintained.
On Aug. 4, 1862, President Lincoln issued a call
for 300,000 nine months' men. Lowell furnished 557,
which was nearly twice its quota. Among the most
prompt to enlist was the Old Sixth Regiment, which
for more than a year had seen no military service.
Under its reorganization, Capt. FoUansbee, of the Me-
186
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
chanic Phalanx, of Lowell, who had shown conspicu- i
0U3 bravery in the march through Baltimore, was com-
missioned as colonel. Other officers were Melvin Beal, I
of Lawrence, lieutenant-colonel; Charles A. Stott, j
major; Walter Burnham, surgeon; O. M. Humphrey
and G. E. Pinkham, assistant surgeons; and J. \V. j
Hanson, chaplain. The regiment was ordered to
Washington, where it reported to Gen. Casey, who
ordered it to Fortress Monroe, whence it was sent
by Gen. Dix to Suffolk, Virginia, where it remained
on duty until the nine months expired. Suffolk was
an important position commanding the railroad lead-
ing from Petersburg to Norfolk.
While at Suffolk the Sixth Regiment had a varied
experience of numerous alarms, and skirmishes, and
expeditions to neighboring places. Though in one
engagement the loss was twenty-one men, the sojourn
at Norfolk was one of general comfort and good cheer.
The soldiers occupied themselves in constructing a
formidable line of defences, and in efforts to make
their camp-life home-like and comfortable. They
held religious services; they obtained from the neigh-
borhood sweet potatoes, grapes and other luxuries,
they kept Thanksgiving Day with tons of goodies sent
to them from their Northern homes, and on the whole
enjoyed a somewhat holiday experience. They
reached home on May 29, 1863, when the people of
Lowell gave them a splendid ovation.
But even this expedition, with so much to soften
the usual asperities of war, had its aspect of sadness.
In the engagement at Carrsville, only a few days be-
fore the regiment started for home, two excellent
young men, graduates of Lowell High School in the
class of 1859, lost their lives. These were Anson G.
Thurston and Geo. I. Fox. Young Thurston was a
good scholar and much beloved for his genial char-
acter. On leaving the High School he entered Har-
vard College, and at the close of the second year of
his college course he enlisted in the service of his
country. When wounded at Carrsville, he lay for
nearly six hours neglected on the field of battle.
He was then conveyed to a deserted house, where
after two days he died. His classmate Fox, also an
excellent young man, fell in the battle and soon died
of his wounds in the hands of the enemy.
In Company H of the Forty-eighth Massachusetts
Regiment of nine months' men were forty-four re-
cruits from Lowell. This regiment was commanded
by Colonel Eben F. Stone, of Newburyport. It saw
but little hard service and lost but few men. It took
part in the reduction of Port Hudson, where its lieu-
tenant-colonel, James O'Brien, of Charlestown, a
gallant officer, was killed.
This regiment lefl Camp Meigs for New Orleans in
December, 1862. It took part only in the battles of
Plain's Store and Port Hudson.
The Fifteenth Light Battery was recruited at Low-
ell and at Fort Warren, and was mustered into service
February 17, 1863. Its captain was Timothy Pear-
son, a Lowell lawyer, and Albert Rowse and Lorin L.
Dame, both Lowell men, held the office of first
lieutenant. Lieutenant Dame was a graduate of
Lowell High School and of Tufts College. The com-
pany was very largely composed of Lowell men, but
it was unfortunate in having in its ranks a large
number of soldiers of fortune brought to the State by
brokers for the sake of securing bounties. Accord-
ingly before leaving the State and subsequently, about
one-half of the soldiers deserted.
The company was ordered to Brasbear City, in
Louisiana, and did service in a great variety of places
in Louisiana, Arkansas, Tennessee, Alabama and Flor-
ida. It took an active and gallant part in the capture
of Blakely, Alabama. The company served through
the war and was mustered out of service August 4>
1865.
Upon the call of the government for 100 days' men,
the Sixth Regiment, under Colonel FoUansbee, enlisted
for its third campaign, going into camp at Readville
on July 13, 1864. On leaving the recruiting camp at
Readville it was transported to Washington and sta-
tioned on Arlington Heights, in Old Virginia. Their
passage through Baltimore, so unlike that of April
19, 1861, was very gratifying to the regiment. Trea-
son did not show its head. The regiment though suf-
fering from the extreme heat of the season, enjoyed
their magnificent position overlooking the city of
Washington. The soldiers' duties were very light,
and when off duty the time was improved by many in
visiting Washington. Chaplain Hanson says: "When
the weather was insufferable [from heat] we lay under
our canvas roofs waiting and wondering if govern-
ment had nothing for us to do."
On August 21st the regiment set their faces home-
ward, having, however, before reaching home one
more service to perform. On their way the soldiers
of this regiment enjoyed for the fifth time the gener-
ous hospitality of the city of Philadelphia.
On August 23d the regiment was stationed at Fort
Delaware, " a fine fortification [on an island] mid-
way between the New Jersey and the Delaware
shores. Here the service consisted in keeping guard
over the various posts in the island, and taking
charge of the rebel prisoners gathered at this port.
Here some of the officers were accompanied by their
families and a delightful social condition was enjoyed.
Even the free intercourse with the rebel prisoners
was attended with pleasing incidents. The following
testimony of Chaplain Hanson, relating to the hu-
mane treatment of rebel prisoners by our government,
affords a very vivid contrast to the infamous cruelties
of Libby Prison and Andersonville : " The most im-
portant event that broke the tedium of garrison life
was the arrival and departure of prisoners. They
usually came from recent battles, often wounded and
sick and generally ragged and dirty ; and I have often
seen them, when exchanged, receive shoes and cloth-
ing from our officers, while the physical appearance
LOWELL.
187
of those taken from the hospital was in great con-
trast to those who came. Indeed, the food given
them, both in quantity and quality, was excellent."
October 19th the regiment was relieved and em-
barked for home. The campaign had been unevent-
ful.
And here, without regard to chronological order,
let us give a brief tribute of praise to a few patriotic
and gallant men whom Lowell claims as her own.
Dudley C. Mumford, captain of Company G, of the
Nineteenth Infantry, who enlisted from Lowell in
July, 1863, as a private, and by his bravery rose to
the command of a company, was killed at the battle
of Cold Harbor, on May 31, 1864. In his company
were thirty-two Lowell men.
John Rowe, in August, 1863, enlisted from Lowell
as a sergeant of Company D, in the Sixteenth In-
fantry, and rose to the captaincy. He died of his
wounds in Libby Prison, August 13, 1863. He fell at
Cold Harbor, in that most fearful carnage of the war.
Almost the only Lowell man in the Thirteenth
Massachusetts Regiment was Lloyd W. Hizon, for-
merly sub-principal of Lowell High School. Heacted
as assistant surgeon until the close of the regiment's
service.
In this regiment also was George Bush, son of
Francis Bush, of the well-known firm of Bent &
Bush, hatters, on Central Street, Lowell. He was
bom in Middlesex Village (now Lowell), but enlisted
from Boston, as second lieutenant, and rose to the
captaincy of Company B. He was killed at Chan-
cellorsville.
Captain Salem S. Marsh was the son of Sumner
Marsh, who held a responsible position on the Boott
Corporation under its agent, Hon. Linus Child, who
was his brother-in-law. After leaving Lowell High
School, young Marsh entered West Point, and grad-
uated in 1858. He entered the regular army and was
one of its finest officers. At the battle of Chancel-
lorsville he was acting colonel of the Second Massa-
chusetts Regiment, and in leading it into battle he
displayed great coolness and bravery. He was in-
stantly killed by a bullet, on May 1, 1863. A fellow-
officer writes of him : " The army has lost one of its
best leaders. Every officer and man deplores his
loss."
April 2, 1864, Lieutenant Charles B. Wilder, of the
steam fi-igate " Minnesota," was killed near Smith-
field, Va. He commanded the respect and esteem of
all. He was buried in Lowell with naval honors.
It would be impossible to tell how many Lowell
soldiers died in the service during the Rebellion. Mr.
Cowley, in his history of the city, gives the names of
more than 500. How many, alas 1 of this long roll of
honor sleep in unknown graves. How many, who
were just as brave as the few of whom we have made
special mention, will have no record on the page of
history. It is disheartening to reflect that the soldier's
renown does not depend alone upon the gallantry of
his action and the purity of his patriotism, and that
circumstances too often determine the measure of
his fame. General Warren, who fell on Banker Hill,
has left an imperishable name, while thousands of
equally gallant officers in this great Rebellion will
have no record on the page of history. Even the de-
feat on Bunker Hill has been transformed in the
patriotic American heart into a glorious victory. The
vast magnitude of the War of the Rebellion buries
in oblivion the name and glory of thousands of gal-
lant men. Their numbers are so great that it is sim-
ply impossible for the pen to record their deeds.
With the mention, therefore, of only two of the
sons of Lowell who have acquired a national fame,
we will close our record of the brave men whom our
city sent to the war.
Gustavas Vasa Fox was born in Baugus, Mass.,
June 13, 1821, and died in the city of New York, Oc-
tober 29, 1883, at the age of sixty-two years. He was
the son of Dr. Jesse Fox, who came to East Chelms-
ford (now Lowell) in 1823, one year before Lowell
was incorporated as a town. The son, who on com-
ing to Lowell was only two years old, was educated in
the public schools of the city. From the High
School he entered, as midshipman, the United States
Navy, his appointment having been obtained through
the aid of Hon. Caleb Cashing. At the age of seven-
teen years he was employed in naval service at
various stations and on the coast survey. He took
part in the war with Mexico until 1856, when he re-
signed his commission with the rank of lieutenant,
and became the agent of the Bay State Woolen Com-
pany, of Lawrence, Mass.
Upon the approach of the Rebellion, in 1861, he
was summoned to Washington by Gen. Scott, in con-
sultation upon the sending of supplies to provision
the garrison of Fort Sumter, in the harbor of
Charleston, S. C. An expedition for this purpose was
planned, but was forbidden by President Buchanan.
President Lincoln, upon coming into office, approved
of the enterprise, and an expedition, under Lieut.
Fox, was, with due despatch, seat forth. But before
it had reached its destination the rebel batteries from
the shore bad fired upon the fort and it had surren-
dered.
Lieut. Fox, having gained the confidence of the
President, was appointed Assistant Secretary of the
Navy, under Secretary Welles. This office he held
until the close of the war. During these four years
of severe trial of his powers his services were ex-
tremely valuable. A member of Mr. Lincoln's Cabi-
net says of him : " Fox was the really able man of
the administration. He planned the capture of New
Orleans and the opening of the Mississippi, and, in
general, the operations of the navy. He had the
honor of selecting Farragut, and was often consulted
by Grant. He performed his duties with no view to
any interests of his own."
After the war he was sent, as a representative oi
188
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
our Government, to Russia, to congratulate the Em-
peror, Alexander II., upon his escape from assassina-
tion, and this visit resulted in the purchase of Alaska.
Subsequently Capt. Fox became the agent of the
Middlesex Woolen-Mills, in Lowell, and for several
of hi« last years he was partner in the firm of Mudge,
Sawyer & Co., in the city of New York.
He was a man of unsullied honor and exalted
worth. His name will never be left unrecorded in the
history of our nation.
Benjamin F. Botlee.— For biography of Gen.
Butler see Bench and Bar.
Nor were the citizens of Lowell who did not enter
the " ranks of war " wanting in generosity and patri-
otism. Every appeal from the country met with a
prompt and hearty response. Especially were the
ladies of the city inspired with the tenderest sympa-
thy and the most generous devotion.
The following quotation from Mr. Oilman's " His-
tory " gives us a concise statement of the home-work
of the people of Lowell, even in the first weeks of the
war : " The several banks tendered loans of money
to the State. April 27 [1861] the Soldiers' Aid Asso-
ciation was organized — Nathan Crosby, president ; S.
W. Stickney, treasurer, and M. C. Bryant, secretarj'.
The ladies entered heartily into the work of supply-
ing the soldiers with articles needed for their comfort
and convenience. The record of this association is
honorable to all connected with it."
The following quotation from Mr. Cowley's " His-
tory " well describes the part enacted by the ladies:
" On Feb. 26, 27 and 28, 1863, the ladies of Lowell
held their famous Soldiers' Fair, to replenish the '
funds of the Sanitary Commission. About $5000
were realized by this fair, which was the second of
the kind during the war, St. Louis, the Queen City of
the West, having held the first. $5000 raised by this
fair, $3000 collected through the aid of the Soldiers'
Aid Association, $4000 contributed to the Boston
Sailors' Fair of 1864, numerous smaller sums col-
lected and distributed through other channels, and
innumerable contributions of clothing, shoes, etc., all
combine to attest how faithfully and how efficiently
the ladies of Lowell served their country in her most
perilous hour."
The course pursued by the City Government of
Lowell during the Rebellion is very concisely ex-
pressed in the following extract from the inaugural
address of Mayor J. Q. Peabody, before the two
branches of the City Council, Jan."!, 1866 :
"The part taken by our city in the struggle for
national existence has been such as to leave us no
regrets, except for the loss of our brave sons who have
fallen in the conflict.
" The following is an abstract of the number of men
furnished by our city under the several calls of the
President, and the expense of recruiting the same,
including the city [but not State and national] boun-
ties :
" April 15, 1861. Call for 75,000 men for three
mouths. Lowell furnished 223 men at a cost of
$596.08 ; average cost, S2.67.
" May 3, 1861. Call for 50,000, and July Ist, call for
600,000 men. Our quota under these calls was 2098
men, for three years. The number recruited was
2390, at a cost of $65,681.78 ; average cost, $27.48.
"Aug. 4, 1865. Call for 300,000 men for nine months.
Our quota was 235. We enlisted and furnished 557
men, at a cost of §22,162.25 ; average, S35.78.
"Oct. 17, 1863. Call for 300,000. Our quota was set
at 288 men. And Feb. 1, 1864, a call was issued for
500,000. This was understood to include the previous
call. We furnished 211 men, at a cost of S902.30 ;
average cost, $4.27. The report of the Adjutant-
General, Jan. 1, 1864, stated that we had at that time
a surplus of 179 men.
" July 18, 1804. Call for 500,000. Our quota, 627.
We furnished, including 196 navy recruits allowed,
998 men, at a cost of $147,549.11 ; average cost,
$147.94.
"Dec. 19,1864. Call for 300,000 men. Xumber en-
listed 132, at a cost of $17,039.55 ; average cost,
$129.08.
" Of the volunteers for 100 days, Lowell furnished
252 men, at a cost of $143.80 ; making the whole
number standing to our credit, 4763 men, and the
whole cost of recruiting and bounties, 8254,074.87.
In addition to this we have expended for uniforms,
equipments, interest on State aid paid, and other inci-
dental expenses of the war, exclusive of the Ladd
and Whitney monument, the sum of $39,141.02, mak-
ing a grand total of $293,215.39."
CHAPTER XL
LOWELL— { Continued).
THE PRESS.
M. Chevalier, a distinguished Frenchman, who
visited Lowell in 1835, remarks in one of his pub-
lished letters : " In Lowell, reading is the only re-
creation, and there are no less than seven journals
printed here."
While this remark of the learned traveler is not
literally true, still it is true that in the early days ol
our city there was remarkable intellectual activity.
This is clearly indicated by the great number of pub-
lications which issued from the local press. In-
dividual churches even had their special organs, and
every phase of thought and sentiment sought expres-
sion through the public journals of the day. One
after another, most of these publications, having ful-
filled or failed to fulfill their mission, have disap-
peared and are almost lost to memory.
And here, upon the threshold of my notice of the
LOWELL.
189
newspaper press of Lowell, I desire to express my ac-
knowledgment of the great and most valuable aid I
have received in my work from two of my honored
friends, Alfred Oilman, Esq., and Z. E. Stone, Esq.,
of this city. Mr. Gilman, the secretary and main pil-
lar of the Lowell Old Residents' Historical Association,
is a born journalist and antiqaarian. Among his
many valuable contributions to the history of our
city, he prepared, seven years since, an excellent and
exhaustive article upon the" Newspaper Press of Low-
ell," to be read before the Old Residents' Association.
This article has saved me many a tedious hour of
search in the records of the past, and to its author I
give my sincere thanks. A brief biographical notice
of Mr. Gilman will be found in my record of
the post-office and postmasters of Lowell.
Mr. Stone has devoted his life to journalism. He
is the Nestor of the craft. In ability and character
he holds the highest rank in his profession. He is an
indefatigable student and collector of the journals of
our city. He has very kindly put into my hands his
great list of the newspapers of Lowell, which for many
years have been accumulating in his library. It is
difficult to tell precisely how many different papers
this list contains, for it is often difficult to tell how
great a change in the title or ownership or editorship
of a paper constitutes a loss of its identity. Some
would find two papers where others find only one.
But I have examined the papers collected by Mr.
Stone, and I judge that there are forty-seven different
publications. But Mr. Stone's collection embraces
only a part of the list of about seventy-nine papers
now to be noticed.
The newspapers of forty to sixty years ago are of
smaller size generally than those of to-day, having
uniformly four pages, each about fifteen by twenty
inches. They contained very little local news, and
evidently employed in their compilation no one cor-
responding to the modern reporter.
In examining Mr. Stone's file of papers one is
forcibly impressed with the evidently brief existence of
most of them. Of the forty-seven which I have ex-
amined, about two-thirds were marked " Vol. I.," and
I judge that one brief year was the full average limit
of the existence of most of them. This whole file of
extinct journals is little more than a sad record of
failures and disappointed hopes.
We will first direct our attention to the history of the
newspapers which are now published in our city, and
then briefly notice those which no longer exist, the
lives of most of which were prematurely cut off.
The Lowell Journal is the oldest paper now pub-
lished in Middlesex County. It has often changed its
name and place ; it has absorbed many other papers ;
it has outlived many rivals; it has had many pub-
lishers and many editors ; it has had its full share both
of good fortune and bad ; but it still lives and retains
its identity and its high respectability.
We are told that under the name of The Chelmsford
Courier its first number was printed by Wm. Baldwin,
I editor, in Middlesex Village, now a part of Lowell,
I bearing the date of June 25, 1824. The following extract
I from the diary of Dr. John O. Green is interesting at
j this point : " 1824, June 24. First number of our
I Chelmsford newspaper brought round to us." How
I the doctor could receive on the 24th a paper dated on
the 25th will be easily explained by the reader who
knows " the way they had " of dating newspapers.
This little falsehood of dating a paper " ahead,"
which, indeed, is not yet out of use, was an ingenious
device in those old days of slow transition for making
what was really stale appear fresh and new.
The office of the Chelms/ord Courier was in a small
one-story building standing opposite the site of the
old meeting-house.
On May 20, 1825, Rev. Bernard Whitman became ed-
itor of the paper, Mr. Baldwin remaining as publisher.
Mr. Whitman was the Unitarian clergyman who offic-
iated in the meeting-house, referred to above, which
stood near the head of the Middlesex Canal.
The office of the paper having been burned in the
first year of its existence, it arose. Phoenix-like, out
of the ashes on June 28, 1825, under the name of the
Qielmsford Phsniz, with the scriptural motto : " But
to do good and to communicate forget not."
In September, 1825, E. M. Reinhart became
publisher of the paper, but in the November follow-
ing J. S. C. Knowlton purchased it of Mr. Reinhart,
and in 1826 the Phoenix becomes the Merrimack Jour-
nal. When the name " Merrimack " was given to
the paper it was supposed that when East Chelms-
ford should become a town its name would be " Mer-
rimack." Very soon, however, the name " Lowell "
was given it, at its christening in the spring of 1826,
and in 1827 the paper took the name of the Lowell
Journal. In 1831 it came into the hands of John R.
Adams, an attorney-at-law, at the cost of $1800. Mr.
Knowlton had removed to Worcester, where he estab-
lished the Worcester Palladium, and became sheriff of
Worcester County.
Mr. Adams engaged E. C. Purdy, of Somerville, as
editor, who, for a short time, issued a daily Journal,
the first number appearing Sept 17, 1831.
In May, 1833, John S. Sleeper, editor of the Exeter
News- Letter, purchased the Journal, but in February,
1834, he became editor of the Boston Journal, and
Charles H. Locke succeeded him as editor of the
Lowell Journal.
■ In 1834 the publication of this pai)er was for a
short time suspended, but in 1835 the Journal was
united with the Mercury, and for one year the new
paper is styled the Journal and Mercury, but subse-
quently the Lowell Journal.
The Mercury, here referred to, was a Democratic
paper, edited by Rev. Eliphalet Case. Having been
purchased by Mr. Leonard Huntress, it was made a
Whig paper, much to the disgust of its Democratic
editor.
190
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The Lowell Courier was started by Messrs. Huntress
& Knowlton Jan. 6, 1835, as a tri-weekly paper, and
has ever since been published in connection with the
Journal. At the present time the Courier is published
daily under the title of the Lowell Daily Courier, and
the Journal is mainly made up of articles taken from
the Courier, and is published under the title of the
Weekly Journal.
In the first issue of the Courier, January 6, 1835,
Messrs. Huntress & Knowlton, in their prospectus,
say : " In politics we are Whigs. Andrew Jackson
[then President] is the open and avowed chief of a
political party, and therefore we are opposed to the
perpetuation of his factious and partisan rule."
The Courier was published on Tuesdays, Thursdays
audSaturdays, at three dollars per year. In June, 1836,
it was changed from an evening to a morning paper. Mr.
Huntress was its editor from 1836 to 1839, when he was
succeeded by Robins Dinsmore, a lawyer from Ver-
mont. Mr. Dinsmore was not popular, being accused
of writing too long editorials. He retired in 1840,
after a short service, employing in his valedictory the
following philosophical language: "As I have been
severely accused of writing long and dull editorials,
the present paragraph will be brief, and will probably
be the most satisfactory to the public I have ever
written, —
*I have Dot loved the world
Nor the world me,
But let ui part fair foes.' "
Mr. Dinsmore, however, continued to reside in
Lowell and engaged in editorial work.
In August, 1840, William O. Bartlett, brother of
Dr. Elisha Bartlett, first mayor of Lowell, became
editor of the Courier, but retired in April, 1841, on
account of ill health, and Mr. Huntress became sole
editor. In May of this year the paper became again
an evening paper, and as such has continued to the
present time.
In May, 1841, Daniel S. Richardson, one of the
ablest lawyers in our city, became editor of the Cour-
ier, and held the position less than one year, his pro-
fessional business demanding his entire care. In his
valedictory is the following :
'*Do boldly what 70a do, and let your page
Smile if it emllee, and if it rageo, rage."
We have appreciated the poet's advice, leaning to-
wards the smiling page, however.
In December, 1841, Mr. Huntress sold out to Wil-
liam Schouler, who began his management of the pa-
per on a very liberal scale, employing William S.
Robinson as a Washington correspondent, and also
publishing a weekly letter from New York. Mr
Schouler was a man of superior talent, but he seems
to have been somewhat disappointed in the success of
his enterprise. He withdrew his Washington corre-
spondent, and in one issue of his paper says, despond-
ingly : " We have been enabled thus far to pay our
debts, and this is about all.'' The defeat of his fa-
vorite, Henry Clay, by James K. Polk, in the Presi-
dential canvass of 1844, greatly disappointed him.
On July 1, 1845, the tri-weekly became the Daily
Courier. In 1847 Mr. Schouler sold the Courier to
James Atkinson, and Messrs. Atkinson & Robinson
became its editors, while Mr. Schouler became editor
of the Boston Atlas. From 1847 to 1849 Leander R.
Slreeter was employed as editor, and from 1849 to
1853 John H. Warland, who was one of the most
brilliant writers ever employed on the editorial stafi"
of the paper.
Meantime Mr. Atkinson sold the paper, in 1850, to
Samuel J. Varney. Charles Cowley, LL.D., was em-
ployed as editor in 1853, and iu 1854 was succeeded
by John A. Goodwin, who had been editor of the
Lawrence Courier. Mr. Goodwin was succeeded, in
1855, by Benjamin W. Ball. In 1860 Z. E. Stone and
S. W. Huse purchased the paper of S. N. Merrill, to
whom Mr. Varney had sold it, and Homer A. Cook
became its editor. Mr. Stone succeeded Mr. Cook as
editor in November, 1860.
In September, 1867, Messrs. George A. Marden and
Ed. T. Rowell purchased the paper of Stone & Huse,
and still, after twenty-two years of enterprise and
success, are its proprietors.
George A. Mardex was born in Mont Vernon,
N. H., August 9, 1839, being the son of Benjamin F.
and Betsey (Buss) Marden. His ancestors were of the
pure New England type, inured to a life of self-reli-
ance and labor. Very early in life Mr. Marden
learned the trade of his father, who was a shoemaker,
a trade upon which he relied in future years as the
means of securing to himself a liberal education.
From the age often to that of sixteen years he was
busily occupied in working at his trade and in farm-
ing, together with fitting for college in Appleton
Academy at Mont Vernon, now known as the Mc-
Collom Institute. He entered Dartmouth College in
1857, and though by teaching and other labors he de-
frayed almost the entire expenses of his college course,
be graduated in 1861 with a high rank as a scholar.
At the time of his graduation the War of the Re-
bellion had just begun, and there was an urgent call
for the services of patriotic young men. In Novem-
ber of that year Mr. Marden enlisted in Company G,
Second Regiment of Berdan's United States Sharp-
shooters, and when mustered into service he received
a warrant as second sergeant. He served with his
regiment under General McClellan in the Peninsular
campaign in 1862, from Yorktown to Harrison's
Landing.
In July, 1862, he was commissioned by the Gov-
ernor of New Hampshire as first lieutenant and
regimental quartermaster, and in 1863 he was ordered
to staff duty, as acting assistant adjutant-general
of a brigade in the Third Corps of the Army, tak-
ing part in the battles of Chancellorsville, Gettys-
burg and Wapping Heights. He served in the army
until September, 1864, when his regiment was dis-
"'^^.^ y4 . ^Vc ^^^ ^-^ '
LOWELL.
191
banded, the terms of most of its soldiers having
expired.
He returned to New Hampshire, and at Concord
engaged in the study of law and in writing for the
Concord Daily Monitor. Of the two pursuits journal-
ism proved to Mr. Harden the more attractive, and
in a few months he purchased the Kanawha Republi-
can at Charleston, West Virginia, which he published
during the winter of 1865-C6. But finding that the
success of his enterprise could be secured only by
adopting and advocating the policy of President
Andrew Johnson, a policy which he heartily con-
demned, he sold his paper and returned to New
Hampshire, where he was employed by Adjutant-
General Head in compiling, editing and arranging
the history of each of the New Hampshire military
organizations during the war.
Meantime his pen was not idle. He became a con-
tributor to the Concord Monitor and the regular Con-
cord correspondent of the Boston Daily Advertiser.
Of the latter paper he was appointed assistant editor
January 1, 1867. In September of the same year, in
company with his college class-mate. Major Edward
T. Rowell, he purchased the Lowell Daily Courier and
the Lowell Weekly Journal, and became a resident of
Lowell. The partnership thus formed has continued
to the present time (April, 1890), and it has proved
fairly successful.
Although journalism is Mr. Marden's chosen voca-
tion, his fellow-citizens have recognized his ability by
bestowing upon him various offices of trust and honor.
In 1873 he served as a member from Lowell of the
Massachusetts House of Representatives, and in 1874
he was chosen Clerk of the House. In this office, by
repeated re-elections, he served nine years. Again, in
1883-84, be was a member of the House of Represen-
tatives, in both of which years he was elected Speaker.
In 1885 he was elected to the Maasachuaetts Senate.
In the Republican Convention of 1888 he was nomi-
nated for treasurer and receiver-general of the State
of Massachusetts. To this office, which he now
holds, he was re-elected in 1889. On receiving this
office he resigned his position upon the Board of
Trustees of the Massachusetts Agricultural College, to
which he had been appointed by Governor Ames in
1888. It is but just to say that Mr. Marden has ably
and honorably filled every public office to which he
has been called. He occupied the chair of Speaker
of the House of Representatives at a period when the
troubled and discordant political elements demanded
a clear head and a firm baud. He proved equal to the
demand. His admirable control of himself, together
with his k«en judgment of other men, gained for him
the approbation and respect of all.
But when we have spoken of Mr. Marden only as
a soldier, a journalist and a politician, we have left
unnoticed that phase of his life and character by
which he is perhaps best known and most admired.
It is as a speaker on public occasions that he has won
some of his greatest triumphs. It is the most striking
characteristic of his mind that upon all occasions he
has the most complete command of all his intellectual
resources. With ever-ready wit and humor, with a
hearty relish for fun and merriment, with an inex-
haustible fund of pertinent anecdotes, he never fails
to win the sympathy and applause of his hearers.
It would be difficult to find a finer illustration of
that kind of oratory in which Mr. Marden excels, than
his speech at the New England Society dinner in the
city of New York in December, 1889.
Mr. Marden has done other miscellaneous literary
work, his most notable efforts being a poem read be-
fore the Phi Beta £appa Society at Dartmouth Col-
lege Commencement in 1875, and a poem delivered
before the Dartmouth Alumni ABSociation at Com-
mencement in 1886.
Mr. Rowell was a classmate of Mr. Marden's in col-
lege and a comrade in war. He was born in West
Concord, New Hampshire, August 14, 1836. He is a
man of sterling sense and, though not inclined to ap-
pear in public, he has held many offices of honor and
trust. I notice him on another page among the post-
masters of our city. Honorable John A. Goodwin,
another editor of the Courier, is also noticed among
the postmasters.
Mr. Z. E. Stone, editor of the Courier from 1860 to
1867, deserves special mention as a man admirably
fitted, by his high character and great range of
knowledge, to fill the editorial chair. Few journal-
ists in the nation have had so large an experience or
have collected so great an amount of useful knowledge
in regard to the public press.
Col. Schouler also has gained an honorable name,
as member of both Houses of the General Court and
as editor of the War Records of Massachusetts. Wil-
liam S. Robinson, too, has attained a high rank as a
writer. Few American journalists are better known
or more kindly remembered than " Warrington.''
The Journal has lived a somewhat nomadic life.
We find it located at Middlesex Village, in a wooden
two-story building near the First Congregational
Church, in a building near St. Anne's Church, near
the American House on Central Street, on Hurd
Street, on the comer of Central and Middlesex
Streets, on the corner of Central and Hurd Streets,
on the comer of Central and Middle Streets, in the
Mnseum Building, in the Hildreth Block, and now at
last in the new block erected by its proprietors on
Merrimack Street. The firm of Marden & Rowell
now employ upon their papers and in their job print-
ing establishment about sixty hands.
I may be charged by the reader with giving to the
Journal and Courier a disproportionate amount of
space ; but it is history that I am writing, and this paper
alone may emphatically be said to have a history.
Others, though managed with equal ability, are now
busily engaged in making history. Though strong
they are young.
192
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The Daily rones was eatabli:ihed Aug. 23, 1872,
by Joseph H. Smith, il.D., with E. A. Hills, his son-
in-law, as editor. For about two years before this
date Dr. Smith had published from the Museum
Building the Middlesex Democrat, a weekly paper, first
issued Oct. 8, 1871.
After publishing the Daily Times one year, he sold
both the Times and Democrat to John L. Hunt, who,
in company with his brother, Charles L. Hunt, for
three years published the two papers under the names
of The Weekly Times and The Daily Morning Times.
In 1876 the brothers Hunt sold out to Charles Cow-
ley, Esq., who, after three months, sold the papers to
Dr. Smith, who had held a mortgage upon the prop-
erty since selling it in 1873.
The firm of Campbell i Hanscom, the present pro-
prietors, having purchased the property of Dr. Smith,
issued their first copy of the paper Dec. 15, 1879.
The Daily Morning Times is recognized by all
political parties as a very sprightly and well-con-
ducted paper, and among business men the firm of
Campbell & Hanscom has an honorable name.
The paper is an uncompromising advocate of the
political principles of the Democratic party.
James L. Campbell was born in Henniker, N. H.,
his father having been publisher of the Manchester
Union, of Manchester, N. H. In company with Geo.
A. Hanscom, he published the Union from 1872 to
1879, when the partners purchased the Lowell Times
and removed to Lowell.
Geo. A. Hanscom was born in Elliot, Maine. After
an apprenticeship of three years in the ofllce of the
Democrat at Saco, Maine, he followed the sea for
twenty years. In this service he became master of
his vessel and thus received his well known title of
" Captain." We have already spoken of his partner-
ship with Mr. Campbell in publishing the Union
in Manchester, X. H., and the Lowell Daily Times.
Vox Populi. — The first number of this paper ap-
peared May 25, 1841. Its purpose seems to have been
to afford an opportunity for the public expression of a
feeling, which then somewhat extensively prevailed,
that the corporations of the city were exercising too
exclusive a control of its affairs. Its name indicated
its purpose, that the voice of the people ought to be
heard. Hence it advocated the amelioration of the
condition of the operatives in the mills, by reducing
the hours of labor. Besides this, battle was waged
against the abuses said to exist in the " Whig dynasty
in Massachusetts."
In general, men who felt aggrieved or indignant at
the insolence of office or the oppressive exercise of
power intrenched by corporate authority, found in
the Vox a channel for conveying their pent-up feelings
to the public mind.
The names of the originators of this organ, for
obvious reasons, did not publicly appear. It is said
that Gen. B. F. Butler, Henry F. Durant, James M.
Stone and Granville Parker belonged to their number.
Mr. Cowley informs us that, in addition to the gen-
tlemen above named, J. G. Abbott, now Judge Abbott,
of Boston, actively participated in the management
of this paper as a rival and opponent of The Adverti-
ser, then published by Rev. Eliphalet Case.
Mr. Gilman tells us that J. M. Stone was, at first,
the editor of this paper. Whoever, for the first few
months, were the responsible editors and managers of
the Vox, on December 4, 1841, it came into the hands
of Samuel J. Varney, who had before been engaged
in the mechanical work of printing and publishing
the paper. In January, 1850, John T. Chesley be-
came the proprietor. In May, 1856, the paper was
purchased by Mr. Varney, and was published by 6.
W. Huse & Co.
Mr. Varney, the owner of the paper, having died
in November, 1859, it became, on January 1, 1860,
the property of Z. E. Stone and S. W. Huse, who (with
N. J. N. Bacheller, subsequently admitted into the
partnership) remained proprietors until 1878, when
Stone and Bacheller sold their interests to Mr. Huse,
who took as his partner John A. Goodwin, the latter
an once becoming editor. Since the death of Mr.
Goodwin, September 21, 1884, S. W. Huse has become
the proprietor of this paper, and the business has been
conducted under the firm-name of S. W. Huse & Co.,
the son of Mr. Huse, Harr)' V. Huse, being his
father's partner, and ilr. John L. Colby being
editor.
The following is substantially Mr. Oilman's list,
without dates, of the numerous editors of this paper :
James M. Stone, S. J. Varney, J. F. C. Hayes, B. F.
Johnson, Enoch Emery, A. W. Farr, Thomas Brad-
ley, Miss Harriet F. Curtis, John A. Goodwin, Z. E.
Stone, Samuel A. McPhetres, John L. Colby.
The Vox Populi, partly from the circumstances of
its origin, and partly from its intrinsic merits, has al-
ways been a favorite journal among the people. It
has been very generally sought for by the operatives
in our mills, and probably no other paper is so gene-
rally taken by persons who were once citizens of
Lowell, but now reside elsewhere. In politics it is
now Republican.
The Lowell Daily Citizen had its origin in the pur-
chase, on April 28, 1856, by Leonard Brown and
George F. Morey, of the three following publications:
1. The Daily Morning News, started in 1851. 2. The
Americaji Citizen, a weekly, started in 1854. 3. The
Daily Citizen, started in 1855. The journal formed
by thus consolidating the three was styled the Daily
Citizen ami News, having for its editor John A.
Goodwin.
It had its birth in the midst of high political ex-
citement and agitation. The Kansas outrages had
roused to a white heat the anti-slavery sentiments of
the North. The Republican party was led on by
eloquent men, who fired the public heart by denounc-
ing the encroachments of the slaveholders and of
slavery upon the domain of freedom. " Fremont
LOWELL.
193
and Dayton, free soil for free men," was the rallying
cry. The mutterings of the coming war already be-
gan to be heard.
Into this contest the Citizen entered with ardent
zeal, taking the advanced position of the Republican
party — a position which it has ever since consistently
held.
Mr. Goodwin retained the position aa editor, with
some interruption, until June, 1859, when Chauncey
L. Knapp and George F. Morey became the proprie-
tors, and Mr. Knapp the editor, of the paper. In
1876 Mr. Knapp and his son, Charles L. Knapp, be-
came the proprietors, the firm-name being C. L.
Knapp & Son.
On April 3, 1882, the Citizen was purchased by a
stock company styled The Citizen Newspaper Compa-
ny, of which Harry R. Rice is president. Henry J. Moul-
ton was made principal editor, with C. F. Cobum as
assistant editor, James Bayles as city editor, and H.
R. Rice as business manager. Mr. Moulton retired
in 1887. Mr. Bayles, the present editor, succeeded
Mr. Moulton. He is a roan of genial nature and supe-
rior ability, and he makes the Citizen a very racy and
readable paper.
Lowell Morning Mail. — Messrs. Z. E. Stone, N. J.
N. Bucheller and Ephraim D. Livingston, having
formed a partnership, commenced the publication of
this paper, as a daily, in July, 1879. For about one
year they published a semi-weekly Mail in connec-
tion with the daily. Since then a weekly Mail has
taken the place of the semi-weekly, and is called the
Saturday Evening Mail.
About five years ago a stock company, for publish-
ing this paper, was incorporated, of which Z. £.
Stone is president, N. J. N. Bacheller, manager, and
Charles E. Burbank, clerk.
Until the formation of this company Mr. Stone was
editor. Since then the editor's chair has been filled
by Edward H. Peabody and by the present incum-
bent, Charles L. McCleery.
The management of the affairs of this company is
in the hands of men of such large experience and
such high character that the paper possesses the entire
confidence of the community, and richly deserves
the popularity which it enjoys. In politics it is
Republican.
ne Sun was started Aug. 10, 1878, with Daniel
J. and John H. Harrington as publishers and pro-
prietors, and Thomas F. Byron as editor. After three
years it was enlarged from four to eight pages. John
H. Harrington, the second editor, was succeeded by
John R. Martin, the present incumbent.
The paper is stanchly Democratic. In 1888 it re-
moved from its early home on the comer of Central
and Prescoit Streets, to its new and commodious rooms
on Merrimack Street.
The public has been generous in the support of this
paper and it has prospered. The Sun was the first
paper in the city to emplov an artist, who was a mem-
13-ii
ber of the editorial staff and devoted his whole time
tQ this paper. The cartoons of his pencil were well
drawn and were designed to draw attention to the
strength and weakness of the politicians.
The paper is printed upon copper-faced types and in
a neat form of eight pages, having a very pleasing typo-
graphical appearance. In a few years the proprietors
intend to erect a new " Sun Building."
The Lowell Daily News was established in May,
1884. It is published by an incorporated company
called the Daily yews Company. Its editor is D. A.
Sullivan. It is a stanch advocate of the principles of
the Democratic party and has a large circulation. It
is published from Hildreth's Building, on Merrimack
Street.
L' Union (published in the French language) was
started on March 14, 1889, and is published from
Hildreth's Building by an association of gentlemen.
It is edited by this association.
L'Etoile was first issued Sept. 16, 1886, Lepine &
Co., publishers. Its first editor was Aime Gauthier,
who was succeeded by Raoul Renault. The present
editor is Alfred Bonneau. This same company
publishes another paper in the French language in
Lawrence, Mass.
Having given a list of the newspapers now published
in Lowell, I will very briefly notice those which hare
either ceased to exist or have lost their names by
being merged into other publications. Following the
name of each is the date of its establishment
For the Chelmsford Courier (1824), the Chelmsford
Phoenix (1825), and the Merrimack Journal (1826),
turn back to the history of the Lowell Journal.
The Globe, by J. H. White, appears in 1825, a paper
evidently of little merit and short-lived.
The Lowell Mercury appeared Nov. 14, 1829, with
Thomas Billings as proprietor and Rev. Eliphalet Case
as editor, and wa£ first published in a cottage on the
site of Welles' Block. This paper, in 1835, was united
with the Journal, and, for one year, the consolidated
paper is styled the Journal and Mercury. After that
the name Mercury disappears.
The Middlesex Telegraph appeared in Sept., 1831, as
a weekly. It was published by Meacham & Mathew-
son. It seems to have lived about one year.
The Lowell Observer, a religions paper, Rev. Mr.
Blanchard, of the First Congregational Church, and
Rev. Mr. Twining, of the Appleton Street (now Eliot)
Church, being editors, appeared in 1831. Rev. D. S.
Southmayd appears as its editor in 1833.
The Evangelist, with Rev. E. W. Freeman, pastor
of the First Baptist Church, as editor, appeared in
1831.
H. H. Weld, in 1832, started The Experiment, soon
changing its name to The Compend. It seems to have
lived only to Oct., 1833.
Alfred Oilman started The Album, or Ladies'
Common-Place Book, Nov. 1. 1832. It continued one
year.
194
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The Bose-Bud, a. Sunday-school paper, started by
Oliver Sheple in 1832, survived less than two years.
Tke Times, by H. H. Weld, appeared in 1833.
The Semi- Weekly Times was started by Mr. Weld in
1834. These two papers survived probably only a
few months.
The Lowell-Advertiser, a tri-weekly, was started in
1834 by B. E. Hale, with Eliphalet Case as editor,
and the Lowell Patriot, a weekly, was in 1835 pub-
lished in connection with the Advertiser. They were
issued from No. 35 Merrimack Street. These two
Democratic papers had a longer life than most of
the papers of that time. In 1838 the Adver-
tiser was edited by N. P. Banks, then a Democrat,
and in 1840 the two papers were published by Abijah
Watson. In 1845 they paased into the hands of H.
E. and S. C. Baldwin. In 1852 the Lowell Advertiser
appeared as a daily, with James G. Maguire as editor,
and Bellows & Hedge as publishers. In 1855 Charles
Hunt and Robins Dinsmore became its editors, with
Either A. Hildreth as proprietor. This paper sur-
vived thirty years and had many editors. Mr. Cowley
mentions as editors, E. Case, N. P. Banks, H. H.
Weld, J. G. Abbott, I. W. Beard, William Butter-
field, Henry E. Baldwin, Samuel C. Baldwin, Fisher
A. Hildreth, Robins Dinsmore and J. J. Maguire,
and adds : " The Advertiser always supported the De-
mocracy, but the Democracy never supported the Ad-
vertiser, and in 1864 it collapsed. The Patriot col-
lapsed at the same time with the Advertiser.
Mr. Hildreth, for a long time the proprietor of the
Advertiser, was an astute politician and a man of
marked ability. A brief sketch of his life is found
in my notice of the postmasters of Lowell.
Tlie Pledge and Tke Female Advocate appeared
in 1835 ; also the Journal and Bulletin was published
from the Livingston Building, near Tower's Corner,
by Kinnicutt & Parker; also Zion's Banner, a Free-
Will Baptist paper, edited by Elder Thurston.
In 1836 the Messenger was printed by George Brown
and the Standard by Edward Waylen ; also the Ga-
zette by Alfred S. Tilden and the Philanthropist by
Rev. Aaron Lummas.
In March, 1837, the Casket was started by Brown
& Judkins. In January, 1840, the American Wes-
leyan Observer, an anti-slavery sheet, was started with
Rev. Orange Scott as editor. This paper, after six
months, was succeeded by the New England Christian
Advocate, edited by Rev. Luther Lee.
In 1839 the Ladies' Repository was started by A. B.
F. Hildreth, also the Literary Souvenir by Mr. Hil-
dreth.
In October, 1840, appeared the Lowell Offering, a
unique paper of wide-spread fame, being entirely
composed of original articles written by the mill-
girls. It had its origin in an improvement circle under
the auspices of Rev. A. C. Thomas, of the Second
Universalist Church. The contributions written by
the girls and read by Mr. Thomas at the meetings of
this circle, exhibited so much talent as to warrant
issuing a paper as an exponent of the thoughts and
aspirations of the operatives in the Lowell Mills.
Of its literary merits the poet Whittier, who, for a
few months in 1844, was a citizen of Lowell, says, in
his "Stranger in Lowell:" "In its volumes may be
found sprightly delineations of home-scenes and char-
acters, highly-wrought, imaginative pieces, tales of
genuine pathos and humor, and sweet fairy stories
and fables, reminding the reader at times of Jean
Paul." Its editors were Harriet Farley and Hariot
Curtis, two factory girls. It continued to be pub-
lished several years. A rival of the Offering, called
the Operatives' Magazine, was started, but it was ab-
sorbed by the Offering.
In 1841 the Ladies' Pearl was published by E. A.
Rice. The Star of Bethlehem was a Universalist
weekly paper, published by Powers & Bagley. In
1844 its editors were T. B. Thayer and A. A. Miner.
The Sword of Truth, a Methodist paper, was issued
in 1842. The Orion was started by W. F. Somerby
in 1843 or 1844.
lu 1843 the Middlesex Washingtonian and Martha
Washington Advocate was started by L. D. Johnson,
and the Daily Herald was issued by James M. Stone ;
also the Genius of Christianity was printed at the
Journal and Courier office. In 1843 or 1844 the (Jper-
ative, which survived two years, was published by J.
C. Stowell & Co. Its editor during the second year
was Arthur P. Bonney.
In May, 1844, John C. Palmer started the Life in
Lowell, which survived about five years. It was of
too scurrilous a character to live longer. Lowell is
not a favorite soil for such publications.
John G. Whittier, in 1844, at the solicitation of
friends, came to Lowell as editor of the Middlesex
Standard, an anti-slavery paper. It survived but a
few months. While in Lowell Mr. Whittier wrote a
small volume of high literary merit, entitled the
"Stranger in Lowell."
In 1845 F. A. Hildreth started the Republican,
which, in 1846—17, was absorbed by the Advertiser and
PcUriot.
In 1846 W. F. Young edited a paper called the
Voice of Industry.
In 1847 the Literary Visitor, and succeeding it, the
Lowell Gazette, were published by Joel Taylor and
Daniel Kimball. The Gazette survived about two
years.
In 1846-47 the Niagara, a temperance paper, is
edited by Rev. William H. Brewster, and the Gospel
Fountain, edited by Rev. William Bell ; also the
Ladies' Magazine and Casket of Literature, edited by
E. A. Rice; also the Temperance Offering, by Nathaniel
Hervey.
In 1849 William S. Robinson started the Tri- Weekly
American, which survived only a few months.
The Massachusetts Era, a free-soil paper, was started
by Dana B. Gove, with J. W. Hanson as editor; also
LOWELL.
195
the Day Star, a Sunday-school paper, was started by
A. B. Wright.
In 1851 the Christian Era, a Baptist paper, was
published by J. M. Burt, with Rev. D. C. Eddy as
editor; also the K. E. Offering and Mill Girls' Advo-
cate was published and edited by Harriet Farley ;
also the Spindle City was published by Eeach &
Emery.
For the Daily Morning News (1851), the American
Citizen (1854), and th.e*Daily Citizen (1855), see history
of the Lowell Daily Citizen.
In 1852 Wentworth's Waverly was published by
George Wentworth ; also the Lowell Mirror by Chase
& Hoitt.
In 1854 the Lowell Daily Morning Herald was pub-
lished by Enoch Emery. It survived one year; also
the World's Crisis, a second advent paper, was
issued by Jonas Merriam.
In 1857 The Star was issued by E. D. Green & Go. ;
also the Middlesex American, edited by L. J. Fletcher ;
also the Weekly Union, edited by scholars of the
High School ; also the Trumpet, by the Addisonian
Reformatory Club.
The Gad Fly, " devoted to truth, virtue and Democ-
racy," was published by S. W. Huntington in 1861 ;
also Homer A. Cook started a literary paper called
the Lowell Sentinel in 1861. It survived but a few
months.
In 1861 the Douglas Democrat appeared under the
auspices of A. R. Brown, W. E. Livingston and J.
K. Fellows.
In 1871 the Middlesex Democrat was published by
Dr. J. H. Smith. In 1872 this paper was merged in
the Daily Morning Times.
For the Semi - Weekly Mail and the Saturday Eoen-
ing Mail, see history of Lowell Morning Mail.
The following papers were published in the French
language : L'Echo du Canada, which started in 1874
and survived one year. La Republique, in 1875, by
H. Beaugrand, which survived about six months. La
SeiUinelle, in 1879, which survived less than one year.
L'Abeille, in 1880, with L. E. Carufel as editor, which
survived about three years. Le Soliel, Le Farceur and
Le Loup Garon were very short-lived.
The Advocate, a temperance paper, was started in
1885 by William Cogger. It subsequently fell into
the hands of Adams & Farley. It lived about two
years.
The Sunday Bell, by A. P. Kelly, -was started in
1884 and survived but a few months.
I am told by a journalist that in recent years the
number of -newspaper enterprises unwisely-started is
far less than it was in the earlier part of our city's
history.
CHAPTER XII.
ZO WELL—( Continued).
MEDICAL.
BY LEONARD HUNTRESS, M.D.
The physicians of Middlesex County did not enjoy
the advantages of a local medical society until the
formation of the Middlesex District Society in 1844.
Meetings of the Massachusetts Medical Society (in-
corporated in 1781) were held in Boston, and the Act
of March 10, 1803, dividing the State society into four
districts — Middle, Southern, Eastern and Western —
did not mend the matter, for this county was placed in
the Middle District, consisting of Suffolk, Norfolk,
Essex and Middlesex Counties, and the business of
the district society was all transacted in Boston.
There was an association in this county called the
Middlesex Medical Association formed some time late
in the last century, but no records are extant. In the
communications of the Massachusetts Medical So-
ciety,' in an obituary notice of Dr. Josiah Bartlett, of
Charlestown, we read that " he delivered two dis-
courses of a medical nature, one before the Middlesex
Medical Association, and the other before the Massa-
chusetts Medical Society. Quoting from the last-
named discourse :' " In 1785 corresponding and ad-
visory committees were appointed for the different
counties, in several of which' associations were formed
for professional conversation, reading dissertations
and communicating useful cases."
In 1829 another society, likewise called the
Middlesex Medical Association, was formed, but
the records have been lost. The first meeting was
held iu Lexington, in May, 1829, when the associa-
tion was organized, and in May of each year meetings
were held and an annual address was delivered until
the dissolution of the association in 1833. Dr. John
0. Green, of this city, delivered the last annual address
at Charlestown, in May, 1833. That this association,
meeting but once a year and necessitating a journey
from one end of the county to the other, was short-
lived, was in the nature of things.
On the 8th of March, 1839, the Lowell Medical As-
sociation' was formed. The following physicians:
Elisha Bartlett, John C. Dalton, James W. Ford, J.
W. Graves, William Grey, J. P. Jewett, Gilman Kim-
ball, George Mansfield, Daniel Mowe, Hiram Parker,
Otis Perham, Harlin Pillsbnry, J. D. Pillsbury, J. W.
Scribner, Benjamin Skelton and Daniel Wells, assem-
bled in the office of Dr. J.D. Pillsbury and'organiaed
a society for mutual improvement. The records are now
in thearchives of the Middlesex North DistrictjMedical
1 Vol 111. p. 419.
> DiiMrtsUoD b; JoaUh Bartlett, of Ctau-lastown, bsfore
Soc., June 6, 1810.
s Mlddleaex, Worceiter, Bristol and Kennebec.
Ued.
196
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Society. Meetings were held in the offices of the
members at first every week, later once in two weeks,
and after the first year not so frequently. There are
no records after February 4, 1841.
In November, 1844, the Massachusetts Medical So-
ciety, in answer to a petition from many prominent
physicians, granted a charter to those members of the
State society living in Lowell and fifteen neighboring
towns (Acton, Ashby, Billerica, Carliale, Chelmsford,
Concord, Dracut, Dunstable, Groton, Littleton, Pep-
perell, Shirley, Tewksbury, Townsend and Tyngs-
boro'), thus establishing the Middlesex District So-
ciety.
At first the meetings were held in the Assessors'
Room, City Hall, afterwards in the Committee Room
of the same building, and on July 12, 1848, the society
established itself in the Natural History Rooms in
Mechanics' Building, where they remained for thirty
years. For the past twenty years it has been the
custom of the society to meet in one of the large
hotels of this city, usually at the American House.
In studying the records of the early days of the
society we notice several striking features. Funds
for carrying on the work of the society were solicited
from citizens of Lowell by a committee on donations.
The first committee was appointed April 22, 1845,
consisting of Dra. Green, Daltou, Huntington, Harlin
Pillsbury, J. D. Pillsbury and J. W. Graves.
An orator was elected annually to deliver a public
address in the City Hall. Dr. A. H. Brown was
invited by the society to address the citizens of Low-
ell, Feb. 26, 1845, and his effort was so excellent
and so well received that the society decided to estab-
lish the custom of having an annual public oration.
Dr. J. D. Pillsbury was the orator in May, 1845; Dr.
Josiah Curtis in '46 ; Dr. J. P. Jewett in '47 ; in '48
there was no oration, and in '49 Dr.Augustus Mason
delivered the last public address.
The society advertised for free patients, and two
physicians were selected at each meeting to examine
them, thus establishing a clinic. At a meeting held
June 6, 1845, it was voted: "That all persons living
in this city and vicinity wishing for medical or surgi-
cal advice or surgical operations can receive the
same gratuitously by presenting themselves before the
society at their next quarteily meeting, and that the
secretary give four weeks' notice of the same in two
public papers printed in this city." At a meeting
held Aug. 27th, of the same year, eight patients pre-
sented themselves and were examined by a commit-
tee consisting of Drs. Dalton and Huntington. This
practice seems to have ceased in 1847, and at a meeting
held in February, 1848, it was voted that reports of
cases be read and discussed, writers to be appointed
alphabetically. Dr. Nathan Allen presented the first
paper March 22d.
In 1848 two towns. Stow and Westford, were joined
to the society, and since then Ashby, Ayer (Groton),
Concord, Shirley, Stow and Townsend have been taken
from us. In 1855 three district societies were estab-
lished in this county — Middlesex North, East and
South District Medical Societies — the Middlesex Dis-
trict -Society being henceforth called the Middlesex
North.
The following physicians have served as president
of the society :
Neheniiuh Cutter, of Pepperell, 1844-47 ; Elisba Huntington, of Low-
ell, 1848-19 ; John C. Dalton, of Lowell, 18oi'-52 ; Natban Allen, of
Lowell, 1853-00 ; Hanover Dickey, of Lowell, lSoO-5T ; John W. Graves,
of Lowell, 18d8-o9; Cb&rlei A. Savorj', of Lowell, 1S6U-62: John C.
B&rtlett, of Lowell, 1863-64 ; Jonathan Brown, of Tewksbury, 18G5-U7 ;
Jeremiah P. Jewett, of Lowell, 1808 ; Juel Spalding, of Lowell, 186(i-TO ;
Gilman Kimball, of Lowell, 1871-72 ; Levi Howard, of Chelmsford,
1873-74; Daniel P. Gage, of Lowell, 1»75; Lorenzo S. Fox, of Lowell,
1876-77 ; George H. Pillsburj", of Lowell, 187S-7'J ; George E. Piukhatu,
of Lowell, 1880-81 ; Charles Duttou. of Tyngsboro', 1SS2-S3 ; Willi.im
Boss, of Lowell, 1864-85; Walter H. Leigbton, of Lowell, 1886; Natban
B. Edwards, of Chelmsford, 1887-S8 ; Hernion J. Smith, of Lowell, 1359-
90.
It will not be within the scope of this paper to in-
clude all the physicians who have practiced in Lowell,
and biographies of only the more prominent ones can
be given. Of the present generation short sketches
of the older men will be offered. A special chapter
of this book will be devoted to practitioners of the
homoeopathic school in this city, and our attention
will be confined to members of the Massachusetts
Medical Society.
The following list comprises all members of this
society who have practiced in Lowell :
AdntiUtfd. Relirfd or resign--d. Died. Age.
1822. Moses Kidder 1832 1855 6:1
1827. John Orne Green 1885 86
1831. John Call Dalton 1864 . C8
18.32. John Wheelock Graves 1873 63
1832. George Mansfield 1869 61
1832. JohnBurgin Wadleigh 1S53 62
1833. Ellsha Bartlclt . . . 1855 51
1833. William Graves 1843 50
1834. John Taylor Gilman Leach ... . . 1889 . .
1831. Charles Gordon 1872 62
1834. John Dale Pillsbury 1656 49
1836. Patrick Paget Campbell 1865 00
1836. Henry A. Dewar 1838
1837. Moody Slansur 1839 1889 81
1838. Gilman Kimball
1838. Hinim Parker 1873 1877 08
1639. Daniel Clark
1839. Abraham Drake Dearborn ...
1839. James W. Ford
1839. Elisha Huntington 18C5 69
1839. Jeremiah Peahody Jewett ... . . 1870 72
1839. Austiu Marsh
1839. Daniel Mowe 1854 1860 70
1839. Otis Perliam l8C3 50
1839. Harlin Pillsbury . ' 1871 1877 79
1839. Isaac White Scribncr . . 18t'>4 ."'8
1839. Benjamin Skelton 1843 1867 84
1839. David Welles 1877 72
1840. John Baker
1841. Jeremiah Home
1842. Xathan Allen 1889 7.5
1842. John Butterfield . . 1847 30
1843. William Gray
1843. Cynis Sweetser Mann
1843. Hervey Backus Wilbur 1883 62
1844. Augustus Mason 1882 58
1845. Josiah Curtis 1883 67
LOWELL.
197
AdmitUd. Bttired or retigned.
1845. Benben ^. Hill ....
1845. Flo.ver Galea Eittredge .
1846. Peter Manning
1845. John McCrillia
1845. Tboniafi Wonieraley . . .
1646 HanoTer Dickey 1870
1846. Daniel Holt 1874
1846. John Little
1846. Daniel Morrill
1846. Latber Blodgett Morse .
1846. Joel Spalding
1847. George Henry Whitmore .
1847. Oscar Burbank ....
1847. Charles A. Davis . . .
1847. Henn- M. Hooke . . .
1847. Rufus Shackford . . .
1847. John B. Wadleigh . .
1847. Henry Womersley . .
1848. Josiah Crosby ■ . . . .
1848 Walter Kidder . . . .
1849. Henry S. Babbitt. . .
1849. Benjamin Di.\un Bartlett .
1849. Abiier Hartwell Brown .
1849. Leonard French ....
1849. C. W. B. Kidder ....
1849. Eben Kimball Sanborn .
1849. Joseph ThomaBOdiome West .
ISSO. Ambrose Goulet . . .
18.iO. Peter Pineo
1850. Charles .Vugustus Savory
18.%0, Elisha Bucon Shaploigh .... 1851
1851. Paris B. Brown. . . .
1851. Ira Lovistuii Moore. .
1852. Henry 'VVhitiup. . . .
1852. Lutiua Cnnipbell Den. Woodn
1853. Jeremiah Blake. , , .
1853. Sidney Smith Merrill .
1W4. Edward Augustas Perkins.
1856. Daniel Parker Gage .
1856- Franklin .Augustus Wood .
1859. Deodat Mignault ....
1839. Harlin Henr>- Pillsbury.
1859. William B. Proctor . . .
1860. Henrv Holton Fuller , .
18C0. Henry John Harwood. .
1860. Moses Warren Kidder. .
1860. John William Pearson
1560. Peler Prius
1860. Charles Warren
1561. Jumes Gerrett Bradt . .
1(^61. George F. Brickett . . .
IsOl. .Vbraham Drake Dearborn.
1861. Charlen G. A. Eayrs. . .
1862. William Henrj- Bradley .
1862. Otis Milton Humphrey .
1802. Alfred Livingstone . . .
1663. Walter Burnham ....
1863. Edward Dillon Ireland .
1863. George Cowles Osgood. .
1864. Kirk Henry Baucroft . .
1861. William Bass
1865. Lorenzo Smith Fox . . .
1865. John Henr>' Gilman . .
1865. George Edwin Pinkham.
1865. Francis Charles Plunkett .
1866. James G. Maxfield . . .
1866. Uoees Greeley Parker. .
1867. Walter Henry Leighton. .
1867. FrankUn Nickerson. .
1868. Joseph Edward Langlois ,
1868. Joseph Haven Smith .
1869. David Goggin
1869. James Daley
i Honorary member.
Dttd. Age.
U
1653
85-
35
883 59
856 . .
63
72
47
(2
78
48
48
:9
1863 37
39
883 75
1869 31
869 26
79
1878
1875
AdmUUd. BeUred or resigned. Died, Afft.
1870. Ezra Barnes Aldrich . . .
1870. George Harlin Pillsbory .
1870. Charles Barton Sanders . .
1870. Vernon Otis Taylor. . . .
1871. Albert Manley Ballard . .
1871. William Henry Warn. . .
1871. William Harrington W'arren
1872. Abner Wheeler Buttrick .
1872. Gyrus Mentor Fisk ....
1872. Orris 0. Davis
1872. Alfred Willis Lavigne. . .
1872. Hermon Joseph Smith . .
1873. Albert Shaw Henick 1881
1873. Frederick Augustus Warner.
1874. Talentine Plunkett Dillon. .
1674. Rol)ert James Halloran , .
1874. William Michael Hoar . .
1874. Havllla 3[arcena Buckllff .
1875. Bumhani Roswell Benoer.
1876. John Carroll Irish . . . .
1675. John Erastus Weaver. . .
1876. Francis Watte Chadbourne .
1876. Leonard Huntress ....
1876. William Henry Lathrop. .
1876. Charles Parker Spalding. .
1877. John Jay Colton
1677. David Kelson Patlei^on . .
1877. Edwin Weston Truewortby .
1878. Benjamin Benoit, Jr. . . .
1878. Edward Hyde
1678. James Joseph McCarty . .
1878. Hartwell Augustus Sibley.
1878. Clarence .\lbertus Viles . .
1879. Wyllls Gilbert Eaton, Jr. .
1679. Harvey Knight
1879. Arthur Quinn Phelan. . .
1879. Frank Reader Rii ....
1880. Henry Bupert BriMett . .
18S0. William Benjamin Jackson ,
1880. Herbert Perry JeGTeraon .
1880. Albert Clarence Lane . . .
1880. Charles Frederick Ober . .
1881. Eben True Aldrich ....
18^1. Gerrett James Bradt . . .
1881. William Terrence Carolin .
1B81. John Alexander McKinnon .
1881. Henry Phelps Perkins. .
1882. Herbert Shattuck Johnson
1882. Charles Henrj-Ricker. .
1883. Kalph Marcus Cole . . .
1683. Williani Augustus Johnson ,
1883. Edward Aarou McGannon.
1883. William Henry McOwen .
1883 Onier Pillsbury Porter . .
1883. Henry Albert Kice Bundlett.
1883. Sumner Phinney Smith.
1863. James Francis Sullivan .
1853. James Joseph Sullivan 1885 28
1884. Robert Eddy Bell ....
1884. James Brainard Field . .
1884. Timothy Edward McOwen. .
1884. Oliver Augustus Wlllard .
1685. James Arthur Gage. . . .
1885. Rodrigue Mignault ....
1885. Royal Blood Prescott . . .
1865. Charlee Edward Simpaon .
1885. Charles Warren Taylor . .
1886. ArUn Edouard Zephirin YiDcelette
1865. Jacob Biuckett Wentwortb .
1886. Mary Ann Hall
1686. Lawrence John McDonongb.
1886. Matthew John McGannon.
1886. Thomas Gerald McGannon .
1886. Robert Lester Qua . . .
1887. John Cochrane 1888
198
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
AdmitteiL Retired or rtaigned. Died. Age.
1883. Arthur Earnest Gillard
1888. Frank Harconrt Koyle
1888. William Patrick Lawler
1889. Thoma* Kruncia Hamngton. . ,
John Orne Gkeex was the son of Rev. Aaron
and Eunice (Orne) Green, of Maiden, Mass., where he
was born, May 14, 1799.
His preparatory education was received at the acad-
emy of Dr. Homans, in Medford, Massachusetts, and
he was graduated at Harvard College with honors in
the class of 1817, at the age of eighteen, with George
Bancroft, Caleb Cushing and Rev. Dr. Tyng, During
college he paid particular attention to theological
studies, intending to enter the ministry. But after
teaching school for a year in Castine, Me., he
entered the office of Dr. Ephraim Buck, of Maiden,
and commenced the study of medicine. In the
winters of 1818 and '19 he attended lectures at the
college on Mason Street, Boston, entering the office of
Dr. Edward Reynolds, of Boston, in October, 1821.
March 10, 1822, he received his degree of M.D.
from Harvard, and on the 23d of April he came to
Lowell, where he remained in active practice until
his death, a period of nearly sixty-four years.
Dr. Green's place will probably never be filled in
this city. Dr. Huntington was undoubtedly a more
popular man. Dr. Bartlett was more widely known,
but as an ideal family physician Dr. Green's position
was unparalleled.
He gave his whole life to his profession, taking
little part in politics, although his early training and
his love of letters induced him to identify himself
prominently with school matters. He was a member
of the School Board for twelve years, and for nine
years was its chairman, and wrote its reports. In
1870 he delivered the address at the dedication of the
new Green School, which took the place of the old
building on Middle Street.
In the American Journal of Medical Sciences for
July, 1830, he reported two cases of fracture of the
liver, which were re-published in Germany.
In the Boston Medical and Surgical Journal for De-
cember, 1837, he wrote an account of an epidemic of
small-pox in Lowell. He also rendered valuable aid
by his investigations to Dr. Elisha Bartlett, in his
work on fevers, the second edition of which was dedi-
cated to him.
He served as alderman of the city of Lowell, and
as health commissioner for several years he prepared
the bills of mortality which preceded the present sys-
tem of registration. He was councilor of the Massa-
chusetts Medical Society for many years, and he de-
livered the annual address before that body in 1846
on "The Factory System in its Hygienic Relations."
He served on the staff of St. John's Hospital for
nearly twenty years. He was president of the Lowell
Old Residents' Association, and president of the Low-
ell Institution for Savings.
Dr. Green was an earnest churchman, and his ex-
tensive practice never interfered with his church
duties. He read and published papers as follows :
1830, "Fractures of Liver;" 1837, "History of Small-
Pox in Lowell ; " 1846, " Annual Address Massachu-
setts Medical Society ; " 1851, " Biography of Calvin
Thomas, M.D.;" 1857, "Address at Dedication of
Chime of Bells ; " 1866, " Resolutions on the Death
of Elisha Huntington, M.D. ; " 1868, " Address before
Old ResidenU' Association ; " 1869, " Memorial of
John C. Dalton, M.D.;" 1870, " Address at Dedica-
tion of Green School ; " 1876, " Reminiscences at
Lowell Semi-Centennial ; " 1877, " Lowell and Har-
vard College O. H. R."
Dr. Green was thrice married, — first, to Jane
Thomas, of Tyngsboro', September 14, 1826; second,
to Minerva B.Slater,of Smithfield,R. I.,6thof March,
1833, and third to Jane McBurney, 25th of April,
1871.
Dr. John Orne Green, of Boston, is his son. Full
of years and honor, he died 23d of December, 1885.
Elisha Huxtixgtox, son of Rev. Asahel and
Althea (Lord) Huntington, daughter of Dr. Elisha
Lord, of Pomfret, Conn., was born in Topsfield, Mass.,
9th of April, 1796. He was graduated from Dart-
mouth in the class of 1815, and from the Medical De-
partment of Yale in 1823.
He came to Lowell (then East Chelmsford) in
1824, where he lived until his death, a period of more
than forty years. He was a busy man, devoting much
time to the interests of the city, and never neglecting
his professional duties, and in both spheres was he
highly honored. He gave especial attention to our
schools. When Lowell was a town he served four
years as a member of the School Committee, and the
same length of time on this board, after the munici-
pal incorporation in 1836. He was selectman of the
town of Lowell two years, and a member of the Com-
mon Council of the city three years.
Dr. Huntington was first elected mayor the 24th of
April, 1839, being then president of the Common
Council, when the office of mayor was made vacant
by the sudden death of Luther Lawrence.
He was re-elected to this office in 1840, '41, '44, '45,
'52, '56 and '58. In 1847, '53 and '54 he served as
alderman.
In 1852 he was elected Lieutenant-Governor, but
declined a re-election for the next year.
He was an overseer of Harvard College from 1860
to 1865, and served one term as inspector of the State
Almshouse, at Tewksbury. Huntington Hall waa
named in his honor.
He never sought office ; it always sought him. In
fact, he declined office many times on account of his
love for his profession, and during all his years of po-
litical service attended a large general practice. He
was very regular in his attendance at the meetings of
the District Medical Society, and was president of this
society in 1848-49. He was president of the State
Society in 1855-56.
LOWELL.
199
Dr. HuntingtoD published several addresses and a
most excellent memorial of Prof. Elisba Bartlett
(Lowell, 1856). He was elected city physician in
.1843, and served the unexpired term made vacant by
the resignation of Dr. A. D. Dearborn.
He was married, May 31, 1825, to Hannah, daugh-
ter of Joseph and Deborah Hinckley, of Marblehead.
He died at Lowell December 10, 1865.
Elisha Bartlett, son of Otis and Wait Bartlett,
was born in Sraithfield, E. L, Oct. 6, 1804. He was
graduated from the Medical School of Brown Uni-
versity in 182G, after which he spent a year in Eu-
rope, and on Dec. 15th entered upon the practice of
his profession in Lowell.
He was a man of elegant presence, a finished ora-
tor and a writer of rare ability, and he was at once
singled out for honor and preferment. He was often
called upon to deliver public addresses and orations
before the citizens of Lowell. He delivered the
Fourth of July oration in 1828, when only twenty-
three years of age, and a resident of the town of only
six months' standing. When Lowell became a city,
in 1836, he was honored by being made the first
mayor, and he was re-elected the following year. He
regularly contributed editorials to several of the
newspapers of this city, and through the medium of
the press he vindicated the character, condition and
treatment of the factory girls, which had been as-
sailed by Boston newspapers.
Although attending to a general practice when in
Lowell, he delivered a course of lecturesat the Berk-
shire Medical Institute in 1832, and again in 1839.
Dr. Bartlett held professorships as follows: In
Transylvania College, Lexington, Ky. (1841); in the
University of Maryland (1844); again in Lexington
(1846); in Louisville (1849), and in the University of
New York (1850). From 1851 until his death he
held the chair of Materia Medica and Medical Juris-
prudence in the College of Physicians and Surgeons,
New York.
The professorships occupied his time during the
autumn and winter, and in the spring and summer,
from 1843 to 1852, he delivered lectures at the "Ver-
mont Medical College, at Woodstock.
While in Lowell he started the Medical Magazine.
The first number was published in 1832, the editors
being A. L. Pierson, J. L. Flint and Elisha Bartlett.
This, the first number, was printed in Lowell, but the
succeeding numbers appeared in Boston. This maga-
zine continued for three years.
Dr. Bartlett wrote " Essay on Philosophy of Medi-
cal Science " (1844), " Inquiry into the Degree of
Certainty in Medicine" (1848), "The Fevers of the
United States " (1850), " Discourse on the Times,
Character and Works of Hippocrates " (1852), and a
volume of poetry, "Simple Settings in Verse for Por-
traits and Pictures from Mr. Dickens' Gallery " (1855).
In the Lowell City Library is a copy of his transla-
tion from the French, entitled, " Sketches of the
Character and Writings of Eminent Living Physi-
cians and Surgeons of Paris " (1831). This transla-
tion is a most finished work, and stamps him as an
accomplished French scholar.
Dr. Bartlett married, in 1839, Elizabeth, daughter
of John Slater, of Smithfield. He died at Smithfield,
July 18, 1855.
Harlin Pillsbury, son of Samuel and Mary
(Currier) Pillsbury, was born at Sandown, N. H.,
Nov. 30, 1797. He was liberally educated, receiving
his degree of A. B. from Dartmouth College in 1823,
and in 1826 he received his degree of M.D. from the
same institution.
He came to Lowell in January, 1827, and remained
here in active practice until within a few years of his
death, a gentleman of the old school, a careful, con-
scientious physician, an upright man.
He married Sophia Bigelow Pratt, of Brewster,
Mass., in 1842. The doctor devoted himself strictly
to the practice of his profession, and always eschewed
politics, although he was pressed into public service
in 1828-29 as a member of the School Board, and in
1840 and 1843 as an alderman. In 1874, after a resi-
dence in Lowell of forty-seven years, he removed to
Billerica, intending to spend his last days in rest.
This was denied him, however, as his services were
constautly called in requisition until his death, which
occurred at Billerica April 12, 1877.
JosiAH Crosby' was born in Sandwich, N. H.,
Feb. 1, 1794. He was the son of Dr. Asa and Betsy
(Hoit) Crosby. He was educated under the private
instruction of Rev. Mr. Hidden, of Tamworth, N. H.,
and afterwards was sent to Amherst Academy. He
was an elegant penman and for some time he taught
school and gave private lessons in penmanship. He
studied medicine with his father and the well-known
Dr. Nathan Smith, and was graduated at Dartmouth
in 1816.
Dr. Crosby practiced in Sandwich, Meredith
Bridge, Epsom and Concord, N. H., until the year
1828, when he came to Lowell. He remained here
five years, one of the most prominent physicians of
the place. He was one of the founders of the Apple-
ton St. Church (now the Elliot Church), and was
foremost in many public enterprises. While in Low-
ell, Feb. 9, 1829, he married Mary Light Avery, of
Guilford, N. H.
In 1833 he gave up the practice of his profession,
and for five years interested himself in manufactur-
ing. In 1838, however, he resumed his practice, set-
tling in Meredith Bridge, and taking the place of his
brother Dixi, who was appointed professor in Dart-
mouth. In 1844 he went to Manchester, and he
stayed here through the remainder of his life, a period
of over thirty years. In Manchester he originated
and introduced the method of making extensions of
fractured limbs by the use of adhesive strips, and
' Vide "A Crosby Fsmily," publiabed by Nathan Croaby.
200
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 5IASSACHUSETTS.
later he invented the invalid bed, the celebrated
Crosby bed. In 1848 he was elected an honorary
member of the Massachusetts Medical Society. He
died in Manchester, January 2, 1875.
John Wheelock Graves, son of Dr. William
Graves, was born in Deerfield, N. H., January 7, 1810.
His preliminary education was received at Exeter, N.
H., and his medical studies were pursued in his
father's office, and at the Medical College at Wash-
ington, D. C, where he received his degree of If.D.
in 1830.
He entered into practice in Lowell at once and re-
mained here until his death, with the exception of
the eight years when he was at the Marine Hospital
at Chelsea.
Dr. Graves was a physician of high repute and much
respected by his brother practitioners. He was pres-
ident of the Middlesex North District Society in 1858-
59. He was city physician in 1850, '59 and '60. He
was also highly honored by his fellow-citizens in being
elected to municipal office. He was a member of the
School Board in 1833, '34 and '35 ; was an alderman
in 1842 ; was elected to the State Senate in 1850-51 ;
and several times he was a candidate for the office of
mayor of Lowell, but without success.
In 1861 Dr. Graves was appointed superintendent
of the Marine Hospital at Chelsea, a position which
he filled with credit until 1869, when he returned to
Lowell and resumed his practice.
He was made superintendent of the Corporation
Hospital July 19, 1869, and remained in this position
until his death, which occurred November 28, 1873.
Daniel Mowe, son of Peter and Molly (Bamford)
Mowe, was born in Pembroke, N. H., 3d of February,
1790. His preliminary education was received at the
Salisbury (X. H.) Academy, and for several 3-ears be-
fore he commenced the study of medicine he taught
school. He was graduated from the Medical Depart-
ment of Dartmouth in 1819, and he at once entered
upon the practice of his profession at New Durham,
N. H. He remained here only a brief time, remov-
ing to Sanbornton Bridge (now Tilton), N. H., where
he stayed until he came to Lowell, in 1830.
In the winter of 1830-31 he attended lectures at
Bowdoin, and in 1832 he visited Philadelphia to
study the cholera, which was at that time raging.
He married, January 1, 1825, Elizabeth Hart
Whittemore, of Sanbornton Bridge. Dr. Mowe con-
tinued in practice in Lowell until within a few weeks
of his death, a period of thirty years, and he had the
respect and confidence of the entire community. He
is widely known as the compounder of " Mowe's
Cough Balsam," a medicine of much local reputation.
While on a visit to Salisbury, N. H., on a matter of
business, he was attacked with an acute lung trouble
and after an illness of a week's duration, died Novem-
ber 3, 1860.
Oilman Kimball, son of Ebenezer and Polly
(Aiken) Kimball, was born in New Chester (now
Hill), N. H., December 8, 1804. He received his de-
gree of M.D. from Dartmouth in 1827, and practiced
for a short time in Chicopee, Mass. He then visited
Europe, giving special attention to the clinical ad-
vantages which Paris at that time offered in surgery.
He was personally acquainted with Dupuytren, and
walked the hospitals of Paris in company with this
great teacher.
Dr. Kimball settled in Lowell in 1830, and has
lived here since that time, being inactive practice
until within the last few years. On the establishment of
the Corporation Hospital, in December, 1829, he was
appointed resident physician, a position which he
filled for twenty-six years. In the report of the sec-
retary of the Middlesex District Medical Society,
April 11, 1849,' is embodied a report by Dr. Kimball
of cases that occurred in the first nine years of the
hospital. This report shows the careful and syste-
matic manner in which cases were classified and re-
corded by the resident physician, as well as the very
small mortality (less than five per cent.) of the cases
of typhoid fever here treated, more than one-half of
the entire number reported being of this disease.
He was appointed Professor of Surgery in the Ver-
mont Medical College, in Woodstock, in 1844, and in
1845 he was elected to a similar position in the Berk-
shire Jledical Institute, in Pittsfield.
In the spring of 1861 he entered the army, and for
four months served as brigade surgeon under Gen-
eral Butler, and at Annapolis and Fortress Monroe
he superintended the organization of the first military
hospitals that were fstablished for National troops.
In 1871 and 1872 he was president of the Middlesex
North District Medical Society. In 1882 he was presi-
dent of the American Gyniecological Society. His
practice has been mainly surgical, and to-day he
ranks among the most eminent and successful of the
surgeons of this country.
Dr. Kimball has contributed to medical literature
papers on gastrotomy, ovariotomy, hysterectomy and
the treatment of tumors by electricity, and was the
first to practically illustrate the value of the latter
method. The following is a partial list of his medi-
cal contributions :
"Operations for Cancer of the Lip,'"' " Successful
Case of Extirpation of the Uterus,'" " Excision of the
Elbow- Joint," ' " Cases of Ovariotomy,"^ " Case of Can-
cerous Disease of the Ovary,"* "Cases of Ovariotomy,"'
" Cases of Drainage from the Cul-de-sac of Douglass
after Ovariotomy,' ' ' " Cases of Uterine Fibroids treated
by Electrolysis." '
t In the archives of the Middlesex North District Medical Society.
3 Boslcn Medical and Surgical Journal, Tot. xlii.. No. 26.
'Ibid., vol. 52, No. l:i, May 3, 1855.
« Ibid., vol. 53, No. -T.
5 Ibid., from vol. 68, No. 20, to vol. 71, No. 8.
'Ibid., vol. TO, No. 4.
' Ibid., vol. 79, No. 7.
9 Ibid., from vol. 90, No. 22, to vol. 91, No. 12.
'Ibid., vol. 90, No. 5, Januarr 29. 1874.
LOWELL.
201
He married twice,— first, Harriet De War, in 1832
and second, Isabel De Friez, iu April, 1872.
John Call Daltox' was the son of Peter Roe
and Anne (Call) Dalton, of Boston, where he was
born 3l8t May, 1795. He fitted for college under Dr.
Luther Stearns, principal of Medford Academy, en-
tering Harvard College in 1810. While in college he
displayed high scholarship, winning the Bowdoin
Prize in his senior year. He was graduated at Har-
vard, in the class of 1814, and the following year he
taught school in Medford. In 1815 he entered the
office of Dr. Josiah Bartlett, of Charlestown, subse-
quently attending two regular courses at Harvard
Medical School and a third one (during the winter of
1817-18) at the University of Pennsylvania. He re-
ceived his degree of M.D. from Harvard in 1818, and
at once settled in Chelmsford. In the fall of 1831 he
removed to Lowell, where he remained for twenty-
eight years.
During his life here he stood at the very head of his
profession, and won a place in the hearts of the peo-
ple and a name in their memory second to none. He
was president of the Middlesex North District
Medical Society in 1850, '51 and '52 ; a councilor of
the State Society for many years and a member of the
American Medical Association. He was averse to
holding public office, although he served as alder-
man in 1845 and 184G.
Dr. Dalton married twice— first, Julia Ann, daughter
of Deacon Noah Spaulding, of Chelmsford, 2l8t Feb-
ruarj-, 1822, and second, Lydia, daughter of the late
Hon. John Phillips, of Andover, in 1851.
He removed to Br ston in 1859 to spend his last
days in rest, but he was recognized and sought out
for honors there. He was appointed a member of the
State Medical Comrai.ssion for the examination of
surgeons, in the place of the late Dr. Haywood, and
was elected senior physician of the new City Hospi-
tal a few weeks only before his death.
He died in Boston after a short illness, the result
of an accident, 9th January, 1864.
Charles Gordon" was the son of Dr. William
and Helen (Gilchrest) Gordon, of Hingham, Mass.,
where he was born 17th November, 1809. He fitted
for college at Derby Academy, Hingham, under the
tuition of the Rev. Daniel Kimball. He was gradu-
ated at Brown University in the class of 1829, and
at his graduation he delivered an oration on "The
Dignity of the Medical Professior." He studied med-
icine with his father at Hingham, and at the Har-
vard Mf dical School, where he received his degree of
M.D. in 1832.
Dr. Gordon entered upon the practice of his pro-
fession in Lowell, and remained here several years a
highly respected physician. In 183G he settled in
Boston, where he gave especial attention to surgery.
He made four professional visits to Europe, one of
' ridt Memorial of J. C. Dalton, M.D., bj J. 0. Green, M.D. (1864).
which extended to three years. On the 29th of
December he married Mary, daughter of Phineas
Upham. of Boston, who, with three daughters surviv-
ed him. He died in Boston 2d March, 1872.
John Dale Pillsbuey, son of Dr. John and
Dorothy (Ordway) Pillsbury, was born at Pembroke,
N. H., April 16, 1805. After completing his pre-
liminary education he taught school for several years
in Pembroke.
He studied medicine in the office of Dr. Peter
Renton, of Concord, N. H., and with Dr. William
Graves, of Lowell, receiving his degree of SI.D. from
Bowdoin, in 1830. He entered upon the practice of
medicine at Pembroke, remaining there a year or two
and coming to Lowell in 1832.
Dr. Pillsbury was in active practice here for over
twenty years, a highly honored and respected physi-
cian. He was the secretary of the Lowell Medical
Association and the first secretary of the Middlesex
District Society, serving from 1844 to 1847, inclusive.
He was chosen by this society as their orator to de-
liver the annual public address before the citizens of
Lowell in May, 1845. He was interested in edu-
cational matters, serving as a member of the Lowell
School Board ic 1835 and '37.
He removed from Lowell in 1854, going to Roches-
ter, N. Y., where, after a short illness, he died Dec.
21, 1855. He married, January 18, 1835, at Lowell,
Lucy Cooley Moore, of Brimfield, Mass.
Patrick Paget Campbell was born at Killin,
Perthshire, Scotland, March 30, 1804. His father. Dr.
Donald Campbell, and his mother, Margaret Campbell,
were second cousins and members of the Breadalbane
clan Campbell. He received his academical edu-
cation at Collander, Scotland, and received his degree
of M.D. from King's College, Edinburgh, in 1826.
He commenced practice at Collander in 1827, and
seven years later sailed from Glasgow for New York.
Soon after reaching this country he came to Lowell
(1834), where he remained in active practice for
twenty-four years.
He was a well educated and highly respected man,
and his practice was very extensive, though princi-
pally among the foreign-born. In 1842 he purchased
a farm in Chelmsford, and in 1858 he moved there,
giving up his practice in Lowell. He was deeply
interested in farming and was the first to attempt the
cultivation of the cranberry in Middlesex County.
He married in Lowell, December 27, 1840, Jane
Hills Sprague, of Billerica. Three children were
born to them, two of whom died in infancy. The
third, Mrs. Margaret Campbell Hayes, is now living
in Clinton, Iowa.
Dr. Campbell died of pneumonia November 18,
1865, at Chelmsford. Nine days later his wife died
of the same disease.
Isaac White Scribner, son of Josiah and Mary
Ann (White) Scribner, was born at Andover, N. H.,
January 24, 1808.
202
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
He studied medicine with Dr. Silas Merrill, of
Andover, and Dr. Jesse Merrill, of Franklin, N. H.
He was a graduate of Dartmouth Medical College.
Dr. Scribner commenced practice in Hopkinton, but
in 1836 removed to Lowell, where he practiced until
his death.
He was held in high esteem by his brother prac-
titioners and was a ripe scholar.
He published "The Legends of Laconia," a tale of
the White Mountain region — a book of much merit.
In this book are several original poems of a high
order.
Dr. Scribner died, unmarried, Oct. 15, 1864.
David Wells, son of Rev. Nathaniel Wells, was
born in Wells, Me., 13th November, 1804. His pre-
liminary education was received at Phillips Exeter
Academy, after which for several years he was en-
gaged in teaching. He entered upon the practice of
his profession in 1828, in Deerfield, N. H., where be
remained until 1837, when he came to Lowell. His
cotemporaries speak of him as a physician of more
than ordinary ability, and as an upright and con-
scientious man, but he was modest and retiring and
not so widely known as many of less worth. He was
unmarried and lived by himself for many years in his
office in Welles' Block, in the rooms occupied until
recently by Dr. John H. Gilman. He was city
physician in 1845 and 1846. His death, which was
sudden, occurred in his office 22d February, 1877.
Benjamin Skelton, son of John Skelton, of Bil-
lerica, was born in that place 16th March, 1783. He
studied medicine under Dr. Thompson, of Charles-
town, and after receiving his degree of M.D. com-
menced practice in Reading, where he lived two or
three years. He then went to Pelham, N. H., and
made this place his home for twenty-five years.
In 1837 he came to Lowell, and here he lived until
his death, which occurred 23d March, 1867. His
health was poor during his residence in Lowell, but
he continued in active practice notwithstanding,
until the last two or three years of his life.
He married 'twice — first, Iza Bacon, 18th October,
1810, and second, Hannah Varnum, 5th January,
1836.
Two of his sons were pioneers in the drug business
in this city. Oliver started the store corner of Merri-
mack and John Streets (now Bailey's), selling out to
Samuel Kidder, and Christopher started the one on
Central Street, now owned by Mr. Crowell, selling
out to Staniels.
Of eight children, two are now living — Mrs. Dr.
Austin Marsh, of Carlisle, and Mrs. Hiram W. Blais-
dell, of Lowell.
Hanover Dickey was born in Epsom, N. H.,
14th September, 1807. He studied medicine in the
office of Dr. William Graves, of Lowell, and at the
Harvard Medical School, where he was graduated in
1837. He started to practice in Lowell, but soon re-
moved to Epsom, where he practiced until 1845, when
he returned to Lowell. He remained here until his
death, a highly esteemed physician, although an ex-
ceedingly eccentric man. He lived and died a thor-
ough old bachelor. His health was poor, a fact
which rendered his practice less extensive than it
would otherwise have been, but few physicians in this
city have been held in fonder regard by their patients.
His talents were recognized in the local medical
society, and he was chosen secretary of the Middle-
sex North District Society in 1849, and president in
1856 and 1857. He died at his residence in Lowell,
•J9th May, 1873.
Otis Perham, son of Jonathan and Mary (Parker)
Perham, was born at Chelmsford, 2d October, 1813.
He was graduated at the Medical School at Wood-
stock, Vermont, his cousin. Dr. Willard Parker,
being a professor there at the time.
Dr. Perham commenced practice in Lowell in
1837, and remained here in active practice through
his life. He was an old school gentleman and a well-
read physician, and being naturally of a social dispo-
sition, he was much respected and beloved by his
brother physicians.
He married Elizabeth Cornell Brownell, of Low-
ell, 30th October. 1844.
Dr. Perham died in the prime of life, 22d Novem-
ber, 1853.
Jeremiah Peabody Jewett, son of Dr. Jere-
miah and Temperance (Dodge) Jewett, was born 24th
February, 1808, in Barnstead, N. H. He studied
medicine in his father's office and at Hanover, where
he was graduated in the class of 1835.
Dr. Jewett came to Lowell in 1838, and continued
here in practice until his death, which occurred June
23, 1870. He was a successful physician and a re-
spected citizen ; was a member of the Lowell C')m-
mon Council, and in 1855 was elected to the General
Court. In 1847 was chosen by the Middlesex Dis-
trict Jledical Society to deliver the annual public
address before the citizens of Lowell. In 1868 was
president of the Middlesex North District Society.
He married, 26th May, 1841, Harriet Emily Loom-
is, of West Windsor, Connecticut.
Peter Manning, son of Peter Manning, of Town-
send, and Rebecca (Carter) Manning, of Lancaster,
was born at Townsend, 11th November, 1791. His
father was a celebrated musician, and the first presi-
dent of the Handel and Haydn Society of Boston.
Dr. Manning began the study of medicine in Lan-
caster, in the office of his maternal uncle. Dr. James
Carter. From there he went to Schenectady, N. Y.,
and was graduated at a medical school in that place.
He began the practice of his profession in Hollis,
N. H., remaining there about two years. After this
he engaged anew, in the town of Merrimack, N. H.,
with Dr. Abel Goodrich. Dr. Manning remained
here twenty-three years, and in 1840 he removed to
Lowell, where he was in active practice for about
nine years. He then moved to Lunenburg, where
LOWELL.
203
he lived until about 1854, then returning to Lowell,
where he died August 4, 1854.
He married, first, Elizabeth Kimball, of Lunen-
burg, and second, Nancy Stearns, of the same place.
He had nine children, one of whom is Jerome F.
Manning, Esq., of Lowell.
Nathan Allen, son of Moses and Mehitable (Ol-
iver) Allen, was born in Princeton, Massachusetts,
25th April, 1813.
His collegiate studies were pursued at Amherst,
where he was graduated in the class of 1836. He
studied medicine at Philadelphia, receiving his de-
gree in the^ spring of 1841, and in the fall of that
year he came to Lowell and entered upon the prac-
tice of his profession.
In his professional life of nearly fifty years in
Lowell, Dr. Allen was engaged in general practice,
and was highly esteemed and respected as a family
physician, but he was most widely known as a writer.
His first work in the field of letters began while he
was attending medical lectures, when he edited the
first three volumes of the Arnerican Phrenological
Journal, published in Philadelphia.
Dr. Allen published many papers during his life,
and was a frequent contributor to the daily press on
subjects of interest to the citizens. The following
list, which is by no means complete, includes papers
which are of great merit, and which have received
favorable criticism both in this country and in Eu-
rope, where his name is not unknown :
"The Opium Trade (1853), "The Law of Human
Increase,"' "The Intermarrage of Relatives,"'
"Physical Degeneracy,"' "The Medical Problems of
the Day,"'* "State Medicine in its Relations to In-
sanity,"' "Prevention of Diseases, Insanity, Crime
and Pauperism," " " Education of Girls," ' " Divorces
in New England,"' " Insanity in its Relation to the
Medical Profession and the State," ' " The Amherst
Gymnasium," " " Changes in the New England Popu-
lation.""
For twenty-nine years he served on the "gymna-
sium committee " of Amherst College, and his name
is held in grateful remembrance by all friends of that
institution. He was a member of the original Board
of Pension Examiners, and held this position until
within a few years of his death.
' QuarUrly Journal of Piychologicai iledicmt, April, 1868.
'Idem, April, 1869.
• Idem, October, 1870.
^AdduaI DlBcoarse before Maas. Me<L Society, Jane, 1874.
ft Read before the American Social Science Anociation, Detroit, Hay
13, 1875.
'Bead before the Conference of Charities at Cincinnati, May 22,
1878.
' Addreae before the American InfUtnte, Jnly 10, 1879.
■ North American Review, Jane, 1880,
*Bi»adat the Annual Meeting of the American Aasociation for the
Protection of the Inaane, New York, January 20, 1882.
loEesay read before American Academy of Medicine at Pittsburgh, Oc-
tober 12, 1886.
" Bead tiefore American Social Science Association at Saratoga, Sep-
tember 6. 1887.
In 1864 he was appointed by Governor Andrew a
member of the Massachusetts State Board of Chari-
ties. During the entire existence of the board, a
period of fifteen years, he continued a member, a por-
tion of the time serving as chairman. It devolved
upon him to write a number of the annual reports,
and these were prepared in such a thorough manner
that to-day they are held as authority upon the sub-
jects of which they treat.
In the last year of his life Dr. Allen collected and
published abook of 350 pages, containing about forty
of his most popular articles.
In this city he served for four years (1881, 1882,
1886 and 1887) on the Board of Health, being chair-
man the last year of his service. He was city physi-
cian in 1864 and 1865, and a member of the School
Board in 1851. For over twenty years he was on the
staff of St. John's Hospital, and for about the same
length of time president of the City Institution for
Saviugs.
He married twice — first, Sarah H. Spaulding,
daughter of Dr. Thaddeus Spaulding, of Wakefield,
Massachusetts, in 1841, and second, in 1858, Annie
W. Waters, of Salem, Massachusetts, who, with four
children, survives him.
He died 1st January, 1889.
Moses Kidder was the son of Isaac and Sarah
(Stickney) Kidder, of Billerica, where he was born
15th January, 1789. He was for two or three years
a student at Williams College and graduated as a
physician from a medical school then located at Fair-
field, prior to 1812. In 1812-13 he was assistant sur-
geon at Fort Warren. Later he taught school at
Hillsboro', New Hampshire, and among his pupils was
Franklin Pierce, late President of the United States.
He commenced practice at Littleton, Massachusetts.
He remained here about six months and then went to
Dublin, New Hampshire. In 1820 he moved from
Dublin to Ashby, Massachusetts. In 1827 he moved
to Townsend, where he lived until the autumn of
1841, when he moved to Lowell. -Here he engaged
in the practice of his profession until his death,
which occurred from disease of the heart May 5,
1855. He was married, 1st January, 1815, to Rachel
Shepard Kendrick, of Amherst, New Hampshire. He
had eight children, three of whom were physicians.
Of these, Drs. Walter and Moses Warren Kidder are
mentioned in this history. Their brother, Franklin
Kidder, was born at Ashby, Massachusetts, 26th June,
1826. He was graduated at the Albany Medical Col-
lege in 1857. He located in Middle Tennessee, where
he remained till after the war. Then he went to
Florida, where he married and died in 1872.
JosLAH Curtis was born at Wethersfield, Conn.,
April 30, 1816. His preparatory education was re-
ceived at the academy at Monson, Mass. Before en-
tering college he taught school for several years, and
he resumed this occupation for a short time after his
graduation. He received his degrees of A.B. (1840)
204
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
and A.M. from Yale College, and that of M.D. from
the Jefferson Medical College, in 1843.
Dr. Curtis commenced practice in Lowell, remain-
ing here until 1849, when he went to Boston. In
May, 1846, he delivered the annual public address at
the Lowell City Hall.
He made the study of the sanitary management of
large cities a prominent branch of his profession, and
twice visited Europe in pursuit of this subject. He
published numerous articles on ventilation and
kindred subjects, and was the author of a report on the
" Hygiene of Massachusetts,"' and earlier reports to
the Massachusetts Legislature on the registration of
births, marriages and deaths.
While in Lowell he took an active part in the
moral and physical improvement of that and neigh-
boring cities and towns, and was recognized as one of
the most thoroughly-educated physicians that ever
practiced here.
He served through the war, rising to the highest
medical rank in the volunteer service.
In 1872 he filled the position of surgeon, micro-
scopist and naturalist to the United States Geological
Survey, and in 1873 he became chief medical officer
to the United States Indian service, which he organ-
ized and placed on a useful footing.
It is claimed for him that he was the discoverer of
collodion, or liquid gun-cotton, but this claim is not
thoroughly marie out.
Dr. Curtis died at London, England, Aug. 1, 1833,
while traveling.
Abxer Hautwell Browx, son of Abner and
Polly (Ayer) Brown, was born in New Ipswich,
N. H.. July 6, 181ti. His family removed to Lowell
when he was fourteen years of age, and he en-
tered the High School, being a member of the first
class to graduate from that institution (1835). He
received his degree of A.B. from Dartmouth in 1839,
and for several years devoted himself to teaching,
with distinguished success. He attended medical
lectures at Dartmouth and at Xew Haven, receiving
his degree from Yale as valedictorian of the class of
1844. ^
He soon came to Lowell, where he engaged in ac-
tive practice, and although his work here was more
or less interrupted by his duties in connection with
his professorships, he early won the confidence of the
community, and acquired a good practice. He was
Professor of Chemistry in the Willoughby Medical
College, of Lake Erie, and when that school was re-
moved to Columbus, Ohio, he continued to occupy
his position as professor. In 1847 he received the ap-
pointment of Professor of Materia Medicaand Medi-
cal Jurisprudence in the Berkshire Medical Institute.
This office he retained until his death.
Dr. Brown was chosen by the local medical society
to deliver the first annual public oration (Feb. 26,
ead before the Americaa Med. Adflo. at BostoD, 1&49.
1845) in the Lowell City Hall. He was city physi-
cian of Lowell in 1847, '48, '49 and '50, and was cho-
sen secretary of the Middlesex North District Medi-
cal Society for 1850, but in November of that year he
was obliged to resign this position, on account of iU
health.
He married, April 13, 1847, Susan Augusta, daugh-
ter of Professor Shunleff, of Dartmouth. His death
occurred at Hanover, April 21, 1851.
Luther Blodgett Morse, son of Joseph and Ab-
igail (Stevens) Morse, was born in Rochester, Ver-
mont, 13th August, 1820. His preliminary education
was received at schools and academies in^his native
State. He studied medicine at Castleton and Wood-
stock, Vt., and at Hanover, N. H., being graduated
from Dartmouth in 1844.
Dr. Morse commenced practice in Lowell in 1845,
remaining here in active practice eighteen years. He
held various public offices while here ; was a member
of the City Council and a director of the City Li-
brary, and in 185(5 and '57 was city physician. He
was elected to the Legislature in 1853 and '54. He
was also connected with the State militia, serving as
surgeon of the Si-x'.h Regiment for six years.
He married, 17th September, 1856, Julia M.
Fletcher, daughter of Hon. Horatio Fletcher, of
Lowell.
He removed to Watertown, Mass., in 1863, where
he is now living. He has held offices as town phy-
sician and member of the School Board of Water-
town.
Augustus Masox was the son of William D. and
Mary A. (Bolton) Mason, of Waltham, Mass., where
he was born, 2d October, 1823. His family removed
to Lowell in his childhood. He received an academ-
ical education at New Hampton, N. H., and was grad-
uated at the Harvard Medical School in 18-H. He
practiced for a short time in South Dedham (now
Norwood), Mass., after which he spent a year in Paris.
On his return he practiced in Lowell (and Billerica)
ten years. He stood in high repute while here, and
in May, 1849, he delivered a public oration in the
City Hall, under the auspicies of the Middlesex Dis-
trict Medical Society.
Dr. Mason removed to Brighton in 1855, where he
practiced seventeen years. In 1873 he relinquished
practice on account of his wife's ill-health, and went
to Santa Barbara, California.
In 1877 he resumed his practice in Brighton, but
with impaired health, and he died in 1882. He mar-
ried, 6th December, 1850, Sarah Blanchard Rogers,
of Billerica.
Walter Buknham,^ son of Dr. Walter and Sub-
mit (Smith) Burnham, was born at Brookfield, Vt.,
12th January, 1808. He was graduated from the
University of Vermont in 1829, and entered upon the
practice of his profession in Guildhall, Vt. Thence
2 Vidt "Journal of American Medical Anociatiou," August IB, 1883.
; lyl^.
r/.
;^<ir/^-Z ^ <L^y e.
LOWELL.
205
he removed to Barre, and in 1846 he came to Lowell,
where he soon became engaged in a large practice,
mainly surgical.
Dr. Burnham was often called upon to fill positions
of trust and responsibility by the citizens of Lowell.
Among them were two terms of service in the Gene-
ral Court. While a member of the Legislature he
presented to that body a bill known as the " Anatomy
Act," which provided for the use of certain material
by the medical schools of the State and by physicians
for the purposes of dissection. Mainly through his
efforts the bill was passed, and with few, if any, mod-
ifications, is now a statute law of Massachusetts.
Although a general surgeon, he gave not a little at-
tention to ovariotomy. He made his first ovarian
operation in 1851, at a time when the almost univer-
sal sentiment of the medical world was opposed to
this operation. His first case was successful, and
others followed in rapid succession until, in 1881, his
whole number of cases was about two hundred and
fifty, of which more than seventy-five per cent, recov-
ered.
To him is due, also, the credit of having been the
first to remove, successfully, the uterus and its ap-
pendages by abdominal section, an operation which
at the time was naturally the topic of much discus-
sion, and was noticed in the medical journals abroad
as well as at hoi„
While in Vermont he was for some time treasurer
of the State Medical Society.
lu Lowell he served on the School Board in 1852,
'53, '57, '58, '72 and '73. He belonged to the Ameri-
can Medical Association, and was an honorary mem-
ber of the Connecticut, Rhode Island and Vermont
societies.
The doctor was especially beloved by young prac-
titioners, to whom he always extended a helping
hand. In all their difficulties and discouragements
an appeal was answered with kind words and gener-
ous acts.
He married, February 8, 1831, Annis, daughter of
Hon. Theophilus Crawford, of Putney, Vt., by whom
he had five children, three of whom are now living.
A son (Arthur) was graduated from West Point
second in his class, and at the time of his death was a
brevet-major of engineers in the United States Army.
When returning from a professional visit to New
York, in January, 1880, he received so severe an in-
jury to the left elbow as to necessitate an amputation
of the arm in the following year. From this time his
health gradually failed until his death, which occurred
January 16, 1883.
Walter Kidder, son of Moses Kidder, was born
June 18, 1823, at Ashby, Mass. He studied medicine
with his father and at the Harvard and Berkshire
Medical Schools, and was graduated at the latter school
in 184G. He commenced practice in Lowell with his
father, and continued in practice six years. Then he
moved to New York, resigning his practice and giving
his attention to an invention of his own for four or
five years. In the Civil War he served as surgeon to
Scott's "Nine Hundred," a body of cavalry from New
York. Next he located as a physician at Townsend,
Mass., about 1864. Two or three years later he set-
tled in Jersey City, N. J., where he died January 29,
1872. He was married, February 15, 1854, to Lucy
Rubs Burnap, of Lowell. He had three sons.
Joel Spalding, son of Jonathan and Sarah
(Dodge) Spalding, was born in Chelmsford (now Low-
ell) March 2, 1820.
He was fitted for college at Pinkerton Academy,
Derry, N. H., and was graduated at Dartmouth Col-
lege in the class of 1841. He received his medical de-
gree from the Berkshire Medical Institute of Pittsfield,
Mass., and then attended the College of Physicians
and Surgeons in New York City, serving for one year
as house physician at Bellevue Hospital.
In 1846 he commenced practice in Lowell, and he
remained here for over forty years, living and dying in
the house in which he was born.
In 1854 he was appointed coroner for Middlesex
County. In 1857 he was elected city physician for
the city of Lowell, and by successive elections held
the office for five years. He was one of the counsel-
ors for the Massachusetts Medical Society for many
years. He also held office in the Middlesex North
District Medical Society as counselor, vice-president
and president.
He served on the staff of St. John's Hospital from
its start (1866) until January, 1885.
The Masonic fraternity bestowed upon him high
honors. In 1854 he was chosen Worshipful Master
of Pentucket Lodge ; was High Priest of Mount
Horeb Chapter in 1856, '57 and '58 ; received the
degrees of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite to
the 32d, April 10, 1856, and on May 2l8t, 1862, was
elevated to the 33d and last degree.
Dr. Spalding never married. Although possessed
of an ample fortune, and by nature fond of society, he
dedicated his life unreservedly to his profession, and
died respected and beloved by the whole community
January 30, 1888.
Charles Augustus Savory, son of Charles and
Nancy (Vickery) Savory, was born in Beverly, Mass-
achusetts, 2oth December, 1813.
He studied medicine at Hanover, New Hampshire,
receiving the degree of M.D. in 1835. In 1842 his
alTna mater conferred upon him the honorary degree
of A.M.
He commenced practice in Hopkinton, New Hamp-
shire, and lived there until 1844. He was appointed
postmaster of Hopkinton in 1840, and from 1841 to
1843 was superintendent of the School Board. He
went to Warren, New Hampshire, in 1844 and resided
there a short time. Moving to Philadelphia, he was
appointed Professor of Midwifery in a Medical Col-
lege in that city, but he soon resigned his position.
Dr. Savory came to Lowell in 1848, and has been
206
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
in active practice here ever since. He lias devoted
much time to foreign travel and study, having been
abroad four times— in 1860, '66, 74 and '80. Although
a general practitioner, he has made special study of
the eye, and has been a close follower of Bowman,
Critchett, Wells and Lawson, of Moorfields, London.
He has also given much attention to general surgery,
having performed nearly every operation known to
the surgeon of to-day.
It may with fitness be mentioned here that he was
one of the earliest to perform the operation of ovari-
otomy. And with all his versatility, his operations
have been uniformly successful and often brilliant.
There are few men living to-day who can point to so
large, so varied and so successful a practice as can
Dr. Savory. He was one of the first surgeons in this
country to advocate the use of perfect antisepsis in
surgical operations, and his success has been in no
small measure due to this.
He is an accomplished French scholar withal — in
fact, a man of many parts. The writer of this paper
was 80 fortunate as to enter upon the study of medi-
cine under his pupilage and can speak from a per-
sonal knowledge of these facta.
While in New Hampshire the doctor was honored
in 1847 by being one of the members elected to ex-
amine candidates for the degree of M.D. at Dart-
mouth. And in 1848 he was chosen as a delegate to
the American Medical Association.
He has always taken a keen interest in the Middle-
sex North District Medical Society and has held
nearly every office in its gift, being president of this
society in 1860, '61 and '62.
He was a member of the original staff of St. John's
Hospital and for many years was chairman of the
board. He is now (1890) president of the Lowell
Institution for Savings.
Dr. Savory married, 9th May, 1838, Mary, daughter
of Dr. James Stark, of Hopkinton, New Hampshire.
Eben Kimball Sanborn,' son of Dr. John Tilton
and Mary (Kimball) Sanborn, wag born in Chester
(now Hill), New Hampshire, 24th of January, 1828.
He came to Lowell when twelve years of age, and his
preparatory education was received in the schools of
this city.
He studied medicine under the pupilage of his
uncle. Dr. Gilman Kimball, and on receiving his
degree at once stepped to the front rank of his pro-
fession.
In 1853 Dr. Sanborn was chosen lecturer on Path-
ological Anatomy in the Vermont State Medical
School, and he spent the following winter in visiting
the hospitals of England and Germany. At the close
of his first course of lectures in Vermont he became
connected with the Berkshire Medical Institution as
teacher of Anatomy, and in the following year was
elected Professor of Surgery in the same college.
1 Ftd< '* Conuniuiicationa Man. Med. Soc.," toL z. p. 163.
He also for some time filled the position of Profes-
sor of Surgery in the Medical Institute at Castleton,
Vermont, and at the same time practiced in Rutland.
He married, 10th of October, 1855, Harriet Williams,
daughter of John Avery, agent of the Hamilton
Mills, of Lowell.
The doctor was naturally of a mechanical turn of
mind, and invented a useful splint, named for him the
"Sanborn " splint.
He has published papers as follows: " Fractures of
the Patella, treated by Adhesive Straps ;" " Ligamen-
tous Union of the Radius and Ulna treated by Drill-
ing and Wiring after Failure by other Means ;" " Un-
united Fracture of the Humerus cured by the same
method ;" " A.New Method of Treating large Erectile
Tumors, with a Review of the Pathology of the Disease
and the Different Modes of Practice."
la April, 1861, he was commissioned surgeon to the
First Vermont Regiment, and went to Fortress Monroe.
He was thence sent to Newport News, where he became
post-surgeon. At the solicitation of General Butler,
he was transferred to the Thirty-first Massachusetts
Regiment, and sent to Ship Island, where he died the
3d of April, 1862.
Iba Loeiston Moore is the son of Ira and Mary
Gordon (Brown) Moore, of Chester, New Hampshire,
where he was born the 24th of November, 1824. He
went to Lowell in 1840, and after attending the public
schools there he prepared for college, entering Am-
herst in 1847. After leaving Amherst he studied
medicine in Lowell, with Dr. John W. Graves, and
at the Jefferson Medical College, at Philadelphia,
where he was graduated.
He commenced practice in Lowell, in partnership
with Dr, Graves, and after about a year he opened an
office by himself While in Lowell he was twice
elected director of the Public Library, and in 1856 he
was chosen representative to the General Court.
He removed to Boston in 1860, where for ten years
he devoted himself to the practice of medicine. Since
then he has been engaged in real estate business.
He is chairman of the executors and trustees of the
Chamberlain estate of Boston, and to him is largely
due the credit of constructing the Adams House of
that city.
In 1861 Dr. Moore was elected a member of the
Boston School Board for three years.
In 1865, '66, '70 and '71 he represented his district
in the Legislature.
January 1, 1873, he married Charlotte Maria,
daughter of Daniel and Maria Marble (Martin) Cham-
berlain. They have had two children, one of whom
is now living.
Moses Wabeen Kidder, son of Dr. Moses Kidder,
was bom at Townsend, Mass., September 11, 1828. He
studied medicine with his father and at the Harvard
and Berkshire Medical Schools. He received his de-
gree at the latter school in 1852. He then practiced
in Lowell with his father while he lived, and con-
LOWELL.
207
tinued his profession until October, 1870. He was a
member of the Lowell School Board in 1860 and
1861, and city physician in 1861, 1862 and 1863. In
1870, on account of ill health, he resigned his prac-
tice. In 1872 he moved to Boston, where he lived
until he went to Lincoln, in 1879. He resumed prac-
tice in Lincoln in 1881, where he still resides. He was
married, May 1, 1855, to Francis Maria Palmer, of
Thetford, Vt. He has had six children, all born in
Lowell and all now living.
Daniel Parker Gage, son of Daniel and Mary
(Gage) Gage, was born in Berlin, Mass., October 5,
1828. His preliminary education was received at the
Newbury (Vermont) Academy. He subsequently
taught school for several years before he commenced
the study of medicine. He received the degree of
M.D. from Harvard in 1855, and came at once to
Lowell, where he remained through his life. In 1865,
while making an autopsy, he was inoculated with the
virus, and for the remainder of his life suffered from
blood-poisoning, but, with great fortitude, he attended
to a large practice until almost the end.
Dr. Gage served as assistant surgeon in the Thirty-
third Massachusetts Regiment for seven months in
1862-63.
In March, 1867, he was appointed on the staff of
St. John's Hospital, a position which he held until
January, 1873. He was also for several years physi-
cian to St. Peter's Orphan Asylum. He attended the
meetings of the Middlesex North District Medical
Society with great regularity, and was president of
this society in 1875. Dr. Gage was a very popular
man, and was often urged to accept public positions.
He invariably refused all honors of this kind, with
the exception that he served for two years (1866 and
1867) on the School Board.
He married, September 22, 1857, Elizabeth Norcutt
Hammond, of East Cambridge.
William Bass, son of Joel, Jr., and Catharine
Wright (Burnham) Bass, was bom in Williamstown,
Vt., June 22, 1832. He received his degree of M.D.
in 1856, and came at once to Lowell, associating him-
self in practice with Dr. Walter Burnhan (q.v.).
In 1858 he left Lowell for the West, but at the end
of two years he returned. He served as assistant sur-
geon in the Sixth Regiment Massachusetts Volun-
teers for several months in 1864.
Dr. Bass is a general practitioner, although he has
given much attention to surgery. He has always
been a constant attendant on the meetings of the Mid-
dlesex North District Medical Society, and has been
elected to nearly every office in the gift of the society,
being president in 1884 and 1885. He has been on
the staff of the Corporation Hospital and is at present
on the surgical staff of St. John's Hospital. He has
been physician to the Old Ladies' Home from the
establishment of that institution. He married, Octo-
ber 5, 185G, Elizabeth Gates Hunt.
James Gerritt Bradt was born in Lowell, Sep-
tember 27, 1837. He was the son of Gerritt Jamee
and Selina Ann (Bayley) Bradt. He received his
early education in our public schools and at the age
of sixteen entered Harvard College. He left college
during junior year on account of hemorrhage from
the lungs and commenced the study of medicine.
He attended medical lectures at Harvard and in the
spring of 1858 was graduated from the College of
Physicians and Surgeons, New York. In 1859-60
he was Professor of Anatomy in the Medical College
at Worcester.
Dr. Bradt commenced practice in Lowell, but be-
fore he was fairly established he left for the seat of
war, being appointed assistantsurgeon of the Twenty-
sixth Massachusetts Regiment in September, 1861.
In September, 1862, he was made surgeon of the
regiment and was with ii in the campaign near New
Orleans and also accoropaniedSheridan in his famous
Shenandoah campaign. Much of the time while in
the army he acted as division surgeon. Leaving the
service in November, 1864, he returned to Lowell,
and became a partner with Dr. Burnham in 1865.
He married, June 6, 1865, Julia Burnham, his
partner's daughter. He was secretary of the Middle-
sex North District Medical Society in 1866 and was
re-elected in 1867, but was obliged to resign on ac-
count of ill health.
He died of consumption January 22, 1868.
George Henry Whitmore, son of Levi and
Mehitable Ellen (Edgell) Whitmore, was born in
Stow, Mass., July 27, 1821. He received his degree
at the Berkshire Medical College in 1845 and com-
menced practice in Roxbury, but his health failing,
he went to California, and afterward to London and
Paris, where he studied in the hospitals for one year.
On returning to this country he went to the Sand-
wich Islands.
Dr. Whitmore began practice in Lowell in 1861
and remained here until his death. Although his
residence here was unfortunately brief, he occupied a
high position professionally and socially, and his
name will be long held in remembrance as one of
the three founders of the Young Men's Christian
Association in this cit)-. He married Lizzie A.
Calef, of Lowell, June 27, 1861.
He was chosen resident physician of the Corpora-
tion Hospital May 1, 1866, and he served acceptably
until his death, which occurred May 18, 1869.
Francis Charles Plunkett, son of Joseph
Plunkett, barrister, and Frances (French) Plunkett,
was born at Castlemore House, County Mayo, Ire-
land, March 13, 1842.
He was educated at the Diocesan Seminary, BaUa-
ghederrin, same county. He passed the preliminary
examination at the Royal College of Surgeons in
Dublin in 1859 and was at once apprenticed to Dr.
Andrew Dillon. He was graduated at the same col-
lege in 1863, after which he spent a year at the Bal-
laghederrin and Loughlin Dispensaries.
208
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Dr. Plunkett came to this country in 1S64 and im-
mediately joined the One Hundred and Eighty-third
Ohio Volunteers as assistant surgeon. After one
year's service he was mustered out, having spent four
months in charge of the Berry House Hospital, Wil-
mington, N. C, and several months with the Invalid
Corps at Washington. He then passed the examina-
tion for the United States Army and received a com-
mission as assistant surgeon, but declined it, prefer-
ring private practice.
He came to Lowell in 1865 and has been here in
active practice for the past twenty-five years. At
first he was almost the only Catholic practitioner in
the city and his practice soon became very extensive.
Being thoroughly educated, naturally popular and
with a robust constitution, he has maintained during
all these years perhaps the most extensive practice in
Lowell.
The doctor was one of the consulting surgeons to
the Board of Health at the time of the small-pox
epidemic, in 1871. He was on the original staff of
St. John's Hospital and to-day is president of the
board. He has give;i but little attention to politics,
but served as alderman in 1887.
Dr. Plunkett has been twice married, — first, to
Alice Ann Martin, in 1869; second, to Mary Anna
McDuff, in 1876.
Lorenzo Smith Fox, son of Ralph and Sophia
(AVebster) Fox, was born in Dracut, February 7,
1840.
He received his degree of M.D. at Harvard in 1863,
and on the 23d of March that yearentered the service
as assistant surgeon of the Twenty-sixth Massachusetts
Regiment. He remained with this regiment until
July, 1864, serving in the Louisiana campaign, and
taking part in the Red River expedition under Gen-
eral Banks. He re-entered the army in this month
(July) as assistant surgeon U. S. A., and served in
front of Petersburg and Richmond until the close of
the Rebellion, and was one of the first to enter Rich-
mond.
He commenced practice in Lowell in 1865, and has
been here in active practice ever since. He has given
special attention to surgery, and more particularly to
gynaecology. He has performed the operation of
ovariatomy many times, and with distinguished suc-
cess. He read a paper entitled " Ten Cases of Ab-
dominal Section " before the Gynascological Society
of Boston in 1885, and is now writing for publication
a paper " Seventy -seven Cases of Abdominal Section,"
these being in addition to the first ten.
Dr. Fox has been connected with the Corporation
Hospital since the formation of the staff in Novem-
ber, 1881.
Dr. Fox is a member of the Loyal Legion tJ. S. A.,
and for several years was surgeon of Post 42. He
served on the School Board in 1876-77. He was coun-
cilor of the Middlesex North District Medical Society
for many years, and was president of the society
in 1876-77. He is a member of the American Medi-
cal Association, the British Medical Association and
the Boston Gynaecological Society.
The doctor has been thrice married. He married
Lizzie S. Swan (his present wife) May 19, 1880.
Moses Greeley Parker,' son of Theodore and
Hannah (Greeley) Parker, was born in Dracut, Oct.
12, 1842. His preliminary education was received at
the Howe School in Billericaand at Phillips Andover
Academy, and he commenced the study of medicine
under the pupilage of Drs. Nathan Allen and Jona-
than Brown taking his degree from Harvard in 1864.
Passing the army and navy examination, he was
assigned to the Fifty-seventh Massachusetts Regiment
of Volunteers as assistant surgeon, but by request of
General Butler was transferred to Fortress Monroe,
and was mustered into service as assistant surgeon
Second U. S. Colored Cavalry April 10, 1864, and
was in engagements at Suffolk, Drury's Bluff, Point of
Rocks, siege of Petersburg and Richmond.
He was honorably discharged May 24, 1865, and
the following year entered the general practice of
medicine in Lowell, where he now resides.
Dr. Parker has devoted much time to literature and
has gained an enviable notoriety as a writer on scien-
tific topics.
In 1873 he visited Europe, spending a year in
Vienna, and after taking short courses at Berlin,
Paris and London, returned to his practice in Lowell.
In 1875, under the auspices of the " .Ministry at
Large," he opened a free dispensary (see reports of
Ministry at Large for 1875, '76, '77, '78 and '79.)
The doctor invented a thermo-cautery for medical
use in 1876. He was appointed trustee of the Howe
School, February 6, 1877.
He discovered and demonstrated by photography a
peculiar rotary motion in lightning and other elec-
trical currents in 1886. He was appointed on the
staff of St. John's Hospital in January, 1889. He
has always taken a deep interest in the Middlesex
North District Medical Society, and for the past
seven years has been a councilor of that society. Dr.
Parker has read and published papers as follows:
" Early History of the Schools and Academies in
Billerica,"' " A Thermo-Cautery," ^ "Photo-Micog-
raphy, the Best Means of Teaching and Illustrating
Pathology," * " Peculiar Rotary Motion found in
1 Uis father was Theodore Parker, bud of Peter, son of Kendiill, bud of
JonmhaD, Jr., aoo of Jonathan, son of Deacon Tboniaa Parker, "bo w«»
hU flret American ancestor, emigrating from England at the age of
thirty, in the "Suaan and Ellen," in 1635, settled in Lynn, was admit-
ted freeman of the Colony 17th May, 1737, and ufternards removed to
Reading, Mass.
His mother was Hannah Greeley, daughter of Deacon Moses Greeley,
Hudson, N. H., and JIary Derby, Harvard, Mass. Deacon Moses Gree.
ley was the son of Joseph, son of Benjamin, son of Joseph, son of An-
drew Greelie. who came from England and settled in Salisbury, Mass.,
and was deputy of Salisbury in 1640.
• Lnicill Courier Juno 28, 1878.
^Tmns. of the " Am. Med. Asso.," 1882, vol. 33, p. 243.
•Trans. " Xinth International Med. Congress," Washington, 1887,
vol. 3, p. 432.
LOWELL.
209
LightniDg and other Electrical Currents,'" " Light-
ning.''^ " Early Cases of the use of Electrolyais for
Myomata." '
Dr. Parker early saw the advantages of the tele-
phone and became interested in its introduction as
early as 1879. He has been enthusiastic in its ad-
vancement and it* success, and has been identified in
many com])auies as a director and in the New Eng-
land Telegraph and Telephone Company, not only
as a director, but as one of the executive commit-
tee for years.
The doctor is unmarried.
John Hexky Gilm.^n was the son of John and
Sarah Coffin (Gilman) Oilman, of Sangerville, Me.,
where he was born February 24, ISiiti. He received
his education in the Lowell public schools, at Phillips
Andover Academy, and at Harvard Medical School,
where he was graduated in 1863. In March, 1863, he
entered the army as assistant surgeon of the Tenth
Massachusetts Regiment, serving until July, 1804.
In August, 1864, he re-entered the service as acting
assistant surgon of the United States .\rmy, and was
in charge of Wards 9 and 10, Mt. Pleasant Hospital,
Washington, D. C, until the close of the war. He
took part in engagements at Chancellorsville, Gettys-
burg, Wilderness, Spott-sylvimia, (!old Harbor and
Petersburg.
Dr. Gilman commenced practice in Lowell in 1866,
and remained here until within a few weeks of his
death. He gave especial altenlioii to surgery and
was a well-read and skillful .surgeon. He was city
physician in 1869 and '70, and was appointed on the
stafl'of St. John's Hospital in Augu.st, 1874, where he
served faithfully until his death. Li 1871, during the
small-pox epidemic, lie \vascho»i»n oneof the consult-
ing physicians tu tlie liuard of Health. In the sum-
mer uf 1874 he visited l^uioiie, and spent nearly a year
in study and travel. In 1880 he re-visited Europe for
a few monlhs, He was a forcible and decided writer
and he contrilmted several articles o'' high merit to
the Boston Meili-v/ and Hni rjiml Journal. He read an
bssay on " Diphtheria " before the Massachusetts Med-
ical Society at the annual meeting in June, 1877. He
met with an accident early in the present year (1890),
while visiting a patient in Dracut from the effects of
which he gradually failed until he was obliged to
close his office iu the month of May. He went to
his sister's home, in East Barringtou, N. H., on the
1 Brad Iwfor"- th« S. T Electrical ijliih X.jieiiilier 1."., 188S. Tub. in
Club Cireuhir X... 15.
EUclriral R-iUir. NoTeraber 2t, 1888, vol. 1.3, No. l^i, p. 0.
Engineering, LoDdoD, Eng.. Decelnlwr 21, 1888, vol. 44, No. 1199, p.
593.
"Summary of I'rogre*^.;," EUctricd bevirtc, vol. 13, No. 19, p. 2.
Miud. Institute of TecliDology, I'roc».e<liTigd of the Society of ,\rta,
lS»)<-v.i. p. 48.
■- Read liefore the Boston Electrical Clnl., NovejoUer C, ISSO. Pub. in
Modern l.i'jid and Hiil, UmsIju, .Novemlier 20, 13S9, vol. i\ Ko. 12, p.
3fiT.
^"Annals of fiyneecology," .\pril, ISO', p. 12").
14-ii
28th of May, and rapidly failing, died on the 11th
of June. The doctor was unmarried.
Franklin Niceerson was born in Hingham,
Mass., 8th September, 1838, and is the son of Anson
and Sally Ann (Downs) Nickerson. He was gradu-
ated from Harvard College in the class of 1863, and
he pursued his medical studies at the Bellevue Hos-
pital Medical College and at the Harvard Medical
School, receiving his degree of M.D. from the latter
institution in 1865.
During the closing months of McClellan's Peninsu-
lar campaign he was employed by the United States
Sanitary Commission as physician and surgeon, and
in November, 1863, he was appointed assistant surgeon
in the United States Navy. He resigned his commis-
sion in November, 1864, and in the spring of 1865 he
opened an office in Chicago. Here he gave clinical
instruction in diseases of the chest, at the United
States Marine Hospital, and in company with a com-
mittee from the Chicago Academy of Science, inves-
tigated the pork-packinghouses of that city, in study-
ing the origin of the trichinal disease then prevalent
in the West.
Dr. Nickerson came to Lowell in 1866, and has
practiced medicine here since that. time. He married,
I4th November of that year, Mary Wallace Lincoln,
of Hingham, Mass. During his residence in Lowell
he has held the following offices : Surgeon of Post 42,
G. A. R. ; physician to the Lowell Dispensary from
I7th January, 1867 to 5th June, 1875; medical exam-
iner for the Mutual Life Insurance Company, of New
York, and several other life insurance companies ;
physician to the Lowell jail, nearly all the offices in
the Middlesex North District Medical Society, physi-
cian to St. John's Hospital since 1889, correspondent
of the State Board of Health, a member of the Lowell
School Board (1877-79), a trustee of the Lowell Insti-
tution for Savings since 6th May, 1879, and chairman
of the Committee on Library and Reading-room of
the Mechanics' Association since September, 1882.
In the year 1874 he was chosen superintendent of the
Lowell Hospital, but declined the appointment.
While on the School Board he took a prominent
part iu the revision of its by-laws, and one of the
most important of the changes effected here by him
was the addition of the department of hygiene to the
province of the committee on school-houses.
He has been a member of the Boston Natural His-
tory Society for nearly thirty years. He assisted in
the preparation of the " Flora of Middlesex County,"
which was published in 1888, and wrote an elaborate
review of that work.*
As chairman of the Library Committee of the Me-
chanics' Association he has performed a large amount of
labor in the preparation of the catalogue and of anno-
tated lists of books. In co-operation with the libra-
rian, he has also done other bibliographical work,
* Lowell DaOy Vititm, August 29, 1»88.
210
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, :\IASSACHUSETTS.
which is recorded in the library reports, of which he
has been the author since 1882.
The report of the School Committee for the year
1878 was written by him. In this report the subject
of school hygiene is minutely discussed.
For several years the correspondence on the health
of towns was a leading feature in the reports of the
State Board of Health. In this correspondence Low-
ell appears very prominently. Among the most im-
portant subjects investigated by the Lowell correspon-
dent were epidemics of diphtheria and cerebro-spinal
meningitis, the burial of the dead and cases of poi-
soning by arsenic and trichina.
In a summary of the seven years' work of the State
Board of Health, published in 1876, by \V. L. Rich-
ardson, M.D., occur these words : " The report foi
1875 contained a paper by Dr. F. Nickerson, of Low-
ell, in which the present sanitary condition of that
city was treated of at considerable length, and manv
valuable suggestions were made as to the great ad vac -
• tage to be derived from the establishment of local
Boards of Health." For these and other services to the
State, honoraria were twice conferred.
Joseph Haven Smith, son of John and Betsy
(Roberts) Smith, was born in Rochester, N. H., Nov.
17, 1805.
He prepared for college at Rochester, but instead
of pursuing his studies further he taught school for
several years. He begau his medical study in tht
oflSce of Dr. James Farrington, of Rochester, being
graduated at Bowdoin in the class of 182"J.
For three years he practiced in Rochester, moving
to Dover in 1832, where he remained until 1867, when
he came to Lowell.
Although he lived here nearly twenty years, his
history is, for the most part, associated with New
Hampshire, where he received honors which are ac-
corded to few.
He represented Dover in the State Legislature in
1837. In 1848 he was chosen one of the Presiden-
tial electors, who gave the vote of the State to Lewis
Cass for President of the United States.
In 1849 he was president of the New Hampshire
State Medical Society, was in the Governor's Council
in 1851 and '52, and in the State Senate in 1854 and
'55.
He was at one time a trustee of the State (N. H.)
Lunatic Asylum, director of a railroad corporation,
president of a bank and a member of the Dover
School Board. He likewise had the honor of being
appointed delegate from the State Society to the
Medical College in Hanover, and delivered the an-
nual address before the graduating class in 1848.
While in Dover he was editor of the Dover Gazette,
and for a number of years after coming to this city he
edited the Lowell Times. He was a good writer, clear,
concise and to the point. In spite of the demands
which his political and editorial duties made upon
his time he always had a large general practice, and
he was a well-read and skillful physician. The doctor
married twice^first, Meribah Hanson, of Rochester,
in 1830, and second, Harriet Spooner Wiggin, of
Dover, in 1865. He died in Lowell Feb. 23, 1885.
Dr. Hermon J. Smith {q.c), of this city, is his son.
Kirk Henry Bancroft was born in Lowell
Sept. 10, 1839. He was the son of Jefferson and
Harriet (Bradley) Bancroft, daughter of Dr. Amos
Bradley, of Dracut. His preliminary education was
received at the Lowell High School and at Westford
Academy. He served as a private in the Sixth Jlassa-
chusetta Regiment during the nine months' cam-
paign, being detailed to the hospital department.
He then studied medicine at the Pittsfield Medical
."School, and was graduated there iu 1864. He at once
re-entered the service, being appointed assistant
surgeon in the United States Navy, and served on
board the U.S. S. S. "Iosco" until the summer of
1.S65.
Dr. Bancroft settled in Duxbury, Jlass., in the fall
of 1865, and remained there until 1867, when he came
to Lowell. Here he was in the office of Dr. Walter
Burnham until his death, which occurred Oct. 16,
1860. He married, Oct. 27, 1.S68, Jane Porter, daugh-
ter of Dr. .lohn Porter, of Duxl)ury.
Waltkr Hf.nry Leiohtun, son of Andrew and
Mary Ann (Langley) Leightou, was born in Lowell
Sept. 14, 1842. He was educated iu the Lowell pub-
lic schools, at the Newbury (Vt.) Collegiate Institute,
and at Jefferson Medical School, where he received
his degree of M.D. in 1864. He entered the army as
assistant surgeon in 1864, and was mustered out in
1866.
He commenced practice in Lowell iu 1867, where
he remained until 1886. He was city physician in
1871 and 72, and in 1885 was elected a member of the
School Board for two yearr>. He has tilled nearly
every office iu the Middlesex North District Medical
Society, and was elected president in the spring of
1886. In this year he left Lowell to fill the position
of surgeon to the Soldiers' National Home, at Togus,
Me. In 1888 he was transferred to the National
Home at Milwaukee, Wis., where he is now serving a*
surgeon.
Dr. Leighton visited Europe in 1876 for purposes of
medical study, and while there was elected a Fellow of
the London Jledical Society and the London Obstet-
rical Society.
He has been prominently identified with the Grand
Army of the Republic, and in 1888 was an aid-de-
camp of the National Commander's Staff.
The doctor has been twice married. He married,
first, Fannie .Maria French, at Lowell, and second,
Sarah Slteiihenson, at Togus, .Me., Feb. 22, 1887.
Alfred Willis La Vigne, son of Dosithc and
Marie (Morin) La Vigne, was born at ."?t. Sesaire,
Canada, 0th March, 1839. He left Canada for the
States in 1858. He served as a private in the war
about four months in 1865, and after that commenced
LOWELL.
211
his medical education. He received his degree of
M.D. from Jefl'erson Medical Collejre, Philadelphia,
in 18G9. He commenced practice in Nashua, N. H.
.but remained there only a few months, coming to
Lowell in December, 18G9. His practice, which is
quite extensive, is mainly among the French resi-
dents. For the past four years he has been a coun-
cilor of the Middlesex North District Medical Soci-
ety. The doctor married Mary Elizabeth Conant, 3d
July, 1S77.
George Harlin Pillsbdry, son of Dr. Harlin
(y. I'.) and Sophia Bigelow (Pratt) Pillsbury, was born
in Lowell, 8th June, 18i3. He attended the Lowell
High School and Dartmouth College, receiving his
degree of A.B. from Dartmouth in the class of 18GG.
He was graduated from Harvard Medical .Sch<iol in
181)9. Immediately after his graduation he went to
Europe, where he remained one year, most of the lime
in the hospitals in Paris. He entered upon the prac-
tice of his profession in Lowell in June, 1870, where
he now remains.
He married, oth June, 187:;, Mary Augusta Boyden,
of Lowell. The doctor has given no attention to
politics, although he has served five year.^ on the
Lowell Schoul Board. He ila^ served on the stall' ol
St. John's Hospital since 187o, ami was presiilent ol
the Middlesex North District Medical Society in
1878 and 1879.
Dr. Pillsbury is a thoroughly educated man, a good
writer and a ttnished speaker. He has devoted his
jife nevertheless to the assiduous duties of a hard-
working family i)liysician, with a l.irge practice, and
is to-day perlia|)s the best rej)reseniative of the gen-
eral practitioner in the city.
He1!Mi.).N" JitsKi'H Sjiitii, son iif J().-,eph Haven
(</. c.) and Mcribali (Hansoiij Smith, w:l^ born at
Dover, N. H., Nov. l-j, 1830. He prepared for col-
lege at the Lowell High School, being graduated at
Tufts in 1808, the hrst cla.ss that was graduated al
that college. For four or five years he taught school,
first at Dover and later at Woodstock, Vl. He studied
medicine at Harvard and at Dartmouth, receiving his
degree from the lattei- college in ISiiii.
While a medical .student lie entered the army, and
served as assistant surgeon from October, 1864, until
the spring of l^^GG, in the Western Department under
General Brisbin.
Dr. Smith commenced practice in New York City,
and remained there until 1871, when he came to Low-
ell, where he still resides.
In 1874 he was apjiointed superintendent of the
Corporation Hospital, a position he filled acceptably
for eight years, serving afterwards four years on the
stafl' of this hospital. He was city physician in
1873, '74, '7o, '7G and '77.
Dr. Smith has been a member <>[ the board of
pension examiners from the date of its organization,
October 1, 1S.S3. He was a member of the School
Committee in 1S83 and '84.
In 1885 and 1886 he was Master of Kilwinning
Lodge, F. and A. M. He is the present president of
the Middlesex North District Medical Society.
He was married, Oct. 2G, 1865, at Woodstock, Vt.,
while on a furlough, to Isabella Sarah Anderson, of
Woodstock.
Abnek Wheelee Buttrick, son of John Adams
and Martha (Parkhurst) Buttrick, was born in Lowell
August 28, 1842. He was educated at Phillips An-
dover Academy and at Williams College, where he
was graduated in the class of 1865. He received his
medical education at Harvard, taking his degree of
.M.D. in the class of 1869. While a medical student
he served in company with Dr. George H. Pillsbury
('/. r.j, nine months a.s interne in the Marine Hospital
in Chelsea, during the superintendency of Dr. John
W. Graves.
In the summer of 1869 Dr. Buttrick visited Europe
for the purpose of study, and he spent two years in
tiie hospitals of Dublin, Edinburgh and Paris. On
returning he found Lowell in a state of excitement,
owing to the small-pox epidemic, and he offered his
services as physician to the pest-house. He served
here with skill and heroism, not giving up his posi-
tion even when, in the discharge of his duties, he was
attacked with varioloid.
For about ten years he was in active practice, and
in that time attained a good patronage, besides at-
tending to an immense amount of charity work. Dur-
ing nearly the whole of this period he was a mem-
ber of St. John's Hospital staff, physician to St.
Peter's ( )rphan Asylum, and physician to the Low-
ell Dispensary. In 1872-75 he was secretary of the
Middlesex North District Medical Society. In 1880
his health failed and he was obliged to relinquish
his practice. He died, unmarried, March 27, 1882,
of consumption.
Cviu'S Me.ntok FlsK, son of Ephraim and Mar-
garet (Dow) Fisk, was born in Chichester, N. H.,
.Fan nary 9, 1825. His early life was spent in Hop-
kinton, N. H., and in April, 1847, he began practice
in Contoocookville, Hopkini*)ii.
In the fall of 1848 he moved to Bradford, N. H.,
where he remained in active practice until the
spring of 1872. While in Contoocookville he was
superintendent of schools, and he held a similar of-
fice for several years in Bradford.
November 4, 1862, he enlisted as private in the
Sixteenth Regiment New Hampshire Volunteers,
and was given his commission as assistant surgeon
of that regiment. For nine months he served in
the Department of the Gulf under General Banks.
He was in many engagements, the most important
being the siege of Port Hudson. At Butte a La
Kose he was post surgeon, and on the 13th of June,
18G3, he was commissioned surgeon. Of the four
surgeons connected with the regiment, Dr. Fisk was the
only one in service for several months prior to August
20, 18G3, when he was mustered out of the service.
212
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
In April, 1872, he settled in Lowell, entering into
partnership with Dr. C. A. Savory, and remaining
with him for twelve years. Since then he has been
in practice by himself.
He has been a member of the statf of St. Jobn'»
Hospital since 1880, and was on the Lowell School
Board in 1877-78.
He was appointed pension examiner October 1,
1883, and is a member of the board to-day. He is
a trustee of the Lowell Institution for Savings, and
vice-president of the Middlesex North District Med-
ical Society. He married Amanda Melvina Putnam
at Hopkinton, December 8, 1848.
William Michael Hoar, son of Michael and
Catharine Cecilia (Ford) Hoar, was born in Lowell
22d November, 1849. He spent one year at the Jesuit
College in Georgetown, D. C, and then went to Holy
Cross College, Worcester, where he was graduated in
the class of 1870. He studied medicine at the Beilevue
Hospital Medical College, N. Y., receiving his degree
in 1873.
Dr. Hoar at once settled in Lowell, where he re-
mained until hia death. He was fond of polities and
served as chairman of the Democratic City Commit-
tee and represented his district in the Legislature for
one year, and in 187ti, '77, '78 and '70 was a nieml)er
of the Lowell School Committee. In the .<iummer of
1885 he was appointed pension examiner by Presi-
dent Cleveland, a position which he held until the
fall of 1880.
He married, 20th October, 1875, Mary Augusta
Welch, of Lowell.
His death occurred suddenly on the 9th of Janu-
ary in the present year (1890).
John Carroll Irish, son of Cyrus and Catha-
rine (Davis) Irish, was born at Buckfield, Me., 3iHb
September, 1843.
He received his degree of A. B. at Dartlnouth in
the class of 1868, and liis medical degree at the Relle-
vue Hospital Medical College in 1872.
He commenced practice in Buckfield, remaining
there until November, 1874, when he came to Lowell.
While in Maine he was a- member of the Board of
Examining Surgeons of Pensions.
He has been in Lowell since 1874, and has prac-
ticed surgery almost exclusively, giving especial atten-
tion to ovariotomy. Up to this date (June, 1800) he
has made ninety-six abdominal sections, priucipally
ovariotomies and hysterectomies.
He has read and published papers as follows:
' Reasons for the Early Removal of Ovarian Tum-
ors,'" "A Discussion of the Statistics of Ovarioto-
my,"" "Two and one-half Years' Experience in Ab-
dominal Surgery," ' " Laparotomy for Pus in the
Abdominal Cavity and for Peritonitis,'' * " Treat-
1 Boiloii Medical and Surgical Journal, April 10, 1884.
» Ihut., August 19, 1686.
'Ibid., December 27, 1888.
' B«ul befure Uius. Med. Society in Boston, June 7, 1887.
ment of Uterine Myo-Fibromata by Abdominal Hys-
terectomy." '
He was appointed medical examiner lor this dis-
trict in 1877 by Governor Rice, and at the expiration
of his terra of seven years, in 1884, was re-appoint-
ed by Governor Robinson, and, by virtue of that ap-
pointment, is still in office.
He married, 17th July, 1872, Annie March Frye,
daughter of Major William R. Frye, of Lewiston,
Maine. '
Burnham Roswell Ben:ner, son of Burnham
Clark and Frances Maria (Talpey) Benner, was born
in Pittston, Me., lOlh April, 1847. After a full course
at the Roxbury (JIass.) High School he taught for
several years at Curnwall-on-the-Hudson. He at-
tended lectures at the Harvard Medical School and
the College of Physicians ind Surgeons, N. Y., re-
ceiving his degree from the latter school in 1875.
He practiced medicine one year in Lowell, when
he removed to Concord, N. H.,to accept an appoint-
ment as assistant physician in the New Hampshire
Asylum for the Insane. This position he held for
nine years, and in 1885 he returned to Lowell, where
he is now in practice, giving special attention to dis-
eases of the nervous system and the brain. For the
past two years he has had charge of the clinic for
this class of diseases at the Out-Patient Department
of St. John's Hospital. In 1880 Dr. Benner was
nppointed by the Governor one of the trustees of the
Massachusetts Hospital for Dipsomaniacs and Ineb-
riates.
He married, C>th February, 1S70, Carrie, daughter
of Dr. ,T. P. Bancroft, former superintendent of the
( 'oncord Asylum.
FRASri.>i AVait.^ Chadboik.ve, Son of Francis
Watts and Eliza (Bacon) < 'hadbourne, was born in
Ke.inebunk, Me., 2-ld of October, 1843. He entered
Bowdoin <"i)lleg(' in lSti3, and ;it the end of his sopho-
more year was obliged to relinquish his academical
studies on account of ill health.
He studied medicine at the Portland School for
Medical Instruction, and at Bowdoin, receiving his
degree from the latter school in 1860. He then spent
one year in Boston, attending private courses at the
Harvard Medical School.
Dr. Chadbourne commenced practice in Orono,
Me., remaining there until 1876, when he settled in
Lowell. He ha.s devoted himself strictly to the prac-
tice of his [)rofession and has never sought public
honors. He ha.s been on the statT of the Corporation
Hospital the [)ast nine years and is now chairman of
the staff. He married, June 24, 1874, Ella Maria
Whitney, of Brookline, Mass.
John Jav Colton, son of Quintus Curtius and
Abigail (Jocelyn) Colton, of Georgia, Vt., where he
was born May 12, 1830, was graduated at Amherst
College in 1S55. For a number of years he taught
^ Read before the Miisb. Medical Society in Boston, June 10, IS!J0.
LOWELL.
213
school, being instructor in natural sciences in the
Lowell High School eight years.
He studied medicine in Philadelphia, graduating at
the University of Pennsylvania in 1800. He lived iu
Philadelphia until 1872, devoting hi.s attention to the
administering of nitrous oxide gas. After this he was
in Boston three years in the drug business. He com-
menced practice in Lowell in ISTti, and has continued
in practice there up to the pre.-'ent time.
Dr. Colton was city physician of Lowell in 1880-
81-82, and a member of the Lowell .School Board in
1876-77-80-81.
He was married, December 23, 185G, to Czarina
Currier Varnum, of Dracut. Has had two children,
both of whom are living. He published a paper on
the "Physiological Action of Nitrous-Oxide Gas"
(1871).
He went into the army in the spring of 1804 as
paymaster's clerk, and was appointed paymaster in
February, 180-3 ; was mustered out in Sef)tenilier, 1S65.
William Hexry L.^throi-, son of William Me-
Cracken and Charlotte Elizabeth (Belcher) Lathrop,
was born in Enfield, Mass., March 11, 1840. He was
educated at the Boston Latin School and at Harvard
College, being graduated from the latter institution
in the class of 1803. He studied medicine in Phila-
delphia, receiving his degree of M.D. from the Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania in 1S05. He settled in De-
troit, Michigan, where he reniiiined ten years. While
there he was Professor of Physiology in the I)etroit
Medical College and editor of the Ih-lroil lieiicir oj
Mecliciiii aiul J'h<irmaci/ (now the Detroit Lnn'cf) from
1868 to 1873. He was phy.sician to the Detroit Re-
treat for the Insane four years and physician to the
County Insane Asylum, near Detroit, two years.
In 187."i he was appointed physician to the State
Almshouse at Tewksbury and remained there eight
years. Doctor Lathrop came to Lowell in 1883 and
has been in practice here since that time.
In the late war he was private in the Forty-fourth
Massachusetts Pegiraent, and assistant surgeon in
the Fifty-fifth Massachusetts Regiment, also acting
assistant surgeon in the United States Army with the
Army of the Potomac. He married May Saflbrd, of
Detroit, September 6. 1871.
CoRPOR.\Tiox Ho.SPITAL.— In 1839 the Lowell
Corporations agreed " to establish and maintain a
Hospital for the convenience and comfort of the per-
sons employed by them when sick or needing medical
or surgical treatment," and "to contribute funds
necessary for that purpose."
There was no hospital of any kind in Lowell at that
time. Articles were drawn up and executed in legal
form, under which the Lowell Hospital Association
has existed for fifty years.
The Kirk Boott House — at that time the best house
in Lowell — pleasantly situated at the corner of Merri-
mack and Pawtucket Streets, on high land overlook-
ing the Merrimack River, was purchased for this pur-
pose. Additions have been made from time t» time
to the original building. This contains on the first
Hoor a reception-room, a nurses' parlor, consulting-
rooms and waiting-rooms for the out-patient depart-
ment, and private dining-rooms. On the second story
are the sleeping apartments of the hospital ofiicers
and nurses. This floor also contains private isolated
rooms for abdominal operations and for convalescence
therefrom.
In rear of the administration building is an ell
containing the kitchen and laundry. At the side of the
administration building is the hospital proper, with a
male ward down-stairs and a female ward up-stairs.
Besides the large rooms, containing several beds, there
are a few private rooms in each ward. Beyond this
building is the contagious ward, erected in 1887. In
the rear of the hospital wards are the dispensary,
waiting-rooms and operating-room.
The hospital contains forty-six beds for patients.
The largest number of patients at any one time was
thirty-nine, and the largest number of patients
treated in any one year was three hundred and ten,
in 1889. The total number of patients occupying
beds in the hospital since its foundation is four thou-
sand, eight hundred and sixty-eight.
The management is in the hands of a Board of
Trustees, the members of which are the local agents
of the several corporations, together with (since 1882)
two citizens at large, one of these being the mayor of
the city for the time being.
In the early history of the hospital the patients
were in charge of a resident physician, whose wife
generally received the appointment of matron.
The following physicians have served as resident
phvsicians: Oilman Kimball, M.D., appointed Dec.
27. 1839, served twenty-six years ; G. H. Whitmorc,
M.D., appointed May 1, 1860, died May 18,1869;
J. W. Graves, M.D., appointed July 19, 1869, died
Nov. 28, 1873; H. J. Smith, M.D., appointed Feb.,
1874, resigned June, 1881.
Upon the establishment of the visiting staff, the
office of resident physician was abolished until July,
1886, when the following appointment was made :
C. E. Simpson, M.D., superintendent, July, 1886.
As stated above, the wives of various resident
physicians held the position of matron in the earlier
days of the hospital. Since the reorganization the
following ladies have held that position :
Miss E. M. Duren, matron, Aug., 1882, to March,
1S87; Miss C. B. Whitford, matron and superintend-
ent of Training-School, May, 1887.
In 1881 the hospital was placed in charge of a staff
of visiting physicians and surgeons who gave their
services gratuitously. The staff at first consisted of
four members and later of six members. The first
staff' organized November 18, 1881. The following is
a list of physicians who have served on the staff, with
the approximate dates of their appointments and res-
ignations :
214
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
VisUing Staf. — Lorenzo S. Fox, M.D., Appoiitteil November, l^si ,
Geurge E. PiDkham, M.D., appointed November, 1881 ; resigned June
1886. neinion J. Sonth, M.D., appointed November 1881 ; reeigned
June, 1886. FruDcis W. Cbadbourne, M.D., appointed XoTcniber, 1S81 ;
resided January, 1887. AVilliam Bnaa, M.D.. appointed February,
1883; resigned June, 1886. William T. Carotin, M.I>., ;ippoinled Feb-
ruary, 1883. Herbert P. JefTerson, .M.D., appointed June, 188i; i refligned
December, 1887. James B. Field, il.D., appointed Fehrunry, 18,v7
Herbert S. Johnson, M.D., appointed April, 1887: resigned September,
1889. F. W. Cbadbourne, M.D. (reappuintuient), appointed August.
1887. William B. JackaoD, SI. D., appointed February, 1888. Oliver .A.
Willard, M.D , appointed September, ISS'.l.
OpItUtalmie Surgeont.—Reary W. Kilburn, 51. D., of Boston, ap-
pointed .April, 1887 ; resigned May, 188'J. Edli in E. Jack, .M.D., uf Bos-
ton, appointed May, 18S9 ; resigned ^September, 18&9. John C. Bowker
Jr., M.D., of Lawrence, appointed October, 1889.
Aurul Surgeons. — Frederick L. Jack, SI. D., of Boston, appointetl May,
1387; resigned September, 1889. John 0. Bowker, Jr., M.D., of Law-
rence, apiiointeil October, 188!».
Out-Pafient Dqaarliiient. — In June, 1877, the tru.s-
tees established an Out-Patient Department, not only
for the employes of the Corporations, but also for tlie
poor of the city. Suitablettonsiilting-iooms, waiting-
rooms and a dispensary were provided, and medicine
was furnished at cost. Tlie consulting-room wa.-»
equipped with the various appliances essential for
diagnosis and treatment in special branches of medi-
ter. This systematic education of nurses has added
largely to the efficiency of the hospital, and will grad-
ually furnish to the community a corps of skillful
nurses. Four nurses have already been graduated
j from the training-school, and there are ten members
of this school connected with the hospital.
j St. .Tohn'.s Hospital.— In IStiG Sister Emerenti-
j ana Bowden, daughter of ."^t. Vincent, on her way to
Lowell, was ;idvised by the Bishop of the diocese to
build a hospital for the care of the sick poor. She
'■ at once purchased ofJIr. John Nesmith, for $13,000,
I the Livermore estate, whure the hospital now stands.
1 The Sisters, with the assistance of a few gentlemen,
prominent among whom was the late John F. McEvoy,
' Esq., set about devising means to fit up the old yel-
I low building for temporary use. Father John O"-
I Bricn had a little hospital of his own on Lowell
Street, and the patients there, seven in number, were
taken by .'^isier Rr>se, and thus the work of the hos-
pital, called St. .lohn's, in honor of the Bishop, cora-
' menced in May, ].'>ilil.
The I'lillowiiig winter a >peiial act of incoiporatioii
was i;ranted liy the C'liiumonwealtb, giviiisr the Sis-
cal science. The departments for diseases of the eye, ters the power of incorporated bodies. A loan of
and ear were from the first in charge of specialists , .•?20,000 was perfected, and a new building, the pres-
from out of town. The surgeons treating these di.—
eases also attend suitable operative ca.ses within the
hospital.
The other out-patient clinics were at first cared lor
by the members of the visiting staff. Finally, how-
ever, the number of out-patients became so great that
an out-patient staff was appointed in May, 15)88. The
whole number of patients treated in the out-patient
department from June, 1887, to January 1, 18!iO, is as
follows :
No. of vi.sils. '
Eye patients 4lila i
Ear patients 16;:ti
.Medical and surgical patients 4::u:;
Total out-patients fiy.'iT j
Oul-Palii^Hl a'to/, 18wi._G. K. Liveiniure, M.D. ; T. li. McGannon, :
M.D.; C. W. Taylor, 51. D. ; A. K. Z. Vincelette, M.D. ; C. E. Simpson. ■
M.D. ,
Training-School for Nurses. — In September, l.*87, :i
training-school for nurses was established, with a
ent hospital, was built, and opened in the fall of
|.S(;7.
The hospital proved to be of insufficient size, and
in 1882 the anne.x was erected. Before the building
of the anne.x the .^isteis occupied the original tempo-
rary hfjspital, the old woodiii building which stands
in the grounds to the iioilheast rif the hospital, and
is now iitili/eil ;is .-m :isyliim for olil ladies. By the
building of the anne.x. accoinmo<latifins for twenty-
rive iulditionai patients were secured, as well iia a
spacious chapel and ilormitory room for the Sisters.
lu tlie spring of ia.'*7 the Farley place was pur-
chased. This is the liou.se (now called St. .Viine'.-)
next to the main hospital, rm Bartlett Street, now
used for the out-patient department and for female
surgical cases.
The hospital has a capacity for one hundred house-
[latients, in round numbers, and during the epidemic
ofZa O'rippe, in .ranuary of the present year (1890).
course of instruction similar to that found in the best there were accommotlated 103 patients. In the main
hospitals of our larger cities. With this idea in view, ' hospital there are .54 beds ; in the Old Ladies' Re-
the trustees appointed in May, 1887, as matron, Mi.ss treat, the original Livermore house, 21 ; in St. -Vn-
C. B. Whitford, a graduate of the Rhode Island Hos-
pital Training-School. The pupil nurses receive daily
clinical instruction in their duties from the matron
and superintendent.
The medical staff and superintendent deliver lec-
tures once a week (except in summer) upon the
various subjects upon which a nurse should be in-
formed. The matron holds frequent recitations upon
these lectures and upon the text-book le.s.sons. At
ne's, 9; and in the cottage for contagious di.seases, 9.
There are seventeen beds in the annex which would
be opened for the benefit of the public should exigen-
cy require.
Sister JIary Ro.se, the original Sister Superior, re-
miiined until May, 1870. She was succeeded by Sis-
ter Mariana, who wa.s in charge until May, 1874,
when she w;is succeeded by the present efficient Su-
perior, Sister Beatrice. The peculiar fitness of Sisters
the end of two years, after final examinations, the j of Charity for the office of nurse needs no proving
nurses thus trained receive certificates, showing the I here. A few years ago the French Government re-
knowledge of nursing, their ability and good charac- moved the Sisters from most of the hospitals of Paris,
LOWELL.
215
appoiutiiig secular nurses in ibeir slead. This was
by no means an improvement, and the moat promi-
nent physicians of that city have, in the case of seve-
ral hospitals, petitioned for a return to the old rr-
gimt. Suffice it to say that St. John's Hospital to-day
has a corps of nurses who reflect honor upon the un-
selfish Order to which they belong.
From March 23, 1867, to October 1, 1889, 5798
regular house-patients were cared for.
The first medical staff of the hospital consisted of
Drs. John O. Green, Charles A. Savory, Walter
Burnham, Joel Spalding, Nathan Allen, Daniel P.
Gage, David Wells and Francis C. Plunkett. 01
these, Drs. Savory and Plunkett alone survive, and
Dr. Plunkett is the only present member of the staff.
The changes have been as follows :
In January, 1873, Dr. Gage resigned, from ill
health, and Dr. A. W. Buttrick was chosen in his
place. In October. 1873, Dr. Burnham retired and
Dr. George H. Pillsbury was elected. In August,
1874, Dr. John H. Oilman succeeded Dr. Wells. In
Januari,-, 1880, Dr. Cyrus W. Fisk succeeded Dr. But-
trick. In January, 1S8-1, Dr. Green resigned and
Dr. Charles V. Spalding was chosen in his place. In
January-, 188.5, Dr. Walter H. Leighton succeeded
Dr. Joel Spalding. In April, 1887, Dr. John C. Irish
was chosen to fill the vacancy caused by Dr. Leigh-
ton's removal from Lowell. In January, 188'.'. Drs.
Moses G. Parker and Leomird Huntress succeeded
Drs. Allen and Savory. In .Vpril, 1889, the staff was
enlarged by the addition of four new members, and
Drs. William Ba.ss, George E. Pinkham, Franklin
Xickerson and J. Arthur Gage were appointed, six
members serving as physicians and six as surgeons.
Dr. Plunkett is chairman of the board, and Dr.
Spalding secretary.
The number of house-patients cared for in 189u
was 556. This is larger than in any previous year,
there being eighty-one more than in 1890. The
whole number of cases treated in the hospital since
its commencement is 60.>t.
Out-PalienI Itepurtinent. — In September, 1888, an
Out-Patient Department was established. The Farley
house (St. Anne's) which is utilized for the treatment
ofout-dooipiitients, con tjiins on the lower floor waiting-
rooms, consulting and operating rooms and a well-
stocked pharmacy, while on the upper floor are found an
ovariotomy room, a gynrecological room, a room for
the treatment of diseases of the eye, ear and throat,
and chambers for convalescents from operations.
Clinics are held in the following specialties : diseases
of the eye, diseases of the ear and throat, .diseases of
women, diseases of the nervous system, medicine, sur-
gery and deniirtry.-
The staff is as follows : Dr. M. G. Parker, Dr. R.
E. Bell, Dr. H. P. Jefferson, Dr. W. A. Johnson, Dr.
B. R. Benner, Dr. F. R. Ris, Dr. C. A. Viles. Dr.
W. P. Lawler, Dr. H. Walker, Dr. F. W. Barnes.
In 1889, 1403 patients were treated here and more
than 2200 prescriptions compounded, beside numer-
j ous renewals. If we add to the number of patients
treated in the Out-Patient Department, the 556 who
were cared for inside the hospital, it will be seen
that nearly 2000 patients have been treated in the in-
j stitution the past year, and the number baB of late
: been increasing every year. '
The Lowell Dispensary. — A preliminary meet-
I ing of citizens interested in the project of establishing a
; dispensary, was held January 21, 1836, Luther Law-
[ rence being moderator and James G. Carney, secretary.
January 29th, (same year) a meeting for organization
! was held and a Board of Managers (twelve) was
I chosen, James G. Carney being chairman. An act of
incorporation was passed by the State Legislature,
April 14, 1836, which was accepted by the dispensary
i June 10, 1836. There was no fund to draw from, and
I money necessary for the maintenance of this institu-
i tion was raised by payments of membership — lite
i members contributing twenty dollars and temporary
j members one and two dollars annually. In this way
I a large sum was raised, and each year the whole or
' part of the earnings of this money is expended for
medicines for the relief of the worthy sick poor. Dr.
'■ Charles P. Spalding is the present dispensary physi-
I cian.
I City Dispensary. — The city of Lowell passed an
ordinance June 10, 1879, appropriating one thou-
i sand dollars annually for the maintenance of a free
dispensary. This is situated in pleasant quarters in
the Police Court Building on Market Street, and is
carried on under the supervision of the overseers of
the poor. Twelve physicians are chosen annually
who serve without pay, and the medicines are dis-
! pensed by a eompetent drug clerk. The physicians
in attendance the present year are Drs. J. J. Colton
(chairman), Wyllis G. Eaton, Clarence A. Viles, C. P.
1 Spalding, W. A. Johnson, Charles H. Ricker, David
N. Patterson, Timothy E. McOwen and Arthur E.
Gillard. Dr. Ricker is the secretary. Special clinics
are held daily in the following classes of diseases :
Surgery, Diseases of the Eye and Ear, Diseases of the
' Chest, Diseases of Women, Diseases of Children and
Medicine. William T. Loftus is drug clerk. Last
year (1889), 7837 prescriptions were compounded.
For the establishment of this institution the public
I are indebted in a great measure to the late Dr.
Nathan Allen, who called attention to its need in a
paper read before the Middlesex North District
Medical Society in 1877, entitled " Claims of the
Sick Poor."
Board of Health. — A medical history of Lowell
would not be complete without mention of the Board
of Health, for at all times there is one physician on
the board and usually there are two.
In 1878 the city accepted the legislative act estab-
lishing a Board of Health, which since that date has
> Tidt Secretaiy's Bepoit for 1889.
216
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
been composed of the following persona, the first I
name being that of the chairman, and the last that of !
the city physician ex o^cio.-
1878.— J. W. B. Sbaw, Michael Hoar, Leonard HuntrMS, Jr., M.D. |
1879.— .1. W. B. Shaw, Michael Hoar, E. W. Trueworthy, M.D. I
1880.— J. W. B. Shaw, Michael Hoar, E. W. Traeworthy, M D.
1881.— J. W. B. Shaw, Nathan .\llen, M.D., E. W. Traeworthy, M.D. j
1882.— J. W. B. Shaw, Nathan Allen. M.D., W. G. Eaton. Jr., M.D. |
1883.— J. W. B. Shaw, William M. Hoar, M.D., W. U. Eaton, Jr., j
M.D. j
1884.— William M. Hoar, M.D., James J. McCarty, M.D., W. G. Eaton,
Jr., M.D. j
1885.— J. W. B. Shaw, Janiea J McCarty, M.D., John J. Colton, M.D.
1880.— J. W. B. Shaw, Nathan Allen, M D , John J. Colton, M.D.
1887.- Nathan Allen, M.D., Charles R. Costello, John J. Colton, |
M.D
1888.— Jamee B. Field, M.D., Charles R. Cjuteilo, J. Arthur Gage.
M.D. I
18S9.— Jamea B. Field, M.D , Charles R. Costello, J. Arthur Gage.
M.D.
1890.— James B. Field, M.D., Charles B. Costello, J. Arthur Gage, i
M.D.
In addition to the routine work of attending to
contagious diseases, as reiiuired by the Public Statutes, [
the Health Department collects the a-slies and .swill
of the city, inspects milk, vinegar and provisions, pro-
vides public baths, inspects and tests plumbing, etc.
The Board of Health, beginning in the crowded j
portions of the city, is compelling property-owners to I
remove privy vaults on all streets where there are I
sewers.
All plans for plumbing work are submitted to the
board for approval, and on completion of the work
all plumbing must pass the tests of the inspector
before it is connected with the sewer.
When the Board of Health assumed supervision ol
the inspection of milk and provisions more than one-
half of the milk wa.s below standard, and tainted ineai
was frequently found in the butcher-shops. A rigid
series of prosecutions changed all this. Now the
markets are in excellent condition, and the quality ol
the milk has steadily improved.
The use of swill .as a food for cows has been almost
entirely abolished by the Board of Health within a
few years. It is hoped before long to have a suitable
furnace for the cremation of the city's garbage.
The Board of Health gives especial attention to
contagious diseases, requiring prompt notification,
isolation and disinfection in every instance. Disin-
fection of each house at the termination of a case is a
routine part of the department work. The hospital
accommodations for diphtheria and scarlet fever are
somewhat limited. The fact that there is no hospital
under control of the city, to which such cases can be
sent, handicaps the Board of Health. What can be
done when a suitable hospital for isolation of a con-
tagious disease is furnished, is shown in the ease of
small-pox. The city is frequently menaced with this
disease through additions to its French Canadian
population from Montreal. In recent years each epi-
demic has been nipped in the bud by prompt depor-
tation to the hospital, quarantine of exposed persojis,
aud thorough vaccination throughout the community.
The Health Department of Lowell is, with the ex-
ception of that of Boston, second in efficiency to none
in the State. Connected with the department are
forty men.
In addition to the members of the board there are
the following officers: a superintendent, an assistant
superintendent, two inspectors of plumbing, two in-
spectors of vaults and nuisances, an inspector of milk
and provisions, and an office clerk. In addition the
services of a medical inspector and of a chemist are
called into frequent requisition. Until completion of
the new City Hall, the Board of Health has its offices
at 7t) Merrimack .Street, requiring four commodious
rooms for its purposes.
En preparing this history the writer has of necessity
been obliged to .solicit the co-operation of his brother
practitioners, and he wishes to state that, but for their
uniform kindness and courtesy, he could not have
arrived at the small metisure of success which he has
attained. He desires to tieknowledge especial favors
from Drs. James B. Field, David N. Patterson and
Franklin Nickeison.
HOMCEOPATHY.
BY ED.MUND H. PACKER, M.[>.'
WiTHi.N'the present century hoimeopathy has form-
ed a new school of medicine dill'ering radically, and
in many respects entirely clianging the former
methods of treating the sick. Although something
had been known previously of the principles on
which homifopathy is founded, yet it remained for
Samuel Hahnemann, a ' Jerinan physician, to clearly,
define the principle and develop a system <if medicine.
He first began his work in ITOO, and continued it
till his death in Paris in 1.S44, at the age ni' eighty-
nine. His trials aud persecutions at the hands of the
medical profe.ssion are matters of history ; but he
lived long enough to see his system firmly established.
In 1825, Hans Christian Gram, a Danish physician
introduced the system into New York, where at first
it spread but slowly, though in later years, it has
become firmly established there.
In 183S it was introduced into New England by
Dr. Samuel Gregg, of Medford, in the County of
Middlesex. .Vtthe time he was an active practitioner of
mediciue, but becoming convinced that homa'opathy
was a very much better method of treatment, he aban-
doned his former practice, and received a cold shoulder
from his brother practitioners as well as from many
of his former patients. His greater success, however,
brought increased patronage until his death in Bostun
1 The work of preparing this history was first itssigned to Dr. Bailey^
but .jn his removal to the State of Washington, it unexpectedly fell upon
the above to .lo it, and he trusts that tht- limited time (eight days) at bis
disposal, may be a surticient apology for any ehortcominga. .\clinowr
edgementfl are due to Dr. Lelaud for hia aid.
LOWELL.
217
in 1873. Thus Middlesex County was the birthplace
of homceopathy in New England ; and from the small
beginning, it now forms a very important part of the
medical profession.
In 1840 the first homoeopathic medical society wa.*!
organized in Boston under the name of The Homceo-
pathic Fraternity. This gradually increased in num-
bers, and in 1856 was incorporated by the State
Legislature as The Massachusetts Homceopathic
Medical Society. This society has held its meeting.s
continuously for a half-century, and it now numbers
about three hundred practitioners in the State, while
there are in the New England States alone something
like twelve hundred belonging to this school. Each
State has its incorporated medical society, and there
is a large number of local societies and clubs belong-
ing to this school.
Among the incorporated institutions under home-
opathic management the first was the Massachusetts
Homceopathic Hospital. At the time of its incor-
poration, in 1855, it failed by only a single vote in the
Senate of securing State aid to the amount of $20,000,
and it was not opened for patients until 1871. A
public fair in 1873 secured for it a fund of $80,000^
since which it has been very successful.
In 1870 a buildine was erected at a cost, including
land, of 5'7G,71G. In 1S84 additions were made at an
expense of S93, 500,'; and the State Legislaturein the
past year has granted aid for the erection of building.'-
to the amount of $120,000.
The present capacity of the hospital is about
eighty bedn ; and at the beginning of the present
year it had taken care of 4311 patients, with a
death-rate of less than four and one-half per cent.
The buildings which are now in progress of erection
will increase the capacity of this ho''pital to some-
thing like two hundred beds. Several donations and
legacies of considerable size attest the interest of the
public in the work of this hospital.
The second institution was the Honneopathic
Medical Dispensary, incorporated in 1850, and which
since that time has provided for over two hundred
thousand sick and indigent persons. It is now erect-
ing a large and commodious building for its purposes.
Another institution of great importance is the
Westboro' Insane Hospital. It was established by the
State in 1884, and provides for about five hundred
patients. The results of homceopathic treatment in
this institution have been of the most satisfactory
kind.
The Consumptives' Home, under homceopathic
treatment, has cared for many thousands in this fatal
disease.
There are many other institutions in the State
which are partially or wholly under homieopathic
caie. Hospital? have been established at Newton,
Taunton, Quincy and Maiden, in which homceopathic
and allopathic treatment are equally practiced ; and
these institutions have proved remarkably successful.
The institution which has proved of the greatest
service, not only to homceopathy, but to the profes-
sion, and the community, has been the Boston Uni-
versity School of Medicine. This was established in
1873, after the attempt on the part of the allopaths
to espel homoeopaths from the medical societies, and,
if possible, to ostracize them from the profession.
With the great interest exhibited in homoeopatliy
by the public, as shown in the extensive and success-
ful fair, which realized over $80,000 for the hospital,
there arose a demand for a medical school in which
this science should be taught. Accordingly, the
trustees of Boston University, in conjunction with
the friends of homoeopathy, established a Medical
Department. At that time the standard of medical
education in this country was at a very low point.
Students were admitted without previous preparation,
attended two courses of lectures, often not more than
four months each, and sometimes both courses in the
same year ; then, after a slight examination, were
granted the diploma of Doctor of Medicine. Even
diplomas were shamelessly sold to persons utterly
ignorant of any branch of medical science, and such
persons afterwards advertised themselves as Doctors
ol Medicine. Even some of the best schools felt
themselves compelled, owing to their small pecuniary
resources, to enter into competition with the lower
grade of schools in order to secure students. The
trustees and faculty of Boston University School of
Medicine, from the very first, set themselves rigidly
against this debased form of medical instruction, and
it was the first school in America to present in com-
bination the following essential elementsof a thorough
reform in medical education :
First. The requirement that the candidate for ad-
mission either present a college diploma, or pass a
prescribed entrance examination.
Second. The provision of a carefully graded mini-
mum course of instruction covering three full
scholastic years.
Third. The provision of a four years' course for
those who wish to pursue their studies with special
thoroughness, and with suitable leisure for collateral
reading, and to obtain professional experience under
direction of the faculty.
Fourth. The requirement that every student pass
a successful examination upon the work of each year
before promotion to that of the next.
Fifth. The requirement as a condition of gradu-
ation, not merely that the candidate shall have
studied medicine at least three full years, but also
that he shall have attended a reputable medical school
not less than three years.
Sixth. The restoration of the degrees of Bachelor
of Medicine and Bachelor of Surgery, to be attained
at the end of the third year by those who take a four
years' course.
Seventh. A provision for visiting and examining
boards independent of the teaching faculty.
218
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Eighth. The repudiatiuu of all sex disubilitiea,
either in teaching or learning.
Its requirements have grown .stricter, and its method
of inatruction has steadily improved year by year,
and it has sent out over five hundred graduates, many
of whom reflect great credit upon the school in which
they were educated. In 1882 an optional four years'
course was established, the first course of this kind in
the country. So important has this proved that the
faculty and trustees have resolved after the present
year to make this four years' course compulsory, with
the privilege of allowing students to perform the
work of the first year in college, academy, or with
instructors outside the medical school, although they
must in all cases undergo a rigid examination previous
to entering the work of the second year, .\lready
the influence of this school has been felt by the medi-
cal schools of this country and the profession
generally. The demand now is that all medical
colleges shall pursue asimilar course of thoroughness.
Dr. I. T. Talbot, of Boston, has been the dean of
its faculty from its inception, and feels a deep interest
in its success.
The spread of homcropathy has been rapid and ex-
tensive throughout the country. In 1S44 the first
National Medical .\s?ociation was formed — tbe .Vmeri-
can Institute of Homu'opathy — and it continues to '
hold its annual sessions in various parts of the coun- !
tjy. It includes in its membership more than one
thousand of the most prominent homo'opatliic physi- [
cians in the United States. Its bureau of statistics at
the last session represented over 12.000 practitioners, |
32 State societies, l(jO local societies. 30 medical clubs,
o2 general hospitals, as many special hospitals, 4'^
dispensaries, 25 medical journals, and Ij honid'opathic
colleges.
The progress of this school of medicine h.xs been so .
rapid and .so continuous that there is no prospect of !
its stopping until it embraces the whole medical
profession.
Homieopathy was first practiced in Lowell by Dr.
Christian F. Geist in 1843. He was born in (rermany
in 1805, and came to this country in 183"i. He was in ■
AUentown for a considerable time, and was with Dr. '
William Wesselhoeft in Boston two years previous to '
locating in Lowell. He returned to Boston in 1845, I
where he continued in active practice till his death. I
Dr. Rufus Shackfoud succeeded Dr. Geist in '
18-15. He remained in Lowell some three years, and ■
then removed to Portland, Me., where he now lives. '
Dr. Daniel Holt was born in Hampton, Conn., :
July 2, 1810. He was the youngest son of a large ;
family. His father served six yeara in the Revolu-
tionary War, much of the time under Washington. '
He was a local magistrate, and dying, left the boy '
Daniel, at fourteen years of .age, to assume charge of
the large farm, and attend school in winter. Armed ;
with a common-school education, in 1826 he com- I
menced his claseical studies at the academies of Am- '
herst, Ma.ss., and .Vslilord, Cunn. In 1831 lie entered
the Scientific Department of Yale College, and gr.adu-
ated from the New Haven .Aledical School in 1835,
with the hiirliest honors of his class. He conducted
a successful practice for ten years in Glastonbury,
Conn., and was the author of several valuable essays
on medical topics, including a monograph upon scar-
latina, which was awarded a prize by the Connecticut
State Medical Society.
Dr. Holt spent the year 1844 in New Haven to fur-
ther perfect his medical education. While here he
was led to investigate the claims and principles of
homii'Opathy, rather to display its absurdities than to
defend its tenets. .\. rigid test of its claims, coupled
with a practical application of its practice at the bed-
side, was hi.s cordial adoption of the new method. In
1845 his essay was published under the title of
" Views of Homieopathy ; with Reasons for Examin-
ing and Admittinir it 4is a Principle in Medical
.•Science." He " had the courage of his convictions,"
and proceeded to a farther study of the materia med-
ica and the use of remedies.
As a result of his essay he was promptly expelled
by the New Haven Medical Association. In the
autumn of 1845 he removed to Lowell, Mass., and
entered upon a practice of medicine which continued
until his death.
The severe dvsenten.' epidemics of 1847, '48 and
'40 atforded him an opportunity to demonstrate the
eminent success of his new treatment, which he fully
employed. He Joined the Ma.ssachusetts Medical
.Society in 1840, and the American Institute of Hom-
ieopathy the same year, and was an original member
of the Massachusetts Horauopathic Medical Society
in 1848. He delivered it^ annual oration in 1858
upon " Medicine as an .\rt and as a Science," and was
president of the society in 1S(>3.
Dr. Holt preserved an active interest in the art'airs
uf the day. and had decided opinions upon subjects of
public interest. He always held himself ready to de-
fend by arj<nment the faith that was within him. He
served one term as Republican Representative in the
State Legislature. He died iu Lowell April 11, 1883,
aged seventy-three years. His bearing was gentle
and afl'able, and he was held in affectionate esteem
both in city and State medical circles.
Dr. Hira.m Parker was born in Kittery, Me.,
about the year 1809. He studied with Dr. Charles
Trafton, of South Berwick, Me., and graduated from
Dartmouth College iu 1833. He graduated from
Philadelphia College, at what date is uncertain. He
afterward taught school at Salmon Falls, N. H., and
came to Lowell in 1834. He was married iu 1838 to
.\nnie G. Trafton, daughter of Dr. C. Trafton. He
was a prominent abolitionist. He was chosen a
Board of Health commissioner in 1871, and vice-
president of Merchants' Bank. He was a member
of Pentucket Lodge of F. A. Masons. He died May
2, 1877, after an illness of four years, of paralysis.
((
^^
LOWELL.
219
He wrote and published " Harmony of Age>," a re-
ply to Dr. Beecher's "Conflict of Ages." He was
always n hard student, read Greek and Hebrew, and
studied Bibles in those languages. He was very char-
itable in a secret way, and, after his death, his charity
account-books were found, showing generous and
well-placed gifts. His favorite work was the study
of the Bible, yet he was broad and liberal-minded,
enjoying discussion with all denominations. Dr.
Parker was famous as an obstetrician, his practice in
this branch of his profession far exceeding any of his
contemporaries. His books show an aggregate of
7000 cases.
Dp.. CHARLE.S Walker was born at Northampton,
Mass., July 30, 1831, and was the son of Dr. Charles
and Sarah Dwight (Storrs) Walker, of that town. His
father was a widely-known and eminent physician of
Northampton, a graduate of Yale College and of the
Jefferson Medical College, of Philadelphia, and was
one of the first of the old-school physicians to adopt
the horaieopathic theory of practice.
Dr. Walker was educated at Northampton and Am-
herst, and was graduated at the Jefferson Medical Col-
lege, Philadelphia, in IS.Vi, and the same year began
practice in Ware, Mass., where he remained until 185fi,
when he removed to Lowell, Mass., where he practiced
until 1858, when his failing health obliged him to
seek a more genial climate. He accordingly removed
to Danville, Ky., where he at once secured a large
and prosperous practice. His health, however, con-
tinued to fail, and he died of consumption at Danville
April I'l, 1861. He was buried beside his kindred in
Northam))ton.
Dr. Walker was a very bright and amiable man, of
polished manner, and easily won friends. He had a
very thorough medical training under his accom-
plished father, and stood high in his medical college
class. He had a very kind, sympathetic and social
nature, which endeared him to his patients. His
practice in Lowell was very large and successful, and
he did much in the way of introducing and popular-
izing the new school of practice iu that city.
Daviii Packer, M.D., was born in Newark, Ver-
mont, February 20th, 1808. His father, Eleazer
Packer, was one of the pioneers of Northern Ver-
mont. His mother, Abigail Potter Packer, came
from an old New England family, and was a woman of
great energy and firmness. Dr. Packer received his
early education in the common schools, and after-
wards at the academy at Concord, Vt. In 1833 he
was married to Miss Angeline Woodruff, of Burke,
Vt. Five children were born to him, three of whom
died in childhood ; two daughters, both married, are
now living. In 1841 he joined the Vermont Method- |
ist Conference. In 1842, in addition to the cares of
his pastorate, he undertook the study of medicine,
first with Dr. Asa George, of Calais, and afterward
with Dr. George Hinman, of Derby. In 1848 his at- j
tention was called to homoeopathy, and, after a care-
ful invedtigatiun of the Hafanemannian law, he em-
braced that doctrine, studying with Dr. Darling, of
Lyndon. In ISSO, after nine years' study in both
schools, he began his medical labors as a homceopath-
ist in Derby, Vt. For fifteen years he continued his
double duties, as a physician and clergyman. Under
the stress of these combined labors his health, in
I860, gave way, and a pulmonary difficulty forced him
to relinquish public speaking. He then devoted him-
self entirely to medicine. In the same year (1865) he
attended the Homceopathic Medical College at
Philadelphia, graduating the following year among
the first of his class. He immediately located in
Lowell, Mass., where he remained in practice for
three years. In 1869 his health again failed, forcing
him to sell his practice and leave Lowell. He re-
moved to Chelsea. His reputation still followed him,
however, and he was unable to escape practice.
From overwork he had an apoplectic attack in Feb-
ruary, 1873, from which he never fully recovered. He
died in Chelsea, Mass., Dec. 1, 1875.
Edmund H. Packer, M.D., of Lowell, Massachu-
setts, WHS born in Newark, Vermont. His parents
were Dr. J. Q. A. and Lovina N. Packer, of Marsh-
field, Vermont. He received a common-school edu-
cation in his native town and also attended the select
school of Edwin Burns. He was fitted for college by
his uncle, Itev. David Packer, M.D., who was at that
time a minister and practitioner of medicine. In
August, 18G4, he enlisted as a soldier, and served in
the Third Vermont Light Battery in front of Peters-
burg until the surrender of General Lee, and was
mustered out of service at Burlington, Vermont, in
June, 18G5. He then entered the office of his uncle.
Dr. David Packer, and began the study of medicine.
Matriculation tickets to the Hahnemann Medical
College of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, bear the date
1865-66, and 1860-67. In 1867 he received the degree
of Doctor of Medicine, and came to Lowell, where he
again entered the office of his uncle and remained in
active practice with him one year. He then opened
an office for himself, and continued in practice until
1870-71, when he took a post-graduate course at his
old Alma Mater, since which time he has continued
in practice in Lowell. He was elected a member of
the American Institute of Homreopathy on the 8th
day of June, 1869, and is a member of the " Massa-
chusetts Homoeopathic Medical Society," and "Lowell
Hahnemann Club." He has been eminently suc-
cessful in bis career, as his large practice abundantly
testifies, being particularly good in diagnosis and in
the treatment of chronic diseases.
Dr. Augdstise Thompson, of Union, Maine,
studied medicine with Dr. Batcbelder, of that place.
He graduated from the Hahnemann Medical College
of Philadelphia in 1867; came to Lowell the same
year, and for about eighteen years had a very large
practice there. He retired from active practice to give
his attention to other branches of business. Dr.
220
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Thompson was captain of a company in a Maine reg-
iment in the late war, and is a member of the Grand
Army of the Republic.
Albert Buswell, M.D., was bnrn in Hartland,
Windsor County, Vermont, on the loth day of August,
1821. He graduated from Norwich University in
1847, at Norwich, Vermont. The following autumn he
commenced the study of medicine with Dr. Mitchell
M. Davis, of Norwich, Vermont, and in the winter of
1849-50 he attended a private course of lectures at
Woodstock, Vermont, given by Dr. Rush Palmer, and
subsequently two public courses, graduating at Castle-
ton, Vermont, in November, ISol. For seventeen
years he practiced as an allopathic physician in Ver-
mont and New Hampshire.
In the winter of 1868-t)9, having been previously
led to see some of the advantages of the homeo-
pathic practice, he took a course of lectures at the
Hahnemann Medical College of Philadelphia, Penn-
sylvania. He then settled in Lowell, Massachusetts,
where he engaged in active practice for about ten
years, and then by reason of illness he gave up the
practice of medicine.
Horatio M. Hunter, M.D,, located in Lowell,
Mass., in 1870, removing from St. Johnsbury, Ver-
mont, where he had been in practice for a number of
years, until he- was compelled to seek a less arduous
field.
He received an academic education, and read med-
icine in the office of tlie late C. B. Darling, M.D., of
Lyndon, Vermont, a pioneer of homueopathy in r.hat
part of the State ; graduating from the Homceopathic
Medical College of Pennsylvania in the class of 1857.
He is practicing his profession at Lowell at the
present time, doing a large and lucrative business.
He is a member of the American Institute of Hom-
ivopathy, Massachusetts Homieopathic Medical So-
ciety, Massachusetts Surgical and Gyniecological So-
ciety, Vermont Homoeopathic Medical Society, Lowell
Hahnemann Club, Essex County Homceopathic
Medical Society, Boston Hahnemann Club, &c., &c.
Dr Fred'k a. Warxer, now located at 42 Kirk
Street, Lowell, Massachusetts, is a native of the West-
ern Reserve, Ohio. His father and mother, Lyman
and Amanda Warner, migrated from Western Connec-
ticut and settled in the Western Reserve, Ohio, which
was then known as a part of Connecticut. On Au-
gust 18, 1831, the subject of this paper was born to
them in Canfield, Mahoning County, Ohio.
Dr. Warner received his academic education at
Kenyon College, Gambler, (3hio, afterward entering
the office of Professor W. J. Scott, then Kenyon's phy-
sician, during 1851, and studying medicine under his
supervision. His medical education was continued
in the Medical Department of the Western Reserve
University, from which school he graduated during
the session of 1854-55. Part of the years of 1854-.55
was spent in the office of Dr. Andrews Merriman, in
Madison, Lake County, Ohio, in study and practice.
The winter of 1856 found him located at Farming-
ton, Illinois. In November, 1859, he was united in
marriage to Miss Adelia B. Merriman, a daughter of
Dr. Andrews Merriman.
As the years rolled by Dr. Warner found himself
engaged in a very active and extensive practice.
In 1872, while on his summer vacation in New Eng-
land, yielding to the strong desire to live in a non-
malarious climate, and to the earnest solicitation of
his friends, it was decided that Lowell should be his
future home and field of practice.
The freedom which he has had from all malarious
disturbances, and the marked success which he has
obtained in building up a lucrative practice, justifies
the wisdom of the doctor's decision.
The members of the various medical societies with
which Dr. Warner has been connected will testify as
to the active interest he has always maintained in them.
At the time of his leaving Illinois he was a member
of the following societies, viz. : The Illinois Medical
Society, the Fulton County and Peoria County
Medical Societies. In the year 1872 he w.is chosen
president of the last-mentioned society.
At that time, and for two vears previous, he had
been endeavoring to test the truth of the alleged law
of cure "Siynilia Similibus Curanliir," by research, by
the bed-aide and in office practice. This method of
investigation was continued in his Lowell practice.
Not beine ready to declare himself an adherent of this
method of practice, he affiliated himself with the old-
school practitioners, and joined the Massachusetts
Medical Society.
Later on, having become convinced of the great
value of the homieopathic law of cure, he boldly
adopted that method of practice. Soon after this he
united with the Essex County Medical Society, and in
the course of three or four years was elected as one of
its presidents. Since then he has been an active
member of the ^Massachusetts Homieopathic Medical
Society, the Massachusetts Surgical and Gynrecolog-
ical Society, the Boston Gynwcological Club, and the
HahneraanuClubof Lowell. Obstetricsis hisspei.'ialty.
As a citizen, the doctor's great ambition has been
to be known as a true neighbor, .and one loyal and
patriotic enough to always cast his vote whenever
there was an election, no matter how small the office
to be filled.
Dr. Warner is a member of St. Anne's Parish, and
has served for several years as one of the wardens of
the church.
Dr. C. H. Leland was born in Winchendon,
Mass., on the 9th of September, 1848. His father,
Leander Leland, was a carpenter by trade, and has
lived most of his life since his majority in this town.
The subject of this sketch attended the public schools
of the town, the usual summer and winter terms, and
also High School, until the age of about thirteen,
when he went to work in the manufacturing shops,
and after this attended school about three months a
^/.T-c^'UA
iZ^^ I'Uf
LOWELL.
221
year. By studying evenings, after bis day's work, he
fitted himself for a teacher, and taught several terms,
and also supplied as assistant in the High School of
his native town. Afterwards he attended the Vermont
Conference Seminary, at Montpelier, Vt., teaching in
the winter at East Montpelier, Vt. He studied medi-
cine with his uncle, Silas Cummings, M.D., of Fitzwil-
liam, N.H., an allopathic physician of some repute.
His medical lectures were received at the Hahne-
mann Medical College, Philadelphia, Penn., where he
attended four terms, receiving his degree of Doctor of
Medicine in the spring of 1873. He came to Lowell
ihe same year, and is in active practice at the present
time, having, by his own efforts from boyhood,
without other assistance than hi.s own labor, provided
for himself, and is now in possession of a good prav-
tice, and is considered successful in his profession.
Dr. Lelaud is a member of the Massachusetts Homce-
opathic Medical Society, and president of the Hahne-
mann Club, of Lowell.
Edward Brown Holt, M.D., was born October
3, 1843, at Glastonbury, Connecticut. He is the son
of the late Daniel Holt, M.D., and Abby Sarah Holt.
His father was born July 2, 1810; graduated at
Yale Medical College in 1833, and embraced homtp-
opathy'"as a principle in medicine " in 1845. He
removed to Lowell in 1846, where he practiced his
profession until a few years before his death, which
occurred in April, 1883. For nearly twenty years he
was the sole representative of homnpopathy in Lowell.
In 1SS3 there were twelve.
His father, Nehemiah Holt, served some six years
in the Revolutionary War, from the age of eighteen
to twenty-four, partic ipaling in the battles of Long
Island, Harlem Heights, Princeton, Trenton, York-
town, etc. He was a sergeant in Colonel Durkee's
company, Second Regimeut, and received iu his arms
Lieut.-Col. Kiiowllon, of his regiment, as befell from
his horse mortally wounded at the battle of Harlem
Heights. His great-grandfather served two years in
the French ami Indian War, and was a great-grand-
son of Nicholas Holt, who came from England in li)4C.
< »n his mother's side, his great-grandfather, How-
ell Woodbridge, was a lieutenant in the Sixth Con-
necticut Regiment at the outbreak of the Revolution-
ary War. He served during that whole period, and was
commissioned captain, major and lieutenant- colonel.
During the last two years of the war he ranked as
colonel of the Sixth Connecticut Regiment.
His daughter married Pardon Brown, of Glaston-
bury, Conn., a merchant of Hartford, and a graduate
of Yale in the year 1793. He suffered financial loss
from the seizure of a vessel in which he was one-third
owner, by the French in 1798. He reared ten child-
ren, one of whom, Abby Sarah Brown, was the mo-
ther of the subject of the present sketch.
Ill 1846 Dr. Holt came with his parents to Lowell,
and soon after came very near perishing in the de-
struction by tire of the house where the family
boarded, at corner of Central and Market Streets,
where Mansur Block now stands.
His mother died in February, 1852, of phthisis, and
two sisters, aged one and two and one-half years, died
in 1850, of dysentery.
Dr. Holt steadily pursued the studies of the Low-
ell schools, and graduated from the High School in
1861. In the fall of 1862 he enlisted in the Sixth
Massachusetts Regiment, Company G. and served for
nine months with the regiment as private in all the
incidents of camp and field.
He returned to Lowell in June, 1863, and spent
several months in the study of Latin, Greek and
French under private tutors, and in the summer of
1864 again enlisted in the same company and regi-
ment and served one hundred days at Arlington
Heights and Fort Delaware. At the latter place he
contracted the fever and chills, which seriously un-
dermined his health for several years, and of which
he is occasionally reminded at the present time.
After much earnest thought and deliberation he
determined to enter the medical profession, and after
studying a year and a half in his father's office he at"
tended two courses of lectures and one session of the
summer school at Harvard Medical College, also one
course of lectures in the Long Island College Hospital
at Brooklyn, N. Y'., where he took a special course on
diseases of the heart and lungs, under the late Prof
Austin Flint, going over to Bellevue Hospital, New
York, for the purpose. On returning to Boston he
graduated at the Harvard Medical College in July,
1868. On returning to Lowell he again entered upon
a student's life for the purpose of investigating and
studying the homceopathic or specific mode of treat-
ing disease. He had a good chance for so doing, as
his father was in full and successful practice. The ad-
vantages of the new over the old or allopathic meth-
od were soon made apparent by his father's skill in
treating the sick.
In the^ winter of 1869 and '70 he attended the lec-
tures at the Hahnemann Medical College, at Philadel-
phia, and watched with a keen interest the treatment
of disease by the ablest representatives of the allo-
pathic and homceopathic schools iu the hospitals and
clinics of the city of brotherly love. He returned
to Lowell in April, 1870, and continued in practice
with his father until March, 1871, when he entered
into partnership with Dr. Daniel A. Johnson, of
Chelsea, Mass., also a graduate of Harvard Medical
School, and a convert to homceopathy. This partner-
ship, extending over some seven years, gave Dr. Holt a
large opportunity of treating almost every disease to
which flesh is heir in this climate, including a severe
epidemic of small-pox, in which the new school
method was of decided advantage over the old. In
April, 1878, Dr. Holt removed to Brookline, Mass.,
where he remained until March, 1881. During this
time he acted as assistant to the chair of Obstetrics in
the Boston University Medical School, but was com-
992
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
pelled to reaign on account of ill health, and return-
ed to Lowell, his former home. He has now been a
resident of the "Spindle City " over nine year.^, and
although at times s uttering severely from his old en-
emy, fever and ague, contracted duriug his service
in the war, he has seen his practice as a physician and
obstetrician steadily grow.
Dr. Holt does not attempt to do surgery, but con-
fines his attention to the two former branches of the
profession. He has never sought or held political
office. He belongs to Post 120, G. A. R., and was for
four years its medical officer. He is medical exam- ,
iner for the Berkshire Life Insurance Company, and
for several fraternal orders.
He attends the Congregational Church, and is a Re-
publican in politics. In person he is nearly six feet
in height, and weighs 200 pounds. He is unmarried,
and his family consists only of his step-mother, Mrs.
Mary D. Holt, and a half brother, Robert Holt, A.B.,
a gniduate of Amherst College.
Stephen Goodhue Bailey, A.B., JI.D., was born
in Lowell, Mass , January 23, 1845. His early edu-
cation was had in the pu]>lic schools of his native city,
graduating from the Lowell High School in 1864, and
from Yale College (classical course) in 18(38. He was
engaged as a public-school teacher most of the time
for nine years, till 1877, being principal of a Lowell
grammar-school some four years of the period. ,
He graduated from the Boston University School [
of Medicine in 1880, and immediately entered upon ;
the practice of his profession in the adjoining towns
of Haverhill and Bradford, Mass. In the spring of
1881, returning to Lowell with his wife ami family,
he entered upon this new field of medical practice,
where he continued an occupant of one office till the
spring of 1800, when he left tor a visit of some months
to the new State of Washington on the Pacific coast.
Dr. Bailey is a member of the MassHcliu.ietts
Homreopathic Medical Society and of the Lowell
Hahnemann Club, assisting by tongue and pen the
growth of homieopathy in the community. The sub-
ject of a local hospital and dispensary has found in
him an earnest advocate and promoter, though as
yet resulting in no definite fruition.
George W. Hilton, JI.D., was born in South
Parsonsfield, Maine, in 183!»; attended the schools of
his native place and the academy at Leverett, Me.;
graduated from the Hahnemann Medical College of
Chicago in 1877; practiced in Chicago and in La- |
moille. 111., and came to Lowell in November, 1881.
He enlisted in the army in August, 1861, and was :
discharged in September, 1805: was delegated as '
hospital steward in the General Hospital No. 12 at
Beaufort, S. C. ; also on the steamer "Matilda" on i
the James River. He received appointment as hos-
pital surgeon in the regular army.
Dr. Warrex S. Fos«, sou of Jonathan and .\nn
P. Foss (American people), was born in the town ol
Stanstead, P. Q., May 10, 1843. He received his
early education in the schools of his native town,
and began the study of medicine with Dr. E. B.
Cashing, of St. Johnsbury, Vt., now of Lynn, Mass.
He afterwards attended the Hahnemann Medical
tJollege of Chicago, graduating at that institution in
the spring of 1882. Since that time he has been en-
gaged in the practice of medicine at No. 275 Merri-
mack Street, Lowell, Mass. Dr. Foss has been three
times married. His last wife, Maud R., was the only
child of Dr. Charles W. Kierstead, one of the leading
physicians of Oshkosh, Wis.
Charlott E. Page, M.D., is a graduate of the
Boston University School of Medicine, graduating
about the year ISSO, since which time she has been
in practice in Lowell.
Ai.-MON Ward Hill, JI.D., was born in Lowell,
Mass., June 27, 1864; completed the course of study
in the public schools, entering Brown L'niveroity at
the age of seventeen; pursued his >ludies in the Uni-
versity until 1884, completing the scientific course.
The fall of 1884 he entered the Boston rniversity
.Medical School to pursue the study of medicine ;
•.graduated in 1887, and settled in [..owell in August
of same year, where he now is in active practice.
Dr. Hill is a menilier of thi Massachusetts Homo'O-
pathic Medical Society and of the Lowell Hahne-
mann Club.
CHAPTER -XIII.
LO WELL— I Coiitiii"fdj.
Masu.vk' .Suiieties. — Before the beginning of the
present century there were in Jliddlesex County Ma-
sonic lodges in the towns of Cliarlestown, Marlboro',
LexiuL'toM, Framinghain, (oucord :iik1 (irotoii, but
none in < 'helmsford, Tewksbury or Dracut, the three
towns from which the territory of Lowell was taken.
Ill 18'I7 the few scattered Masonic brethren in these
three towns petitioned the Grand Lodge for a charter
to hold a iodge at East Chelmsford, to be known as
the Pentucket Lodge. By •" Pc-ntucket '' was evi-
dently meant what we now call " Pawtucket," the
orthography of the word not having been definitely
fixed till more recent years. "Pawtucket" seems
now to have been settled upon as the appropriate In-
dian name of the site of l^owell, while " Pentucket "'
applies to that of Haverhill, Mass.
The petition of the Masoliic brethren was granted,
and the charter of the Pentucket Lodge was executed
and dated March 9, ISO", having the signature of
Timothy Bigelow as Grand Master. Mr. Bigeiow
was a distinguished lawyer and an important public
man of that day, having his residence iuGroton until
1807, and subsequently in Medford.
The first recorded meeting of the new lodge was
held December 10, 1807, though there had been be-
LOWELL.
223
fore this meetings probably of an iaformal and social
character.
The first recorded meeting was held in the hall of
the spacious house of Phineas Whiting, father of
Phineas Whiting, now of Lowell. The house wa.-
situated nearly on the site of the residence of Fred-
eric Ayer, Esq., and was used as a hotel.
This meeting was a novel event to the quiet village
of East Chelmsford. The inquisitive boys, as they
gazed in at the front door and saw standing at tlie
bead of the stairs the imposing form of the Tyler of
the lodge arrayed in the dazzling paraphernalia of
his mystic office, with threatening drawn sword in
his hand, were filled with strange wonder, if not
with fear.
At this meeting were six brethren, — i;aptain Isaac
Coburn, W. Master ; Jonathan Fletcher, 8. Warden ;
Jeremiahs. Chapman, J. Warden ; David Hayden.
Sec; Jonathan Chapman, Jr., and Jonas Clark. The
reader will observe that two of this assembly held no
office.
The installment of Pentucket Lmlije took place Oc-
tober 12, 1809, and was conducted with great cere-
mony and parade under Deputy Uraiid Master Tim-
othy Whiting, of Lancaster. Among the seveiileeii
officers present a.s official delegates trimi the (iraiid
Lodge on this august occasion, w:is John Abbott, a^-
J. G. Warden, who. si.xteen years afier this event,
had the honor, as Grand Master, of laying the corner-
stone of the Bunker Hill Moiiumciit. being assisted
by the Marquis De La Fayette. On the morning "I
the installment the officers of the Grand Lodge
met at the house of Mr. Whiting, while the Pen-
tucket Lodge met at the house of Joel Spaulding. the
grandfather of the late Dr. Joel Spaulding. .\t this
point I introduce the following interesting qiintatiun
from the address of R. W . William S. tiardncr, de
liveied at the dedication of the Masonic Teiiiple
February 1-j, a.l. ^lil'l, to which address I am in-
debted for the facts which 1 am recording:
" The Grand l-odge was then escorted by a band ul
music to Spalding's Hall and received in due form by
Pentucket Lodge. After the usumI ceremonies on
such occasion^, the blaster of the Pentucket Lodge
having been duly ' invested with the Oharacterislick.s
of the Chair,' a grand jirocession was formed, com-
posed of the Grand Lodge, Pentucket Lodge, and St.
Paul's Lodge, of <irotoii, preceded by a band of music.
It was a beautiful October morning. The bright sun
brought out in their richest colors the variegated tints
of the foliage, touched by the autumnal frosts. The
air was pure and invigorating. The . procession
marched gaily over the bridge, the roar of the falK
beneath almost drowning the strains of martial music.
The jewels and regalia of the craft Hashed in the sun-
light, as they marched in this first Masonic proces-
sion to lay the foundations of a .society in this new-
region. On they went until they arrived at the nieet-
iug-house, jmt over the bridge, and which is now
{ standing. Into the building the procession filed, and
j after them poured in the astonished spectators, to
' whom the scene was novel and inexplicable."
In the church took place the solemn consecration
of the Pentucket Lodge, the Rev. Wilkes Allen, pastor
of the church, delivering " an elegant and enlightened
discourse." These solemn services in the church
were followed in Whiting's Tavern by a " sumptuous
refreshment," which the reverend clergy and other gen-
tlemen shared with the members of the Masonic
fraternity.
For several years the Pentucket Lodge held its
meetings at Whiting's Hall, and at the hall of Jona-
than Fletcher and that of Artemas Holden in East
Chelmsford (now Lowell). However, for three years
previous to May 6, 1819, the meetings of the lodge
were in the house of Simeon Spalding, in the middle
of the town of Chelmsford ; but from that date, after
a somewhat acrimonious discussion, in which the dis-
tinguislled Dr. Israel Hildreth, of Dracut, took a
prominent part, the place of meeting was the hall of
.■^. F. Wood, of Middlesex Village. This village in
those days was a place of considerable importance,
having a glass manufactory and also being at the head
of Middlesex Canal, which was doing a thriving bus-
iness between Boston and Chelmsford.
The meetings of the lodge then partook so much of
a convivial character, that it was found necessary to
pass, not a prohibitory, but rather a license law, for-
bidding all refreshments except " crackers, cheese,
rum and pin." Soon, however, " bread and cyder "
were added. But in March, 1821, before the general
;igitation of the temperance reform, the law of the
lodge became more stringent, and only " bread, bis-
cuit and cheese " were permitted. Thus early, by the
exclusion of " rum and gin '" from their festivities, did
the Pentucket Lodge lead the way in this beneficent
rel'orm I
In 1825 the place of meeting of the lodge was
changed from Middlesex Village to the hall of the
Stone House, the residence of the late J. C. Ayer.
And now with the incorporation (in 1826) of the
town of Lowell and its rapid increase in population,
came increased numbers and prosperity to the frater-
nity. A Royal Arch Chapter was formed on April 8,
1S2(;. On May 31, 182G, the corner stone of the First
Bapti.st Church was laid with imposing Masonic rites.
.V procession escorted by the Mechanic Phalanx
marched from the Merrimack House to the church,
where the ceremony was performed by W. John
Fletcher, Master of Pentucket Lodge. Following
this service a supper was served at Carter's Hotel
(now the Washington House), of which about 300
persons partook.
The Pentucket Lodge celebrated St. John's day in
1828, in conjunction with lodges from other places.
The formal services in the First Baptist Church were
followed by a dinner at Carter's Hotel.
About this time (1828J arose that great political
224
HISTORY OF 3IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
party of Anti-Masons, which for a time threatened
the very existence of the mystic order. The agi-
tation which gave birth to this powerful party had its
origin in the alleged abduction and murder by the
Masons of Wm. Morgan, of Batavia, New York, who
had been, by some means, conveyed from his home to
Fort Niagara, on the shores of Lake Ontario and
there incarcerated. Of Morgan no subsequent trace
was found. The Masons of Lowell did not escape
the effects of this charge. The Pentucket Lodge, its
debt being heavy, its numbers reduced, lingered on
till 1834, when it surrendered its charter to the Grand
Lodge, and practically ceased to exist, after having
occupied Masons' Hall in the Stone House about ten
years.
And now follows a long and dreary night of eleven
years. But in 1845 the violence of the Anti-Masonic
persecution having ceased, the Pentucket Lodge was
re established. A hall in Wenlworth's Building, at
the corner of Merrimack and Shattuck .Stre«t9, wa.s
secured, and a committee was appointed to petition
the General Lodge for a renewal of the charter. The
prayer was granted. Of this committee the last .sur-
viving was Jetferflon Bancroft, who died Jan. 3, 1890.
In 1853 the lodge, after occupyiug the hull in ^Vent•
worth's Building about seven years, removed to a
hall known as Masonic Hall, in Nesmith's Block, on
John Street, which it continued to occupy for a period
of about nineteen years.
In March, 1857, Pentucket Lodge celebrated the
semi-centennial of its charter by a large meeting in
Masonic Hall, followed by a supper at French's Hall,
on Central Street.
On Feb. 13, 1872, was dedicated the Masonic Tem-
ple, now the home of the Masonic fraternity of the
city. This hall was erected and owned by \V. Brother
Hocum Hosford.aud is thus referred to in the address
of Judge Gardner, before referred to: " This elegant
temple has been erected and these apartments
especially built for our use. Every convenience
which necessity required, every ornament which a re-
fined taste suggested and every luxury which ease and
comfort could command have been lavishly bestowed
by the architect, who has now surrendered to the
M. W. Grand Master the implements of his office and
trust. Into this elegant, cultivated home we have
now come." '
In 1871 the Pentucket Lodge contained 2t>5 mem-
bers. In 1890 it contained about 425. '
Among the officers of the Pentucket Lodge for 1890
are: W. M., Herbert A. Wright; Secretary, Lucius A. i
Derby; Chaplain, Rev. George C. Wright; Treasurer,
Adeibert M. Hunloon.
Most that is historically interesting in the record of
Free Masonry in Lowell is connected with the Pen-
tucket Lodge. It is the only lodge which has seen
the " day of small things," and encountered the hos-
tility of political faction. Long is the history of ad-
versity, while that of prosperity is meagre and un-
eventful. We shall, therefore, content ourselves with
a brief record of the other Masonic organizations of
the city.
The charter of the Pilgrim Emampment was granted
(October 21, 1855. This encampment was composed
of Masons in Lowell who had been advanced to the
grade of Knights Templar. The charter of the Pil-
grim Commandery gives it rank and precedence as
number eight in the jurisdiction. Sir Samuel K.
Hutchinson was the first commander. This Com-
mandery is a distinguished body of Masonic Knight-
hood. It is composed of men of the highest respecta-
bility, and it'i management has been of a highly able
and I'lfective character. It has had the honor of be-
ing invited out of the city to take a conspicuous part
on ini|iortatit occasions, .^* the dedication of the Tem-
ple in Boston and the laying of the corner-stone of
the Post-Office in Boston.
.\mong the officers of the Pilgrim Commandery for
1890 are: E. (,'., Eihvard J. Noyes ; Treasurer, Arthur
G. Polbird ; Recorder. James W. B. Shaw ; Prelate,
Geo. W. Howe; Wiuileii, Walter W. Johnson.
Thu A/uiiiKTiis V'liiifil of Royal and SeleH Masons
was establislu'il in Lowell, July ri, 1826. It was a
self-constituted body, having no charter. During the
.\nti-Miisoti excitement this organization almost ceased
to exist. But at length, in IS'Mj, it was resuscitated,
and for the lirst time received a charter, which was
granted on December Vth of that year.
Among its officers for 1890 are: T. I. M., Charles
A. (.'rii-*s : Treasurer, ( 'ornelius S. Livingston; Re-
corder, Lucius A. Derby ; ( 'haplain. Wm. A. Lang.
T/if Muiiiif H'ji'-b lUiijiil Anh Charter was chartered
in 1S2H. .Vmoiig its officers for 1890 were: H. P.,
Frank L. Weaver: K., Charles A. Cross; Treasurer,
Willard A. Brown; (^liaplaiij, Wm. k. Lang; .Sec?e-
tary, TlK'ndore Adams.
r/i^ Ancifiil \'orl: hnhf was instituted in 1S52.
Among its officers for 1890 are : W. M., Arthur F.
.Salmon; Treasurer. Albert \. Haggell ; Chaplain,
Rev. Robert ( 'ourt ; Sec, Frank M. Merrill.
Kihviiininr] Lnilije was instituted in 1867. Among
its officers for 1890 are . W. .M., Frank L. Weaver;
Treasurer, Clarence W. Whidden ; Chaplain, Geo. F.
Lawton ; .Secretary, Williard .\. Brown; S. W., John
H. Fuller; J. W.," Arthur H. Hosford.
Win. North Lotliy was instituted in 1868. .\mong
its officers in 189ii are: W. .M., Virgil G. Barnard;
.S. \V., Charles W. Money; .1 W., Harry K. Boaid-
man ; Treasurer, Geo. F. .Scribner ; Chaplain, Rev.
Ransom ,V. (xreene; J. D., Wm. S. Greene.
The Masonic officers in the following record are for
the year 1889:
M'lsonic Relii'/ Assorialion. President, Wm. F. Sal-
mon.
Lowell Masonic Assoi'iation. President, Wm. F.
Salmon.
Loirell Masonic Masters and Wardens' Association.
President, Arthur F. Salmon.
LOWELL.
225
Lowell Lodge of Perfection was organized in 1857.
T.-.P.-.G.-.M.-.C. H. Hutchinson.
Lowell Council of Princes of Jerusalem was organ-
ized in 1857. M.-.E.-.S.-.P.-.G.-.M. -.Hiram N. Hall.
Mount Calvary Chapter of Rose Croix, 18lh Grade,
was established in 1859. M. W. and P. Master, Rev.
Josiah L. Seward.
Odd-Fellows' Lodges. — Odd-Fellowship seems to
have its origin in certain independent secret fraterni-
ties which existed in England in the early years of
the present century, and which were formed for social
and convivial purposes, and adopted the initiatory
rites, phraseology and organization of Free Masonry.
But these early fraternities possessed not the spirit,
but only the form of modern Odd-Fellowship.
The fraternity finds its true and virtual origin in
the institution of the order in Manchester, England,
in 1812, in which its main purpose is declared to be
" to render assistance to every brother who may apply
through sickness, distress or otherwise, if he be well
attached to the Queen and government and faithful
to the order."
The order of Odd- Fellows in the United States is
independent of that in England. The Grand Lodge
of the United States, which is composed of Past Noble
Grands of subordinate lodges, has sole jurisdiction of
the order in the country. The original objects of the
order in the United States were the relief of the
brethren, the interment of the dead and the care of
their widows and orphans. To these objects have
been added, in later years, "the giving of unsectarian
religious instruction and the elevation of the human
character."
In 1820 Thomas Wildey introduced the order into
the United States by instituting the Washington
Lodge, No. 1, in Baltimore, receiving a charter from
the York Lodge of Preston, England. Since 1820 the
order has greatly and rapidly increased in the United
States, so that its number of members in 1888 was, in
Massachusetts alone, 38,371. Of the twenty organiza-
tions in Lowell, classed under, the general title of
Odd-Fellows, some are known as Cantons, which are
mainly devoted to the service of military parade on
public occasions; some as Encampments, which differ
from ledges by being composed of members of a
higher degree ; and some as Daughters of Rebekah,
consisting of ladies.
The following is a list of such organizations now
existing in Lowell, in which the statistics and names
of officers are mainly taken from the report of the
proceedings of the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts at
its annual session held in Boston August 8, 1889, and
from the Lowell Directory of 1889, their place of
meeting being (unless otherwise specified) Odd-Fel-
lows' Hall, on Merrimack Street:
Grand Canton Pawtucket, No. 9, Patriarchs Militant.
Captain, George A. Dickey (Commandant).
Componant Canton, No. 21. Captain, George A.
Dickey.
' 15-ii
Componant Canton, No. 22. Captain, T. E. Boucher.
Monomake Encampment, No. 4. C. P., W. H.
Randlett.
Wannalancet Encampment, No. 39. C. P., George
H. Smith.
Lowell Encampment, No. 17. C. P., N. E. Annis.
Meets at Highland Hall, on Branch Street.
Merrimack Lodge, No. 7. N. G., Daniel G. Ryan.
Number of members, 320.
Oberlin Lodge, No. 28. N. G., J. T. Trask. Num-
ber of members, 459.
Mechanics' Lodge, No. 11. N. G., Henry G. Hart.
Number of members, 454,
Veritas Lodge, No. 49. N. G., Thomas Stimson.
Number of members, 305.
Lowell Lodge, No. 95. N. G., Asa B. Hilliard.
Number of members, 290.
Lincoln Lodge, No. 188. N. G., William Knowles.
Meets at Lincoln Hall, Odd-Fellows' Block. Num-
ber of members, 152.
Highland Lodge, No. 6. N. G., Charles Bean.
Meets at Highland Hall, Branch Street. Number of
members, 174.
Loyal Excelsior Lodge, 1. 0. O. F., Manchester
Unity. N. G., J. L. Broughton. Meets at Bay State
Hall, Central Street.
Integrity Lodge, I. 0. 0. F., Manchester Unity.
N. G., Arthur H. Best. Meets at Bay State Hall,
Central Street.
Lodges entitled " Daughters of Rebekah " consist
of Brothers of the order, and wives and daughters of
Brothers. Of these lodges there are two :
Evening iStar Lodge, No. 80, Daughters of Rebekah.
N. G., Mrs. Eunice Stone.
Highland Union Lodge, No. 31, Daughters of Re-
bekah. N. G., 'Mrs. Clara Wheelden. Meets at
Highland Hall.
Odd-Fellows' Mutual Benefit Asiociation, organized
July 22, 1868, and chartered in 1885. President, J. T.
Trask; Clerk, Benjamin Hodgman. This society has
for its object the mutual insurance of the lives of its mem-
bers. The membership of this association is limited to
the Odd-Fellows of the Lowell lodges and of the Shaw-
sheene lodges of Billerica. It is the oldest of the
kind in New England, and has been the means of
benefiting a large number of families. Many of
our most prominent citizens are included in its
membership. Number of members in January, 1890,
between 600 and 700. During the period of its ex-
istence of less than twenty-two years, it has paid iu
benefits to 167 families of deceased members the
large sum of $118,000.
Odd-Fellows' Ladies' Relief Association. Meets alter-
nately each month at the homes of its members.
Odd-Fellows' Halls. In 1871 a special charter was
granted by the Legislature of Massachusetts to Jo-
siah G. Peabody, Ambrose Lawrence, Joseph L.
Sargent, William H. Wiggin and A. B. Plimpton,
for the purpose of erecting or purchasing a build-
226
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ing for the use of the I. O. O. F. Merrimack Lodge,
No. 7, Mechanics' Lodge, No. 11, Oberlin Lodge, No.
27, Monomake Encampment, No. 4, and Wannalan-
cet Encampment, No. 39, subscribed for stock to the
amount of $60,000, and immediately purchased the
building known as Carleton Block, on Merrimack
Street, and fitted it for the use of the above-named
orders and others who might need to occupy it.
The building is now owned by the purchasers, and
is free from incumbrances.
Red Mek. — Kindred in form to the lodges of the
Odd-Fellows, are the three following leagues of the
Improved Order of Red Men, whose object is to
promote freedom, fraternity, hospitality and charity.
It is purely American in its origin, dating backto-the
early days before the American Revolution, when the
patriots disguised themselves by forming as Indian
societies. Hence the name Red Men. Hence, also,
freedom is placed among its objects. The whole
order numbers nearly 100,000 members. The order
differs from other fraternal and secret benevolent so-
cieties in the originality and beauty of its mysteries
and ceremonies. It cares for the relief of the sick
and of the unfortunate and burial of the dead.
Osceola League, No. 2, instituted 1889. Bashaba,
Edgar M. Hill. Meets at G. A. R. Hall, Wyman's
Exchange.
Pasaaconaway Tribe, No. 32. Prophet, James H.
Hickey; Sachem, John L. Stevens. Meets at Grand
Army Hall.
Miantohomi Tribe, No. 52. Sachem, Elmore R.
Fife. Meets at Highland Hall, Branch Street.
IXDEPEXDENT ORDER OF FREE SONS OF ISRAEL.
— Citizens of Lowell of Jewish birth hold an inde-
pendent lodge, known as the Samuel Lodge of the Inde-
pendent Order of Free Sons of Israel. President, S.
Kurtz; Recording Secretary, Bernard Lederer.
Royal Arcanum. — In Lowell are two Councils of
Royal Arcanum, whose object is Mutual Life Insur-
ance for the benefit of the widows and children of
deceased members. The order is designed to promote
fraternal union ; to secure the social, moral and intel-
lectual education of its memembers ; to relieve the
sick and distressed among them, etc.
Lowell Council, No. 8. Regent, C. 0. S. Wheeler ;
Treasurer, Albert M. Gray.
Highland Council, No. 970. Regent, Arthur W.
Early ; Treasurer, Dr. W. G. Eaton, Jr.
The Royal Society of Good Fellows. — Fra-
ternity Assembly. Ruler, Edgar M. HiU ; Secretary,
Samuel M. Chase.
This fraternity was organized in Providence, Rhode
Island, in 1882. Its object is to unite men of sound
health and good moral character for encouraging each
other in business, for assisting each other to obtain
employment, for relieving sick and distressed mem-
bers and for assisting the widows and orphans of de-
ceased members. Assessments are called for only
when needed to pay benefits. Policemen are found
in large numbers in this order.
Knights of Py'THIas. — Lowell has six lodges of
the Knights of Pythias. This order finds its name
in the ancient story of the devoted friendship of
Damon and Pythias, in the reign of Dionysius, at
Syracuse. It was founded at Washington, D. C, in
1864, by Justus H. Rathbone. Its design is to relieve
the misfortunes of its members, to visit the sick, and
to bury the dead. It cares for the widow and edu-
cates the orphan. The expenses are met by annual
dues and initiation fees.
No person except a white male citizen, of temper-
ate habits, good moral character, sound mental and
bodily health, able to support himself and a believer in
the Supreme Being can be admitted to the order.
Endowment Rank of Knights of Pythias. President,
Alexander Walker. Meet in Pythian Hall, Merri-
mack Street.
Lowell Lodge, No. 24. Instituted 1870. C. C, E.
D. Shadduck.
Wamesit Lodge, No. 25. Instituted February 1,
1870. C. C, 0. P. Romaiue. Meets in Hosford's
Block.
Cavalier Lodge, No. 2. Instituted May, 1888. C.
C, Albert M. Gray. Meets at No. 84 Merrimack
Street.
Samuel H. Hines Lodge, No. 56. C. C, L. E. Con-
ley. Meets at Hosford's Block.
Middlesex Lodge, No. 58. C. C, John F. Bateman.
Meets at Highland Hall, Branch Street.
Knights of Honor. — The Knights of Honor have
two lodges, whose object is the mutual insurance of
the lives of the members. The order started in
Louisville in 1873. The members number over 130,000.
Since its organization it has collected and disbursed
more than §28,000,000.
Excelsior Lodge, No. 139. P. D., Fred. D. Mansur.
Meets in Union Hall, on Middle Street.
Fredonia Lodge, No. 2980. P. D., G. S. Oilman,
meets at State Hall, Central Street.
The Knights and Ladies of Honor have one
lodge, in Lowell, whose object is insurance of life
and mutual protection. " Its experience has demon-
strated that female risks are better by 4 per cent,
than male." The order was chartered in 1878, and
was the first to admit female members. It has paid
to beneficiaries more than $4,000,000.
Edson Lodge, 1029, P. P., H. E. Dutton, meets at
G. A. R. Hall, cor. of Merrimack and Central Streets.
Iron Hall. — The city has the two following lodges
of the Order of the Iron Hall, whose object is to afibrd
aid to sick or disabled members, and, under certain
rules and restrictions, to disburse money to the families
or heirs of deceased members.
Branch No. 386. Chief Justice, Charles S. Dodge.
Meets at Union Hall, Middle Street.
Local Branch Sisterhood, No. 526. Chief Justice,
Mrs. Benj. Holt. Meets at Union Hall, Middle Street.
LOWELL.
227
UxiTED Workmen. — Lowell has one lodge of the
Ancient Order of United Workmen, whose object is
the benefit and protection of its members and the
relief of their families when in distress. The order
was started in Meadville, Pa., by John J. Upchurch
in 1868. In the twenty-one years of its existence its
beneficiaries have received more than S38,000,000.
Lowell Lodge, No. 22. Master Workman, Orrin
F. Osgood. Meets in hall over the Boston and Maine
Depot.
Okder of iEGis. — Of the Order of -SIgis, the Star
Lodge, Xo. 2, President, D. J. Moran, meets at
Highland Hall. Its object is to aflford aid to sick and
distressed members, and to insure the lives of mem-
bers.
American Legiox of Honor. — There are two
councils, whose object is to establish a fund for the
relief of sick and disabled members, also to aid the
family of deceased members. The order was chartered
under the laws of Massachusetts in 1879. The order
has paid to beneficiaries over $15,000,000.
Loicdl Council, No. 427. Commander, James W.
Kilburn. Meets at Caledonia Hall.
Middlesex Council, No. 1027. Commander, Hugh
Walker. Meets at Lincoln Hall, Odd Fellows' Block.
United Order of the Golden Cross. — There is
one commandery whose object is the mutual insur-
ance of the lives of its members. Temperance men
alone can be members of this order. Its spirit incul-
cates the visiting of the sick and the supplying of
their wants.
Washington Commandery, instituted Nov. 7, 1878.
Noble Commander, Frank W. Corson. Meets at
Union Hall, Middle Street.
Order of United Friends. — There are the follow-
ing three councils, whose object is to establish a relief
fund for use in case of suffering or misfortune of its
members. The order was organized in Albany, N. Y.,
in 1881.
Highland Council, No. 287. Chief Councilor, Sum-
ner P. Smith. Meets at Highland Hall, Branch St.
Mystic Council, No. 10. Chief Councilor, Emu-
lus Thompson. Meets in Union Hall, Middle Street.
Spindle City Council, No. 190. Organized Jan. 8,
1 886. Chief Councilor, Cyrus Barton. Meets at Union
Hall, Middle Street.
Sons of St. George. — Lowell has one lodge of
the Sons of St. George. This order was instituted at
Scranton, Pa., in 1871. It is composed of English-
men, their sons and grandsons, and its object is to
bind in one common brotherhood the natives of the
mother country and their descendants.
Waverly Lodge, No. 104, instituted Nov. 2, 1882.
P. P., Geo. H. Harris. Meets in Union Hall, Middle
Street.
United Order of Pilgrims. — There are two col-
onies of the United Order of Pilgrim Fathers, whose
object is the mutual insurance of the lives of its mem-
bers. It members are of both sexes.
Garfield Colony, No. 34. Governor, Edwin De-
mack. Meets in Pilgrim Hall, Wamesit Bank Build-
ing.
Bay State Colony, No. 71. Governor, Melvin J.
Brown. Meets at No. 55 Central Street.
The Catholic Union. — This society contains
about 300 members of both sexes. Its object is the
moral, mental and social advancement of its members.
Under its auspices a Choral Society, conducted by P.
P. Haggerty, has been organized.
Knights of St. Patrick. — Michael Corbett, Com-
mander. Meets at Farragut House, Central Street.
This society has for its object the social interests and
enjoyment of its members. Its meetings are not fre-
quent.
The Irish National League. — President, Ed-
ward Gallagher.
The New England Order of Protection. —
Organized June, 1888. Warden, H. P. Kittredge.
Meets at Highland Hall. Its members are of both
sexes, and its object is the mutual insurance of the
lives of its members. It is limited to New England.
The Lowell Lodge of B. P. 0. Elks was insti-
tuted April 10, 1888, and is designed for the social
and convivial enjoyment of its members, and for the
aid of members when in sickness or distress. Its Ex-
alted Ruler is Frank M. Merrill, and its Esteemed
Lecturing Knight is Charles F. Libby. Mayor Palmer
and Postmaster Haggett are among its trustees. This
order is composed mostly of men in musical or theat-
rical employments.
A Loyal Lodge of Orangemen, Knox's True
Blue, Master, Thomas G. Little, meets at Good Tem-
plars' Hall, on Middle Street.
The Caledonia Club, Chief, Andrew Livingston,
meets in Wyman's Exchange.
Ancient Order of HIBER^^ANS. — Lowell has
four divisions of the Ancient Order of Hibernians,
organized for benevolent purpose.
Division Ko. 1. Organized in 1867. President,
Patrick J. Custy. Meets at Lynch's Hall, Market
Street.
Dii-ision No. 2. Organized in 1869. President,
Dennis O'Brien. Meets in Tyler's Hall, Middle Street.
Division No. ?. Organized in 1873. President,
P. J. Bolton. Meets in Tyler's Hall, Middle Street
Division No. 28. President, Joseph McQuade.
Meets in Hibernian Hall, Market Street.
Foresters. — Lowell has four Courts of the Ancient
Order of Foresters, whose object is to furnish its mem-
bers with the services of a physician in sickness, to
pay .a weekly sick benefit of five dollars during illness
and otherwise afibrd mutual and fraternal aid. The
society seems to have derived its name and inspira-
tion from the forest life and benevolent character and
acts of Robin Hood, Little John, Friar Tuck and
other foresters in Sherwood Forest in the twelfth cen-
tury. The present membership in the United States
is about 75,000.
228
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Court City of Lowell, No. 7389. Chief Ranger,
James O'Brien. Meets atG. A. R. Hall, Central Street.
Court Merrimack, No. 6462. Chief Ranger, C. F.
Marren. Meets in Union Hall, Middle Street.
Court Middlesex, No. 7077. Chief Ranger, James
H. Hickey. Meets in Union Hall, Middle Street.
Court Gen. Shields. Chief Ranger, M. F. Conley.
Organized in 1890.
Grand Army of the Republic. — There are in
Lowell seven Posts of the Grand Army of the Repub-
lic, whose object is to relieve the wants of soldiers
who served in the War of the Rebellion and also to
care for their families when in need.
The Gen. Butler Encampment, Post 42, Com-
mander, C. A. R. Dimon, meets at the Grand Army
Hall, Central Street. Number of members about 325.
James A. Garfield Encampment, Post 120, Com-
mander, Luther A. French, meets in Grand Army
Hall, Merrimack Street.
Ladd and Whitney, Post 185, G. A. R., organized
April, 1886, Commander, F. S. Pevey, meets at G.
A. R. Hall, Wyman's Exchange.
James A. Garfield Woman's Relief Corps, No. 33.
Organized Nov. 1883. President, Mrs. Sarah E. Mer-
chant. Meets at Grand Army Hall, Merrimack Street.
Woman's Relief Corps of Pott 42. President, Mrs. E.
T. Bean. This organization has for its object to as-
sist soldiers and their families in sickness and dis-
tress; also to assist army nurses who were connected
with the Civil War. The membership in Massachusetts
is over 8000.
Post 42 G. A. R. Drum, Fife and Bugle Corps,
Leader, James A. Murphy, meets at Grand Army
Hall, Central Street.
Post 120 G. A. R. Band, Leader, Albert Gregoire,
meets in G. A. R. Hall, Central Street.
Sons of Veterans. — There are two associations,
whose design is to perpetuate the name and honor of
their fathers who served as soldiers in the War of the
Rebellion.
Admiral Farragut Camp, No. 78, Captain, A. C.
Blairsdell, meets at 129 Central Streef..
Sons of Veterans' Benefit Association, organized
May, 1887. President, Fred. J. Bradford.
. Sixth Regiment of iLissACHtJSETTs Volun-
teer Militia.— Colonel, Henry G. Green, of Fitch-
burg. Two companies belong to Lowell.
Lowell Mechanic Phalanx, Company C, Captain, O.
M. Pratt, has its armory in the Market-House Build-
ing.
Putnam Guards, Company G, Captain, Charles H.
Richardson, has its armory in the Market-House
Building.
Ambulance Corps, First Brigade M. V. M.,
Lieutenant, Amasa Howard, Jr., M.D., has its armory
in Hildreth's Building.
Welch Guards, Company M, Ninth Regi-
ment M. V. M., Captain, Charles Connor, has its
armory in Urban Hall.
Second Corps Cadets, Company D, Captain,
Charles S. Proctor, has its armory in Hildreth's
Building.
The Lowell High School Battalion, Major,
F. Roy Martin, has four companies, as follows : Com-
pany A, Captain, Frank E. Johnson ; Company B,
Captain, Michael Corbett ; Company C, Captain,
Charles E. Doulan ; Company D, Captain, Arthur
J. Lamere.
Temperance Societies. — Lowell has fourteen
temperance organizations, as follows :
Woynan's Christian Temperance Union, President,
Mrs. Almira Sturtevant, meets at 10 John Street.
Irene Lodge, No. 74, /. 0. of G. T., organized 1870,
meets at the chapel of the Ministry at Large, on Mid-
dlesex Street.
Wide-awake Lodge, I. 0. of G. T., meets at Good
Templars' Hall.
Hope of Lowell Lodge, No. 7, I, 0. of G. T, meets
at St. Joseph's Building, Button Street.
Golden Cross Lodge, I. 0. of G. T., meets at Pil-
grim Hall.
Merrimack Lodge, L 0. of G. T., meets at St. Jos-
eph's Building, Button Street.
Mt. Zion Lodge, L 0. of G. T., meets at Good Tem-
plars' Hall, at Bavis' Corner.
Lowell Reform Club, President, Bennis J. Ring,
meets at Welles' Hall, Merrimack Street.
Lowell Reform Club Corporation, President, Alvin
E. Joy. Birectors meet in Welles' Hall.
St. Patricias Temperance Society, organized in 1869,
meets in rooms of Parochial School, on Suffolk
Street.
Burke Temperance Institute, organized June, 1884,
President, James A. Sullivan, meets at 18 Middle St.
Elliot Temperance Institute, organized June, 1884,
meets in Albion Block, Merrimack Street.
Mathew Temperance Institute, President, James J.
Quinn, meets at 37 Market Street.
Sunbeam Union, No. 650, President, A. J. Boies,
organized March, 1888, meets in Mathew Temperance
Hall, Market Street.
The " Associated Charities of Lowell," or-
ganized May 6, 1881, President, Rev. L. C. Manches-
ter, has its office at the rooms of the People's Club,
in Wyman's Exchange. The object of the society is
to give proper direction to the charities of the benev-
olent, to aid in discriminating between the deserv-
ing poor and the fraudulent, and to secure justice in
the proper distribution of the contributions in aid of
the suffering.
Sunday-School Superintendents' Union of
Lowell and vicinity. President, John McKinnon.
Chaxning Fraternity. President, C. F. Coburn.
" An organization for the purpose of furnishing fruit
and flowers for the sick, and Sunday evening lectures
during the fall and winter months ; and also country
week for children." It is under the auspices of the
Unitarian Church.
LOWELL.
229
The Dorcastriak Association, organized 1883,
President, Miss C. P. Kitson, has its rooms in tlie ves-
try of Kirk Street Church. Its object is to aid and
encourage the poor to learn the means of self-support,
especially by instructing girls in the art of sewing
and other kindred work.
St. John's Hospital, Bartlett Street, Belvidere.
''Organized May 1, 1867, under the charge of the
Sisters of Charity. Visitors will be admitted daily.
Open at all hours for the reception of patients, who
are admitted upon the lowest possible terms, varying
from S4 to SIO per week. The staff consists of the
following physicians : Doctors Savory, Spalding,
Plunkett, Oilman, Fisk, Pillsbury, Irish, Parker^
Huntress.
"Also an out-patient department, where the poor of
the city are treated free of charge by the following
physicians: Doctors Parker, Benner, Jefferson, Bell,
Lawler, Gage, Walker and Burns."
St. Peter's Orphan Asylum, 39 Appleton Street.
Spiritual Director, Rev. M. Ronan. Superior, Sister
Hildegarde. This asylum, formerly in charge of the
Sisters of St. Vincent de Paul, has for about two
year* been in charge of the Sisters of Nazareth.
Faith Home, No. 3 Leroy Street. — Incorporated
December. 1884. President, Rev. 0. E. Mallory. The
Faith Home is an orphanage, under the auspices of
the Branch Street Baptist Church.
Theodore Edson Orphanage, No. 13 Anne
Street. President, Rev. A. St. John Chambr6. Matron,
Albertine J. Harrison. This orphanage owes its
existence to the efforts of the Rev. Dr. Edson, of St.
Anne's Church.
The Holy Name Society of St. Patrick's
CHfRCH meets in St. Patrick's Church. President,
Michael McDermott. The object of this society is
religious, having in view the repression of profanity
and the cultivation of a reverent spirit in the use of
the names of the Divine Being.
Lowell Baptist Union. — , President Rev. A.
Blackburn. The board of management consists of five
delegates from each Baptist Church, with the pastors
and superintendents of Sunday-schools.
Massachusetts Society for Pretention of
Cruelty- to Children. — Headquarters, Police Sta-
tion, Market Street. Agent, James E. Webster.
Lowell Board of Trade, No. 29 Post-Office
Building.— Organized May 12, 1887. President, Charles
H. Coburn.
Lowell Underwriters' Association, No. 31
Central Street. President, Charles Coburn.
Middlesex Mechanics' Association, Mechanics'
Building, Dutton Street. Incorporated 1825. Presi-
dent, Hamilton Burrage. The history of this associa-
tion will be found under " Libraries."
Lowell Young Men's Christian Association,
on Hurd Street. Organized 1866. President, Wm.
F. Hills. The history of this association will be
found under " Churches.''
Sons and Daughters of Maine Association
meets at G. A. R. Hall, Central Street. President,
W. A. Stinson.
The Old Residents' Historical Association. —
Organized Dec, 1868. President, C. C.Chase. Secre-
tary, Alfred Oilman. Meets at Banquet Hall of the
Middlesex Mechanic Association. This association
has for its object the collecting, publishing and pre-
serving of the history of the city of Lowell from its
earliest days. It has already published three valuable
volumes of reminiscences, and at its quarterly meet-
ings papers upon local history or biography are regu-
larly presented.
The Franklin Literary Association is an in-
corporated society of about fifty members, having for
its object the literary and intellectual improvement of
its members.
Lowell Bar Association. — Organized Oct., 1875.
Meets at Police Court Building. President, Hon.
Arthur P. Bonney.
Lowell Choral Society. — Incorporated 1886.
Meets at Mechanics' Hall. President, Solon W.
Stevens.
Lowell Hahnejiann Club. — Organized Nov.,
1881. President, Dr. S.G. Bailey. Meets alternately
in office of members. This club has for its object the
propagation and defence of the principles of homoe-
opathy.
The Ministry- at Large in Lowell. Organized
in 1843. President, Geo. F. Richardson. Church and
office on Middlesex Street. The history of this or-
ganization will be found under " Churches."
Lowell Pharmaceutical Association. — Presi-
dent, Greenleaf C. Brock. This is an association of
apothecaries for the purpose of mutual aid in impart-
ing a knowledge of the most recent discoveries and
of the best methods of conducting their business.
Lowell Master Builders' Exchange, corner of
Appleton and Central Sts. President, J. W. Bennett.
Lowell Stoni:-Masons' Union meets in Wyman's
Exchange. President, Patrick McCabe.
Lowell Press Assoclation. — President, James
Bayles.
Lowell Retail Grocers' Association. — Organ-
ized October, 1881. President, E. W. Clark.
Day Nursery, 33 Moody Street. — Organized 1885.
Matron, Miss Ellen O'Leary. The design of this
organization is to care for the young children of la-
boring women while away from home on service, and
other like purposes.
Home for Young Women and Children. — Or-
ganized March, 1873. President, Mrs. Wm. Nichols.
Matron, Mrs. A. G. Rouviere. The design of the
institution is to protect and befriend young women
and children who, on account of being strangers in
the city, or from sickness or other misfortune, need
support and protection. The institution owns an
eligible building on John Street, and is supported by
fairs and the gifts of the benevolent.
230
HISTORY OF 5IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The Old Ladies' Home, on Fletcher Street. Or-
ganized July, 1867. President, Mrs. George Hed-
rick ; physician. Dr. Wm. Bass. It is the design of
the Home to support aged and feeble females. Of
the 29 inmates, whose names are given in the last
report, the oldest was 78 years of age, and the young-
est 58, the average age being 68 years 3 months. For
many years the Home was in a house on Moody
Street, but in September, 1882, possession was taken
of its new and elegant building on Fletcher Street,
which is admirably adapted co the purpose for which
it was erected. At present the number of inmates is
36, this being the full number which the house was
designed to accommodate. The institution is mainly
supported by annual fairs and gifts of the benevolent.
Lowell Association of Veterans of the
Mexican Wae. — Headquarters, No. 256 Fletcher
Street. President, John P. Searle.
Crescent Club. — Rooms in Wyman's Exchange.
President, Joseph P. Donohoe. This is a social asso-
ciation.
People's Club. — Rooms for men in Nesmith's
Building, on John Street ; for women, in Wyman's
Exchange. President, Fred T. Greenhalge. The ob-
ject of this club is to atford to men and women such
places of resort and entertainment as will promote
virtue and improve the mind and save them from the
allurements of vice.
Home Club. — Rooms at Wyman's Exchange. Or-
ganized April, 1878. President, Leroy S. Kimball.
The object of this club is the social entertainment
of its members.
Lowell Humane Society. — Incorporated 1889.
President, James Bayles. The object of the society is
the prevention of cruelty to animals. Charles H.
Philbrick is employed as agent of the society in pros-
ecuting its work.
Lowell Camera Club. — Meets in Central Block,
Central Street. President, William P. Atwood. The
object is to afford mutual aid in learning the art of
photography.
Lowell Cricket Club. — Organized 1874. Meets
at Bay State Hall. President, John J. Hart.
Vesper Boat Club. — Boat-house on Pawtucket
Street. Number of members, 150. President, Paul
Butler.
Lowell Rod and Gun Club. — Headquarters, O.
A. Richardson's gun store. Central Street. Presi-
dent, L. A. Derby. Shooting-grounds at Tewksbury
Centre.
Young Men's Social Club and Reading Room,
No. 249 River Street. President, Thomas Gamble.
YoRicK Club.— Rooms, 51 Central Street. Presi-
dent, George R. Richardson. This is a social organ-
ization.
Lowell Co-operative Association, No. 58 Dut-
ton Street. Organized January, 1876. President,
John Dobson. Its object is to furnish its members
with groceries, coal, etc., at their net cost.
L'Union St. Joseph's de Lowell (French Ca-
nadian), St. Joseph's Block, 59 Dutton Street. Pres-
ident, Isadora Turcotte. This society has about 500
members, and its object is to aid its members in sick-
ness or distress, and to beiriend and help the widows
and children of deceased members.
Society St. Jean Baptiste (French Canadian).
—Organized May, 1869. Meets at 198 Middlesex
Street. President, George D. Jaques. This society
contains about 625 members. Its object is like that
of the last-mentioned society.
Association Catholique de jeunes gens of
St. Joseph's Church (French Canadian). — Organ-
ized December, 1878. Meets at 83 Middle Street.
President, Henri Daigle. The object of this society
is the social and religious improvement of its mem-
bers and others.
Corporation St. Axdre (French Canadian). —
Organized February, 1889. Meets at St. Joseph's
Block, Dutton Street. President, Joseph S. Lapierre.
Its object is like that of St. Joseph's.
Le Cercle Canadian, No. 83 Middle Street.
President, C. H. Parthenais. This circle is for social
purposes.
British-American Association, President, Jos.
Miller. This is a political association, whose object
is to persuade Englishmen and other foreign residents
to become naturalized and to cast their votes for sus-
taining the free public schools and other kindred
institutions.
Middlesex North District Medical Society,
embracing Lowell and neighboring towns. Quarter-
ly meetings held in Lowell. President, N. B. Ed-
wards, il.D., of North Chelmsford. This is a society of
long standing and of high character.
Middlesex Poultry Association, President,
John H. Nichols, Lowell.
The Young Men's Catholic Library Associa-
tion has long been of great service to young Irish-
men in giving them free instruction, encouraging
them to obtain an education, to read useful books and
in general to seek the cultivation of their minds.
Many a promising young Irishman of the city has
received his first inspiration from this society. The
association possesses a library and has from time to
time afforded instruction to young men who desire
to cultivate their minds.
Middlesex North Agricultural Society, in-
corporated in 1855. It embraces Lowell and neighbor-
ing towns. President, A. C. Varnum. This society was
started in 1855 by the efforts of Hon. John A. Goodwin,
Abiel Rolfe, Samuel J. Varney and others. In the act
of incorporation the names of William Spencer, Josiah
Gates and Josiah C. Bartlett are mentioned. Its first
president was William Spencer, superintendent of
the Print Works of the Hamilton Corporation. Its
first exhibition was held in September, 1855. The
society owns extensive fair-grounds and a spacious
exhibition building in the south part of the city.
LOWELL.
231
» The successive presidents of the society have been
William Spencer (1855), Tappan Wentworth (1856),
John C. Bartlett (1858), Elijah M. Read (1860), E. P.
Spalding (1863), James T. Burnap (1865), Asa Clem-
ent (1867), H. H. Wilder (1869), Jonathan Ladd
(1870), Elijah M. Reed (1872), William F.Salmon
(1873), John A. Goodwin (1875), Joseph L. Sargent
(1877), A. C. Varnum (1879).
City Dispensary, at the Market-House Building,
on Market Street, in charge of the following corps of
physicians: Doctors Ricker, Colton, Gillard, Viles,
Spaulding, Patterson, McOwen, Sullivan, W. A.
Johnson, Willard and Eaton. This institution has
for its object to furnish medicine to the poor without
charge upon the prescription of a physician.
Lowell Hospital Association, "organized in
1840 by the several manufacturing companies for the
benefit and medical care of those in their employ who
may be sick. It is also free to the public by the cost of
board. The agents and superintendents of the sev-
eral companies are its trustees. Superintendent, C.
E. Simpson ; Matron, Miss C. B. Whitford."
CHAPTER XIV.
LO WELI^-{ Continued).
MISCELLANEOUS.
The Post-Office. — If those institutions of a city
which touch the daily life and thought of the great-
est number of its citizens most deserve historic men-
tion, surely no one presents a higher claim to notice
than the post-office. The eyes of half the people of
a city are almost daily turned toward the post-office,
for almost everybody is expecting a letter. The
revenue of the Lowell post-office was, in 1888, over
$85,000, and the number of letters, etc., delivered
was probably over 5,000,000. The number of clerks
and carriers employed is above 40, and the institution
in many ways comes near our social and domestic
life. The postmasters of a city become very widely
and very familiarly known to the citizens, and a brief
record of their lives cannot fail to interest them.
In the early days of our city, letters were very much
less frequently written than now, and those that were
written were very much less frequently entrusted to
the mails. The cause of this is easily found — there
was much less money and much higher postage.
From 1816 to 1845 the postage of a single letter was
six and one-quarter cents for thirty miles and under,
ten cents from thirty to eighty miles, twelve and one-
half cents from eighty to 150 miles. Accordingly,
letters were often sent by stage-drivers, teamsters,
and occasional travelers. Letters were left for de-
livery at stores and hotels, in order to save the post-
age. Lowell (then called East Chelmsford), for two
or three years after the great manufacturing enter-
prises were started, had no post-office of its own, its
thousand or more inhabitants depending upon neigh-
boring post-offices or other means for the conveyance
and delivery of letters.
Its first United States post-office was established in
1824, the postmaster being Jonathan C. Morrill, a
trader in the village. He was appointed by Presi-
dent Monroe, and remained in office about five years.
His annual salary varied from S78 to $362. The post-
office was kept in his store, first on Tilden Street near
Merrimack Street, and afterwards on Central Street
near the site of the Boston & Maine Depot. In the
store on Tilden Street the board in which was the
aperture for admitting letters from the street, is still
preserved and labeled " Post-office, 1824."
Mr. Morrill, after leaving the post-office, became an
agent for Waterville College, and for a Bible so-
ciety, and died in Tpunton, Mass., in 1858, at the age
of sixty-seven years.
In 1829 Capt. William W. Wyman was, by Presi-
dent Jackson, appointed postmaster of the town.
His salary varied from S625 to SIOOO. He kept the
office first on Central Street and afterwards in the
City Government Building, which waserectedin 1829-
30. Captain Wyman served four years. He died in
Lowell in 1864, at the age of eighty-two years.
Rev. Eliphalet Case, a Universalist clergyman, was,
in 1833, appointed postmaster by President Jackson.
He was an ardent Democratic politician. His salary
varied from $1537 to $1404. During this administra-
tion the office was first in the City Government Build-
ing, then at the corner of Merrimack and John
Streets, and afterwards on Middle Street. His term
of service was eight years. He died at Patriot, Ind.,
in 1862, at the age of sixty-six years.
Mr. Jacob Robbins, an apothecary, was appointed
postmaster of Lowell by President Tyler, in 1841.
His salary varied from $1304 to $1547. He kept the
office throughout his administration near the corner
of Merrimack aad Middle Streets. His term of ser-
vice was four years. He died in Lowell in 1885, at
the age of eighty-seven years.
Mr. Stephen S. Seavy, the fifth postmaster of Low-
ell, was appointed by President Polk in 1845. He
had been a clerk in the office about ten years. His
salary varied from $1734 to $1850. The office was
kept in the same place as in the administration of his
predecessor. His term of service was four years.
Mr. Alfred Gilman, paymaster on the Hamilton
Corporation, was appointed postmaster by President
Taylor in 1849. His salary was $2000. He served
four years, and is still living, at the age of seventy-
seven years. He retained the office where it was dur-
ing the service of his predecessor.
Thomas P. Goodhue was appointed postmaster in
1853, by President Pierce. He had been a trader in
Lowell. Having held the office only about six
months, he died, Oct. 6, 1853, at the age of fifty years.
232
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, xMASSACHUSETTS.
Mr. Fisher A. Hildreth, an editor, was, on Oct. 21,
1853, appointed postmaster by President Pierce. He
was in office; seven and one-half years. His salary
varied from $14(30 to $2000. He died in Lowell in
1873, at the age of fifty-five years. During his
administration the office was removed to Merrimack
Street, near the site of the present office.
Mr. John A. Goodwin, an editor, was appointed by
President Lincoln in 1861. His term of service of
thirteen years was much longer than that of any
other postmaster of Lowell. He retained the office on
Merrimack Street. His salary varied from §2000 to
$4000. He died in 1884, at the age of sixty years.
Major Edward T. Rowell, an editor, waa, in 1874,
appointed by President Grant, the tenth postmaster
of the city. His salary varied from S4000 to S31U0.
He retained the office on its present site on Merri-
mack Street. He is now one of the proprietors of
the Lowell Courier and is fifty-three years of age.
Col. Albert A. Haggett, paymaster on the Middle-
sex Corporation, was appointed to the office by Presi-
dent Cleveland in 1885. His salary has varied from
S3300 to $3200. The office is in the Hildreth Block
on Merrimack Street. His age is fifty years.
The present postmaster, Willis P. Burbank, was
appointed by President Harrison February 4, 1890.
The United States Congress, in the session of 1888-
89 appropriated the sum of 8200,000 for erecting in
Lowall a new post-office, the present post-office build-
ing, on Merrimack Street, being the property of the
heirs of Mr. Fisher A. Hildreth. Afiera long contest in
regard to the site of the new building the Postmaster-
General decided, in 1888, upon the lot on which now
stands St. Peter's Church.
The money-order system was established in Lowell
post-office in 1864, and free delivery in 1866.
The working force of this office in 1890 was : one
postmaster, one assistant postmaster, eleven clerks,
twenty-five regular carriers, five supernumerary
carriers, two special delivery boys.
Lowell Fire Service. — The data of the follow-
ing notice of the fire service of Lowell have been
mostly obtained from an account of this service written
by Mr. Frank N. Owen and published by the Lowell
Firemen's Fund Association in 1888.
In 1825 there were in the village of East Chelms-
ford {now Lowell) three fire-engines — one owned by
Thomas Hurd, the manufacturer, near the site of Mid-
dlesex Mills ; the second by the Merrimack Company,
and the third waa kept at Middlesex Village. These
engines were of very simple construction, the water
being supplied to them, not by suction, but by buckets
in the hands of the people who gathered at the fire.
They were, doubtless, used at the fire at Hurd's Mills
in June, 1826, the most destructive fire of those early
days.
From the incorporation of the town of Lowell, in
1826, to the time of the organization of the Fire De-
partment, in 1830, ten or twelve citizens were annually
appointed as fire wards, who, in case of fire, carried
an official staff and were clothed with high authority
over their fellow-citizens. Disobedience to their
commands was punishable by a fine of SIO. The
town also had an organization called The Lowell United
Fire Society, each member of which was required to
keep a leathern fire-bucket, which, upon an alarm of
fire, he must seize and rush to the rescue.
At a town-meeting in March, 1829, the sum of
SIOOO was voted for the purchase of the town's first
fire-engine. Before this several of the corporations
had purchased fire-engines for the protection of the
corporation property.
The engine and hose firat purchased by the town
cost the sum of §822, for which an engine-house was
erected on the site of Barristers' Hall, on Merrimack
and Central Streets. Not long after this the engine-
house was removed to Hosford Square.
The legislative act creating the Lowell Fire De-
partment waa passed February ij, 1830.
At the fire in the winter of 1830-31, by which one
of the Merrimack ilills was burned, the engine be-
longing to that company froze up and became unser-
viceable.
Up to 1832 in case of fire the city's engine was not
manned by an organized company, but by such of the
citizens as were present and were willing to serve at
the pump. But in 1832 a regular fire company was
organized, with Charles Gregg as captain, and theser-
vice of this company was demanded on the day after
iti organization at a fire which occurred in the .Vpple-
ton Mills.
From 1832 to 1836 a board of eight engineers hj>d
control of the Fire Department. But in 1836 Lowell
became a city, and the department was regularly or-
ganized under an officer called chief engineer.
In 1838 the Fire Department possessed ten engines
and one hook-and-ladder truck. Eight of these en-
gines, however, belonged to the manufacturing com-
panies.
In 1843 there were thirteen engines, four of which
belonged to the city. The number of men upon the
rolls was 615.
On June 27, 1842, the City Council voted to pay the
firemen twenty cents per hour of actual service. Be-
fore this time the only compensation had been ex-
emption from jury service and abatement of poll taxes.
Up to 1860 alarms of fire were given by ringing the
church-bells. This custom was attended with great
inconvenience and delay, because it gave to the fire-
men no notice aa to the part of the city in which the
fire was to be found. But in 1860 a steel bell was
procured and hung in the tower of the police station-
house. The sound of this bell could be easily distin-
guished from that of others in the city. The number
of closely succeeding strokes on this bell indicated
the ward in which the fire was to be found. This de-
vice rendered the service much more prompt and effi-
cient than before. The first steel bell soon cracked
LOWELL.
233
and was replaced by another, which long hung in the
tower, but has very recently been removed to the
tower of the new engine-house on Middle and Palmer
Streets.
The first steam fire-engine owned by the city was
purchased in 1860, and though clumsy, it did good
service until 1866. In 1861 a second steamer was
purchased, and in 1866 two more were added.
The introduction of city water in 1872 afforded a
means for extinguishing fires of incalculable value,
giving, as it did, a plentiful supply of water close at
hand in every part of the city. The number of hy-
drants in 1873 was 499.
While the water-works were in process of construc-
tion the electric fire alarm was introduced, the City
Council appropriating 815,000 for this purpose. This
device superseded the use of the steel fire-bell. The
first alarm sounded by the new system was given for
the fire in Ayer's City, August 24, 1871.
The number of hydrants available for extinguish-
ing firea in January, 1890, was 819.
In December, 1889, there were in the Lowell Fire
Service 144 firemen, five steamers, nine hose-carriages,
three hook-and-ladder trucks, two chemical engines
and one protection wagon.
The chief engineers of the Fire Department have been
Charles L. Tilden, 1836-37 ; Jonathan M. Marston,
1838, '43 ; AVilliam Fiske, 1839 ; Joseph Butterfield,
1839 ; Josiah B. French, 1840^1 ; Stephen Gushing,
1842 ; Jeflerson Bancroft, 1844-45 ; Aaron H. Sher-
man, 1S46-49 ; Horace Howard, 1850-52 ; Lucius A.
Cutler, 1853 ; Weare Clifford, 1854-59, '65-66, '69-72 ;
Asahel D. Puffer, 1860-62 ; Joseph Tilton, 1863-64 ;
George W. Waymoth, 1867-68; George Hobson,
1873-77 ; Samuel W. Tayior. 1878; Keuel F. Britton,
1879-80 ; Edward S. Hosmer, 1881-83, '85-86, '88-89 ;
Thomas J. Farrell, 1884-85, '87.
Of the chief engineers, Weare Clifford should re-
ceive special mention. He was born in South Hamp-
ton, New Hampshire, January 25, 1816, and came to
Lowell in 1834. In Lowell he was the proprietor of
an establishment for dyeing, first on Lawrence Street,
and afterwards on Aiidover Street. He early became
a member of the Fire Department, first as a fireman
from 1840 to 1846, then as foreman till 1850, and then
in 1854 as chief engineer for twelve years. His whole
term of service was thirty-two years. He died while
in office and in the midst of his years, on March 10,
1872, at the age of fifty -six years.
Libraries OF Lowell.— TAe City Library. — This,
the free public library of the city, is one of the few
libraries of the country that owes its existence entire-
ly to municipal action. It had no nucleus in a pre-
viously established library, and it has never received
gift or endowment in money from an enthusiastic
lover of books or philanthropic, public-spirited citi-
zen ; in fact, it inherits nothing from the past, but
sprang into being through the passage by the City
Council of an ordinance, on the 20th of May, 1844,
Elisha Huntington being mayor. This action seems
to have been prompted by certain resolves of the
State Legislature about that time, authorizing cities
and towns to establish and maintain " school " libra-
ries, and appropriating funds for that purpose, the
amount coming to Lowell being about twelve hun-
dred dollars. The library was instituted as the
" City School Library," in accordance with the legis-
lative resolves. The ordinance provided for a board
of seven directors, consisting of the mayor and presi-
dent of the Common Council, ex officio, and five other
citizens, and the first board was constituted as follows :
Elisha Huntington, mayor ; John Clark, president of
Common Council ; Homer Bartlett, Rev. J. B. Thayer,
Josiah G. Abbott, Julian Abbott and Abner H.
Brown. These gentlemen held their first meeting on
the 7th of June, 1844, and voted " to use the west sec-
tion of the entry of the city hall as a room for the
library." At that time the " old " city hall, at the
corner of Merrimack and Shattuck Streets, had an
entry running from an entrance from the alley at the
east end of the building to the passage connected
with the main door in present use on the Merrimack
side. The " westend of the entry," therefore, meantthe
apartments now occupied as the oflSce of the overseers of
the poor and the store of J. H. Guillet, and here the
library was opened to the public on the 11th of Feb-
ruary, 1845, — "from 2 to 5 o'clock every afternoon,
and from 7 to 9 every evening, Sundays and holidays
excepted." Josiah Hubbard was installed as libra-
rian, and an annual fee of fifty cents was required for
admission to the privileges of the library. Messrs.
Bartlett and Abbott resigned their positions in a
short time, and Dr. J. W. Graves and Nathan Crosby
were elected to serve in their places. At the meeting
in September a committee was appointed " to ascer-
tain the terms upon which Messrs. Bixby and Whit-
ing (leading booksellers in the city at that time) will
dispose of a part of their circulating library." This
committee made a favorable report, and the proposed
purchase was afterward consummated at the cost of
S126.63. It was also voted to procure " Lardner's
Cabinet Cyclopjedia," "if it can begot for $150.'' The
mayor was soon after " requested to draw on the city
treasurer for the sum of two thousand three hundred
dollars, . . . the same being a part of the library fund
and being appropriated by the directors to the pur-
chase of books for said library."
Thus equipped, with a board of earnest, enthusias-
tic directors, a fair supply of books and a librarian who
was continued in office for thirteen consecutive years,
our library was launched upon a career of usefulness
which has continued with ever-increasing progress to
the present time. This first board of directors was a
fair example of those that have followed. Men of the
highest character and intelligence have taken both
pride and pleasure in serving in this position, and to
this is largely owing the fact that the affairs of the
library have all along been conducted so judiciously
234
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY", MASSACHUSETTS.
that in reviewing the past very little is seen to criti-
cise or regret.
For many years there was no change in the library
management. The number of subscribers fluctuated
firom year to year, and the attention of the directors
was much engaged in efforts to increase the list. Can-
vassers were occasionally employed, who were some-
times paid a very high percentage on their receipts.
With the idea that the word " school," in the legal
title of the library, might deter some from seeking
its privileges, from the erroneous opinion that it was
for the exclusive benefit of the schools, an amend-
ment to the ordinance was obtained in 1860, which
eliminated that word and caused the title to read
" City Library." In the process of incorporation,
this got to read the " City Library of Lowell," which
remains the full legal name of the institution. From
time to time various boards of directors had recom-
mended that the annual fee be remitted, and the
library made free to the public, and in 1878 the mat-
ter was brought to the attention of the City Council.
A committee reported strongly in favor of the pro-
ject, but it was defeated by a heavy vote, upon the
pleas of prudence, economy, and a quite general opin-
ion that the small annual payment prevented none
who desired the privileges of the library from becom-
ing its patrons.
Upon the completion of Huntington Hall, in 1853,
the old City Hall was remodeled ; the lower floor,
upon which the library had been situated for nine
years, was transformed into stores, and the two upper
floors were assigned to various city offices. The
library was placed on the upper floor, at the eastern
end of the building occupying its extreme width,
being in part the rooms now used by the School Com-
mittee. Here it remained for another nine years,
until the late Hocum Hosford ofliered it a home in
the new building which he was about to erect on
Merrimack Street, for Masonic and business purposes.
His offer was accepted, and removal was made to the new
quarters in 1872. These apartments were very pleas-
ant, and in every way a great improvement upon the
former ones. They also appeared very commodious,
and to provide sufficient space for the growth of many
years. But books increase in number very rapidly
in a library which makes any effort to keep abreast
of the public demand, and it was not very long before
it was found necessary to add to the shelving capacity,
which had been thought so spacious. This process
of addition to the book-storage facilities has been
continued at lessening intervals, until it does not
seem possible to find room for another 500 volumes.
Meanwhile, a remedy unexpectedly presented itself :
the City Council determined to erect a city hail upon
the site held for several years for that purpose, at the
intersection of Merrimack and Moody Streets, and
also upon the same lot a " memorial hall," which is
to contain quarters for the library, adapted to the ex-
pected growth of fifty years to come. The architect
of the proposed building for library purposes is Mr.
Frederick W. Stickney, at whose office we have ob-
tained the following description :
The new library building will extend eighty-nine
feet on Merrimack Street and 121 feet on Colburn
Street, the main entrance being on Merrimack Street.
The entrance hall will have marble flooring, with a
stair-case eight feet wide, leading to Memorial Hall
above.
The first floor will contain a delivering-room 27x27,
a catalogue -room on the right 37x27, a reference-
room on the left 27x43, with a smaller reference-room
18x28, a reading room for periodicals 37x38, two fire-
proof book-stack-rooms to take 150,000 volumes and
the librarian's room 18x37.
The second floor will contain Memorial Hall and
ante-rooms.
The basement will contain a reading-room for news-
papers 37x38, a repairing-room, a store-room for
bound volumes of newspapers and an unpacking-
room.
The year 1883 saw the beginning of moment-
ous events in the history of the library which, in later
years, had suffered to some extent from its "politi-
cal " connection with the city government. This un-
fortunate relation had at times caused men who had
little or no interest in the institution to seek positions
on the Board of Directors, and had occasioned changes
of librarians and assistants, to the serious interrup-
tion of systematic work. To remedy this condition,
in some degree, the ordinance was amended, in the
year mentioned, to provide for six directors, one from
each ward, each to serve for three years and two to
retire annually. In the same year the annual fifty
cents fee was abolished, and the library made free to
all. A free reading-room was also established. This
important action was followed, in 1886, by a further
amendment of the ordinance, by which the choice of
a librarian was removed from the City Council and
placed in the hands of the directors, the superinten-
dent of schools was added to the ex officio members of
the board and the other members were to be no
longer selected by wards, but chosen at large. Upon
the coming of Charles D. Palmer to the mayoralty, in
1888, he at once saw the benefit it would be to the
library to sever the last connection with the ever-shift-
ing elements at the City Hall. Largely at his sugges-
tion, therefore, an act was passed by the State Legis-
lature to incorporate a board of trustees, consisting of
the mayor ex officio and five citizens appointed by
him and approved by the aldermen, each of whom is
to serve for five years, and one to retire annually.
To these trustees is committed the entire manage-
ment of the affairs of the library.
In this same year a special reading-room for women
was established, which has met with a fair degree of
success.
When the library was made free, considerable al-
teration in the rooms was required, and the library
LOWELL.
235
was closed for several months. Advantage was taken
of this interval to rearrange and classify the books
according to the system known as the " decimal,"
or Dewey, classification. This plan serves its pur-
pose admirably. By it the books are so grouped
that all the works in the library upon any subject
are found catalogued together in the card-catalogue,
and somewhat less minutely subdivided in the
printed finding-lists. The largest number of sub-
Bcribers under the annual payment system was less
than 1800, and the number of books loaned in the
last year of that system was 51,000. Since the library
was made free the number of borrowers has increased
to not less than 5000, and the average circulation for
the last five years is 115,334.
The librarians of the City Library have been Josiah
Hubbard (from June 7, 1844, to January 5, 1857), J.
J. Judkins (from Januarj- 5, 1857, to January 4, 1858),
Eliphalet Hills (from January 4, 1858, to September
13, 1859), H. W. Palmer (from September 13, 1859,
to January 2, 1860), Charles A. Kimball (from Janu-
ary 2, 1860, to June 29, 1864), George C. Edwards
(from June 29, 1864, to January 6, 1868), Marshall H.
Clough (from January 6, 1868, to January 6, 1879,
and from January 5, 1880, to July 2, 1882), Joseph A.
Green (from January 6, 1879, to January 5, 1880),
Frank P. Hill (from July 11, 1882, to January 8,
1884, and from January, 1885, to October 1, 1885),
Henry S. Courtney (from January 8, 1884, to January,
1885), Charles H. Burbank (from October 1, 1885, to
the present).
Of late years the educational idea has been promi-
nent in the conduct of the library. It has come to
be realized that a library of the extent of ours is
called upon to perform a higher work than to provide
chiefly for the entertainment of its readers, though
that branch of its numerous functions is by no means
neglected. But supplemental to and fellow-worker
with the public schools, the library is beginning to
find its highest degree of usefulness. By the aid of
the intelligent teacher, the scholar's labor is greatly
lightened and made more interesting and profitable,
while those who have left school can continue their
education in the library to the highest point if so in-
clined. The relations of the library with the schools
is constantly becoming more intimate, and the in-
creased conveniences expected in the new building
encourage the most hopeful prospect for future results
in this direction. Artisans and physicians, mechan-
ics, architects, engineers and working people of all
sorts constantly resort to the library for the latest in-
formation in regard to their respectivexallings, and
every effort is made, not only to provide for, but even
to forestall their wants.
Beginning without a book nearly half a century
ago, the City Library has now upon its shelves not
less than 40,000 volumes, many of which are of great
and increasing value. Besides the greater number of
practical worth, there are numerous books of consid-
erable bibliographical interest, including a few incu-
nabula, representatives of the art of the most famous
early printers and engravers, and rare works of art
and literature, to enumerate which in the compass of
this article would be impossible. The reference-room
is unusually well supplied with cyclopaedias, diction-
aries and general books of reference in all depart-
ments of knowledge, and this most important branch
of the library is being constantly strengthened.
Catalogues. — Very soon after the organization of
the first board of direction, and books began to be
acquired, measures were taken to prepare a catalogue,
and this seems to have been ready when the library
was opened to the public, as the only copy preserved
in the library bears the date of 1845. It comprised
about 3000 volumes. Ten years thereafter, in 1855, a
supplement was issued, and a second supplement,
without date, followed before 1858, in which year the
second complete catalogue was published, the library
then containing 10,000 volumes. A supplement to this
catalogue appeared in 1860. One year later, very few
catalogues remaining unsold, preparations for a new
edition were made with much care, and the plan
adopted called for " following the examples of the
catalogues of the Boston Public Library and the
Middlesex Mechanics' Association," which had just
appeared. The work of compilation was undertaken
by Mr. Julian Abbott, for the compensation of $150,
" the city to furnish stationery." The agreement was
made March 27, 1861, and the copy was required to
be ready for the printer October 1st. The result was
an excellent catalogue, which, with three supple-
ments, issued respectively in 1865, 1869 and 1870, re-
maided in use until 1873, when another complete cat-
alogue, on the basis of its predecessor, was thought
to be necessary. Supplements followed in 1875,
probably in 1878, as the only copy of the second sup-
plement preserved is dated 1879, but styled " second
edition," and a third, dated 1879. When the library
was made free and the classification of the books
begun, advantage was taken of the closing of the
library to commence the preparation of a card cata-
logue, consisting of at least two eniries, under the
author and the subject of each book. The author
cards are arranged by themselves on one side of the
room, and the subject cards are placed together on
the other side. The subject cards are enriched by
copious references to works containing mention of
each particular topic, thus bringing to the attention
of the reader information he might not easily find,
and placing before him all the resources of the library
in almost every department of human knowledge.
A printed catalogue of a library of considerable size
is not only costly, but it is out of date before it is
published, as it cannot contain the newest books — the
very ones most sought for. But a card catalogue gives
the last book added to the library, as soon as it has
been made ready for use. It was at first designed,
however, to reproduce in print the entire card cata-
236
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
logue, cross references and all, as soon after its com-
pletion as the copy could be prepared. Both the
labor and the cost of such a bibliographical work as
was intended at the start appeared so great that the
plan was abandoned, and the printing of finding-lists
adopted instead. Previously, however, an author and
title catalogue of fiction was published in 1883, very
soon after the library was made free. The finding-
lists are now in course of publication. They are is-
sued in sections, so that one can purchase such as
only interests him, if he so desires. That of fiction,
and the one including the departments of natural
science, useful and fine arts and literature (except
fiction) are now ready. Others to follow will comprise
history, including travel and biography, and general
works (encyclopiedias, periodicals, etc.), philosophy,
religion, sociology and philology. These, of course,
like any other printed catalogue, will be complete
only to the time of printing, but the card catalogue
will supply the latest additions and afibrd ready
means for the preparation of subsequent bulletins and
supplements whenever they may be needed.
Library of the Middlesex Mechanic Association. — This
librarv is so important an institution that under the
head of " Libraries " not only the history of the li-
brary will be presented, but also that of the associa-
tion to which it belongs.
The Middlesex Mechanic Association was incor-
porated June 18, 1S25, on a petition of about eighty
mechani&s. Its name indicates that it was originally
intended to embrace the county of Middlesex, but it
has practically been confined in its operations to the
citv of Lowell. It was started as an association of
mechanics only, all others, except as honorary mem-
bers, being carefully excluded. Even the "' overseers ''
of rooms in the mills were objected to as members.
Women, too, were excluded even until the year 1884.
However, in 1827, manufacturers were considered as
mechanics and admitted. In 1829 a proposition to
make all respectable persons eligible to membership
was defeated, there being twelve affirmative and
twenty-three negative votes.
The original admission fee was three dollars, with a
quarterly assessment of twenty-five cents.
An attempt in 1830 to admit others than mechanics
and manufacturers resulted in such violent dissension,
that a vote was taken to sell the property of the asso-
ciation ; but after several months of inaction the vote
was rescinded.
During its first nine years the association had a
feeble existence, a few courses of lectures only being
given. But in 1834 its waning life revived. Men of
influence came to its aid ; the entrance fee was raised
to twenty-five dollars, and 220 new members were
added. Steps were taken for erecting a building for
the permanent occupation of the association, and the
Proprietors of Locks and Canals gave to it a lot of
land on Dutton Street, valued at S4500. A building
was erected in 1835 at a cost of S20,000. Donations
were made by manufacturing companies. Mr. Kirk
Boott, agent of the Merrimack Company, was an es-
pecially prominent benefactor. Thus, in 1S35, the
association secured a permanent home and a stable
position.
The first story and basement of this building were,
for many years, rented as stores, while the second
story and attic above were used by the association. In
1870, however, and subsequently, important changes
were made, and the first story is now, in part, used by
the association for a banqueting-room and ante-
rooms.
The hall in the second story of this building has
long been, and continues to be, one of the most eligi-
ble and inviting places of popular resort in the city.
The hall was opened on Saturday evening, Sept.
20, 1835, an address being delivered by Dr. Elisha
Bartlett, who in the following year was elected first
mayor of Lowell.
The full-length portraits which adorn this hall are
worthy of special notice. They are set in massive
and superb frames and do much to make the hall at-
tractive.
The portrait of Abbott Lawrence was placed in the
hall in 184ij. The artist was Harding. The purchase
money was raised in Boston by Samuel Lawrence.
The portrait of George Washington had for its
artist Jane Stuart.
The portrait of Xathan Appleton, painted by
Healey, was placed in the hall according to a reso-
lution of the Mechanics' Association. It was painted
by Healey and was completed and ready to be de-
livered to the A.ssociation in Dec, 1840. Upon this
occasion Mr. Appleton addressed a letter to the Asso-
ciation, in which he concisely states the earliest steps
iu the introduction of the great cotton manufacture
of Lowell. This letter is a historic treasure, Mr.
Appleton having been conversant with the whole plan
from the start.
The portrait of John A. Lowell was painted by
Healey.
The portrait of Patrick T. Jackson was also painted
by Healey.
The portrait of James B. Francis was painted by
Staigg and was placed in the hall in 1878.
The portrait of Kirk Boott was placed in the hall
in accordance with a vote of the Association passed
Jan. 3, 1835, presenting the " thanks of the Associa-
tion for the interest he had taken in its welfare, with
the request that he would sit for his portrait at the ex"
pense of individuals of the Association."
Within five years preceding May, 1839, the sum of
$22,480 w.is contributed to the Association by the
various manufacturing companies of the city.
The reading-room was established in 1837, twelve
years after the incorporation of the Association. For
many years the reading-room was in the front portion
of the second story, where now is the library, the
library being directly above it. The reading-room
LOWELL.
237
was originally, as at present, opened on Sunday.
When the building was remodeled in 1870 the read-
ing-room was removed to the rear of the second story.
In recent years it has been the policy to supply it
with periodicals and magazine literature, rather than
daily newspapers.
In 1837 the membership of the Association rose to
250, but subsequently the number gradually de-
creased until, in 1850, it was only 180.
In 1851, after repeated failures and much discussion,
a yote was secured admitting all respectable persons
to membership on paying an entrance fee of §12.50.
This Association opened a very successful exhi-
bition of mechanic arts and inventions on Sept. 16,
1851, the receipts of which were $8488, and its ex-
penses were $8284. At this exhibition, which closed
Oct. 18, 1851, there were distributed as prizes, eight
gold medals, sixty-five silver medals and 210 diplomas.
Another similar exhibition was held in 1857, and
another somewhat less successful in 1887.
Courses of lectures, nearly half of which were
scientific, were commenced in 1856, and continued
for several years. However, in the early days of the
Association, lectures were delivered before it. On
July 5, 1827, Warren Colburn, the celebrated author
of school-books and agent of the Merrimack
Mills, was invited to give the first course of lectures,
the admission fee to each lecture being fixed at one
shilling.
In 1858 the shares were all surrendered and the
fee for life membership was fixed at six dollars.
The presidents of this Association have been as
follows: In 1825-26, Samuel Fechem ; in 1827-28,
Abner Ball ; in 1829-30-31-32-33, James Russell ; in
1834-35, Joshua Swan ; in 1836-37, Geo. Brownell ;
in 1838-39, Alexander Wright ; in 1840-41, Charles
L. Tilden ; in 1842-43, James Hopkins; in 1844-45,
Geo. H. Jones ; in 1846-i7,Wm. A. Burke ; in 1848-49,
John Wright; in 1850-51, James B. Francis; in
1852-53, Andrew Moody ; in 1854-55, Joseph White;
in 1856-57, Mertoun C. Bryant; in 1858-59, Wm. A.
Richardson ; in 1860-61, Sewall G. Mack ; in 1862-63,
Jeremiah Clark ; in 1864, Samuel Fay ; in 1865-66.
Geo. F. Richardson ; in 1867-68, Samuel K. Hutch-
inson; in 1869-70, Jacob Rogers ; in 1871-72, Wm.
F.Salmon; in 1873, Charles L. Hildreth ; in 1874-
75, H. H. Wilder; in 1876-77, Oliver E. Gushing; in
1878-79, James G. Hill ; in 1880-81, Benj. Walker;
in 1882-83, C. C. Hutchinson ; in 1884-85, Charles
H.Allen; in 1886-87, C. C. Hutchinson; in 1888,
H. Burrage; and in 1889-90, Walter Coburn.
We give a brief account of the library proper.
This library had a humble beginning. On Jan.
4, 1827, somewhat more then a year after the incor-
poration of the Association, it was voted that a li-
brary should be established, and Thomas Billings was
elected librarian. His salary could not have been
large, for after a service of three years it was fixed at
six dollars per year. The Association possessing no
building, the few books which it had collected in
its early years were kept in rooms occupied also for
other purposes. For example, in 1833, they were
accommodated in the counting-room of Warren Col-
burn, agent of the Merrimack Company. Upon the
completion of the building of the Association, in
1835, these books, then about 725 in number, were
placed in a low room in the third story of the build-
ing and were kept there until the remodeling of the
house in 1870, when the library-room and the read-
ing-room directly beneath it in the second story, were,
by the removal of the flooring, thrown into one lofty
room having two galleries. In the main this excel-
lent arrangement still exists.
In its early days this library was mainly supported
by donations, the Hon. Abbott Lawrence being its
largest donor.
At length lecture courses became popular, and they
were relied upon for supplying funds for the purchase
of books. In later years the sources of income have
been assessments, rentals, new memberships and sub-
scriptions.
The card catalogue system and the charging sys-
tem were introduced in 1880.
The library has received donations of books and
pamphlets from Kirk Boott, Charles L. Tilden,
Charles Brown, Hon. T. Lyman, Hon. Caleb Gush-
ing and various other men.
The annual appropriation made by the Association
for the purchase of books has, of late years, usually
been S500.
Among the means employed for replenishing the
librarj' have been a Japanese Tea Party in 1878, and
the Hungarian Gipsy Band Concert in 1883.
In recent years an attempt has been made to cre-
ate and foster among children a taste for wholesome
reading, and an alcove of 1000 volumes has been set
apart in the library for their use.
The annual report, dated April, 1890, makes the
number of volumes in the library 20,816.
The opening of the City Library as a free library, in
1883, together with the great advantage which it enjoys
in having its books purchased, and its numerous em-
ployes paid from public funds, has placed the Me-
chanics' Library at a great disadvantage. The man
who enjoys without charge all the privileges of a
large and excellent library is often slow to pay an
annual assessment for the privileges of a smaller
library, however excellent. But notwithstanding
this serious drawback, such is the devotion of the
friends of this oldest of Lowell's libraries, and the
skillful jnanagement of the Library Committee and
•its devoted and self-sacrificing librarian. Miss M. E.
Sargent, that its character and efficiency are still ably
maintained. This, however, has been accomplished
by raising the annual assessment from 81.50 to $5.00.
One very important reason for the attachment of
many of its members to this library, is that they have
free personal access to all its books. This privilege
238
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
is 80 highly prized by them that they very cheerfully
pay an aflsessment in order to enjoy it. This freedom
of access has resulted in the loss of an exceedingly
small number of books.
The librarians of this Association have been as fol-
lows: From 1827 to 1838 inclusive, Thomas "Bil-
lings ; from 1838 to 1839, Wm. G. Chamberlain ; from
April, 1839, to October, 1839, Benj. Stevens ; from
1839 to 1848, P. P. Spalding ; from January, 1849, to
May, 1849, Jesse Huse; from 1849 to July, 1850,
Nathan F. Crafts ; from 1850 to 1857, Joel Powers ;
from 1857 to 1858, Charles Butterfield ; from 1858 to
1864, Nathan Crafts ; from 1864 to 1866, Wm. Hard-
man ; from 1866 to 1871, Nathaniel Hill, Jr. ; from
1871 to 1872, Miss B. Merriam ; from 1872, Miss M.
E. Sargent, the present incumbent.
From necessity Lowell has no very old libraries, and
the many small libraries which have, for various rea-
sons, and at various times, sprung up during the com-
paratively brief existence of the city, have generally
had a feeble life, especially since the City Library has
been made a free library.
The Young Men's Catholic Library Association,
which, in 1854, was organized for the literary im-
provement of its members, possesses a library of
about 1000 volumes. This society, after many years
of active and beneficent existence, has languished in
recent years, and its library was, in 1889, temporarily
closed. However, the organization is kept up, and it
is proposed to re-open the library during the year
1890. The books of this library have been selected
in reference to the literary wants of the young Irish-
men of Lowell. Many an enterprising and intelli-
gent citizen of Lowell owes his first start in intellec-
tual life to this society and its library.
A notice of the Old Residents' Historical Associa-
tion of Lowell is to be found upon another page. The
library of this Association contains about 500 vol-
umes, consisting of works of historical and anti-
quarian character. It is kept in the office of Alfred
GUman, Esq., the venerable and faithful secretary of
the Association. Like all libraries of this description,
it has a limited number of patrons. The volumes
which the Association issues from time to time, being
composed of articles of historical value, read at its
quarterly meetings, are much prized, and they possess
a value which grows greater and greater as the years
pass away.
The Library of the Middlesex North Agricultural
Society — a society noticed on another page — contained,
two years since, about 350 volumes, treating mainly
of agricultural subjects. Though in this collection
there were valuable books, the farmers composing the
society, most of them being at a distance from the
library, failed to make use of it, and, by common
consent it was, two years since, donated to the Mid-
dlesex Mechanics' Library.
The Library of the Young Men's Christian Associa-
tion, of Lowell now coDtaius Sibo\it 600 volumes. In
1889 about 400 of the 1000 then belonging to the li-
brary were discarded as being worthless. Libraries
of this character, being largely composed of books
donated by friends of the cause, and not intelligently
selected to meet the known wants of young men,
necessarily contain many works of no value. Donors
of books do not often give away their best books.
Hence it is that this library, even now, is far from
having that value which a library for young men
should possess. Encyclopaedias and scientific works
are greatly needed. Of all the instrumentalities em-
ployed by this Association for the benefit of the young
men of Lowell, the most poorly equipped is its
library.
The efforts of the physicians of Lowell to sustain a
medical library have not been successful. At one time
about 250 volumes and a large number of pamphlets
had been collected, but the enterprise languished, and
the library has been placed in the charge of the li-
brarian of the City Library, the physicians having
abandoned the attempt to sustain its separate and
independent existence.
TTie People's Club of Lowell has two branches, for
the two sexes. The library of the men's branch, on
John Street, contains 1101 volumes, and that of the
women's branch, on Merrimack Street, 322 volumes ;
total, 1423. These libraries contain historical, bio-
graphical and story-books, such as are usually found
in libraries, and, in addition, many other very useful
and instructive volumes, which have been selected
with great care, and are particularly adapted to the
wants of the young men and women who frequent the
rooms of the club.
The popular magazines of the day, with daily and
weekly papers, are also to be found upon the tables at
all times.
This club, which has now existed for eighteen years,
is still prospering in its beneficent work of affording
to the men and women who frequent its rooms be-
tween seven and nine o'clock in the evening an agree-
able resort, in which the character is improved and
the intellect cultivated. It is especially beneficial to
those whose only home is a crowded boarding-house,
or who, being strangers in the city, have no other
home.
LOWELL.
238-a
Rogers Fort Hill Park. — This, the most re-
cently established and far the most beautiful of
the parks of Lowell, is situated in the extreme eastern
part of the city. It occupies the fine and commanding
swell of land long known as Fort Hill, which rises j
about 175 feet above the sjeneral level of the city, and
presents a very pleasing and commanding view of the
country far around.
Before further describing the park, however, it is
proper that a brief history of Fort Hill should be
given, as well as a record of the Rogers family, by
whose munificence it has become the property of the
city of Lowell.
In 1800 Zadock Rogers, of Tewksbury, purcha.sed
the valuable farm of 247 acres, which bordered upon
the Concord River, and had for its highest point the
hill on which the park is situated. This excellent
farm was one of the five great farms which lay along
the banks of tlie Merrimack and Concord Rivers and
on which most of the great manufactories of Lowell
have been erecteil.
These farms were, first, the Cheever farm, which
extended along tlie right bank of the Merrimack
abiivetlie site of the Meirimack Mills, on which were
probably built all of the Lawreuce and the Tremont
and .Suffolk Mili^. It was covered with woods in the
vieinity of Tilden Street and a large i)a.sture filled the
bend of the river above the Lawrence corporation.
The farm contained about ind acres. The farm-
house of Mr. Cheever, the owner, is c<i longer stand-
ing, but its site is marked by a willow tree on Cheever
Street.
Nest came the Fletcher farm of about 74 acres, on
which have been erected the Merrimack, Houtt and
most of the Massachusetts Mills, the residence of the
owner bciiiL' not far from the junction of Merrimack
ami Central Streets.
Third was the farm of Nathan Tyler, father of the
late Captain Jonathan Tyler, containing about iitt
acres. It occupied the site of the central portion o)
our city, where now are C^entr.il, I'jescott, Lowell and
Middle Streets. The residence of Mr. Tyler wa.< not
far northof the I'rescotl MilU and hi< orchard covered
grounds in the vicinity of Prescott .Street.
Next, acres? the Concord River, was the " Gedney
Estate," of l'>0 acres, with its stalely niul cons|)icuous
old mansion-house, long known ;is the " Old Yellow
House," which was situated on the site of the St.
.John's Hospital, having in front a fine row of Lom-
bardy poplars. This large and valuable estate be-
came the home of Judge Edward St. Loe Livermore,
who purchased it, about 1810, as a pleasant retreat for
his declining years after the political turmoil of his
earlier life.
The fifth farm, of 247 acres, was that of Zadock
Rogers, already mentioned, iu whose honor the
Rogers Fort Hill Park was, by his children, presented
to the city of Lowell.
Mr. Rogers was a descendant of John Rogers, one of
the first martyrs under Queen Mary. His earliest
American ancestor was John Rogers, said to be a
grandson of the martyr. This ancestor was a freeman
in Watertown, Mass., in 1C39, but subsequently (proba-
bly in 1C.56) removed to Billerica, where his " bouse
lot" was situated near the site of the present town-
house. He died in 1G85-8C, at the age of seventy-
four years. His grave-stone, in the South Burying-
ground, is still standing iu Billerica. His sou John
was born in 1641. Thelatter lived just beyond North
Billerica and his house, which stood about eighty rods
north of the Governor Talbot house, was for some
years the extreme outpost of civilization in th.at direc-
tion. He was killed by the Indians in 109;'), at the age
of fifty-four years, and two of his children were taken
captive. John Rogers, the son of the latter, was born
in 1C80 and died in 173C, at the age of fifty-sis years.
Timothy, the son of the last-named John Rogers, was
born in 1717 and died in 179G, .at the age of seventy-
nine years. He lived in Tewksbury and wa-< the
father of Zadock Rogers, the subject of this sketch.
Zadock Rogers was born May S, 1774, and he w.as
thirty-one years of age when he purchased the iarm, as
before mentioned. The land was then apartof Tewks-
bury, and was pleasantly situated on the east bank of
the Concord River, the farm of Judge Livermore ;^cpar-
ating it from the Merrimack. It was at that time in a
low state of cultivation, but the energy of its new owner,
together with the rapid increase of popul.ition which
soon followed in the vicinity on account of the intro-
duction of manufactures, made it one of the most val-
uablefarmsin the State of Massachussetlii. The farm-
house was a large, imposing building, having in front
a portico of two stories. It is an interesting incident
in regard to this imposing |)ortico, that in tiic memo-
rable '" September gale " of 18iri a large portion ol' it
was carried completely over the house, decapitating
the chimney and landing in the field beyond.
In lS37-3.SMr. Rogers erected the present sjiacious
and substantial house on the site of the former build-
ing. This house, facing, as it does, the beautiful
park, occupies a most charming position.
Mr. Rogers, though always in politics a stanch ^\'llig,
having been bred a farmer, as probably all his An)eri-
cau ancestors were, had no ambition for public or polit-
ical honors. He loved his pleasant home, to secure
which he had devoted his highest energies, and in it
he lived a contented, benevolent and hospitable life.
He was one of the few inhabitants of IjOwell who
were " to the manner born," and his name occupies a
large and honorable place in the historic records of
the city. He died February 16, 1844, at the age of
seventy years.
Jlr. Rogers married Jemima Cummings, daughter
of Ebeuezer Cummings, of Woburn, Mass. Their
children were : Zadock, born December 21, 180G ; Jo-
seph Porter, born May 8, 1809; Emily, born Septem-
ber IS, 1811; Benjamin Parker, born Februarj' 19,
1814 ; Elizabeth, born May 7, 1819. The mother died
238-b
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
in 1861, at the age of nearly eighty-four years, aud nt
the children only Elizabeth survives.
Benjamin Parker, the youngest son, who died in
1866, at the age of fifty-two yeiirs, should be specially
noticed for the skill and fidelity with which be man-
aged the estate and the respect and affection iu which
he was held by those who knew him.
Emily, a lady of devout and benevolent character,
died March 14, 1804, at the age of seventy-two years.
All the children except the oldest have passed their
lives unmarried on the old homestead. Such has
been their attachment to their farm that they have
not only been averse to leaving it, but until re-
cently they have refused to part with any portion ol
it at any price, for the purpose of supplying buildins
lots for the citizens of the rapidly enlarging city of
Lowell.
However, in ISSi!, when the only surviving members
of the family were the two sisters, this policy wa.s
changed. The.-5e sisters, reserving for their own resi-
dence the homestead, with a small amount of land,
sold the rest of the farm to a svndicate, consistine ot
E. A. Smith, E. W. Hoyt, p". B. Shedd and T. R.
Garrity, with this condition, that they should expend
upon the thirty acres known as Fort Hill the sum of
.•s25,0Uii for the purpose of preparing it to be presented
to the city of Lowell "to be maintained perpetually
as a public park for the unrestricted use of the citi-
zens of Lowell." These gentlemen, commencing the
stipulated work in the spring of 1886. promptly and
satisfactorily fulfilled the contract. Under thesuper-
vi.siiMi of E. A. .'Smith, one of the syndicate, and E. \V
IJowditch. an expert landscape gardener of Boston,
niaca<lainizpd driveways thirty feet in width were con-
structed and numerous concrete walks. These drive-
ways winding up the hill are protected on either side
by gutters covered with concrete. ThegroujiiU, wiiich
heretofore bad been only a rouiih and stony pasture
land, were ()repared for the purpose of a [park and
planted with a larcre variety of trees, arai.ng which
birch, majile, willow, poplar, spruce and catalpa i
abound. They are also adorned with shrubbery iu ■
every direction.
Since accepting this park, thus prepared and
adorned, the city of Lowell has added greatly to its j
attractiveness and beauty. Uuder Superintendent !
Skene the work of .adding to the trees and shrubbery
aud beautifying the landscape with flowers of varioii- ;
hues, artistically arranged, has .added new .attr.action.s
every year. To the toiler in the great manufactories i
of Lowell it is a delightful change to mount 175 feet
above the level of the city and drink the pure air and 1
view on every side, stretching far away, a landscape !
of unusual beauty. On the height in the park lias •
been placed a marble tablet on which the names of the |
distant objects in the landscape have been chiseled !
and lines drawn which direct the eye of the visitor to |
each of these objects. The tablet thus becomes a verv j
ple:u-ing and instructive study. It points the be-
holder to .Mount Huugerand Mount Watatic, in the '■
town of Asliby, Mass.; to Mount Monadnock, in '
Jaffrey, N. H. ; to Mount Wachusett, in Princeton,
Mass. ; to Robin's Hill, in Chelmsford, Nobscott Hill, i
in Framingham, and Long Hill, in Lexington ; to j
the water tower in Stoneham, the insane a:iylum in I
Dan vers and the State Almshouse in Tewksbury ; to
Boston, Lawrence, Temple. Lyndeborough, Peterbor-
! ough and other places. Spread out beneath him are
the fertile fields of the neighboring towns, and, most
< attractiveof all, a full view of the city of Lowell, with
its vast manufactories, whose graceful chimneys tower
I aloft, with its numerous church spires and its thousand
structures erected by the hand of industry.
Besides the beauties which thus meet the eye, the
hill has to the citizen of Lowell a historic charm. Its
very name suggests the fact that in the old days of
Indian warfare, when the powerful Mohawks tbreat-
ened with relentless hand to destroy the weaker easteri.
tribes, the Pawtuckets, whose liouies were on the banks
of the Merrimack, under their chief, Wannalanoet,
erected a fort upon this hill, surrounding it with pali-
] sades. Hence the name of the hill and the park.
1 The entrance to the park is commanded by two
ma.ssive columns of granite about fourteen feet high, on
', each of which i- the iiann' of the park, together with
a tablet on which is the following inscription : ''This
I jiiirt iras preieiiteil to Ihr lihj nt' Loimll >>i 18H6 hy
Einilij Unit Kli:nbrili J,'injri.<, ildiii/iitern of Zdilm-I:
. RdcjeiK, ,iV., ir],o homjlit lln: i\ii m iHr/iiitiii;/ Fort Hill iu
I ISOd."
APPENDIX TO LOWELL.
The following [laragr.nphs were by accident omitted
from their proper place — namely, at the close of the
memoir of J. C. Aver, on page lo,") :
No memoir of Mr. Aver can be written without re-
cording something of the characicr of the wonderful
woman who was his wife, antl who played so lofty a
part in all his purposes and achievements. (Jf extra-
ordinary judgment and a mental calibre capable of
grasping any subject, she was the constant companion
and adviser of her husband in all his varied projects
and occupations. He kept her daily informed of all
the details of his plans and business, and more than
once was he turned aside from a road leading to
catastrophe by her advice. As evidence of 3Ir. Ayei's
estimate of her capabilities it may be st.ited that he
appointed her one of the trustees under his will. Of
great self po.ssession and strength ofcharactercombined
with clearness of intellect, no estimate can be placed
upon the importance of the part played by this re-
markable lady in the drama we have just recited. A
single incident will show her self possession and
[lower of will. In the fall of 1889, while driving in
the streets of Paris in company with Lady Clarke, she
left her carriage to take her accustomed exercise. In
crossing a street she wiis knocked down and run over
by a cab, and both her arms were broken. Without
calling for the assistance of any one, she resumed her
seat in her carriage, and drove back to her hotel ;
and although both arms hung limp by her sides, she
went alone to her room, and the boy in the elevator
did not notice that anything had happened to her.
She furthermore took nothing to relieve the pain or
produce unconsciousness while the bones were being set.
Added to these <iualities, she possesses great gentle-
ness and .amiability, and has always been an excep-
tionally devoted and affectionate mother.
CHELMSFORD.
239
CHAPTER XV.
CRELMSFORD.
BY HENRY S. PERHAM.
EAKLY HISTORY.
The first movement toward the settlement of
Chelmsford was made in 1652 by some citizens of
Woburn and Concord who petitioned the Court for
the privilege of examining a tract of land on the
" other side of Concord River."
Woburn and Concord were the towns then nearest
to thi^ tract, the latter having been the first inland
town in Maasachussetts.
The examination of this tract was followed by a
petition May 10, 1C53, for a grant of the quantity of
six miles square, " which bordereth upon Merrimack
River near to Paatucket, which we do find a very
comfortable place to accommidate a company of
God's people upon ; that may with God's blessing and
assistance live comfortably upon and do good in that
place for church and commonwealth." Signed to this
were the names of Benjamin Butterfield, John Parker,
Isaac Learned, James Parker, George Farley, Thomas
Chamberlin, Joseph Parker, John Hosmer, Jacob
Parker, Henry Foster, William Chamberlin, John
Kuttinge, Edmund Chamberlin, John Baldwinge,
Richard Griffin, James Blood, John Smedley, Roger
Draper, William Fletcher, Thomas Adams, William
Hartwell, Robert Proctor, William Buttrick, Baptist
Smedley, Richard Hildreth, Thomas Briggam, Daniel
Bloggett, John Hall, William Hall.
This tract petitioned for included the fishing-
grounds of the Indians, at Pawtucket, upon the Mer-
rimack, where the city of Lowell now stands. Gookin
wrote that this was an " ancient and capital seat of
Indians." Rev. John Eliot, of Roxbury, was then
engaged in those efibrts to convert the Indians to
Christianity, from which he came to be known as the
Apostle to the Indians. He had visited Pawtucket aa
early as 1647, in company with Captain Willard, of
Concord, and some of the Christian Indians of his
own neighborhood. Again in the spring of 1648 :
" At that season of the year there was annually a
great collection of Indians at this spot, a famous
fishing-place, and they furnished him with large aud-
iences— Indians that came from various quarters."
The good Eliot, who was mindful as well for the
temporal as the spiritual welfare of his dusky charges,
petitioned the Court for a grant of land for the
Indians. The following answer of the Court was to
both petitions :
"Mat 18, 1653.
"Id ans' to the peticoD of seueralt ol the iohabitaDte of Concord and
"Wooboarae for the erecting of a new plantacon on Merremacke RiTer,
neere to Pawtuckett, the court doth granot the peticonere of Concord
and Woobourne the track of land uenconed in theere peticon, excepting
Boroe part of it joyning to Merremacke RiTer : Prodded, that the Bajd pe-
ticoners shall Bufiicjentl; breake Tp full eo much land for the Indjanfi
in Buch place aa they ahall appointe wth in lucb plantacon •a staall there
be appointed them, aa they baue of planting ground about a bill called
Bobbins Hill, and that the Indians shall have vie of theere planting
ground, aforesajd, free of all damages, vntill the peticooerv shall bare
broken Tp the land for the Indians aa atforenjd.
" 2'.'. For the plaotacon peticoned for by Mr. Eljott, the cotirt jndgeth
it meete to be graunted them, wth the exceptions and proTiaaionB afore-
mentioned, and for the stating of both, that Capt Willard and Capt
Johnsou be appointed to lay out the sajd plantacona or touneehtppa, the
English at the charge of the peticonere, tbu Indjans at the charge of the
countrje, wtiiin one month after the end of this aeenons, that neither of
the plantacons be retarded.
**3'J. That if the peticoners of Concord and Wooboume shall not,
wt*'in two yeares, setle a competent noumber of familjee there, by build-
ing and planting vppon the s^d tract of land twenty familjee or Tp-
wards, so as they may be in capacltje of injoying all the ordjnancee of
God there, then the graunt to be Tojd.*'
Of this committee, which was entrusted by the
Court to lay out these grants, Captain Edward John-
son, of Woburn, was the author of " The Wonder-
working Providence of Zion's Savior in New Eng-
land," a valuable historical work which epitomizes
the Puritan philosophy. Simon Willard, of Concord
(the ancestor of two presidents of Harvard College),
was the gallant captain who rode to the relief of
Brookfield when it was assaulted by the Indians Au-
gust 2, 1675.
A few families came in and occupied this territory
without waiting for their petition to be acted upon,
probably in 1652, as the first birth is recorded early
in 1653, viz., "Joseph Parker, the son of Joseph and
Marget, his wife [ ] 30 daye of March : 1653."
One record bears an earlier date, viz. :
" Sarah Parker, dau. of Jacob and Sarah, his wife
[ ], Janeware 14 : 1653." But the reform in the
calendar, by Pope Gregory, had not then been
adopted in New England. By the old style then in
vogue the year began March 25th ; therefore January,
1653, old style, would be January, 1654, new style.
The usual form of writing dates between January
and March was 165i.
Allen gives it as a tradition that Joseph Parker
was the first person born in town. One other birth
and a marriage were recorded the same year.
The petitioners for the grant of the township did
not all take up their abode here, and some who took
up land soon disposed of their possessions and went
elsewhere.
The Parkers were from Woburn. There were five
brothers. Of the four whose names were among the
petitioners, none of them long remained in Chelms-
ford. James went, about 1660, to Groton, where he
became the leading man of the town. Joseph also
went to Groton and after to Dunstable. Jacob was
the first town clerk of Chelmsford, but soon removed
to Maiden, and John went to Billerica. The Cham-
berlins were also from Woburn. Thomas and Ed-
mund settled in Chelmsford and William in Billerica.
John Baldwin and George Farley, also from Woburn,
settled in Billerica. The first birth in that town was
Samuel, the son of George Farley. James Blood and
John Nutting took up land here, but both soon went
240
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
to Groton. The latter was killed by the Indians in
the aaaault upon that town in 1676.
Abraham Parker, the elder of the brothers, came
early with his sons, Moses, John and Isaac, and re-
mained in this town.
A tradition,' which is worthy of credence, says that
Abraham's wife was the first woman who " baked and
brewed in Chelmsford."
Sagamore's planting field is shown upon the north-
east. The description which accompanied the plan
is, unfortunately not preserved. When the adjoining
territory came to be occupied the lines of the town
were found to be so indefinite as to occasion an un-
certainty as to the correct boundaries.
The Naahoba Indians had obtained a grant of the
section which is now Littleton, through the good offi-
THE PLAN OF CHELMSFORD FBOM MASSACHUSETTS AKCHIVES.
The plan of the town as laid out by the committee,
as here shown, waa engraved from a tracing from the
original in the Massachusetts Archives, Ancient
Plans, vol. 112, p. 81. The space marked " India
Land " was the tract reserved for the Indians. Joe
' Letter of Janatb&n Perbam, 1821.
ces of the apostle, Eliot, about the time of the grant
to the Pawtucketa. At the time of King Philip's
War the Indians mostly abandoned their reservation,
and it was encroached upon by people from adjoining
towns, mostly from Groton. Boundary controversies
grew out of this. The Chelmsford line bordered
upon this tract for a considerable distance.
CHELMSFORD.
241
Controversies also arose in another quarter between
Chelmsford, Concord, Billerica and the Blood farms.
In 1694 the selectmen of Chelmsford and Concord
united in a petition to the General Court for a com-
mittee to examine and settle these rival claims. This
was done and the claims of Billerica were estab-
lished.
Finally, in 1697, the town chose Captain Bowers
and Thomas Parker a committee " to act on the
towns be halfe in all things nesery as to the finding
out the first grant of the town and to do what soauer
is nedfull to secuer the town as it is bounded"
They obtained the following deposition of one of
the committee, then living in Grotou, who assisted in
laying out the town forty-five years before :
*' GrotoD. Doamber : 24 : 1698 capten Jeams parker beiog of full ag«
teityfj and say that the honered Jenarall courte grated a sarten track
of laDd for a plantation nowe caled Chelmsford and impowered majear
ijmoD wilard and capten edward Johnson as a commltte, vrhlch com.
mltt« came with full power to lay out sd plantation and did ae sd planta.
tion layd oat to ther content capten .lohn Shearmou being the artes,
did lay out sd plantation beglnlug at a riner comonly caled conkard
riuer bounded with a stake upon the land caled wamaaet land and so
Tuning on a lyne bj marked tree to a heape of stones and to nasboba
plantation runing upon naahoba line to a great pine*tre and so nining
on a Btiayt line ouer a pond caled stouny brook pond to a pioe-tre
marked with C and G aud so ouer sd brook to a heape of stones and so
runing on the south eyd of a great bill on the north syd of ed brook and
oner sd brook to a great piue-tre and so tosd stake by conkard riuer thus
Bd commltte and sd arttes layd out sd plantation and reseued fuUsattes-
facttion for tbersarues therin: aud did Ingage to make a tru return to
the honared court of ther laying out sd plantation : and furder sd parker
doutbe teetyfy and say that hlnslef Thomis adams Wilyam flecher
and Isack lamit ware the commltte chosen by the petetlnors of sd land
to se ed plantation layd out : this taken upon outh befoer me this 24 of
Doumber ; 1698
"Thomis hinchman, Justes.
**Thi8 aboue is a true coppey of the origanall recorded by me, soLlo-
man Keyee, toune clerk the 5 day of desember 1698 " i
It is impossible to reconcile this description, and
the lines as settled between Chelmsford and Billerica,
in 1701 (in which those towns joined for several
miles), with the plan. It will be seep, however, that
Chelmsford extended from the Concord Eiver on the
east to Stony Brook Pond (now called Forge Pond)
on the west. Following the description from there,
" over sd brook to a heap of stones," — the northwest
comer, — " and so running on the south side of a great
hill " — either Kissacook or Snake Meadow Hill —
" on the north side of said brook " — Stony Brook —
" and over said brook to a great pine tree " — the
northeast comer. Allen says that the latter bound
was at the glass factory, which stood near what is
now Baldwin Street, in Lowell, nearly opposite West
Pine Street. Although 1 know of nothing improba-
ble in this statement of Allen's, his other descriptions
of the town lines are so manifestly erroneous that
little reliance can be placed upon it.
As soon as these few pioneers become established
in their new home they set about to provide for the
religious wants of the community.
In September, 1654, propositions were made to the
IC-ii
^ Copied from original record, page 56.
church of Wenham and their pastor. Rev. John Fisk,
to remove to this place. An account of these nego-
tiations in the quaint diction of the time has been
preserved in the handwriting of Mr. Fisk :
*' A (fcy was set of meeting at Chelmsfonl.
" Ypou the B^ day set divers of y* Brethren accompanied the Paato'
ouer vnto chelms. where y« Comittee & divert others were present. A
view was taken of y* place. The Brethren pfsent satisfyed themselvea
aboute thelre accommodations, Jt proposalls were then made to y* paste
for his accommodation & yeerely maynlenance, as to be tended Tnto
him by consent of y* whole of Inhabitants & in their name by y" Com-
ittee."
Soon after their return to Wenham the major part
of the church, seven in number, with their pastor, de-
cided to accept Chelmsford's proposals. But at this
stage of the proceedings, for some unexplained rea-
son, the negotiations were broken off. "Thus the
matter Lay dormant as twere all winter till y' 1" m°.
55, at what time Bro : Head coming ouer enformed vs
in such wise here at Wenham, as therevpon both y*
P. & y' B*" engaged brethren demurred vpon y' pro-
ceedings & some y' had sold heere at Wenham, re-
deemed their accommodations agayne into their pos-
session and a Letter was sutably sent by Br. Bead to
acquainte y' Chelmsf. comittee how things stood &
advised to stead themselves elsewhere."
The matter was not abandoned, however; several
letters passed between them. And in June, 1655,
" Jsa. Lernet, Sim : Thompson & Tho: Adams " went
with letters from the people of Chelmsford, entrusted
" with full power to them to treate & finally to deter-
mine the busines depending betwene both parties."
It was finally decided " to refer the matter to counsell
and y' parties agreed vpon were M'. Endicott, Gov-
ernor ; M' Mather, Mr Allen, of Dedham ; M' Cob-
bet, M' Sherman Capt. Johnson, of Wooburne who
determined the case for Chelmsford.
" This case thus determined : on either side prep-
aration was made for y'^ Removal of the church.
" Accordingly about y' 13'" of 9"°. 55, There were
met at Chelmsford, the pastor with y' Engaged
Brethren of Wenham Church, viz., Ezdras Read,
Edw. Kemp, Austin Killam, Ser: Foster, Geo: Byam
&, Rich Goldsmith, Seuen in all To whom such of
the Brethren of Wooburne & Concord Ch : late at
Wenham, Now in Removing to Chelmesford, pre-
sented themselves & Testimony Giuen were by an
vnanimoos vote Recejved into fellowship They be-
ing y* greater number in way of [ ] complyance
a Relation passes [on] either side, as each one rela-
tion by [word] viz. :
Slemb". Reci.
" leaack Lemett (he dyed 8 of 10, 57) 1
Simon Thompson (be died about [at Ooburne]) 2
"Wm. Underwood 3
Abram Parker 4
Benj. Butterfield 6
Tho : Chamberlin 6
Next received Dan. Blogget, who brought letters of dismiaeion
from the ch : at Cambridge 7
"So after this the Seals of the Sapper administered and there were
admitted by vote these members of other Churchea, to commuuion with
242
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
lu in the«» Seals: Mr. Griffin, Wm, Fletcher and his wife, Tho ■ .idanis)
and his wife, Br. Vnd'wood's wife (Edw. Spalding), Bro : Butterfield's
wife, Bro : Cbamberlin's wife, Edm : Cbambeiiin's wife,Abram Parker's
wife, Joe. Parker's wife, laa. Lernet's wife, Sim ; Thompson's wife.
" 8. Since Rec<*. into fellowship was Jacob Parker
"9. Tho : Adams and Edw. Spalding on 27 of Ifi 56."
The FIEST TOWN-MEETING for the choice of officers
to govern the town aifaira and to provide for the sup-
port of the church was held in November, 1654, at
the house of William Fletcher. This is said to have
been the first frame house in town. It stood a few
rods east of the house of the late Ephraim Crosby,
upon land which has continued in the possession of
the Fletcher family to the present time.
The following is the record of this meeting :
" The : 22d : the : 9th : month : 1C54.
" At a meeting then at William Fletcher's Hous there was chosen to
officiate in Ordering the Publick affairs of the Place by the Consent of
the Major part of the Town for this present year ensuing are as fol-
loweth :
" Esdras Read : Edward Spaulding : William Fletcher: Isaac Leroed,
Simon Thompson: William Underwood: Thomas Adams.
" We gire to Mr. Fisk Thirty acres of meadow and Thirty Acres of
Plowable Land for the acomidation of bim for his most conveniancy :
And we do agree and Order that he shall have a hous built for him
Thirty. eight foot in Length i Twenty foot in bredth, with three fire
Rooms, the Chimneys built with Brick or Stone : and we promise to pay
to Mr. Fisk, Fifty Pounds for the first year ; And we promise to pay
his maiotlnance as the Lord shall enable us for the future."
It ia uncertain at this day where ilr. Fisk's house
stood, but I think it was on or near the site of Wil-
son's Block.
In all the foregoing transactions we see revealed
the deep religious character of the founders of this
town. The clause in the first petition for the grant,
that "they find a comfortable place to accommodate a
company of God's people upon," and the condition of
the grant that they settle a competent number of
families ... as may be in capacity for enjoying
all the ordinances of God there." And their action
in submitting the question of the removal of the
Wenham Church to a council composed of the
Governor and some of the Colonies' most eminent di-
vines, are acts consistent with that theocratic scheme
of government which "sought to erect a common-
wealth to be composed of a united body of believers."
The Wenham company was a great accession to the
town. Especially the influence of Rev. Mr. Fisk in
shaping and guiding the affairs of the infant settle-
ment cannot be estimated. ' He was born in the
pariah of St. James, Suffolk County, England, about
the ye.ir 1601. HLs parents sent him to the grammar
school near their home and after to Immanuel
College, Cambridge, where he took his first degree.
He then studied for the ministry and entered upon
his favorite work. The persecution of the non-
conformists obliged him to abandon the ministry.
He turned his attention to the study of physic, and,
afler passing an examination, engaged in practice.
He came to New England in 1637. To avoid the
fiiry of his persecutors he was obliged to go on board
1 Allen.
the vessel in disguise. " He came well stocked with
servants and all sorts of tools for husbandry and
carpentry and with provisions to support his
family in a wilderness three years, out of which he
charitably lent a considerable quantity to the country,
which he then found in the distresses of a war with
the Pequot Indians." His mother died on the
passage and his infant child soon after.
"■ He taught the Charlestown grammar school and
after in Salem the first grammar school in that city."
He acted as pastor in Wenham for about fourteen
j'ears. "Twenty years did he shine in the golden
candlestick of Chelmsford, a plain but an able . . .
and useful preacher of the gospel ; rarely, if ever,
by sickness hindered from the exercises of his
ministry."
He was physician as well as pastor and Cotton
Mather says of him, "Among the first preachers and
writers which rendered the primitive times of New
England happy, was one who might be called the
beloved physician ; one who might also be given the
eulogy which the ancients think was given to Luke —
a brother whose praise was in the Gospel, throughout
all the churches. This was Mr. John Fiske."
Of those who came with Mr. Fisk, Mr. Thomas
Hinchman became perhaps the leading man of the
town. As deacon of the church, deputy to the court,
trustee for the Indians, and leader of the military, he
exerted a wide influence. He was also probably the
most wealthy man of the town. Although he left no
family so far as we know, his name has been remem-
bered. One citizen now living was named for him —
Edwin Henchman Warren. Esdras Read soon re-
moved to Boston, where he died in 1680. TheSpald-
ings and Byams have continued prominent names in
town to the present time. Austin Killam and Rich-
ard Goldsmith both died in Wenham. The latter was
killed by lightning May 13, 1673, while engaged
in conversation with Rev. Mr. Higginson, who had
just returned from the church.
The second town-meeting was held " month first
Day 24th 1655. William Fletcher is chosen Consta-
ble : Isaac Lemed is chosen Sergeant of the band :
Simon Tomaon is chosen Clerk of the Band :
" It is ordered that the first Second Day of the first,
month Shall be observed by all the householders of
the town from year to year for the Chusing of all
annuall officers belonging to the Town as the Select-
men or Committee, Deputy for the Court: Constable;
The three men to end all small causes under Forty Shill-
ings, Surveyors for the high-ways Overseers of the
fences and Swine and to meet at the meeting-houa
by nine a clock in the morning and for the first hours
non-appearance twelve pence and for a whole Days
Absence two Shillings."
Allen states that the third town-meeting was " held
at the meeting-house agreeable to former vote."
- Ch. Mannal Wenham.
CHELMSFORD.
243
It is not stated ' in the record where this meeting
was held. It is probable that the meeting-house was
not built for several years. , In 1662 a rate was levied
for the " meeting-house for ye Towne £100-8." And
the two years previous considerable sums were raised
relative to the same object.
IxcORPORATlox. — The town was incorporated May
29, 1655, by the following act :
" VppoD iDfonuacon from M^c W'illard^ bj a letter from Esdraa
Bead, Edward Spaldec, Wm. Fletcher, etc., iDhabitantaof anew plaDta-
coD, that th« Doumber of inhabitants, according to the time ptizt in the
GonrtB graunt, were there settled at tbeire request, the Court doth
graunt the name thereof to be called Chelmsford."
The incorporation of Billerica and Groton bear
the same date.
Chelmsford was probably named for that town in
England. President John Adams, who was from the
same family as Samuel and Thomas Adams of this
town, wrote in his diary that " Chelmsford was prob-
ably named in compliment to Mr. Hooker, who was
once minister of that town in Essex."
It is pleasant to feel that in bestowing a name upon
the town its founders may have been moved by a
sympathy with the enlightened democratic views of
the great preacher who founded Connecticut; the
author of " the first-written constitution known to
history that created a government, and it marked the
beginnings of American democracy, of which Thomas
Hooker deserves more than any other man to be
called the father." ^
Saw-Mill. — As soon as the town was fairly or-
ganized measures were taken in the following action
for the establishment of a saw-mill:
*' 1C56, July Day ye third. At a Public meeting of the whole town,
ft Is Granted to Ur. Samuel Adams in Considoratlon of Setting np a
Saw-mill : and thereby Supliing the Town with Boards at three SbilliDgs
the hundred, or the Sawing of one Board log for the providing and
bringing of another to be Redy to work by the next Majch ensuing. In
consideration AMiereof it is hereby Granted to the Sd Ur. Adams to have
the Sum of Four hundred and fifty acres of Land upon the South Side of
the meadow belonging to the Sd Hr. Adams, called brook meadow ; Far-
ther that the Sd Mr. Adams Shall have Liberty to make use of the Fines
upon the Common. And to bold the foreSd Land to bim and bis heirs
for ever."
A further grant of one hundred acres was made in
consideration of Mr. Adams erecting a corn-mill.
Later the town gave him liberty to set flood-gates at
Heart Pond.
This mill was upon Great Brook, about two miles
southeast of the centre of the town, where Russell's
mills now are.
The diflaculties which these pioneers experienced
in maintaining themselves in this wilderness is indi-
cated in their petition for an extension of their
grant.
_ 'I.7U. ,-},».._ 1656.
" The hnmbell petition of the inhabiunts of Chelmsford aheweth that
wheareas this honoured Courtt hath fformerly giuen them a sertayn
tractt of land which we thankefuly acsept of, and wee thought it to
bane binn sofltient and Conuenient for a plantatyon, but by reason of
the stonioes of sum part and the barones of another part there of, we
' Transcript.
SFisk.
weare Constrained to eet off our habitatyons on one comer of our
bounds which was only Conaenient for that ree, and so wee have Toa-
uoidablj put our seines vp on straights because now our setuation is
neare vpon onr north east line, wheare wee bane no outlett for our Cat-
tell to feed on, may it please, therefore, this honoured Conrtt to take this
our Condityon In to Consideratyon, and to grant a small parilll of land
from our north ea«t line downe to merimack Bluer, and so bownded by
the sayd Riner abontt three mills, and so to mn Tp on a south west line
so as that wee woold not bee any bindraoce to Grantou plantatyon :
May it please this honoured Conrtt to graunt petytion how euer your pe-
tisionors will Continualy Bemayne praying for a biesing vpon all your
walty affaires.
•* Isack lemed,
" Thomas Addams,
"Joffiske; "Simon Tompeon,
" Edward Spauldlng,
" Benlamin bnterfild,
" William fletcher
" William Tnderwood,
" in the name A on the Behalfe of y Towne.'*
Some misapprehension has been occasioned by the
expression in this petition " our situation ia near upon
our north east line." The centre of population was
at the meeting-house, which stood upon, or near, the
site of the present Unitarian Church ; and as the
town extended westward to Groton, and not as far
northward as the present North Village, it will be
seen that what is now the centre of the town was then
the northeast section.
That " we have no outlet for our cattle to feed on,"
while there were but twenty or thirty families to oc-
cupy such a large extent of territory, was owning to
its physical conditions. It was covered by forest ex-
cept upon the meadows which skirted the streams, or
where fires may have swept through leaving spaces
where the wild grasses would spring up, or where the
" barroness " of the sandy plain was incapable of
supporting vegetation.
Eliot had petitioned about the same time for an
extension of the Indian grant, and the answer of the
Court was to both petitions, viz.:
" In Answer to this Peticon and AIlso that part of m'. Eliot's Peticon
respecting An Interagrement of land, vpon Conference with the Com-
ittee who layd out the bounds of Chelmsford and perusal of a deacrlp.
con, A plott of the sayd plantacons and AIlso of the Track of land now by
both parts Peticooed for; Wee Apprehend it requisite that the Indian
grant be extended A mile from the North East Angle or comer bound
of Chelmsford Abutting on Merrimack and Fatucket Eastward, taking
in John Sagamor'B planting ground. And the end of the said mile to
determine the Indain plantacon. And for the rest of the land [in
l)ehalf of both towns — ] Feticoned for, that Chelmsford South and
North line Abutting on Tadmnck, be extended from the Northweaat
Angle or Comer three Miles north : so as it pass not Merrimack riner.
And from thence to mn A parralell line, with the East and weat Une of
Chelmaford, Totill It meete with Merimack Bluer. And that the whole
Track of land so taken in, be and remayne in Comonltie vnto the
Towns of Chelmsford and the Indian Town called Patnckett for all Taea.
" 21th 3"" 1656. " Dilflll. OoolIK,
*' JoiEFB Huxe,
" John Wibwau..
" Tbe-Depntyea approve of the retume of tbe ComJttee In answer to
this petition deeiringe the consent of o' hono^ znagist* hereto,
" William Torbxt. Clerie.
" Consented to by y* magist*. Edwa&d Rawson, Beerety.'*
(Copy from original record in tbe archives at State-House, by David
Pulsifer.)
The dotted line on the plan shows the territory
petitioned for. A portion of this was granted exclu-
244
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS
sively to the Indians, and in the remainder they were
given equal privileges with the people of Chelmsford.
This arrangement, as might be expected, proved
" prejudicial to the mutual peace of the said planta-
tion," and in 1660 the Court granted permission for
an exchange of land with the Indians. By this the
Indiana gained some land formerly held by Chelms-
ford, and relinquished to their white neighbors all to
the north of the Chelmsford line that had been peti-
tioned for in 1656. The agreement was signed by
James Parker, William Felther (Fletcher), and Tho.
Hincksman, trustees for the Indians and by John
Eliot, "in witness of my approbation.''
Appended was " the names of y" cheife iubabitants of Pmatucket,
testifying tbeira consent and sattisfaction in this deed :
"Tbemarke PuDtabbun, Jobn Tubatowon.
"Tbe marke Eussinanscut.
"Tbe nmrke of Pannobotiquis.
" Tbe m^ke of Nompbon.
'* The ni'ke of Peter.
"Tbem'keuf Nonnoit.
"Tbe mfke of Wompannooun."
Petition to Trade With Indians.— The follow-
ing petition for the privilege of trading with the
Indians probably contains the names of nearly all
the men then residing in the town :
" Cbelnisford, 3Iay 17 : '08. To tbe bonored Coart Assembled at Bos-
ton.
"Tbe bumble petistlon tbe inbabetants of the towne off Chelmsford
Sbewetb ; that we have as god by his providen [baveing despoased off
nss with ow« famelies into this Remuat Corner of the wlldernes ; wbare
not with Standing tbe improvement of all Lawful! Liberties and Advan-
tages put into ow« hands wee have and doe find as tbe State of things
now Btaodetb much dtficaJte <•> : nay imposebile[ ] of procuering such
neaesarie suplve as boath cbuirb and familie ocations doe call for to tbe
great hasard boath of uss and owrs as wee dout not but y wisdoms are
sensable off which dlflcalltie is much increased to uss by beeiug prohibe-
ted from tnideing with the indiens which we doe conseiue to bee ow*
Lawful Liberte: ow* bumble Request tharfore is that y honera would
bee pleased to take this case into y consederation : and grant yow* pe-
tiscionera thare Lawfall Liberte which wee conceive ought not to bee
Menopolised inasmuch as it is no nue inuention, and that tbe Lord
would kepe boath you and yow^s in his feare and truth wee yow^ petis-
cionera shall for ever praye wee doe further iD[ ] your boner to Rate for
this inserted Leter to bee ow* townes brand or Leter of marks as Law
Injoynetb vss : C :
** Jamas Parker, Thomas Adams, Josiah Richardson, '.William Fletcher,
Edward Spalden, John Fiske, Henry Farwell, Georg bvam, Berabin
butterfild, Tho. Chamberlln, Beniamin bntterfield, Roberd Procter,
Edward Kempe, Daniel Bloget, Edman Chamberlln, James Blud, John
Spalden, Joseph Parker, Roberd Fletcher, Samewell Foster, Joseph Gil-
eon, Games Hildretb, William Underwood, John Sbiple, Richard Uil-
dreth, Jobn Nutting, Abraham Parker, Edward Spalden, Jobn Shiple,
Joseph Parkia, Samewell Kempe."
In 1665 the line was more definitely established
between Chelmsford and Wamesit. The agreement
was signed by the following Indians, who were
" present and consented : nob how, John line, misstik
george,frrances,Sameull alias manatoques,ould roger."
The line began at the Concord River, where Billerica
and the Indian grant on the east side of the river
joined ; from there " a streight line untill you come
ouer the River meadow" — "thence westward cross
the high ridge to a pine in the bottom" — "thence
westward " — " thence it turns to the great swamp."
It is impossible to follow the line accurately, but
the language over the river meadow and "cross the
high ridge to a pi ne in the bottoms " seems to describe
the lay of the land west of the Lowell City Farm
buildings. From there it went to the swamp through
which runs the bed of the old Middlesex Canal, and
from there north to the river where Baldwin Street
terminates.
In these exchanges of land with the Indians, it is
plain that the superior shrewdness of the whites
gained them the larger share. Some compensation
may, however, have been made to the Indians, as in
1665 a rate was levied of £31 17s. Sd. " for the pur-
chase of the plantation of y° Indians."
Roads and Residences. — It is interesting to
trace the early roads, as it enables us to determine
the lines of settlement. As we have seen, when this
territory was first explored the only land mentioned
as under cultivation was the Indian's corn-field upon
Robins' Hill. With that exception the territory
which these men surveyed from this eminence, \ya8
probably an almost unbroken forest, except upon the
meadows which skirted the streams. The first inhab-
itants could not therefore erect their dwellings in
villages, as social considerations and mutual safety
would prompt. They must push out upon the borders
of the meadows or wherever they could find food for
their cattle. Highways were necessary to enable
them to go from house to house, and to " mill and
meeting-house." , At first these were little more than
rude paths cut through the forest, some of which
came by continued use to be established highways,
without any formal action of the town.
The road from William Fletcher's house to the
meeting-house passed around in front of the present
residences of Mrs. E. B. Worthen and Mr. D. A.
Bussell. There were perhaps half a dozen families,
besides the minister, living near the meeting-house.
These were Wm. Fletcher, John Bates, who lived
near Mrs. Worthen's. Dea. Cornelius Waldo, whose
house stood in Mr. Bussell's garden (Dea. Waldo
came from Ipswich about 1665). Stephen Pierce, a
tailor, and Abraham Parker were on the south side
of the brook. (Parker and his sons afterwards built
the first mill on that stream.)
"Stony Brook path" started at John Bates' (now
Worthen's) and extended toward what is now Dis-
trict No. 7. Upon this road was John Perham, upon
land which has continued to be occupied by his de-
scendants to the present time.
The "town-way to the mill " is now South Street.
It has been straightened from time to time. It passed
around before the present residence of C. E. A. Bart-
lett, and made a turn before J. E. Warren's and, after
crossing Farley's Brook, swung around to the east to
avoid the hill. Upon this road, besides Samuel
Adams, the miller, lived Edward Spaulding ' (one of
the Wenham Company) at the present Sanford Hazen
place.
1 Family tradition.
CHELMSFORD.
245
MoBCE Barron lived near Mr. Charles Sweetser's,
and Joseph Warren located, before 1700, upon the
place which still continues in the possession of his
descendants. It is said that the first burial in town
was upon his land.'
The Billerica road was the " road to the Bay." It
was the line of travel to Boston, for Groton and Lan-
caster, as well as this town, and these towns were re-
quired to help support the bridge across the Concord
River in Billerica. Henrj- Farwell lived on this road,
I think, where Timothy Adams lives. The road
which runs from the town farm over the Golden Cove
and Carolina Plain to Middlesex, was the " country
way to Merrimac." This terminated at Poor-Man's
Bridge, which was near where Westford Street, in
Lowell, now crosses Black Brook. It was extended
to the river, corresponding to what is now Baldwin
Street, probably in 1673. The following is the report
of the committee :
" William Underwood, WUIiam fletcher and Abrabam Parker being
appointed a comitlee to Lay out a highway for the Inhabitants on the
other side of Meremack do Determine that it shall begin at the Conntry-
Vfay at pour man's bridge, and so along ben\'een the two swampe and
over William Underwood's Meadow, all along bounded by marked
trees on both sides ; and so Runeth below Mr. Hincbman's Dam ; and so
to the Indian Line to answer the Country Road at merimack and on this
aide."
A number of families were located on the borders
of the Indian land, within the present limits of the
city of Lowell, in the vicinity of Stedmaii, Baldwin
and West Pine Streets. Two foot-ways were laid out
in that section in 1C77, of which the following is a
copy of the record : -
"By appointment of the Townsmen, there ia two footways Laid out
through the Land of John Wiight ; The one begining at the stile next to
Jerabmeel Bowers, and so to the cai^ bridge, and then below the or.
chard to the Land of Jonathan Butterfield; and then close by the fence
of John W' right up to the Drift-way, and tbe other Begining against
John Shepley's and then Straight to the Driftway at Jonathan Butter-
field's Bam ; by William Underwood's and Jerathmeel Bowers'."
Jerathmel Bowers lived where Sewal Bowers now
resides. The cart-bridge was probably over Black
Brook. Bowers was a man of considerable wealth
for the times. He removed to Groton two or three
years before his death, in 1724.
John Shepley came to Chelmsford with Mr. Fisk
in 1655. (His house and land in Wenham he sold to
a brother of Mr. Fisk.) He is an ancestor of the
Perhams through the marriage of his daughter, Lydia,
to John Perham, in 1664. His son John sold, in
1698, and removed to Groton. The Indians afterwards
massacred all the Shepleys in Groton save a boy,
John, sixteen years old, who was taken captive and
kept four years, after which he returned, and from
him descended .all the Shepleys in that vicinity.
Other residents in this section were : John Wright,
Thomas Sewal, Jonathan Butterfield, John SpauldLng,
Anthony Harker, James Richardson, Joseph Park-
hurst (son of George, of Watertown), and Maj. Thom-
' E. H. Warren.
'Transcript, p. 63.
as Hinchman. Capt. John Webb, alias Evered, or
Everett, lived on the banks of the Merrimack, near
the present Chelmsford line. He was a man of prom-
inence, was the first deputy to the Court, officer in the
military and an extensive land-owner. (He owned
Tyng's Island.) He was disfranchised by the Court
for unchaste conduct, but afterwards forgiven and re-
stored to his political privileges and allowed to hold
his military office.
Henry Bowtall, or Bo wt well, lived near tbe present
Lowell line, on Steadman Street. The Dunstable
road entered this as the following record shows:
"The : I" : Day of January : 1674 : LeTet Thomas Hinchman and
Levet Samael Foster, being appointed by the Town to Joyn, with Leret
; Wheeler and Abraham Parker, tbe Committee to Lay out tbe Conntry
way from Dunstable to Chelmsford ; They do Joyntly agree on both par-
ties : That the Way shall in Chelmsford bonnds begin at Mr. Ting's
Farm, and so to be six polls wide: And so to continne as by marked
Trees down to Jerathmeel Bowers' Land : and so to Black brook in to
the Country way that comes from Merlmaok."
This corresponded to the road which passes through
North Chelmsford. It turned eastward near Drum
Hill, over a road now little used and entered the " way
that comes from Merrimac," near the present West-
ford Street. The travel to Boston, from Dunstable
and the country above, passed over this line for a long
term of years.
The Beaver Brook meadows attracted a number of
families to the section which is now School District 5.
The first permanent road in town which was recorded
was in this section, viz. :
" January : 7 : 1659.
" George Biam and Thomas Barrett are appointed a comittee to
state tbe High. way that gos to Tadmuck before Thomas Chamberlain's
bous: The tree at his Hog's Coat is concluded one bound, and so to Run
bis due bredth acording to order, towards the Brook Cald Bearer
brook."
Thomas Chamberlin lived a few rods east of the
Hunt place. The road from there goes across Tad-
muck Swamp on the north side of Heart Pond. This
record presupposes a road to the meeting-house
from that point. Thomas Chamberlin was a man of
wealth. He owned one-third of the Dudley fiirm of
1500 acres, in Billerica. Others in the neighborhood
were Edmund Chamberlin, Richard Hildreth (from
Woburn, died 1693). The Court granted him 150 acres
of land because of his " necessitous condition."
George Byam, who -came with the Wenham Com-
pany, in 1655, settled where his descendant, George
A. Byam, Inow resides. Tbe farm has remained
continuously in possession of the family. Arthur
Warren lived, I think, where B. O. Robbins' house
stands. Jacob Warren lived there in 1711, when the
road was laid out from that point northward.
The way to " Little Tadmuck," early referred to in
descriptions of land in this section, starts at the house
of the late S. C. Hunt, passes the No. 6 School-
house, and on towards Chamberlin's Corner, in West-
ford. This was probably the first outlet for the
Stony Brook lands.
The Sheehan place was originally occupied by
246
HISTORY OF .MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Adams. Thomas Adams lived at the Hay ward place.
He sold to Benjamin Haywood in 1726 and removed
to Dunstable, where he died in 1746, aged seventy-one.
The farm still continues in the Hayward family.
This was a garrison-house and may have been occu-
pied by the Haywards earlier than the above date, as
" Mr. Nathaniel Hayward and his man, with two
souldiers there posted," occupied a garrison-house in
1692. The Otis Adams place was occupied by Samuel
Chamberlin at an early day. The house stood on
the opposite side of the spring from the present dwell-
ing.
The Pine Hill road was not formally laid out till
1755, although it was probably in use as a means of
access to Flaggy Meadow at an earlier day. An old
cellar, between G. A. Byam and E. E. Dutton's indi-
cates an early habitation upon that road.
The following is a copy of the record of the Groton
road, which passed through this section. A portion
of it was probably already in use as a road to the meet-
ing-house :
"3« 1 month 1C62-3.
" Tbomafl Adams and Josiah RIcbardMn being chosen a committee to
Jofn with GrotOD committee to Lay out a High-way from Town to Town
the work is performed by them and the way ia Laid out from Beaver
Brook Bridge orer the North side of RobbioB-hill and tbenca through
Richard Hild^eth'a yard and bo to the west end of Hart pond over the
swamp and so to Thomas Chamberlin's meadow and so on towards
Groton on the eaet side of Xadmuck great meadow."
The road which passes around on the south and
west sides of Robins Hill, and enters the above road
at John Byam's was laid out soon after as follows :
": 7th: 8: month:: 1673: Laid out by the selectmen
the Day above for the use of the Town a high-way
which is bounded Between Henry Gidleys Lott and
John Blanchards meadow and so all along between the
meadow and Robbins hill Runing into the way that
comes from George Biams to the meeting-house."
This accommodated Gidley, who lived at what is now
the Fay place, and Thomas Barrett, who was at what
ia now Chas. W. Byam's. Probably other farms had
paths leading into this road. Mr. E. F. Dupee's farm
and Andrew H. Park's are both said to have been oc-
cupied by Barretts at this time. The latter was a gar-
rison-house.
The meadows upon Great Brook early attracted set-
tlements to the southern quarter of the town, in what
is now Carlisle. In this neighborhood lived John
Barrett, George Robbins, Thomas Cory and Ambrose
Swallow, and probably others. In 1671 the town laid
out a highway " for the Inhabitants of Great Brook
and others to travel to mill and meeting-hous."
Settlements soon pushed westward into the Stony
Brook Valley, in the vicinity of what is now Westford
Depot, on the Stony Brook Railroad. John Snow,
Joseph Parkhurst (who had removed from his former
place of abode), Joseph Butterfield and others were
there located. The time of the laying out of their
road ia uncertain, as the original record is not dated;
but the committee to lay it out was appointed in 1696-
It was called the " Stony Brook highway to the meet-
ing-house."
A road was already in use from the meeting-house
to the vicinity of what is now the No. 7 School-house.
From there it passed over Francis Hill by the house
of Joseph Keyes to John Snow's. A portion of this
road on the west slope of Francis Hill has been dis-
continued. Another road was laid out at the same
time leading into this from Arthur Crouch's house,
" and by the houses at Little Tadmuck." This com-
pleted the first road from what is now Westford Centre
to Chelmsford Centre. Arthur Crouch lived upon
Tadmuck Hill as early as 1680. He was probably the
first person to erect his dwelling upon this beautiful
hill, nowcrownedby the charming village of AVestford.
Samuel Cleveland was granted land the following
year upon the east side of Tadmuck Hill, with the
privilege of damming the swamp upon his land. He
was a son of Moses Cleaveland, of Woburn, who was
the ancestor of Grover Cleveland, one of the only two
persona now living who have completed a term in the
high office of President of the United States.
Samuel Burge, John Spaulding, Joseph Spaulding,
Joshua Fletcher and Benjamin Spalding were chosen
fence-viewers for Stony Brook in 1682, '83 and '84.
These records indicate that there were considerable
settlements in this section at an earlier date than has
been generally supposed.
Josiah Richardson, one of the original proprietors,
provided a shelter for his family, at first, by digging
into the bank. This farm is one of the very few
which has remained continuously in one family.
Mr. Edward F. Richardson is the present proprietor.
The Groton road (1663) passed through what is now
the south part of Westford, then called " great tad-
muck," and settlements pressed in that direction.
Several Chelmsford names appear in a petition in 1711,
for a township in Nashoba (now Littleton), which
had been abandoned by the Indians, and a short time
after a number of families living in that vicinity were
united to Littleton for religious worship.
The method which governed the proprietors of the
town in their land distribution is not described in the
records. The first book of proprietor's, records, Allen
states, was burned about 1715, with the house which
contained them.
The lands not taken up were called "common
lands '' or " towns' common."
There were four divisions of the common lands.
New settlers were admitted by vote and granted a
quantity of land for a house-lot, and the town granted
land from time to time for the encouragement of use-
ful trades.
The cattle were allowed— subject to certain re-
strictions— to range over the town's common.
The different herds were under the care of the field-
drivers, who kept the cattle from straying away to
become the prey to wolves.
This is probably the origin of this office, which is now
CHELMSFORD.
247
usually bestowed good-naturedly upon the newest
benedicts. The limits of the different ranges are de-
fined in the following order, which is interesting, as it
indicates the early lines of settlement :
" 7 : 1 : 71 ita ordered ConcerDinp herding of Cattell that from Croe
Bridge to henry Doutetle shall bee one herd." (Boutell Ufed near the
Lowell line on Stedman Street.)
"2 From Croe bridge to Moses Barrons Shall bee another herd."
(Barron lived near Chas. Sweetser'a, on Sontb Street.)
'• 3 From Thommafi Barrets to Bobertt proctere and John barke Shall
be an other herd." (Barrett's wa« at C. W. Bjram's, and Proctor was
near the old South Chelmsford School-house. i )
"4 From George Biams to Arther warrens shall be another herd and
that If Any person shall neglectt to put ther Catell to the herd they shall
pay ther proportion of herding and twelve pence a boast over and Above."
(This fourth herd was in District Five, probably from Geo. A. Byam's to
B. 0. Bobbins'.)
A former vote passed in 1667 provided that " such
as Live remoat shall have Liberty to choose their
beards and have Cows and working cattell exempted."
Swine were also subjected to regulations, some of
which must have been very annoying to piggy.
" Every inhabitant being an householder shall have
liberty to keep two swine on the common,'' and a per-
son holding a ten-acre lot could keep four; "and so
every man according to his enlarged lot." To prevent
a too free use of piggy's snout it was " ordered that
all swine above three months old Shall bee suffitiently
Ringed in the midell of the nose Constantly youcked
from the tenth day of Aprill until the twentith day
of October."
Hog- reeves were chosen " to oversee swine and keep
them in order."
2\'excfield. — The interval land along the Merrimack
north of Stony Brook, consisting of 214 acres, was
fenced as early as 1659 and used as a common pasture
by twenty-two proprietors. It was called Newfield,
and that name finally became applied to all that
section of the town. The pond now called Leeches'
Pond is called Newfield Pond in the old records. An
eddy at the northern extremity of the field still retains
the name.
Difficult as were the conditions of existence in this
new settlement the people maintained a lively interest
in the public affairs of the Colony.
When Charles IL sent a couple of ships-of-war
with 400 troops to Boston Harbor in the summer of
1664, with commissioners to look after the affairs of
the New World, and the Massachusetts' charter
seemed in danger, Chelmsford was among the towns
which sent petitions to the Court testifying to their
good content and satisfaction in the present govern-
ment, in Church and Commonwealth, and their reso-
lution to be assisting and encouraging the same, and
desiring that all means might be used for the con-
tinuance and preservation thereof^
After twenty years of faithful service the aged
pastor. Rev. John Fiak, became physically unable to
carry the burdens of his labors alone, and upon " The
13 Day of the 10 mo. 1675, att a general mitting of
inhabitants of Chelmsford was voated as foloeth :
" l'' in consideration of Mr. Fiske* Age and in-
fermitis Acompanny the same ther is ned of sum
hilpe to goine with Mr. Fiske in the worke of the
minestry.
" 2'' that besides the eighty pounds formerly
granted yerly to the minestry ther shall be forty
pounds more Raised yearly for the obtaining of Mr.
Clarke to be a help in the worke aforesaid if bee may
bee Attained." Mr. Fiske now rapidly declined in
health. " On the second Lord's day of his confine-
ment by illness, after he had been many Lord's days
carried to church in a chair, and preached as in
primitive times, sitting, ... on January 14, 1676,
he saw a rest from his labors."'
It is much to be regretted that no stone reveals to
us the spot where the remains of this beloved man
are interred.
Rev. Thomas Clarke succeeded Mr. Fisk in the
ministry.
The following contract with Mr. Clarke is as it
appears in the original record, page 144 :
"Articles of agreement bettwine Mr. Thomas Clarke and the inhabit-
ants of Chelmsford in order to Mr. Clarke Settelment in the ministry
for time to com in Chelmford are as foloeth :
"1 firstly it Is agred beetwlne both parties that the inhabitants
of Chelmsford do pay yearly to the said Clarke the just and full sum of
tightey pounds in maner as foloeth, twenty pounds in curent mony
and sisley pounds in proTlsions ; viz.; fortey pounds in com of
all sortes as god gives and the other twenty pounds in porke. Beefe and
other flish not exseding tow pence, halfe peny p pound more over its
allso Agred that the towne shall soply Mr. Clarke with wood soStient
for his family use yearly which is by Agrement thirty cord yearly.
" 2 secondly it is also agreed that the said towne shall pay sixty ponnds
in mony towards the purchaa of Corsers land lying in Chelmsford and
that they build an house upon the said land which house Shall be forty
foott in length, twenty in bredth, flvelen in stud and a ciching adjoyn-
ing of sixten foott Square and tene foott stud provided that the said
Clarke shall pay on quarter partt of what this bulding shall cost.
** 3 Thirdly it is agred that the said towne make an Aditjon to tha
Salary Above stated if he stand in ned and the towne be Abell ther to.
•' 4 fourthly that the eelectt men shall stand in gaged yearly to the
performance of the above Agreements by making a Rate and proporj
tiont the Inhabitants his partt of the foresaid snni and to levey the
same.
" 5 fillhly its agred that this yearly Salary shall be paid with in the
year.
" Finaly it is Agred that If the Said M'. Clark do grow [ ] remov and
leave the worke of his ministry in ChelmsfonI then the said land and
house as abpve Shall rettome into the bands of the towne of Cbelmsford
they paying to Mr. Clarke what bee hath expendid to wards the parches
and bulding and tjettering the Acomedatione And for A confermatioD
of this Agrement As above this fifth Day of the twelfth month one
thoiuand aixe hundred seventj and SeTen wee have sett to onr hands.
"TBOUAfi Clarke
" Sam'l AnAXB, Clerk, in the name o/ the inhahftants."
This agreement was ratified by the town with a
"full voatt " at a general meeting the same day.
Rev. Thomas Clarke was bom in Boston about the
year 1652. He graduated from Harvard University
in 1670.*
He served for a time in the army at Narragansett
1 Family tradition.
- Becerds of Mass.
'Allen.
4 AUen.
248
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
during Philip's War, probably in the capacity of
chaplain.
His name appears to an acknowledgment, in 1679,
that the town had fulfilled its agreement in regard to
building the parsonage.
This house stood near the site of the passenger
station of the Old Colony Railroad. In 1692 several
families were assigned to his house in case of danger
from the Indians. When the house was moved to its
present position and remodeled, several years since,
the walls of a portion of it were found to be protected
by thick plank.
Witchcraft. — The witchcraft delusion which
swept over the country occurred during Mr. Clarke's
ministry. One case occurred in Chelmsford, and it
was dealt with by Mr. Clarke with such moderation
and good sense that no such disastrous consequences
resulted as were witnessed in some of the towns of
the Colony. The following is the account as related
in Mather's "Magnalia: "
'* There waa at Cbelmaford an afflicted person, that in her fits cried
out a^iDSC a woman, a neighbor, which Mr. Clark, the minister of the
Godpel there, couid not balieve to be guilty of such a crime, and it
bapned while that woman millied her cow, the cow struck her with
one liorn upon her forehead and fetched blood ; and while ehe was thus
bleeding a spectre in her likeness appeared to the party afiQicted ; who,
pointing at the spectre, one struck at the plaae, and the atflicted said,
'you have made her forehead bleed ; ' hereupon some went unto the
woman and found her forehead bloody and acquainted Mr, Clark of it ;
who fortunate went to the woman and asked, * how her forehead became
bloody^* and she answered, 'by a blow of a cow-bom,' as abovesaid ;
whereby he was satisfied, that it was design of Satan to render an in-
nocent person suspected. " — MaOter't " Magnolia" vol. 3, p. 478.
In 1681 the town voted to purchase a bell " and
hange him in the metting-house." Previous to this
a drum had been used to assemble the people. A
drum was bought by the town for Henry Farwell in
1659.
The ancient method of noting time, by the shadow
cast by the sun, is recalled by the record of a sum
paid to John Bates " for seting the dial." The same
person was paid, in 1698, for " mending the Stoxs "
(stocks). This implement, for the punishment of of-
fenders, tradition says, stood upon the Common by
the old ash-tree near the monument.
The supply of wood furnished to Mr. Clarke did
not prove adequate, and in 1683 the amount was in-
creased to forty cords yearly. In 1688 his salary was
increased to £100, at his request.
The ministry land was laid out in 1679, "by the
Towns Gifte and order was laid out [for] the minis-
try, and for that only use for ever in Chelmsford, to
Bay thirty acres of upland and swamp, be it more or
less."
The Old Burying-Ground at the centre of the
town, was first enclosed by a stone wall in 1717.
About ten years previous to that date the town had
protected it by a board fence. In 1790 the old wall
was replaced by a more substantial one.
A few rude stones and some tablets, which bear the
marks of having been placed in position at an early
date, bear no mark to reveal the name of those who
rest beneath. The inscriptions here given are among
the oldest, or are otherwise of special interest :
e
HERE LYES Y BODY OF GRACE
LIUERMOAB WIFE TO lOHX
LIUERMOAB AGED 73 YEARS
DIED THE 14 OF lANUABT
1690
MARY THE WIFE
OF THOMAS
CHAMBERLAINE
AGED 88 DIED
FEBRUARY 8
1692
RICHARD
HILDRETH
AGED SS YEAR'
DIED FEBRUARY
23 1093
He was one of the original settlers of the town, as
his name appears among the petitioners for the grant
of the town May 19, 1653.
«
HEBE LYES Y BODY OF
CAP
A
lOSIAS
RICHARDSON AGED
61 YEARS DIED THE
22 OF lULY 1693
0
HERE LYE6 Y BODY
OF EZEKIEL
RICHARDSiiX AGED
29 YEARS DIED
KOUEMBER 27
1C96
HERE LYES Y BODY OF
SAMUEL FLETCHER
AGED 05 YEARS
DIED DECEMBER 9
1097
0
HERB LYES Y BODY OF
Deacon CORNELIUS WALDO
AGED 75 YEARS
DIED JAS' 3 1700
The Memory of
the just is blessed
He was a man of distinguished usefulness. His
house was upon what is now Mr. David BusseU's gar-
den.
HEBE LYES T BODY OF
DEACON SAMUEL
FOSTER AGED S3
«
TEARS DIED lULY Y
10 1702
HEBE LYETH
•
T BODY OF M.\JOR
THOMAS HINCHMAN
AGED 74 YEARS
D •
DEC. JULY Y 17
1703
A foot-Stone of the grave beside it bears the name :
M"? ELIZABETH
HISBSMAN
CHELMSFORD.
249
Major Henchman was one of the first settlers,
coming with Rev. John Fisk and the church from
Wenham. He was an extensive land-holder and a
prominent citizen.
The following is the epitaph of the Rev. Thomas
Clark, the second pastor of the church of Chelms-
ford:
MEMENTO
UOBl
rVOIT
UOEA
Euic puloerl Mandatae BUDt
Eeliqiue Eot'U Dom Tho~ Clark
Gregia Cri§ti Chelmef :
Pajtoria Ecimij, qui fide &
ape Beatae Beaarrectiooia aoima
Id ainum Gfiau Ecpiravit Die
VII Decembr, Anno Dom
MDCCIV i .Sutisauae LII.
The following receipt shows the cost of the above
monument:
" Chelmaford 17>» Not. 1708
" Kscievd of Mr. William Fletcher the aum of fifty ehillinga In
money to be beatowed for a monument over the grave of the Bct. Blr.
Thomas Clark late of Chelmaford decwued ; It being the donations of
•undry pereona In Chelmaford for that uae. I lay received by me.
" JOHS Hancock."
HERE LTES THE
T
BODY OF LIEC .
EDWARD 8P0LDIK
AGED 73 TE.^RS
WHO DECEASED
EV • I"
JAN . Y 10 1707 I g
•
HEBE LTtS Y BODY
OF A M?? A LUCTA A
TTKG WIFE TO . CAP'
WILLIAM TYNG
AGED A 28 YEARS
i 4 MONTHS . WHO
DEPARTED THIS LIFE
APRIL . Y
A^A™^
Her husband, William Tyng, is buried in Concord,
having been wounded by the Indians between Groton
and Lancaster and carried to Concord, where he died
Aug. 16, 1710.
Here Lyes y" Body
of M' JOHN
PERHAM who
'Dec^ Janurr y«
■t
21 1T21
Aged 88 Yean.
Here is one which has some historic interest :
SACRED to the memory of
Mr. JOSEPH SPALDING
who died July 31 1820 ^t. 64.
Id hope of eteroal life which Ood
who cannot lie hath promiaed to
btilJevera to Chriit.
He was amoDc the brave aaaertere & defenders of the liberties of hi«
country at Bunker Hill, wnere he opened the battle by firing upon the
enemy before orders were gJTen : i. after enjoying for many years the
blesBiogs of civil k religious liberty in common with others
He, "sunk to rest
With all hid countryp honor's bleat.
By the Church of
Christ in CbeluBford.
In testimony of their esteem and Veneration
tfaiB sepulchral Stone was erected, to stAnd aa a
sacred Memorial of their late worthy Pastor,
the Beverend Ebenezer Bridge,
who after having officiated among them,
Id the Mrrice of the Sanctnary,
for more than a year above half a Century,
The Strength of Nature being exhausted
sunk under the Burden of Age,
and joined the Congregation of the Dead,
Oct. 1, 1792 ^tat. 78
The following: recalls one of the past industries
of Chelmsford, which flourished at the time of the old
Middlesex Canal :
to the memory of
John J. Siickelmire,
a Native of GERMANY, and late foraman of
the Chelmaford Glaaa Manufactory,
Died March 31" 1814
Aged 48 yeara.
Thia ver»e remlnda the heedleea aa they paaa
Thatllfe'a a fragile drop of annealed glaaa,
The aliehtest wound enauree a fatal but^t
And the frail fabric abivera into dust.
So he whom in bia heart could none aurpaas,
la now himself reduced to broken glaas.
But from the grave, the fining pot of man,
From acandiver and galea galle purged again,
New mixed and fashioned by almighty power,
Shall rise a firmer fabric than before.
CHAPTER XVI.
CHELMSFORD— [ Omtinued) .
Indian Hitlory— French and Indian Wan— War of the Bmotution—Shaiii'
Bebdlion— War of the BebtUion.
The Pawtuckets or Wamesits. — ^The Indiana
that inhabited in the vicinity of the Pawtucket
Falls, where the city of Lowell now stands, were one
of the tribes scattered along the Merrimack, and Pis-
cataqua Rivers, which acknowledged Bubjection to
Passaconnaway, the great Sagamore of Pennacook.
In the early settlement of New England these num-
bered about 3000 souls. They were very much re-
duced by the great sickness of 1612 and 1613. And
in an expedition against the Mohawks or Maqnas in
1669 large numbers of them were destroyed. In 1674
■' there were not above two hundred and fifty men,
besides women and children.'"
These Indians were sometimes called Wamesits,
from their village or capital near the mouth of the
Concord River, and sometimes Pawtucketa, from the
falls of that name in the Merrimack.
lAllen, who quotes mainly from Gookin.
250
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
These Indians were not naturally of a warlike dis-
position. Passaconnaway, their chief, died in 1662.
A short time before, at a great feast and dance, he
gave his dying counsel to his people. He warned
them to take heed how they quarreled with their
English neighbors, " For though they might do
them some damage, yet it would prove the means of
their own destruction. He told them that he had
used " all the arts of sorcery to prevent their settle-
ment and increase," but to no purpose.
Passaconnaway was succeeded by his son, Wanna-
lancet (also spelled Wonolanset). This chief contin-
ued steadfast in his friendship for the English.
The following interesting account of Chelrasford^s
Indian neighbors, and of the conversion ofWanna-
lancet, is from the pen of the historian, Gen. Daniel
Gookin, who wrote from personal observation :
" Wamesit is the fifth praying town ; and this place Is situate upon
Uerrlmak river, being a neck of land, where Concord river falleth into
Merrimak river. It is about twenty miles from Boeton, north north
west, and within five miles of BlDerfca, and aa much from Chelmsford:
80 that it hath Concord river upon the west north west ; and Merrimak
river upon the north north east. It bach about fifteen families ; and
coDsequentlv, aa we compute, about seventy five souls. The quantity
of land belonging to it is about twenty five hundred acres. The land is
fertile and yieldeth plenty of com. It is excellently accommodated with a
fishing place; and there is taken variety of fish in their seasons, as
salmon, shad, lamprey eels, sturgeon, ba», and divers other?. There is
a great confluence of Indians, that usually resort to this place in the
fishing seasons.
"Of these strange Indians divers are vitious and wicked men and
women ; which Satan makes use of to obstruct the prosperity of religion
here. The ruler of this people is called Numphow. He is one of the
blood of their chief sachems. Their teacher is called Samuel: son to
the ruler, a young man of good parts, and can speak, read, and write
English and Indian competently. He is one of those that was bred up
at school, at the charge of the Corporation for the Indiana. These In-
dians, if they were diligent and industrious, — to which they have been
frequently excited, — might get much by their flsh, especially fresh sal-
mon, which are of esteem and good price at Boston in the season ; and
the Indiana being stored with horses of a low price, might furnish the
market fully, being at so small a distance. And divers other sort of fish
they might salt or pickle, as sturgeon and bass ; which would be mueb
to their profit. But notwithstandiog divers arguments used to persuade
them, and some orders made to encourage them ; yet their idleness and
ImproTidence^oth hitherto prevail.
"At this place, once a year, at the beginning of May, the English
magistrate keeps his court, accompanied with Mr. Eliot, the minister :
who at this time takes bisopportuoity to preach, not only to the inbabit-
anta, but to as many of the strange Indians, that can be persuaded to
hear him : of which sort, usually tn times of peace, there are consider-
able numbers at that season. And this place being an ancient and capi-
tal seat of Indians, they come to flab; and this good man takes this
opportunity to spread the net of the gospel, to fish for their souls.
" Here It may not be impertinent to give you the relation following.
Uay 6tb. 1674, according to our usual custom. Mr. Eliot and myself
took our journey to Wameait, or Pawtuckett; and arriving there that
evening, Mr. Eliot preached to aa many of them aa could be got together
oat of Mat xxil. 1-14, the parable of the marriage of the king's son.
We met at the wigwam of one called Wannalancet, about two miles
from the town, near Pawtuckett falls, and bordering upon Merrimak
river. This person, Wannatancet, is the eldest son of old Paasaconaway,
the chiefest Bachem of Pawtuckett. He is a sober and grave person, and
of years, between fifty and sixty. He bath been always loving and
friendly to the English. Many endeavors have been used several years
to gain this sachem to embrace the christian religion ; but he bath stood
off f^om time to time, and not yielded up himself persoDally, though for
fonr years past he hath been willing to hear the word of God preached,
and to keep the Sabbath. — A great reason that bath kept him off, I con-
ceive, hath been the indisposition and aversenesa of sundry of hia chief
men and relations to pray to God ; which he foresaw would desert him.
in case he turned christian. — But at this time, 3Iay 6th, 1674, it pleased
God so to influence and overcome hia heart, that it being proposed to him
to give hia answer concerning praying to God, after some deliberation
and serious pause, he stood up, and made a speech to this effect:
'"Sirs: You have been pleased for four years last past, in yonrabuud-
ant love, to apply yourselves particularly unto me and my people, to
exhort, press and persuade us to pray to God. I am very thankful to
you for your pains. I must acknowledge, said he, I have, all my days,
used to pass inan old canoe (alluding to his frequent custom to pass in a
canoe upon the river) and now you exhort me to change and leave my
old canoe, and embark in a new canoe, to which I have hitherto been
unwilling ; but now I yield up mydelf to your advice, and enter Into a
new canoe, and do engage to pray to God hereafter.*
"This his professed subjection was well pleasing to all that were pres-
ent, of which there were some English persons of quality ; as Mr. Rich-
ard Daniel, a gentleman that lived in Billerica, about six miles off, and
Lieutenant Henchman, a neighbor at Chelmsford, besides brother Eliot
and myself, with sundry others, English and Indiana, Mr. Daniel be-
fore named desired brother Eliot to tell this sachem from him, that it
may be, while he went in hia old canoe, he passed in a quiet stream ;
but the end thereof was death and destruction to soul and body. But
now be went into a new canoe, perhaps he would meet with storms
and trials, but yet he should be encouraged to persevere, for the end of
his voyage would be everlasting rest. Moreover ho and his people were
exhorted by brother Eliot and myself, to go on and sanctify the sabbath,
to hear the word, and use the means that God bath appointed, and en-
courage their hearts in the Lord their God. Since that time, I hear this
sachem doth perBevere, and is a constant and diligent hearer of God's
word, and sanctifieth the sabbath, though he doth travel to Wameait
meeting every sabbath, which is above two miles ; and though sundry of
hia people have deserted him since he subjected to the gospel, yet he
continues and persisra.
" In this town they^observe the same civil and religioua orders as Iq
other towns, and have a constable and other officers.
"This people of Wamesit suffered more in the late war with the Maw-
kawka than any other praying town of Indians ; for divers of their peo-
ple were slain ; others wounded ; and some carried into captivity ; which
providence hath much hindered the prosperous estate of this place."
From this account it appears that their capital was
on the east of Concord River, in what is now Belvi-
dere. Allen states that Wamesit consisted of about
2500 acres, of which iOOO were estimated to be east of
Concord River and 1500 on the west.
Upon the outbreak of King Philip^s War Wanna-
lancet withdrew with his people to the north to pre-
vent being drawn into the quarrel. And although he
suffered great provocation at the hands of the Eng-
lish even in this retreat — his wigwams and provis-
ions being destroyed by Captain Moseley's troops — he
would not suffer his. men to retaliate. '* Wannalan-
cet after a long absence called on the Rev. Mr. Fiske
and congratulated him on the restoration of peace,
solicitously inquired after the welfare of the people
in Chelmsford, and whether they had suffered greatly
during the war. Mr. Fiske replied that they had
been highly favored, for which he desired to thank
God. 'Me next/ said the sagacious sagamore, inti-
mating that through his influence this town had been
exempted from the calamities that had befallen many
others." ^
KiXG Philip's War. — Chelmsford suffered much
less than many of the other frontier towns. The peo-
ple were, however, in a perpetual state of alarm.
When the father went forth from his home he waa
tortured by the fear that he might return to find it a
smoking ruin, with the mangled bodies of his loved
1 Allen.
CHELMSFORD.
251
ones beside it. Several years previous to the out-
break of hostilities some acts of the town show that
even at that time the feeling was far from one of secu-
rity.
While assembled in the church on the Sabbath
their devotions were liable to be rudely disturbed by
the savages. But whether the menace was from some
roving band of the warlike Mohawks, who had dealt
such a crushing blow to the Pawtuckets a short time
before; or whether it was from some of the Pawtuck-
ets themselves, made dangerous by a too free indul-
gence in " strong lickers," we can only conjecture.
" 25 the 6 mo'i' 1671 It is ordered by the Selectmen For SeTerall
ConfiideratioDS espetialy for the preeeruatioD of peace That with in ooe
moDeth After the Date hear of Enry every malle perBoD with io our
tovDe above the Age of fiveten years Shall provid a good Clabe of foDer
or five foott in liogtb with a Knobe in the end, and to brioge the same
to the mettiog houae, tber to leave the Same vntill vntill ocation fore
use of It be [found, &c.)
" tba name of the Rest By
' Sahitel Adams,
' CUrit.
The next year the town " covenanted with Abra-
ham Parker ... to cut all the brush in the Training
place . . . and by Training place is understood all
that land now cleared by the town for that use."
This land was probably on the pine plain between
Chelmsford Centre and Lowell. The year following
the town built a house upon Robins Hill. The rec-
ords relating to this are suflnciently interesting to be
given in full :
•' T" 8 mo.. 1673.
"Tbetowne voated Leftenant Samuell Foster and en — wllliam Fletcher
Shold a point the place wbear the towne bouse Shold bee bultt," at the
same time, "It was voated that all mall persons from the age of twelve
years to siitey, shall, every one, worke one day in the yeare for the
Clearing of Robins bill, on the penalty of twelve pence a boy, and tow
Shillings a man, in case thay Neglectt beeing ther unto caled. . . .
by order of the Select men For sixe years in sewing, the datte beer of
being left to the Selectman to a point the day yeerly, and Ukwis thay are
to apoint a man to lead on the worke either tber or else whear, att the
lelectmens apoiutment, dated as above by order of the Towne."
"7 of October, 1C73, att a general! metting [ J the towne
order tbes foloing, (sic.)
" Articls of agreement made the fonith Day of octobor, on thousand
ilxe bundretb seventy and three, bettwene the inhabitants of CbelniB-
ford and Joeeph barrett, of the Same place, (sic).
"The Said Joeeph barrett Doth promis and Ingage to buld a bouse of
eighten Foot longe, and sixten foot wid, and eight foot Stud, and to do
all the worke belonging to the Same, From the stump to the finishing of
the Same, and to find borda for the hole house, and lay the flowers and
dobell bord the Roofe, and bord (?or bore) the aids and ends, and
to make the Cbimly, and dore and window, and to find stones and clay
and to finish the Said house att, or beefore, the last day of march Next
insewing the date above.
"The inhabitants of Chelmsford do promise, and bearby Ingage, to
pay unto the for said barett, in full satisfaction for the house Aforesaid,
the Just sum of twelve pounds in towne pay, that is, such as the towne
can produce, and to pay the same twelve pounds, att or beefore the
tenth day of octtobor, in the yeare on thousand stxe hnndreth sevety and
foure, as wittneas in tbe behalfe of the towne the date above.
" allso it was agreed vpon that the towne Should find Nails for tbe
whole house.
"Sau Adaus,
" atrke."
It is not clear what purpose this house was intended
to serve. It undoubtedly had some military signifi-
cance. The committee appointed to locate it were
both officers in the " foot company." The place was
admirably adapted for a lookout from which to warn
the people of approaching danger. Several years be-
fore the Indians had built a stockade upon Fort HiU,
now Rogers Park, in Lowell, to protect themselves
from the Mohawks, and it is said that tbey signaled
across from that point to Robins Hill. The house
was leased by the town to Daniel Gralutiah, or Galu-
sha, for a term of years for a nominal sum, — one and
one-half pecks of corn yearly. Galusha was a Dutch-
man. He was afterwards a soldier in a garrison at
Dunstable. His house there was attacked and burned
by the savages and one woman killed.
The state of feeling in 1675 may be inferred by the
following extract from a letter :
"Chelmsford, March y' 20, 1675. Good Sr, I
humbly intreat you to pray the Gounsell to giant us
a stronger Guard, for wee expect the Indians every
hour to fall upon us, and if they come wee shall be all
cutt off," and a petition from some of the leading citi-
zens to the General 'Court to "Consider o' dangerus
Conditions y' we are in in refference to o' lives and
estates." '
The town built several garrison -houses. One of
these stood opposite the present house of Henry Hod-
son, in District No. 7. (This was the one mentioned
by Allen opposite Mr. Audrew Spftlding's.) One was
on Francis Hill, near the Keyes place. Allen speaks
of " one south of the meeting-house." It is uncertain
where it stood. It is said that one stood on South
Street, between the houses of E. R. Marshall and
John S. Shed. The late Mrs. Hezekiah Parkhurst
said that one stood on the high point of land between
the mill-pond and the South Chelmsford Road.
Another was upon the bank of the Merrimack, at Mid-
dlesex.
This was Lieut. Thos. Hinchman's garrison. In
October, 1675, he was given ten pounds out of the
public treasury for his " extraordinary expenses and
labour." The order sets forth that he " hath been at
great charge in providing ffor the diet of certaine soul-
djers appointed to garrison his house vpon Merre-
macke Riuer, where sundry Englishmen, his neigh-
bors, are concerned, which is a very apt place to se-
cure that frontier."
The withdrawal of the Wamesit Indians into the
wilderness occasioned great uneasiness, as it was feared
that they had joined the enemy. Some of the
Chelmsford soldiers, who were in the more exposed
garrisons at Groton, desired to be released because of
this new peril at home. These fears fortunately
proved to be groundless. In Sept., 1675 Comet Tho-
mas Brattle and Lieut. Thomas Hinchman, who were
in command of a company of fifty horsemen, were or-
dered " forthwith to march to Chelmsford '' to attend
to distributing the forces in the garrisons of the more
exposed towns, and " you are to endeavor either one
>r. p. Hill's, " Chelmsford."
252
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
or both of you (if it may bee) to gaine ttie Indian
Sachem called Wannalanset to com in againe and
Hue at wamesit quietly [and] pecabley: you may
promise him in the councills name y' if hee will re-
turne & his people and liue quietly at Wamesit hee
shall susteyne no p'iudise by the English ; only you
are to ppose to him y' he deliuer for a hostage to the
english his sonne who shalbe wel vsed by vs, C in
case hee come in and can bee gained then you are to
impour him to informe the Pennabooke and Nata-
cook indians and all other Indians on the east side of
Merrimack Riuer, that they may liue quietly and
peacable in y' places and shall not bee disturbed any
more by the english prouided they do not assist or
ioyne with any of or enimiy nor do any dammage or
preiudice to y* english." Capt Saml. Moseley sent
twelve men to the garrisons in Chelmsford in Aug.,
1675. He reported that " Our Major having a cer-
tain intelligence of a considerable party of Indians
that have gathered together a little above Chelmsford,
which I hope we shall be up with this night or to-
morrow at furthest, and if please God I come up with
them, God assisting me, I will closely engage with
them, and God sparing my life, I shall, as opportunity
gives leave, acquaint your honor of my actions."
In the beginning of 1676 the Indians became more
aggressive. Wannalancet informed Mr. Hinchman
that a company of about fifteen Mohawks were in
the woods above the river. Joseph Parker was way-
laid and wounded, as related in the following letter
dated at Chelmsford, 12th Feb., 1676, and signed by
Samuel Adams, Samuel and William Fletcher, and
sent to the Governor and Council at Boston: "This
Morningabout an howerand Half after sun-rising, Jo-
seph Parker of this place with his son, coming for
[from] the Hon'd Major Willard, about fower Mile from
o[v]rMeeting-House, along by some houses pertaining
to this towne, now agpinst one house standing nigh
the way [were] Way-layed, and had ye indians bullets
thick (as they report) about them — They rode fast to
escape them. The young Man was wounded in the
Shoulder by a Musket Bullet, as cut out on the other
side of his Arme, and we conceive by Pistol Bullets.
His clothes torn in several Places." This may hare
been the Joseph Parker who was the first white person
bom in the town.' The next month " some part " of
Chelmsford was burned. But the people were fortu-
nate at sustaining no more serious blow, for the same
body of Indians the next day made a furious assault
upon Groton, and the town was so nearly destroyed
that the survivors abandoned the place altogether.
These acts excited such an intense feeling of resent-
ment towards the Indians that any act of lawlessness
was apt to be followed by swift punishment, adminis-
tered, too often indiscriminately, upon any Indians
that could be found, without inquiring very carefully
whether they were friends or foes. This was the case
1 Hubbard, p. 195.
when some of the Wamesits were shot because they
were "vehemently suspected" of having burned a
barn and some haystacks. This provoked the hith-
erto friendly Wamesits to retaliate. The story is
thus told by the historian Hubbard:
" At Chelmsford the said Wamesit Indians, about
March 18, before, fell upon some Houses on the
North side of the River, burned down three or four
that belonged to the Family of Edward Colburn ; the
said Colburn, with Samuel Varnham, his Neighbour,
being pursued, as they passed over the River to look
after their Cattel on that side of the River, and mak-
ing several shots against them, who returned the like
again upon the said Indians (judged to be about
forty). What success they had upon the Enemy was
best known to themselves; but two of Varnham's
sons were slain by the Enemies shot before they
could recover the other Side of the River."
Samuel Varnham lived upon what is known as the
Howard farm in Middlesex. His sons who were
killed are buried there.
April loth the savage foe made another descent
upon the town, and the startled inhabitants beheld
their dwellings in flames. Upon this occasion there
" were fourteen or fifteen houses burned."
By midsummer the wily Philip had been hunted to
his death and the fury of the war wa.«i abated. Nearly
a thousand men in the Colony had lost their lives,
while the destruction of property had been simply
frightful. The frontier towns suffered most, and
Chelmsford was among those that were obliged to
apply to the General Court for relief. This was
granted in the following order : " In ans' to the peti-
tion of the selectmen of Chelmsford, &c., it is ordered
that Chelmsford be allowed and abated the sume of
fiuety-three pounds seven shillings & one penny out
of their last tenn country rates towards theire losses."
The Nashoba Indians, who lived upon the southern
borders of the town, suffered great hardships during
Philip's War. They were removed by order of the
Court to Concord, where they were cared for by John
Hoar. Here they were living peaceably. When
Capt. Samuel Moseley came he broke into their
house, scattered their property and they were hurried
to " their furnace of affliction " at Deer Island. In
May of the following year they were, with some of
the Naticks, removed, by order of the Court, to Paw-
tucket. Those who were removed were mostly women
and children. It was ordered "that the men be
improved in the service of the country." Arms were
provided for such as were trusty, and they were
placed under the command of Captain Hinchman.
The Pawtuckets did not return, at the conclusion
of the war, to their former habitations at Wamesit.
They retired with, perhaps, the remnant of the
Nashobas, to Wickasuck (Tyng's) Island, in the
Merrimack.- This island had been granted to Wana-
3 KaMD'g " Daostable."
CHELMSFORD.
253
lancet and other Indians in 16C5. They remained
upon this island or its vicinity until their removal to
Pennacook in. 1686.
The results of King Philip's War were so disas-
trous to the hostile Indians that they no longer had
the power to threaten the existence of the (Colonies.
The relations with the survivors were not rendered
more cordial, however, by the struggle. Cordial
hatred was the feeling between the races. As
marauding parties and as allies to the French in the
wars with that nation they inflicted great damage to
the exposed settlements for many years.
By the wise management of Hinchman Chelmsford
continued to have a valuable ally in Wannalancet.
His influence with the Indians was always exerted
for peace, and when danger could not be averted he
warned the people so that they were able to prepare
for it. Chelmsford should hold the name of Wanna-
lancet in grateful remembrance.
A feeling of insecurity prevailed, however, as is
shown by the following extract from the diary of
Samuel Sewall, of Boston :
" 7-9th, 1685. When came home heard of body of
Indians near Chelmsford, 3 or 400. The fears and
Rumors concerning them much increase. The In-
dians near Albany ; Wonolaneet brings the news to
Chelmsford, and mistrusts of their mischevous
designs."
Through representations made to the Court by
Hinchman the services of Wannalancet " in the
treaty late with the Indians at Pennacooke" were
recognized, as also his grievance that some of his
friends were transported, and it was ordered "that
the Treasurer advance tenn pounds in money &
clothing, deliver the same to y"^ major-generall,
Capt. Thomas Hinchman & Mr. Jonathan Ting, to
be distributed by them amongst sajd Indeuns, some
writting bein draune vp to be presented to sajd In-
deana at the same time to signe, for the rattififcacon
of an intire peace and amity betweene them & y'
English."
In 1689 the first of the series of French and Indian
Wars began, and military preparations again became
active.
The following item appeared in a Boston news-
paper, under date of Sept. 25, 1690 (the earliest news-
paper published in America) : " While the barbarous
Iiidiaiu were lurking about Chelmsford there were
missing, about the beginning of this month, a couple
of children belonging to a man of that Town, one of
them aged about eleven, the other aged about nine
years, both of them supposed to be fallen into the
hands of the Lidiam." '
There were eighteen garrison -houses distributed
throughout the town, and one on the north side of the j
Merrimack, in what is now Dracut. To these were j
assigned, besides women and children, 158 men, i
' Copied in London bj Hon. Samuel A. Green, M.D., of Boaton.
including four soldiers. This was, prcbably, the
entire adult male population of the town. Another
instance of the friendship of the Pawtuckets occurred
on June 22, 1689. Two Indians, Job Maramasquand
and Peter Muckamug, came to Major Hinchman
from Pennacook and reported a plot against Major
Waldron, of Cocheco (now Dover). Major Hinch-
man immediately despatched a messenger to notify
the authorities at Boston, and they sent a courier with
the information to Major Waldron.
But the news came too late. Upon the fatal night
of June 27th, while the courier was detained at New-
bury Ferry, at midnight, the squaws, who had impru-
dently been allowed to lodge in the garrison-houses,
opened the doors and the savages rushed in. The
story is familiar of how the major gallantly defended
himself with his sword, but was struck down with a
hatchet, and then placed in his arm-chair upon the
table and taunted by the Indians while they slashed
him with their knives until he fell from loss of blood
upon his own sword which they held under him.
Twenty-two others were killed and twenty-nine cap-
tives carried to Canada.
Samuel Butterfield, who was captured in Groton by
Indians in August, 1704, bad a somewhat romantic
experience. With other soldiers he was guarding a
man who was at work in a field when the Indians
came upon them. He killed one Indian and wounded
another, but was overpowered by numbers. As the
slain Indian was a Sagamore " of great dexterity in
war," his captors proposed to wreak their vengeance
upon him by inflicting a death by torture. While
lamenting his cruel fate, relief came from an unex-
pected quarter. The " squaw widow," when asked to
name the manner of his death, replied : " His death
won't fetch my husband to life: do nothing to him."
His life was spared, and after fourteen months of cap-
tivity he returned to his friends. He was probably
the Lieutenant Butterfield who again met with a nar-
row escape from the Indians two years later, while re-
turning with his wife from Dunstable. His horse
was shot and the woman taken captive, "and Jo
English, a friend Indian, in company with y", was at
the same time slain."
Capt. William Tyng, a young man of promise, who
had served the town as representative to the General
Court, and filled other positions of trust, was wounded
by Indians between Groton and Lancaster. He was
taken to Concord, where he died, Aug. 16, 1710.'
Chelmsford was drawn upon heavily for men for
the various campaigns of the French Wars, and valu-
able lives were sacrificed.
Lieut. Jona. Barron was in the successful siege of
Quebec. Upon his return he presented Parson Bridge
with a silver cup taken there. Lieut. Barron after-
wards lost his life in the campaign against Crown
Point in 1755, as did two other Chelmsford soldiers.
'Alien.
254
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
viz. : Jacob Parker and James Emery. This was the
campaign in which the English troops fell into an
ambuah of French and Indians under Baron Dieskau.
There were twelve Chelmsford men in the expedi-
tion.
In the unsuccessful campaign of 1756, undertaken
against the same point, of twelve Chelmsford men in
the company of Capt. Jonathan Butterfield, of Dun-
stable (a native of Chelmsford), four lost their lives,
viz. : Nathaniel Butterfield, Simeon Corey, James
Dntton and Isaac Proctor. In the other campaigns
the losses were doubtless equally heavy.
In the campaign against Nova Scotia, in 1755,
which resulted in despoiling the thrifty Acadians of
their homes and property, and scattering seven thou-
sand of them as exiles throughout the Colon ies, twenty-
three Chelmsford soldiers took part. It seems a pity
that brave men should be employed in such dishonor-
able service.
Seventeen of these Acadians were cared for in
Chelmsford. Their names appear in the following
account rendered by the selectmen of the town in
1757, as found in the Massachusetts Archives :
" CuELMflrOHD, October 24, 1757.
** In obedience and pursuant to order of the Great and General Court
of the Province of Ma£aactiuaett3 Bay, made and passed the 2l8t daj of
January, A. D. 1767.
" The following is a tme Hat of the several French Persons* names in
the Town of Chelmsford, the amount of their age, sex and the cireum-
■tances of their health and capacity for lal>or.
"The number of [ ] are seventeen, viz, :
NAUES. AGED.
" Jean Landrie, a man, 62 years,
MaudUn, his wife, 60 Weakly, unable to labor and
laboring under the misfortune of a broken arm and the charges
thereof Dow.
Paul Landrie, his 80D, 22 able to labor.
Charles Landrie, do. do. 20 sickly and not able to labor.
Simon Landrie, do. do. 18 able to labor.
Aaam Landrie, do. do. 16 years, able to labor.
Charles Trawhorn, a man, 29 years, sickly and ailing and not
able to labour.
Tithome, his wife, 29 years, able to labour.
Maty, their daughter, 6^ years.
Blaudlin, their danghter, 5^ years.
Joseph, their son, 4 yeaiv, sickly.
Grigwire, their son, 3 years.
Margaret, their daughter, 0 : 7 months.
Joseph Landrie, a son of the ) ^„ ...
. - T . • r 26 years, healthy and able to labour,
sd. Jean Landne, J
Maudlin, his wife, 26 years, healthy and able to labour.
Jean T., their son, 2 years, sickly and weakly.
Murray Maudlin, their daughter, 5 months.
'* David Spauldimo, ^
" Daniel Peoctor, | Selectmen
•' Henry Spadlddio, V of
*' Jonas Adams, 1 Chelmsford."
" Andrew Fletcher, J
Numerous entries appear upon the town records
showing the expense of the " support of the French."
The charges are mainly for provisions, fuel, house
rent, medical attendance, and sometimes for rum
(spelled in one case rhumb). In one instance one of
the French is paid by the town for assistance ren-
dered by him to his less fortunate companions in ex-
ile, as appears by the following : — " Joseph Landrie
for time spent in moving Jane Landrie and wife with
their goods from David Spaulding's to Epliraim War-
ren's and for going twice to Dunstable about a nurse
for said Jane Landrie and wife when sick, five shil-
lings and four pence " and David Spaulding is paid
for his " cart and oxen to move the French from his
own house to Ephraim Warren'.s."
As the Indians abandoned their grant at Wamesit,
their lands were gradually occupied by individuals,
mostly from Chelmsford. In 1686 their remaining
lands on the west of Concord River and 500 acres on
the north of the Merrimack were purchased by
Jonathan Tyng and Thomas Henchman. This was
known as the Wamesit Purchase. Henchman bought
Tyng's claim for £50, and by him it was sold to forty-
six proprietors in Chelmsford, who occupied it as a
pasture. As described by Allen, the northwest
boundary " began near the head of the Middlesex
Canal, and so to the glass manufactory and thence
running near the houses of the late Mr. Philip Parker,
Mr. Micah Spalding and Capt. Benj. Butterfield, ter-
minated at Wamesit Falls, in Concord River, or at
the mouth of River Meadow brook."
Philip Parker lived near the present Highland
School-house. Micah Spalding at the corner of Lib-
erty and School Streets, and Benjamin Butterfield on
Hale Street, where the house of the late Benjamin
Edwards now stands. To describe this line by the
present streets of the city of Lowell, it would corre-
spond to Baldwin, West Pine and Liberty Streets,
and thence to the mouth of River Meadow Brook.
This territory now became a part of Chelmsford,
although it was not formally annexed until 1726.
The town had now reached its greatest area, and
all changes made thereafter were attended by loss of
territory.
The town now embraced, in addition to what is now
occupied by the town, a large pait of Carlisle, the
whole of Westford and all of Lowell, with the excep-
tion of Belvidere, Centralville and Pawtucketville.
Chelmsford also held jurisdiction over the settlements
upon the north of the Merrimack, at what is now Dra-
cut, and the part of Lowell which lies north of the
river. The people voted and paid taxes in Chelms-
ford and looked to them for protection. This relation
was confirmed by the Court in 1667, that " sundry
ffarmes erected aboue the toune of Chelmsford, about
Merremack Riuer" . . . '' haue their dependances
vpon & performe services & beare chardges w"" the
sajd toune of Chelmsford." The town of Dracut was
incorporated in 1702, but the people continued to act
with Chelmsford in religious matters till the relation
was severed by the following action : " Janawary
the: 14: 1705-6 " " It was uoated that Draw Cut shall
not uoate In Chelmsford."
The fall ot Fort William Henry in 1757 occasioned
great alarm, and troops were hastily summoned to re-
pel a threatened invasion. In a roll of the company
of Captain Samuel Bancroft, of Reading, raised to
CHELMSFORD.
255
meet that exigency, are fourteea Chelmsford names.
In 1763 the conquest of Canada was completed and
peace again smiled upon the land.
War of theRevolutiox. — Colonel Samson Stod-
dard, a son of the former pastor, was perhaps next to
Parson Bridge the most influential peraon in town
and shared with him the social honors. He was a
graduate of Harvard College and studied divinity,
but relinquished the profession for trade and agricul-
ture. He kept a store for the sale of general mer-
chandise, and was interested in land operations in
New Hampshire. The town of Stoddard, in that
State, was named in his honor. His house, which
stood upon the site of the Central Baptist Church,
was the resort of fashionable and cultured people.
The following from Mr. Bridge's diary, under date of
June 24, 1763, shows the quality of the company that
sometimes assembled there : " Dined at Col. Stod-
dard's with his Excellency, the Governor, and Hon.
Mr. Bowdoin, and others, and their ladies."
In the disturbances which led up to the Revolu-
tion Parson Bridge was at first exceedingly loyal to
the home government. The clergy, as a class, were
conservative and inclined to favor existing institu-
tions. His associations naturally strengthened him
in that position. He was a friend of Governor
Hutchinson.
In 1771 he records a visit to Dr. El lis and Governor
Hutchinson — the latter of whom received him " very
graciously." He was honored by being selected to
preach the election sermon May 27, 1767, and in this
he expressed strong sentiments of attachment to the
mother country. But after the republication of
Hutchinson's letters, in this country, his feelings
underwent a change and he became an ardent sup-
porter of the liberties of the Colonies.
The position of the people of the town in respect
to the grievances under which the Colonies suffered
was, in the highest degree, creditable to them. While
they firmly adhered to their rights as Englishmen,
there is not the remotest suggestion of a desire to
sever their connection with the existing government.
The riotous opposition excited by the passage of
the Stamp Act by Parliament is thus alluded to in
the parson's diary :
August 30, 1765. — "Every day we hear ye news
from Boston of ye mobish doings there in which first
insurrection they hanged Secretary Oliver in eflSgy,
and then burned him ; burned the stamp-office, etc.,
rifled his dwelling. . . All this is owing to ye stamp
act.''
Colonel Samson Stoddard, the Representative of
Chelmsford at the time, asked of the town instructions
as to how he should act in so delicate a crisis. In
town-meeting the following resolutions were adopted
lor his guidance :
" This being a time when, by reason of several acts
of parliament, not only this province, but all the Eng-
lish colonies of this continent, are thrown into the
utmost confusion and perplexity ; the stamp act, as
we apprehend, not only lays an unconstitutional, bat
also an insupportable, tax upon us, and deprives us,
as we humbly conceive, of those rights and privileges
to which we are entitled as free-born subjects of Great
Britain by the royal charter ; wherefore we think it
our duty and interest at this critical conjuncture of
our public afluirs, to direct you, sir, our representative,
to be so far from countenancing the execution of the
aforesaid stamp act, that you use your best endeavors
that such measures may be taken and such remon-
strances made to the King and Parliament, as may
obtain a speedy repeal of the aforesaid act, and a re-
moval of the burden upon trade.''
When, upon the accession of Pitt to the ministry in
England, the Stamp Act was repealed, hope again
revived in the Colonies, and rejoicings were indulged
in. Colonel Stoddard's house was illuminated in
honor of the event. Bridge writes, "May 22,
1766. Spent the evening at Col. Stoddard's, with
abundance of other company. His house being illu-
minated, &c., on acct of the news of the repeal of
the Stamp Act." It proved, however, that the hope
was not well founded.
When, in consequence of the dissolution of the
General Court by Governor Barnard, the convention
of September 22, 1768, was called by the Committee
of Safety of Boston to deliberate on measures to ob-
tain redress of grievances, this town was one of the
ninety-Six there represented. Colonel Samson Stod-
dard being their delegate.
A town-meeting was called January 11, 1773, to
know the sentiments of the people relative to certain
grievances under which the Colony is laboring. And
at an adjourned meeting, January 22d, the following
resolutions were unanimously adopted :
" We are fully of opinion that the inhabitants of
this Province are justly entitled to all the privileges
of Englishmen, and to all those rights inseparable
from them as members of a free community. We are
also sensible that some of those rights are at present
endangered. In such unhappy circumstances, the
only question that can be made is this : What method
is most suitable to obtain a redress? Whatever doubts
may arise about the particular mode, this we are clear
in, that all rash, unmeaning, passionate procedures are
by no meant) justifiable in so deUcate a crisis. When
a community thinks any of ite rights endangered they
should always weigh consequences and be very caa-
tious lest they run into a step that may be attended
with the most deplorable efiects."
In their instructions to their representative, Mr.
Simeon Spaulding, the following language occurs :
" Sir, as the present aspect of the times is dark and
difficult, we do not doubt but you wiU cheerfiUly
know the sentiments and receive the assistance of
those you represent. The matters that may now
come under your cognizance are of great, import-
ance. The highest wisdom, therefore, prudence and
256
HISTORF OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
decision are evidently necessary. We would earnestly
caution you by no means to consent to any rash, pas-
sionate plan of action, which will not only sully the
dignity, but finally prove the utter destruction of the
cause we pretend to support. We hope those little
animosities that involve persons, not things, may be
utterly banished, and that every determination will
be founded in the nature of a free state, and that there-
fore every privilege annexed to each part may be re-
ligiously preserved. Of consequence, you will be
careful not to trample on majesty, while you are
firmly but decently pleading the liberties of the sub-
ject. In fine, we wish you that wisdom which is from
above, and we pray you that your conduct in this im-
portant crisis may be such as the coolest reflection
will ever after justify."
Again, when the news of the act closing the port of
Boston and transferring the seat of government to
Salem was received, " at a very full meeting of the
freeholders and other inhabitants of the town. May
30, 1774, in consequence of letters sent to the Com-
mittee of Correspondence by the Committee of Corre-
spondence of the town of Boston, containing matters
of as great importance as ever came before a town-
meeting, a Committee of Correspondence was chosen,
consisting of Jonathan William Austin, Captain
Oliver Barron, Mr. Samuel Perham, David Spauld-
ing, Benjamin Walker, Deacon Aaron Chamberlin,
Captain Moses Parker, Samuel Stevens, Jr., and
Simeon Spaulding, and the town expressed the fol-
lowing sentiments :
" It is the opinion of this town that the present
day is as dark and distressing a day as this country
ever experienced, and when we consider the aspect of
the times, not only what has actually taken place, but
what we are immediately threatened with, we must
think that the question is, whether we submit to the
arbitrary, lawless, tyrannical will of a minister, or by
using those powers given us by the God of nature,
and which it were sacrilege to surrender, prevent so
awfiil a catastrophe ; and it is extremely afflictive to
us to consider that, if we are made slaves, we are so
made by a nation whom we ever gloried in as a pa-
rent State, whose honor was dear to us, and to secure
whose reputation the best, the richest blood has been
spilt. Taxation without representation we have no
conception of. The present act respecting the block-
ing up of the port of Boston we esteem dangerous and
destructive.
" We are not so lost to every generous principle of
the human mind as not to sympathize with our breth-
ren of Boston, who have in a more peculiar sense
been struggling in our common cause and are now
suffering for our common liberties ; and as we think
the act so very severe and cruel, so we are determined
to support with all our power the town of Boston, in
defense of rights common to us all. And while we
are sensible our cause is right we are resolved never
to 3ubmit*to the iron hand of despotism and oppres-
sion. We resent the base treatment which that illus-
trious defender of American liberty — Dr. Frankin —
has received for detecting such wicked designs. May
he still live to be guardian of our rights and the
scourge to the enemies of liberty on both sides of the
Atlantic. But in such a situation we do not think it
suflicient to weep only at the distresses of our coun-
try ; we think our union is our life — the contrary
our death. We mean, therefore, to preserve this
union inviolate at all hazards, and we are determined
in a firm, virtuous, manly and joint way, neither
cajoled on the one hand nor intimidated on the other,
to secure and defend our liberties, those liberties pur-
chased for us by our ancestors, at the expense of so
much blood and treasure, and before they are wrenched
from us we will struggle hard, very hard for them,
considering ourselves as the guardians of unborn
millions; and 0, our God ! in the midst of this strug-
gle we would look up for Thy direction and assist-
ance ; may the liberties of America still flourish under
Thy smiles as they did in the days of our fathers, and
in this most adverse situation of public affairs we may
trust in Thee, and may this be the prevailing senti-
ment of us all: In freedom we're born and in freedom
we'll die." i,
They manifested the sincerity of their sympathy for
the sufferers at Boston by collecting a drove of sheep
and sending them to their relief. In Sept., 1774, Mr.
Simeon Spaulding was chosen to represent the town
at Salem. He was instructed to firmly adhere to the
charter of this Province, and do no act which could
be possibly construed into an acknowledgment of
the validity of the act of the British Parliament for
altering the government of Massachusetts Bay. Two
delegates were sent to the first provincial meeting in
Concord, in August, 1774 — Jona. W. Austin and
Samuel Perham. A Committee of Inspection was
chosen to prevent the purchase and sale of any articles
imported from Great Britain. It was voted to equip
the alarm list with the implements of war, also to
raise and discipline fifty minute-men.
The expressions of the town during all this trying
period show that the hostilities which followed were
not of their seeking. Their language is not the
language of men eager to achieve glory by deeds of
arms ; nor was their intense desire for a peaceful
solution of the diflBculties and caution against rash
measures the caution of timidity, as their subsequent
acts abundantly testify. For when, upon the 19th of
April, 1775, a messenger rode into town with the news
that the British were marching from Boston towards
Concord, the town was soon on the alert to obey the
summons. The time for words had passed, the time
for action had come. The alarm-guns were fired, the
drums beat to arms, and from the farms and work-
shops the minute-men hastily assembled in our little
village, at the alarm-post, which was a rock standing
where the hay-scales now stand.
The good parson was on the ground and requested
CHELMSFORD.
257
the men to go into the meeting-house and have prayers
before they went; but the impetuous Capt. Ford, his
patriotism getting the better of his piety, replied that
they had more urgent business on hand, and hastened
on with his men. Soon over one hundred men were
on their way to the scene of conflict. One com-
pany of sixty-one men were under the command of
Capt. Oliver Barron, and the other company, consist-
ing of forty-three men, were under the command of Col.
Moses Parker. These men did not march in regular
order, but hurried off in squads, on horseback, as
fast as they received the summon*. They assisted in
the pursuit of the British toward Charlestown, taking
part in the encounters at Merriam's Corner and
Hardy's Hill. Capt. John Ford, who was at this time
sergeant in Capt. Barron'i company, was conspicuous
at the latter place. He was an old veteran of the
French and Indian Wars, and knew how to handle
his rifle. He is said to have killed five of the enemy
during the battle. Two of our men, Capt. Oliver
Barrou and Dea. Aaron Chamberlain, were wounded.
Bridge writes :
" April 19, 1775 — The Civil War was begun at Con-
cord this morning I Lord direct all things for his
glory, the good of his church and people, and the
preservation of the British colonies, and to the shame
and confusion of our oppressors."
" April 20 — In a terrible state, by reason of ye news
from our army. The onset of ye British was begun at
Lexington, was carried on at Concord, where some
were killed on both sides. They inglorioualy re-
treated soon and were followed by our men down to
Cambridge, before night. Five captives were carried
through this town for Amherst. A constant march-
ing of soldiers from ye towns above toward ye army
as there were yesterday from this town and the neigh-
boring towns. We are now involved in a war which
Lord only knows what will be the issue of, but I will
hope in His mercy and wait to see His salvation."
" April 21 — I sent provisions to the army as did
many more. 'Tis a very distressing day, soldiers pass-
ing all day and all night."
At the battle of Bunker Hill, which soon followed,
the Chelmsford men took a prominent part. Upon
the morning of that glorious day, the 17th of June,
1775, when the dawn of light revealed to the aston-
ished Britishers the American works on Breed's Hill,
Capt. Ford, who was now in command of the Chelms-
ford company, which consisted of sixty men, was
stationed with the army at Cambridge, under Gen.
Ward. When the preparations for the battle began,
the gallant captain, who had no taste for inactivity,
obtained permission from the general to withdraw
his company privately and march directly to the
scene of action, to reinforce the troops. They marched
af'ross Charlestown Neck, which was being raked by
cannon from the British ships, and were proceeding
down Bunker Hill when they were met by Gen.
Putnam, who ordered Capt. Ford, with his company,
17-ii
to draw the cannon, which had been deserted by Gen.
Callender and left at the foot of the hill, into the
line. The captain at first remonstrated on the ground
that his company were ignorant of the management
of artillery, many having never seen a cannon before,
but finally obeyed "and moved with the cannon and
the general himself to the rail fence," which they
reached just before the battle began. Capt. Knowlton
with the Connecticut troops and Col. Stark with some
of the New Hampshire troops were also stationed at
this part of the defences. The right wing of the
British army, under Gen. Howe, was directed against
this point for the purpose of turning the American
flank and cutting ofl' a retrett from the redoubt. As
the enemy advanced to the attack, the artillery,
manned by a portion of Capt. Ford's company,
opened upon them with great effect, some of the shots
being directed by Gen. Putnam himself. The muskets
were ordered to reserve their fire till the enemy were
within eight rods. Joseph Spaulding, however, of
Ford's company, could not resist the temptation and
discharged his musket, as did some others, while the
enemy paused to destroy a fence which obstructed
their way. The inscription on his grave-stone, which
stands in the old grave-yard, says : " He was among
the brave asserters and defenders of his country at
Bunker Hill, where he opened the battle by firing
upon the enemy before orders were given."
When the word was given, the fowling-pieces
mowed down their victims with fatal celerity, and the
enemy was obliged to retreat, " leaving on the
ground," as Gen. Stark related, "where but the day
before the mowers had swung the scythe in peace, the
dead, as thick as sheep in a fold." When upon the
third assault of the enemy the fortunes of the day
were reversed, and the Americans were obliged to re-
treat from the redoubt, the force at the rail fence,
where some reinforcements had been received, main-
tained their ground with great firmness and intre-
pidity, and successfully resisted every attempt to turn
their flank. This line indeed was nobly defended.
The force here did great service, for it saved the main
body, who were retreating in disorder from the re-
doubt, from being cut off by the enemy. When it
was perceived that the force under Col. Prescott had
left the hill, these brave men gave ground, but with
more regularity than could have been expected of
troops who had been no longer under discipline.
Capt. Ford behaved with great spirit in the engage-
ment. Thirteen men of his company were wounded.
Benj. Pierce, afterward Gen. Pierce, and the father
of President Pierce, was a member of his company.
" Capt. Benj. Walker led his company of about
fifty resolute men, ten of whom were from Chelms-
ford, into Charlestown before the battle commenced
to annoy the enemy's left flank. They did great exe-
cution and then abandoned their dangerous position
to attack the right flank on Mystic River. Here the
captain was wounded and taken prisoner. He died of
258
HISTOrxY OF -MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
his wounds in Boston Jail." Lieut.-Cul. Moses Parker,
also of Chelmsford, was wounded and left, in ihe re-
doubt. He was a skillful and brave veteran of the
French Wars and behaved with great gallantry.
The British carried hiui to Boston, where he died,
aged forty-three. He was a good otiicer, much be-
loved by his regiment, and his loss was severely felt.
An obituary notice of iiim in the JVew En;jkinil
Chronicle, July 21, 1775, says : " In him fortitude,
prudence, humanity and compassion all conspired to
heighten the lustre of his military virtues," and it
states that " through the several commissions to which
his merit entitled him, he had always ihe pleasure to
find that he possessed the esteem and respect of nis
soldiers, and the applause of his countrymen." The
notice concludes : "God grant each individual that
uow is, or may be engaged in the American Army, an
equal magnitude of soul, so shall their names un-
sullied, be transmitted in the latest catalogue of fame,
and if any vestiges of liberty shall remain, their
praises shall be rehearsed through the earth till the
sickles of time shall crop the nation."
The first news of the battle was received in Chelms-
ford by special messenger from Billerica the same
evening, and caused great e.xcitemeut and aii.xiety on
account of the uncertainty as to the e.xteiit which our
own men sutTered. The alarm-guns were fired, and
before morning several of the wounded returned.
Parson Bridge wriies in his diary upon that day :
" A terrible day thi^ in relation to our nrmy, in battle
with our oppressors at Charlestown. The whole town
on fire. The armies engaged on Bunkei's Hill. At
night we saw a fire from Cuehnsford." On the ISth
he writes : " The armies at Charlestown still eng:iged
and news Hying with respect to the slain and
wounded." He expresses the intensity of his feel-
ings in the following language: " This is a day big
with distress and trouble. Our enemies are those who
were our brethren of the same nation, and subjects of
the same king, and ail for the sake of a wicked and
corrupt ministry, a deluded, a devilish, a venal p.arlia-
ment."
During the seven long years of the war for inde-
pendence which followed these opening battles, this
town took its full share of the burden, by providing
men and means, although the names of many of the
men who served in the army from the town are not
preserved to us. Capt. John Minot enlisted a com-
pany in December, 177G, seventeen of whom were
from Chelmsford. In July, 177G, C:ipt. Ford and his
company were again called out. On the morning of
July 23d, they marched to the meeting-house, where
the parson. Rev. Mr. Bridge, prayed with them and
gave them a word of e.'chortation, and theu they took
up the line of march to join the army in Canada.
In September, 1777, Capt. Ford was again sent
witn a company of fifty-two men to reinforce the
northern array. They were present at the time of
the surrender of Burgoyne. In 1777 thirty men were '
raised for three years or during (he war. The
town voted to give them a bounty of £20
each over what the Slate and Congress
paid. In consequence of the depreciation of the
currency, it was alterward commuted to twenty
head of horned cattle, of a middling size, per m;iii.
If the war lasted one year they were to luive their
cattle at one year old; if it continued two years, at
two years old, and so on in the same proportion. Jn
1778, six men were drafted to go to Rhode Island. In
1779 sixteen men were enlisted to go to Rhode Island
for three months. In 17SU the militia were em-
powered by the town to enlist fifteen men for the
Continental service, and the selectmen were instructed
to raise money and produce for nine months" service.
In addition to the names already given of those who
lost their lives in the service of their country, th^
history records the names of John Bates, David
Spaulding, Lieut. Robert Spaulding, Pelatiah .^dams
and Henry Fletcher.
In May, 1770, belbre the Declaration of Independ-
ence was written, this town anticipated the mearure
and gave its adhesion to it in advance, by the lollow-
j ing vote : " W it should be the pleasure of the Honor-
I able Continental Congress to declare an Independent
state With respect to (treat Britain this town will
stand by them to the expense of life and fortunes."
It will be noticed that Col. Stoddard, whose name i>
so conspicuous in the period imuicdiately preceding
the outbreak of hoitilities, does not figure in that
struggle. This was due to the fact that he continued
loyal to the government of I ireat Britain.
The feelings of respect in which he had hitherto
been held now changed to those of animosity, and
even his high position did not save him from those
indignities which were everywhere heaped upon the
Tories. His house was assailed with sto nes and his
fence destroyed.'
.Sn.vYs' RF.CEi.r.iox. — The period between the close
of the war for independence and the adoption of the
Federal Constitution was a trying one lor the new
nation. The history of this time is ably treated in
Fisk's "Critical Period of American History." The
heavy burden of debt entailed by that long struggle,
obnoxious taritt' laws between the several States, and
the utter demoralization of the currency were prom-
inent among the causes of that restlessness, which
culminated in those deplorable acts of resistance
which so sullied the fair fame of Massachusetts,
known as Shays' Rebellion. Perhaps at no time in
her history has Chelmsford shone so conspicuous
among her sister towns for her patriotism as at
this crisis. Committees were chosen to co-operate
with those of other towns in measures for suiipresriug
the insurrection. A detachment from the militia
consisting of twenty -six men were in the meniorahie
expedition under General Lincoln which marche<l
' B. P. Hunt.
CHELMSFORD.
259
thirty miles upon the 30th of January through the
wintry snow to meet the insurgents.
War of the Rebellion.— The record of the town
in the War of the Kebellion was in the highest degree
honorable. When President Lincoln issued the call
for 75,000 men, a. public meeting was called which
was fully attended and all of the speeches expressed
the most patriotic- sentiments. Three thousand dol-
lars was pledged by individuals present to encourage
enlistments and aid the families of those who should
enter the service.
Every call for volunteers was responded to. The
records kept by the selectmen show that the total
number of men who had entered the service accred-
ited to the town was 229, which was eighteen iu ex-
cess of all the calls which had been made by the gov-
ernment, and that the town had incurred an indebt-
edness in consequence of the war amounting to
827,620. Every dollar of this honorable debt has
since been ;)aid.
The account of the selectmen is by no means a
complete record of the service? of Chelmsford soldiers.
Some of the names, those who served for two differ-
ent terms of enlistment, appear twice. In the " Record
of Massachusetts Volunteers '" by the adjutant-general,
the names of Chelmsford men apppear who pre
not upon the town records. One of these, William R.
Patch, was the first Chelmsford volunteer. He was
not mustered in, but joined the ranks as they were
marching to the defence of the capital, and was
wounded at Baltimore upon the memorable lOth of
April, 1801. In another case the same published
records, by an unfortunate error, class Elijah X. Day,
who sacrificed his life for his country, as a deserter,
one whom his comrades know to have been as true a
man as ever faced the enemy.
The records should be carefully examined and cor-
rected up -ij the t)wn-b-)ok wi-le there are living wit-
ne.-ses to correct clerical inaccuracies. The following
are thenanifs of those who did not live to enjoy the
gratitude of their countrymen :
.\lbfrt E. Pike, .Mliert S. nyniii. Henry SiMinlding, .laniea H. Barton,
difii at sea July IT, "CI ; .)al^e^ Jacksiin, .lulin T. .McCabe, Henry W.
I'avidsoli, Patrick B;irl-ett, Tliuuias Coclirnn, (icorpi* E. Iteed, Geuige D.
Laiiipliir<*, Palrii-k Dtrry, killed at Gettyslinrp: .Inly -2, 1SC2: George
Curtis, killed at Battlt uf Wilderuess ; Webster C. Dec.ltur, Jonas V.
Pieive, Jann-s Gray. Peter McEuany, kille'l at Brittle of Frederiekibiirs
Dee. 11, 'Gi : Henry H. IngalU, (Tharily L. Dunn, Coliimn S. Farwell,
Pbilip Wbelau, Elljab X. liny, Micbael 31aniD.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHELMSFORD— { Continued).
EDUCATIONAL HISTORY.
The natural desire of an intelligent people to
educate their children wji-s, in the case of the found-
ers of New England, stirauliited bv their religious
zeal. Of their political fabric the Bible was the
chief corner-stone. As they interpreted the Divine
will, through the written word, their course was gov-
erned in all thinge. It, was regarded, therefore, as a
sacred duty to provide so much instruction as to en-
able the children to read and understand the Bible.
The General Court made education compulsory.
In 1642 an act was passed requiring the selectmen "lo
have a vigilant eye over their brethren and neighbors
to see first that none of them shall suffer so much
barbarism in any of their families as not to endeavor
to leach, by themselves or others, their children and
apprentices so much learning as may enable them
perfectly to read the English tongue."
In 1C47 towns of fifty householders must appointa
teacher, and towns containing 100 householders must
have a grammar school.
For the first forty years it is probable that the
teaching was mainly confined to that given by the
good mothers at their homes, aided, perhaps, by the
[ minister.
The first record of a teacher appointedby the town
! is as follows : "Samuel Fletcher is Apointed to be a
scolle-master for the town for the year 1G9G, by order
of the selectmen. Thomas Parker Clarke."
Samuel Fletcher, the first school-master, became
prominent in the affairs of the town, occupying at
different times the several positions of town clerk,
] treasurer and selectman.
j The next record in regard to the schools is evi-
; deutly incomplete. It reads: " May the 12 : 16: 98
1 the towne being m"' edward emerson schoolmaster for
I the year 1698." This teacher belonged to that family
] of Einersons which numbered among its descendants
Ralph Waldo Emerson, of Concord. The town
granted him land at different times. He married a
daughter of Dea. Cornelius Waldo. His house stood
where Mr. Allan Cameron now lives, in Westford Cen-
i tre. For the year following the record stands : "Agust
the 26'" 1699. the selectmen of said towne Apointed
Samuel Fletcher Junr Schoolmaster to Learne young
persons to write ; on the Day Above said Selectmen
Apointed for Scooldames : Deacon Fosters wife, Jno
Wrights : Moses Barretts wife and Joshua Fletchers
wife."
There was at this time no school-house in town.
The children gathered at the house of the nearest
teacher or school-dame. The teachers must, there-
fore, be selected somewhat in reference to their loca-
tion in the differ* nt neighborhoods.
Deacon Foster lived not far from the centre of the
town ; Joshua Fletcher was in the Stony Brook neigh-
borhood, now in W^estford ; Moses Barrett was near
where E. F. Dupee new lives, in South Chelmsford,
and John Wright lived at the Neck, now Lowell.
For the two succeeding years there wjs nogrammar
school. Towns were often complained of and fined
by the Court for their neglect to provide suitable
schools. Chelmsford was now reminded of her duty
260
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
in that respect, as the following indicates: At a gen-
eral town-meeting " March SO^, 1702, A proposition
was mad whether we should apply our selves to y'
General court by our Debety in Rel'eranc to our being
presented to the quarter session & finned at sd court
lor not having a Grammar School j' we may endeavor
by a petision to sd general court to be eased in our
greivance on y' account this was voted in y' Afirmi-
tive.
■' the day above it was voted y' y' selectmen should
draw up a a petision to present to y' General court &
send it by our Debyty."
In August the same year the town chose a commit-
tee to '"agree w' A scoolmaster for sd Towne." "Sep-
tember 4, 1702, captain Bowers cornet Hill &
Eleazar Brown Sen Agreed w' Sir Weld to be our
scoolmaster half a year for 15' y" sd Sir Weld begun
to keep school on y* 1st of October, 1702."
This teacher was a son of Rev. Thomas Weld, the
first minister of the church of Dunstable. He had
just graduated from Harvard College. He died in
1704.
The next year 1703, "capt Bowers and me': Emer-
son wer chosen to Joyn with the Selectmen to Agree
with a scoll master to save the Towne from a fine."
In 1705 " the selectmen of sd towne Appointed Moses
Barron and Eben wright Scole Masters to teach young
parsons To Right And one the Day a boue sd the
wido Burdg the wife of John Snow the Wife of
Israll Prockter the wife of old torn Cory the wife of
sargent Samuell Foster war Appointed scools Dames
for the teaching of children to Reed." Moses Bar-
ron, one of the writing teachers, was also town clerk,
and the record upon the town-book, of which the
above is a copy, stands in his handwriting. The spell-
ing, use of capitals and punctuation, here saown, are
exactly as it appears upon the records.
He represented the town at the General Court and
held other important offices. He was town treasurer
at the time of his death, which occurred in 1719. His
house stood near where Charles Sweetser now lives,
upon South Street. Ebenezer Wright, the other
school-master, lived in the neighborhood of what is
now Middlesex Village in Lowell. There were three
brothers, John, Joseph and Ebenezer, living in that
section in 1692.
School-dame Snow lived near the present Westford
depot on the Stony Brook Railroad. The neighbor-
hood was known as the " Stony Brook houses." Mrs.
Corey lived in the south part of the town near Great
Brook, now in Carlisle.
The grammar school was found to be a heavy bur-
den of expenee. For several years it was not sus-
tained, and the town was again brought to task by the
Court, and a petition was sent in " as to an easmeut of
our gramer Scoole."
At " A Generall Toune Meting March the 7'\ 1709-
10, voted that the selectmen shall agree With a man to
teach children and youth to Wright and sifer and
kep scool in Chelmsford," and in 1711 "the Selectmen
are appointed By the note of the towne to provide a
Scoolmaster as the Law Derects." The following
year five pounds were paid to " m' Cheney for being
our Scoolmaster."
From this time forward the town was not without a
school for some part of each year. The grammar
school, however, had not yet become firmly estab-
lished. The town was called upon to answer fbr want
of one in 1714, 1716, 1721 and again in 1726.
At a " Town Meeting May the : 12'", 1718, voted to
Petition the genorall court that the fishing place at
Pattuctt may be granted to Chelmsford for the benifit
ofseportinga scoole in Chelmsford the fishing-place
one the south side uieremack."
Before the waters of the Merrimack were diverted
from their native channel, to furnish motive-power
for manufacturing, the fishing industry was a most
important one. Allen, writing in 1S20, says : "The
quantity of salmon, shad and alewives caught in
Chelmsford annually may be computed at about
twenty-five hundred barrels, besides a large quantity
of other fish of less value." The river derives its name
from the Indian name of the sturgeon.
As the settlements extended each year farther
from the centre of the town the question of the loca-
tion of the schools assumed more importance and
sometimes occasioned lively contests. An article an-
nually appeared in the warrant for the March meet-
ing similar to the following:
"To agree and vote in what part or parts of the
said town the Grammar school or other schools shall
be kept the year ensuing, and to act in that all'air as
shall be thought proper." Upon this question, in
1716, the town '' voated that the scule master shall
keep scule in the fore quarters of the town one month
at a time in one place.
"Voated that the selectmen shall determine wheir
the fore quarters of the town are."
This duty must have taxed the wisdom of the
fathers of the town.
Mr. Nathaniel Prentice, of Cambridge, was the
schoolmaster for the years 1718, 1719, 1720. He
graduated from Harvard College in 1714. He was
afterwards the second minister of the church of Dun-
stable, where he labored until his death, in 1737.
The following is the language of the contract be-
tween Mr. Prentice and the town :
" CHtLMsronr. September 22'', 1719.
"The pelect men have agreed with m'. Nathnuiel Prentice, of Cani-
bride, to keep acoole in Chelmaford from the tin* uf October next ensu*
ing the Date untill tbe firs Day of Aprill, ITiti, tbe alwve ad Nathaniel
Prentice doea obleige himaelf to keep Scoole six hours erery Day in sd
term exepl it be Silturday, Dayes which lie is alowed for hiuiaeif, For
which &d pienlice is to have eigtcen pouiuU."
The school, as we have seen, rotated between the
four quarters of the town — one month at tbe centre
of the town, the next, perhaps, in the Stony Brook
neighborhood, five miles distant, the third at the
south end. This school was usually near where the
CHELMSFORD.
2G1
No. 3 School-house was afterwards built, on the road
leading from South Chelmsford to Carlisle, past the
house of Mr. Quimby. The last month was at the
north end. This included, iu addition to the present
Xo. 2 District, all that part of the town to the north
and northeast, including what is now Lowell.
The first school-house was built in 1718. It cost
£21 10s., which was paid by the following con-
tributors :
*' m' StoilUard, Moses Barron, Josiali Fletcher, Deacon Waring, Ebeii
Vosler, Edwarl S)taulding, William Fletclier, Jolin Bates, Steptien
Peirce, Moses Parker, John Danes, Natliall Bnttertield, Sam" Barron,
Denonf Perliain, Eben Parker, Jolin Buree, Benj. Parker, Richard
Slratton, Joseph Foster, Benjamio Adams, Edward Foster."
The land for this building was granted by the
town to William Fletcher for this purpose, and by
him conveyed to the subscribers. It appears by the
description that this school-house stood upon land
now occupied by the horse-sheds belonging to the
First Congregational Society.
"CHELMsrouD, octobr the 27>h, 1718.
*' Ijiid out To Willftm Fletcher, one m' Moses Fiske Right three Rod
and half of Land at the most Kasteily Cornar of the buring Place in
chelmsforrl aioTG sd the same beio); more or Less to the use of the sub.
facrilter^ to the holding of a'Shoole house up on sd Land being buted and
bounded as foloweth Kastu-ardly u|> on a stake and beape of stons south-
erle by the buring Place Wall to a etake and lieape of stons wliicli is the
most Boutlerle Cornar on the wesierle Cornar to a stake and lienpe of
Btons, the Xortberle Cornar to a stake and heai>e of stons And to tbe
bounds first mentioned.
" EpHRIAM IIELDRETII, ^
*' John Wright, > Comite."
*' Jonathan Bowars, j
" November the 2S<'| ; 1718.
"These Presents Declare that I. Willam Fletcher, a boue sd do give
the three lto4ls and a half a boue Laid oute at the Xortlierie Cornar of
tile Buring Place on Which the Schuole-hoiise stands to them that bull
it to them tiiere heirs and asigries for Euer ami to that use for euer as
" Witness my band and seale in Presence of
" BouERT Richardson. Samuel Howarii.
,*' William Flktcher [his seal].'"
The second school-house must have been erected
soon after, for in 1720 a road was laid out from the
" North School-house " leading over the home
meadow and Carolina Plains. The building stood a
few rods east of J. R. Parkhurst's green-houses, at
the point where the road intersects with the old Mid-
dlesex turnpike. It is probable that this school-house
was also paid for by subscription, as there is no evi-
dence that the town raised mouey for such purposes
prior to 1794.
Joseph Whipple succeeded Mr. Prentice as teacher.
He continued from 1721 to 1724.
Mr. Whipple's work did not meet with unanimous
approval. But he was sustained by a majority of the
citizens in the following vote in 1724 : " voted that the
Petition of Moses Parker and nine others, freeholders
who Petitioned that the School-master be Dismissed
and a committee chose to provide another in his
Room, be dismissed." Mr. Thomas Frink, of Sudbury,
followed Whipple and taught three years, when the
town paid John Spaulding — "to wait upon Mr. Frink
home."
Josiah Richardson. Isaac Richardson, Joseph Lov-
ett and Jonathan Miles each taught for one or two
years.
Samson Stoddard, a son of the minister, taught for
five years, ending in 1734. He was a graduate of
Harvard, a gentleman of culture and strong char-
acter. His relation to public affairs is treated in
another place.
Oliver Fletcher, of this town, taught six years,
beginning in 1750. He was a graduate of Harvard,
class of 1735. He was a person of high character,
and received many honors at the hands of his
fellow-townsmen. He was town clerk for a number
of years, and the records that he has left are elegantly
written. Bridge refers to hi« death, which occurred
in 1771, as a " great loss." Allen says of him, " His
pietj' and integrity gave him great ascendancy over
his fellow-townsmen, and secured their esteem and
confidence."
The action of the town in locating the grammar
school sometimes occasioned great dissatisfaction to
the people in the more remote sections. In one case,
1724, when the town voted to " settle" the school at
the centre of the town, two citizens, Joseph Under-
wood and Ebenezer Wright, entered their formal pro-
test. Underwojd lived at what iw now the centre of
Westford, and Wright lived where Edwin Heyward
now resides, near Charaberlin's corner. The next
year the wishes of the dissenters were respected, and
the west end was given four months school.
For several seasons after Westford was set off the
grammar school was continued throughout the year
at the centre of the town. At other times the vote
would be to keep "one-half in the north end and one-
half in the south end," and again it would be decided
to " circulate." None of the plans met with suffi-
cient favor to become permanent until 1757. That
year the time was divided between the north end, the
centre and the south end. This method was annually
adopted, with but one or two exceptions, until the
formation of the school districts in 1792.
The north end embraced what is now District No.
2, and North Chelmsford (then called Newfield) and
the neck (now Lowell). The school-house for this
wide section was less than two miles from the centre
of the town, but the school was sometimes kept at a
dwelling-house at the neck, " where the neighbor-
hood should appoint."
The school-house at the sonth end was built about
1753. It was upon the road leading from South
Chelmsford to Carlisle, past the house of Mr. Quimby.
The old school-house now forms a portion of a dwell-
ing, upon the same spot.
Schools of a primary grade, for " reeding, Righting
and Cyphering," were provided at the same time for
the different sections and held in dwelling-houses.
In 1781, in addition to the grammar school, the
town voted "Nine months Righting-school, three
mos in Neck, so-called, extending from Mr.
262
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Timothy Clark's to the mouth of Concord and to Mr.
Simeon Moreses and to Mr. Pierieces So by 3Ir. Philip
Parkers.
"Voted one month schooling at Xewfield, one month
at Mr. David Spaulding's, one month in Concord
River Neck, so-called, and five weeks on the mill
road, so-called, and eight weeks at, or near, Mr. John
Adams."
This record is valuable, as it defines the limits of
the neck district, and furnishes a basis for estimat-
ing the population of Lowell one hundred years ago.
Timothy Clark lived in Middlesex, near the head
of Baldwin Street.
Simeon Mores' house stood upon what is now
Moore Street. Joseph Pierce lived near the present
City Farm buildings, and Philip Parker upon West
Pine Street, near the Highland School. This district
then embraced all of what is now Lowell, excepting
what lies beyond the Concord and Merrimack
Rivers.
The children were provided with three months'
school in the little red school-house, which stood upon
what is now School Street, near the cemetery. The
first mention, in the records, of a school-house in this
section was in 1767.
Soon after the adoption of the Federal Constitu-
tion, in 17S9, the school district system began to de-
velop. Up to this time the management of the
schools h.ad been in the hands of the selectmen. In
1792 this authority was, for the first time, transferred
to a School Committee, as it has since continued.
The change was not made without a struggle. But
after several adjournments and attempts at reconsid-
erations, the following vote was recorded: "that a
select committee be chosen to provide the grammar
school-masters and all other school-musters, and that
said committee proportion, inspect and regulate said
schools."
The committee chosen consisted of nine persona,
one from each district or " squadron." In 1794 it was
"voted to raise £2o0, for the purpose of building
school -houses, each squadron to draw their own
money for building their school-house, location de-
cided by vote of members of squadrons."
In the year 1800 the town supported twelve schools,
at an expense of six hundred dollars. They were lo-
cated as follows:
At the middle of the town, now District 1.
At the North School-house, now District 2.
Near Ebenezer Parker's, now District 3, South
Chelmsford.
At Mill Row, now District 4.
At Squadron by Capt. Benj. Fletcher's, now District
5.
At Concord River Neck, now District G, East
Chelmsford.
At school-house by Simon Stevens', now District 7.
At Newfield, now District 8, North Chelmsford.
At Grate Neck, now Lnwell.
At school-house by Joseph Adams' and
At school-house by Benjamin Chamberlain's.
One of thfse last was undoubtedly in Carlisle,
where the school-house now stands, north of Great
Brook, and the other was in Lowell. This portion of the
town had now begun to develop. The little red school-
house was outgrown, and three others took its place. —
one at the corner of Parker and Powell Streets, an-
other on Pawtucket Street where the City Hospital
stands, and the third at Middlesex.
In these district schools men teachers were usually
employed for the winter terms and women for the
summer. The grammar school now disappears, and its
loss must have gone far towards offsetting the ad-
vantages of the new system.
In ISOl a new school-house was built in tlie ''Mill
Row " District [novr No. 4), costing ¥310, and the fol-
lowing year a new brick school-house took the place
of the original structure at District No. 1, at a cost of
s.jOO. This building is now used by the town for a
hearse-hou^<e.
The district schools had some famous teachers,
among whom was Willard Parker, afterwards the em-
inent physician of New York. He taught in the
old brick school-house in the winters of 1821, "22 and
'23.' Dr. Parker was a descendant of one of the five
brothers who came from Wobuin and settled in
Chelmsford in 10.33. He graduated from Harv.ird
College in 1S2(J, studied medicine under the direction
of Dr. John C. Warren, Professor of Surgery in Har-
vard University, and took his degree of M.D. in 183U.
He was at once appointed Professor of Anatomy at
the Medical .'School at Woodstock, Vt., and the same
year, the same position at the Berkshire Medical In-
stitution. His appointment to the chair of surgfry
al the same college soon followed. In 1S3G he filled
the chair of surgery at the Cincinnati Jledical Col-
lege. He soon after visited Europe and spent consid-
erable time in the hospitals of London and Paris.
Upon hi.5 return he was appointed to the chair of sur-
gery in the College of Physicians in New York City,
a position which he held for thirty years. He was
one of the founders of the Academy of Medicine and
at one time its president.
In 1870 the degree of LL.D. was conferred upon
him by a college in New Jersey. Dr. Parker was a
son of Jonathan Parker, who removed to New Hamp-
shire when a young man. He returned to Chelms-
ford when Willard was five years old and settled upon
the hill where Riley Davis now lives on South Street.
Jonathan was "Jock" in those days, and he was
called " Hill Jock " to distinguish him from another
Jonathan Parker, his next neighbor, who was called
"Trooper Jock."
Dr. Parker always retained his interest in Chelms-
ford. He kept the old homestead until near the close
of his life, when the care of it became too perplexing.
' Letter of nr. Parker written in 1877 to H. S. Perliani.
CHELMSFORD.
203
The feeliugs with which he regarded it are shown in
a letter written in 1S7J) : " I love it as my old home,
nnd where my parents lived, worked hard and died.''
Hisde.ith occurred in New York City in April, 1SS4.
CHEi.MSFoni) Classical School. — The desire of
the people fur bet'.er educational advantages, for
those wishing to pursue the more advanced studies,
led to the estabiishmenl of the Chelmsford Classical
School in 1820. The building, which has since been
converted into a parson.nge for the Central Baptist
Society, was erected for that purpose. The fuuds for
the support of the school were furnished by individual
enterprise.
The management was entrusted to the following
Board of Trustees :
Abel Hunt, Ilev. Wilkes Allen, Rev. Abiel Abbott,
Samuel Bachelder, Esq., Oliver il. Whipple, Jonathan
Perhsm, Esq., J. S. C. Knowltou, Esq., Capt. Josiah
Fletcher. Sen.. Dr. J. C. Daiton, Owen Emerson, Jr.,
Cranmore Wallace, Cajitain William Fletcher, Dr. J.
O. Green, Dr. Eufus \\'yman, Oti-i Adams, Joel
Adams, Esq., Josei)h Warren, Captain John (?) But-
terfield.
The trustees with rare irood fortune secured the
services of rvali>h Waldo Emerson, of Concord, as
teaclier.
Although the Chelmsford Cla-ssical School had a
brief e.\islence the 'own has occasion to feel proud of
its results. Probably at no otlier period has so many
young men gone out from the schools of Chelmsford
to gain distinction abroad and confer honor upon their
native town.
The following distinguished men were among the
pupils of Kalidi Waldo Emerson, or the teachers who
immediately followed hira: Judge Josiah G.Abbott, of
Boston ; Hon. Fletcher Abbott, Esq., who died at
Tidedo, Ohio; Morrill Wyman, A.M., M.D., LL.D.,
who is still in the practice of his profession at Cam-
briilge, Massachusetts; Professor JeH'ries Wyman,
M.D.; the late Benjamin P. Huut.of Philadelphia, and
the late Professor John Daiton, M.D., of New York,
who gained a national reputation in his profession.
J. G. Abbott entered Harvard College at the age of
thirteen. After completing his studies there hechose
the i)rofe-sion of the law, in which he rapidly rose to
di-linction. He has also occupied many high posi-
tions of political honor, among them that of member
of the United States Congress. A more extended
notice of him is given in the chapter upon the Mid-
dlese.t Bar. Benjamin P. Hunt, born May IS, 1808,
entered Harvard College in 182S. From there he
went to Philadelphia and engaged in teaching a clas-
sical and scientific school. He sailed for Kingston,
Jamaica, March 6, 1840, in the capacity of supercargo.
He wrote an account of his voyage which was pub-
lished in The Dint in 1843. Emerson said of it:
" It seems to me the best of all sea voyages. Besides
its rhetorical value, it has another quite additional,
inasmuch as it realizea so fully for ine the promise of
the large, wise boy who made my school-days in
Chelmsford so glad by his lively interest in books and
bis native delight in ethical thought, and life looks
more solid and rich to me when I see these many
years keep their faith." Hawthorne pays the follow-
ing high tribute to the literary e.xcellence of the arti-
cle— '■ a solid example of facts which had not lost their
vigor by pa.ssing through the mind of a thinker."
In 1842 Mr. Hunt went to Hayti and became the
head of a wealthy mercantile house.
Although actively engaged in business his scholarly
mind was at work in other directions. He made a
study of the West Indian negro character, and he got
together a unique collection of books relating to those
islands. It is said that his collection of works relat-
ing to the Antilles is the most complete in the coun-
try, if not in the world.
In 1858 he retired from business and settled in
Philadelphia. Here he became actively engaged in
charitable and philanthropical movements, especially
those for the benefit of the freedmen.
Through his efl'orls the orphans of the negro sol-
diers were collected and provided for in a home upon
the banks of the Delaware. In June, ISGO, Mr. Hunt
was requested by President Grant, through Secretary
Fish, to "join a party of gentlemen going to the West
ludie^ for the purpose of obtaining information con-
cerning several interesting localities in those islands,
but more especially Saint Domingo." He was deeply
interested in the project of annexation, but sickness
prevented his taking i>art with the commission.
JeH'ries Wyman was Professor of .\natomy at Har-
vard College at the time of the famous murder of Dr.
Parkman by Professor Webster, and the trial largely
turned upon the scientific investigations of Professor
Wyman. His death occurred September 4, 1874.
The need of better educational advantages than
were offered by the i)ublic schools led to a movement
in lS-j[) for the establishment of a school of a higher
grade. The use of the building erected for the
Chelmsford Classical School, thirty-four years before,
was obtained, and on Aug. 29, 1859, the " Chelmsford
Academy " was opened. Albert Stickney, A.B., a
graduate of Harvard University, was the principal.
The trustees were: Levi Howard, M.D., William
Fletcher, Dea. David Perham, Charles H. Daiton,
Edward F. Richardson, Solomon E. Byam and Edwin
H. Warren.
Mr. Stickney was succeeded by Edward E. Spald-
ing, now of Passadena, Cal. Mr. Spalding was a
native of the town, and had had a long and success-
ful experience as an instructor.
But in the mean time the War of the Rebellion
came on. Some of the pupil? joined the ranks of the
army. The trustees were unable to secure the sup-
port necessary for its m.aintenance, and in 1862 the
school was closed.
264
HISTORY OF MIDDL?:SEX COUNTY, MASSAC'IIUSETTS.
CHAPTER XVIir.
CHELMSFORD— { Continued).
MANUFACTURES.
The first saw-mill, established in 165G, lias already
been mentioned.' In 1669 the town granted a large
tract of land to Thomas Henchman, William Flet-
cher and Josiah Richardson to encourage the erection
of another saw-mill in the northwest part of the
town. The contract stipulated that the inhabitants
of the town "shall have their boards at four shillings
per hundred, and not exceeding that price, for any
kind of pay that the inhabitants can make at price
current between man and man, in this town ; and that
any of the inhabitants of said town, by giving timely
notice to any of the owners, shall be supplied for
their pay before others. And it is further agreed
that the aforesaid owners of the mill shall have full
liberty to take from the town common what timber
they see meet to work in the mill."
The location of this mill was at what is now called
Westford Corner, upon Saw-mill lleadow Brook,
which flows from Nabnasset Pond and empties into
the Stony Brook at that point. A mill wa» continued
here until within the memory of persons now
living.
There is some evidence of there having been a mill
at an early day upon Stony Brook below the file shop
at West Chelmsford. An excavation like a wheel-pit
is still pointed out, and marks of an old cart-path
leading in the direction of the Crooked Springs
Road. The late Dea. Isaiah Spaulding (born 1792) re-
lated the traditipn that a corn-mill stood there.
In 1678 a saw-mill wjis built upon Beaver Brook, at
the centre of the town, by Abraham Parker and his
sons, Moses and John. It is probable that a grist-
mill was soon added, as a deed given by Abraham to
.John, in 1679, mentions " y° upper & low' Dura."'
The old wheel-pit of the mill at the upper dam is still
to be seen beside the railroad track, a few rods above
the machine-shop. The entrance to this mill was
from the " lane," at the point where Alfred Day now
resides. The mill was removed to the lower dam
within the memory of the older residents. Button
Brothers (Lewis M. and Edwin E.) are the present
proprietors.
In 1G73 (Feb. 3d) the following action was taken by
the town : " the day above, by a major voatt was
granted to farther the Iron-woiks that thy shall have
for 2d. a cord leave to cutt wood aeording to former
agreement.'' I find no further record in regard to
iron-work at so early a date. It probably refers to
works near the outlet of Forge Pond, then in
Groton.
The people in the ease part of the town were ac-
commodated by a grist-mill upon the Concord River
at what is now North Billerica. The following vote
refers to the mill at that place: "7 of M.irch, 1721-2.
Voted that the Selectmen in the name of the Town
Petition to the Hon'' General Court that Mr. Christo-
pher Osgood's mill Dam may be speedily erected
again." Osgood's grant from the town of Billerica
was in 1708.
The Third Grist-Mill.— In 1695 Daniel Waldo
had leave ''to set up a grist-mill at the mouth of stony
brook below the way that leads to Dunstable between
Merrimack river and the bridge." He was obliged to
contract "to grind the corn and malt of the inhabit-
ants of Chelmsford, except on the forth day of each
week, which was appropriated to the use of Dunsta-
ble. He was to grind the town's corn and malt (or
half toll, except a small quantity as a bushel, or the
like, and according to turn, as much as may be." '
The original mill was situated on the northerly side
of Stony Brook.
In 1709 the mill was owned by one .Tohii Richard-
son, Rs at a town-meeting held May 25, 1709, "It was
voted that John Richardson shall have the Liberty of
Drawing of the pond called New- field pond to suply
his null with Water; and shall have the benefit of sd
pond to thet high-water mark."-' Acting under this
authority, he dug through a narrow bank which sepa-
rated the pond from the Stony Brook Valley. The
water, let into a sandy channel which they had dug
for it, soon cut a passage for itself, carrying in its
current a negro, who happened to be the only person
in the ditch at the time, until a pond, covering ninety
acres, was in a very short lime emptied, leaving only
about one acre covered with water. The body of the
negro was never found.
The mill property and quite a tract of adjacent
land came into the possession of William .\dams,
Esq., in part, through a descend;int of John Richard-
son, and an ancestor of Mr. Adams. In 1814 Mr.
Adams rebuilt the grist-mill on the southerly side of
the brook, on an improved plan, with three runs of
stone, each run by a separate tub-wheel, each one of
which was at a different height, so as to be able to run
one or all, according to the height of the water in the
river. The corn-mill had a fanning-wheel near the
mouth of the shoe to blow out the chaff. The other
had a tin sieve to let out the sand, sorrel and other
small impurities. The saw-mill was rebuilt in 1815.^
Mr. Adams owned and occupied the mill until 1822,
when it was sold to the Merrimack Manufacturing
Company, uy whom it was purchased to secure the
right of Howage by the erection of the dam at Paw-
tucket Falls. It was sold by the Merrimack Manu-
facturing Company to the Locks and Canal Company,
who leased it to different parties until 1839, when it
was sold to Lincoln Drake. In 1842 Lincoln Drake
sold to Charles Blood. In 1845 Charles Blood sold
one-half to William Swett. In 1848 William Swett
• .illen'a " History of Chelmsford," p. :;0.
- Tninscript of town rpconi, p. 17i'.
3 Allen's ■* Hi>tury," p. :\*.
CHELMSFORD.
265
sold his half to Joel Paige. In 18G1, Edward Larason,
J. E. Rogers and Warren C. Hamblet bought the
mill. From 1695 to this time the privilege had been
used for grinding grain and sawing lumber. Between
the years 1863 and 1868 the saw-mill was taken out,
an additional story put on the saw-mill building and
the mill utilized for grinding and storing grain for
a grain-store in Lowell.
A spice and drug-mill was also introduced, where
drugs were ground for J. C Ayer & Co., for the com-
pounding of their medicines. Large quantities of
gypsum were ground at one time during their occu-
pancy of the mill. For a short time a portion of the
room was occupied in the manufacture of worsted
yarn by Sharp & Axlell. Later the manufacture of
ho.iiery was carried on for a time.
In 1868 James C. Dodge bought the mill, and in
1871 sold one-half his interest to John G. Sherburn,
using it largely for milling purposed in connection
with a grain and flour store kept by them in Lowell.
From 1872 to 1882 the premises were occupied by
Gray, Palmer & Pendergast, for the manufacture of
shoddy, who turned out some 250,000 pounds of
shoddy a year, being very successful financially until
the dissolution of the partnership in the latter year.
After the removal of the shoddy business in 1882, the
mill remained substantially idle, the buildings going
to decay and the dam rotting and being washed away
until 1887, when Mr. Geo. C. Moore bought the privi-
lege, and in 1888 tore down the old grist-mill part,
and in 1889 removed the last of the dam, building a
substantial wall on either side of the brook from the
bridge to the original site of the dam, using them as
abutments for a railroad bridge, occupying the re-
maining building for storage purposes.
It appears that an early date the quantity of bog
ore found on the borders of the meadows in town at-
tracted attention, and was utilized to some extent,
from the following, found in original town records
book marked 1656, page 118:
From a transcript of town records, page 17, is the
following :
" At a Gen'll Town meeting, march the 4th, 1706-7,
Jonathan Richardson and John Richardson had
granted the Liberty of erecting Iron works upon
Stony brook with convenency of flowing provided it
Damnifies none of the inhabetants." Where these
iron works were located the memory of the oldest in-
habitants retains no tradition.
About the year 1823, Esquire William Adams,
thought that with the growth of Lowell, then just devel-
oping, the amount of iron ore in this vicinity might be
advantageously used, and secured the favorable opinion
of Gen. Shepard Leech, of Easton, who was then run-
ning a foundry in Easton and also in Boston. To ob-
tain the necessary water-power, Mr. Adams conceived
the idea of filling the breach in the bank of the origi-
nal Newfield Pond, cut out in 1709, and by cutting a
can.al from near the foot of the scvthe factorv dam at
West Chelmsford, to fill the pond to its original
capacity. '
A canal cut from the lower edge of the pond to the
present foundry works would utilize the whole fall.
He purchased the land necessary for the upper canal
not already owned by him, and in 1824 sold to Gen.
Leech the land now occupied by the upper canal,
with all the original pond bottom, and nineteen acres
and fifteen rods of land now included in the village
of North Chelmsford, together with the right to dig
and maintain a canal from the pond to the village.
The canals were dug, the pond filled, and a blast
furnace was erected on the site now occupied by a part
of Mr. Moore's mill. The first iron was made from
ore obtained in the vicinity, in 1825.
A large part of the ore used in the manufacture of
iron was obtained from Chelmsford and the neigh-
boring towns, brought mostly by farmers with their
own teams, and reduced by the tise of charcoal. Ore,
called stone-ore, was brought from Boston, via Mid-
dlesex Canal, and mixed with native ore. The blast
furnace was in use as late as 1840.
Large tracts of land within six or eight miles of
the furnace were stripped of wood, which was con-
verted into charcoal for this purpose. A large brick-
kiln was built, for making charcoal, in the rear of
the furnace, but was not a success. The brick block
belonging to Silver & Gay was built, in 1842, from
the bricks of this kiln.
A small cupola furnace was built about the time
the works were started for melting scrap-iron, and
large pieces of ore as well as pig-iron, at a later date.
In 1833, after the death of General Leech, the
property came into the possession of Lincoln Drake,
also of Easton, who carried on the foundry business
till 1849. Williams, Boid & Co. were proprietors
and carried on the business till 1857.
Mr. George T. Sheldon, president of the present
Chelmsford Foundry Co., bought the real estate in
1858, and the present Chelmsford Iron Foundry Co.
was organized. They have an office in Boston, and
are largely engaged in preparing the iron work for
building purposes, furnishing both cast and wrought-,
iron, much of which is finished and put in place by
contract.
In 1888 a shop, eighty by forty-four feet, and two
stories high, was erected in connection with their foun-
dry for thefinishing and fitting up these works. An ad-
dition, sixty by thirty feet, one story high, was erected
in 1890. They also occupy a shop in Boston and
another in Cambridge for the same purpose. In their
foundry and shops in the several places they employ
about 150 hands. From 1825 many heavy castings
were made for the mills erected in Lowell, Nashua
and Manchester, especially in the line of heavy gears,
until the burning of their pattern-house in 1875.
1 Tbe original pond bottom was now nearly covered with a beavy
gruHlli of wood.
266
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The stone-ore, pig-iron, hard coal, sand and other
materials used in a foundry were brought t'rom Bos-
ton to Xorth Cheimstord in canal-boats, by way of
the Middlesex Canal and Merrimack River, fill 1S5:J,
when the canal was given up. The boats were
" poled " up from the head of the canal into the
pond below the grist-mill dam, and Ihe freights
transferred to carts and conveyed to the places of
their use. Castings were frequently sent to Boston
by the same route.
Machine-Shop. — Soon after General Leech com-
menced operations in the foundry business he erected
a blacksmilh-shop, containing some machinery, on
the site of the present machine-shop, which was
burned. The brick portion of the present shop was
built later, and in 1S34, Lincoln Drake, successor to
General Leech, sold one-fourth of the property to
Mr. Ira Gay ; and in 1S3S he .sold one-fourth to Mr.
Ziba Gay, both residents of Nashua. Mr. Ziba Gay
secured the intere-t of his brother Ira after tlie de-
cease of the latter. In 1S42 Captain Drake .sold one-
fouith interest to Mr. Harvey Silver. After Captain
Drake tailed, in 1849, the remaining tijurih part
came, through several successive owner.', into the
possession of 3Ir. Silver, in 1S59. Mr. Ziba Gay, Jr.,
succeeded his father, and the shnp has been run l)y
Gay & Silver, and .Silver it (iay, for many years.
Machinists' tools, turbine-wheels and worsted ma-
chinery have been e.xtensively manufactured here ;
and at present worsted machinery, ball-winders and
spring-pins constitute the principal manufactures.
The shop has a capacity for the employment of 100
men.
SvVAlx's JIalhixe-Shop. — In 1807 Jlr. Asa .AI.
Swain, having purch.i.-^ed the site of aii old saw-mill on
the road leading from Xurth Chelmsford to Dunstable
builtasubstantial dam across Biodgetts' Brook (called in
theearly history of the town Deep Brook), and erected
a shop, S0.K43 feet, one story high, for the manufacture
of a very tine turbine-wheel, patented by himself, and
known as Swain's turbine-wheel. This shop was run
about ten years, affording work at one time for twenty
men. It was given up about 1S77. and came into the
po.ssession of Dr. Simpson, remaining unoccupied till
188!), when it was taken down and the lumber removed.
Baldwin Mill. — A mill was erected for the man-
ufacture of worsted yarn and carpets in 1841, and a
company was afterwards organized as the Baldwin
Manufacturing Company, which was very succe.»sfully
operated for several years, until near the close of the
war, when, with many similar conipaiiies, they failed,
and the privilege has since been unoccupied. The
present proprietor is G. H. Sheldon.
Moore's ;\Iill. — In 1872, Mr. Geo. C. Moore, then
a young man, bought of G. T. Sheldon the old
foundry on the northerly side of the passage-way
leading from the Lowell road to the old turnpike,
near the brook, with the water privilege, except cer-
tain rights previously sold and certain rights reserved
by Jlr. Sheldon. Machinery w.as put in and wool-
scouring was at once commenced. In 1875 he
erected a brick-mill, 100.\70 feet, three stories high.
A part of the building w.is rented to ilr. Richard
Rhodes for the manufacture of worsted yarn, and
wool-scouring was carried on in other parts. Oct. 10,
1S75, this new mill, just completed, together with the
old foundry boarding-house, foundry carpenter's shop,
ware-dressing shop, patteru-shop and counling-rooiu
were burned.
A temporary wooden building, 100.x40 feet, one
story high, was soon erected and wool-cleansing re-
sumed. In 1S77 a new brick mill, 220x70 feet, one
story high, waserected, coveringthe temporary wooden
buildiuL', so that wool-cleansing was not interrupted
during the rebuilding.
In ISS-J an additional brick building. 14ii-70 feet,
two stories high, w.ic erected on the easterly end of
the one->tory building.
In 1S8S a second story of brick, 120x70 feet, was
put on to the easterly end of the one-story building,
an<l a brick buiUling, 4.5x5i) feet, two stc/ries high, was
added to the easterly end of the mill, for a machine-
shop and a carpenter's shop. The lower story of the
two-.-tory mill, now 2tjOx7(J feet, is used for sorting
an<l drying wool, and carding and combing wool.
The second story is used for spinning worsted yarn
anil for a counting-room.
In 1800 the old walls of the westerly end of the one-
story buildin.g were torn away, and a new building,
]iiOx70 leet, three stories high, erected, to increase the
t'acilities for cleansing wool.
The worsted-mill is now producing lO.ijOO lbs. of
worsted yarn per week, mo-itly Iromcamel'? hair. Ho
has facilities lor cleansing oO.OOO lbs. of wool a day.
The pay-roll contains 170 names.
In 1704 a map or plan nf the town was mnde from
a survey by Frederick French. One co|iy of the plan
is on file in the State Archives and another is in pos-
>ession of Mrs. Thomas J. Adams, of Xorth Cheims-
tord. From this map it appears that there were at
that time two saw-mills and one corn-mill on the
Merrimack River at Pawtucket Falls; one saw-mill
and one set of iron works on Concord River near its
mouth ; one saw-mill on the canal near where it
emptied into the Concord River; one clothier's mill;
one saw and grist-mill upon River Meadow Brook ;
these were all within the limits of the present city of
Lowell. A grist-mill and saw-mill are shown upon
the Stony Brook, at what is now North Chelmsford ;
a grist-mill on Beaver Brook at the centre of. the
town, and one on Great Brook (then the Adams milll.
The clothier's or fulling-mill was erected in 170'*
by Moses Hale, who came from West Newbury. It
stood just below where Gorham Street crosses the
River Meadow Brook. The saw and grist-mill were
above the street. In 1801 Mr. Hale introduced a card-
ing machine into his mill, and carried on quite a bus-
iness. The iron works were carried on bv a Mr.
CHELMSFORD.
267
Ames or Ames & Fisher. They were .situated on the
Concord River at Massic Falls, near the foot of Ames
Street. N. P. Ames, a son of the proprietor (born
September 1, 1S03), afterwards introduced many im-
Drovements into tlie works. Allen says, "hoes and
shovels are manufactured, and various kinds of
curious work done, and irons for machinery cast."
Young Ames possessed great skill in the mechanic
arts, combined with an enterprising spirit and inven-
tive talent of a high order.
In 1829 he removed to Chicopee, and afterwards
became the founder of the Ames Manufacturing
Comj)any the first company to engage in the man-
ufacture of swords in this country.
The success of the cotton manufactories at Wal-
tham and 1= Rhode Island, which had been started
as a result of the restrictions imposed upon commerce
by Great Britain in 1812, stimulated some enterpris-
ing person'' to attempt their introduction here. Capt.
Phineas Whiting and Col. Jojiah Fletcher erected in
181?) a building si.\;ty by fifty, and forty feet high, for
a cotton factory.
In 1818 it was purchased by Thomas Hurd, of
Charlestown, and converted into a woolen factory.
One hundred and twenty yards of satinet per day were
turned nut Irom sixteen looms " worked by water."'
In 1816 a saw and grist-mill were built by Luke
Bowers & Son, at Pawtucket Falls, and a grist-mill by
Mr. K. Tyler, on the " locks and canals."
In 1816 Mr. Moses Hale added a faw-inill to his
other works, and two years later erected works for
the manufacture of gunpowder. In 1819 Mr. William
Tileston, of Boston, and Oliver M. Whijjple were
taken into partnership in the latter branch of the
business.
In the autumn of 1S21 a scheme was inausrurated
which in its importance overtopped all previous en-
terprises in Chelmsford, as it resulted in creating the >
wonderful cotton industry of Lowell. i
A company of gentlemen consisting of Patrick T.
Jackson. Kirk Boott, Warren Button, Paul Moody,
John W. Boott and Nathan Appleton visited the
Pawtucket Falls with a view to utilizing the vast
power running to waste there, and compelling it to
become the servant of human industry.
The result of their investigations was that iu the
February following the Merrimack Manufacturing
Company was incorporated.
A canal was built and in September, 1823, the
waters of the Merrimack passed through this canal
and turned the wheels of the first of the Merrimack
Company's mills. Population and capital now rap-
idly increased, and in 1826 the new town of Lowell
was incorporated. From that time the mother town
has viewed with pride and wonder the achievements
of her precocious daughter, and rejoiced at everything
which has contributed to her prosperity.
' Mien.
Although Soutli Chelmsford has always been al-
I most wholly an agricultural community, some man-
ufacturing was done there at one time which was very
important in its relation to modern improvements.
I The first Lucifer matches manufactured in this
j country were made here by Ezekiel Byam, a native of
the town, in ISO.'). One hundred of these matches
i sold for twenty-five cents. They were ignited by
drawing them through a piece of bent sand-paper.
Although clumsy and expensive, as compared with
what we now have, they were the first practical device
to do away with the old flint and tinder. The friction
match was invented by A. D. Phillips, of Springfield,
M.iss., Oct. 24, 1836. Mr. Byam at once recognized
its merits, and with characteristic enterprise he pur-
chased first the right to manufacture, and soon after
the whole patent, and the following year began the
manufacture of the friction match. Very soon the
Byam matches, with the following verse upon the
wrapper, were known the country over:
"For quickness anJ 9urpne<:3 ttip puMic will find,
TliPse niatclip,^ will leiive all others bt-hilid ;
Without further reuiarks we iD\ ite vou to Irj' 'em,
Uenieuiber all g'tod that are sigued by
t. BVAM."
The old "match-shop," as it was c.illed, stood on
the old road leading from South Chelmsford to the
centre of the town, a (evr rods, and on the opposite
side, from the residence of Mr. Eli P. Parker. It was
a small building set into the bank, with one story
above the basement. The matches were put up at
the Willard Byam house, which stood upon the site
of the residence of the late E. P. Bean.
After manufacturing here about a year, Mr. Byam
removed his business to Boston. He resumed manu-
facturing in Chelmsford again about 1845 and con-
tinued three years. The favor with which the
matches were received by the public was such that
his facilities were now entirely inadequate to meet
the demands upon them, and the business was re-
moved permanently to Boston.
The old matcii shop, was mostly demolished several
years ago; a portion of it is now used by Mr. N. B.
Lapham for a carriagehousa.
The manufactures upon the Stony Brook at West
Chelmsford were commenced by Dea. John Farwell,
who came from Fitchburg in April, 1823, and erected
a factory, upon the site of the present file and knife
works, for the manufacture of scythes. The little
village which grew up about these works was kiiown
for many years as the "Scythe Factory Village."
From 1500 to 2000 dozen of scythes were turned
out annually, from which they realized from $15,000 to
^20,000. In the spring of 1844, Dea. Farwell sold out
to his son, J. P. Farwell, and others, who two years
later sold the real estate to Lincoln Drake, of North
Chelmsford, and removed the machinery to Fitch-
burg. Drake sold the properly to F. T. Sawyer.
Christopher Roby purchased a half-interest of Sawyer,
2G8
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY. MASSACHUSETTS.
and together they at once refurnished the works and
engaged in the manufaciure of scythes under the
firm-name of Roby, Sawyer & Co. From 2000 to
2500 dozen of scythes were annually produced by this
company.
The factory was destroyed by fire, but soon rebuilt.
In 1853 Mr. Sawyer retired, and the business was
then conducted under the name of C. Roby & Co.
The market for these goods was largely in the South-
ern and border States, and when the war broke out,
in 1861, this company found their trade destroyed,
and in addition to that suffered the loss of most of
their goods, which had been shipped during the pre-
vious winter.
The company now ceased to manufacture imple-
ments of peace, and proceeded to furnish implements
of war. They manufactured swords and sabres until
1865, when the company closed up its affairs. Mr.
Roby continues an honored resident of the village,
and by him the data in regard to the industries at
that place were kindly furnished.
The Hiscox File Company purchased the scythe
works, and engaged in the manufacture of files and
machine knives. They discontinued business about
two years ago, since which time the shops have been
idle.
In 1830 a dam was built above the scythe factory
pond by Mr. Nathan Oliver, assisted, perhaps, by his
brother, Samuel Oliver, of Lowell. They sold the
water-power and land to the "Chelmsford Company,"
by which a mill was erected for the manufacture of
worsted yarn. Mr. William Calvert was the superin-
tendent for several years. When the financial depres-
sion of 1857 came on the mill was closed. After a
time it was purchased by Isaac Farrington, of Lowell,
who resumed business. It was burned 18G2, but at
once rebuilt. Business was continued by several
parties until about six years, when it was again de-
stroyed by fire. The power has since remained unused.
There are five lime-kilns — two upon the north slope
of Robins Hill, and three on the north side of Beav-
er Brook — where for many years lime was manufac-
tured. Allen says, that from them "are annuallly
drawn about a thousand hogsheads, which may be
estimated at S5 per hogshead." The lime used in
building the first mills in Lowell was made here.
David Perham, Sr., who operated the largest kiln,
continued the business till 1832. Maine lime, which
was brought up the Middlesex Canal, was sold for
less than it could be produced here. This led to
their abandonment.
The history of manufacturing at the centre of the
town is quickly told. In 1887 a brick two-story ma-
chine-shop was erected by Mr. John Byfield, for the
manufacture of knitting machinery. Business was
commenced in January, 1888, under the name of the
Byfield Manufacturing Company. Mr. Byfield has
since withdrawn from the firm, and occupies the
upper story for the manufacture of knit-goods, under
the name of the Beaver Manufacturing Company.
A business closely related to the faiming interests
has been the manufacture of cider vinegar. David
Perham began to make a specialty of that in connec-
tion with his farming in 1840. The business con-
stantly increased. In 1872 he sold to his son, Henry
S. Perham, who is of the seventh generation from
John Perham, who first settled upon this farm in
1664. From 500 to 4000 barrels of cider are made
annually from apples brought to the mill from this
and adjoining towns. The late Israel Putnam was
also largely engaged in this business.
In order to facilitate the navigation of the Merri-
mack River, and allow of an easier transportation of
timber around the Pawtucket Falls to Newburyport,
a canal-was built beginning above the falls and emp-
tying into the Concord near its mouth, the distance
being one and a half miles.
The company was incorporated August 8, 1702, by
the name of the "Proprietors of the Locks and
Canals on Merrimack River."
The same year the first bridge was built across the
Merrimack at Pawtucket Falls, then called theMerri-
mac Middlesex Bridge.
A more formidable canal enterprise was in contem-
plation by some enterprising spirits at thi.s time, and
in 1793 the Middlesex Canal Company was incorpo-
rated.
Loammi Baldwin, of Woburn, was the superinten-
dent and engineer, and under his direction the work
was rapidly pushed to completion. The canal was
opened for business in 1804. The business of the
company continued lo increase until the building of
the Boston and Lowell Railroad, in 1835, when the re-
ceipts soon fell below expenses, and in 1853 the busi-
ness of the company was suspended.
The facilities atlbrded by the Middlesex Canal
greatly stimulated the growth of Middlesex Village.
The glass manufactory was built in 1802, upon the
bank of the canal, near the end of what is now West
Pine Street. The annual production of window
glass exceeded forty thousand dollars in value. The
enterprising firm of Bent& Bush first began the man-
ufacture of hats at this place. There were also two
stores and a public-house. The latter was kept by
Mr. Timothy Clark, who, doubtless, maintained the
reputation which it had gained under the former
landlord. Col. Jonas Clark, as " the general resort for
all fashionable people in these parts."
A religious society was organized in 1824 and a
meeting-house built.
CHELMSFORD.
269
CHAPTER XIX.
CHEIIISFORD— (Continued).
MISCELLANEOUS.
AcitlcuLTUKE. — Although more space in this arti-
cle has been given to manufactures than agriculture,
the latter has been the occupation of the majority of
the people, and an active interest has been taken in
movements for the advancement of agricultural in-
terests.
A society was formed at Chelmsford, January 6,
1794, for the " promotion of useful improvements in
agriculture." It was composed of gentlemen living
in the westerly part of Middlesex County. It was in-
corporated by act of the Legislature on February 28,
1803, under the name of "The Western Society of
Middlesex Husbandmen."
Its annual meetings were held alternately at West-
ford, Littleton and Groton. Hon. Ebenezer Bridge,
of Chelmsford, was the first president chosen after the
incorporation of the society. Mr. Bridge was a son
of the then late parson. He commanded a regiment
at the battle of Bunker Hill. He was a member of the
Massachui-etts Senate from 1781 to 1800, and was
perhaps, the most influential citizen of the town at
that time. He died at Hardwick, X. Y., February 9,
1814, aged seventy.
This agricultural society was afterwards merged in
the Middlesex Society, which held annual exhibitions
at Concord until recently.
Death of General Washington. — The follow-
ing action, in January, 1800, well illustrates the pat-
riotic feelings of the citizens of the town : " took into
consideration the death of the worthy General Wash-
ington, to be observed by an oration 22d Feb. by Mat-
thias Spaulding."
The orator selected for this important occasion was
a SOD of Col. Simeon Spaulding. After completing
his studies he taught school for several years and then
entered the, medical profession. In 1806 he removed
to Amherst, N. H., where he lived to a great age.
The following brief notice of his death, in 1805,
appeared in the Boston Traveller :
"The venerable and eminent physician. Dr. Mat-
thias Spalding, died on Monday last, aged ninety-six
years. He was born at Chelmsford, JIass., June 28,
1769, and graduated at Cambridge University in
1798."
Death of Rev. Thomas Clark. — The people
were called to mourn the death of their pastor, Rev.
Thomas Clark, which occurred December 7, 1704, in
the fifty-second year of his age and thetwenty-seventh
of his ministry. We have but little material from
which to estimate the character of the man. No
church records relating to the period of his ministry
are preserved. The few modest requests which he
made of the town were readily granted. The calm.
judicial spirit with which he dealt with the case of
witchcraft which occurred during his pastorate well
illustrates his character. His desceodanls were peo-
ple of intelligence and force of character. Governor
John Hancock, whose name is appended to the im-
mortal Declaration of Independence, in the well-
known bold and striking characters, was his grandson.
Rev. Samson Stoddard, of Boston, the third min-
ister of Chelmsford, was ordained November 6, 1706.
An ordination was a great social event, and elaborate
preparations were made to provide for the guests who
assembled.
In 1713 Mr. Stoddard preached the election sermon.
Sewal pronounced it "an excellent discourse."
The old meeting-house, which had served the peo-
ple from the first settlement of the town, was now go-
ing to decay. It had been repaired in 1702 "both
w'out Side to keep out rain and snow, & also within-
side such Inlargement as may be needful & in pertic-
ular A long table from one allee to another." In 1705
the people in the west part of the town petitioned
that the proposed new meeting-house " he set in the
senler of the toune." This, if acceded to, would
have taken it to Chestnut Hill, and might have pre-
vented the formation of the west part into a new town,
which occurred a iev years later.
Death of Rev. Samson Stoddard, and West-
ford SET OFF. — The struggle of the people in the
west part of the town for the formation of a separate
precinct was begun in 1713, and continued from time
to time until the object was accomplished in 1724.
The separation was made complete by the incorpora-
tion of the town of Westford, September 23, 1729.
Rev. Samson Stoddard was a person of delicate
mental and physical organization. His arduous pa-
rochial duties and financial difficulties, which he was
unable to meet, produced a severe strain upon his
powers.
During the last years of his ministry he manifested
symptoms of a disordered mind. His death, by sui-
cide, occurred August 23. 1740, in the thirty-fourth
year of his ministry. His body was found in the par-
sonage well. The railroad passenger depot now
stands over the well.
Rev. Ebenezer Bridge. — On December 30th, of
the same year, a unanimous call was extended to
Rev. Ebenezer Bridge, to become their pastor. He
was ordained to the sacred office May 20, 1741.
Mr. Bridj^e was a native of Boston. After complet-
ing his studies at Harvard University he engaged for
a time in teaching.
His theological studies were pursued under the di-
rection of Rev. Wm. Welstead, pastor of the North
Church, Boston. In October, 1741, he married Miss
Sarah Stoddard, the third daughter of Rev. Samson
Stoddard.
Mr. Bridge was i man of strong character, and he
exerted a wide influence in the trying times through
which the country passed during his ministry. In
270
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
person "his stature was large and corum.inding, his
manners grave and dignified. He possessed great
social powers, and was a communicative friend and
pleasant companion.'" Although his style was some-
what neglitrent and diffuse, "he was an acceptable,
animated and searching preacher. His creed partook
of the orthodox of theday," but " he wasa strenuous
advocate for liberty of conscience and the rights of
private judgment.'' 3Ir. Bridge's influence wa.s not
confined to his immediate field of labor. He main-
tained a wide circle of acquaintances. He enter-
tained liberally, and among the guests at the parson-
age WPre often persons widely honored. He has left
a voluminous diary,' which contains a fund of infor-
mation, and gives us an insight into the daily life of
a counrry par.<on in the colonial days.
Up to the time of Bridge'spastorate there had been
but one religious society in town, except during the
brief time between the tbrmation of the West Pre-
cinct and its incorporation as a town. But the
preaching of the eminent Whitefield, which so
stirred the people and created such a dirturbance
among the churches, produced a di.-atfection, espec-
ially among the peopie of the south part of the town,
which the parson was powerless to prevent. The
preaching of one Hi Je, a tailor, in the south part of
the town, drew away >oine of the peopie, by which
the good parson was much exercised.
Whitefield himself once |)reached in this toun, at
the house of a Mr. Birge, where Israel L. Putnam
now lives, on ?-outh rrtreet. and it is related that by a
singular incident, Par.snn Bridge w.is himself an un-
willing listener to the discour.se.- " Before the hour of
the meeting arrived Parson Bridge called at the house
in order Co dissuade the owner, if possible, from al-
lowing it to be held. AVhile he argued long wiih
Mr. Birge, the crowd thronged the house to such a
degree that the pastor was unable to recover his hat,
which had been left in another room, and he was.
therefore, unwillingly constrained to hear die sermon
out with the res'."
In 1753 a petition was presented to the Court for
the fiirmation of a district in Carlisle. In ITOS a
rude church was erected there. In 17S0 ('arlisle was
formed into a separate precinct, and in ISO-'} incorpo-
rated as a town. By this act Chelmsford lost about
seventeen families and a considerable araouut of ter-
ritory. In 17.54, 300 acres of land on the northeriy
side of the town were set ort" to Dunstable. This
makes a point of land belonging to Tyugsboro' ex-
tending into Chelmsford.
New Meetisg-Hol-sk.— In 1700 the town voted
to build a new meeting-house upon the site of the old
one, "and a Terit to hang the bell in."
Social distinctions were much more rigidly ob-
served than in these more democratic times. Tiie
1 Now in the possession of a ilfsjeudiiut, B. M. Fiske, uf Botlon.
»n. p. Hunt.
I people were seated in church in accordance with the
! rank which they occupied. These seats were assigned
by a committee chosen from time to time by the
town, consisting of the most dignified characters.
! Sl.-VVERY. — In Parson Bridge's time some negroes
were held as slaves in this town, as appears from sev-
eral entries in this diary. March 3, 1772, he records:
"married Prince, a negro man belonging to William
Kittridge, of Tewksbury, and /ulee, a mulatto girl
belonging to Dr, Nehemiah Abbott, of this town ; was
I offered one dollar as a fee, but took none.'' August
i 7, 17G1, "attended llie funeral of Titus, an aged ne^ro
i of widow Rebecca Parker."
By the declaration of rights contained in the new
i Constitution of 17S0, Massachusetts has the honor of
! having been the first of the American States to abol-
ish slavery within her limits.
i Several entries in Bridge's diary similar to the fol-
lowing show that the second meeting-house, which
had stood eighty years, was now going to decay :
' " May l.j, 1791, Preached all day, but omitted readinir
' by reason of the pul[iit being ^o wet after tlu' rain. "
■ The good pastor -vho had lor more than fifty years
ministered from this pulpit was nearing the close of
his mortal existence. His death occurred October 4,
1792, the same year in which a new house of worship
■ was erected.
Upon the death of Mr. Bridge a day of fa.sting
and prayer was appointed by the town, and ^eveii ol
the mini-ters of adjoining towns were invited to i)ar-
lici[)ate in the services.
Rev. Hkzeki.ui 1'-V(IC.vi:|) accepted a call by the
church and town and was ordained tJctober lli, 17;'o.
By li's agency in establi-hing the Chelnisl'ord
.Social Library in 1794, Mr. Packard has left an en-
during monument to his memory. This library was
incorporated in January, 1S12, under the name of
" Proprietors of the Social Library in the town of
Chelmsford." .Vllea estimated its value at about •■^lUOU.
Until recently the books have been dispensed from
the house of the librarian. Because of the want of a
j suitable public place for the library its growth was
slow. .Since it has been placed in the town-house
, [)ublic interest in it has revived and the yearly circu-
lation of the books has much increased.
I Mr. Packard budt and occupied the house now
j owned by David A. Russell. His son, the late Pro-
I fessor Alpheus S. Packard, of Bowdoin College, was
born here.
The resignation of Mr. Packard concluded his con-
nection with the church July .5, 1S02.
Rev. WilivE.s Allen was ordained .as pastor No-
vember l(j, 1S03. Mr. Allen was a son of Elnaihan
and Lydia (Pratt) Allen, of Shrewsbury, Ma.-sachu-
setts. He graduated from Harvard College in ISOl.
In November 13, 1S05, he married Mary Morrill,
daughter of Deacon James Morrill, of Boston. Their
children were James Morrill, iiorn October .5, 180(> ;
Charles Hastings, born March 11, 1809; Wilkes, born
CHELMSFORD.
271
December 30, 1810; John Clark, born November 12, f
1815 (?) ; and Nathaniel Glover, born January 22, [
1816. j
Mr. Allen was the author of a "History of Chelms- ■
ford," which was published in 1820 — a work wliich
forever identifies his name with the town.
I'lEVOLUTlONAEY WoNVMENT. — The monument in '
honor of the citizens of the town who fell in the War
of the Revolution was erected in 1859. Charles H.
Dalton was the prime mover in this patriotic enter-
prise. The monument, composed of Chelmsford gran-
ite, was dedicated September 22, 1859. The principal
address was delivered by WillnrJ Parker, M.D.,of New
York, president of the Jlonument At-bsociation ; H.
W. B. Wightman, was president of the day ; Rev.
John Parkhurst, chaplain ; Dr. J. C. Bartlett, di-
rector of the choir, and Otis Adiims, chief marshal.
L.\WYER.'5. — Previous to the growth of so many
manufacturing towns in the State, Chelmslbrd occu-
pied a position of much greater relative importance
than it does to-day. This is shown by the character
of the men who were attracted to it as a place for
the practice of the professions.
In January, 1772, .^lepken Soales, A.M., settled iu
town to engage in the practice of the law.
What promised to be a brilliant career was sud-
denly cut short by death, November 5th of the same
year. Mr. Bridge records :
" Thi3 niornini: difd Tcry andileiilv Stephen Scales, a: tlie Iiodbo of j
Sflni[i80ii SttHjdiinl . bt" Iiud l»«?eii coiitiiieti witli tliL- iiioHslfS, wns iibletu
walk iil-'lll llie liuUBe, but tv>uk Cf'M, seiz.d Hitb ml apojiltctic iitliH-k, j
fell out of li'S clmir auti ilif<l iu a f'iU iiiiiiiitc!.. He wiis Tutof .it H.ir- i
Mild O'll , RttKf Ftiuii'-d liiw A: was a jTactitiuiuT ill tbe liuniliesd, a man |
of strung puwiT uf inlad, a great nebular, i very colisldoiable lawyer 1
for lllB age A tbe time be batb practiced ; b" bid fair to be a very usetul
Mild »ervicc;ibK' as well u5 buliuratdc man in life, but at uiice is al iili |
end N3 to tbis lifei world, au allei;tiug stroke in Providence A; may the \
Lord sanctity it."
The following high tribute to hi> character and 1
talents appeared in Thr Muxi'icltusdiii Gazette and the
Boxloii WceLlij Xews-Lctti:r, Thursday, November 12,
1772:
" We hear from Clielnisford, that on Tliuraday 3Iorniiig last Stephtn
Staled, Esq., teveml years a Tutor at Harvard Col lege, but lately in
the !?tudy of tbe Law. was seized with a Numbness in one of Ilia
UatuU. which increased so fast tb.it he died within ten Minnies. He
was a [zeiitlenittn of fiujierior Genius, improved by a tlioroujrh Acquaint-
alice with the various JJrauclies of Science,— fuilhful in the DiscbarKe
of his Duty iu tbe rollet:e.— of strict Intesrity, and e.\eniplary Virtue —
and of BO preat proficiency iu the study ol the l^w that he wua truly au
Honor to the Prolessiou iDto wUicb be bad entered."
His tombstone, upon which is a lengthy inscription
in Latin, stands at the right, and very close to, the
central path in the old cemetery.
Within two weeks from the death of Mr. Scales,
Mr. Jonathan Williams Austin, a young man of great
promise, just admitted to the bar, took up his resi-
dence in town to iollow the profession of the law.
Bridge's diary contains the following reference to
him :
"Kov. IS, 1772. Mr. .Toua. ^\'illiam .\ustin, who came into town last
night, diued with me and spent the P.M.; he conies to settle with iis as
n Lawyer. He brought letters to me reccommendatory from Rev. Dr.
Cbauncy A: Cooper."
He was born in Boston, April 18, 1751, and grad-
uated from Harvard College in 1709. He studied
law in the office of John Adams, and, doubtless, had
imbibed something of the patriotic fervor of that il-
lustrious statesman, as he immediately became promi-
nent in the agitation then going on with the mother
country. He represented the town, with Samuel
Perham, as delegate to the Middlesex Convention,
which met at Concord, August IC, 1774, and, though
then but twenty-three years of age, he was selected
by tbe convention for the chairman of the committee
to draw up the resulutions expressing the sentiments
of the people upon the grave questions which con-
fronted them. The resolutions, which were adopted
by a vote of seventy-four to four, conclude with the
following ringing sentences :
" Our fathers left a fair inheritance to us, pnrrhased by a waste of
blood and treasure. Thi* we are resolved to trausniit equally fair to our
children after us. Ko danger sball affright, no dilficulties intimidate
us : uud if, in support of our richts, we are culled to encounter oven
death, we are yet undaunted, sensible that he can never die too soon
who lays down bis life iu support of the laws and liberties of his
country."
He showed himself to be a man of action as well
as of words, for lie gave his life in support of those
principles so dear to him. He entered the service
upon the opening of hostilities ; was a major in
1775, commandant at Castle William in 1776, and
died in the army to the southward in 1778 or 1779.
John Wytlie, A.M. — A graduate of Harvard in 1760.
Settled ii; Chelmsford 1778. Afterwards removed to
Le.xington, and from there to Cambridge, where he
died.'
Samuel Dexter, LL. D., the statesman, who occu-
pied, besides other high positions, that of United
States Senator from Massachusetts, practiced law for
a time in this town, coining here in 1786. He re-
moved to Billerica and after to Cbarlestowu. He
died in the State of New York in 1816.
In 1800 Asahel Stearns, A.M., opened aa office at
Pawtuckei Falls. In 1814 he represented the district
in the Congress of the United States. He removed
toCbarlesto?. n in 1815, and three years later accepted
the position of College Professor of Law in Harvard
University.
Joel Adams, A.M., was a son of Timothy Adams,
of this town. His birth-place was what is now the
Shehan place, in Dislrict 5. He graduated from
Harvard College in 1805, and began the practice of
law in 1808. His residence was that now occupied
by his grandson, C. E. A. Bartlett. His office stood
between bis house and what is now Jonathan Lar-
com's. He was known as a sagacious counj-elor and
shrewd man of business. He removed to Lowell,
and was president of the Prescott Bank, and was
connected with other financial institutions. Later
572
HISTORY OF MIIXDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
in life he relinquished the practice of his profession
and again toolc up his residence at his old home in
Chelmsford.
In 1813 Nathaniel Wright, A.M., entered the law-
ofBce of Asahel Stearns, at Pawlucket Falls. When
the latter withdrew to a wider field, Wright suc-
ceeded him in business. He at once became identified
with the rising fortunes of Lowell ; was the chairman
of its first Board of Selectmen, and later its mayor.
He died November 5, 1858, aged seventy-three years.
Physicians. — Of the physicians who practiced iu
the town in the early days little is known. The list
given by Allen begins with, —
Dr. Anthony Emery, A.M., who graduated from
Harvard in 1736, and commenced practice in 1740.
In 1748 Samuel King, M.D., came from Littleton.
He afterwards removed to Chesterfield, N. H.
Dr. Jonas Marshall commenced practice in 1765.
His residence was that now owned by Mr. C. W.
Byam, on the south slope of Robins Hill. A
magnificent elm, standing beside Mr. Byam's house,
was brought by the doctor on horseback from his
former home in Fitchburg. He was long remem-
bered as an active man and successful practitioner.
In 1776 his wife and two daughters died of small-
pox, which was communicated by a soldier return-
ing from the war, to whom they had afforded hos-
pitality. Their bodies were the first interred in the
South Chelmsford Cemetery. He removed to Fitch-
burg in 1783.
Dr. S'ehemiah Abbott came from Andover in 1772.
He built and occupied the house which has long
been known as the "ark," at the corner of the
South Chelmsford road. He died July 13, 1785.
■ Dr. Walter Hastings graduated from Harvard,
1771; commenced practice in 1776; died December
2, 1782, aged thirty.
Dr. Timothy Harrington, n graduate of Harvard,
1776 ; came here in 1782. His residence was what
is now owned by Gilbert Wright. He died Febru-
ary 28, 1802, aged forty-eight.
Dr. John Betty wa.s a native of the town. He
was a soldier in the Revolution. He began prac-
tice in 1792. His residence was that now owned
and occupied by B. O. Robbins, near the South
Chelmsford Cemetery. He is still remembered by
the older citizens.
Dr. Ichabod Gibson, from Lunenburg, commenced
practice in 1792. He built and occupied what is
now the residence of C. E. A. Bartlett. He died
May 10, 18ia.
Dr. Matthias Spalding, a son of Colonel Simeon
Spalding, commenced practice in 1802. He removed
to Amherst, N. H., in ISOo.
Dr. Oliver Scripture, from New Ipswich, N. H.,
commenced practice in 1807. His residence was
upon the site of the house now occupied by Mr.
W. H. Hoyt, on South Street. He removed to Hollis,
N. H., in 1818.
Dr. Ritfus Wyinan was born in Woburn, Muss.,
July 16, 1778. He graduated from Harvard College
in 1799. He studied medicine under the direction
of Dr. John Jetfries. The following degrees were
conferred upon him by Harvard : A.M. and M.D. in
1804, M.M.S. in 1811, and later A.A.S. He settled
in Chelmsford in 1805. His residence was the house
now occupied by Timothy Adams, upon the Billerica
road.
Dr. Wyman gained so high a reputation in the pro-
fession that when the McLean Asylum for the Insane
was started in Charlestown (now Somerville) he was
chosen, March 28, 1818, as its first superintendent
and physician. The appointment proved a fortunate
one. Notwithstanding the popular prejudice then
existing against hospitals of that kind, the number of
patients presented for treatment constantly increased,
as well as generous contributions for the support of
the institution. He resigned his position in 1835.
His death occurred in Roxbury June 22, 1842.
When Dr. Wyman removed from Chelmsford, to
accept the appointment of superinteiulect of the Mc-
Lean Asylum .it Charle-ttown, a public meeting of the
citizens was called to expres-s their high esteem and
respect for Dr. Wyman and to request him to appoint
a successor.
He complied with their wish and introduced Dr.
John C. Daltoii to the people of Chelmsford. In mak-
ing this choice he displayed his characteristic saga-
city, and laid the people under further obligations of
gratitude to him.
Dr. Daltou was born in Boston May 31, 1795. He
entered Harvard College in 1810, where he acquired
scholarly tastes which he retained through life. He
received his degree of M.D. from Cambridge in IS 1 8.
Dr. Dalton lived while in Chelmsford at what is
now called the " syndicate farm." He was a gentle-
man of accomplished manners and au ardent lover of
his profession.
After thirteen years' practice he removed to Lowell,
in 1831. During his residence of nearly thirty years
in that city he occupied an honored position both as
a physician and citizen. He died in Boston, Jan.
9, 1804.
Dr. Paul Kittredge, one of this famous family of
doctors, succeeded to the practice of Dr. Dalton,
coming to Chelmsford from Littleton in 1831. He
was a son of Dr. Benj. Kittredge, of Tewksbury,
where he was born Aug. 29, 1784. He studied with
his uncle. Dr. Jesseniah Kittredge, of Walpole, N. H.
He took his degree, was admitted to the Massachu-
setts Medical Society, and then began the practice of
his profession at Littleton, Mass., in 1810, where be
remained until he came to Chelmsford in 1S31. Dr.
Kittredge built and occupied the residence of the late
Adams Emerson, Esq., had an extensive practice, and
was often called, especially in cases of surgery, far
beyond the usual circle of his practice. He had a fam-
ily of fourteen children, four of whom were physicians.
^ ^^/^^^'^L.'i-CC)
^ 1- ,
2--i-
CHELMSFORD.
273
One of these, Francis M. Kittredge, familiarly known
as Doctor Frank, was a graduate of Dartmouth Col-
lege. He was a-sociated with his father in business
for several years, and upon the death of the latter,
Au^. 10, 1845, succeeded to the pra";tice. In 1848 he
disposed of his interests in Chelmsford to Levi How-
ard, M.D., and removed to Lowell. He died in Cali-
fornia Feb. 13, 1878.
Dr. Katlian B. Edwards was born in Westford,
Mass. He was educated at Groton Academy and
Dartmouth College, studied medicine with Dr. Eli-
sha Huntington, of Lowell, and received the degree
of M.D. from the Berkshire Medical Institute in
1844. The year following he settled in practice at
North Chelmsford.
It is somewhat difficult to write unreservedly of
persons now living, but after a residence of forty-five
years among us a person's reputation may be supposed
to rest upon a somewhat substantial foundation.
It is not too much to say that no person in Chelms-
ford was ever held in more universal respect than
Dr. Edwards. Notwithstanding the somewhat exact-
ing duties of his profession, movements for the edu-
cational, moral, religious, political or material interests
of the people have ever found in him an earnest
supporter.
He has filled, at one time or another almost, every
position to which his townsmen could elect him.
He has kindly furnished that portion of this art-
icle which relates to the manufactures at North Chelms-
ford.
His appearance indicates a vigor which promises
to continue his usefulness for many years to come.
Dr. John C. BartUtt was born in Charlestown, Mass.,
Oct. 5, 1808, and graduated from Bowdoin College,
Maine, in 1828. Having decided upon the medical
profession, he studied with Dr. Thompson, of Charles-
town, and attended lectures at Harvard University,
graduating in 1831. He soon after settled in Chelms-
ford, where he continued in practice nearly forty-six
years. Dr. Bartlett entered upon his work with the
Very best preparatory training. His standard of pro-
fessional houor was high, and he never neglected a
call of duty. Quackery or imposition of any kind
gained his decided opposition.
AUhough of a somewhat aristocratic bearing, he
was one of the kindest of neighbors, and a man uni-
versally respected for the uprightness of his life. He
possessed fine musical tastes, and was for many years
chorister of the Unitarian Society.
He was active in the cause of temperance and in-
terested in education.
He held the position of president of the board of
trustees of Westford Academy for many years. He
died Jan. 13, 1877, aged seventy-two. The esteem in
which he was held by his medical associates was ex-
pressed in a series of resolutions adopted by the Med-
ical Society.
Dr. Levi Howard was born in Bolton, Massa-
18-ii
chusetts, May 26, 1820 ; was educated at Worcester
and Bridgeton Academy, Maine ; studied with Dr.
Lewis W. Houghton, of Waterford, Me., and was
graduated from the Dartmouth Medical College in
184C. He began practice at Stillriver, Mass., where
he remained two years before coming to Chelmsford.
Dr. Howard proved to be a worthy successor to the
long line of successful Chelmsford physicians. He
was thoroughly devoted to his profession, and possess-
ed of keen discernment and powers of observation
which did not allow the slightest symptom to escape
unnoticed ; these qualities, combined with sound judg-
ment, self-reliance and devotion to his patients, gain-
ed him the full confidence of the community, and be
was rewarded by a wide and lucrative practice, which
included not only Chelmsford, but all the adjacent
towns. This he retained to the close of his life. In
physique he was large and powerful, with that per-
sonal magnetism born of robust health, quick sensi-
bilities and ready tact. His mind was active and
well developed in other fields beside the professional
one, and he was a lover of literature and music ; in
the latter he excelled, and his skill with the violin
was of a high order.
He practiced his profession to within a week of his
death, which occurred January 23, 1885, and was suc-
ceeded in practice by his son, Amasa Howard, M.D.,
who is improving his capacity to rank with his hon-
ored predecessors.
Church History. — For upwards of a century the
history of the church is so interwoven with that ot
the town that the history of one includes that of the
other.
The religious agitation which began with Whitefield
finally led to the withdrawal of members from the
oiginal church and the establishment of others hold-
ing a difl'erent creed.
A Baptist Church was formed at South Chelmsford
in 1771. The following is the record of their first
meeting: " On Tuesday y' 22°" October 1771, a num-
ber of men and women, baptised ou profession of faith
by immersion, assembled at the house of Daniel Lock,
in Chelmsford, in y' county of Middlesex, in y' prov-
ince of y* Massachusetts Bay, in New England, being
assisted by Mr. Bartlett of New Town, who was chosen
therefor by the church of Leicester, under the pastoral
care of Elder Thomas Green." '
A meeting-house was erected in 1772. It stood
near the South Chelmsford Cemetery. (This burying-
ground was established in 1774, upon land given by
Dr. John Bettie.) Their first pastor was Eev. Elisha
Rich. The present house of worship, which is about
a quarter of a mile from the site of the original one,
was built in 1836. The membership of the church
when they celebrated their centennial in 1871 was
134.
Rev. John Parkhurst, a native of the town, and a
> Ber. Geo. H. Alleu, OaleoDlal Addrm.
274
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
graduate of Harvard University in 1811, was the pas-
tor from November 13, 1822, to April, 1845.
The Cenlral Baptist Church, composed of a mem-
bership largely drawn from the mother church, was
organized February 14, 1847, with Rev. John Park-
hurst as pastor. This society worshiped in the Acad-
emy building until the erection of their present church
edifice, in 1869, upon the historic site of Col. Samson
Stoddard's house.
The venerable Father Parkhurst closed hia labors
with the church in 1868, after a service in the minis-
try in this town of nearly half a century.
As a result of the Unitarian movement, which be-
gan in 1824, the old First Church adopted that faith ;
they continued, however, under the name of the First
Congregational Society. The same agitation caused
a division in the churchatMiddlesex, just established
in 1824. The Unitarian portion retained the meeting-
house, and called to their service Rev. Hezekiah
Packard, D.D., who was ordained in 1830.
The Trinitarian members with their pastor. Rev.
John A. Albro, worshiped for a time in a hall in the
village. In 1836 they removed to North Chelmsford,
and a meeting-house was erected. Rev. Benjamin F.
Clark, was called to this church August 1, 183'J, and
continued to January 31, 1869, a period of nearly
thirty years. Mr. Clark's influence was not confined
to his immediate charge. He waa an active citizen of
the town, the author of several literary works, and at
one time represented the district in the Massachusetts
Senate.
The rapidly-growing city of Lowell drew so largely
from the Middlesex Society to its various churches,
that services there were discontinued. The meeting-
house, after remaining unoccupied for a number of
years, was purchased by the Roman Catholics and re-
moved to North Chelmsford. Under the name of St.
John's Church, that form of worship has continued
thereto the present time. The church was dedicated
in July, 1860.
The St. Anne's Episcopal Society, over which the
esteemed Rev. Theodore Edson presided for upwards
of half of a century, was first organized in March,
1824, while the territory still formed a part of
Chelmsford.
Aa Episcopal Soc'ety, at the centre of the town, by
the name of the "Parish of St. Anne's, Chelmsford,''
was formed May 26, 1867. The name was changed
by an act of the General Court February 27, 1888, to
"Parish of All Saints." Their Gothic stone edifice
was consecrated December 20, 1882.
An Orthodox Congregational Society was formed at
the Centre Village in 1876. They have since erected
a very neat and attractive church building.
No New England village is completed without its
church and school-house. As soon as a sufficient
number of families had clustered about the manufac-
turing enterprises at West Chelmsford a religious so-
ciety was formed by the name of the West Chelms-
ford Union Church, and a house of worship erected
in 1848. As the name implies, it was undenomina-
tional in character. But in 1871, those of the Method-
ist persuasion predominating, the name was changed
to the West Chelmsford Methodist Episcopal Church.
The present neat and attractive church was dedicated
January 10, 1888.
The resignation of Rev. Wilkes Allen, October 21,
1832, closed the last of the long pastorates over the
First Congregational Society. The present pastor,
Rev. Joseph H. Chase, began his labors with this
church in 1883.
The meeting-house now used by this historic society
is the fourth which has stood upon or very near the
site of the original one. The third one was destroyed
by fire in 1842.
Statistical. — The following statistics in regard to
the present condition of the town are taken from the
Massachusetts census of 1885:
Population, 2304; agricultural products, S160,009;
agricultural property, §944,115; number of manufac-
turing establishments, 22; capital invested, 87:^,368;
total value of good.n made and work done, 5517,868;
number of persons employed, 421 ; total wages paid,
$139,717. Census of 1890, population 2693.
In the report of the assessors submitted February
28, 1890, the value of rej^l estate assessed is given as
$1,336,390; personal estate, §256,769; total valuation,
$1,593,159; number of horses assessed, 480; cows,
985; swine, 186; dwellingi, 593; acres of land, 14,132;
the appropriation voted by the town for the support
of schools, including text-books and school inciden-
tals, 16700 ; for the support of the poor, $2300 ; for
highways, $4000.
The report of the School Committee gives the total
number of school children 463 ; average number at-
tending school, 340.8 ; amount paid teachers, $5505 ;
the number of schools, 15, four of which are at the
centre of the town, four at North Chelmsford, one at
West Chelmsford, and one each at Districts 2, 3, 4, 5,
6 and 7.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
GEORGE T. SHELDON.'
George T. Sheldon was born in Easton, Mass.,
February 6, 1829. Hi» father. Rev. Luther Sheldon,
was for more than fifty years the pastor of the Con-
gregational Church in Easton. Bis only brother,
Rev. Luther H. Sheldon, a graduate of Middleborough
College, after a service of many years as a Congrega-
tional clergyman, is now a resident of Andover, Mass.
Mr. Sheldon received his education in the commou
schools, in the academy at Rehoboth, Mass., and at a
private school in New Jersey. After a short service
aa clerk in Easton, he came to North Chelmsford, in
' By CharlOT C. Ctaiuc.
'**"^^^^^^^,. ,,
K /T/^'i^-^^^^^^^^^^^^
CHELMSFORD.
275
1847, when eighteea years of age, and for about three
vears was employed by Lincoln Drake, who was run-
ning a foundry in that village. Williams, Bird &
Go. having, in 1850, purchased this foundry, Mr.
Shejdon entered the service of the new proprietors.
Being a brother-in-law of Mr. Bird, one of the pro-
prietors, his position was one of special trust. In
this establishment he has now spent about forty-three
years, almost the entire period of his business life.
This foundry is upon the Stony Brook, which unites
with the Merrimack at the village of North Chelms-
ford. It was started in 1822, the first proprietor of
the plant being General Shepherd Leach. Upon the
death of General Leach, in 1832 or 1833, it became
the property of Lincoln Drake, who, in 1850, sold it
to Williams, Bird & Co.
The financial panic of 1857 was disastrous to this
firm, their losses for one year being about $72,000.
Mr. Sheldon, who had now been employed by this
company for seven years, hired the plant of the as-
signees of the bankrupt firm and, in less than two
years afterwards, purchased it and for a short time
was the sole proprietor.
In 1859 an incorporated company was formed under
the title of " The Chelmsford Foundry Company."
Of this company Mr. Sheldon is the treasurer, having
his office on Portland Street, Boston. He is the prin-
cipal owner of the slock and is the efficient and re-
sponsible manager of the affairs of the corporation.
Mr. E. D. Bearce is the agent and superintendent of
the works at North Chelmsford. For a few years
after the corporation was formed Mr. H. W. B.
Wightman shared in its management. This com-
pany relies upon steam for two-thirds of its motive-
power and upon the waters of Stony Brook for the
other third.
Besides the works in North Chelmsford, in which
more than 100 hands are employed, the company has
a beam-yard in East Cambridge, in which wrought-
iron beams from Belgium, Pennsylvania and other
places are sawed and drilled, and otherwise prepared
for building purposes. Also on Portland Street, Bos-
ton, the company has a large block supplied with
every variety of wrought and cast-iron materials (both
useful and ornamental) demanded in the erection of
buildings. In all their operations the company em-
ploys about 200 workmen.
This company holds a high position among the iron
manufactories of the State, having the confidence of
the community to such an extent that for want of a
more extensive plant it is able to do less than half
the business which is offered it.
For more than thirty years Mr. Sheldon has had a
very important connection with the ice business of
the country. In the winter of 1857, in which very
little ice could be obtained in this vicinity, he found
that a pond in North Chelmsford, of which he was the
fortunate owner, was, to the surprise of all, covered
with ice twelve inches thick. The pond was imme-
diately leased by dealers in Boston, and during the
winter 20,000 tons of ice were cut. Mr. Sheldon now
engaged in the ice business, cutting for both the Low-
ell and the Boston markets. After about five years
another ice famine came, in which ice scarcely formed
near Boston, while the pond in North Chelmsford
yielded 30,000 tons from twelve to eighteen inches
thick, bringing, in some cases, fourteen dollars per ton.
In the warm winter of 1869 Mr. Sheldon, in com-
pany with A. Gage & Co., of Boston, cut 40,000 tons,
which was shipped and brought twenty-two dollars
per ton. This was almost the only ice in the vicinity
thick enough for shipping.
The ice famine of this year compelled the starting
of the ice business in the State of Maine where the
supply is never cut off. Ice-houses were speedily
erected in that State, having a capacity of a million
tons. This new competing enterprise in Maine com-
pelled the formation by Mr. Sheldon of an ice com-
pany with a capital of $80,000. This company erect-
ed ice-houses in North Chelmsford holding 50,000
tons, and took a lease of the pond for twelve years
for $36,000. Since the expiration of this lease Mr.
Sheldon has received a liberal rental. During the
recent warm winter [1889-90], while almost every
other source of supply in this vicinity has failed,
from 25,000 to 30,000 tons have been cut upon this
pond.
Mr. Sheldon has no ambition for political honors.
He devotes his entire energies to the exacting de-
mands of his prosperous and ever-extending business.
Few men could accomplish the daily task which his
remarkable physical powers and his intense love of
action enable him to perform. For ability and in-
tegrity he holds a high rank among the leading men
of business in the State.
Mr. Sheldon confines himself with remarkable reg-
ularity to the duties of his position, being found on
almost every business day of the year at his oflBce in
Boston. At his pleasant residence in North Chelms-
ford, however, he has a few fine horses, in driving
which he takes a special pleasure and finds the al-
most only recreation in which he allows himself to
indulge.
In 1851 Mr. Sheldon married Julia L., daughter of
Mr. Lewis Ripley, a manufacturer in North Chelms-
ford.
Of his three children, (1) George H. was born in
1853, and is now in the employment of the Chelms-
ford Foundry Company ; (2) Lewis R. was born in
1858 and died in infancy; (3) Royal E. was born in
1863, and is now in the employment of the Chelms-
ford Foundry Company.
276
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
CHAPTER XX.
DRA CUT.
BY ATKINSON C. VARNUM.
EAKLY HISTORY.
The history of the town of Dracut, from the time
of its occupancy by English settlers, dates from
1G64, although the town was not incorporated until
1701. The petitioners who applied to the General
Court for an act of incorporation designated the
locality as "A tract of land beyond Chelmsford, in
Massachusetts, which runs seven miles eastward on
the North side of Merrimack River, from Dunstable
line, and then six miles northward from said river."
The court, in granting the act, quaintly describes the
territory as " A tract of land for a township, on the
North side of Merrimacke River, Beginning at the
Island lying in Merrimacke River, called Wekasook,
& takes about half of it, & is bounded by Caplaine
Scarlet, & Dunstable line on the Northwest as farre as
Kimball's farme at Jenmie Hill, which is about six
miles in a crooked line. Then it is bounded by Dun-
stable line on the West about four miles. It is
bounded southerly by Merrimacke River about seven
miles by a strait line to Wekesook, where we began.
The South East Corner is a White oake marked with
D, a little from the River ; and from thence it runs
due North six miles, which line is parallel with Dun-
stable line on that side ; then by a North West line it
againe cloaeth to the Dunstable line. This North
West line is four miles longe, then on the West is
bounded by Dunstable four miles."
" Dracut Township contains 22,334 acres, as attests
Jo. Danforth, Survey'r."
This description, though not so tersely and techni-
cally expressed as are those of modern civil engineer-
ing, wag nevertheless sufficiently distinct to avoid any
misunderstanding or trouble in regard to its meaning.
As in many other ancient towns, however, encroach-
ments have been made upon the territory, and " Jo.
Danforth, Surveyor," were he now living, and pos-
sessed of all his keenest faculties, would not by the
present boundary lines j;ecognize his original Dracut
Township of 22,334 acres7~ '
The earliest settlements in Massachusetts, as is well
known, began along the sea-coast — Plymouth in 1620,
Salem in 1626, Boston in 1630, Newbury in 1633.
These settlements were gradually extended into the
interior. Some twelve or fourteen brave colonists
pushed out as far as Concord in 1635, where they ob-
tained a " piantacion of 6 myles of land square."
The townsofGroton, Billerica (which then included
Tewkabury), and Chelmsford (which then included
Westford) were all incorporated in 1655. These towns
were then on the extreme verge of English settle-
ments, and nearly all the territory lying north as far
as Canada was an unbroken wilderness. In 1643 the
various settlements of Massachusetts weredivided into
counties: Middlesex, Essex, Suflblk and Norfolk. Mid-
dlese.x included the towns or settlements at Charles-
town, Cambridge, Watertown, Sudbury, Concord,
Woburn, Medford and Reading. Essex contained
Salem, Lynn, Enon (Wenham), Ipswich, Rowley,
Newbury, Gloucester, Chochichawitk (Andover).
Suffolk included Boston, Roxbury, Dorchester, Ded-
ham, Braintree, Weymouth, Hingham and Nantasket
(Hull). Norfolk embraced Salii-bury, Hampton,
Haverhill, Exeter, Dover and Portsmouth. In these
counties the whole number of towns was thirtv.'
So that when the first English settlements began in
Dracut (in 1664) considerable progress had been
made in pioneer ;jfe in Mfissachuaetts, and although
these enterprising colonists were pressing farther
out into the wilderness, they had the advantage
of many facilities afforded by towns already estab-
lished, and upon which they could rely as a base
of supplies, or for needed reinforcements in danger-
ous emergencies.
The First Settler.— The first actual settler of
the town appears to have been Samuel Varnum, who
received a grant of Land which was conveyed to
himself and Richard Shatswell, by John Evered,a/in3
Web. It consisted of UOO acres, " in Drawcutt. on
Merrimacke River," under date of January 10, 1664.
Richard Shatswell never became a settler ; he sold
his part of the land October 7, 1609, to Thomas
Hinksman, and Thomas Hinksman (or Hinchman),
sold and conveyed the same to Edward Coburne,
November 22, 1671.
Edward Coburne (or Coburn, as the name is now
generally spelled) is supposed to have been a
neighbor of Samuel Varnum, in England. They
came to this country at about the same time, and
both settled first in Ipswich, Mass., then removed to
Chelmsford, and finally to Dracut. Mr. Coburne is
the progenitor of a long line of descendants, and
most persons of the name, so numerous in this vicin-
ity, may trace their ancestry back to him. He ap-
pears to have been an active man in the settlement,
and made several conveyances to his sons, as will be
seen hereafter.
The first settlement was made on what is now
called Varnum Avenue, in Lowell (the territory hav-
ing been annexed to Lowell in 1874), about a mile
above Pawtucket Falls.
Samuel Varnum married Sarah Langton, and came
from England to America prior to 1649. He built
his house on or near the spot now owned by Thomas
Varnum, where hia farm-house now stands. He had
five sons, two of whom were killed by the Indians upon
the breaking out of King Philip's War, in 1675. The
other three were Thomas, John and Joseph, to whom,
January 14, 1695, he conveyed all of his estate.
Drulte'a " Hiat. Co. Miildlesex."
DRACUT.
277
Thomas, the eldest, retained the home-spot, and the
present Thomas, who now owns it, ia the fifth of that
name to whom it has descended. John and Joseph,
however, settled near their brother, in Dracut, on
land comprised in the orip;inal grint.
Name of the Tov^x.— History and tradition both
inform us that the town received its name from Sam-
uel Varnum, who called it Dracut, from his native
town in England.
Some writers of local history have supposed that
Mr. Varnum came from Wales; but there is no evi-
dence of that fact. We are not aware of any town in
Wales of the name of Dracut; while in England
there are several places bearing a similar name — as,
Draycotte Moore in Berkshire; Draycotte in the
moors in Staffordshire; and Draycot Orne and Dray-
cot Foliat in Wiltshire. In his diary Sewall spells
the name Dracot.^
The following interesting account of early grants
was given by Capt. E. W. Taonrpson in a communi-
cation to the Lowell Courier, March 26, 1S87. Cap-
tain Thompson has been for some years engaged in
transcribing these early records for the county of
Middlesex :
"Tlio perus.il of tlie ancient tran-iferi gives the impression that Dra-
cut w.is orij^ioally p.irceUeU out iLi grants by the general court. The
first deeJ recordeil \a from JoUn Evered, alitu Web, to S.imue! Varnuni
and Rich:irJ Sh.itwjll of eleven Uiinired u-^res of UaJ ' in Drawcutt
on McrriDi.icke River,' under d.ite of January 10, IGOt.
".(line 19, IGO."), Jno. Evered, alio* Webb, of Drawcutl, sells to Rob-
ert E.iines Ijr 21 pounds * LiwFul ntjuey of England,' a parcel of up-
land, ' boumieil Southerly (in length one hundred &. fourteen Hod or
Pule, every Uoil couteyning in lengtb sixteen foot tS: an balfe) with the
Mernnidcl;.'
" Sept. 4. 1609, ' Mary Evered, aliafl Web, relict of Capt, Jno. Evered,
alias Web, of Drawcutt upon Merrim.ick,' deeds all her estate, ' both reall
and persouall,' to Mr. Jno. Falreweatlier.
*' Ocluber 7, IGGCi, Richard Sliatswvll deeds his half of the oleven hun-
dred acres sold to him and Saml. V-iroani by Jno. Evered, alias Web, to
Thomas Hiucksmun.
"June 2l,lG7u, the heirs of Jno. Evered, alias Web, release toThomaJi
IlincksDian.
"September 1,1070, Jno. Faireweather deeda all the estate, 'both
reall and persouall,' transferred to hi:u by Mary Evered, alias Webb, to
Thomas Hincksman.
"liovcinber 2i, 1671, Thomas Hincksnian, or Hinchmiu, sells to Ed-
ward Cuburne the whole of the Sliatwell portico of the UOU acres in
Drawcutt sold by Jno. Evered, alius Web, tu Vnrnuni and Shatwell.
" Dec, \1, 107S. Edward fkjburu, ' in cousideraliun of the dear and af-
fectionate love be bcareth tu his oldest Sun John,' and al?ii fifty pounds
sterling, dfeJ^< liini one-eighth of Evened land ; another parrel north of
the same and one-fi^i^litli uf all the reniiiiiiing field landb.
" July fc. 16Si, Eduard Cuburn, of Drawi;utt, deeds oue-eighth of Ev-
ered land to Joseph Cuboru ; also eleveu acres CO poles of intervale
land ; mIso o^^ acres bounded Bonth on Merrimack river , al3o a house-
lot and oiie-t--iglitb of reniataing uplands, commonage, &c.
"Oct. 20, 1C83, Edward Coburne m ntgages to Thomas Hiochman * a
parcel of Und lyiug on the intervale at Merrimack river and a divi-
sion of meadow lying in fellowship with Samuel Varnum ; also six-
eigbths of the farm purchased of Jno. Evered.'
*' Jan. 3, 1G84, Edward Coburne deeds to his son Ezra one-eighth of
the land bought of Evered, alios Webb ; also eleven acres next bin dwell-
ing, reserving 'his proportion of the orchard by the River.' Thio piece
was bounded ' Soutli by the Merrimack River, Eiist by Evered L, and
by Thomas Uichardbon on the West, and by the highway North,' and,
to further quote the description, ' lyeth above tweuty-oue Pole wide
perpendicular.'
1 " Hist. Dracut iu Drakc'e Co. Middlesex," by Nason.
I
"April 29, 1084, Old Beas Nomphow deads to Samnel Sewall *400
acres of land North Eant of Merriraicb River, at a Place called
Wekeeottli.' Thia land may have been in Dracut or Tynf^borough.
" Feb. 20, IC90, Edward Ooburn debdi an eleven-acre lot and one-
eii;bth of Evered land to his son Daniel ; alao 5>^ acres of intervale on
Merrimack riv«r, an>l also a houee-lot-
"April 14, 169 1, Edward Coburn deeda to his ' Sonnei,' Thomafl, Dan-
iel, Ezm and Joseph, land bought of Blajor Thoaias Uinchmau called
'Satchell's laud,' and also all the meadows.
"November 7, 1G9I, Jno. Kidder, of Chelmsford, *in consideration of
Six budhells of good Merchantable Indian Cornc," salld to Jno. Varnum
his whole right, title and interest 'in a Tract of Land Ijiug upon ye
North Side of Merrimack River, at a pla::e Called by ye nama of Pan-
tuccett falls, by estimation Five Hundred acres.*
"Dec. 28, 1636. Edward Coburn, of 'Drawcutt,' sells to B«ra *Co-
bum 5J^ acres of ' Interraile, bounded South on Merrimack River ; '
iildo another piece in Bire Meadow, for the consideration of 'G
pounds.'
*' Jan'y 14. 1695, 'Samaell Varnum, of Dracutt, In Consideration of
Love and affection, as also for a Certaine sum of money,' deeds to his
sons, ThoDias, John and Joseph, all of bis estate.
"Julys, 1697. Elizabeth Baud, executrix of Capt. Wm. Bond, sells
to Thomas, John and Joseph Varnum 'Upland and Meadows which
WMB Robert Earned', lying ou ye North Side of Merrimick River,
bound on ye River on the South,' and on the west, north aud eaat
by land of the Varnnms April 19, 1698, Daniel Rosae, of Concord,
in consideration of 16 pounds, deeds to Thomas, John and Joseph Var-
num, of 'Drawcutt,' several lots of land, including a tract * lying on
ye North Side of Merrimack River, granted to aitd Dauiel Roose and
other petltionere by the Geuerall Court.' "
These constitute the traasfers of interest in Dracut
up to 1700.
NotwithstandiDg all previou3 grants from the Gen-
eral Court to individuald, and for the incorporation
of the various towns, it appears that the Indians did
not in all cases consider their claims extinguished.
In the following deed it is not clear what land is in-
tended to be conveyed ; but rather than quarrel with
the claimants the grantees preferred to clear the title
by taking a deed of the lodians whether they had
any valid claim or not; although they were in pos-
session and had probably been holding under their
original titles for nearly forty years.
In justice, however, the Indians were the rightful
owners of the land ; and it speaks well for these early
settlers that they recognized their rights, and were
willing to recompense them for their property.
INDIAN DEED.
"To all Christian people to whom this present deed shall come :
Greeting. Know ye that I, Maater John Sagamore, Minioter of Nut-
ick, The right heirofye soiUe of Dracutt, in the Maaeachnsetta Colony
iu Ne«" England, in the County of Middlesex, for three hundred
pourda of silver to him in hand, welt add truly paid, ye Minister of
Katick, John Thomoji, by John Colburne, Thomas Culburne, Robert
I'olburue, Daniel Culburne, Ezra Culburne, Juaeph Colburne, the Han-
nah RichardBun, widow, Thomas Varnum, John Varnum, Joseph Var-
num, uf Dracutt, neir Chelmsford, in the Couilty aforesaid. Whereof
the said John Thomas doth acknowledge, and thereof and of every
part and parcel thereof doth fully and clearly and ubeolately release
and discharge the Kiid Tliomxi. Ezra, Daniel, Joseph, But)ert and John
Colbnrne, and the Hannah Bichardaon, widow, and Thomas, Juseph
and John A'arnum, their heira, admluetrators and aaaigns forever, bj
these pn.*Bents, doth freely, fully aud absolutely, grant, bargain and
cctnve}' tu the above named, John Colburne, Thomae Culburne, Robert
Colburne, Daniel Colbnrne, Ezra Culburne, Juaeph Culburne, the Han-
uflh Richardson, widow, Thomas Varnum, John Varnum und Joseph
^'aruum, and to tlieir hein), executors, adminiBtratora and aasigns for-
ever. Two or three thousand acres of laud, be it more or less ; bounded
on Merrimack River on }e aoulli, and on Muster SewelTa farm on the
west, and bu running a atniight hue To ye Noitti HirJe 'oi Long Pnud, to
278
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
s tree with stones by it and marked, and bo runninn due East to a
Broolc, called Bearer Brook, and containing nil ye land that tbe above-
named Colbnrns and Varnunis have possetaed, and running on Braver
Brook to a farm called Chelmsford land, and so runniug to a corner
pine-tree marked, and then ninning South to another pine-tree
marked, and then ninning East to another comer bound, which is a
pine-tree marked, and running South to Merrimack River at Paw-
tncket, and there bounded by a white-oak tree, to have and to hold to
tbe said John Colburne, Thomua Colbome, Robert Colbume, Daniel
Colburne, Kzra Colbume, Joseph Colburne, the Hannah Riclmrdaon,
widow, Thomas Vamum, JohnVamum, Joeeph Varnum, their IieirB,
administrators and assigns forever. In vritiieaa, the John Thomas has
afflxed bis band and seal hereunto set this seventh day of the fourth
month called April, in the year of our Lord One Thousand seven hun-
dred and one (1701), in the thirteenth year of the reign of our sovereign
Lord King WilUam. John Thomas, his seal and mark."
The Colbume (or Coburne as the name is origi-
nally spelled), grantees in the above Indian deed
were all sons ot Edward, and the Varnuras were sons
of Samuel. Hannah Richardson, another grantee,
was a daughter of Edward Colburn, and of course
sister lo the Colburn grantees. She married Thomas
Richardson September 28, 1682. He was the eldest
son of Lieut. James and Bridget (Henchman) Rich-
ardson, of Chelmsford, born October 26, 1661, and
died February 10, 1700, a little more than a year pre-
viously to this conveyance. He was a srandson of
Ezekiel Richardson, who came to New England in
Winlhrop's fleet, July 6, 1630. Ezekiel was the ear-
liest colonist of that name in New England. He was
the first settler in Charlestown, and afterwards re-
moved to Woburn, in 1642, and was one of the found-
ers of that town. Two of his sons, Capt. Josiah
Richardson and James, above named, removed to
Chelmsford as early as 1659, and are the ancestors of
most of that name in this vicinity.
Rev. Jonas Colburn, a native of Dracut, now de-
ceased, in some well-writlen reminiscences contributed
to the Lowell Citizen and Xews, Oct. 12, 1859. says:
"The Colonial records mention five early grants of
Dracut lands by the General Court to Individuals.
Ist. A grant in 1650 of 3000 acres on the North of
Merrimack River to Robert Saltenstall. 2d. A grant
in 1059 of 1600 acres on the North of Merrimack
River, and East of Beaver Brook, to Richard Ru-sel.
3d. A grant in 1660 of 250 acres, lying North West
of Russel's grant, to Edward Tyng. 4th. A grant
in 1660 of 600 acres, lying opposite the mouth of
Concord River, to one Symons. None of these
grantees appear ever to have taken possession of the
land. After the settlement of the town, four men
took up land in the upper, or West End. Their
names were Scarlet, Webb, Setchel and Hucksman,
each of their lots bounding southerly by Merrimack
River. Scarlet Brook lakes its name from the man
through whose lot it run. It is not known that any
except Webb ever occupied the land taken. He
built a shanty, which was burnt by the Indians. It
was on the river bank, below the old 'Capt. Blood
Place,' later owned and occupied by Win. H. Dur-
kee, and now owned by Dr. George W. Clement, for-
merly of Dracut, now of Boston.
Rev. Wilkes Allen, in his "History of Chelmsford,"
.says: "In 1686 (sixteen eighty-sis) Jonathan Tyng,
Esq., and Maj. Thomas Henchman jointly purchased
of the Indians 500 acres of land, lying North of Mer-
rimack River, and bounded on the East by Beaver
Brook, and Southwardly by Merrimack River, near
Pawtuckett Falls. Also what land doth lie on the
W est fide of Concord River belonging lo the Indihn
Plantation, excepting only Wanalancett's old plant-
ing field. The same year Jona. Tyng sold his right
in these lands to Maj. Henchman for fifty pounds,
and Maj. Henchman sold the land belonging to the
Indian plantation West of Concord River." (This
land was sold to diflTerent individuals, consistiug of
forty-six in number, whose names are mentioned in
Allen's " Hist, of Chelmsford.") Allen further adds:
" The 500 acres North of the Merrimack appears to
have been retained by the Indians, though it was in-
cluded within the sale made by Passaconaway, Saga-
more of Penecook, Runnawit, Sagamore of Paw-
tucket, Wabangnonawitt, Sagamore of Swampscott,
and Rowles, Sagamore of Newhawanack, to Wheel-
wright and others in 1629."
CHAPTER XXI.
DRA CUT— ( Continu(d).
IXDIAX HISTORY.
Extensive and reliable information rFspccliiig
the various Indian tribes in New England may be ob-
tained from Gookiu, Hubbard, Wood, Morton and
other early historians, and also from various official
documents on file in the secretaries' office — of Masa-
chusetts.
Gookin, who in 1056 was appointed magistrate and
ruler over such as had submitted to the Colonial Gov-
ernment, in his history, published in 1674, classes
them into five principal tribes, viz.: The Pequots, of
Connecticut ; the Narraganselts, of Rhode Island ;
thePawkunnawkets, of the southeastern partof Massa-
chusetts ; the Massachusetts, situated about the bay ;
and the Pawtuckets. on Merrimack River.
The latter he describes as follows :
"The Pawtuckets are the last pieat Sachcniship of Indians. Tlieir
country lyeth North ± Northeast from the Maa?achuse[ts tribe, und
whose dominion rearbelh so far as the English jurisdiction or ("olony
of 3Ia8&achusetts doth now extend. They ha\e under them several Sag-
amores, as those of the Pennacooks, .\pawam8, Nuunikeeks, Paiscuta-
ways, .\ccominta« and others.' They were a considerable people here-
tofore— about three thousand men — and held nmily with the litnssacliu-
setls tribe, but they were almost destroyed by the freut sick ness that
prevailed among Indians about 1612 and Ml:), so Iluit at this day llipy
have not above two hundred and flity men, besides women .and
children."
The Pawtuckets embraced several minor tribes,
1 A Sagamore ia a title. It was applied by the North American In-
dians to a chief of isecond rank, the first being Sachem.
DRACUT.
279
which were classed under that national name. It in-
cluded the Nash ways, whose headquarters covered
the rich intervales of Lancaster ; the Nashobas, who
inhabited the forests of Littleton ; the Pennacooks,
upon the alluvial lands of Concord, N. H., and the
Naticooks, the tracts near the mouth of the Souhegan
River. The Wamesits' dwelt near the falls of the
Concord River, and the Pawtuckets proper near the
Pawtucket- Falls, on the Merrimack River.
The territory now occupied by Lowell and a por-
tion of Dracut had, for many years before the white
man made his appearance, been the grand capital of
the Pawtuckets (under which name we include its sub-
ordinate tribes). It was the home and headquarters
of Passaconaway, their chief. The Pawtuckets were
more peaceable and friendly than any other tribe.
They avoided war, but when once engaged they
fought with great bravery and determination, as the
traditionary accounts of their battles with the Tar-
rantines and the Mohawks will show.
Passaconaway. — At the time when the Englishset-
tlers made their appearance in this place, the chief of
the Pawtuckets was Passaconaway. The name is
said to mean in the Indian tongue, " child of the
bear" — from Popoct's, child, and Kunnaway, a bear.
He did not, however, possess many of the character-
istics of the name.
Considering his opportunities, he must have been,
from the accounts we have of him, in some respects a
remarkable man ; for, under some of the most trying
circumstances in connection with the English, he
displayed great intelligence, deliberation and forbear-
ance.
When the Colonies were first established, the In-
dians in Massachusetts were regarded as independent
nations, but about the year 1644 it was deemed
necessary to inaugurate measures for reducing the
authorily of the various chiefs to that of petty mag-
istrates under the laws of the State. Passaconaway
was the first to submit to this ; but several other
chiefs came into the arrangement during the year.
Daniel Gookin, the ruler or superintendent of those
who submitted, appointed " Indian commissioners " in
each village, whose duty it was to hear and determine
all KUch matters as might arise among themselves,
both civil and criminal, as a magistrate might do
among the English. These commiosioners were chos-
en among the Indians, but commissioned by the Eng-
lish magistrate. Gookin, himself, was to join with the
chief of their rulers in holding a higher court among
them. These officers were all appointed by authority
of the General Court. This was all done with the
consent and approval of Passaconaway. He seems
to have had the wisdom to see the superiority of the
white race and to foretell their ultimate success in the
affairs of stale.
1 Wauteiit signifies '* a place of large aaseDlbly."
- PoiriKcAft meaoB " fulliug watero." — NaaoDH " Hi£t. DuoBtable."
It was unfortunate for Passaconaway that other
tribes did not so readily submit to the laws of the
Colonial Government, in consequence of which sus-
picions were sometimes entertained as to his loyalty
to the treaty which he signed ; and he bore with great
equanimity many indignities that were put upon him
by such suspicions.
On one occasion, in 1642, when his family were
seized and carried to Boston as prisoners, upon the
alarm of an Indian conspiracy in Connecticut, and
it appearing afterwards that there was no just cause
for such treatment,~the authorities, anticipating that
the assault would arouse his just indignation, sent a
messenger to him with an apology and an invitation
for him to visit Boston to speak with them.
"Tell the English when they return my son and his
squaw then I will come and talk with them," was his
dignified reply. He cherished no undue resentment
of this unwarranted outrage, however, and not long
after sent his son to deliver up his guns to the Colo-
nial Governor, in recognition of his authority.
The early historians agree in the statement that he
was regarded with the highest veneration by all the
ludians, on account of a wonderful power which he
was supposed to possess in the use of the magical art°.
Wood, in his "New England Prospect," says of
him : " The Indians report of one Passaconnan that hee
can make the water burne, the rocks move, the trees
dance, metamorphize himself into a flaming man.
Hee will do more; for in winter, when there are no
green leaves to be got, hee will burne an old one into
ashes, and. putting those into water, produce a new
green leaf, which you shall not only see, but handle
and carry away ; and make of a dead snake-skin a
liviug snake, both to be seen, felt and heard. This I
write but upon the report of the Indians who confi-
dently affirm stranger things."
The historian, Thomas Morton, gives a unique de-
scription of the chief the Pawtuckets, as follows :
" Piipadiqiiineo, that Sachem or Sagamore, is a Powow of great esti-
Diation amougst qI kiode of salvages. At tbeir revels, which is a time
u'lieo a great company uf salvagee meete from oeveral parta of the
cnuntr>' iu amity with their neighbors, be bath adraoced Ul^ honor id
bis (eats of juggling tricks, ilee wilt endeavor to pnrsuadu the spec-
tators that bee will goe under water to the further side of a river too
broade for any man to undertake with a breath, which thing bee per-
formed by Bwimming over, and deluded the company with casting a
niiste before their eise that see blm enter in aud come out, hot no
part of the way he has been eeene. Likewise, by '^nr English in the
lieate of suronter, to make ice appear in a bowie of faire wat«r. Fintt
having the water set bufore bim, he bath beganne bis iDcaotatioDB,
and before the same has bin ended a thick oloud has darkened tbe
aire, and on a Bodane a thnuder^clap has bin hearde, and in an fiutaut
be hatb showed a Mime piece of Ice to flote in the middle of a Inwle,
which, doubtlesB, was done by tbe agility of Satan, bis Conaort."
Passaconaway lived to a good old age, and was al-
ways faithful and loving to the English.
In 1662 the General Court granted to him and his
people a " tract of land about Naticut, above Mr.
Brenton's laads, a mile and a half on either side of
the Merrimack in breadth — three miles on either side
in bredth." This territory embraced parts of Mun-
280
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Chester, LondoDderry, Litchfield, Merrimack and
Bedford, in New Hampshire, and also two small
islands near Thornton's Ferry, now known as Reed's
iBlands.'
It is thoDght that he did not long survive this
grant, although no record is left of his death. He
left four sons and two daughters.
Some time previous to his death he invited all his
people to a feast, on which occasion he conferred the
chief sachemship upon his son, Wannalancit, in the
following eloquent language :
*' I am now ^ing the nay of all fleRh ; I am ready to die, aud not
lltely to fee yoo meet together uny more. I will now leave this word
of counsel with you. Take heed how you quarrel with the English.
Hearken to the last words of your father and friend. The while men
are the sons of the morning. The Great Spirit is their father. lie
shines bright abont them. Sure as you light the tires the breath of
heaven will (urn the breath upon you and destroy you. Listen to my
advice. It is the last 1 shall be allowed to give you. Beniember it and
live." 1
Rev. John Elliott.— In 1644 the General Court
instituted measures for the religious instruction of the
Indians. It had been a favorite object with the early
settlers to civilize and Christianize the New Englaud
tribes, and they had always labored to this end.
As early as 1625, Rev. Win. Morrell returned to
England to awaken an interest in their behalf. Again,
in 1046, the General Court passed an order request-
ing the elders of the various churches to consider
whether anything could be done for the promotion of
Christianity among the Indians, whereupon Rev. John
Elliott, who was settled at Roxbury, entered upon the
work with great success. He began his labors at
Nonantura (now Newton) and came to Pawtucket
Falls in 1647. Rev. Nathaniel Bouton, in his " History
of Concord, N. H.," says:
" The fiinioue John Elliott, known as the Apostle to the Indians, in
pursuance of his apostolic labors, in 1G47 visited Pawtucket Falls in Dra-
cut, w here he met PafKacooaway with bis sons."
The result of this and a subsequent visit is related
by Elliott himself under date of November 12, 1648,
as fellows:
"This last Spring I did there (at Pawtucket Falls) meet old Pnesacon-
away, who is a great Sagamore (Sachem), and hath been a great wilclie
in all men's esleeni, and a very politic wise man. The last vear he
and all his eons fled when 1 came, pretending four that we would kill
them, but this year it pleased God to bow his heart to bear the word. I
preached out of Malachi 1: 11, which I thus rendercfl to them:
'*■ From the rising of the Min to the going down of the same, thy
name shall be great among the Indiana, and in every place prayei^
shall be made to thy name, pure prayers, for thy name shall be great
among the Indians.' After a pood space this old I'ussaconaway did
speak to this purpose — That he had never prtiyed unto God before as
he now doth ; and ho said fuither that he did now believe what I taught
them was true, and he was purposed in his heart from henceforth to
pray unto God, and that he would pursnede all bis sonnes to do so,
pointing at two of them who were present and naming such as were ah*
sent. Ilis sonnes present, especially his eldest Sonne, wlio is a Sa'^hem
at Wachusett, gave his vvUlIng consent to what his father hud said, and
BO 'lid the other, who is but a youth. And this act of his was not ouly
ii present motion that soon vanished, but a good while after he said
tliat be would be glad if I would come and live in some place tbere-
1 Cowley'a " Indian Pioneer Memories."
al>out8 and teach them, and if any good place or ground that lice had
would be acceptable to me, bee would willingly let me have it."
The following year, in 1649, Mr. Elliott makes the
following record :
" Paseaconaway, whom I mentioned unto you the last yeere, who pave
himself up and & his sonnes to pray unto God, this man did this yeere
show very greate affection to me and to the word of God. Hee did ex-
ceedingly, earnestly, importunately, invite me to come and live there
and teach them. Hee used many arguments, some whereof I have tor-
gotten, but this was one: That uiy coming I hit her but once a jeeie did
them hut little good, because they sooue had forgotten what I taught,
it teing so seldom and so longe betwixt times, that he had many men,
and of them many naught, and would not believe him that prii\ nig to
God was so goode, but if I would come and tench them, he hoped llu-y
would believe me. flee further added that I did as if one should coiito
& throw a fine thing among them, and they earnestly catch at it, and
like it well because it looks finely, but they cannot look into it to tee
wliot is within it; they cannot tell whetber something or nothing. It
may he a stock or a stone is within it, or it may be a f reciL'us thing ;
but if it be opened and they see what is within it, and see it precious,
then they should believe it. *So,' said hee, 'you tell na of praying to
God (for 80 they call religion), and we like it well at fiiTt sight, and we
know not what is within. It may be excellent, it niay be nothing ; we
cannot tell ; but if you would come i show us, then ue should be
lieve it is so excellent as you say.' Such elegant nrgumeljta na thesedid
hee use, with much gravity, wisdom and atfection, and truly my heart
much yeoruelh towards them, jc I have a greate desire to make an In-
dian towue that way."
General Gookin held his court in May, and be tells
us that Elliott came with him at that time, because at
that season of the year there was '' a great confluence
of Indians " who came here to fish, and of these many
were strange Indians — ^"vicious men and women
whom Satan made use of to abstract the prospeiity of
religion, who, except for their immortal souls, were
like unto the wild ass's colt, and not many degrees
above the beasts," but Mr. Elliott came to " spread
the net of the gospel around them."
Mr. Elliott gives an account of the manner of con-
ducting the public service in the praying villages
substantially as follows: "The people were called
togetner at the sound of the drum, twice on the Sab-
bath, Jind once on lecture days. The minister began
with prayer, then read from the Bible ; a psalm was
then lined out and sung; then the minister catechised
upon the important principles laid down in holy
writ ; after which he offered prayer, and then preached
his sermon. He then concluded with prayer, singing
and the benediction." Among the English, as well as
among the Indians, both the drum and the horn were
used in calling the people together on the Sabbath.
Wannalancit. — The Sachemship of the Paw-
tuckets was conferred upon Wannalancit, son of
Passaconaway, about the year 1660. He passed most
of his life in the vicinity of Pawtucket Falls, and
along the banks of the Merrimack. Wannalancit
was like his father, kind and considerate, alwavs
friendly to the English, and not easily moved to
acts of violence. In 1664 he came down from
Pennacock (Concord, New Hampshire) where he
passed a portion of his time after becoming chief,
and built a fort near Pawtucket Falls, on what is
now called "Fort Hill," in Lowell,' fearing an .at-
2 The hill in 1S80 was presented to the city by Misa Emily Rogers, for
DRACUT.
281
tsck from the Mobawks, who resided principally in
the valley of the Mohawk River. Hutchinson thus
speaks of the event : " The Penacooks have come
down the river and built at Pawtuiket Falls. They
were opposed to Christianity, and obstinately re-
fused to pray unto God."
It was some fourteen years after Wannalancit
became chief before he made much profession of
having embraced the Christian religion. At one
time he was imprisoned for a debt of forty-five
pounds, and land belonging to the tribe had to be
told to secure his liberation. Gookin gives this ac-
count of his conversion : " May 5, 1674, Mr. Elliott
preached from Matt. 22 : J^ (The Marriage Feast).
We met at the wigwam of one called Wannalancit,
about two miles from the town, near Pawtucket
Falls in Merrimack River. This person, Wannal-
ancet, is a grave, sober man, and of years between
fifty and sixty. He hath always been loving and
friendly to the English. Many endeavors have been
used several years to gain this Sachem to embrace
the Christian religion ; but he hath always stood off
from time to time and not yielded himself up per-
Fonally, though for four years past he hath been
willing to hear the word of God preached, and to
keep the Sabbath. A great reason that has kept
him off, I conceive, hath been the indisposition and
averseness of sundry of his Chief men and relations,
to pray to God, which he foresaw would desert him
in case he turned Christian. But at this time. May
6, 1674, it pleased God to influence and overcome his
heart."
Mr. Elliott proposed to him to give his answer
concerning prayer to God. After some deliberation
and serious pause he stood up and spoke to this
effect :
"Sir.? — You have pleased for four years last past,
in your abundant love, to apply yourselves partic-
ularly' to me and my people, to exhort, press and
persuade us to pray to God. I am very thankful
to you for your pains. I must acknowledge I have
all my days used to pass in an old canoe (alluding
to his frequent custom to pass in a canoe up the
river) and now you exhort me to change and leave
my old canoe and embark in a new canoe, to which
I have hitherto been unwilling; but now I yield
up myself to your advice and enter into a new
canoe, and do engage to pray to God hereafter."
Mr. Gookin further adds : " This was well pleasing
to all present, of whom there were some English per-
sons of quality, as Mr. Richard Daniel, of Billerica,
and Lieutenant Hiochman, a neighbor at Chelmsford,
besides Brother Elliott and myself, and sundry others,
English and Indians. Mr. Daniel desired brother
Elliott to tell this Sachem from him that it may be
while he went in his old canoe he passed in a quiet
a public park, and ie now the delightful resort of thousaudB of people
for pleaBurablt? purpoaefi.
Stream, but the end thereof would be death and de-
struction to soul and body ; but now that he went in
a new canoe perhaps he would meet with storms and
trials, but the end of his voyage would be everlast-
ing reht. Since that time I hear that he doth peree-
vere and is a diligent and constant hearer of God's
word and sanctifieth the Sabbath; though he doth
travel to Wamesit meeting every Sabbath, which is
above two miles, and though sundry of his people
have deserted him."' When King Phillip's War
broke out Wannalancit could not be induced to join
him, but withdrew with his men into the woods. In
consequence of this they suffered severely from Phil-
ip's revengeful disposition. The English also were
alarmed, and the General Court sent messages invit-
ing him to return ; but this he refused to do, and
passed the winters of 1675 and 1676 about the head-
waters of the Connecticut, where abounded a plenti-
ful supply of such game as deer, moose, bear and
other wild animals.
Captain Moseley, with a force of one hundred men,
was sent to Pennacook, where it was reported there
was a body of Indians. As Captain Moseley drew
near, the Indian scouts reported the fact and the In-
dians left their fort and withdrew into the swamps.
Wannalancit would not allow his men to lie in am-
bush, nor shoot at the English soldiers, although they
burnt their wigwams and destroyed some dried fisb.
In 1676, after the war was over,' Wannalancit re-
turned and brousht with him seven white captives,
viz., Philip Eastman, and the wife and five children
of Thomas Kimball, of Bradford, taken by some of
King Philip's men, and condemned to die, the fires
having been twice kindled to burn tbem. But Wan-
nalancit had saved them, and kept them till his re-
turn.
The Rev. John Fiske and Thomas Henchman, of
Chelmsford, are said to have cultivated the friend-
ship of Wannalancit and his tribe, and possessed their
love and confidence. After the return of this chief
from the wilderness he called on Mr. Fiske and in-
quired after the welfare of the people of Chelmsford,
and whether they had suffered much during the war.
Jlr. Fiske said they had been highly favored, for
which he desired to thank God. " Me next," said the
sagacious sachem, intimating that through his influ-
ence and exertions this town had been exempted
from the calamities that had fallen upon many others.
Frequent disclosures were made to Major Henchman
of evil designs upon the English by the savages under
King Philip.
General Gookin bad appointed Henchman an agent
to look after the interests of this tribe, and by his
wisdom and prudence he possessed their entire confi-
dence and esteem.
In March, 1677, Wannalancit informed him that
I Gookiu's Hist. Coll. Vol. 1, page 187.
-King Philip waa killed .\ugust, lt>T6, and the war aoou cloecd.
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the French and Mohawks had entered into a league
against the English, and that they were up the river,
at Souhegan. Consequently a party of forty scouts
under Lieut. Richardson, was raised to traverse the
Merrimack Valley, to protect the inhabitants. In
1686 WannaJancit, with those Indians residing at
Pawtucicet Falls, Wamesit, Nashua, Concord, Groton,
Lancaster and Dunstable, sold all their land to Jona-
than Tyng and others.' '
The last record of Wannalancit to be found is that
of the General Court, which, in 1697, placed him un-
der the care of Jonathan Tyng, and allowed twenty
pounds for keeping him ; but it is thought by many
that he retired to the St. Thomas tribe in Canada,
and ended his days with them.
King Philip's War. — About the 18th of March.
1676, the Indiana under King Philip attacked the
inhabitants of Dracut, and three or four houses were
burued, including that of Edward Coburn. The party
of Indians numbered about forty. The inhahitantj
escaped across the Merrimack River to Chelmsford,
but the Indians pursued, firing at them as far as the
river.
The English returned the fire, and a few of the men
who had guns and ammunition kept the savages at
bay until the others had crossed, when they also were
able to cross in safety. On the 15th of April, 1676,
another attack was made, and some fourteen or fifteen
houses were burned, but no lives were lost on the part
of the inhabitants.' It was during the same year,
1676, that two of the sons of Samuel Varnum were
killed by the Indians. History and tradition give us
the details of the affair as follows :
One morning, about March 18, 1676, while cross-
ing the river I'rom Chelmsford, in a boat, with his two
sons and daughter, to milk the cows, and attended by
a guard of soldiers, they were fired upon by the Indi-
ans lying in ambush, and the two sons, who were at
the oars, were killed. One fell back into the arms of
his sister sitting behind him. The soldiers were so
alarmed that they did not return the fire until called
upon by Mr. Varnum, who fired, exclaiming, " We
must not let dead men lie at the oars I " The sons
were buried in Howard's field, near the river. The In-
dians fled, uncertain of the result of their attack.^
This occurred some time during the spring or summer
of 1676, previous to the close of Philip's War.
" February 25, 1675-6, an attack was made upon
Chelmsford by the Indiana, and several houses de-
stroyed. In consequence of this Colburn's garrison
on the east side of the river was strengthened, but
nearly all the settlements were deserted." (Fox's
" Hist. Dunstable.")
A small garrison had been maintained at Lieut.
Henchman's house from Aug., 1675 ; but in April,
1 Bentley's "Hist Salem,'* Cowley's " lodiaD Memoird."
' Hubbard's'MDdiaQ Wura of New England,"
3.Hubl)ani'8 "Iiid. Wai8," N. U. Hisl. Coll. 31m. of Parker Vamuiu,
Esq.
1676, the Governor and Council ordered a fort to be
built at Pawtucket Falls for the better security of the
people living on the frontier; which was immediately
done, and it was placed under the command of Capt.
Henchman upon receiving news of the approach of
the enemy.
This was an effectual check to the enemy ; and after
the death of Philip, which occurred in Aug., 1676, the
settlers returned to their deserted homes and began in
good earnest to obtain a livelihood.
Frexch axd Indian War. — During the French
and Indian War, which began in 1755, two boys',
Robert and Joseph Coburn, sons of Robert Coburn,
of Dracut, while after their cows one night, were
captured by the Indians and carried off to Canada.
It was the custom of these Indians to amuse them-
selves in winter by skating on the lake. Frequently
a large number of'them would join company and each
one use the skates in turn. One day they put the
skates upon Robert to see how he would manage with
them. He slipped and tumbled down and rolled
about, which made fine sport for them. It pleased
them so much to see him tumble about that they
frequently allowed him to exercise himself on their
skates. One day, when Robert had decoyed them a
considerable distance from where they had stacked
their guns, he rose upon his feet, an expert skater,
made a circuit of the stack of guns, and having
secured one with ammunition, turned his back upon
them and bade them good-bye. They ran for their
guns, powwowed, shouted and fired at him, but the
balls only whistled past him on the ice. He waasoon
out of their reach.
After a long and tedious journev, and much suffer-
ing, he reached an English garri:;on and was restored
to his liome and friends. Joseph did not succeed iu
escaping from them and no information was ever re-
ceived concerning him.'
Indian Curiosities. — Many Indian curiosities
have been found in Dracut and preserved. Flint-
stone arrows are still found on a piece of land owned
by '.he writer. Stone chisels, stone axes, mortars and
pestles, vessels made of soap-stone and many other
curious implements are occasionally found in the
vicinity of their old camping-grounds in various
parts of the town. In one locality in the north part
of the town, near Double Brook (which empties into
Beaver Brook), where the Indians were accustomed to
fish, there is a large shelviug rock, against which it is
said one of their wigwams stood and it still bears the
marks of their smoky fires.*
A Friendly Visit. — On one occasion Mrs. Jabesh
Coburn, who lived in the north part of the town, upon
going to the barn to milk the cows at night, before
the return of the men from the fields, found a large
and powerful-looking Indian on the hay asleep. She
retired as quietly as possible, not wishing to disturb
* KemiQiscencea by Rev. Jouaa Colburu.
DRACUT.
283
him until the return of her husband ; but be awoke
and followed herto the house, and seeing a ehad hang-
ing on the jamb of the fire-piace, asked Mrs. Coburn
to give it to him. She readily complied with the re-
quest and offered to cook it for him. "Me like it
well," said the Indian. So he sat down while she
roasted the shad on the coals. When it was cooked
she pave him some bread and salt to eat with it, which
he appeared to relish exceedingly. After his meal
was ended he approached his hostess and patting her
on the shoulder said : " Me never hurt you," and took
his departure. The last remnant of the Indians in
this town is said to have been a family who lived in a
wigwam at the upper end of the town, as late as the
latter part of the last ceniury.'
An Old Garrison-House. — On Riverside Street,
running easterly from Pawtucket Bridge — formerly
Dracut, but now a part of Lowell— there stood for
many years a house that was used in the early settle-
ment of the town as a garrison -house, and if not the
first, was one of the firut framed dwelling-houses used
for that purpose.
It is supposed to have been built during King
Philip's War, though there is no positive proof of the
date of its erection. The place was owned for many
years by Theodore Hamblet, and is now owned by
Henry Emery, but the house was removed about the
year 1880. Tradition says that at one time, when the
colonel of the garrison was riding on horseback, out-
bide of the stockade, he stopped to water his horue,
and was fired upon by the Indians, who lay in ambush,
and was wounded in such a manner that bis bowels
gushed out upon the pommel of his saddle. He
started off, however, with all speed, firing back at his
pursuers, and finally reached the garrison and es-
caped.
At another time, when a fewsoldiers were stationed
there, they were surprised by the Indians, who had
come upon them by stealth, and succeeded in getting
inside of the stockade. The Indians rushed upon the
house and killed the trumpeter. The soldiers ran up-
stairs and prepared to meet them; the Indians fo-
lowed with their tomahawks in hand ; but the sol-
diers met them with such valor and determination
that not one of the savages escaped alive.
A Brave Woman. — At another time, it is said, the
Indians planned an attack upon the garrison. AVhen
they made their appearance there was no one in the
house but a woman and her children, the garrison
having gone out, apprehending no danger. The
woman kept a sharp lookout, however, after being left
alone, and discovered Indians lurking about. With
great presence of mind she put on a huzzar uniform,
and taking a musket, began walking back and forth
in front of the house, as though on guard. After a
time she went out of sight, and quickly puttiae on a
different uniform, appeared again on duty with aguu
1 RemiuiBceDces by Rev. Jouus Culburu.
on her shoulder. After a time she again disappeared
only to return clothed in the uniform of a colonel.
All this time the Indians lay watching, supposing
they were not seen ; but they dared not make the at-
tack, and withdrew without molesting any one.
We have been informed by Mr. Emery that the
sides of the house were sealed up inside the plaster,
with oak plank, in order to make it bullet-proof.
Human bones have frequently been exhumed in the
vicinity of the old garrison-house, supposed to be
those of Indians killed there.
Lovewell's Expeditions. — In 1724, on account
of the many barbarities committed by hostile tribes
of Indians, the General Court of Massachusetta passed
an act offering a bounty for their destruction. Soon
after this John Lovewell raised a company of thirty
men, of which he was commissioned captain, and
Josiah Farweil lieutenant, and they started upon
their expedition into the wilderness. They discov-
ered an Indian trail about forly-four miles above
Winnepisaukee Pond, and, on the 19th of December,
1724, they came upon an Indian, whom they killed
and scalped, and took a boy about fifteen years old.
captive. >'ot meeting with any further success, they
returned, and upon their arrival in Boston they re-
ceived their bounty, £150, and £50 as a gratuity.
The Newf-LetUr of Jan. 7, 1725, says: "The Lieu-
tenant-Governor and Council were pleased to give
them (Capt. Lovewell's Company) fifty pounds over
and above the one hundred and fifty pounds allowed
by law." '
In this company were Henry Coburn and John
Varnum, of Dracut. For this service Mr. Coburn
received a tract of land in Suncook, N. H.'
This expedition, having been considered in a meas-
ure successful, Capt. Lovewell soon raised another
company of eighty-eight men, among whom were
his brother, Zacheus Lovewell, Thomas Coburn,
Peter Powers, Josiah Cummings, Henry Farweil,
William Ayers and Samuel Fletcher, of Dunstable,
and John Varnum, of Dracut, and on the 1st of Jan.,
1724, they set forth on a second expedition against the
enemy. They came upon a body of Indians at the
head of one of the branches of the Salmon Falls
River, now in the town of Wakefield, N. H., killed
them all, and returned to Boston with their scalps
stretched on poles, for which they received their legal
bounty.
Capt. Lovewell made a third expedition on April
15, 1725, with a company of forty-seven men.
Various accounts are given of this undertaking (see
" White's Early History of New England," Patten's
" History of Manchester," Nason's "History of Dun-
stable," and many others).
It proved to be a most unfortunate one, in which
Capt. Lovewell and most of his men lost their lives.
• The pound was tlien worth S1..16 accordiog to our preeent mode of
reckoning. Nosoo's " Hist. DuojiUible."
3 Nuson.
284
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
After these exploits of Capt. Lovewell the Pequaket
tribe removed to C^iaada, after which the people felt
some degree of security io their homes, and some of
the soldiers were withdrawn from the garrijons in this
vicinity. The following letter (unsigned, probably
from the General Court), to Col. Tyng, at this time,
describes the situation of affairs :
LGTTEB TO COLOXEL TYNO.
"Sir: The enemy beinj; lirawn off, and the danger pretty well over,
you must see that the eoldieri in the Frontiera be reduced to the follow-
ing uunibera, viz. : Twenty-flvo men at Uiiuatable and Dracut, Ton at
Turkey Hill. Fourteen at Groton, Fourteen at Lancaster, Twenty-five
at Rutland and ten at Brookfteld ; and that all the rest of the soldiers
in the Counties of Middlesex and Essex, includius Lieut. Breotnal's
scoula, be forthwith disbanded, and the several officers are required to
put thedaordem in execution accordingly." ^
CHAPTER XXII.
DRA CUT— ( Continued).
CIVIL AXD DOCU-MENTARY HISTORY.
PttttUMi for, and Act of Incorporation.
" To the lion. Council & Representatives of his Majesty's Province of
the -Masauchusetta Bay in New Eugland in General Court assembled
February, 1701.
"The petition of Samuel Sewall, Esq., Benjamin Walker, John Hunt
4 Jonathan Belcher, proprietors of part of the Trait of Laud culled
Dracut, bevoiid Chelmsford iu (he County of MidUlese.x on the North
Side of .Merrimack Kiver, and of Samuel Varuum, Thomas Varnuni,
John Vurnum, Jueeph Varnum, Thumas Colburne, Daniel Coolburn,
Daniel Culburn, Jr., Ezra Colburu, Joseph Colburn, John Colburn,
Kobert Colburn, William Colburne, James Uicharddon, Ezekiel Richard-
son, Beuja. Richardson, Joseph Richardsou, Ezra Colburne, Jr., Joaiah
Colburne, Hannah Colburn, widow, Elizabeth Colburne, widow, i llau-
nab Richardson, Inhabitants and Proprietors of the said Tract of Land
called Dracut —
** Humbly Showetb,
" That the said Tract of land (which) adjoins to Dunstable on the
West •& Northwest, A: runs seven miles Eastward upon the River from
Dunstable line and six miles Northward from the River) lyes very com-
modious for a Township, ,1 hath about Twenty Families already nettled
thereupon in which are about Eighty Souls, i Fonianiuch as the making
said place a Township will not only be a great Encouragement to the
Inhabitants thereof .t be a means for the settlement of the Ministry
among them (for the benefit of which they are uow obliged to go to
Chelmsford, which is a great difficulty ± cannot be attended by their
Children 4 several others by reason of the distance thereof) but will
also be of conaiderahle benefit to the Publick, and be a great Strength-
ening of the Frontier parts by reason of the people which will be de-
sirous to settle at said place when made a Township, because of the con-
venient situation thereof.
*' Your Petitionera therefore humbly pray, that by the Grant of this
Hon.ble Court, the Tract of laud aforesaid may be mide a Township,
and that the Iiihabilanta, which are or shall settle thereupon, may have
& enjoy all Libertys, Privileges & Immunities as the Inhabitants ol
other Towns within this Province have & do enjoy.
"And your Petra. ae iu duty bound, shall ever pray, ic.
" In the house of Representatives, Febr. 2oth, 1701. Read.
" In the HouBo of Representatives, February 2oth, 1701.
" Retalced, That the prayer of the Petition on the other Side b«
Granted, and the Tract of Uand therein described be made a Township
i called by the name of Drtcilt, provided That the Bounds Specified
Intrench not upon any former Grant or Grants of Townships. That
the Inhabitants of Land assist in the maintenance of the Ministry at
the Town of Chelmsford as at present they do. until they are provided
with a Minister os the Law directs. That a General Plot of said Land
1 Manaachusetts Archives, Book 72, p. 263.
(taken by a Sworn Surveyor), be laid before this Court and their Session
beginning in May next. And that if any Land shall h.ippen to full
within the Bonoda abovesaid, that hath not been heretofore granted, it
shall be reserved to be disposed of by this Government —
'• Sent up for Concurrence,
"NEHE3II.VH Jewett, Speaker.'*
" At a great and General Court or .\ssembly of the Province of the
Massachusetts Bay in New Eiig and, bsguii and held in Boston upon
Wednesday, the 23th day of May. 170), and continued by several prero-
gations &. adjouruments unto Wednesday, the 18th day of February,
& then met.
"Thursday, February 26, 1701.
" .\ petition of Samu?l Sewnll, Ksq., Ephraim Hunt, Esq., Benjamin
Walker, John Hunt, A Jonathan Belcher, Proprietors of a part of
the tract of laud called Dracut, beyond Chelmsford, in the County of
Middlesex, on the North side of Merrimack River, i of Samuel Var-
num i several others, inhabit luti .& Proprietors of the said tract of
land, praying that the said tract of land which adjoins to Dunstable on
the We.-it and Northwest, ,t runs seven miles Eastward upon the River
from Dunstable line, Jfc six miles Northward from the river, may he
made a Township, Jt that the Inhabitants which are, or shall seitle
thereupon, may have 3i enjoy all liberties, privileges^: immunities as
the Inhabitants of other Towns within this Province have and do
enjoy, was sent up fronn the llouje of Represeuutives with a resi.he
passed by that House tiiereupon in the words following (being Q repeti-
tion of the foregoing resolve passed in the House of Representatives) :
" In Council, 2Gth of February, 1701. Read, Concurred with Jt Con-
sented to.
".loseph LyiiJe, John Walley, Eiu. Hutchinson, Penn Townseiid,
Nuthl. Thomas, Nathl. Bjlield, Beuja. Brown, .lolin lliggilisoo, Jos.
Russell, Elisha Cooke, John Halhorne, Elislia Hutchinson, Peter Ser-
geant, John Foster, Jonilhau Corwin, John Appletoii.
" "-'oppy examiued. J. Wii,i..iaD, .S'cc'rjr."
surveyob's repobt.
" According to the order of the Honble Genl Court of last year, there
is laid out to the Inhabitants aud proprietors of Dracutt, a tract of land
for a township on the North side of Merrimack Kiver, it begins at nn
Island lying in Merrimack River called Wekasook and takes about lialf
of il, and is bounded by Capt. Scarlett and Dunstable line on the North
West as as far as Kimballs larme at Jerimies Hill, wliirb is about eii
miles in a crooked line, then it is bounded by Dunstable line on the
west about 4 miles. Il is bounded southerly by Merrimack River about
7 miles by a straight line from wekasook, where wo began. The South
eait corner is a white stake maiked with D a little from the river, aud
from thence it runs due North 0 iiiilos, which line is near piirallel with
Dunstjible line on that side. Then by a Northwest line it agniiie closes
to Dunstable line. This Northwest line is four miles longer, then on
the West it is bounded by Dunstable line 4 miles.
" Laid out and bounded by
"Jonathan Dasfobth, Survptjor.
" Ma.v 26, 1702.
" Dracut Township contains 22,334 acres as .\ttest,
"Jo. DASFoaTH, Siiraetjor.
"June 3, 1702."
"June 6th, 1702.
"Ordered that the town of Dracut be rated with the town of
Chelmsford as formerly, in the tax to be raised this session, they having
the Liberty to chuse aud juin an assessor with the assessors of said
Town.
" Sent up for Concurrence,
" Jaji«. Costers, Speater."
Common, or Reserved Land.— In many of the
towns, during the early settlement of this country,
there was " Common Land," or, as it was generally
called, " Reserved Land." The name was properly
applied, inasmuch as when towns were incorporated,
land that had not been previously granted was re-
served, to be afterwards disposed of by the State. In
Dracut a considerable amount of territory was thus
situated, and in 1709, eight years after the town was
incorporated, a petition was presented to the General
Court for permission to dispose of the reserved land
DEACUT.
285
for reasons set forth in the petition which is herewith
inserted :
" To Ilia Excellency, Joaepli Dudley, Esq , Captain-General ami Gnv-
ernor-iD-Chief. The Hau.ble tbe Coaociland Kepreaentntivee in General
C^iirt araemljled Feb. pro. 17(iO.
"The petition of John Varnum of Dracut, ^vithin the County of
Middlesex on behalf of hiuiaelf Jt other the FreeboMers and InhahitantB
of the said Town—
*' Humbly slieweth,
" That in tlie year 1701, This Hon.ble. Great A General Court or As-
eembly upon tlie petition of Samuel Sewell, Esq., Ephmim Hunt, Esq,,
Benjaeniin Walker, A Jonathan Belcher, proprietore of part of tin.- Tract
of Land called Drocut, beyond Clieltnsford, on ihe NoHh Side of Merri-
niacU Uiver, and of Samuel Varnum A; several othere, Inhabitants &
proprietors of thoaaid Tract of Land, whicli adjoine Dmwtable on the
Meat i Korthwest, &. rune Seven Miles Eastward upon the River from
the Diinetable Line &. Six miles Northward from the River, were
pleAsed to Grant the eanie to be a Township, to be called by the Name of
Dnicut i that tlie Inliabitants which are or shall settle thereupon may
have i enjoy all Liberties, Privileges A Immunities as the Inhabitants
of other Towns within this Province have A do enjoy, and that if any
Land sliall happen to fall within the Bound aboveeaid that hath not
been heretofore granted, it shall be reserved to be disposed by this Gov-
ernment.
" Now 60 it is, may it please Your Excellency & tliis Hon.ble As-
sembly, pursuant tu a Clause in the aforesaid Grant, that the Inhabit-
ants on the said Land assist in the nidintenance of the Ministry at
Chelnisfoid, as at prcHenl they do, until they are pruvidid wiih a Minis-
ter as the law directs, they have accordingly paid the Ministry dues
there. But being desirous to settle the Jliniitry A Gospel Ordinances
among themselves ns in duty bound, for tliPir own benetitand advantage
A the Benefit of their Families i posierity. have fur Twu or Three
years piul, had some young Schollura, Caadidates for the Ministry, to
preach unto them, and at prcBeut have Young Mr. Chewver, of Marble-
head, with them attending that Work with geiicml acceptance A: appro-
bation, A- have good hopes they shall obtain him to Settle among them, if
theycun give him due Encouragement —
•'They therefore humbly Pray, That it would please this Hon.ble As-
sembly fur the better Enabling them so to do, to Order i Grant that the
reserved Land lying within the Boundaries aforesaid mentioned in the
afurc recited Order, may be allotted to i among such as shall come to
settle with them, as the Freeholders i proprietors may think fit—
" And your Petitioners, aa in duty bound, shall ever pray, ic.
"John Vahnvu.
" Boston, Feb. Cth, 1709."
■' Fehy. Gth, 1709. In Council. Read <k Ordered That Colo. Jonathan
Tyng, Capt. John Lane, Capt. Edward Johnson. \. Lieut. Hill,
with such as shall be added to them by the Representatives, be u Com-
mittee to make entjuiry into the Quantity of the Reserved Lands, men-
tioned in the within recited Order ic niakf Report thereof to this
Court at their next sitting i what number of luhabiunie it may be
capable of EnierUining to make a Strong Town.
"Sent down for concurrence.
'* IsA Addingtok, Beery"
*' In the House of Representatives, Sept'r 7th, 1709. Read i Concur'd
ic that Mr. John Stevens be added to the said Committee.
" John Cl.\ek, Speaker.
" Coppy examined. J. Willard, Sec'r^."
As we have already seen, the town wan incorpo-
rated in 1701. But the very earliest records are miss-
ing. The first entry in the first town-book in exist-
ence, for the choice of officers, was made March 25,
1712, when John Varnum was chosen town clerk,
and John Varnum, Joseph Coburn and Ebenezer Good-
hue, selectmen. The first book of the " Proprietors "
of the ReaerveJ Land (who were the legal voters of
the town) is in existence, from which may be gathered
information not to be found elsewhere.^ The first
1 Also see Naaou'ii " Hifit. Dracut " in Drake's "Middlesex Co."
record in this curious old book bears the date of 1710,
and reads as follows :
" We do except of ye parsons within named, to be ProprietorB of the
Reserved Land io the Township of Dracuii. and do order thir Loots and
thir Nams to be Entered in the Book of recordsfoi Dracutt, accordingly,
Jonntban Tyng.John Lane, John Stearns.
*' This is a treu Coppy of the General Cort's order.
" Wittnas Ouer Hands. Joseph TabNUm,
*" EZEKIEL ChFEVEE.
*' Jaues Fales."
"Dbacltt, Janevnry ye 2"*, 1710.
" These are the names of the men that have the Loots now In
posaession with ye consent of ye General Cort's Committee, and sum
that have sould to others with the Conacnt of ye Selectmen of the Town
of Dracutt.
"Selectmen : John VarDum, Joseph ColboD, Ebenezer Goodhew, Ben-
jamin Barans.
" 1, Ebenezer Goodhew ; 2, Ezekell Cheerers : 3, Jauiea Colbon ; 4,
Benjamin Hooro ; o, Ebenezer Wright; G, Oneeimus Marsh ; 7, Benja-
min Barans ; 8, Solomon Wood ; 9, Josiah Rlchasun ; 10, NathanelL
Foxe ; 11, Anthony (Neggerou) (negro); 12, William Reed; 13, Na-
tbanill Cheevers ; 14, Samuel Frime ; 15, John Higgason.
"These are the fifteen that Lye between mr. Bflllsher's Farme and
mr. Winthi ip's Farme, and over>' man's nam is sect te his Loot.
"Samuel prime his Loot Lyes below mr. wiathrip's Farme, Lying on
merrimack river. John Hijigeson's Loot lyea onmerrimack river below
Samuel Prime's Lout. Minister's Loot and rainister'a Farme lies at
Compos on ye north sid of bever Brook. Solomou Wood's Loot lyee on
GompoB Brook. George Broneu 2, Joseph Crtsby 3, Ezekel 4, Calbrey's
Balle o. John Hayward, Oheyney Flage these two Loot Lye on the
North aid of Bever Brook west of the minister's Farme. Solomon
Wood his Loot Lyes on ye east Side of Bever Brook and on ye northe sid
of ye Colbon'6 ould Ueddowes. John barane, hosacaah Tounasane,
Joseph Whitter, these three LooU lys narth of mr. Winthrips Farme."
The following is a record of a proprietora' meeting
neld in the spring of 1716-17 :
"At a generall meeting of the proprietors of the common and undi-
vided land belonginj: to the Township of Dracutt legally assembled on
the last thii-sday of march, in the year of our Lord, 171G, by vertue of
a warrant from justice Tyng. 1. chosen for moderator for this prespot
meeting Ezekiel Cheever, Senior. 21y. Choeen for a clarke for the pro-
pi ietors aforesaid Nathaniel Fox. 31y. Chosen for n Commlty to act
about the undivided land belonging to the foresaid proprietore, mr.
George Brown of Bilricah. Capt. Josiph Varnum, Ezekiel Cheever,
Senior, Mr. Nathaniel Fox, mr. Jeanis Fails. 4Iy. Voted that tbiscoro-
niity now choeen, shall go upon the undivided land and vieu the land
that is not yet divided, and lay It out into two squadrons, and the
land that lyeth nearest the river, loots to be laid out into the river
Loots : and that which lyeth nearest the Gunisett's Loots, to be laid out
unto the Gumset Loots. Sly. Voted that there shall be a considerable
quantity of upland laid out to each man's medow, laid out of the land that
lyeth about his uie^dow, out by the Committy according to the quantity of
meadow he hath; and so much upland as every nian huth laid to h\&
meadow it uhall be reckoned as so much of his share in the undivided land.
(j|y. Voted that when the land is laid out into squadruns, then they
shall lay out unto every loot an hundred and thirty acres or more if
they shall judge it best, and the rest at the next laying out. 7ly. Voted
that this Committy, or a major part of them, are fully empowered to lay
out all the undivided land as aoone as cad coDvenieotlj be done, and
that this Committy shall be allowed fore sliilliugi a day for their aer-
Tices by the proprietors. 8ly. Voted that this Committy shall bare the
power to sell some of this undivided land to pay the charge of bijlog
out said land, and the sale of the land to be posted up io aome public
place. 91y. Voted that for the time to come any two of the Committy
and the clarke shall have ptiwer to cal 1 a proprietor's meeting
by posting up a notification in some publick place 14 dayee before the
meeting Inly. Voted that this Committy shall have to employ the eer-
veir or artist so much as shall be needful, and the proprietors to bare the
charge of it. Illy. Voted that this committy shall have full power to
lay what high wages they shall think needful. Lastly. It is voted and
ucreed upon that do man shall debar any other from coming to bis
meadow, where tliere shall not be highways laid out, but every man
shall have sufficient liberty to come tu hia meadow for mowixrgaDd mak-
286
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ing and carrying off his hay. These were the things that were agreed
upon and voted at this meeting.
" Attest EzEKiEL Chekver.
" Moderator."
It appears that the early settlers made no distinc-
tion on account of color. A lot of the reserved land
being laid oi:t to Anthony, or Tony, a negro, or, as
the name was written, " neggerow," in 1721, reads as
follows:
"Mabch ye 25tli, 1721. A loot laid out to Anthony, of dracott in the
reeerred land in Dracut, in the county of Middlesex, in New Englami,
contnining 88 acres, be it more or Leas, as it is bounded Lying Southerly
of Higginson's medo Loots, bounded Easterly by a Line of Markod
Trees Littered A by Thointon's land, Southerly by Land Laid out to eze-
kiel cheever, of Salem Villsge, which was sonld to the s^ Anthony.
The above s^ Anthony hod Ten acres of Land Laid out in the bounds uf
the above b<* Cheevers Land, the westerly line of the above s** Anthony's
Land is Pine trees by ffuxe's mnrshea, and tborulon's Land tl>e north-
west corner is a stake pnd stones. Also another Loot of Land Luid out
to aalhony, negro, of Dracutt^ in the above s^ Reserved Land in Dra-
cutt, containing four and a half acres, be it more or le*«. Lying Wester-
ly of his homestead house Loot, bounded Easterly on 6^ house Loot, and
Westerly by County Bhond Leading from the Canenytrj' to Cuitisses
house. Also another Lout Laid out to the ub')ve sjiid Anthony, negro,
lying In the above said Reserved Laud un the South side of the Culburn's
New meadowp, Bounded Southerly by a Hhoad Leading to Ceader Pond
mea<iows. Westerly by the Lund of beiija Wood, Northerly by the Col-
burn's new medo faniie, eusterly by a Line of marked trees cald four
Loot, in order from Bolcher's und Hildretli's Land and Coiitaino Twenty
Eight Hcres, be it more or less, Laid out and recorded by us with some
help of Nathaniel Fox in laying out.
" JOSEPH VAttNUM, \
*' EZEKIEL CllEEVEE -
"JAMES FALES, J
A lot was also laid out at the same time for the first
minister that should settle in the town :
'* Mahch ye 25th. 1721. A Lott of Land Laid outt to the firs Setled
miniuter in Drurtit, in the Reserved Lands iu said dracutt, in tlie County
of Middlesex, iu New England, cotitaining One Hundred and Twenty
one acres Culled the sixth Lott southward from Goulding'a Pond.
Bounded Westerly on William Colburn's Dei^tracted medo Line Nortlit^r-
ly by a line of niaiked trees Lettered with S. B by the fifth Lott. easter-
ly by the easterly Line of Dracutt, the South East corner is u rock
stoneHon it. Bounded Southerly by a line of marked trees and beeps of
stones, also another Lott of Land called the fourth Lott northward from
Gouldlng's and Callecut's farnie, is laid out to the first settled minister
in Dracutt, in the uttove said Reserved Land, and contains 186 acres, be
it more or leas. Bounded as followeth. ees westerly by j, Vamum Line,
Northerly by a line of mnrkd trees Lettered with S. B., Easterly by that
Land that was Laid out to the Gumpas Loots equatl to the River Lotts,
SoHtherly by a line of marked tres Lettered with S. B. Numbered
with four chops. Also another Lott of Land Laid ont to the first settled
minister la Dracutt, in the above s^ Reserved Land Containing 28 acres,
be it more or le-s. Lying Easterly of the first settled minister's Lott and
the minister farme, bounded westerly on the Mtnisler's Irf}tt and minis-
tree farnie. Northerly and Easterly by a line of marked trees. Southerly
by a line of marked trees by a medo that lyeth on beavour Brook, also
seven acres of upland laid ont to the first settled minister in the Town
of Dracutt, Lying on the Colburn's new medo farrae, stso one acre of
Land Lying at the west end of the seventh Lott Northward from Gould-
inga & Colecut's famie.
" Laid out oud recorded by us with some help from Nathaniel Fox in
Laying out.
"JOSEPH VARNUM, N
•'EZEKIEL CHEEVEB, - ^^^^ ^°^
*' JAMES TALES, J «** ^O^k."
Comte for
B^ work."
There were also laid out at this time, from the com-
mon land, lots to the folio wing- named persons: Ebe-
nezer Ingalls, of Marblehead ; Anthony — negro, Wm.
Colburn, of Dracut; Col. Samuel Brown, of Salem ;
Caleb Moody, of Newbury ; Joseph Wheeler, of Con-
cord ; Thomas Wyman, of Dracut; Solomon Wood,
of Bradford; George Brown, of Billerica ; Ezekiel
Cheever, of Salem Village; Ephraim Curtis, John
Barron, Nathaniel Fox and Benj. Wood, of Dracut;
Mr. Proctor, of Boston ; Ebenezer Wright, of Dracut ;
Jonathan Waldo, of Boston ; Josiah Richardson, of
Dracut; Nathaniel Cheever, of Salem Village; Jos-
eph Varnum, of Dracut; Alexander McNeil, Ebe-
nezer Goodhue, Benj. Richardson and Samuel Prime,
of Rowley; most of whom were actual settlers of the
town.
The proprietor's book also mentions some very
curious and amusing names which were applied to
certain localities, a few of which are retained lo the
present day. Among the names mentioned are Ridge
Hill, Mine Pet Hill, Walker Brook, Mine Brook,
Beaver Brook, Ayer's Hill, Island Pond Hill, Cedar
Brook, Dennison's Brook, Island Pond Brook, Gould-
ings Brook, — an affluent of Beaver Brook, — Tony's
Brook, — 30 named from the nei^ro, Anthony, — Dun-
stable Brook, Long Pond, North Pond, Ledge of
Rocks Pond, Bumpas, The Cove, Distracted Meadows
and Peters Pond.
Roads Laid Out. — At the last town-meeting men-
tioned, several roads were laid out, a transaction the
j modus operandi of which the following is a fair sample
and description :
I ''March 25th, 1721. A high \ray Laid out in dracutt, in Middlesex,
iu new Kugland, iu the reserved Land at a place called Prim's Lott and
Higginson's Laud, two or three Rods wide, as it is here plotted out with
heaps of stones and trees bhisMed with two blasses next the way begin-
ning westerly .it Winthrop's fiirm with heaps of Rocks, running easterly
over rocky land, then turning partly nortlieHsterly with trees marked
down a hill of a plain, then running partly easterly on the north side uf
a little pond hole, socontinuinK easterly to the mine pit hill. with a little
crosse, aliooii the north aide of mine pit, then running northenBterly on
the South Side of Spruce bog in Higginson's Laud, then turning p;irtly
easterly to the east line of Dracutt Town, this is fur a country Road
tiom dracutt to haTerhill. Laid out and platted and recorded by ua
Cuuimitty fur said work.
*' EzEKiAL Cheever,
" Joseph Vasnum,
" James Falzs."
This was the main road leading easterly to Haver-
hill. The Mine Pit referred to was on the Gen.
Varnum farm, and is the same that has recently been
re-opened and from which a considerable quantity of
nickel has been taken.
Price of Land. — It maybe interesting to some
of the residents at the present time to know the price
for which their valuable acres were once sold by this
same committee :
*' Dracutt. Janevery the last in ye year of our Lord 1722. According
to a vote of the proprietors we have sold il acres of said laud upon ye
mine pit, also 140 acres at the East line of ye town about a mile off from
Merrimack River, be they more or leas, according us they are bounded.
Sold to Jeams Colburne ffor 3 pounds and one shilling. Also 1(X> acres
sold at north pond for 5 pouuds to .\lesauder Mackneal, also 100 acres
by Gouldiiig's farme sold to Alexa:;der Mackueal for M pounds, be they
more or less, according as they are bounded. Also 100 acres by Sedar
pond, sold for 8 pounds to Richard Jakes, be it more or less, according
us it is bounded. Also sold 76 acres to Nathaniel Cheever fur 7 pounds, 10
Eibilliugs, be it more or less, according as it Is bounded. All this above
DRACUT.
287
Innd waa measured wj(h the eame meneure as the other Lotts were, and
were all pusled in nt the meetingbouoe, and some at ja tATero 14 duyee
before tLey were sold.
" EZEKIEL ChEE\'EB,
'* Jaues Fai.es,
Votes and Records. — Some of the early records
from the town books are here transcribed, not alone
for the information they afford, but for the quaint
language in which the facts are recorded:
*' Dbacut, Aug. 9, 1*21.
" Cnptaine Joseph Varnum woa this vearchoaeDurepresentutive to the
General Court."
He was also chosen the fullowing year.
"Auc ye S^ day, 1721.
" Jonathan Nej?ro, the son of Anthony Negro and Sara, his wife, was
born unto tUeni this day."
" Dracut, Feb. ye 9, l72'-28.
" Then tacken up and strayed by Joaiab Colburn. of Dmcut, a Black
Uoir Cull, Coming in two year old with a star in her foarbad.
*'EpHEAiM HiLnacTH, Tount Clerk."
"Mar. ye 24. 1731-32.
*' Voted ye Colonel Joseph Tarnum shall have ye fishing fules In Dra-
cutt fur the }ear iu8uing, fur twenty pounds "
" Dbacctt, December y« 22"'', 1727.
"Then taken up and strayed by Joeiali Richarditou, uf Dmcutt. a Red
heifer, cunilD]; two year old. Some white under her belly, a white ftpot
in her forehead, and Nomething whitish at ye end of her taile, and a slit
ciitt in ye under side uf the near Ear, and u slit cult in >« top uf y off
Ear."
* Taken up r kind of a Sandy Sow with a peace cut of from y« Rit Ear,
and full of black sputH. marked with 3 huls iu y rit ear and a kind of a
^twuUuwa tail ill y« Left Ear JL also 8 pigs."
•* Deacutt. Jan. y<&lh, 1729-30.
"Then Taken up and Strayed by , of Dntcutt, a Dark
Bi'uwn Cult, a gelding, cumiog a Bifut two yoars old, with a happeney
out of y* off Ear."
"July y»24:l7<6.
** Then tacken up in Damag pessant and impounded a Bay mere with a
Small Bay niear Cult, they Both have a fue white barej In tliare fure-
hed anl Blackish mains and tailed, and Blackish Legs, they have No
other mark Either Natural or artyfitial to B« Discovered, and the owner
Nut appearing they were proceeded with an Strays on y 27 of y month.
Thay were apprised at &ve Pounds."
"July ye 26 : 1736.
" then tacken up In Damage peaant and Impounded, a Black and white
Pyed S^HJiIed or Speckled cow with u short Bubtaile and a pece cropt out
of y End of her Neare Eare and a Small pece cut ouie of y* under Sid
of her Eare and (no owner appeanug). She whs proceeded with as u
Stray on v* 2^' of y* mouth. She was apprised at six pounds and y« dam*
age at five ahillingb."
" December y» 8"", 1742.
"Then taken np In Damage pesant. Impounded and Strayed, A Gray
Mare Judged to Be aboute 13 yeare old. She hath a halft} petty cut out
off one of her £ar«. Said mare was apprised at Six pounds iu old ten.
nor.*'
• DEAcrTT, Sept. r 7"'. 1738.
" Then taiken up In Damage peasant (and proceeded with as a Stray), A
Bay Hors Colt With a Black mane and tale and a Small while Speck on
hia Nose, he hath one Wall ey ; be Is Judged to Be about two years
old."
" Dracutt, November y« 19, 1748.
" Then taken up and Strayed, a Brown Cow. coming in Six years old
with the Top of the neer Eare catt off, and a balf-peney cutt out of the
under side of Both Earee, and white ander the belly, and the hind feet
white, and the Top of Both Horns cntt off, and a Large Long taile, and
the hair of the Eand of the Tayle white, no other marks natural or arti-
ficial to be Discoveted."
"Dbacttt, March 3I« 1740.
" At a general Town Meeting of the Inhabitants of the Town of Dra-
cutr, a vute was passed tbatfiwine should go at large in the said Town,
tliis present year."
Eaely Industries. — In 1816 Reveral new mills
were built in this vicinity, which contributed very
much to the convenience and prosperity of the inhab-
itants of Dracut. A saw and griftt-mill was built at
Pawtucket Falls by Luke Bowers & Sons, a
grist-mill on the locks and canaU on Merrimack
River b}' Nathan Tyler, and a saw-mill on Beaver
Brook by Moses Hale. ^
PeBAJIBDLATION of the BoDNDAfiV BETWKEN DSACrT AND DtJirffTABLC.
Decembr In y« year 1723.
*' Renewing the bounds between Dracut and Dunstable by order of the
selectmen of E^cb town, beginning at a pine tree on the North Bide
of beaver Brook in sight of 8^ Bruuk, being marked and lettered wltb E,
it being fallen down we have Laid stones about it from thence Runnine
Southard by the old marked threes, many of them Lettered M~(b D D til
we came Near to a place Called Slone Dam, then Not finding the old
bounds, wu agreed both parties to mark a pine w^ stands on the East
Side of beaver Brook, fuur Rods froui a^ Dam, w^ tree is Lettered w^
D D and elands by it wt> frs^i tree ^ Slone both parties a Greed to be a
bound between s'^ Town from s<i bound tree Konning Southward to a
pine tree marked and Lettered D D. So Rnnuing to a pine marked
and stones about it Near to a pine tree w^ U called the Southeast angle
of Henry Kimbles farm & from e<^ piue tree we Renewed the old bounds
to Long pond then Running by the pond Part of the way to an oak
tree then the e<' bound L^wt both Comlttyes u Gree^l upon a Line off
marked trees Crag Rock to be the bounds between efl towmi w^ trees are
lettered w^ D. D. and then we Renewed the old bounds to marrimac
River, this is our mututl agreement that the s^ lines shall stand good
fur Ever, and it is a Greed that the buundu w^ jg mentioned shall be en*
tered in Duusiable and Dracut Town Buuks.
"Thos Varkcm,
"Joseph Vabncu,
"Sam". Colbubn.
*' Being the whole of the Comity of Dracut.
"Joseph Blanuabp,
his
"J08IPH X BtTTTEBriELD.
mark
"Being the major part of the Comity of the town of Dunstable ap-
pointed for B^ work.
"Samtel Danfoeth,
"Surue^or,"
"BiLLERiCA Great Bridge/' — On the Boston
road, at Billerica, near the old fordway, was erected
the firdt bridge over the Concord River previous to
1658. In 1662 it was removed higher up the river,
and again in 1699 it was removed end built over at
the place where it now stands. It was built and sup-
ported at the joint expense of Chelmsford, Groton,
Dracut, Dunstable, Westford and Billerica; Groton
obtdined an act of exemption in 1699. The other
towns petitioned that the act might be repealed and
the General Court referred the whole matter to the
Court of Sessions, from which Groton obtained a de-
cision in their favor in 1716. Dracut and Dunstable
were holders until 1737, and Chelmsford till 1792, at
which time the whole expense was assumed by Bil-
lerica.^
Historians differ somewhat in their dates, but all
agree upon the main facts. The following is from
Butler's *' History of Groton : "
"About the year 1672 a committee was choven in Groton, to m«et
with Concord and Chelmsford men, to lay out the way to the Bay^-or
the Bay Road. This Bay road lay through Chelmsford and Billerica.
The bridge over Concord river was built at the expense of Billerica,
Chelmafurd, Groton, Dracut «t Dunstable, and supported by those towns
for many years."
I Allen, 86.
2 Allen, 76.
288
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The towa of Dracut voted, May 22, 1738, to pay to
John Varnum the sum of £6 "for his Servis and Ex-
penses In GiLting the Town free from Charg of Bil-
lirica Bridg." This bridge, built over the Concord
River, on the main road to Boston, was almost indis-
pensable to the towns required to build and support it
for many years, as Boston afforded the only market
for the productti of their farms, and over thi^ bridge
must pass all their traffic, besides all the goods for the
supplies of the country stores north of Billerica.
And up to the time when the Middlesex Canal was
constructed (incorporated in 1793, and opened for
service in 1803, at a cost of $500,000), a substantial
team of four horses was required to transport the New
England rum alone required by the country mer-
chants in Chelmsford, Dracut and neighboring towns.
Line Established between New Hampshire
AND Massachusetts. — In 1741, when the boundary
line was established between Massachusetts and Sew
Hampshire, a considerable portion of the territory be-
longing to Dracut became a part of New Hampshire.
This land, with other territory, was, on July 5, 1740,
incorporated as the town of Pelham. This divisional
line was very unsatisfactory to Dracut on account of
the loss of so much of their land, and a committee was
cho.-en to draw up a petition, ''setting forth to ye
king's most Excellent Majesty the distressed circum-
stances of ye town, and praying that the part of &"*
town that 'u taken away by said line may be annexed
to ye &** province of Massachusetts Bay."
The boundary line was not satisfactory to Massa-
chusetts on account of its severing from the State
some sixteen towns that had been settled under the
original charter. The subject h thus commented
upon by the authnr of " Richardson Memorial : '*
"The clinrter under which Massiichuaetts wag settled by Charles l3t.
King of EnglHDd, to sundry persons, on the 19th of March, IGJT-)^, ouri-
veyeU to those gentlemen, well known iw the llo-ssttchusetts CiPinp;iny,
all lliHt tract of land, — that portion aa the earth's aurfiice, extending
from a point three miles north of the Slorrinmck River, and every jiart
of it, to a point three miles south of Charles River, und every part u( it,
and within these limits from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean, or Great
South Sea.
"With a view to ascertain the northern limit of thia crant, a com-
mission WHS appointed in 1639 hy the governnieot of Slossachiisetts.
The limit was found at the outlet of the Luke Winnepiseo^^ee where the
Merrimack leavea said lakeuud where it begins to be the Merrimack. A
certain tree three miles north of this was marked an the northern limit
of Masaachn setts. It is plain as the day-light that this is the true north
hmit whence the line should run arcordiug to the charter.
'* One of the last acts of that profligate and irreligious prince, Charles
II. was to annul the charter, and ihus deprive the people of Maa^ichu*
Bettsof any title to their lauds, which were all held tinder this instru-
ment. It was a most wicked and flagitious proceeding, though dune
under the forms of law, in the Chancery Court of England, Oct., I68J.
" The rights and liberties of MasaachusettM now lny prostrate in the
dust. The government of Xew Hampshire, taking advantage of this
unhappy state of afTairs— for the new charter of 1692 did not recognize
the old boundaries as established in 1628— after many elTurts continued
through a score of years, at letigth prevailed on the Privy Council of
England to issue the order referred to in the text. And thu^, by a mere
stroke of the pun, ^laasacbusetts was uhorn of a Urge portion of her
heritage, uf which she had full possession more than a century."
John M. Varnum, Esq., a native of Dracut, but
now a resident of Boston, who has paid much atten-
tion to the history of the town, in a communication to
the Lowell Courier, some time since, gave the follow-
ing interesting facts upon this subject :
"The writer possesses a copy made in 1741 of this original survey,
which gives ihe shape of the original town uf Dracutt pretty much IJku
a club foot, with the toes towards Sew Uanipshire. A later plan, made
in October, 1701, by Frederic French, surveyor, shows the foot lopped
i off as far as the instep, and the northern line of the town following
almost parallel with the Merriuiack Kiver. This reduced the town to
1G,()00 acres.
" It is a carious incident in the history of this ancient town, which has
lost 30 much territory of late years by being absorbed into the city of
Lowell — over one hundred and twenty years its junior — that its first
dismemberment was the result of what was regarded as Ihe arbitrary
act of tlie King of Greut Britain In changing the line between tlie two
provinces of New Hampshire and Massachuserts Buy. This led to an
emphatic protest on the part of the town, whose petition, dated Dra-
cutt, 2(ilh Movtniber, 1741, recites :
"'Whereas by his Majesties lute determination of ye northern bound-
ary of ye ilassachusetts province, the greate part uf ye town of Dra-
cuit is left out of the Province of Massachusetts Ciy to which they al-
wiiys supposed themselves to belong, they tlien and thereupon voted :
That u petition be preferred to ye Iviug's most e\celK-nt mujesty setting
fottli our distressed circunietances, and pntying that that jiart of sd
town that is taken away by said line, may be annexed to ye sd province
I of )IaB!(achu&i-tta Bay, and that .Mea-t John A'arnum, Darius Uichurdson
' and Nathauiel Fox, or any two of tlient, be a cunimiitee and be fully
empowered to sign t>uch one petition and prefer it to ye Court of Great
' Britain iu such a way and niFuner as thoy or any "2 of them bIihII think
I most LOMveuient, and in such w;iy and uianupr for us to appear in all
, tilings touching such our petition uccurdiug to their best discretion.'
I "This petition was presented to the General Court, which reported
that :
" ' The committee appointed on the petition of John Viirniim, of iJia-
cutt, have taken ye same under consideration and apprehend tlitit fur
Ending the Dittlculry mention in said petition and all Ditflciilty uf je
doit In any other towns within ye Province Bordering on the Province
of New lltim|whire, a committee be appointed by tlie Geiil Court to Goe
into the uaid sflvei-al towns and Enquire what number ul Polls and mte-
uble E;jtates is taken oS from this Province by the Lines Lately run Be-
twixt said Provinces and make Report thereof to this Court as soon as
may be, and That in the mean time the Cuiistjihles of Dmcutt and Not-
tingham be released from Cliarlestown goal.'
" Who the.-e constables were or wlmt they did does not appear. No
record theieuf appears in the town bouksuf Dnicutt. It is pnthable that
the town still insisted on its rights and instructed its cuiistabk-s to regard
that part of the town thrown into New Hampshire by tb^ new line, as
still a part of the original tuwn and under its jurisdiction, ullhongh
why said constables should have been arrested by the 3Iiu>»itcl>iisi'tis au-
thorities io not evident. On the 20th October, 1742, the tow u voted ' To
act with other towns as to grievance in the settleuient of the boundary
line, and to raise £120 to difniy expenses.'
" It is too much of a story to go farther into the history of the above
matter. The controversy raged with considerable bitterness, and led to
charges apiiust Governor Belcher and the appointment of a commission
to Loudon. letters from which are interesting reading, and are filed
among the archives at our state-house.
"The result was that the act of the King was confirmed by Parliament,
although the line was so badly surveyed as to lead to much controversy,
which, even at this lute day, is not settled, and is being examined into
by commissioners appointed by the lust legislature of .'tla'^uchuseiis.
" It seems that oiie of the odd results of this dismemlnmnent of the
town was to throw the Ministers' Commons, or land which belonged to
the parish aa a perquisite of the minister for the pasture of his cattle or
supply of his fuel, into the province of New Uampsliire. The town af-
terwards was allowed by an act uf the legislature to diitpuee of this tract
with the proviso (hat the proceeds should be applied to the support of
the ministry of the town.'*
The Dark Day. — A most singular and remarkable
phenomenon occurred on the 19th of May, 1780, the
cause of which at that time was not immediately ob-
vious, and which was the occasion of great alarm to
DRACUT.
289
the common people, and caused much epeculation
among the most scientific minds of that period.
The morning was cloudy, and in some places a lit-
tle rain fell. By the middle of the day there was an
unusual darkness, which increased until two or three
o'clock, so that labor had to be suspended, unless per-
formed by artificial lights, and the beasts and the
birds repaired to rest, as al night. Accounts of it
differ somewhat, but most of them agree that this
darkness did not extend beyond Connecticut, nor very
far at sea.
After considerable deliberation the cause was gen-
erally attributed to a thick smoke united with heavy
clouds, which had been accumulating for several
days, occasioned by great fires which were then
raging in the northern part of New Hampshire,
where many new settlements were being made.
Various descriptions of it are given, some of which
are quite interesting as well as amusing. Bishop Ed-
ward Bass' manuscript cootains the following ac-
count :
"This day ie the rooet remarkable In the memory of man for dark-
DesB. For a week or ten diiys the air bad been rery thick and heary,
wbicb made the sun look uncommonly red. On the morning of the
lytb (May) I he sun wa« visible for a short time very early, but was soon
overcast, and very black clouds were B«*en to rise suddenly and very fast
from the West. The wind, what there was of it (though hardly enough
to move the leaves on the tr«ee) at Southwest. The forenieotioned
clouds mixing with the vast quantities of smoke, occasioned by a (reneral
burning of the woods caused, in the opinion of many, this unusual,
alarming darkness, which begun about twenty minutes before eleven
o'clock A.M., and lasted the whole day, though not equally dark all the
time. It was the darkest from about twelve to one o'clock.
" Afterwards there was a larger gUn at the horizon which made it
somewhat lighter. It was, however, at the lightest, darker I think
(ban a moonlight nigbt. The sky had a strange yellowish, and some-
times reddish appearance. The night waf> the darkest I remember to
have seen, til', about midnight, when a slight breeze spruug up from the
north or northwcKt, after which it soon t)egan to grow light. At Fal-
iiioulti, Cawo Day, it was not dark at all. Upon Piscutaqua River,
Berwick, Dover and so forth, it wa* verj- rainy (very liitle^of which we
hail here, which fell a little t>efore it begun to grow dark) but not un-
commonly dark as I am told by a person who traveled there that day.
I hear of the darkness at Danbury, In Connecticut. It did not extend
to North River. The forementioned darkness was no doubt occasioned
by an unustial concurrence of several natural causes; but to pretend
fully and clearly to account for it^ argues perhaps too great con5-
dence."t
In the " Memoirs of the American Academy " we
find the following account:
**Candles were lighted up in the houses ; the birds having sung their
evening songB. disappeared and became silent ; the fowls retired to their
roosts. The cocks were crowing all around as at break of day ; objects
could not be distinguished but at a very little distance, and everything
bore the appearance and gloom of night."
The darkness was the occasion of much alarm, and
caused much speculation among all classes of people.
Mr. Phineas Sprague, of Maiden, in his journal says:
*' It began to rain and grew vere dark, and at 12
it was allmost as dark as Nite, so that wee was
obliged to lite our candels and £ate our dinner by
candel-lile at Noonday." -
Dr. Tennev attributes the darkness to an uncom-
1 Coffin's " History Newbury.'
19-ii
- Nason's " History Dunstable."
I
monly thick second stratum of clouds, probably oc-
casioned by two strong currents of wind from the
southward and westward, condensing the vapois and
drawing them in a northeasterly direction.*
A good story has come down to us (related
by the fathers of each succeeding generation) of a
young man in Dracut who attempted to take bis lady-
love to a social party on this dark evening of the
dark day. At that time extensive forests of wood and
timber covered much of the land, which has since
been cleared and improved. The road to the party
lay through one of these dense forests, which was a
considerable distance away from the home of the fair
one. The couple, in good social standing, and other
circumstances to match, proposed to perform the
journey in a manner befitting their station in life, and
least calculated to expose their health, or detain them
on the road. In fact, they proposed to ride, and so
not spoil their party clothes. Carriages not being
common in those days, either public or private, the
best of men and the most fastidious of ladies felt that
they were well accommodated while travelingon horse-
back, and both upon the same horse — the gentleman
on his saddle in front, and the lady on a pillion be-
hind. And this was the way the couple started off
in high anticipation of the pleasures of the evening.
But the night being so dark, and the roads on the
19th of May not being always in the best condition,
the journey must be made cautiously, and the rate of
speed must be moderate ; but with all the care that
human forethought could suggest, and with all the
instinct ascribed to that noble animal, the horse, to
find his way in the dark, these travelers strayed
from their path and were lost in the woods ! After
exhausting their own efforts to regain the road they
shouted for help, and were finally rescued, but not
until nearly the whole night had been passed in be-
wildered anxiety. Some young men returning
from the party, hearing their repeated calls, and ap-
prehending that they proceeded from some persons
in trouble, formed a rescuing party, who, with the aid
of lanterns, succeeding in finding and returning them
to more agreeable surroundings.
This little episode was thoroughly enjoyed by all
who participated in it. It had its influence, perhaps,
in making of the young man who was lost and found,
a hero, a husband and a father of a large and happy
family ; as it is understood that the twain were after-
wards made one flesh ; he became an officer in the
Continental Army, where he rendered most excellent
service, after which he lived many years, the father
of ten children. He always declared that the "Dark-
day " was the lightest and brightest epoch of his life.
Pawtucket BfiiDGE. — The Pawtucket Bridge was
the first bridge constructed across the Merrimack
River. The enterprise originated in Dracut, and
was largely carried out by Dracut men. Its history
'Barry's "Butorj MMsacbiuetu."
290
HISTORY OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
has been of special iDterest to our citizens ; but the
original bridge itself has long been numbered among
the things that were.
A corporation, composed of Parker Varnum and
others, was formed by an act passed February 1, 1792,
entitled the " Middlesex Merrimack River Bridge Cor-
poration." The act was approved by John Hancock,
Governor. A meeting of the stockholders was called
at the house of Joel Spalding, in Chelmsford (now
Lowell), agreeably to a notice given in the Indepen-
dent Chronicle, a newspaper published by Thomas
Adams, at Middlesex Village ; and Colonel Loammi
Baldwin was elected president, Parker Varnum clerk,
and Colonel James Varnum treasurer. These oflBcers
held their positions until 1805, when Mr. Baldwin re-
tired and Parker Varnum was elected president and
Asahel Stearns, clerk. The stock was originally di-
vided into eighty shares, but was afterwards reduced
to sixty.
The first structure was built entirely of wood, —
piers, abutments and all. After the timber was se-
lected, and before the work of building began — which
wa? the last of June, 1792 — the president was instruc-
ted, by vote of the directors, to procure at Boston a
quantity of iron and two barrels of New England
mm, and every laborer was allowed half a pint a day,
" when called for by the master workman."
Subsequently the president was instructed to pur-
chase a barrel of West India rum for the use of the
proprietors: These pioneers in bridge-building were
not only men of enterprise and business, but they
had a streak of sociability in their natures. It was a
busy time of year, and the directors' meetings were
frequent, but they insisted on prompt and punctual
attendance, making a penalty for absence " a fine suf-
ficient to pay for two mugs of flip or toddy." Rather
an odd fine, but practical, for the use of liquor was a
custom of the times. On the 5th day of November,
1792, the bridge was opened for travel, free for that
day. At night a supper was provided for sixty per-
sons, including the laborers and proprietors. Mr.
Ebenezer Bridge was appointed the first toll-gatherer.
and for the first three months the receipts were £18
14«. 8W.
The second structure was composed of wood, with
stone abutments and pieis, and was completed in the
autnmn of 1804, at an expense of $14,000. Money
being scarce, the demands were so heavy that more
than twenty shares were forfeited and sold to pay as-
sessments. It was quite thoroughly repaired about
the year 1845. In February of 1861 it was laid out as
a public highway by the county commissioners, to
be supported jointly by Lowell and Dracut, the Bridge
Company receiving $12,000 for the franchise. Dr.
John O. Green was for many years the president and
Phineas Whiting clerk, and Timothy Coburn and
Theodore Hamblet, directors. The iron bridge now
in use was built in 1871. It was completed and
opened to the public November 25th of that year at a
cost of about $40,000, divided equally between Low-
ell and Dracut.
" Old Bunt." — In the bend of Merrimack River,
below Pawtucket Falls, on the northern side, was
formerly a noted fishing-place (piscary) called "the
Bunt" (or Old Bunt) of great value — at one time
owned in forty-two shares. Sturgeon, salmon, shad,
alewives, etc., were here taken in great abundance.
CHAPTER XXIII.
DRACUT— ( Continued).
ECCLESIASTICAL A>'D EDUCATIONAL.
Ecclesiastical. — The only reliable information
to be obtained in regard to the early church history
of Dracut is from the records of the town. The
church and society left no records (and probably
none were kept), for many years. As we have al-
ready seen, the first settlement of the town begun
in 1664. The town was incorporated in 1701, but
even the first records of the town are supposed to have
been lost as none are found earlier than 1711. The
Puritan settlers of New England, as soon as they had
provided temporary shelter for themselves, began to
make preparation to carry out the main object of their
immigration to these then wild and inhospitable
shores by providing houses of worship. We here in-
sert a few of the earliest votes of the town verbatim,
which, although somewhat mixed with other matters,
explain themselves :
Towx-Mekiixg».
" Dkaccit March the 6tb 1711
" At a generall town meeting unRnimouBly a^eed by a geoeral vute for
buililing of a meetiDghouse. Alao by a geueral town metJtlDg voted aod
made choice of the West end of Flag meadow hill to be the yard lo set
the oieetiog-house on itnd likewiee voted that Daniel CobiirD, Ezra
Coburn jr, Joseph Coburn, Joseph Varnum, Ephraim Uildretti, Joseph
Crosby Si Jonathan Robins are chosen for the Committee to lay out all
country roads and all convenient ways which said town want ii stand in
need of"
"Draci'TT June the K, 1711
*' .\t a general town meeting Toted k made choice of Mr. Amos Cheever
10 be our minister aud also at present voted to give him fifty pounds a
year yearly Jt aa the town grows abler add to his salary and voted to
give him eighty pounds for the building of his botiae, and we are to have
three yearfl time for the payment of the money at twenty six pounds
thirteen shillings A four pence a year, if he be pleased to settle with us
i be our minister 4 also voted that Thomas Varnum Daniell Coburn
Joseph Coburn should go i discourse with Mr. CLeever to acquaint him
with what the town hath proffered him Jt to receive his answer"
"DEiClTT Sept. 10 1711
"The inhabiunts of the town met i voted to give a minister fitly
pounds a year also voted that Thomaa Coburn Thomas Varnum are
chosen to take the care i provide a minister for the town A voted to
give them five shillings a day. .Mr. Hail came to Dracutt on the 5th
day of Oct. 1711 to preach the gospel whereof hath received 43 shillings
4"
"DeacuI, March 5th 1712.
" \\ a general town meeting made choice of Town officers and chose
John Varnum Solectniuu aud Town Clark Joseph Coburn select man
Ebeneicr Goodhue Selectman Abraham Coburn Constnble Robbard Ci>-
burn Darnell Cuburn Joseph Ckiburn field drivelB « and also voted lh»t
DRACUT.
291
John Vamnrn's forte sball be pound for this year and be to be pound-
keeper 4 al»u voted to cbooee two njioieters along with Mr. Hail in way
of settleiiicQt <fcalso voted for Mr. Anioe Cbeevt-r J* Mr. Wiggleawortbiu
way of settlement *'
" DnAcuT, April tlie 4th in the year 1712.
** At a general town meeting voted Mr Cbeevei-e for to come to be our
goepel UiiDisler if he will come on the terms we have formerly offered to
bim ; also it is voted that Thomas Colburn A Joseph Colbiirn be tbe
comiuitlee to treat with him in a way for a settlement. Also it is voted
thai Mr. AVigclesworth should come to preach for a time, in a way to
making a selllemeal after Mr. Cheverfl baa been treated with, and don't
come to preach, & lu a way to malciiig a settlement."
" De.\cct, Juue the 2ith day, in tbe year 1712.
" At a general town meeting, voted that Mr. Wiggleworth should be
our gosjiel minister, to preach the goepel of Christ with us, and if he will
spend his days with us, then we have granted to him fifty pounds in
current money of New England ± as the town grows abler then to odd
to his salary. Also granted eighty pounds in current moneys of N.
England fur his settlement, and we have three years time to paye this
money in, which is twenty six pounds thirteen shillings, & four i)ence a
year — Also voted that Joeeph Varnum. John Varnuni, i Sargent Hil-
dretb should lie tbe comuiittee to treat with Mr. Wiggleworth con-
cerning his settling with us, i to receive his answer and briug it to the
town this day month, which our town meeting is adjourned."
Mr. Amos Cheever, who was a graduate of Harvard
University, in 1707, declined the call extended to him,
as did also Mr. Wigglesworth. Inadequacy of the
salary was the probable cause, and the church had to
wait and be content with a stated supply until their
little colony should be increased in numbers. In the
latter part of the year of 1714 the subject of building
a church was again started, and a town-meeting called
to see what could be done. The following is the offi-
cial record :
" Dajcirr December ye 8th day in tbe year 1714
"At general Town meeting of the luhabitauts that was warned by the
selectmen of the town for to meet i to see in what manner to build a
nieetinghuusc for our town i to begene It this year ; And it was granted
by theafuresuid town meeting that the meeting house should be 3li feet
lunge and 2J feet wide. Also it wase granted six pounds of money lo be
paid towards the building said house. 3(i pounds in the next year in July
iiuileiug :JJ pounds in the month of July in the year 17IG. Also tis
grametl for four cattle and a man a day five shillings A so according,
and two shillioes one man a day for getting timber, also tis granted
Thomas Cohuru Ezra Colburn Joseph Colburn Thomas Varuuin John
Varmioi should be trustees for the al>ove said town to hire A: agree with
men for to build said tneetiughouse above named ,& give a true account to
tbe tow-n of their expenses 10 get the work done as cheap as they can.
•'This is a true account done at a general town meeting
" Joseph Colbdrn,
" Saucct, COI.BURN,
** Selectmen."
This last meeting having been holden in December,
there was not much accomplished during the year
1714, and it was not until the following April that the
selection was made upon which to locate the house,
as appears by a vote of the town.
The FinsT Meeting-Hoose.
"Deacit, April the Uth 1715.
*' \l a general town meeting it was granted to set our meetinghouse
for the town of Dracut on a piece of land near the South side of a hill
called by the name of Flag meadow hill on Thomas Varnnni's land,
bounded asfollowetb. — West by Joseph Varnum's land; North liv a
highway — Eastward by a stake and stones ; and on the South by siake
and stones. Also it is granted one barrel of cider and such a quantity
of rum as the trustees sbuU think needful Soi the raising said meeting-
house.
" Thomas VABKtrji,
•• Toicn Clerk."
The locality was on what is now called Varnum
Avenue, about half a mile above Pawtucket Bridge,
on the southerly side of the street, on land owned by
Deacon Abel Coburn, and just east of his present res-
idence. Marks and relics of the old structure have
appeared from time to time until within a few years.
The spot still retains the name of "the Meeting-
House Lot." We are informed by Mr. Coburn that
there appears also to have been a " Noon-house," in
which the people assembled between services to warm
themselves and partake of a lunch.
As there were no fires in churches in those days, a
" Noon-house," or " Sabba'-Day House," as they were
sometimes called, was almost indispensable in winter.
Edward Abbott, in his " Revolutionary Times," gives
the following description of these houses : "An im-
portant and interesting adjunct of the meeting-house,
in some parts of the country, was the ' Sabba'-Day
House.' Comfort being carefully shut out of the
meeting-bouse itself was only thus rudely provided
for in such subordinate structures. The Sabba'-Day
House was a family affair, generally comprising but
a single apartment, perhaps fifteen feet square, with
windows and a fireplace. It was very plainly and
sparsely furnished. Chairs for the old people and
benches for the children stood round the walls, and
a table in the centre might hold the Bible and a few
religious books and pamphlets; while at one side
shelves contained dishes for cooking and eating.
Sometimes the Sabba'-Day House was mounted above
a shed within which the horse could be sheltered. A
group of such cabins standing about the meeting-
house added not a little to the picturesqueness of the
spot, and their use conduced greatly to the conve-
nience and comfort of Sabbath worship, especially in
winter. The family able to keep a Sabba'-Day House
drove directly thither on Sabbath mornings, warmed
themselves up from a hot fire without, and quite
likely by a hot drink within, and here spent the in-
termission, with further wholesome regards for the
wants of the inner man. The better class of these
Sabba'-Day Houses were whitewashed ; some of them
were double, and to the truth of history it must be
said that between Sabbaths they occasionally fur-
nished the wild young men of the parish with secure
haunts for unseemly carousals."
The building of this church, 25 by 30 feet, was
then a great undertaking, both for want of money
and building materials; and it was not until Sep-
tember 29, 1716, that it was publicly dedicated for
worship, and two years after this (1718) that it was
fully completed.
Pastor Settled. — In 1720 the church was fortunate
in securing the services of a settled pastor — Rev.
Thomas Parker.
The Covenant for Union. — On March 29, 1721, the
church adopted what they called "A Covenant for
Union," as follows :
" We, wboee names are underwritten, publicly acknowledge our un-
worthiness of such a favor aud unfitness for such a business, yet appro-
292
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
bendlDg ourselTM to be called of God to pat oarselTes into a way for
Cbarch comniuDioD and to seek the settlemeot of all Gospel iotititutiooe
amoDK us, do therefore in order thereto, and for better procunog tbereof
aa mnch as in us lies, koowiog our proneneas to backslide, abjureiDg all
coofldeDca ia oarselvea and relying on tbe Lord Jesus Cbrut alone for
belp, coTenant as follows:
'* 1st — As to tbe confession of faith pnt forth by the last synod of
cbnrcbea, held at Boston, in New England, we do heartily close with
It, so far aa we are or may be acquainted with it, and find it agreeable to
the word of God, and promise to stand by and niainlain, and if need
be contend for tbe f&itb therein delivered to the people of Qod, and if
any among us go about to undermine the same, we will bear due testi*
mony against them.
" 2d — We do also combine together to walk as a particular chureh uf
Christ, according to all these holy rules of tbe Gospel prescribed to
such a society eo far aa Ood hath or shall rereal his mind to us in that
respect.
" 'id — We do accordingly recognize the covenant of Grace in which
we professedly acknowledge ourselves devoted to tbe fear and service of
the unly tme God, our Supreme Lord and to Jesus Christ tbe High
Triest, Prophet and King of His Church, and to whose conduct we sub-
mit ourselves and upon whom we wait and hope for grace and Glory,
and to whom we bind ourselves in an everlasting covenant never to be
broken.
" 4th— We likewise give op ourselves unto one another in the Lord, re-
Bulving by his help to cleave each to tbe other us fellow-members of one
body in brotherly love and holy watchfulnessuver each other tormutual
edificatiuD, and subject ourselves to all tbe holy admonitiuQS appointed
by Him aa Head of the Church, dispensed according to the rules uf the
Gospel, and to give our public attendance upon all the public ordinances
of Christ's institution walking orderly as becometh saints.
** 5th — We do acknowledge our posterity included with us in the Gor
pel Covenant, and blessing God for so great a favor do proniitje to bring
them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord with tbe greatest
care, and acknowledge them in tbe covenant relation of the Gospel
rules.
•• 6th — Furthermore we promise to be careful to the utmost to procure
the settlement and continuance among us of tbe uftlces and officers ap*
pointed by Christ, the Chief Shepherd, for the edification of his church ;
and accordingly to do our duty faithfully fur their niaiutenauce and en-
cuuragetuent, and to curry ourselves toward tbeui as becuiueu us.
-' 7th — Finally, we do acknowledge and promise to preserve communion
with the faithful churches of Christ, for the giving and receiving mutual
counsel aud assistance In all cases wherein it shall be needful.
" Now, the Lord be merciful to us, as he bath put lAto our hearts thus
to devote ourselves to him ; let him ptty and pardon our frailties and
liumble 08 fur our carnal confidence, and keep forever in our hearts to
be faithful to bim, and ooe towards another for bis praise and our eter-
nal comfort, for Cbriiit Jeeus Uis bake, to whom be glury forever —
Amen."
Agitation. — Paaaicg over a period of thirty years,
we find that in 1742, during the paatorate of Mr.
Parker, the subject of building a new meetiug-house
began to be agitated. The old one had served its
purpose and was no longer deemed suitable. During
that time the town had increased in numbers, and it
was thought best, by acme of the parish, to build a
new one of more suitable dimensions and in a differ-
ent locality. Accordingly the people were called
together with the following result:
" At a general town-meeting, Voted to build a meeting-house for
ye public worehip of God, 4S feet in length and 35 feet in breadth, and
23 feet between tbe plates and sills — clapboarded with sawed clapboards,
and shingled with white pine shingles, and the windows shall hav» sash
and glased with glass called ye large square glass (8 by lU) and that the
inside of tbe houee shall bo finished according to the discretion uf tbe
committee, or a major part of them.
" Voted, that bald meeting house shall be set on ye northwesterly side
of ye Great road, un tbe easterly bide uf Mr. Sinionds' land, near said
road, aud near tbe easterly line uf said Simuuds' laud. And tbe uum uf
20U lbs. in bills of credit of this Province of ye last emiasiou be levied,
raised and collected of ye iubabitants of ye town to defray ye eipenses
of said house. A committee of five men were chosen, cousistiog of John
Varnum, Cnpt. John Cobnrn, John Cobnm, Jr., Dea. Robert Coburn &
John Bo were.
"Attest, Joh:t VARnUM, Moderator and Town Clerk.
** Dracut, May 27, 1745."
This locality has been described to us by an old
resident as being on the northerly side of the road,
nearly opposite the house of the late Life Hamblet,
now owned by Mr. John Ames, a few rods east of
Merrimack Woolen-Mills, on Beaver Brook. There
was 80 much opposition, however, to this plan that no
immediate action was taken by the committee towards
executing their authority, and we find that on the
following December another meeting was called and
a different spot was selected upon which to build, aa
will be seen by the following vote :
'* Dractt, Dec. 16, 1745.
*' Toted, to build a meeting-house to be set on the high land between
Col. Varnuni'e house and the old meadow path, 44x30 ft. .t 24 foot stud.
Committee, Josiah Uichardsun, John Littlobale, John Varnum, Edward
Coburn £l Edward Wynian.''
This vote was not carried out, however, and very
little account appears to have been made of it, as it
is not referred to in subsequent proceedings. No
further effort seems to have been made until 1747,
when the matter was again brought before the town,
as appears by record:
"Dracit, February 10, 1747.
" At a general town-meeting it was voted to build a meeting-house for
the public worship of God, to be sett pn the Southwest comer of John
Bowers' homestead lot, the house to be 44 by 36 — posts to be 22 foeC
long between joints. The committee chosen to build the house are,
Josiah Richardson, Maj. Samuel Varouni, Timothy Coburn, John Bow-
ers & Igaac Fox. Two hundred lbs. are raised, and shall be assessed and
collected for to build ye house with, according to ye best judgment of
ye Committee.'*
The spot selected for the meeting-house at this
meeting was about a mile east of the one selected in
May, 1745, and was so objectionable to many that a
memorial was drawn up and signed by a number of
men, and presented to Governor William Shirley and
the General Court, setting forth all the circumstances,
and rehearsing somewhat in detail the ecclesiastical
affairs of the town from the time of its incorporation.
The document is an able one and valuable, as it sheds
some light upon past events, and will be read with
pleasure by all who are interested in them. It reads
as follows :
"To his Excellency William Shirley Esq Govr Ac. The Hon hia
MnjestysCouncell & house of Re^iresentativefl in Genl Court assem-
bled At Boston April the 6th 1748
"The petition of the subscribers, Inhabitants of the Town of Dracut
humbly ahoweth —
"That your Petrs ancestors, in the year 1701, were settled on a tract
of Land the Northerly side of Merrimack River called Dracut, Lonn be-
fore granted in farms to sundry persons Iroin whom they Purchased that
the then Inhabitants A Proprs of part of the sd tract Petitioned this
Hon. Court setting forth that the said tract of land which adjoins to
DuusUble on the West A North West & runs seven miles Eastward upon
the river from Dunstable line «&^ six miles A six miles Northward from
the River Commodious for a township and for reasons mentioned in
their Petition Pniy'd that the sd tract might become a town A privileged
with the Puwers thereof by this Court in answer to which whs Resolved,
That tbe Prayor thereof should be granted and thut tbe sd Inliubta.
should assist in the maintenuiice of the ministry of Chelmsford as they
had done until they were provided with a minister as the law Directs.
And that if any land should happen to fall within the afore descnbed
DRACUT.
293
bounds that had not been before granted it should be reserved to be dis-
poe<>d of by this Government.
"That in the year 1709 the further to enable the Inhats. to snpport
the Gospel, The ud reserved land was inquired into and granted all that
tract undtspoeed of before Lying within the boundrys of the aforesaid
Grant to setllet-s iS: likewise to Etrengtben the town against the enemy.
" That in the year 1715 the let sett ers together with tlie Inliabts. ad-
mitted OS aforesaid by reason of their Difhculties of attending meeting at
Chelmslord agreed to build a meetinghouse in Miid Dracut — And to
measure Eastward from Dunstable line upon the River three miles & a
half and the nearest Convenient place thereto to raise the meeting-house
thereon ; And as the Settlements are Chiefly on and near the entervat
being best situated for Defence tm well as the atost valuable land was
then the most convenient place.
"That A.D. 1720 the Rev. Mr. Thomas Parker was called and ordained
to the Gospel ministry amongst us, \V)io together with the Assistance of
the Town purchased a settlement near the said meetinghouse— the price
mucti Inhanced by reason of the situation. That be hath carried on
the work ever since among us to general acceptance. That back from
the river part of the Land in said town has since been Settled.
"That sd meetinghouse in the year 174> was ntucb Decayed and Hkely
soon to be too small to hold the Inhabitants in sd town, it was moved to
cbooee another place that might accummodate the whole of the settle-
able Land in sd Dracut according to the Limits of their Incorporation
for which purpose a meeting was called & the Inhabta. on ye 27 of May
1745 did vote and agree upon a place for Rebuilding the sd meeting-
bouse Abt. a mile to the Northward from the 1st meetinghouse at the
flame meeting choose Comtet. to manage the Building sd house 6i
grunted two hundred pounds of the last Emission to be Employed in
Carrying on sd Work and part of the money accordingly assessed <!; has
been since collected in part.
" That notwithatandiug ed votes and prosecuting them so far the In-
hahitti. have called another meeting 6: on the loth of Feh. last did by a
mnjoiity of vote^ present in the ad last meeting, grant that a meeting-
bouse should be built at the S. W. corner of John Dowers Homestead at
least a mile Eastward from ye place agreed upon ye 27th of Mayas afore-
said. And further Granted two hundred pounds of the last Emission to
be laid out in buiUing the same and chose a Committee to manage the
affaire. Which last mentioned place is upward of two miles Eastward
from the let meetinghouse. That at Present your Petitrs. Concieve by
the votes of the town there is two meetinghouses to be built at the
town's charge without separating the Inhabitants That by the Incor-
poration it was intended to take so much Land as to commode the orig-
inal settlers and no more and should the Lands Elastward of that Incor-
poration viz to the Eastward of ye sd seven miles be annexed to Dracut
it will extend Eastward of Dunstable Line upon the river not less than
nine miles X a half £ the North E^terly part of sd Land much further
That the place last voted Is about five miles Jc a half east from Dunstable
line at the River on a Straight Course as a Road Can be had By which
vuiethe Town is Involved io Great Difficulty, & should the last place
voted he the place of attendance it will be very unequal and unjust to
ye InhabtH. of sd town <k tender all that part of the let settlement ^ still
the best improved under a great dithculty as if they had not been incor-
porated L the distance at Each End of those lands that Methuen which
part of the luhabts. claims us this town be annexed to us too far to give
a General attendance As well as tlie dietance from our ministers house
BO great ttiat it will be Impracticable for hiui to carry on the Work
of the ministry there &. no provisure nmde for his Relief.
" Wherefore your petitioners humbly pray that Your Excellency &
your Uonrs. Would take the premises into consideration & grant that
the votes px^ed at the meeting May ye 27th 174^ may be further ratified
i the voted of the meeting Feb ye 10th 1757 made null or Otherwise Im-
power a Committee to view and appoint the most reasonable place for a
meetinghouse and State it, Jc in case the Inhabitants on those lands be-
tween the aforementioned seven miles &. Methuen be annexed to us that
we may be Divided Into two towns or Parishes, the Circumstances to be
viewed by a Comtee. and as tbis Honle. Court shall order And further
pray that all matters Relating to the building either of the eaid Douses
may be stayed by order of tbis court till there be a full determiaation
thereon.
" And Ye petr^. as in Duty Bound shall Ever pray.
John Varnnm,
John Littlehale,
Abruhaiii Varnum,
Samuel Winn,
Caleb Parker,
Ephraim Colburn,
Edward Coburn,
,Joeiuh Coburn,
Thomas Varuum,
Edward Coburu, Jr.,
John Llttlebale, Jr.,
Robert Lindscy,
John WllliumE,
Joeeph Colbom,
Ezra Littlehale,
Ezeekel RicbanUon, Jr.,
AaroD Cobum,
Abraham Coburn,
James Bichartlsoo,
Daniel Coburn,
" In the House of Rcpbs Apr. 7 1748
" Read and ordered that Col Richards .t Mr Brewer with luch as shall
be joined by the Hon. Board be a Committee to view the Situation &
Circumstances of the Town of Dracnt at the charge of the PetiUonen &
report what they judge proper for this Court to do on this Petition and
all proceedings respecting building a meeting hoaae in said town of Dra-
cut are stayed in the meantime. Sent op for concurrence.
" T. HtrrcaiMSON, Bpr.
" In Councfl Apr 9th 1718 James Uioot is joined in the above.
" Consented to Wm. Shiklct." ^
In support of the last vote of the town to set the
meeting-houAe on the *' Southwest Corner of John
Bowers his homestead Lott/' the following petition
was also presented to the Governor and Council :
** We the Sabscribers, Inhabitants and freeholders of Dracut oie hum-
bly of the opinion that the meeting house for tbe town of Dracut ought
to stand at the Southwest Coruer of John Bowers his homestead Lett In
Dracntt, and we desire tbe same miiy be set up there as witnes our
bands the 15th day of April 1748
Jacob Coburn, Joeeph ChamberlalD, Jr.,
Samuel Varnum, Darius Harria,
Levi Hildreth, WUllam Uill,
Simon Colburn, Stephio Russell,
Kendall Parker, Jonathan Crosby,
David Parker, Robert Wright,
David Fox, Edward Taylor,
James Emery, titepben Kimball,
Jonathan Emery. Thomas Hildreth,
John Crage, Stephen Russetl,
Francis Nickles, Epbraira Curtis, Jr.,
John Varnum, Jr., Ephraim Richardson,
Stephen Farmer, Stephen Wood,
Alexander Lindsey, Joeiah Richardson, Jr.,
Jacob Colburn, Jr., Daniel Fox."
Joaeph Chamberlain,
BEPoar or tbe coMHrrrEE.
" The committee appointed to view the situation and clrcumstaocen of
the town of Dracut, having attended to that service, and beard the pleas
and allegations of the parties, are humbly of the opinion that the moet
just and proper place in said town for the building a meeting-house for
the public worship of God is un the height of land In tbe highway be-
tween the barn of Col. Varnum and the orchard of said Varnum, north-
westerly of said born. All of which is humbly submitted.
"James Minot, per order.
•• In Council, June 3, 1748.
"Read and accepted and voted that it be recommemied to tbe inhabi-
tants to set their meetiog-bouse accordingly. Sent down for concurrence.
"J. WiLLAEp, Becretar;.
" Read and non-concurred and ordered that tbe petition be dismisaed.
Sent up for concurrence. T. UirrcBiNSOH, Speaker.
"In Council, June 4, 1748.
" Read and non-concurred and the Board adhere to thetr own vote with
this amendment, viz. And tbe charge of tbs committee be borne by tha
petitioners. Sent up for concorreace. J. Willasd, Becrvtaiy.
" In the House or Repeiksentatitis, Jane 7, 1748.
" Read and non-concurred, and tbe bouse insist on tbelr own vote. Sent
up for concurrence. T. Hutchinson, Speaker.*'
And thus the matter ended in the General Court.
A New Church. — The house wa^* built, however,
during that year (1748), and it is supposed to have
been set upon the lot originally selected by the town
I See Ancient Plans and Qrants, volume 1, office of Secretary of Mas-
aachusetta.
294
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
in May, 1745, as before de3cribed, near the Merrimack j
Woolen Mills. J
This church contained the square or box pews, i
arranged around the walls, for "dignitaries" who |
were willing to pay for the houor of owning j
and occupying them. In the middle of the house
were arranged benches for those who were unable to
own pews. There were eight seats of " dignitie," es-
tablished by vote of the town, viz : " The fore seat be-
low— second seat below — fore seat iu the front
gallery — fore seat in the side gallery — third seat be-
low— second in the front gallery — fourth seat below —
second in side gallery." These are mentioned in the
Older of their rank.
The Second Pastor Stttled.— Soon after the decease
of their pastor. Rev. Thomas Parker, a call was ex-
tended to Rev. Nathan Davis. The call was ac-
cepted, and Mr. Davis remained until January 2, 1781,
when he resigned his charge.
In January, 1785, a call was extended to Rev.
Timothy Langdon to become the pastor at one hun-
dred pounds salary, and one hundred and fifty pounds
as settlement; but all things not being satisfactory
it was declined. It was customary in those days to
give a minister a certain sum for "settlement," that
is, to meet the expenses incidental to changing and
starting life anew.
Another Call. — In 1787, on the 27th day of Septem-
ber, the church passed the following vote :
"Voted to chooae 3Ir. Solomon Aiken aa a meet person to preach the
Word of God and adniiuidter the ordinivnceB of liia Houde to r.a. And vv«
are desirous that the town shall concur with the church in giving the
said rilr. Sjlomon Aiken a call to aettle io the Gospel ministry iu said
town."
On the same day the town passed a vote as follows:
" Voted, to choose 3Ir. Solomon Aiken to he a pnator it teacher in the
work of the Guepel ministry to preach the word of GihI and to administer
tlib ordiDances uf the gospel to his church and congregiiliou."
An appropriation of "one hundred and fifty pounds,
lawful money," was made for his seltle-Jient. His
salary was to be ninety-four pounds in money and ;
twenty cords of wood, "the wood to be cut and corded !
at his door in said town."
This call was accepted, and Mr. Aiken remained
over this church for twenty-five years, proving him- i
self to be an efficient and faithful pastor.
1793. Another yew Church Wanted. — It was during
Mr. Aiken's time that another epoch in the history
of the church and the town occurred. It became j
necessary at this time to repair the old meeting-house, ;
which had now stood more than forty years, or to I
build a new one ; and both projects had their earnest
advocates. '
A great many town-meetings were called upon the i
subject of location, but there was never any unanim-
ity of feeling. At last the town was surveyed and !
the exact geographical centre obtained, as we have I
understood ; but even that location was not satisfac-
torj' to all, aa the easterly part of the town was thinly
settled. But the town at length voted to build the
house on the "central line," so called, and erected
the frame and boarded it. About the same time
some of the people bought a lot of land of Jonathan
Ta)lor, about a mile westerlj of the "central line,"
and put up the frame of a meeting-house upon it and
boarded it; and there being two parties about evenly
divided, sometimes the town would vote to finish one
house and sometimes the other, and of course no
progress was made.
In March, 1794, it was voted by the town to take
down the old meeting-house, where the inhabitants
had formerly worshiped, and to use such parts of it
as w!.s thought best in building the new one, and to
sell the remainder ; and it wan determined to com-
mence the work that month (March), and to build
the house on the " central line."
Some of the people thinking that a proposed plan
of dividing the parish was, after all, the best and only
one that could possibly accommodate the inhabitants
of a town situated as they were, geographically, with-
drew from the contest, and the building committee
appointed for the purpose proceeded according to
instructions and completed the meeting-house ; and
on the 31st day of December, 1794, submitted to the
town their report. The town voted to accept it, and
also to raise eighty-five pounds, four shillings and
eight pence to reimburse the committee for money
they had expended more than had been appropriated.
In due time the pews were sold at " public vendue,"
the price ranging from six pounds nine shillings to
seventeen pounds eight shillings, Capt. Daniel Var-
num paid the latter price and took his choice. Fifty
pews were sold on the lower floor iind twenty-one in
the gallery ; the proceeds amounted to six hundred
and thirty-four pounds, six shillings and six pence.
This was the meeting house now known as the "Central
Church," in Dracut.
Those who had opposed building at this locality,
upon the town assuming the work, sent in thtir pro-
ttst as follows :
PROTEST.
"Tiithe Clerkof Ihetoimof Drucnt:—\'ie the euhacribera inhahitanW
of said town herehy enter our protest against the proceedings of said
town in voting to huild a meeting house on this :jlst day of Peceniher
1701 near the holl^e of Kendall Parker jr. as a centre of said town
and in choosing a committee therefor Si grantiue money fr building said
house.
'Mat. Because we denie that being the proper centre of said toxvn.
'•'li. Becanse the situation and the land is hy no means suiliible and
does not accommodate the people so well as where the meeting-house
now stands.
"3d. Because it is making a needleaa and unreasonable cost to the
town, when the present house with hut little expense might be made to
accommodate the people aud save the widows and orphans from a burd-
ensome fax when they cannot hare a voice in the business. For these
and many other reasons we solemly A firmly enter our protest against
all tlie votes that any way relate towards the building a meeting house
at the above described place, i hereby show that we do not consider our-
selves held to pay any cost that may arise thereby.
" Lewis Aneart, Jacob Cohum,
Thomas Varuum, Jonathau Varnnm,
Israel Uildreth, Nathaniel Coburn,
Joaiab Fo.t, Daniel Blood,
DRACUT.
295
Moeefl B. Coburn,
Samuel Coburo,
Parker Varnum,
Jamea Varnum,
Ephraim Coburo,
Joeeph Deao,
Abraham Blood,
Coburn Blood,
Timothy Coburn,
Willard Coburo,
Solm Oacood Jr,
Jonatban Varnum Jr.,
Jobn Uamblet,
Jeptba Coburn,
Jonas Varuum,
Life Wilion,
Solomon Osgood,
Joseph Webster,
Tbadeus Coburo,
Saul Coburn,
Peter Coburn Jr,
Samuel Cummings,
Peter Coburn,
Simeon Williams,
Solomon Abbott Jr,
Ezra Coburo,
Jabeab Coburo,
Willard Coburn Jr,
Bloeea Clement,
Jonathan Coburn Jr,
Hesekiab Coburn,
Zficberah Goodhue,
Jonathan Morgan,
Aaron Cobnrn."
A Revolution — Pawtuckct Church Erected at Paw-
tucket Falls. — The history of the church thus far may
properly be said to belong as much to one Bide as the
other, especially as the inhabitants of the town were
about evenly divided by this division of the parish.
If there is any difference it may be in favor of those
who at this time proposed to act by themselves by the
re-establishment of their religious privileges in the
vicinity of their old church home — the original local-
ity of 1715 — established by their ancestors.
After expressing their most unqualified disap-
proval of the action taken by the town, by a protest
in writing, the protestants and other inhabitants that
were discommoded, took early and effective measures
for their better accommodation.
The building that had been erected on the Jona-
than Taylor lot by the parties opposed to the location
on the Central line (and which was subsequently ac-
cepted by the town and again rejected) was taken
down and erected at Pawtucket Falls, in Dracut, in
1794, as is supposed, and it is the same now called
the Pawtucket Church, in Lowell. It stands now ex-
actly where it was placed at the time of its removal.
Gen. Wm. Hildreth afterwards built his house on the
Taylor lot, as we are informed — a large square man-
sion, still standing, in excellent condition, and owned
and occupied by Joseph L. Sargent, E>q.
The location of the new church at Pawtucket Falls
was a wise and fortunate selection. The Middlesex
Merrimack River Bridge had been incorporated, and
was opened for travel on the 5th day of November,
1792. The great Mammoth Road surveyed from Bos-
ton to Concord, New Hampshire, which crossed the
Merrimack River at this point, was also laid out
through Dracut in March, 1792, and the prospect was
that this point for a church would be central and ac-
cessible. It was convenient for all the westerly por-
tion of the town of Dracut and the easterly part of
Chelmsford, where Lowell is now situated. Besides
these practical and positive conveniences, there might
have been a bit of romance considered, for this was
the "Ancient and Capitol Seat "of the Pawtucket
tribe of Indians, and the spot where John Eliot first
preached the gospel to them in 1647 and for many
years afterwards, as they gathered to obtain their
supply offish at the falla.
All necessary preliminaries having been agreed
upon and completed, a petition was presented to the
Legislature for an act of incorporation, which was
granted and reads as follows:
ACT or IMCOKPOEATION.
"An act to incorporate certain Panooa by the Name of the West Con-
gregational Society in Dracut.
" Section I. Be it enacted bj the Senate and Hoiue of BepresenU-
tives in G«ueral Court aaseoibled and by tbe authority of the sauie,
Tbat Parker Vamum, John Varnum, Peter Coburn, Jr., Jame« Var-
nnm, James Abbott, Coburn Blood. Mome Clemeut, Jabez Coburn, Joo- ,
aUian Morgan, Uezekiah Coburn. TUomaa Varnum. Joseph Dane, Wil-
liam Fife, Lemuel Coburo, Solomon Osgood, jun., John Dutton, AaroQ
Coburn, Seth Dedson, Solomon Osgood, Samuel Coburn. Epbriam Co-
burn, Peletlah Coburn, Timothy Cobam, Lewis Ansart, Willard Coburn,
Jesse Williams, Ezekial Bichardson, Joeeph Rictaardson, Darid Blood,
Andrew Barlier, Motes B. Coburn, Abraham Blood, Solomon Abbott,
jun., Peter Coburn, Josiab Fox, Samuel Cummings, Jonas Varuum,
John Hamblet, Tbadeue Hamblet, Jonathan Hamblet, Joeiah W. Co-
bum. Ef.ra Coburn, Thadeus Wilson, Joshua Marehall, William Webster,
Samuel Coburn, Bradley Varnum, John Taylor, Stephen Kemp, Isaac
Taylor, Timothy Brown, Simeon Williams, Josbua Hunt, Joseph Wilson,
Jonathan Coburn. jun., James Haseltine and Leonard Thompson, with
all thoee who shall join said society and become members thereof, and
unite with them to the same place of worship within tbe eald town of
Dracut, with their several polls and estates, be, ajid they are hereby
incorporated, by the name of The West Congregatioual Society in Dra-
cut, with all the privileges, powere, and immunities which similar Soci-
eties are entitled to by the laws of this Commonwealth.
"Sec. 2. Be it further enacted, That the said West Congregational
Society, be. and they are hereby holden to pay into the Treasury of said
town of Dracut, all taxes legally assessed upon the lobabitants thereof
before the fourth day of June, instant, for the support of the minister,
and shall be intitled to receive their ratable proportion, according to
their polls and estates, of all the monies due, and belonging to said
town, or that may have been in the treasury thereof on the said fourth
day of June, instant, which has heretofore been appropriated to the sup-
port of the minister ; and they shall specially appropriate their propor-
tion of such money when received, to the support of a gospel minister
within the said parish.
"Sec. 3. Be it further enacted. That the clerk of said society shall
keep a fair record of the names of all persons who are members thereof,
and when any member of said society shall requent a dismission there-
from,and shall signify thesamein writing to said Clerk, su-h Clerk sbaU
make a record thereof, and such person shall thereupon be dismissed ac-
cordingly, but shall he held to pay his prtiportion of such money u
shall have been previously granted, by said Society, and shall be subject
to Uxation in the fimt parish or precinct in said town.
*' Sec. 4. Be it further enacted, That all those who shall be hereafter
desirousof becoming members of said Society being inhabitants of said
town of Dracut and shall signify the same in writing to the clerk of (he
first parish or precinct in said town, thirty days at least previous to tbe
annual meeting of the inhabitants of said first parish or precinct In said
town in the month of April, shsll be considered In law as members of
said Society ; And any person or persons who shall leave any other re-
ligious Society in said town of Dracut and join the Soc'ety incorporated
by thiaact, shall be holden to pay his proportion of such money as shuU
have been previously granted by the Society which they shall leave as
aforesaid.
"Sect. 5. Be it farther enacted. That Ebenezer Bridge, Esq., be and
be hereby is empowered and directed to issue his warrant to some princi-
pal member of said Society, requiring and empowering him to warn a
meeting thereof at such time and place, as shall therein he set forth, for
tbe choice of said officers as may be chosen by parishes in the month of
March or April annually and for tbe transacting of such other busi-
ness SB may be legally transacted in such meetings.
"This act passed June 22d, 1797.
" Approved by the Governor.
•' INCEEASE SUMNEB r
Central Church. — After the separation, and the es-
tablishment of another society (at Pawtucket Falls),
the Central Church as it was called — (that name hav-
ing been applied on account of its locality at the sup-
296
HISTORY OF 3IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
posed centre of the town, or on the " central line")
was properly sustained for a number of years ; but
about the year 1830 it lost its name, its house of wor-
ship, its church property and came near losing its
identity.
From the best information we have been able to ob-
tain, the story is briefly as follows :
In 1812 the Unitarian Controversy, as it was called,
broke out among the Congregational Churches and
continued for many years. It did not extend beyond
New England, and was almost entirely confined to
Massachusetts.
Eighty-one churches with church property in Mas-
sachosettu, during this controversy, by a decision of
the Courts, ch&nged denominational ownership, and
went to those calling themselves Unitarians, the esti-
mated value of which was over $600,000. Among
these churches was the Central Church, in Dracut.
Some of the others were the Old Mayflower, at Plym-
outh, and every Congregational Church in Boston,
excepting the Old South.
The church organization in Dracut, however, inde-
pendently of the parish or society, retained its records,
and in 1834, withdrew to the hall of Ebenezer Han-
chett, in the building now owned by Mr. J. L. Sar-
gent. The controversy, however, had been going on
for some time, beginning about 1830 or soon after.
This church continued to worship at Hanchett Hall,
as it was called, until the Hill-side meeting-house
was built, which was dedicated February 25, 1835.
This has been the church home since that time un-
der the name of The Evangelical Congregational
Church of Dracut. It still claims to be the fir.-tt
church.
Since the organization of the first church estab-
lished in Dracut, there have been seven settled pas-
tors, whose names and the time of their service are aa
follows: Thomas Parker, settled in 1720 — tbrty-
four years; Nathan Davis, settled in 1765 — fifteen
years; Solomon Aiken, settled in 1788 — twenty-five
years; William Gould, settled in 1815 — two years ;
Joseph Merrill, settled in 1820 — thirteen years;
Ephraim Goodman, settled in 1836— two years;
George W. Adams, settled in 1844 — two years.
This church is now under the pastoral care of Rev.
Wm. W. Nason.
The victorious party, after having captured the
Central meeting-house, did not long survive. The
members became scattered, and the property was soon
deserted. In 1847 a new Congregational Church was
organized, called The Evangelical Church of Dracut.
It took possession of the Old Central Meeting-house,
and is now commonly called by the old name, — The
Central Church. It has had but one settled pastor,
Rev. George Pierce, installed October 14, 1863. This
church is now also under the pastoral care of Rev.
Wm. W. Nason.
First Parish Meeting of the Pawtucket Society. — The
society being now legally and properly in existence,
it only remained to organize under their charter.
The warr.int was duly issued by Ebenezer Bridge, a
justice of the peace, as directed in the act of incor-
poration, and the first parish meeting was called and
bolden July 6, 1797, just two weeks after the act was
approved by the Governor. At this meeting Colonel
James Varnum was elected moderator, Peter Coburn,
Jr., clerk, Parker Varnum, Solomon Osgood and
Timothy Coburn, assessors, and Colonel James Var-
num, treasurer.
The following votes were then passed :
" Voted, To raiae one hundred dollars for preaching.
" Voted, To let out the collection of the money to the lowest bidder.
" Voted, To accept David Blood as collector.
"Voted, That Bradley Varnum and Jonathan Yamnm constitute a
committee to furnish preiiching.
" Made choice of Jeffrey Hartwell (a colored man) to sweep the meet-
iDg-bouse."
We are unable to state, in the absence of any record
upon the subject, whom the society first employed as
a preacher; the first reference to the subject was made
by the treasurer, who says: "Paid Caleb Bradley
seven dollars for preaching one sabbath," and it is
supposed that he preached the first sermon in the
new church.
In 1798 an order was drawn on the treasurer of the
society for S14.92, in favor of Joseph Dane, in full,
for boarding Mr. Williams, Mr. Weston and Mr.
Fletcher, when preaching for the society. Also an
order the same year to Freeman Parker for fifty-six
dollars, for supplying the pulpit eight Sabbaths. lu
the year 1800 an order was drawn in favor of Jacob
Coggin for ninety-four dollars for supplying seven-
teen Sabbaths. Also, the same year the society paid
Rev. Humphrey Moore forty -eight dollars for preach-
ing eight Sabbaths. In 1801 they paid him $44.50
for preaching eight Sabbaths, and in 1802 he was paid
twenty-eight dollars for preaching services.
Andocer Seminary. — The Theological Seminary at
Andover was founded in 1807, and opened September
28, 1808, and after that time this pulpit was supplied
considerably from that institution. The students came
up on horse-back and preached two sermons "for two
dollars and found." We are informed that some of
the most talented clergymen of later years had their
first experience in preaching in this church.
Style of Architecture. — In early times the style of
church-building in New England was plain and less
pretentious than now. The churches in all the pros-
perous villages of New England looked about alike,
and did not need to be labeled to indicate the purpose
for which they were intended. This church was
built and finished according to the style in those days.
The pews were high and about six feet square, with
seats around the sides, hung on wire hinges. There
was a high pulpit on the north side, the ascent to
which was by winding stairs. In from of the pulpit
was an inclosure, handsomely constructed, called
"the Deacons' Seat." It was occupied by the minis-
ter and deacons on communion davs and was fre-
DRACUT.
297
quently used by lecturers ioetead of the pulpit. On
the other three sides of the house stood galleries. The
" broad-aisle," so called, led from the front door
(which opened where the vestry door does now, on the
Boulh side of the house) to the pulpit. There were
also entrances on each end of the house.
Sounding- Board. — A century ago no first-class
church was complete in its appointments without a
"sounding-board," and this society was possessed of
one which wa.s handsomely constructed and decorated.
It was suspended over the pulpit and remained there
until about the year 1828, when it was removed, by
the request of the pastor, Rev. Sylvester G. Pierce, by
a committee without authority from the society. The
affair caused no little disturbance in the minds of
some of the members of the parish, and a parish
meeting was called to consider the matter; but, after
considerable discussion, it was thought best, on the
whole, to let it remain in the loft of the horse-sheds,
where it had been deposited.
On the next Sabbath one of the good brethren , upon
entering the church and seeing that the temple had
been stripped of this adornment, amazed at what he
considered such vandalism, stopped short, and thus
soliloquized: "They have taken away the Ark from
the house of the Lord, and I will go, too." He then
left the church and returned no more.
The old sounding-board was never restored. It re-
mained in its resting-place until 1844, when the
church was undergoing extensive changes and re-
pairs ; it was then removed and sold with a lot of old
lumber.
The Slefple and the Bell. — The meeting-house, as
originally constructed, had a "porch" on the east
end ; but in the spring of 1820 that was removed and
the tower with steeple, as it now stands, was erected.
Captain Nathan Hunting framed the addition, assisted
by Benjamin Melvin.
Four sticks of timber, each forty-eight feet loug,
that would square about a foot, were required for cor-
ner posts. Samuel Woods and Nathan Tyler, of Mid-
dlesex Village, and Moses B. Coburn, of Dracut, each
furnished one of these posts. Nearly all the people
in the parish were there when the steeple was raised.
Joseph Tyler superintended the raising. The first
bell was purchased the same year (1820), and cost
about $700.
It was also " voted to build pews on the lower floor,
where the seats now stand." The work was accord-
ingly done, and on July 7, 1820, Samuel F. Wood,
Captain Coburn Blood and Lieutenant Joseph Var-
num, the committee, were authorized to give deeds of
the pews.
A New Stove. — The first means ever used for warm-
ing this church was by a large cast-iron box-stove,
which stood upon high legs. It was purchased by in-
dividuals for the society, we judge from the following
vote passed December 12, 1820 : " Voted to give those
persons, who have purchased a stove, liberty to set it
up in the meeting-house." We are told that our
grandfathers and grandmothers wore, respectively,
good homespun woolen breeches and gowns to meet-
ing on the Sabbath, which comfortable articles con-
tributed wonderfully towards the support of their for-
titude and endurance, while sitting al! day in a cold
house in midwinter ; but still we do not much wonder
that they sung :
" Kindle a flame of lacred love
Id tbese cold hearta of ours ! "
The following quaint description is not overdrawn :
** In the large square pew were seated around.
The pioufl matron In her woolen gown ;
The long-queued sire sat free from legend wltchea.
Id bis buckled shoos and homespun breeches;
In pulpit high the aged parson stood,
To pray, to plead, tx> counsel all for good ;
The mighty soDDding-board huug overall,
In sbapeleas carving, fastened to tb' wall."
It will be inferred that iu "olden times" churches
were not furnished with stoves or furnaces as they
now are. An old gentleman, about eighty years of
age, said to us : "I have always attended church here,
and it was a good many years before we had any way
of warming the house. I recollect very well the ex-
ertions I was obliged to make when a boy to keep my
feet from freezing in church."
Ttie Foot-Stove. — The first invention for personal
comfort, by means of fire inside of churches, was
a little tin foot-stove. It was about eight inches
square very nicely fixed into a wooden frame,
with handles on top to carry it by. The stove
was perforated with holes like the old-fashioned
tin lantern, to let the heat out from a little sheet-
iron box, inside the stove, filled with good hard-
wood coals. Every woman who was able to own one,
was glad to carry it to meeting, and we very well
remember when the mothers and grandmothers came
gracefully up the broad aisle each with her foot-stove
in one hand and Walts' hymn-book in the other,
feeling, doubtless, that they were prelty well provided
with the comforts, if not the luxuries, of this life.
Music. — The history of music as used in public
worship in Dracut and in most of the towns in New
England may be briefly stated as follows :
" Two principal methods have prevailed, to a greater or less degree ;
that of the whole Ccmyregalum and that of a telKt Choir. The Congrega-
tion was the primitive method, and the only one known In the early his-
tory of the Cburcb. The method of singing by a choir came Into the
Church at a later period, with wealth, power, and worldly greatness, and
it has been her attendant rather in temporal prosperity tian In poverty
and adversity.
"At the time of the Reformation, CongregatioDal Singint bad l>ecome
extinct, and the more artistic manner of cboirs, conaisting mostly of an
Inferior order of the clergy, singing in a language nnknown to the peo-
ple had Uken its place. Lutber, Calvin, Knox, and otheri>, took early
measure* to nscue the singing service in public worship from the hands
of the clergy, and to reinstate it as an exercise for the people. It was no
attempt on the part of the Reformers to introduce an artistic manner of
soDg. but, on tlie contrary, a very plain one, a 'highway ' of Psalmody
in wliich *tbe wayfaring man, though a fo<il, should not err.'
"The Congregalionul metbud. Ibus restored to the churches, wa< brought
to Ibis country by the Protestant Fathers. It continued to be i heir only
method for about a century and a half. It is not surprislag that during
298
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
this period, aiuiddt the deprirationa uhich the new settlemeote experi-
enced, attention tusougshould tmve been negU-cted, nor tliat, neglected
by Keneration after genel^tiun, the aliility for it should Lave been well-
uihth lost. In the early part of the last century the very low conilition
of the singing io public worship began to attract the attention of some
of the friends of religion, and measures were taken bv a few of the lead-
ing clergymen and othera for reform. Hitherto all the singing in the
American churches had been unisonous, the melody only having been
Bung; but in 17^ a book of tunes iu three parts, 'Cantus,' 'Medius'
and ' Basus,' waa published by Rev. 1'homas Walter. The harmonising
of the tunes in parts undoubtedly grew out of the fact that the more
elaborate service of choii^had always taken that form both in the Luth-
eran and English church. In the Protestant churches of Europe, gen-
erally, metrical Psalmody continues to this day to be sung, as it was
originally, in unison, and it is at least doubtful wlftberparts in harmony
for the choir and unison for the congregation would not still bo the best
arrangement for Ohtirch Sung, This new arrangement of tnnes in parts
led to the formation of choirs. .\t first, they were introduced only as
helps to Congrcgatsonal Singing, hut this gradually yielded, as it had
done before, and the new method advanced with sure anii steady pro-
gress, until toward the close of the Inat centuiy it had become the al-
most exclusive luelbod of Church Song. And now, within tifteen or
twenty yenre. Congregational Singing is again attracting attenrion, and
many churches have adopted this method, some supported by a choir
aod some without.''— Preruce.- Xeio SabbatU Uijnm and Tune Book.
When the Puritans came to this country in 1020
they brought with them some neat little hymn-books
called " Ainsworth's Version of the Psalms," pub-
lished about the year 1U18, by Rev. Henry Aina-
worth, for some years a teacher of the church at
Amsterdam, and it was their cut-torn to sing from
them in their public worship. These books were
continued in use until the year 1640, when a hymn-
book was arranged by the clergymen of the Colonies,
called "The Bay Psalm Book."
This was the tirst hymn-book printed in the Colo-
nies, but the expense was so much that only a com-
paratively small number couid be sold, and it was at
this time that the practice of " lining out the hymn "
began. When there were only a limited number of
hymn-books, the minister would select a hymn, and
read a line or two, and then the congregation would
sing what had been read, and so on until as many
verses had been sung as was desired. It took some
forty years for the lining-out process to become uni-
versal, but at last about every church in New Eng-
land performed their singing in that way. The prac-
tice continued for a hundred years or more and it cost
a great effort to break it up, even after hymn-books
became plenty, and it was a very serious subject of
contention in many of the churches for several years.
The dates assigned to some of the tunes that we
call old are as fellows: "Old Hundred " and " Mon-
mouth " go back to the time of Luther and the
Reformation, 1520; "Dundee," 1615; "St. Martyn's,"
1735; "Darwell" and "Greenville," 1750; "The
Italian Hymn," " Mear," and the "Portuguese
Hymn," 1760; "Silver Street" and "Si. Thomas,"
1779; " Peterboro'," "Lenox" and "Amsterdam,''
1776; "Cambridge," 1790; "Dedham " and " China"
about 1799.
The first hymn-books used here were " Watts'
Psalms and Hymns," They were originally pub-
lished in separate volumes. Several copies may now
be found in families whose ancestors worshiped here.
They were first published in England in one volume,
about the year 1718. Dr. Franklin also published an
edition in Philadelphia, in 1741. This book con-
tinued for some years, but was succeeded by the
" Watts and Select," edited by Samuel M. Worcester,
and published in 1834.
Change to Pieabyterianism. — In 1819 this church
and society joined the Presbyterian order and re-
mained until 1837, when, as the record says, "They
were permitted by the Presbytery at Newburyport to
become Congregational."
ADDITIONAL MEJtBERS FROM CHELMSFOED DY ACT OF THE LEGtSLATl'HE.
" Be it enacted, Ac, .tfl follows :
"Tha' Phineas Whiting, N'athaniel Wright, John Ford, Sllaa Hoar,
.\rtema5 Holden. James B*}weni, Jonathan Bowers. Samuel F. Wood,
Nathan Tyler, J.isiah Fletcher, Joseph C. Hall, Otis Tyler, Nathan Tyler,
Jr., Nathan Hunting, Nathan P. Ames, Joseph Dane, Ephr.iiiii Osgocd,
Simeon Parker, Lewifi Butterfleld, Zebiilon Parker, Jeduthan Parker,
Osgood Worcester, Joel Dix,VHrnum Spalding, Robert Spalding, Micajah
Bowers, Bradley Varnum, .lohn (moulding, Samuel lluut, Moses Chever,
Jr., and .Amos Proctor of Chelmsford, in the County of Middlese.t. with
their polls and estates be and they are hereby set off for parochial pur-
poses only from said town of Chelmsford, and annexed to the West Cou-
gi'egational Society in Dmcut in naid County, there hereafter to enjoy
all the parochial privileges of said society and to pay their proportion of
all necessary cturges that may arise therein for the purposes aforesaid.
Provided nevertheless that the aforesaid persons shall be holden to pay
their proportion of all parochial taxes now assessed or granted by the
said town of Chelmsford.
"Approved by the (iovernor Febriiari' 1, 1820.
"A. Bradford, Secretary of the Commouwealth."
Settled Patiors. — During the existence of the Paw-
tucket Church there have been eight pastors settled
over it, viz. :
Rev. Reuben Searfl. from January .11, 1821, to August it'', 1327.
Rev, Sylvester fi Pierce, from April, IS29, to April 2J, 1832.
Rev. Tobias Pinkhani, from May 18, IHi'.C, to April U"., 1S39.
Rev. Joseph Merrill, from April 20. 1842, to .\pril 19, 18+8.
Rev. Brown Emerson, from .lune .■>, 18.»l), to May 9, 1854.
Rev. Perrin B. Fiske, from October I, 18Gt. to November 7, ISr.,*).
Rev. Joseph Boardman. from September 1, 187(1, to November 1. 1874.
Rev. Charles H. Willcox {the present pastor), settled November 6,
1884.
A Sunday-school was organized in connection with
the Pawtucket Church about 1828.
Schools. — The church and the school were prom-
inent features in the early jurisprudence of Mass-
achusetts. The religion of our forefathers was of
that type which invited light and education, and their
laws were directed to this end. Common schools
were established in all the towns, and appropriations
were required and made for their support.
"A large portion of the tjlergy of New England,"
says Barry, "and some of the laity were men of liber-
al education, and were graduates of the time-honored
universities of England. The materials of greatness
were already theirs ; for they brought with them to
these shores, in addition to their libraries, minds rich-
ly stored with the treasures of learning. Hence, no
sooner were churches erected than school-houses
sprung up." Schools were, without doubt, early es-
tablished in some form in Dracut; but as the records
of the town, during a few of the first years of its ex-
DRACUT.
299
* PkINEAS STfcVFNS,
' Edwabd Colburn,
'John Varnum,
' John Bowf.rs,
isteoce are not to be found, it is impossible to tell just
how they begun. It is presumed, however, that such
teachers as could be found, imparted such instruction
as they could, in private dwellings that could best
accommodate the pupils.
The first notice of a school in the town is recorded
as follows :
"Deacct, Oct. 1, 1736.
*' We, tb« BubflcriberB in the town above «<i apree, with Mr. Pbioeas
SteveuB, of Andover, to keep a HendiD^aud VVnpbliDCKool In Dracutt
tliree montliE, Beginninf; on or about tlie 2Mth of tbie Instant October,
fur u'hicti be Is to Receive twelve Puuuds In Bills of Creddil, as wiineas
our liauds.
f Selectmen
I of
{ Dracutt."
"Oct. 31, 1794. At a general town meeting, voted to raise 11 poands
for tbo 6up|K>rt of a town scbooi tbis present year."
May 18, 1750, the town voted that the school
should be kept at one place, and at the house of Eph-
riam Hildreth. Previously it had undoubtedly been
kept at bouses of different individuals, wherever ac-
commodations could be found.
In 1752 an article was inserted in the town warrant
"To see if the town will vote to build a school-house
or school-housen, and also to see if the town will state
a place to set said school-house or school-housen." The
town voted to build a school-house, and then, as there
was a considerable difference of opinion as to location,
etc., it was voted to reconsider the vote to build. The
school appropriation tbis year was eight pounds.
In 1754 voted ten pounds, thirteen shillings and
four pence for schools.
The First School-house. — In 1755 the town passed
the following vote :
" That if the inhabitants of the southwest part of
the town build a school-house on the land of Deacon
Edward Coburn, on the north side of the road be-
twixt Deacon Edward Coburn's his house and
Samuel Coburn's house, that they shall have
the school kept there according to their proportion
of the taxes. And also if the inhabitants build a 1
house about five rods from Stoney Gutter, so-called, f
they shall have the school there in proportion to their
taxes." The house first mentioned appears to have
been built; as we find that in 175G the town " voted to
accept the school-house where it now stands, near the
house of Deacon Samuel Coburn." This is the first
school-hoiLse built by the town of which we find any
record.
School Committee. — The first-mentioned election of
a School Committee by the town occurred in the year
1809. Lieut. Timothy Coburn, Josiah Blanchard,
Isaac Coburn, Joel Fox, John Parker, Jonathan Par-
ker, Major Daniel Varnum, Moses Bradley and Mi-
cah Coburn were elected. It was also voted "To lay
out the school money, two-thirds in school-masters
and one-third in school-dames." So says the town
clerk, whose early school advantages may have been
unfavorable, or misimproved. We have reason to
doubt that the vote was recorded just as it passed.
The first lady elected on the Board of Superintend-
ing School Committee, by the town, was Mrs. A. C.
Varnum, in 1874. Mrs. George A. H. Richardson
was her lady successor. They had both previously
been teachers in the town.
In 1873, beiuf the year before a considerable por-
tion of Dracut was annexed to Lowell (the annexa-
tion act took effect Aug. 1, 1874) the school statistics
of the town were as follows:
Number of perw)n8 Ijetween the apes of five and fifteen. . . 320
Number of different schoUrs attending school during the year. iilO
Number of male teachers employed during the year J
Number of female leHCbers employed during the year ... 10
Amount received from Stale school fund J19<i-72
Amount raised by the town for support of schools Ea.fiOo.lX)
At that time the town was divided into eleven school
districts, and the schools were under what was called
the " District System," — that is, each district elected
a " Prudential Committeeman," who hired the teach-
ers, took charge of the school-house, provided wood,
etc., — the duties of the town or Superintending Com-
mittee being to examine the teachers as to their qual-
ifications for the various schools, to take the general
charge of the schools, during their terms of session,
and make a report lo the town as to their proficiency
and standing.
John Ames, Edward A. Stevens and John J. Col-
ton were the town Committee in 1873, and in their
report recommend»d that the district system be abol-
ished. They said " About four-fifths of all the towns
in the State have abolished the school district system,
and our schools will not be what they might, and
ought to be, until the present system is abolished."
Soon after this the desired change was made, and
the schools at the present time are under the entire
supervision of a superintendent chosen for that pur-
pose.
From the report of the School Committee for the
school year 1888-89 (the report for 1889-90 not hav-
ing vet been issued) is obtained the following:
Number of persons in town May 1, 1888, between
five and fifteen years of age, 343. Number of per-
sons in town between eight and fourteen years of age,
199. Number of different schools, 11. Average
length of each school, seven months and eighteen
da.vs.
The School Committee are: A. T. Richardson,
chairman ; Charles H. Stickney, secretary; John \V.
Peabody, T. H. Connell, G. M. Hall, G. M. Clark,
Levi Redden, Nat. W. Peabody, Bernice Parker, Ed-
win J. Kennedy, Dr. 0. A. Flint, was superintendtni of
schools.
The town appropriated for support of BchoolB for
1889, $3200.
The following communication has been received
from the superintendent of schools elected in March,
1890, which answers an inquiry as to their present
condition and methods:
" The schools of Dr«cut are in a flourishing condition ; they are com-
posed of desceudants from many nationalities, and of not very remote
300
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
aDceators. While the schools of Dracut rank as country schools, their [
proximity to the citv of Lowell causes them to use the beet appliances of I
both city and country without carrying either to excess. The teachers
are intelligent, painstaking and II love with their work.
" Gf.o. W. Batcheldf.r,
" Supt. of Schools for the town of Dracut.
"June 2, 1890."
CHAPTER XXIV.
DRACUT— ( Conliiiued).
REVOLDTIONARY WAR.
When it became the settled conviction of the pa-
triots of the Colony that a war with England was in-
evitable, preparations began quietly to be made to
meet the emergency. Great patience was exercised,
and every precaution taken by the wise statesmen of
the times, to prevent an appeal to arms, but the blind
and intolerant course pursued by the King and Par-
liament towards the Colonies was beyond the endur-
ance of the most patient and conservative.
Boston Port Bill. — The destruction of several
cargoes of tea iu Boston harbor, sent hereby the Eist
India Company (an English company chartered in
1600 for the purpose of carrying on a trade between
England and other countries'), so enraged the English
Government that retaliatory measures were at once
resorted to, and Parliament passed a bill March 7,
1774, called the Boston Port Bill, closing that port
against all commercial transactions whatever. A sec-
ond bill was soon afterwards pa.«sed, making the ap-
pointment of the Council Justices, judges dependent
upon the Crown. A third bill was also pas.>«ed, di-
recting the Governor to send all persons in the Colo-
nies, charged with murders committed in support of
government, to England for trial. Another bill pro-
vided for the quartering of troops in America, etc.
The Boston Port Bill went into operation June 1,
1774, and to enforce these laws Gen. Gage, the com-
mander-in-chief of the British Army in America,
was appointed Governor of Massachusetts, and an ad-
ditional force was ordered to Boston.
The closing of the port was a heavy blow to Bos-
ton. Business was suspended, laborers were thrown
out of employment, and a general gloom pervaded
the streets. The poor lacked bread to eat, and desti-
tution soon manifested itself to an alarming extent.
Sympathy, however, was everywhere felt, and collec-
tions and contributions were at once forwarded from
all the towns around.
Taking the circumstances into account, a warrant
was issued on the 4th day of January, 1775 (in the
fifteenth year of His Majesty's reign), to warn all
freeholders and other inhabitants of the town of Dra-
cut, qualified to vote, to assemble at the meetirig-
house on Thur=day, the 12th day of January (1775),
"then and there to see if the inhabitants will vote to
come into any method for raising any support for the
poor of the town of Cbarlestown and Boston, now
under oppressed circumstances in struggling for the
liberties of their country."
There is no record of the vote of the town, but we
find the following acknowledgment from the relief
committee :
'* Chablestown, Feb. t5, 1775.
'* Receired from the town of Dracut, by the hand of Parker Varnura,
forty-live and a half bushels of rye and Indian meal, also twenty eight
pounds, eighteen shilliDgs, old tenor, in ca&h for the relief of the poor
sufferers by the cruel Boston Port Uill, for which wa shall account to
the town of Boston.
' Isaac Foster,
** Ch. of Committee."
The Boston Committee of Correspondence, with
whom the committees of Dorchester, Roxbury, New-
ton, Cambridge and Charlestown usually joined in
matters of importance, drew up and sent to the local
committees of the Province and the other Colonies a
pledge on the part of those who signed not to buy or
use any goods of British manufacture until the so-
called Boston Port Bill should be repealed. This
agreement w.-is called a " Solemn League and Cove-
nant." It was circulated and numerously signed.
Gen. Gage, by a proclamation, denounced it as an
unlawful, hostile and traitorous combination.
Provincial Congress. — When General Gage
omitted to issue precepts for the regular sessions of the
General Court, a " Provincial Congress " was organ-
ized by the patriots as a substitute. It did not differ
materially from the House of Representatives, which
had long been chosen in like manner, although this
Provincial Congress was not authorized or recognized
by the charter, and had properly no legislative func-
tions.
The first session of this body was held at Salem on
Friday, October 7, 1774. The meeting was temporar-
ily organized by the choice of John Hancock, chair-
man, and Benjamin Lincoln, clerk, and was adjourned
to Concord on the following Tuesday, where for some
days the business was done with closed doors.
Committees of Safety and inquiry on the state of
affairs in the Province were appointed.
The second Provincial Congress met at Cambridge
February 1, 1775.
At the opening of the new year Boston was garri-
soned by a force of 3500 soldiers of the King, and the
efforts made for resistance were subjects of jest and
ridicule by the British officers, and some of them
boastingly said :
" As to what you hear of their taking arms to resist
the force of England, it is mere bullying, and will go
no further than words. Whenever it comes to blows
he that can run the fastest will think himself the best
off. Any two regiments ought to be decimated if
they do not beat in the field the whole force of Mas-
.sachusetts Province; for though they are numerous,
they are but a mob without order or discipline, and
very awkward at handling arms."
At a town-meeting held January 12, 1775, called to
DRACUT.
301
eee what action would be taken for representing the
town in the Provincial Congress to be held at Cam-
bridge, Februarj' 1, 1775, the town made choice of
Peter Coburn. At the same meeting Thomas Hovey,
Amos Bradley, Isaac Fox, William Uildreth and Dr.
Joseph Hunt were chosen a Committee of Corre-
spondence, and Samuel Coburn, Dr. James Abbott,
Reuben Sawyer, John Bowers, William Hildreth,
Parker Varnum, Elisus Barron, Stephen Russell and
Joseph B. Varnum were elected a Committee of In-
spection. A Committee of Correspondence was early
formed in the Colonies for the purpose of communi-
cating, and securing an interchange of views upon the
great questions which were agitating the public
mind.'
The " Committee of Inspection " was for the pur-
pose of ascertaining the military requirements of the
town ; to inspect the military stores and arms, and to
report to the town as to their suitableness and suffi-
ciency for the great emergency which might at any
time suddenly call for thsir use.
At a meeting June 12, 1775, the town voted to pur-
chase bayonets for a company of minute-men ; and
chose Hugh Jones, Deacon Amos Bradley and Eben-
ezer Coburn a committee to see that the bayonets
were made. The sum of twelve pounds, " lawful
money," was appropriated with which to pay for the
bayonets, and also to buy lead and flints, to increase
the town stock.
Minute Men. — As the improvement of the militia
was an object of the greatest importance, the Provin-
cial Congress made arrangements for increasing the
quantity of warlike stores, and organizing an army.
Companies of " minute-men " where everywhere
enlisted, to be held in readiness to march at the short-
est notice. The organization of these troops into bat-
talions of nine companies each, was provided for.
The ranks of the companies were quickly filled by the
enthusiastic youth of the Province, for whom the most
dangerous service was the most attractive. When the
drum beat to arms, every minute-man was to obey the
call on the instant.' Old firelocks were put in order,
old accoutrements furbished up, bullets run, and every
preparation made to meet the issue, for the conviction
was universal that resistance to the bitter end was in-
evitable.
At a town-meeting holden in Dracut, March 6,
1776, the town
•' Voted unanimoUBlv that we comply with the reaolveo of the Provin-
cial CongTBM m far aa iQ oar power."
" Voted to draw oat one quarter part of the training soldiera afl Uic-
ute Men, aa recomtncDded by the provincial Congreas."
"Voted to give the Minute Men one shilling for exercising one half
dny each week for ten weeks to come, after they are equipped, antes
Ihe last act of Parliament — Boaton Port Bill — shall be repealed."
"Voted that If any ot the Minute-Men refuse to go when called for,
that they shall not receive their wag**8 for service.
"Stephen' Rcssell, Jforferaior,"
The representative of the town to ihe Provincial
' See 2d Barry, 460.
1 Middlesex Co., 110.
Congress, having been elected captain of a company
of minute-men, his services were required in that ca-
pacity, and it became necessary for him to resign the
former office and a successor to be chosen.
The Kino Ignored: New Fobm of Warrant.—
A warrant was issued as follows :
" To Hathew Parker, one of the Conitablee ol Dracut, In the name
and by the order of the Provincial Congrese (all previous warrants had
bet-n drawn In the name of His Majesty, the King) : You are hereby
ordered to warn all the inhabitanta qualified to vote for Bepreaentativc,
to assemble at the meeting-boiiae in Dracnt, on Monday, the 'SBth day
of May, 1775, nt five o'clock in the afternoon. To see if the town will
proceed to the choice of one or moiv peraous to serve in the Congr^as, to
meet in the Walertown meeUng-houee on Wedneeday, the 3lBt day of
May, 1775, to consult, deliberate and resolve upon each further mea-
sures as under God shall be effectual in saving this people from Im-
pending nilD."
A town-meeting assembled in accordance with the
foregoing warrant, and Deacon Amos Bradley was
chosen to go to the Congress at Watertown.
Lexington and Concord. — The first scene in the
great War of the Revolution was the battle at Lex-
ington and Concord on the 19th of April, 1775. The
minute-men of Lexington, Concord, Acton, Carlisle,
Lincoln and other convenient towns were aroused
during the night by Paul Revere, and did great exe-
cution.
Two companies of minute-men went from Dracut.
The British unexpectedly met with a hot reception.
The roads were alive with the invincible patriots in
arms, "as if they had dropped from the clouds," and
volley on volley was poured in upon them, and only
from being reinforced were they saved from anni-
hilation. They barely reached Charlestown, almost
on the run, about sunset.
The following is a muster-roll of Captain Peter
Coburn's company of Dracut minute-men, under the
command of Colonel Bridge, at Lexington, April
19th:
Captain, Peter Coburn ; Llentenant^ Josiah Foster, Ebeneaer Var-
num ; Sergeinta, Miles Flint ; Isaac Bmdiey, Parker Varnum ;
Dnimmer, William Webster ; Privates, Josiah Hildreth, Samuel
Barrou. John Bowers, Edw. Wyman, Samuel Coburn, William Hlldrick,
Leonard Coburn, Heiakiah Coburn, Bradley Vamnm, Peter Haiellun,
Jonathan Parkhurst, Isaac Merrill, Jona Hills, Henchu. Richards,
Zebulun Jones, Micah Hildreth, James Varnnm, James Hunt, Phineaa
Coburn, Jona. Uamblet, John Varnum, Benjamin Barron, Jonas Var-
num, John Bradley, Jonas Whitney, Joeiah Koi, Abijah Fox, Solomon
Wood, Jona. Richardson, Abijah Hill, Benjamin Crtieby, lona Jonea.
The following is a " Muster-roll of the Company of
Militia, under command of Capt. Stephen Russeil,
of Dracut, in Col. Green's Regt. that marched on ye
19th of April, a.d. 1775, against the ministerial
troops, &c." (See vol. 13, page 79, "Lexington
Alarms ").
Captain, Stephen Rnssell ; First Llontenant, Ephralm Coburn ; Second
Lieutenant, Abraham Cobnrn ; Sergeants, Matbew Pa'ker, Benjamin
French, G. Barker ; Privates, Reuben Sawyer, David Jonea, Sam-Bel
Brown, Moses Goodhue, John Austin, Jamee Hebberd, Thomas laudKy,
Jona. Crosby, Jr., WlllUm Hildreth, Robert Nickla", Caleb Austin, Ezra
Coburu, Samuel Piper, Ephraim W rlRhl, David Austin, William Ten-
ner, Fletcher Parker, John Harney, James Manser, William Lindsay,
William Coburn, Francis Sawyer, Joehua Pillsbury, James Harvey,
William Taylor, David Trull, Thomas Taylor, David Jones, Jr., Eph-
302
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ralm Hall, Ephmim Parker, Ezeluel Cheever, Timothy Frjc, Peter
Wood, SlepbeD Wood, Elijah Fox, Caleb Sawyer. Job Cubiirn, William
Cloiigb, N. Flint, Hugh Jones, Jesse Aduiiis, George Burns, Kendal
Parker, James Davis, Mitchell Calley, Green Parker, Jauies Sprugue,
Jlosea Davis, David Blood, Joseph B. Varnuni, .\bijab Wood, Jacob Co-
burn, Thomas Vamura, James Reed, Jonathan Coburn, Jonathan Tay-
lor, WtlllHm Wood, Jonas Ricbardsun, Simon Fox, John Gilcrest,
Bartholomew Massey, David Fox, Uriah Coburn, David Adams, John
BowerB, John Taylor, William Harvey, John Hancock, William Clough,
Solomon Jones, Moses Barker, David Clement, David Lindsey, Timothy
Davis, John Barron, John ThisseU, John Roper, Thomas Wright, Tim-
othy Brown, Jr.
Bunker Hill.— Oq the 17th of June, following
the battles of Concord and Lexington, occurred the
historic and ever memorable battle of Bunker Hill.
The minute-men of Dracut, under Capt. Peter Co-
burn, were there. The whole number of the com-
pany is said to be fifty-one, and mosc of ihem from
Dracut. This company was hotly engaged during the
action, and Capt. Coburn's clothes were riddled with
balls.'
Col. James Varnum, then a sergeant in Capt. Co-
burn's company, " had the top of his hat shot otf, and
two bullets through his jacket." As Capt. Ebenezer
Bancroft was returning from the fight, wounded and
fatigued, " Col. James Varnum" he said, " saw me
and came to me ; he took me by the arm and led me
to the horse. While he was with me the ball of the
last cannon I heard that day passed within a foot or
two of me, and struck the ground a short distance
before me."
Capt. Coburn was in the redoubt, and it is related
that just as the order to retreat was given, a British
officer mounted the breast-works and exclaimed '.
"Now, my boys, we have you I" Capt. Coburn, picking
up a stnne, hurled it at his head and knocked him
down.
The following letter was written by Capt. Peter
Coburn, immediately after 'he battle of Bunker Hill: !
"Camp Cabibridge, June 17, 1775.
*' The regiments were ordered from Cambridge to Charleetown, and ;
they arrived there about eleven o'clock at night, and then and there I
began a breastwork, and piii-sued it until about sunrise next morning.
About sunrise the troops fired on us from the ships as they lay in the
ferry-way, and killed one PoUurd, that lived in Billerica, and they con-
tinued their hre at times, all the forenoon, and we Qniehed our breast-
work about twelve ifclock, at about which time they began to laud
nigh our breastwork, and landed about 4(iO men, and in about two hours
began to (ire at us at our breastwork, and continued the Are very brisk
near about two hour^. At length they stormed our breastwork, and we
were obliged to dee, and they pursued us as far as Bunker Hill, but we
killed or wounded fourteen or fiftt-eu hundred, and the loss sustained by
us was few — about one hundred and fifty killed, wounded aud missing —
and on the 17th day of June I arrived at Canibritlge about sunset— alive,
but much tired and fatigued. Blessed be God therefor."
Muster roll of Capt. Peter Coburn's company in
Col Bridge's regiment, at the battle of Bunker Hill,
June 17, 1775, and in the siege of the British Army
in Boston, in the autumn of 1775:
Captain, Peter Coburn; First Lieutenant, Josiah Foster; Second
Lieutenant, Ebenezer Varnum ; Sergeants, James Varnum, Micali Hll-
dreth, Phiueas Coburn, William Harvey ; CorporuU, John Hancock,
'Cowley's "Hist. Lowell,' Frothinghams • Uist. Siege of Boston,"
ilaauD's •' Hist. Dmcut," In Drake's "Co. Middlesex."
John Taylor, Jesse Fox, John Barron ; Privates, John Varnum l Me.
I thuen), Henry Barrou, Jonas Varnum, John Bradley, Jonathan Jones,
Jonas Whiting, Josiah Fox, Abijiih Fox, Moses Richardson, Moses
; Clement, Seth Didson, Solomon Jone^, Gardner Gould, William Var.
nuni, Timothy Davis, Daniel Hough ^Methuen), William Parker, Jona-
I alhan Hamblet ^New York), William Emerson, Amos Sawyer, David
i Lindsey, Samuel Whiting, Nathaniel Kittridge, Samuel Jeuners, John
] Fox, Nehemiah Jaqnest, Joshua Varnum, Solomon Wood, Jonathan
I lUchatdsoo, Abijah Hills. Timothy Patch, Peter Coburn, Jr., Thomas
j Right, John B per, Thomas Gardner, Zehdiel Fitch, .loeeph Tuttel,
Elijah Tuttel, Tobias Briggs, Benjamin Crosby, John Thissell, John
Hoit.
Two companies from Chelmsford were also present
in the battle of Bunker Hill; one under Capt. John
Ford, that was attached to the Twenty-seventh Reg-
iment of foot, and previous to this battle stationed at
Cambridge; the other, Capt. Benjamin Walker's
company.
; Barzilla Lew, of Dracut, was a fifer in Capt. Ford's
company."
I In 177G, after the people had renounced allegiance
I to the British Crown, it was thought by some of the
leading minds in Massachusetts that a Constitution
and form of government should be adopted, and that
it could be properly and more espeditiou-ly done by
the General Court in connection with the Council ;
and a resolution was passed by the House favoring
^ that course. In re-ponse to this resolution we find
the following statement and vote among the records
I of the town :
".U a meeting of the Inhabitants of the town of Dmciit on the 1st
day of Oct., 177li, agreeable to a resolve of the Great and General C.nirt
Iff the Massachusetts Bay, Recommending a meeting of the Inhabitants
of t>.sid Town to see if they will consider and deteriiiiae whether they
will give their consent that the present house of Uepreselitalives of This
Slate, together with the Council if they consent in one body with llie
House, A by equal voice should consent, agree upon, and enact such a
Cuiistitulion .t form of GovernineDt for this State as the said House of
Representatives ,fc Council aforesaid, on the fullest and most mature de
libenition shall Judge will most conduce to the safely, jieace and happi-
ness of this State in all after successions and Generations, .t if they
would direct that the same be made Publick for the Inspection itiid perusal
of the Inhabitants before the ratification thereof by the aasenibly. Voted
that the Present House of Representatives— together with the Honorable
Council of this State— Draw up such a Constitution and form of Govern*
ment as they in their wisdom shall think will be for the peace and hap-
piness of this State, ± that the same be made Publick Before the Kalihca-
tion thereof by the .\ssembly for the Inspection and Perusal of the
People. Only always reserving that sncli form of government msy be
subject to such alteration as this State hereafter may find to be of con-
venience aud necessity.
"Entered by me,
"Wm. Hildbeth, Toitii Cleik:"
Burgoyxe's Sueresder.— In the early part of the
year 1777 a plan was formed in England that an in-
vasion of the States should be made from the North,
and a communication established between Canada and
New York for the purpose of precluding intercourse
between New England and the more Southern States.
General John Burgoyne was put in command of a force
of 7000 troops, besides a powerful train of artillery
and several tribes of Indians for the purpose of execut-
ing this plan. After capturing Fort Ticonderoga,
and destroying the American flotilla and a consider-
^ Allen 8 "HUt. Chelmsford," Cowley's "Hist. Lowell."
DRACUT.
303
able quantity of baggage and Riores at Skeensborough,
he proceeded, after some delay, to Fort Edward on
the Hudson, where he arrived on the 30th of July.
From this place he despatched five hundred English
and one hundred Indians, to seize a magazine of
stores at Bennington, Vt. They were completely de-
feated by a party of Vermont troops called "Green
Mountain Boys," and a force of New Hampshire Mi-
litia, under General Stark. The result of this battle
caused great rejoicing among the Americans, and
Burgoyne's army was correspondingly depressed, as
it served to retard his progress. In fact, it now be-
came a serious question with this general whether to
proceed upon his expedition or to retreat, as the
Americans, comprehending the situation in which he
had placed himself, rallied in great numbers to sur-
round him.
He concluded, however, to proceed, and on the 14th
day of Sept. passed the Hudson and advanced upon
Saratoga and Stillwater.
The General Court of Massachusetts called for
troops to proceed at once to aid in his capture, and
two companies marched from Dracut — one under
Capt. Stephen Rutsell, and one under command of
Capt. Joseph B. Varnum. Several companies of
militia from Suffolk and Middlesex were called out to
protect the capitol and to guard the military stores
there and at Cambridge and Watertown.
Muster-roll of Capt. Stephen Russell's company of
volunteers from Dracut, in Col. Bullard's regiment of
the State of Massachusetts Bay Militia, at Saratoga,
Sept. 1777:
Captain. Slepben Russell ; First Lieuletiaot, Isaac Warren ; Second
Lieutenant, Christopher I'age ; Serpeaiits, Moses Birker, Jeratlin>ell
Coburn, Benjamin Sprake, Peter Hunt ; Corporals, Fr^incis Davidson,
Zebertiuh Jones. Zebediab Rogers, Benjamin Lane ; Drummer, Beiija-
uiin Gould ; Fifer, Abmbuni Stickney ; Privates, John Adums, Charles
Annis, William Beard, Jesse Bradley, Reuben Baulding. Samuel Cuni-
Diings, Jepthn Cobum, Benjamin Coburn, Stlas Coburn, Josiah Crosby,
Abiel Cross, Nathan Cross, Daniel Clement, Jonatlmn Coburn, Joseph
Chambers, William Colwell, .loeeph Do«se, Timothy Davies, Juslah
Esterbrook, l>auiel Emerson, Simeon Foster, Thonms Goodwin, John
Gordon, Jesse Gould, Enoch Hay ward, John Unyward, Neheraiah Hunt,
James Haseltine, Joiiiah Ueald, Ebenezer Johnson, Kathaniel lugails,
Euoch Jewett, Nathaniel Jones, Daniel Kittredge, Asa Kitfredge, Timo-
thy Kelley, Phineas Kidder, David Lane, Beth Lewietune, Saruuel Mar-
shall, Jesse Marshall, Joshua Marshall, Lwac Marshall, Cambridge
More, AVilliani Melenday, Joseph Osgood, Stephen Pearce, Silas Parker,
Samuel Parkhurst, Simeon Parker, William Perham, William Ricbard-
B..n, James Reed, Peter Beed, John Reed, Porter Rea, David Richard-
son, John Robb, Jonas Spaulding, William Taylor, Nathan Tyler,
James Terbox, Samuel Trult, llezekiah Tborndike, Jonathan Shed,
Sampson Walker, Abijah Wood, Isaac Wright, Oliver Wright, David
Walker, Samuel Whitney.
"Muster-Roll of Capt. Joseph B. Varnum's Company
of volunteers from Dracut, in Col. Jonathan Reed's
Regiment in Massachusetts Bay, who marched and
Reinforced ye Northern Army according to a Resolve
of ye Great and General court of s" State, Passed
Sept. ye 22, 1777."
Captain, Joseph B. Tamnm ; Lieutenant, Ephraim Cobum ; Sergeants
Abijah Fox. Jonas VHrnuni, Jonathau Jouea, Timothy Barker; I'orpo-
raln, John Hancock, David Trull ; Fifer. Barzilla Lew ; Clerk, Joshua
Pilbibury ; Privates, David Jones, Samuel Brown, William Abbott,
Simeon Cobnm, Leonard Cobum, Samnel Cobum, Dafid Cobum, Saul
I Coburn, Reuben Coburn, Jonathan Crosby. Mooes Davis, David Fox,
j Zacb. Qoodhne, Josiah Hlldrelh, Peter Hiuelton, Daniel Jaque«t,
David McLaughlin, John Mear^ Isaac Parker, Jonathan Parkhurst,
Daniel Piper, Kbenezer Sawyer, David Sawyer, Jonathan Taylor, Tho-
mas Taylor, Bradley Varnum, Solomon Wood, John Wood.
Having been surrounded by the Americans under
Gen. Gates, a severe battle occurred on the 19th of
September. Both parties claimed the victory. On
the 7th of October another battle was fought in
which the Americans were victorious. Ten days after-
wards, Oct. 17th, Burgoyne, with all his army, sur-
rendered, and became prisoners of war. This was a
glorious victory, and is raid to have been the turning-
point of the war in favor of the Americans. It
gave into their hands a fine train of brass artillery,
five thousand muskets and a great amount of military
stores. The prisoners were marched to the vicinity
of Boston and quartered in barracks on Winter and
Prospect Hills.
Valley Forge. — After the great victory at Sara-
toga, when Gen. Burgoyne with all his army were
made prisoners of war, the principal part of the
American army went into winter-quarters at Valley
Forge, twenty miles northwest irom Philadelphia,
where it encamped during the severe winter of 1777-78.
Many of the soldiers, on their march to this place,
were bare-footed and left bloody foot-prints in the
scow on their dreary journey. The story of the
events and condition of the array at Valley Forge
presents one of the most gloomy pictures of the war.
Scantily clothed and poorly fed, they suffered beyond
measure, while the British army luxuriated in all the
comforts which the city of Philadelphia could afford.
Losaing has most appropriately and beautifully
said:
" If there is a spot on the face of our broad land whereon Patriotism
should delight to pile up its highest and most venenitcd monument, it
should he in the bosom of that little vale on the banksof the Schuylkill.
There, in the midst of trost and snows, disease and destitution, Lit>erty
erected her altar, and in all the world's history we have no record of
purer devotion liulier sincerity, or more pious eelf-aacrifice, than were
there exhibited in Camp of W ashington. The courage that nerves the
arm on the battle-field, and dazzles with its brilliant, but evanescent
flashes, pales before the steadier and more intense flame of patient en-
durance."
Washington, in a letter to Congress, dated Valley
Forge, Dec. 22, 1777, says :
" Had a body of the enemy crossed the Schuylkill this morning, as I
had every reason to expect, the divisions which 2 ordered to he in readi-
ness to march and meet them, could not have moved."
Two of the divisions were those of Generals Var-
num and Huntington. General Varnum,* upon re-
ceiving the order, wrote to Washington :
" According to the myingof Solomon, hunger will break through a
stone wall. It is, therefore, a very pleasing circumstance to the division
under my command that there is a probability of marching. The men
must he supplied or they cannot be commanded. The complaints are too
urgent to be unnoticed. It is Willi pain that I mention this distreas, as
I know it will make your excellency nnbappy," tc.
' General James M. Varnum, a native of Dracult, and brother of Gen.
Joseph Bradley Varnum.
304
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Daring this terrible winter some of the patriotic
soldiers of Dracut were suffering in common with
hundreds of others from Massachusetts and other
States. The following record shows that those who
remained at home were not unmindful of their trials:
*• To the TreamiT^ of DraciU :
" Pay to Junathan Jones ii£. 16». Sd for hi« going with a load of cloth-
iog to Valley Forge."
Defekce or Boston and Camboidoe.
" A town-meeting was holden in Dtacut, May T"*, 1778, and ai^oamed
to tnet^t May 11*'', and then Toted —
" To chooae a committee of adjustment to adjust claims of soldiers for
sef^'ices in the army.
"Ellaba Barron, Isaac Fox, Beuben Sawyer, Joehiia Pillsbury and
Dr. James Abbott were chosen.
" Voted to hire the men now called for, by assessment on property.
Voted to adjourn the meeting to ■22°'* May, 1778.
"On re-ajsaembliog a motion was made to throw np the warrant and
all the doings under it, but the motion was defeated. Mr. Barron, Mr.
Sawyer and Sir. Pillsbury refused to act on the committee and Ephrinin
Curtis, Wm. Wood, and Lient. David Jones were elected in their place.
Then voted to raise 1535 i>ounds, ten shillings to pay the nine months,
six months aud six weeks men that went into ihe service. Voted to give
the men that went to the defence of Boston in Feb., 1778, six £. for
three months. Voted to pay the men that went on. guard in April for
three mouths, 8£. Voted to the men now on guard at Cambridge,
14£,"
The men who " went to the defence of Boston," and
the " men on guard at Cambridge," " the nine months'
men," "six months' men" and "six weeks' men,"
were those who were called out by the General Court
for the defence of Boston, Cambridge and Watertown.
where large military stores were kept, on account of
the troops that had been stationed there having, at
the request of Washington, joined in the expedition
to capture Gen. Burgoyne at Saratoga.
Articles of Confederation. — The Declaration
of Independence, in 1776, was a resolute act, which set
forth in unmistakable terms the determination of the
people, but it did not, in fact, make them free. It was
only one step in that direction. As yet, however,
there was no proper bond of union between the sep-
arate States and it was only the one common sentiment
in regard to the war that kept them together. Some-
thing more seemed necessary ; consequently Congress
adopted " Articles of Confederation," Nov. 15, 1777,
which had been for some time under consideration.
These articles were then sent out to the several
States, and were afterwards ratified by several of the
State Legislatures. They authorized Congress to
carry on the war, to make peace, to manage affairs
with foreign nations, to decide upon the number of
men and the amount of money to be raised, and to
assign to each State its proportion, etc.
The subject was referred to the various towns, and
the following vote, by the citizens of Dracut, explains
their attitude and shows their loyalty to the cause in
which they were engaged :
On the 2d day of February, 1778, a town-meeting
was called to see what instruction should be given to
their representative relating to the Articles cf Con-
federation and Perpetual Union proposed by the
Continental Congress to the Independent States. The
following record was made of that meeting :
'*.\t a legal meeting of freeholders of Town of Dracntt on Monday the
2rt day of February, 1778, the following Resolution passed. On the arti-
cles of Confederation and Perpetual Union between the United States
having been laid before the town it was
" RfnoUfd^ That the said articles appear to be well adapted to the es-
tablishment of the Union of the said States, to confirm and promote their
mutual friendship, establish freedom and independence, and promote
their general welfare, and the Representative of this town is instructed
to give his vote in the General .Assembly, that the delegates in this State
may be authorized to ratify the said Articles of Confedeiation that the
same may become conclusive.
"John VAa?tt:3t, Moderator.
*' Wm. HiLoRETH, Clerk."
At the same meeting it was " voted to send each
soldier who enlisted in the service for three years, or
during the war, one pair of shoes, one pair of stock-
ings and two shirts. Voted to raise GOO dollars to
purchase them and tran.sport them to the said sol-
diers in the army."
Troops Ordered to Ehode Island. — History
informs us that the British forces occupied Newport,
Rhode Island, from December, 177C, to near the close
cf 1779. A secret expedition was planned by the
Legislature of Massachusetts, in September, 1777, in
the hope of forcing them to leave that place.
To carry out this purpose three thousand men were
raised from the counties cf Bristol, Plymouth and
Barnstable, aud the southern parts of Suffolk, Middle-
sex and Worcester. Gen. Spencer, of Connecticut,
had command of the expedition, but it was unsuc-
cessful.
The plan was revived in August, 1778. Gen. Sul-
livan was stationed in Rhode Island with a consider-
able force, including a thousand of the militia of
Massachusetts.
The call for aid from Massachusetts by the Gover-
nor of Rhode Island was so urgent that 2000 more
men were ordered out, and enthusiasm ran so high
that volunteer companies from Boston, Salem, Bev-
erly, Gloucester, Newburyport and other places of-
fered their services.
This town was well represented. A company from
Dracut, under command of Capt. Joseph B, Varnum,
at OQce volunteered. Dr. John Betty, of Chelmsford,
went as a volunteer, and was chosen clerk of the com-
pany.' Col. Louis Ansart, of Dracut, was also aid-
de-carap to Gen. Sullivan, who was in command of
the American forces. The Marquis de la Fayette and
Major-General Green came from the American camp
to serve in this expedition, and Gen. James M. Var-
num, the second son of Samuel Varnum, of Dracut
(who joined the Continental Army from Rhode Is-
land, came from the main army with his brigade to
assist in this great undertaking.^
In addition to the American troops, aid was also
expected from a powerful French fleet, under Count
D'Estaing, that had recently arrived on our coast.
> Allen's " Hist. Chelmsford.'
* Barry's " Hist. Mass."
DRACUT.
305
On account of a violent storm, which increased to a
tempest, and raged so fiercely at sea and on land that
the fleet was shattered, and the army suffered so se-
verely that a number of the soldiers perished with
the cold, this expedition was not a success, though
some severe fighting was done, and many were killed
on both sides. The Americans held their ground, but
Gen. Sullivan, having been apprised by Washington
that reinforcements for the British were on their way,
the Americans withdrew.
Muster-roll of Capt. Joseph B. Varnum's company.
Col. Mcintosh's regiment. Gen. Lovell's brigade of
militia, at Khode Island, 1778:
CaptaiD, Joseph B. VarouDi ; Fint Lieut., Temple Riodat ; Second
Lieut. Abraham Sticlcney ; Serfreantfi, John Robioa, BeubeD Lewis, David
Aufltio, S. Fiagg LaoiD ; Corporale, Asa SpauldiDg, Jno. Haywood, Oliver
Bowers, Oliver Farmer; Phratee, J. Betty, Eben. UuDt, Amoe Bradley.
J. Butterfleld, J. Coburn, S. Cobum, E. Crosby, B. Danforth, W. D.
Forth, James Davis, Joeiab Fletcher, Levi Fletcher, Edward Farmer,
Johb Gardner, Jeaee Haywood, Jonathan Hunt, James Uadley, Paul Hill,
James Louis, Samuel Carey, Joo. Perbam, William Parker, Chester
Parker, Jno. Shed, Jonathan Woodward, Timothy Bancroft, Oliver Co-
burn, Nathl. Ingalls, Thompson Baron, Jno. Soman, Jesse Auger, Simeon
Parker, John Webber, Ebenr. Lemau, Jonathan Foster, David Merrill,
Wm. Spaulding, Jno. Dunn, Andrew Hall, John Johnson, Thos. Good-
win, A^Jrabam Jaquith. — Draciit, October 6, 1778.
Beef and Horses for the Army. — It appears
that on the 25th of September, 1780, the General
Court passed a resolve requiring the towns to furnish
beef for the army ; and on the 9th day of October a
town-meeting was called, to see what method should
be adopted for raising the proportion required from
Dracut. At this meeting it was voted to appropriate
" 40,000 continental dollars old money for the pur-
pose of procuring beef." This would seem to be an
enormous amount of money for so small a town to
raise, and one might suppose it would furnish a con-
siderable quantity of beef; but we must consider that
paper money had depreciated to an alarming extent.
We find in the orders upon the town treasurer by the
selectmen, that in the purchase of this beef they
paid Deacon Amos Bradley £600 for one ox, and to
Captain Peter Coburn £1400 for two oxen ; to Elisha
Baron £660 for one ox.
It also appears that a quota of horses was required
and the following prices were paid : " To Jonas Var-
num, 1000 pounds for one horse for the army ; to
Deacon Thomas Hovey, 609 pounds for a horse ; " and
to show the current prices of articles, and the depre-
ciation of paper money, we also mention the fact that
an order was drawn upon the town treasurer for £84
for a blank-book to be used as a town-book.
On the 28th of December following (1780), another
town-meeting was called, and a vote passed " to raise
62,000 pounds of the old emission of Continental
money, for the purpose of procuring said town's pro-
portion of beef required by the General Court."
At the same meeting measures were taken to raise
men " Required by a resolve o^ye General Court ye
2d of December," and a committee of nine men was
20-ii
elected, consisting of Captain Stephen Bussell, Cap-
tain J. B. Varnum, Lieutenant Ephraim Coburn,
Lieutenant Miles Flint, Lieutenant Davis, William
Hildreth, Reuben Sawyer, Deacon Thomas Hovey and
Benjamin French, "To procure and agree with men
for three years or during the war at the cost and
charges of the town,'' — leaving it discretionary with
the committee what bounty should be paid. Some of
these men who enlisted had to take the town treas-
urer's notes ; some for specified sums of money and
some took agreements for cattle and some for corn.
In after years quite an effort had to be made to re-
deem these " corn notes," and " cattle notes," as they
were called. In 1784 two men, Joel Bowers and
Amos Morse, asked the town to pay them in money
$300 each, with interest, from the time of their
entering the service, instead of cattle, as specified in
the notes they had taken. But the town preferred to
pay them in cattle. They then brought the matter
up in town-meeting, requesting the town to take the
cattle at fifteen dollars each ; but a vote passed in the
negative, and they were paid in cattle according to
agreement when they enlisted.
Probably a good many men held the same kind of
notes, and to have paid these two men money instead
of cattle, might have established a precedent which
could not be consistently followed.
In 1781 (at a town-meeting held April 2d) a vote
was passed to raise thirty-six hundred silver dollars
for the purpose of paying men for three years, or dur-
ing the war, to be assessed without delay.
So large an amount of silver money could not be
raised at once, and a provision was made, " That the
town treasurer be directed to take a promissory note
of hand of such persons as cannot pay their propor-
tion of the above sum, payable on demand with in-
terest, in the same kind of money. The said treas-
urer to be cautious about taking notes of any person
whereby the town will be in danger of losing thereby,
and to require a sufficient security.'"
On the 22d of June, 1781, another beef tax was
laid by the General Court, and the town appropriated
150 pounds hard money for its purchase, and appoint-
ed a committee for that purpose, consisting of Parker
Varnum, Joseph B. Varnum and Peter Hazelton.
(Three beef taxes, in all, were made.)
On the 8th day of March, 1782, another call for men
was made, and the town voted to request Capt.
Stephen Russell and Capt. J. B. Vamum to call out
their companies and have a meeting, to see if any
men could be procured, and all who belonged to the
alarm list and training bands were requested to meet
at Dea. Thomas Hovey's house, to see what could be
done about filling the quota.
We insert, as a specimen, a few of the receipts and
enlistment rolls found among the Revolutionary
Records in the office of the Secretary of State, with
names of men from Dracut, who had subscribed to
them with their own hands:
306
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
•' Dracut, July 17, 1780.
*' Rec'd of the ComDiittee of Dtacut, for hiring men, a note of haud
of 60 biisbela of Indian Com, for our doing a three months' Turn in the
Army for b<* Town.
" Ebenezer Sawyer, George (his X mark) Kelley, Jonas Preecott Bar-
rett, Jonathan Barker, Reuben Sawyer, Dudley Davia, Jacob Atwood,
John Curtifl, Asa Hall, ChriBtopher ^Viniama, Jonathan (hia X mark)
Parker, Jr., Joahaa Thiasell, John (his X mark) Hancock, William
Clough."
" Dracut, June 26, 1780.
"We, the aubscriliera, do hereby Acknowledge that we have each
one of 118 reepectively received of the Committee of Dracut to procure
men for the war, in said Town, One Hundred BusheU of Indian Com
each, for our doing a six Months' Turn for a<^ Town in the Continental
Army.
"Oliver Jones, David Harvpy, Daniel Clemeut, Wm. Gould, Sami.
Abbott, Reuben Colbam, Reuben Rirliardson, John(hi9 Xmark) Maasey,
Thadeua Cohurn, Joshna Bradley, Sam', (his X mark) Ellioiott,
31 OSes Davie."
" We, ye Subscribers, do hereby severally inliat ourselves into the
service of the United States of America, to continue in that service for
the terui of three years, unless sooner discharged. We engage to be
under the command of ye general officers of the United States of Amer-
ica which are or may be appointed, and faithfully to observe and obey
all such orders as we from time to time shall receive from our officers,
and to be under such regulations in even.* respect as are or may be pro*
vided for the Army of the United States.
" Dracut, Feb. ye 9th, 1781.
" fjliver i^liia X mark) McCan, .lolin this X mark) Mussey, Thomas
Wbitaker, Wm. .\bbott, Tony (bia X mark) Clark, Reuben Coburn,
Samuel Coburn, Joel Bowere, Amos Morse.
"We, the Subscribers, do hereby voluntarily enlist onreelves into the
service of the United States, of America, to continue in said service for
the term of 3 years unless sooner regularly discharged, and to be under
just regulations in every respect, as are or may be provided fortbe Army
of the U.S.
" Dracut, March 28, 17
"Benj. Ditaon, (hisX luark'i David Blood, (his X mark) Bent. Grlffln,
(lii:i X mi\rk)."
CHAPTER XXV.
DRACVT— {Continued).
SH-VYS' REBELLIOX AND JIISCELLAXEO0S.
When troops were ordered from the various coun-
ties in Massachusetts, to suppress Shays' Rebellion
in January, 1787, Col. James Varnum, who had been
an oflBcer and seen considerable service in the Revo-
lutionary War, went from Dracut, in command of a
company of volunteers.
The following are the names of a part of his com-
pany :
First Lieut., Dani. Proctor ; Second Lieut., .\bel Adams ; Benj. Butter-
field, Jr., Orvilla Perham, Silas Parker, Oliver Carey, Jeremiah War-
ren, Zebulon Spalding, Jr., Oliver .\damfl, Reuben Gould, Jr., John Mc-
Clenny, Aaron Spalding, Joseph Butterfleld, Joseph Emerson, Jr., Tim-
othy Howard, Jesse Stevens, Henry Spalding, Jr., Tho*. Cbamberllo,
Sami. Stevens, James Parkhuret, John Farmer, Willard Marshall, Abel
Marshall, Amos Preacott, Levi Spalding, i
The principal causes of this Rebellion were the de-
preciation of the currency on account of the Revo-
lutionary War, the heavy taxation, the public and
private indebtedness, and the legal efforts made for
1 Allen, '* Hist. Chelmsford. "
the collection of claims. The story of this disturb-
ance, which may be found in any of the histories
of Massachusetts, is briefly as follows:
In the latter part of June, 1786, in Western Massa-
chusetts, some 1500 or 2000 men, exasperated beyond
control by the showers of writs to which they could
not respond, and executions which they had no means
of satisfying, undertook to relieve themselves from
the intolerable annoyance by dispersing the courts
and arresting the enforcement of legal process alto-
gether. The idea that the people were laboring
under unjust and excessive burdens to some extent
pervaded the whole Commonwealth ; and the .same
feeling existed in other States. On the 22d of Aug.,
1786, a convention of delegates from fifty towns
met at Hatfield, in the county of Hampshire, and
passed resolutions, and made recommendations con-
cerning measures to be taken for the relief which they
sought.
Soon after this a number of insurgents, supposed
to number about 1500, re-assembled under arms at
North Hampton, took possession of the Court-House,
and effectually prevented the sitting of the Courts at
that place as prescribed by law. Gov. James Bow-
doin issued a proclamation, calling upon the officers
and citizens to suppress such treasonable proceed-
ings ; but little attention was paid to it by the rioters.
The counties of Worcester, Middlesex, Bristol and
Berkshire were set in commotion, and the tumult
threatened to be general. Armed bodies of men ap-
peared wherever the Courts attempted to sit at their
regular sessions. The militia were called out under
Major-General Benjamin Lincoln, as it really be-
came necessary to raise an army to suppress these
outrageous proceedings.
It was recommended by the Council that 700 men
should be raised from the county of Suffolk, 500 from
Esses, 800 from Middlesex, 1200 from Hampshire
and 1200 from Worcester, the whole amounting to
4500 rank and file.
The insurgents, under Daniel Shays, numbered
some 2000 men, or more, who were terribly in earnest
in their cause, which they felt was a just one. And
it was only by the prompt and energetic action of the
Governor in calling for troops, and their prompt re-
sponse, that this rebellion was suppressed without
much bloodshed. All the towns in this vicinity fur-
nished more or less men to fill the quota of Middlesex
County. Daniel Shays was a son of Patrick Shays,
and was born on " Saddle Hill," in Hopkinton, Mass.,
in 1747. He was at the battle of Bunker Hill and
served in the Revolutionary War, a part of the time
as captain. He died at Sparta, N. Y., September 29,
1825.
The Federal Constitution of the United States was
adopted by the Convention of Massachusetts in 1788.
The convention met at the State-house in Boston, on
the .Hecond Wednesday in January, 1688, and Joseph
B. Varnum was chosen by the town of Dracut to rep-
DRACUT.
307
resent them in this convention. December 18, 1778,
the voters of Dracut assembled to elect a representa-
tion to Congress, agreeable to a resolve of the General
Court on the 20th of November, of the same year.
The Congressional District then comprised the entire
county of Middlesex. Joseph B. Varnum received
fifty-one votes.
In 1790 the town voted to " instruct their treasurer
to sell the old paper money that was then lying dead
on hand, whenever he could get one dollar per hun-
dred."
In the year 1788 an oath of allegiance was drawn up
and signed, of which a fac-simile will be found on the
succeeding page.
Roads. — The road from Pawtucket Falls, called
the Mammoth Road, was laid out in March, 1792, and
on Nov. 2, 1792, a town-meeting was called, to see
how the road should be graded and put into condition
for travel, and also to appoint some person to look after
the interests of the town in case of a suit for damages.
At this town-meeting the following vote passed :
" Voted that any man that will work at the road that
was laid out last March from Pawtucket Falls, through
Col. James Varnum's land and Parker Varnum's
land to Mr. Solomon Osgood's blacksmith shop,
should be allowed in the next year's highway tax."
" Voted that Parker Varnum, Esq., be appointed to
defend the town against any cost that may accrue by
a reason of a road being laid out by the court's com-
mittee ill said town."
There was laid out by the selectman, and accepted
by the town, a road from the common in front of the
house of Parker Varnum's dwelling-house to the
river p.ist Col. Louis Ansart's house, in the westerly
part of Dracut in May, 1797. The house where
Parker Varnum lived is now owned and occupied by
the heirs of Dea. Theodore Hamblet. The old An-
sart house was taken down many years ago, and an-
other built on the same spot by Daniel Varnum. The
road to the river was called the Ferry Road, leading
to Clark's Ferry, and it served its purpose, as people
used to cross the river to "Middlesex village" in
Chelmsford to trade before Lowell began, but the
road was discontinued as a town road probably more
than forty years ago.
The Dam at Pawtucket Falls. — In the year
1801, May ye 25th, at a town-meeting, it was voted
unanimously " That the erection of a dam across
Merrimack River at Pawtucket falls, in the manner
proposed by petitioners to the General Court at the
last session, wiU, in the opinion of this town, totally
destroy the fish in the said river and deprive the
people of the important privilege which they for a
long time, even from time immemorial, have enjoyed
without molestation ; of taking neare theire doors the
most delicate food and much of the real necessaries
of Life, and no other purpose can be answered thro'
a gratification of the averitious feelings of a few in-
dividuals who must be unacquainted with the real
effect of the measures or regardless of the publick
good."
PooE Faem. — During the year 1782 the town built
a poor-house. Ebenezer Coburn, Parker Varnum and
Dr. Thomas Hovey were elected a committee with
instructions to build the house as cheaply as they
could consistently, and to locate it in the most con-
venient place.
In 1806 an effort was made to purchase a poor farm
and an article inserted into the warrant to that effect,
but the article was dismissed and no action taken.
Bodwell's Falls. — Voted, unanimously, to send
a petition to the General Court, against narrowing the
passage-way for rafts at Bodwell's Falls, by building a
bridge across the said falls in 1807.
Narrow Escape from Drowning. — About the
I year 1806 Moses Hale, who lived near what is called
'' Hale's Brook " or " River Meadow Brook," in
Chelmsford (now Lowell), in company with Mr. Philip
Bowers, of Billerica, had been on a Sabbath evening
to Middlesex Village, in Chelmsford, in a sleigh ; and
when about to return, the sleighing being poor, they
essayed to drive down on the ice of Merrimack River.
They drove upon the river at Black Brook, and after
proceeding a short distance, came to what they sup-
posed to be black ice ; but what was really an open-
ing. The horse refused to go ; but without investi-
gating the cause, they urged him and drove him into the
water, and were immediately plunged in themselves.
They shouted for help, but it was late in the evening
I and the night was very cold. It so happened, how-
ever, that there had been a singing meeting at the
Toll-House, at Pawtucket Bridge, and several young
men were returning home. Among them were Col-
burn Blood, Thomas Varnum, Samuel and Jeremiah
' Varnum. The accident occurred in the vicinity of
land now owned by Mr. W. H. Hull, and it was quite
a distance from the road to the river ; but these young
men when they heard the call for help, started at full
speed down over the fields, to the assistance of the
j drowning men. When they arrived Mr. Bowers, who
was a heavy man, and was clinging to the ice at the
I lower part of the opening, told them to make all
I possible haste to save him, for he could not hold on
i much longer. Mr. Blood lay down on the ice, and
the others behind him in the same position, taking
hold of each other's heels, and thus approached Mr.
Bowers and succeeded in pulling him out. Two other
young men, Jonathan Hildreth and Peter Hazelton,
had also heard the cry for help, and running to their
relief, they rescued Mr. Hale in the same manner as
that in which Mr. Bowers had been saved. The horse
and sleigh had gone down under the ice, but were
found the next day near Pawtucket Falls, the ice
being so clear that they could be seen through it.
The unfortunate men were at once taken to the house
of Parker Varnum, where such faithful attention was
given them during the night that they were able to
leturn to their homes the next day.
1
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DKACUT.
309
Colored People of Dracut. — The first colored
persou of whom we have any account in this im-
mediate vicinity, that I am aware of, lived in Dracut,
and was here as early as 1720. He was called
" Antony." The town then owned what was called
"reserved land," and some of this land (by vote of
the town) was occasionally set off to poor people, and
Antony came in for a slice of it with others. He was
called "Tony" for short, and his wife was called
" Sary." They had several children ; one named
John was drowned in April, 1739. The birth of one
of the children is thus mentioned in the town records:
" Jonathan, negro, the son of Antony, negro, and
Sary, negro, his wife, was born unto them August
ye 8th, 1721."
Casar. — After the settlement of Rev. Thomas Par-
ker in Dracut, as the "gospel minister," in 1720, he
employed or owned, a negro of the name of " Cassar,"
who was bright and witty, we judge from anecdotes
related of him. A beautiful spring of water in the
vicinity of the minister's home, on what is now called
Varnum Avenue, in Lowell, is supposed to have been
discovered by this humble colored individual with a
great name, and it was called Casar's Spring, and
still is known by that name.
Tnidition furnishes the following anecdote;
Caesar was in the habit of fishing through the ice
in a brook near the house where they lived. One
day he set his hook and went to the woods to procure
fuel. While he was gone Mr. Parker caught a rat
and for the purpose of having a little joke on the dig-
nified Caesar, put it on the fish-hook and sunk it as
Ctesar left it. When Csesar returned he discovered
the rat caught by the mouth, as though it had been
an inhabitant of the water; he held it up, glancing
up to the house occasionally to see if the minister
saw him.
Finally he took off the rat, and set his hook as
before. He made no mention of the circumstance,
and for the purpose of bantering him a little, Mr.
Parker inquired in the evening if he had caught
anything. "Yes, sah." "What did you catch?"
"0, suthin'nudder." "A pickerel, of course." "No,
sah." " A perch ? " " No, sah." " What could it be
then ? " "A minister, I reckon," replied Csesar ; " he
had a black coat on."
Sip. — Col. Louis Ansart, an educated Frenchman
who came to this country in 1776, and was appointed
colonel of artillery and inspector-general of foundries
during the Revolutionary War, settled in Dracut
after the war closed, on the farm formerly occupied
by Rev. Thomas Parker, the place being known as
the " Ministree." Colonel Ansart employed, or
owned, two negro servants, one of whom he called
"Sip." He was a very brave fellow and perhaps a
namesake of the Scipios (the name of one of the
most illustrious patrician families of ancient Rome).
The following funny anecdote has been handed down
as a specimen of the courage and prowess of the re-
doubtable Sip. In the winter of 17%, which was un-
usually cold with a great depth of snow, some wild
animal, as it appeared, visited the farm-yards in this
vicinity in the night-time and killed many valuable
sheep. At this time about all the farmers kept as
many sheep as was convenient, because they manu-
factured their own cloth for clothing, and all the girls
were taught to card and spin and weave and knit and
sew, much as girls are now taught music and drawing
and fancy needle-work as accomplishments. The
silk'^orms had only just set up in business then, and
cotton and woolen-mills were scarcely known in this
country. Numerous efforts were made to discover the
cause of the great destruction of these valuable
animals ; for although it was apparent that they were
killed by some ferocious wild beast, it was for a long
time impossible to tell what it was or where it came
from. Some said it came from the woods, and large
tracks could be traced upon the snow that covered
the walls. The premises that were visited most fre-
quently by this intruder were those of Parker Varnum,
Col. Ansart and Thomas Varnum ; and to prevent
their destruction, the sheep were fastened in tight
pens. But one morning several sheep were found
dead in Col. Ansart's barn, though they were supposed
to be safely enclosed, and there appeared to be no
way that an animal of suflScient size to kill so many
sheep could enter from the outside. This fact led the
people to think that the animal lived under the bam.
Two young men accordingly volunteered to watch for
him ; so armed with guns and plenty of ammunition,
ihey sat in the colonel's sulky during the whole of
one night, but nothing made its appearance. One
morning, by appointment, the neighbors all assembled.
Lieut. Timothy Coburn was there with a very large
dog, which it was thought might drive the creature
out. The dog indicated by his furious barking that
the lair of the voracious marauder had been dis-
covered, and it was equally evident that the dog
thought he had found a foe not to be trifled with, for
he dare not make the attack. After much deliberation
and several protracted consultations, a portion of the
men were stationed at convenient points around the
barn with their guns, while others proceeded to take
up the planks in the floor, at a certain place where,
from the actions of the dog, it was thought the animal
was crouching. It so happened that the first plank
removed disclosed the monster, directly underneath
it, and it was so intent upon watching the move-
ments of the dog that it took no notice of what was
going on above him. Indeed, he dare not turn his
eyes to the right or left lest he might he seized by
the huge mastiff. Now Sip appears upon the scene.
Various plans had been suggested for killing the
creature for he was now considered an easy prey, as
he lay there, apparently unconscious of his perilous
surroundings, excepting the threatening attitude of
the dog. Some proposed that several men be selected
to shoot him, all firing at the same time ; others pro-
310
HISTOKr OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
posed to strike him down with an axe; but Sip pro-
posed to seize him in his brawny arms and crush his
bones in his powerful grip. His proposition of course
was rejected with ridicule, and when told that the
beast would tear him into pieces in a moment, he
said : " Now, gemmens, you all werry much mistaken !
Did young David, we read about in de Lord's book,
when de lion an' de b'ar come to kill de sheep, run off
to get his farder's ole gun ? No, sah ! He just seize de
lion by de beard an' de b'ar by de nap of de neck an
he break dere bones an' frow dere carcases to de
eagles an' de crows an' de fowls of de air, an' he de-
libered de little lamb out of dere moufs, an' he didn't
hab no neighbors an' friends stannin' 'round behind
him to help him ; an 'Leftenant Tim Coburn's big
dog wasn't dere neither. No, sah I dere's no use in
latin'. I's sure I can hold him ; old Sip nebber let go
till he break ebery bone in de beast's body." Sip's
plan did not prevail, however, but a powerful man
with more prudence struck a sharp axe into the
creature's back, severing the spine, which despatched
him almost instantly.
The animal was thought by some to be a wolverine,
but probably it was a wolf It was skinned and the
skin stutfed or mounted, and was kept for many
years. An old gentleman, who has many times re- |
lated the story to the writer, says that " It was, [
after being stuffed, placed at the head of the attic |
stairs at Col. Ansart's house to frighten the children
and prevent them getting the ile-nuts." He had seen
it frequently. It stood about two feet high, and was
about the size of a large dog. For some time before
it was killed, considerable excitement was experienced
throughout the neighborhood, and the women and
children were afraid to go out after dark.
It seemed that the place selected for the den of the
animal lay within about ten or twelve feet of the young
men who were watching for it in the sulky and could,
probably, hear every movement they made and the
noise of their conversation, even though made in
whispers, and of course it remained quiet, though it
lost its supper by doing so.
Fhillia. — A colored woman called Phillis, who lived
with a gentleman long since deceased, was formerly a
slave and ran away from her master when a girl on
account of cruel treatment. She came to this gentle-
man, known everywhere for his kindness, and begged
of him to protect her, as her master was in close pur-
suit. He took her to his large granary, filled with
hogsheads of grain, inverted an empty one, placed
her underneath and strewed the top with rye. Her
master soon appeared and made diligent search, but
did not find her. Soon after (in 1780, by an amend-
ment of the Constitution) all slaves in Massachusetts
were made free, and Phillis, by her own choice, re-
mained at her new home contentedly during life, an
obedient and faithful servant. We have been inform-
ed, however, that she had one prominent weakness.
She was very fond of cider, and if she could get it
would frequently imbibe too freely ; so, for Phillis'
good name and reputation, it became necessary to lock
up the cellar where it was kept. She would then drink
the vinegar, and, when nothing better could be pro-
cured to drink from without attracting attention, she
would draw the vinegar into her shoe and drink from
that. She possessed a religious turn of mind, and if
kept from her special temptation and delivered from
its evil, she was quite as consistent as many who were
socially her superiors ; for in those times nearly all
good people considered it proper to partake of stim-
ulating drinks, not unfrequently imbibing too much.
Old Cuff. — Old Cuff was the colored servant of a
gentleman in Dracut. He possessed none of the ad-
vantages of an education, of course; but naturally of
a bright and active turn of mind, he was a factor in
his way in this community many years ago. It is re-
lated of hira, that on a certain occasion he attended
an auction sale. While there, either before the sale
or afterward, perhaps, he happened to be standing
near two gentlemen whose names we will not mention
now, but they were considered as belonging to the
" upper-crust" in the community. It is understood
that they were talking somewhat ostentatiously, and,
as Cuff thought, rather magnifying the subject they
were discussing, when he gave a most immoderate
guffaw. One of the gentlemen, whose conversation
had attracted Cuff's attention, said good-naturedly :
"Cuff, what is the matter? Do you think I am tell-
ing a lie?" "No, sah," replied the negro," but
massa talk jes' exactly as Cuff do when he lies
mos' cussedly ! — Yah, yah I "
The Lew Family. — In 1775, when the Revolution-
ary War began, there was living in that part of Low-
ell now known as Pawtucketville, a colored man of
the name of Barzilla Lew. I am not familiar with
his pedigree (if he had any) or how he came by his
surname, but have thought that possibly he, or some
of his ancestors, may have taken their name from
some master and is a contraction of the proper name
Lewis or Lewin, both of which are names common
and of some distinction in England. Barzilla was a
free man and was always called " Zeal." He lived to
a good old age and in later years was commonly
known as " Old Zeal." He was a musician, and when
the Revolutionary War began he joined Captain John
Ford's company of the Twenty-seventh Regiment of
Foot as fifer, and was with that company at the battle
of Bunker Hill, June 17, 1775. Zeal lived on what
is now called Totman Street, where he owned a farm,
a part of which now belongs to Jonas Olson. This
street for nearly a century was known as " The Old
Zeal Road." He purchased his wife Dinah, of Maj.
Abraham Blood, great-grandfather of Mr. O. R.
Blood, now a member of the Common Council of
Lowell. Barzilla was a cooper by trade, and was
quite dark-colored ; but Dinah, his wife, was a mulat-
to and almost white — bleached out, as some of the
slaves were in the South.
DRACUT.
311
Barzilla and Dinah had twelve children, viz.: Z«dock,
Barzilla, Peter, Rufus, Zimrye, Eli, Amny, Zurvia,
Beba, Dinah, Phebe and Lucy. They all possessed a
natural talent for music, and most of them could play
any kind of wind or stringed instrument — the girls
as well as boys. They formed a complete band, and
furnished music oc all first-class occasions in this vi-
cinity, and were called frequently to Boston and even
as far away as Portland. After they became celebated
their services were required so much at Boston that
some of them made it their home during the winter
months ; Barzilla, Jr., who was almost white, was well
educated, and became a man of some property and con-
sequence. I have been informed that he owned the
largest library in the town and rode in his coach. He
was tall and dignified in appearance, had a handsome
face with tine features, possessed a commanding ap-
pearance and was remarkably intelligent, refined and
pleasing in his address. Had it not been for the
social degradation to which the race to which he be-
longed had been reduced, he would have been chos-
en to the first ofiices in his town, if not in the State.
Wild Animals. — In the early settlement of Dra-
cut Mr. Jabesh Coburn, great-grandfather of the late
Mr. George S. Coburn, killed a bear on a large stone
in the field in front of his residence, — the same now
owned by Mr. Enoch Mills. Mr. Coburn first caught
the bear in a trap and then shot him. Old Bruin
had been making depredations in the corn-field, and
was not the kind of pet that Mr. Coburn fancied. Many
years ago, Mr. Jabesh Coburn, son of the above Ja-
besh, went quite early in the morning to his barn to
feed his cattle, and upon going up the ladder and
passing under a high beam, his hat and also a hand-
kerchief which he had bound over one of his eyes,
which had been injured, were caught off very suddenly
and unceremoniously. Looking up to see who or what
could have so much audacity, he saw, looking down
upon him, a huge wild-cat. Mr. Coburn procured a
pitchfork and plunged it against the monster. The
fork did not penetrate the skin of the animal, but
forced him from the beam to the floor. A large dog
which stood at the foot of the ladder seized the wild-
cat and broke his back before he had time to recover
himself; but even with the back broken, he beat the
dog and got out at the door and crawled under the
barn a short distance. The dog would look under and
bark, but dared not attack him again. But Mr. Co-
burn came again with his pitchfork and soon dis-
patched his savage visitor. Upon making further in-
vestigation he found that several hens had been
killed, and, after eating what h* desired, the intruder
had taken the feathers for a nest. After the animal
had been killed he reached, in length, from the
ground to Mr. Coburn's chin. This occurred on the
place above named.
A few years ago a raccoon was not an uncommon
animal in New England; but at the present time they
are rarelv found here.
The writer only recollects of one being killed in
this vicinity. About the year 1850 a boy of our ac-
quaintance saw one on a large oak tree asleep in the
high branches. The crows had discovered him and
■commenced an attack. The boy, being destitute of a
gun or any means of killing him, secured the services
of a colored man who came and shot the coon and
carried him home for hie dinner.
Some time about the year 1820 a young man was
going through the woods in the early part of the
evening, at "Flag Meadow," so called, lying north
of the residence of Deacon Abel Coburn, accompa-
nied by a dog famous for bunting. When in the
middle of a large growth the dog gave an unusually
sharp and terrified bark, not a great distance away.
Very soon the young man concluded, by the running,
that the game had started and the dog was in pursuit.
Whatever the animal was it seemed to be making its
course directly to the spot where he stood, and, as he
had nothing to defend himself with, and the even-
ing was " as dark as pitch," and he, judging from
all the indications that the animal must be a wild-cat,
his situation was not a pleasant one. The animal ran
close past him, however, with the dog in pursuit,
when it sprang up a large oak tree. The young man
bade the dog watch by the tree, and he started home
for a gun and lights. He informed his three brothers
of what had happened, and they all started for the
woods, thinking, of course, that the game was some-
thing not commonly found. They surrounded the
tree with pitch-lights, but could see nothing of the
animal. They finally set themselves to the task of
cutting the tree down ; but it being about two feet
through and tough, it required some euergy. But at
it they went, and about twelve o'clock the tree fell-
Search was then made, when the animal was discov-
ered to be only a large raccoon cuddled up in the
branches and uninjured by the fall. The boys con-
sidered it rather a joke that they had taken so much
pains; but the 'coon never " laughed to hear the story
told."
In the winter of 1871 David Ockington, Luke Mc-
Farlin, A. 0. Richardson, William Hapgood and
others were out on a hunting expedition near "Bear
Meadow," in Dracut, when they killed a wildcat.
This was the only wildcat killed in this vicinity since
about 1840, when one was killed by Milton Stanley
in the woods west of the junction of the Nashua and
Mammoth Roads, near the present residence of George
A. H. Richardson.
Old Ferry Lane and Central Bridge. — Old
Ferry Lane, in Dracut, led to Hunt's Ferry, after-
wards called Bradley's Ferry, which was one of the
means of crossing Merrimack River at the place
where Central Bridge was afterwards built, and is
still maintained.
Hunt's Ferry was, in later years, owned by Joseph
Bradley, which fact gave it the name of Bradley's
Ferry. Nehemiah Bradley, a brother of Joseph,
312
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
who kept a shop where he made and repaired boots
and shoes, on the Dracut aide of the river, at-
tended to the ferry. The ferry-boat was kept on
the Dracut side and when people from the Chelms-
ford (now Lowell) side wished to cross, it was their
custom to blow a horn, or attract the ferryman by
calling.
As East Chelmsford increased her manufacturing
and other business establishments the land on the
Dracut side of the river, near the ferry, became
available for building purposes, and better facilities
for crossing the river were required. Several busi-
ness enterprises had been established as early as 1820,
among them Howe's Flannel-Mills, and the powder-
mills of Oliver M. Whipple, on the Concord River.
A line of stages was established from East Chelms-
ford to Boston in 1822, and the Merrimack Manufac-
turing Company, on the 5th of February, of the
same year, with a capital of $600,000.
Travel had increased to such an extent that the old
method of crossing the Merrimack by ferry-boat must
give place to something better. Consequently, on
the 24th of February, 1825, the Legislature of Jlas-
sachusetts passed an act making Joseph Bradley,
Benjamin F. Varnum, Ezekiel Cheever, Abijah Fox,
Ezekiel Fox, Peter Hazleton and others, a body
corporate as the Central Bridge Corporation. The
ferry was purchased by the new corporation, and the
bridge was so far completed during this and the fol-
lowing season that tolls corresponding to those at
Pawtucket Bridge were collected before the close of
the year 1826. The original cost of the bridge was
about S21,000. The tolls for foot-travel were abol-
ished in 1843. The bridge was rebuilt in 1844, and
covered in 1849. The cost of rebuilding was ^9000,
and of covering, $4000.'
Lowell was incorporated during the building of
this bridge, i.e., March 1, 1826.
After the work of building the original bridge was
nearly completed, the following account of it ap-
peared in the Merrimack Journal, under date of De-
cember 15, 1826.
** NEW BRIDGE.
*' The Ceutnl Bridge dow erecting acroea the Merrimack at thin place,
is so Dearly completed ae to be passable. It is built od the principle of
the brace and the arch ; la tive hundred feet iu length, and stands on the
abutments and two pierB. The span of the centre arch is one hundred
and eighty feet ; of the two outer arches, one hundred and sixty feet
each. The traveled way is divided into two parte, with the walks on
each side. The timben are all secured from water. The work appears
to have been judiciously planned by the architect, Luke S. Itand, Esq.,
and handsomely executed under bis direction. The expense of erecting
it will probably amount to 916,000, but the rapid growth of this place
warrants the conclusion that the eoterprisinE proprietors will find it a
profitable investment of capital. Two stage-coacbes cross it daily
already, one to HaverhiU and Dover, and one to Londonderry." 3
In 1885 the bridge was laid out as a public highway
by the City Council of Lowell, and damages of one
^Cowley's*' Hist Lowell."
• " Hist. Centlal Bridge," by Alfred Gllnian, contrib, to Old Residents'
aistoricul An'n. Vol, II, No, 3.
dollar awarded. The Bridge Corporation made a firm
and resolute resistance, and the result was an expen-
sive lawsuit of some seven years duration.^ At last
a verdict was rendered by consent, in 1862, of $33,-
958.51 for the Bridge Company, which included inter-
est and cost of suit. Dracut paid of this sum $7865,
and Lowell the remainder. During the various trials,
counsel for the city were A. P. Bonney, T. H. Sweet-
ser and B. F. Butler ; for the Bridge Company, Rufus
Choate, Daniel S. Richardson, J. G. Abbott and Ben-
jamin Dean.
The bridge was again rebuilt in 1862, at an expense
of 333,818.83, and this bridge was burned Aug. 5,
1882. It has been replaced by a fine bridge, the
superstructure of which is iron, built by the Morse
Bridge Company, of Youngstown, Ohio, for the sum
of S51,590. This, with the piers, abutments, etc.,
built by W. H. Ward, of Lowell, for $59,000, amounts
to $110,590. It is estimated that, with incidentals,
the whole expense was not far from $115,000.
Tejiperan'ce. — The subject of temperance began
to be agitated in Dracut in 1828, and many of our
best and most enterprising men joined in the move-
ment in favor of temperance reform.
The American Temperance Society had been
formed in Boston two years earlier (February, 1826),
and a weekly paper called the National PhilanthropUt
had been established there, but afterwards removed
to New York, and another one was soon after started,
called The Journal of Humanity, edited by Rev.
Edward W. Hooker.
The temperance work was under the leadership of
such men as Rev. Justin Edwards, of Andover ; Rev.
Nathaniel Hewett, of Fairfield, Conn.; Rev. Lyman
Beecher, of Litchfield, Conn.; Jeremiah Day, D.D.
president of Yale College, and others; and in most
towns throughout the State temperance societies had
been formed as early as 1830. In 1831 there were re-
ported nineteen State societies, comprising 3000 local
societies, with more than 300,000 members. Maine,
Alabama, Louisiana, Illinois and Missouri were the
only States in which a State society had not been
formed at that time.
The first temperance society in this vicinity was
formed in Lowell in 1829. The late Hon, John A.
Knowles was secretary of the first meeting called to
organize it. Elisha Glidden was the first president,
Elisha Huntington the second, John A. Kuowles the
third, and William Austin the fourth. The first tem-
perance society in Dracut was formed in 1830, Joseph
Butterfield Varnum president. In 1834 the young
men formed a society. Timothy V. Coburn was
president, Jesse Clement vice-president, George W.
Coburn secretary and Abel Coburn treasurer. Soon
after this society went into operation the young ladies
formed one of which Miss Sarah Ann Blood was
president. Each of these societies numbered about a
3 Gray Beports.
DRACUT.
313
handred, and they were finally united as one organ-
ization. Temperance addresses and essays were
made at their meetings, and some effective tem-
perance work was done. An influence was exerted
which is felt to this day among our citizens. Before
this movement began, in 1828, the use of distilled
liquors was universal, and moderate drinking was
considered no disgrace. Liquors were used on all
public occasions, even at ordinations and funerals.
A clergyman, settled in 1818, informs us that at his
ordination, among more than twenty ministers present,
only one refused to take his grog at the proper time,
nor was it deemed inconsistent with Christian char-
acter and experience, and it would have been con-
sidered a serious breach of etiquette not to have it
provided for all in attendance. Quite a change in
seatimeat has taken place since that time.
Central Village Academy. — This institution,
popularly known as Dracut Academy, was incorpor-
ated March 1, 1833. The Academy building stood on
the spot now occupied by the Varnum (Grammar)
School. It was first occupied for school purposes in
1836, Isaac Withnell, A.M., principal. Joseph Brad-
ley was president of the corporation, and the late
Jefferson Bancroft, secretary. The first catalogue
(one of which is now in possession of Mrs. Paul Hill,
of Billerica,) contains the names of ninety-one pupils.
The school was quite prosperous for a number of years,
and there are still living both teachers and scholars
who remember the old Dracut Academy with much
pleasure.
Other teachers besides Mr. Withnell, during the
existence of the Academy, were Benjamin F. Butler,
Bev. Mr. Cutler, Rev. Cyrus Mann, Wm. G. Russell,
Rev. John C. Ingalls, Henrv F. Durant and Charles
Morril).
Among those who were pupils at different times,
we may mention the names of Wm. P. Brazer, Wm.
AV. Wiggin, the late Jonathan Ladd, Edward Harts-
horn, Joseph B. Varnum, Mary B. Varnum, Caroline
R. Varnum (Mrs. Alpheus R. Brown), Lauretta
Coburn (Mrs. Fisher A. Hildreth), Mrs. Paul Hill,
Phineas and Edward Richardson, Joseph B. V.
Coburn and George W. Coburn.
Of the teachers, B. F. Butler, Wm. G. Russell and
Henry F. Durant became lawyers of more than a
local reputation in their profession. Mr. Morrill was
superintendent of schools in Lowell for a number of
years.
We append the following advertisement which ap-
peared in one of the Lowell papers in 1842 :
" DRACCT CKTTRIL VILLAGE ACADEMY.
*'r I IHE Sammer Term of this InstitutioD will commeDce ou
X WEDNESDAY the 6lh of July neit.
" The location of this School is Rurpassed bj few. If any in New Eog-
land. There is coDoected with it a large and convenient tjoarding-
boufie, a workshop, a small track of land and a Cap^ehop for the Ladiea,
■0 that individuals both male and female, may, in part at least, defray
their expenses If they choose — but all depends upon their own industry
mud economy almost.
** Board for males is two dollan per week, including a reaaonabls
amount of washing, and a room for two persons, well furnished. Wbols-
aome regulations are strictly adhered to in the boarding-boose, »nd
those that make application for board, are requested to give evidence of
sustaining a good moral character.
" The price of Board for Females is $1.60 per week, and they do their
own waabiDgaud irouing, and take care of their rooms principally,
*' Ever; effort will be made to render the InstltuUon useful to all who
avail tbemselvee of the privileges of the school.
" Mr. Russell, the present teacher, who has done himself much booor
for the three last terms, as a very efficient teacher, is about to leave, to
engage in bis professional studies, and the services of John C. Ingalls,
DOW in Connecticut, are secured for the future ; and we doubt not be
will be equally sacceesful with his prvdecessor, in giviog SDtire satisfac-
tioD, for Mr. Ingalls is a man of rare qualifications as a teacher. Be-
sides being a gentleman of finished literary acquirements, be has a well-
earned reputation in this department, and wherever he has beeo em-
ployed has gIveD UDCommon satisfactitm to pareDts and guardians who
have entrusted their children to his care and instruction.
" In behalf of the Institution.
"Dracut, JnneZ, 1842.'
' N. THURSTON.
The old Academy building now stands on Bridge
Street, Central ville, and is used by Wood, Sherwood
& Co. for the manufacture of wire goods. I am in-
debted to Mr. C. C. Chase, for many years head-mas-
ter of the Lowell High School, for valuable facts
concerning this Academy.
Wrestling by Dracut Men. — In 1813 Captain
Phineas Whiting and Major Josiah Fletcher erected
a wooden factory for the manufacture of cotton in
Chelmsford on the present site of the Middlesex
Company's mills, now in Lowell. This was the first
mill built in this vicinity.
After the raising there was a wrestling match, and
Micah Coburn, of Dracut, held the ring for a long
time. He was one of the most powerful men that the
world ever produced, and a scientific wrestler, and no
man of ordinary strength could cope with him for a
moment. "After a considerable time" — in the lan-
guage of one who was present — " they got in Bill
Tank, a man of great physical strength and size, and
so stout that he would load barrelsof cider by putting
them over the sides of an ox-wagon. There was great
sport in this match. It looked like a contest between
two monstrous lions. It was a good while before
either could make any impression upon the other; at
last they both fell -in such a way that it was called a
' draw,' and that ended the game."
The real name of " Bill Tunk," as he was called,
was William Varnum. There were several of the
same name, and to distinguish him from the others
he received this name because when he was convers-
ing with people he had a habit of giving them a
thrust with his hand, or, as they expressed it, giving
them a " tunk."
Half a century ago Dracut was somewhat celebrated
for its men of physical strength and litheneas, some of
whom were very expert in wrestling. So was Chelms-
ford, and other towns in this vicinity. Whether it was
because their boys were raised so largely on lamprey
eels that were taken so plentifully from the Merri-
mack I never knew. I have been informed that a
314
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
challenge was sent to Dracut from Methuen many
years ago to meet them on the line between the two
towns for a wrestling match. It was accepted, and
the best men of both towns met on the day appointed.
The struggle was entered into heartily on both
sides, and the result for a while was doubtful, but
Dracut was finally victorious. To use the expression
of my informant (who is still living), " Dracut threw
Methuen over the line.'' If that was so, it was proba-
bly a friendly triumph which required a mighty
effort, for Methuen boasted of powerful men not to be
tossed about with impunity.
At " ordinations and ' Four-days meetings,' " which
everybody attended, a little wrestling, when nothing
else was going on, was not considered inappropriate.
At an ordination in Dracut some forty years ago, one
of the old residents challenged a person present to
wrestle with him, and told him he would throw him
in a minute or pay for the flip, whereupon they took
hold and no sooner was the word " ready " given the
challenger was thrown, but he sprang up and clenched
his opponent .again and threw him. and it was all done
Inside a minute, so that the challenger was not re-
quired to " pay the flip " although he had been
thrown in the contest.
An old resident now seventy-seven years of age says,
"When the first mill wasbuilton BeaverBrook, at what
is now called the 'Navy Yard,' by Sewell Stanley &
Brothers, I remember very well that as soon as the
plates were up, I saw Joseph Butterfield Varnum
standing on them preparing to pin them on to the
frame and put up the rafters. This was about the
year 1813. After the building was raised there was
a grand trial of skill in wrestling, which lasted till
midnight.'"
Wrestling is of great antiquity. It was one of the
Olympic games among the ancient Greeks, and
Charles the Duke's wrestler in Shakespeare, says :
"To-morrow, sir, I wrestle for my credit, and he
that escapes me without some broken limb shall
acquit him well."
The game is now fortunately out of date. No good
ever came of it, while broken bones, sleeveless shirts
and unkind feelings were frequently the result, but it
is perfectly natural that a man who has the strength
of a Hercules should take some pleasure in display-
ing it.
Husking Bees. — It was a custom among our fore-
fathers in the early settlement of this country, to ac-
complish some of the important work to be done by
making a party or " Bee " and inviting all the friends
and neighbors to assist.
This was a very social and expeditious way of per-
forming labor which would be inconvenient and dif-
ficult for a few individuals ; besides, it was an agreea-
ble and pleasant occasion for all who participated in
it.
Among the most memorable of these gatherings
was the husking party, and it is but a few years since
they were of common occurrence in most of the agri-
cultural towns of New England, and I believe they
are still continued, to some extent, in Maine, New
Hampshire and Vermont.
Although the prime object of the person who made
the party was to accomplish a task, yet it was not
always done with a single eye to economy,, The prep-
arations made to give those who attended a sumptu-
ous and hospitable reception were frequently some-
what expensive, and the sports entered into by the
guests made it of so agreeable a nature that old and
young, rich and poor attended. Not unfrequently
both sexes were invited, and nobody refused to at-
tend, however inefiicient they might be about their
own business. I never knew but one man who was
too lazy to attend and do his proper share of work,
and was reasonably prompt.
He was a wealthy man, but morose, selfish and un-
comfortable, and would a little rather injure a neigh-
bor than help him. He was sure to be there in time
for supper, however, and seldom arrived much before
that time.
Before extending his invitation, the farmer usually
gathered his corn and placed it so that all liiinds
i could stand around it to work. The barn floorings
were full, and the large doors opened wide, and fre-
quently great heaps of corn were placed outside.
1 Sometimes the corn was placed in two separate piles,
! and divided as nearly as possible. Then two of the
smartest young men would be chosen captains, and
I they would "choose up sides" for a trial of skill in
i husking. After each side was arranged the captain
'. would "snap up" for choice of heaps, when both
parties would fall to work to see which would beat.
Every man did his " level best." The corn came
pouring forth as if by magic, and the air was filled with
husks as if a tornado had struck the heaps. This was
not a favorite way, however, as the work was apt to
be slighted, because each party was so anxious to gain
the victory.
An old farmer says: "When the work was done in
this way the pig corn was not properly sorted out,
there was too much silk left in the corn for the rats
and too many nubbins of corn thrown back in the
husks."
Huskings sometimes took place in the afternoon,
but usually in the evening. About dusk, after milk-
ing and the chores were all done up, men and boys,
old ladies and young, from all parts of the neighbor-
hood, might be seen with basket and lantern in hand
wending their way to the scene of operations. The
boys and dogs led the van (every man of means kept
a dog, and poor folks kept several, the same as now).
The young folks, full of anticipations of fun ahead,
could hardly restrain their feet to the measured and
steady tread of the older ones, and would have flown
if possible ; but as it was, they were generally the first
on the spot, and glad when the time came to strip out
the com. Not that there was so much pleasure in
DRACUT.
315
husking, but the fact that the sport was on the other
side of the heap, and not until the last ear of corn
was in the bin could it be enjoyed, for " Business first,
and pleasure afterwards " was the motto of olden
times. When the young ladies attended, the party
arranged themselves with due respect to the rules of
sociability, and I have frequently been told that if
any gentleman found a red ear of corn he was entitled
(according to the laws made and provided for the
regulation of husking parties) to kiss the lady who
stood next to him, and I have also been informed
that if the kissing was agreeable and was reciprocated,
the lucky fellow would frequently hide the red ear of
corn in the pile again, so that he might avail himself
of the privileges it conferred several times during the
husking, — a deception, it is true, but a sia (if it was
a sin at all) one that most of us are inclined to wink
at and some to even justify.
No one seemed to blame him at ihe time, except-
ing, perhaps, some sensitive damsel, whose partner
could find no red ears of corn, or the chap next to
him, who was only aggravated by the transaction.
During the husking a song or two was sometimes
sung by some of the company, and flip and sweet cider
passed around to wash the dust down. After the corn
was disposed of, all hands repaired from labor to re-
freshments. A repast was furnished, varj'ing some-
what in character, according to the pecuniary' circum-
stances of the household, but baked beans, roast beef,
roast -turkey, a fat goose, with plenty of potatoes,
onions, brown-bread with gravy, boiled cider, and ap-
ple-sauce, formed the forefront of the line, while bat-
talions of pumpkin-pies, with savory puddings and
various kinds of fruit, composed the reserve. A lit-
tle skirmishing with the mug of flip, not bo much
to stimulate the stomach as to comply with the
custom of the times, and a gentle brush with the
sweet cider, and the whole force came squarely
down to baked beans and business. Nelson, the
renowned English admiral, at the great naval battle
near Cape Trafalgar, before the fight began, gave
the famous signal — " England expects every man to do
his duty;" but the host had no occasion to quote
from military heroes for the encouragement of his
guests. The vilest sinner would never be guilty of
preferring charges for neglect of duty if he ever
witnessed the proceedings. Faithfully and cheer-
fully they stood like Leonidas and his three hun-
dred Spartan heroes at Thermopylsp, determined to
do their duty if they died at their post. I believe,
however, they were never known to die at their
post, for they were strong and robust, with digestive
organs fully corresponding to their appetites and
courage.
Supper being ended, the sports began, —
" And from Ibe parlor of the Inn
A pleaaaDt murmur smote tb* ear,
Like water rushing through a wier ;
Oft interrupted by the din
or laughter and of lond tpplaiue,
And in each interrentng patue
The music of the tIoUd."
" Before the bUzlng Are of wood
Erect the rapt muBiciac stood,
And ever and anon he twnt
BiB head upon the instrument.
And seemed to listen till he caught
Confesaions of its secret thought —
The Joy, the triumph, the lament.
The exultation and the pain ;
He soothed the tbrobbings of its heart.
And lulled It into peace again."
The immediate descendants of the old Puritan
stock would sometimes indulge in " a little gay and
worldly amusement," and it is said that when they
attempted to dance they took the steps scientifically,
and the style was essentially diflferent from that of the
present time.
The host and hostess generally led ofi" with a con-
tra-dance, frequently " Fisher's Hornpipe," a standard
piece and as familiar in those times as Yankee Doodle
on the Fourth of July, and bean porridge for supper.
Any one who has a grandparent can ascertain all
these facts and get a better impression of the good
old times than I can possibly give.
I have frequently heard descriptions from those who
bad participated in them, and I always arrive at the
same conclusion, although "Times ain't now as they
used to was then," that for rational comforts and
amusements our grandfathers and grandmothers were
not a whit behind ourselves.
The husking party frequently closed with the intro-
duction of plays and games, such as " Blind man's
bufl," " On the road to Boston," "Marching to Que-
bec," " The needle's eye," " We have as many wives
as the stars in the skies," and many others, some of
which are perhaps familiar to the young folks now,
and in many of which kissing was the prominent and
interesting feature of the game.
The first husking party that I remember of attend-
ing took place in the afternoon, and was attended by
some twenty or thirty girls and boys, twelve or four-
teen years of age.
The corn was laid out on the grass near the barn,
and when it was husked, which took until about
night, we were all invited to refreshmente, not on the
grass, but in the house, where Mrs. Blood had her
blue "sprig china teaset" all spread out in the most
elegant manner and an abundance of good things
provided to tempt our appetites. We submitted grace-
fully to the temptation and did justice to the supper,
every one of us, whatever degree of approbation we
were entitled to for our husking exploits.
After the table was cleared away the long kitchen
was ours for all purposes of legitimate fun and frolic.
The furniture was old-fashioned and immensely strong.
That was fortunate.
It was a jolly time, such as many of ds had never
experienced before. When we closed up to go home
316
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
we pronounced (mentally) our benediction upon the
whole world and resolved in our hearts that the
young man who made the husking party was the
hero of the town. Most of us went home with the
determination to make heroes of ourselves in the
same manner, but for various reasons our good resolu-
tions all resulted in nothing. The most formid-
able obstacles to our plans were incorrigible Pa's and
unaccommodating Ma's, who took desponding views
of our brilliant opportunity and did not fully appre-
ciate the turn of our ambition.
Decrease of Territory. — In 1851 that part of
Lowell called Centralville was taken from Dracut by
authority of an act of the -Legislature, passed Feb-
ruary 27th, and approved by the Governor the next
day. Again, in 1874, by an act which took effect
Aug. 1st, a tract of territory, containing about one
thousand acres, was annexed to Lowell from Dracut.
Another tract from the westerly part of Dracut, ad-
joining Tyngaborough, was annexed to Lowell April
1, 1879.
Navy Yard. — We are informed that the locality
in thn vicinity of the Merrimack Woolen-Mills, in
Dracut, acquired the name of " Navy Yard " from
this fact: Many years ago a great amount of ship
timber was ratted and floated down Merrimack River
to Newbury from the various towns in this vicinity.
Beaver Brook being a convenient place in which to
arrange the timber into rafts, it wag cut and drawn
upon sleds in winter-time and left near the brook,
just below where the mills now stand. All the va-
cant land in the vicinity (of which there were some
acres on both sides of the brook), was thus covered
over with oak timber, to be used in building ships.
The person from whom this information is derived
says: " So much ship timber gave the place the ap-
pearance of a navy yard.'' Hence the name.
New Boston.— The locality in Dracut known as
" New Boston " is said to have received its name in
the following manner: One of the old residents who
settled there married his wife from New Boston in
New Hampshire. His neighbor, who settled east of
him, on a hill, gave to this place the name of New
Boston.
Marsh Hill. — The gentleman who had pitched
his tent upon the hill married a lady of the name of
Marsh, and to get even with him, the New Boston
man called the hill "Marsh Hill." Both names be-
came popular, and are retained unto this day.
Black North.— The locality known as " Black
North," in the northeasterly part of the town, took
its name, it is said, from the name of a negro of the
name of North, who was exceedingly dark-complex-
ioned.
CHAPTER XXVI.
DRACUT— { Continued).
WAR OF THE REBELLION — MANUFACTURES
BIOtiEAPHICAL.
To give any adequate idea of the causes which
brought about the great War of the Rebellion, or of
the important events which took place during the
progress of some four years of the most gigantic and
determined war which has ever been recorded in his-
tory, would require more space than is intended in
the condensed histories of the various towns de-
scribed in this volume, For an account of those
causes and events in detail, therefore, the reader not
already familiar with them will turn to the many
elaborate and reliable works already published.
It is sufficient to say here, that during the progress
of this great war the town of Dracut, like other
towns in the Commonwealth, was thoroughly loyal to
the Federal Government, and took up promptly and
cheerfully its proper share of the burdens incident to
the protracted contest.
Dracut furnished, during the war, two hundred
and eighteen men,' apart of whose names are given
here. There is no full list, or any list, of the soldiers
furnished by each town during the war, in the Adju-
tant-General's office of Massachusetts. The only way
to ascertain the number of men from any town is to
look through the list of every regiment that was or-
ganized during the war.
:>i'1h Hefjimtnt w^ moiitha^. — Wm. T. WilsoD, corpor;il, Co. K; Albert
0. Davidson, corporal, Co. K ; Detiuid Crelian, John Creiiun, ByroD
^riauolJ, Joseph Halli»well, TboninB Lyone, Joho Realt, Peter K.
Staples, Jobn Webb, James Welch, Co. K.
Stieiith Lattet-y Li<jht Aitdleiu {'-i yeart). — George H. Cobiirn, Jantes
Scbofleld, sergeanta; Hawly B. Cbaae, .\lbert N. Coburn, James Col,
corporals ; James Birniingbani, Albert £. Cba^e, Dennis Doyle, Dariua
S. Fuller, Francis E. Woolatenholeni, Franklin 6. Norris, privates.
F-ifteeiilh Batlenj Light ArlUlerij (3 j/enr«l,— Ward Clough, Russell
Cocbrane, Charles C. Cotton (accredited to Maiden, December 4, lbtj3),
Duiular Revolpillar.
FirU ReyimaU Heavy .4rti?I«ry.— Jamea C. Maishall, Co. G, August 16,
1861.
Second Regiment Heavy Artillery. — Lorenzo Richardson, Co. M ; George
B. Butterfleld, Co. B, July 28, ISM ; Alonzo L. Melvin, Co. M ; Gardner
M. Dean, Co. B, September 24, 1864 ; E. D. Richardson, Co. 31 ; Thomaa
White, Co. B ; Frank Coburn, Co. M ; Charles B. Vincent, Co. D ; Dan-
iel Smithson, Co. 31 ; Arthur Haniblet, Co. E ; Patrick Donague, Co.
K ; James Lee, Co. E ; Eugene D. Park, Co. E; John Carney, Co. H
(died at Newbern, X. C, July 6, I860) ; Philip Ulrick.
Sixth Regiment Infantry (3 montht), — ColTron Nutting, rausician ;
George H. Coburn, Co. C ; Edmund Coburn, Co. D ; Martin Davis, Co.
D ; Wm. B. Goen, Co. D ; Charles II. Butler, Co. D ; Addison G. Cobura,
Co. D.
Porty-Kcond Regiment Infantry. — Peter W. Ford, Co. D.
Sixth Regitnent (9 montbM). — Thomas Church, Co. A ; Orrin G. Cobtim,
Co. A; Wm. H. Snow, Co. A; Prescott L. Jones, Co. C; Howard Co.
burn, Co. D, corporal ; John M. Davis, Co. D ; Joel M. Thurston, Co.
D ; James 31. Whitney, Co. D ; Jonathan S. Davis, sergeant ; Shaptelgh
3Iorgan, 2d lieutenant.
Asa Howe, Fourth Regiment Heavy Artillery.
Edward Phipps, Second Regiment Cavalry
' Drake's "Hist. Co. Middlesex."
DRACUT.
317
however, a great many transient men floating about
the country, apparently having no particular abiding-
place, and who would enlist wherever they could get a
satisfactory bounty, and all over the country men of
this class had to be called upon to help fill the quotas
when good men became scarce. Many of the young
men, natives of Dracut, however, bravely volunteered
their services and went to the front ; and the town
was creditably represented by its soldiers in the army,
its sailors in the navy, its nurses in the hospitals and
on the battle-fields, as well as by ite contributions in
money and supplies for the sick and wounded.
When General Banks called for a " forlorn hope "
of a thousand men for a storming column at Port
Hudson, La., June 15, 1863, Luther H. Marshall and
Charles D. Richardson, whose names are mentioned
in the foregoing list of soldiers, volunteered their
services.
Edmund Coburn was with the Sixth Massachusetts
Regiment, and was wounded while going through
Baltimore, April 19, 1861.
Mantjfactories. — There are in Dracut three man-
ufacturing establishments situated on Beaver Brook.
First, the Merrimack Woolen-MiUs, at the " Navy
Yard," so called.
This establishment is owned by Solomon Bach-
man. Mr. August Fells is agent and Henry L. New-
hall, paymaster. Shawls, cloakings and dress goods
are here manufactured. There are in use 20 setts
of cards, 82 broad looms, and some 400 hands are
employed. There is in use 1 engine, and there are
2 water-wheels, 350 horse-power.'
Collins' Milk. — In the north part of Dracut, on
Beaver Brook, is situated Collins' Mills, owned by
Mr. Michael Collins. He employs 260 bands in the
manufacture of chinchilla, elysian and beaver over-
coating, and fancy worsted cassimeres, of which the
production is 250,000 yards per annum. There are
at this establishment 10 setts of cards, 6400 spindles
and 72 broad looms. Water and engine, 150 horse-
power.'
Beaver Brook Mills, Parker & Bassett, proprietors,
on Beaver Brook, use 900 tons jute butts and gunny
bagging per year, and make 600 tons paper.
They have 3 turbines and engine 100 horse-power,
and employ 12 hands.'
Newton C. Smith, Third Regiment Cavalry.
William F. Todd, Fourth Rfginient C«valr>-, Co. I.
Katbanlel P. Ford, corporal, Fifth Beginient Cavalry, Co. M.
William H. Smith, Second Regiment Infantry, Co. B.
William Buck, Thirteenth Regiment Infantry.
John White, Thirteenth Regiment Infantry, Co. H.
Thomas Smith, Fint Regiment Infantry.
Daniel Donohoe.
Thomas Davii, Sixteenth Infantry, Co. G.
Frank >1. Baaeett, sergeant, Co. G, Sixteenth Infantry.
Gordon M. Dean, Co. D, Sixteenth Infantry-.
Charles E. Smith, Co. D, Sixteenth Infantry, (see 2d Regt. Heavy Art.)
Charles R. Vincent, Co. G, Sixteenth Infantry, (see 2d Regt. Hea>7 Art.)
John McDuncan, Co. F, Nineteenth Infantry.
William Braniger, Co. F, Nineteenth Infantry.
James Boyd, Co. F, Nineteenth Infantry.
Calviu Harris, Co. H, Twenty-first Infantry.
Augustus M. Jones, Co. H, Twenty-first Infantry.
Charles Crandall, Thirty-firet Regiment, Co. G.
Herbert SI. Hall, Thirty«rcond Regiment, C<.. G.
Horace A. Barrows, Thirty-third Regiment, Co. A.
John Varnuni, corporal. Thirty-third Regiment, Co. A.
Oliver Davis, Thirty-third Regiment, Co. S.
Francis F. Lunt, Thlrty-thlrd Regiment, Co. A.
George F. Richardson, Thirty-third Regiment, Co. A.
Munroe Richardson, Thirty-third Regiment, Co. A.
Lafayette Wilson, Thirty-third Regiment, Co. A.
John Hirwin, Thlrty-thlrd Regiment, Co. A.
Charles Lovering, Sixty-first Regiment, Co. B.
George Cumber, Veteran Reserve Corps.
Edward Bliss, Twenty-fourth Regiment Infantry, Co.'K.
Uartln L. Bassett, Twenty.sixth Regiment Infantr?-, Co. A.
RoecaviouB Brown, Twenty.sixth Regiment Infantry, Co. A.
Edward Bultus, Twenty-sixth Regiment Infantry, Co.;A.
Edward Bohan, Twenty-sixth Regiment Infantry, Co. D.
Ira Bowers, Twenty-pixth Regiment Infantry, Co. D.
Horace Buttus, Twenty-sixth Regiment Infantry, Co. D.
Charles Coburn, Twenty-sixth Regiment Infantry, Co. D.
Osgood Davis, Twenty-sixth Regiment Infantry, Co. D.
George M. Kimball, Twenty-sixth Regiment Infantry, Co. D.
Owen Brannoo, Twenty-eighth Regiment, Co. A.
John JIcNab, Thirtieth Regiment, Co. B.
Benjamin F. Ansart, Thirtieth Regiment, Co. C.
Freeman H. Butler, Thirtieth Regiment, Co. C.
Brooks Butterfield, Thirtieth Regiment. Co. C.
Luther H. Marshall, sergeant, Co. C, Thirtieth Regiment.
Henry E. Richardson, sergeant, Co. C, Thirtieth Regiment.
Charles D. Richardson, quartermaster-sergeant.
Benjamin F. Hamblet, Thirtieth Regiment, Co. C.
Henrj- A. Wood, Thirtieth Regiment, Co. C.
George Boyle, Thirtieth Regiment, Co. B.
A. C. Varoum, major and pjiymaster, C. S. A.
Atis E. Alisart, Sixteenth Ma'sachusetts, Co. 1.
Orford R. Bluod. coroniisaary-sergeant. Sixth Maasacbusetls.
KirkH. Bancroft, Sixth Massachusetts.
John J. Colton, mi\|or and paymaater,_U. S. A.
Henry M. Hand, Seventh Massachusetts Battery.
John M. Hodge, Second Massachusetts Heavy -VrtlUery.
Simeon M. Marshall, Navy — Paymaster's Clerk.
William E. Short, Massachusetts Battery.
Isaac B. Gonld, Thirtieth Massachusetts — Died in service.
Orrin K. Park, Sixth Massachusetts — Died in service.
Alexander Park, Sixtti Massachusetts.
Joseph A. Stuart, Navy.
William Macutchen, Thirtieth Mass. — Killed at Cedar Creek, Ta.
Benjamin C. Morrison, Berdan Sharpehooters.
Oscar Ck>burn, Second U. S. Sharpshooters.
Some of the foregoing may have enlisted in other
towns, but they are all Dracut men.
Many names in this list are of men whooffered their (,^t^ .^^ere his ancestors settled in 1664, and gave the
services for a bounty, and were not residents of Dra- , ^^^^ ^^ ^j^g ^^^jj gg ^^g jjjg younger of two broth-
cut. As the war progressed and year after year went i
by, men in the various towns became scarce, and it , ^„„„^, g,^,^,i„ „f Manufactories in Lowell and neighbonng
was hard sometimes to fill the quotas. There were, towns.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
GENERAL JOSEPH B. VARNUM.
Joseph Bradley Varnum was born in 1750, in Dra-
518
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ere, both of whom became prominent in the early
history of our country — Gen. James il. Varnum in
Rhode Island, and Gen. Joseph B. Varnum in Massa-
chusetts. , r T^'i .'1
At the age of eighteen he was commissioned cap-
tain by the committee of the Colony of Massachusetts
Bay, and in 1787 was appointed colonel by the Com-
monwealth. In 1802 he was made brigadier and in
1805 major-general of the State militia, holding the
latter position at the date of his decease, in 1821.
From 1780 to 1795 he was a member of the House of
Representatives and Senate of Massachusetts. From
1795 to 1811 he was a member of the national House
of Representatives, during which time he was chosen
Speaker for two terms, from 1807 to 1811. In 1811 he
was elected by the Legislature in opposition to Tim-
othy Pickering as United States Senator, and was
chosen president pro tern, of that body December 6,
1813. He was a member of the State Convention to
ratify the Constitution of the United States in 1787,
and of that of 1820 to revise the Constitution of the
State of Massachusetts. Over the latter he mainly
presided, President John Adams and Chief Justice
Parker, the regularly chosen presiding otficers, being
unable to constantly preside, the former through en-
feebled age, the latter because of sickness.
During his public career, although living in times
of hot political excitement and having opponents aa
strong and able as Timothy Pickering and Samuel
Dexter, Gen. Varnum failed but once to receive the
recognition due to his eminent abilities. In 1813 he
was the candidate for Governor of Massachusetts
against Caleb Strong, and was defeated.
Gen. Varnum was among the earliest patriots of the
Revolution and served as captain of the minute-men
from Dracut, in Rhode Island and New York. For
his services in putting down Shays' Rebellion in 1787,
he received a personal letter of thanks from Gen.
Artemas Ward. He was in the foremost rank of
those statesmen who advocated the adoption of the
Constitution of the United States, and, for their zeal
to cement the Federal union, were known by the
name of Federalists. Henry Wilson, in his " History
of Slavery in the United States," quotes him assaying,
in the debate on the bill for the government of Mis-
sissippi territory before the House in March, 1798:
"I look upon the practiceof holding blacks in slavery
in this country to be equally criminal with the prac-
tice of the Algerines ia forcing American citizens
into servitude. Where there is a disposition to re-
tain a part of our species in slavery there cannot be
a proper respect for mankind."
In the reports of the proceedings of the State Con-
vention of 1820, there is quoted quite a lengthy speech
of Gen. Varnum's in favor of religious tolerance. It
ranks him a man of progressive ideas and broad and
liberal in his views. It was not the custom in his
day to report at length speeches or debates. One has
to judge of the sense of what is uttered, not the elo-
quence of the delivery. Gen. Varnum's name ap-
pears frequently in the annals of debate in support of
measures which were adopted as the law of the land.
From his practical experience in military affairs he
was chairman of that committee in Congress and also
in the convention of 1820. His intimate relations
with the elder Adams, Jefferson, Gallatin, Elbridge
Gerry and other illustrious names in our early his-
tory appear in letters from them which have been
carefully preserved by his descendants.
Contemporary testimony states, " Though during
the last years of his life he differed on some points of
political economy from the majority of his fellow-citi-
zens of this State, it may with truth and justice be af-
firmed that at his death Massachusetts did not contain
a more honest nor independent man." Yet during
those last years, after his retirement in 1817 from the
national halls of legislation, he was chosen to repre-
sent his district in the Slate Legislature, and when he
(lied (September 11, 1821) was senior member of the
Senate, thus ending a life which, like that of John
Quincy .^dams, was one long series of public services
and public trusts."
HON. BENJ. F. V.lENCM.'
Benj. F. Varnum, the younirest son of Gen. Jos.
Bradley Varnum, was born in Dracut in 1795. He
received a good common-school education in his na-
tive town, and for a time was a ])upil at Westford
Academy. In 1824 he was elected representative to
the General Court for Dracut and continued to hold
that position until elected Senator from Middlesex
County in 1827. In this office he continued until
1831, when, having been appointed sheriff, he de-
clined a re-nomination to the Senate. When the law
was enacted in February, 1828, to abolish the Court
of Sessions and create the Board of County Commis-
sioners in its stead, Mr. Varnum was appointed one
of the commissioners and continued a member of the
board until he became sheriff.
In the winter of 1831 the Legislature made a law
which limited the tenure of office of sheriff to the
term of five years, which took effect June' 1, 1831. Un-
der this law Mr. Varnum was appointed sheriff of the
county of Middlesex. No appointment could have
been made more satisfactory to the legal profession
and to the community. At the expiration, in 1836,
he was re-appointed, not only without opposition or
complaint, but in conformity with the well-known
wishes of the public. His varied and responsible
duties as sheriff of the most populous county in the
Commonwealth were performed with decided energy
and promptness, and at the same time with character-
istic urbanity.
In the matter of the burning of the Ursuline Con-
vent at Charlestown, and the excitement attendant
thereon, he acted so discreetly and cautiously aa early
^ Writteo by his sod, Joha ^ Yarnum.
DRACUT.
319
to pacify public Bentiment, for which he received a
personal letter of acknowledgment from Gov. John
Davis. He had determined to retire from the shriev-
alty at the conclusion of his second term and had so
announced to his friends. He died January 11, 1841,
at the age of forty-five years, at the outset of a career
which promised high honors in the State and Nation.
GEXEKAL JAMES XI. TAENTJM.
In Independence Hall, in Philadelphia, where the
United States Congress held its first sessions, among
the portraits of men of Revolutionary fame may be
seen that of General James M. Varoum.
Samuel Varnum (son of Joseph, and grandson of
Samuel, the first settler of Dracut) married Hannah
Mitchell, of Haverhill, and had four sons— Samuel,
James Mitchell, Joseph Bradley and Daniel. Samuel
died in Maine about the year 1822. Daniel died in
Dracut in 1822. Joseph B. became a prominent man
in Massachusetts, and is referred to elsewhere.
James Mitchell was born in Dracut, Dec. 17, 1748.
He entered Rhode Island College, at Warren (now
Brown University at Providence), at the age of twenty
and graduated with the first class of that institution
in 1769. He entered the law-office of Oliver Arnold
(then Attorney-General of the Colony) in Providence,
and was admitted to the bar in 1771. William Chan-
ning, Thomas Arnold, John S. Dexter and Varnum
were students together in the office of Mr. Arnold, at
the time of the latter's death, in 1770.
Varnum settled in East Greenwich, R. I., and soon
acquired a large practice, which extended to all parts
of the State. Having a taste for military life, he
joined the "Kentish Guards," and was appointed
commander in 1774. This company furnished thirty-
two commissioned officers to the patriot army upon
the breaking out of the Revolution. When the news
of the battle of Lexington reached Rhode Island,
Varnum's company mustered and marched as far as
Providence on their way to the scene of action ; but
hearing that the enemy had retired they returned.
Varnum had taken a prominent part in the Colonial
controversy, vindicating the rights of the Colonies in
their resistance to British taxation, and when the time
arrived for action he made good his professions by en-
tering his country's service.
He was appointed colonel in May, 1775, and his
regiment marched without delay to the headquarters
of the American forces, then, at Cambridge. He was
appointed by Congress a brigadier-general in 1776.
He was engaged at Bunker Hill, and lost two of his
regiment during that battle. When Burgoyne ap-
proached Ticonderoga, Washington, anticipating an
attempt of the enemy to unite to that general's forces
the army in New York, ordered General Varnum,
with his brigade, to Peekskill on the Hudson, and in
October, 1777, he was detached to Red Bank, where
he commanded all the American troops on the Jersey
side of the Delaware (when the British took posses-
sion of Philadelphia), with headquarters at Wood-
bury, N. J. It was Washington's purpose, by this
movement, to prevent the passage of the enemy's
shipping up the river.
General Varnum continued in active service from
the beginning of the war until 1779, when he re-
signed. He was with Washington at Valley Forge,
commanded a brigade in Gen. Sullivan's expedition
in 1778, and had participated in many, if not most of
the hard-fought battles up to the time of his resigna-
tion. The Legislature of Rhode Island, in consider-
ation of his national services, and for the purpose of
securing them in defence, elected him major-general
of militia, to which office he was unanimously re-
elected during his life. He was elected to Congresa
1780-82 and 1786-88. He was appointed judge of the
United States Supreme Court in Northwestern Terri-
tory in 1787, and died at Marietta, Ohio, of consump-
tion, January 10, 1789, at the age of forty years.
HON. ASAHEL STEARNS.
One of the distinguished men of his day was Hon.
Asahel Stearns. He was born at Lunenburg June
17, 1774, and graduated from Harvard College in
1797. He was educated for the bar, and in three
years from his graduation was admitted to practice
and opened an office in Dracut, near Pawtucket
Falls, where he remained several years.
He was district attorney for Middlesex County, a
member of Congress from 1815 to 1817, Professor of
Law at Harvard Law School from 1817 to 1829, and
subsequently commissioner (with Judge Lemuel Shaw)
for revising the ttatutes of Massachusetts. He was
the author of a valuable summary of the "Law and
Practice of Real Actions, with an Appendix of Prac-
tical Forms,"' published in 1824, and died at Cam-
bridge February 5, 1839.
Mr. Stearns resided in what was then East Chelms-
ford (now Lowell), in the house afterwards owned and
occupied by Hon. Nathaniel Wright, and now by Mr.
Thomas G. Gerriah.
When Mr. Stearns removed to Cambridge Mr.
Wright succeeded him in business, and also as tenant
in the house and office he had occupied. Mr. Wright
had been a student in the office of Mr. Steams and
knew most of his clients, and soon had a thriving
business, taking a leading part in public affairs.'
DBS. AMOS AND PELEG BEADLET.
One of the most skillful and successful physicians
in this vicinity in his time was Dr. Amos Bradley, a
son of Deacon Amos Bradley, whose name occurs fre-
quently in the town records on account of the promi-
nent part he took in the patriot cause during the
Revolution, and who was elected to the Provincial
Congress May 29, 1775.
1 Old BesidenU' CoDtribationf .
320
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Dr. Bradley was born in Dracut, October 2, 1762.
The father being a large land-owr.er, young Amos
spent his earliest years in the performance of the
various duties incident to farm life, with but few op-
portunities for preparing himself for a professional
career; but by the aid of the district school, with a
studious and receptive mind, he managed in some
way to prepare himself for the responsibilities which
he afterwards assumed and sustained with great credit
to himself and to the general satisfaction of an exten-
sive circle of patrons. He spent the most of his pro-
fessional life on his farm, now owned by Charles A.
Hamblet, near the Hillside Church, at which place
he died May 6, 1817, of paralysis, having been in
successful practice more than forty years.
Dr. Peleg Bradley, his son, who is still remembered
by our oldest citizens, was born May 26, 1792. Edu-
cational facilities were such in his day, that he had
not only the advantages of town school, but of the
higher branches of learning taught at the academy at
Westford, Mass.
After pursuing his professional studies with his
father for a considerable time, he attended medical
lectures at Boston, and in due time received a license to
practice from the censors of the Massachusetts Medical
Society. He began to practice in company with his
father in Dracut, about the year 1813, and continued
in practice some thirty years. He is spoken of as a
most skillful practitioner, who enjoyed the confidence
and patronage of all the towns in this vicinity. He
died September 26, 1848, aged fifty-six years.
to be an eflbrt worth listening to, and one which
would grace and enliven the occasion.
Our first recollection of him was as a visiting mem-
ber of the School Board for the town of Dracut ; and
we well remember his efforts at the closing exercises
of the school terms, to impress upon the pupils the
importance of keeping up the habit of study as much
as other duties would permit, during the then long
vacation periods.
At town-meetings in Dracut he was always aprom-
I inent figure. Dr. Hildreth had strong convictions,
and he asserted them freely. All might not agree
with his views; but he always did bis duty as he saw
it, with courage, and those who sometimes difliered
with him were free to admit his strength of character
and bis great power of argument in presenting his
views.
Dr. Hildreth was born in Dracut, Feb. 28, 1791,
and received much of his early education at the fire-
side of his father's house.
He began the study of his profession under Dr.
Thomas, of Tyngsborough, but afterwards studied
with Dr. Wyman, of Chelmsford, after which he at-
tended a full course of lectures at Boston and began
practice in Dracut in 1815.
DR. ISRAEI, HILDRETH.
One of the prominent men in this town and vicin-
ity in his day was Dr. Israel Hildreth. He was a
physician who enjoyed the confidence and patronage,
not only of his own town's people, but of the commu-
nity generally for many miles around. He was fre-
quently called to go long distances to consult with
other physicians in the most difficult cases, his judg-
ment and opinion being so highly valued in the pro-
fession. Haifa century ago he was in the full exer-
cise of a large and lucrative practice.
He is still remembered by his former townsmen as
a man of uncommon skill in his profession, of strong
and vigorous mind, and genial and attractive in his
disposition. During nearly forty years of successful
practice he yet found time to give earnest attention
to every interest devolving upon an active and public-
spirited citizenship. His habits of study were such
that he improved himself upon all the various sub-
jects of interest, and was possessed of an almost inex-
haustible fund of information upon all of the great
public questions of his day, as well as upon matters of
literature and all the local interests of his native town
and vicinity.
A Fourth of July oration, or an address upon any
subject upon any occasion from Dr. Hildreth, was sure
JAMES VAENn'M.
Colonel James Varnum, a native of Dracut, aud an
officer in the Revolutionary Army, was born Septem-
ber 8, 1747. At the time of his death, which oc-
curred December 2, 1832, the following interesting
sketch of his life appeared in the Lorcell Daily Journal
which has since been published in the " New Eng-
land Historical and Genealogical Register:"'
*' .\S0THER Revolvtionaey OFFICER GoNE. — Died, at hia residence id
Dracut, on Sunday, the 2d inat., ColunelJaiuea Varnum, .aged eighly-flve
yeara. The early part of bia life was apent in bis father's family, in the
buBineas of farming. By hia own exenion I for at that time there was
very little opportunity to acquire an education) he succeeded in getting
a tolerably good common-achool education, which, added to Ilia never-
tiring perseverance, enabled him to support his dignity in all the various
aituations of life, which he waa called to flU. In the twenty-eighth year
of hia age (1775), when the alarm waa tirst given at Lexington, he vol
unteered hia aervicea and marched to that place, pursued the euemy to
Cambridge, where he remained a few weeks, and then joiued the Conti-
nental Army. He waa soon aftei'wards appointed a lieutenant, and re-
mained in the army till the year 1780, when the comiuander-in-chiet
gave him leave to retire with an honorable discharge. Hia commission
waa signed by John Hancock. In 1776 be waa appointed a captain in
the regiment commanded by Colonel Michael Jackson ; John Brooka,
late Governor of Massachusetts, lieutenant-colonel. He served in that
regiment till 1780. Ilis commission of captain waa signed by George
Wnabiugton. He was in the battle of Bunker Hill, the battle of White
Plains, at Saratoga, when Burgoyne surrendered, and at the battles ot
Moumouth and Trenton.
On leaving the army, Colonel Varnum returned to
his native place, and continued on hia farm until he
was called upon to assist in quelling that domeatic
insurrection known by the name of " Shays' Rebel-
lion." He at that time commanded a company in the
I Vol. 0, page SI.
DRACUT.
321
militia of the CommoDwealtb, which be marched to
the principal scene of the insurrection. As soon as
tranquillity was restored he again returned to private
life, in which he continued to the time of his death,
engaged in his favorite employment on his farm, and
enjoying in his manhood and old age the fruits of his
youthful labors. He was firmly attached to the Con-
stitution of the United States, and considered that in-
strument a noble ofl'springof our Revolutionary strug-
gle. In private life Colonel Varnum was an affec-
tionate and indulgent parent, a kind husband, a val-
uable citizen, and a friend to good order, morality
and religion. Few men, perhaps, can be found who
possess as many virtues as he did. He was the
pattern of industry, economy and temperance; and
by a strict regard to those virtues, he was permitted
to enjoy the use of bis limbs and mental faculties, al-
most perfectly, to the last moments of his existence.
Colonel Varnum was thrice married. His first wife
was Prudence Hildretli (a sister of General William
Hildretli), of Dracut, who died early, leaving one
daughter. Prudence, who married Benjamin Gale, of
Concord, New Hampshire. Mr. Varnum remained a
widower for seventeen years, and then married
Eleanor Bridges, of Andover, February 12, 1793, by
whom he had two children, one of whom died young.
The mother died in the forty-second year of her
age. He then married Martha McAdams, of Green-
field, New Hampshire, widow of Captain Hugh
McAdams. She died al the age of forty-three
years.
I.OIIS ANSART.
Oneof the notable citizens of " revolutionary times "
was Col. Louis Ansart. He was a native of France,
and came to America in 177C, while our country was
engaged in war with England. He brought with
him credentials from high oflncials in his native
country, and was immediately appointed colonel of
artillery, and inspector-general of the foundries, and
engaged in casting cannon in Massachusetts. Col.
Ansart understood the art to great perfection; and it
is said that some of his cannon and mortars are still
in existence, and are still serviceable and valuable.
Foundries were then in operation in Bridgewater and
Titticut, of which he had charge until the close of the
Revolutionary War.
Col. Ansart was an educated man — a graduate of a
good family. His father purchased him a commission
of lieutenant at the age of fourteen years; and he was
employed in military service by his native country
and the United States, and held a commission until
the close of the Revolutionary War, when he pur-
chased a farm in Dracut and resided there until his
death. He returned to France three times after he
first came to this country, and was there at the time
Louis XVI. was arrested. [It will be recollected that
at the time of the French Revolution in 1789, Louis —
21-ii
finding his power circumscribed by the new constitu-
tion— attempted to leave France, but was captured,
and after a long imprisonment was tried and con-
victed of treason and condemned to die by the guillo-
tine, which death he suffered on January 21, 1793.]
Col. Ansart married Catherine Wimble, an Ameri-
can lady of Boston, and raised a large family in Dra-
cut, some of whom are still living.
History informs us that a combined attack by
D'Estaing and Gen. Sullivan was planned in 1778
for the expulsion of the British from Rhode Island,
where, under Gen. Pigot, they had established a mili-
tary depot. Col. Ansart was aide-de-camp to General
Sullivan in this expedition, and was wounded in the
engagement of August 29th.
In his prime Mr. Ansart stood six feet high in his
boots, and weighed 200 pounds. He died in Dracut,
May 28, 1804, at the age of sixty-two years.
Mrs. Ansart was born in Boston, and witnessed the
battle of Bunker Hill, and often described the ap-
pearance of the British soldiers as they marched
along past her residence, both in going to the battle
and returning. She was thirteen years of age, and
recollected it perfectly. She said they looked finely
as they passed along the streets of Boston towards
Charlestown. The ofiicers were elegantly dressed
and were in great spirits, thinking it only a pleas-
ant frolic to go over to Charlestown and drive
those Yankees out of their fort ; but when they
returned it was a sad sight. The dead and dying
were carried along through the streets, pale and
ghastly, and covered with blood. She said the people
witnessed the battle from the houses in Boston, and
as reaiment after regiment was swept down by the
terrible fire of the Americans, they said that the Brit-
ish were feigning to be frightened and falling down
for sport ; but when they saw that they did not get
up again, and when the dead and wounded were
brought back to Boston, the reality began to be made
known, and that little frolic of taking the fort was
really an ugly job, and hard to accomplish.
Mrs. Ansart died in Dracut at the age of eighty-six
years, January 27, 1849.
REV. THOMAS PARKER.
Rev. Thomas Parker, the first minister of Dracut,
was a son of Josiah Parker, who came from England
to America some time prior to 1700, and settled in
Cambridge or Dorchester. Thomas, the subject of
tais sketch, was born December 7, 1700, graduated at
Harvard College in 1718, and, in 1719, received a call
to settle in Dracut. The town records furnish an ac-
count of the call as follows:
"Dbaoit, December 28, 1710.
" At a peoeral towo-meetiDg (lie town luade choice of Eev. Thonjas
Parker a9 their minister, and voted to give bim a call to settle at eighty
pounds yearly salarj'. Voted, that Captain Varnum, Quartermaster
Coburn and Ephraini Hildretb, carry the vote of the town to Mr. Parker,
anfl that Quarteruiaster Coburn be paid six pounds to pay for ye ordina-
tion."
322
HISTORif OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The committee attended to their duty and " car-
ried" the vote of the town, as we find by tlie follow-
ing reply from Jlr. Parker:
■* CiiELMSFOttD, JaDiian* 30, 17"'0.
"To the inbabitauta of tbe town of Pracut : 1 received your vote the
3d of this instant, January, by tlie baDdd of Capt. ^'arnntn and Lieut.
Hildreth, wherein, I understand, you have unanimously made choice ol
me to be yonr settled minister. I have perused and considered youi
offer, also understanding your oarnest desire tliat I sliouldseltleamongst
you. I can find no fault with what you Iiuve been pleased to ofler, and
I do therefore accept the same, provided you do pay me quarterly.
'*.\flyou have Ijeen uuauiniuuB in your choice, so I hope you will
always endeavor to live in peace and iltuiuiniity, that there be found u
spirit of peace in each ol you. I al>o would bee ynur prayers to.\|.
mighty God for me. that I may prove a faithful minister of Christ and
instrumental in saving many souls, that you may sit quietly and corv-
tentedly under uiy ministry, that I may have a comfortable prospect of
your being benehtted tbereby, and thatyouaud I may bo believe and
manage ourselves that we may meet with coiutbrt in this life and with
peace at death ; and that we may lift up our heads with toy at the la.st
day, shall be the continual fervent praver of nie, one of the uuwortbiest
of God's miui£.ters.
" T(i03t.^s Parri:r.'*
Mr. Parker w.-is only nineteen when settled. The
town then piircha.sed a " ministrce,' on the Diacut
side of the river, opposite what is now called iMid-
dlesex Village.
In a memorial presented to the Legislature, in
1748, in legard to locatiiiii' the second uieetinir-liouse,
built by the town of Dracut, which caused some dis-
turbance on account ol' being placed so far from the
ptirsonage, Mr. Parker is referred to as follows:
*■ In 1720 the Rev. Thoiuaa ParUer vvaa called and oi'duiued to the
gospel ministry amongst us, u bo, together with the a.ssistance "f the
town, puicliased a seltli'iiient Ileal tile meetiug.lunise. the price being
much enlianced Ijy the situalii.ii. He has carried uu iheworkeier
aiuce to geiienil acceptance."
Mr. Parker remained over this church until liis
death, ilarch 18, \7tj'\ a period of forty-four years.
The (lay after his decease a town-meeting was called
to grant money to defray the e.xpenses of the funeral,
and the following business was transacted:
*' iBt, made choice of .ioliii \.iiiium, moderator. 'JJ, v<-red [<• buy
>Iailatu l*arker a inoiiruilig -.'tiit. .VIso voted to buy six iiiig^ f-ir ye
bearers of ye deceased. \'iiied to appropriate twenty pounds lor y
mourning suit and ye rings included. Voted to raise four pounds more
suthat ye whole sum shall be twenty-four pounds."
It Ir related that Mr. Parker was a musician antl
played the clarionet. Sometimes he would sit in
his doorway on a summer's evening and play, while
the Indians would answer him along the banks of
the Merrimack.
An old-fashioned slab, said to have been imported
from England, marks the spot where this worthy man
was laid. The following inscription, although cut in
old-style letters, may yet be easily read on the head-
stone :
Jtfenteitto mori.
Under this atone is Interred ye Remains of ye
Ittv'p Thomas Pirrer.
A gentleman of shining mental Powers. .\di.|ned with
Prudence, llcnevolence a: i.'urtesie of iiiauer^.
-V warm 3t I'atbetic Preacher of ye Gospel, .\
Most watchful and tender Pastor ot ve rimrcli
lu Dracut for ye space of 44 years.
Accomplished with learning. Human ± Divine,
J: endowed and adorned by ye social virtues
.1 afTections, who departed this life March
IStb, ITi;.'-, in the r,.'.tb year of his age.
MICHAEL COLLINS.'
Michael Collins was born in Dudley, !Mass., .Tune
C, 1S30. His grandfather, John Collins, who had
been a manufiicturer of woolens near Dublin, Ire-
land, emigrated to Worcester County, Mass., in 1.S30,
bringing with him his son, Stephen, then sixteen
years of age, who became the father of the subject
of this sketch. Stephen Collins, for many years,
worked at his trade as wool-dyer in various towns in
New England.
Jlichael Collins, having received his elementary
education in the common school.s, was for one year a
student in the College of the Holy Cross, in Worces-
ter, Mass. During the Rebellion he enlisted for three
months in the Third Battalion nf Rifles, under Majnr
Devens, of Worcester, ;\Iass. On returning from the
war, at the age of twenty-two years, he worked at his
trade as wool-dyer in Fitchburg and other places in
M.assachusetts and Rhode I.'dand.
In 1867, when tweuty-eiirht years of age, he formed
j a partnership with his father and his voiiiiirer lnother,
.John iS. This company, under the firm-name uf
I Stephen Collins & Sons, engaoed in the manufacture
I of woolens in the town (if (lilsum, near Keene, N.
I H.. employing new machinery and producing about
i HtO.OOii yards of doeskin, beaver and tricot annually.
.Vfter about four years his brother. John S., became
' sole proprietor of this enterprise, in which he has met
I with marked success as a maaiilacturer, and has had
! the honor four times uf representing the town uf
. tiilsum in the State L('gi>l:iture, unce as .Senator, and
ihree times as member of the Lower Hou^e.
I Michael Collins, upun reiiiing from the firm of
Stephen (.'ollins it Sons, entered into a new partner-
ship, under the firm-name of Collins, Dillon .S; Cn.
This cumpany engaged in running a woolen-mill in
! Springfield, Vf., employing about forty hands, .\fter
three years Mr. Collins returned to Gilsum, and for
one year engaged with his brother in woolen manu-
facture in that town.
I He then began the manufacture of woolens, with-
out a partner, in Harrisville, near Keene, N. H.,
j where, in a seven-.set mill, he employed about ll'O
I hands in making beavers, tricot and other varieties of
1 goods.
In 1870 he crime to Dracut, and leased the old
i Peter Lawson Mill, on Beaver Brook, where he at
I first employe(l about 125 hands in the manufacture of
I woolens, .\fter three years he purchased the mill,
and four years hater, in 18St>, he erected a new brick
mill, and he is now carrying on a very extensive and
; very successful business, employing about 2C0 hands.
He is known .ts a skillful manufacturer. His mills,
which are equipped with modern machinery, have
' By Charles C. Chase.
Uc>^
BILLERICA.
323
for their motive-power a steam-engine and the waters
of Bearer Brook, producing annually about 230,000
yards of goods, consisting mainly of beavers and
cloakings.
It is a fact of peculiar interest in regard to this es-
tablishment that the little village which clusters
about it is almost entirely occupied by the employes
of the mills, and is almost wholly the property of
Mr. Collins himself, having been erected by him for
the special accommodation of his workmen. The
village is very appropriately called " Collinsville."
It is highly to the credit of Mr. Collins that these
tenements, about forty-five in number, have been
constructed with the benevolent purpose of securing
the domestic welfare and comfort of the tenants.
Nor has his generosity stopped with furnishing his
workmen with pleasant and comfortable dwellings.
He has erected a church at his own expense, in which
religious services are held every Sabbath. Though
himself an Episcopalian, these services are those of
the Catholic Church, in deference to the prevailing
religious preferences of his workmen. This little
community sustains a temperance society, and much
is done to promote the moral purity of the village.
Mr. Collins has no ambition for civil office, though
he is a member of the School Board of the town.
Outside of h's own domain he is known as a gener-
ous supporter of every good cause. He takes a lively
interest in the general welfare of the town of Dracut,
which is greatly benefited by having within its bor-
ders so thriving a manufactory conducted upon such
liberal principles. Mr. Collins enjoys not only the
esteem, but the affection of his fellow-townsmen.
CHAPTER XXVII.
BILLERICA.
BV REV. HENRY A. H.\ZEN.
THE BEGIXXINGS.
BILLERICA began life as Shawshin, taking its
name from the small river which ran more than
twelve miles through the entire length of the early
town, reaching the Merrimack in 'Andover. The dis-
placement of this unique and beautiful Indian name
was a misfortune.'
The first mention of the place is found in the
Colonial Records, 1635-36, March 3d, when the Gover-
nor, Deputy-Governor and John Winthrop, Sr., Esq.,
1 Danforth aod all the early clerks of Billerica, spell ** Bbawsbitj " qdI-
formly aa here given, with " i " in the last syllable. The Dew name is
that of a town in Edsex County, England, about seventeen miles nortb.
east of London. A "y " Las been added in England, but tbe Massa-
chusetts town bas probably preserved the earlier fonn. It is Tariously
mispronounced " Billerica and BlUereca." Tbe first syllable should
bave tbe accent, and all the others remain obscure.
" or any two of them, are intreated to vewe Shawshin,
and soe to inform the next Gen'l Court whether or
noe it may not be a fitt place for a plantacon."
Concord had been settled in 1635, and this " gover-
nor " was John Haynes, who went the next year with
Hooker's company to the settlement of Hartford, Ct.
Shawshin was not quite remote or attractive enough
to turn the Cambridge emigrants aside from their
projected Connecticut colony. But it was heard of
in England, and in 1636 Mathew Cradock, the Med-
ford founder, and the early but never-resident gover-
nor of the Massachusetts Company, mentions " a pur-
pose to apply myself to tyllidge, . . . having had
recourse to a plase called Shawe Shynn, where I hear
none comes but myselfe," and asks his correspon-
dent's aid in securing a grant of 2000 acres.
In 1637 (Aug.) another deputation was sent by the
Court to " viewe Shawshin," but the report, which
would have been so interesting, fails to appear. It
may have been made and influenced two import-
ant grants. Nov. 2, 1637, "The Deputy, Mr. Dudley,
hath a thousand acres granted him, wheare it may not
piudice any plantation granted, nor any plantation
to bee granted, w^out limiting to time of impv'."
" The Governo', Mr. John Winthrope, Senior, hath
graunted him a thousand acres of land upon the same
tearms as Mr. Dudley hath his." The governor's
grant was increased, later, by 200 acres, and they pro-
ceeded to a location of their grants, which the Court
confirmed. Mr. Winthrop tells the story in his
"Journal:"'
" Going down the River [from Concord] about four
miles, they made choice of a place for one thousand
acres, for each of them. They offered each other the
first choice, but, because the deputy's was first
granted, and himself had store of land already, the
governor yielded him the first choice. So, at the
place where the deputy's land was to begin, there
were two great stones, which they called the Two
Brothers, in remembrance that they were brothers by
their children's marriage, and did so brotherly
agree."
. There are modern writers who depict the "quarrel "
of these eminent men, but this picture of them,
standing on the banks of the Concord, thus graphic-
ally outlined by John Winthrop, refutes such cal-
umnies.
The " Two Brothers " still lie conspicuous on the
banks of the Concord, the earliest landmark in town.
They are, perhaps, 50 rods south of the brook, where
the later line between Billerica and Bedford begins.
From them a line was run slightly northeast one
mile and a quarter, and another, parallel with this,
was run from the river two miles and a half below.
Between these Mr. Dudley's farm, increased by the
Court to 1500 acres, was located. The north line
runs through the south part of the village, Cham-
-AVinthrop Journal, vol. 1, p. 264.
324
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
staffe Lane being a section of it, and extending just
across Ash Swamp. The land running from the Bos-
ton Road to the ancient Tompson place is a part of
the east line of the " Farme." Winthrop's farm, in the
other direction, extended to the old Concord line,
the Main Street in Bedford, being parallel with
and sixty-four rods north of it. The east line of the I The other eleven are worthy of record here, as fathers
farm crossed the west end of Bedford Street, where it | of the town. They are: William and John French,
divides into two roads, and ran to a point not far west , John and James Parker, Ralph Hiil, father and son,
of the Bedford Springs. It was sold entire, in 1664, I George Farley, Henry Jefts, Jonathan Danforth, John
ing Shawshin has settlers enough to petition the
Court for enlargement on the west side of Concord
River, and that the " name of .shawshin henceforth
may be cal'' Billericay." Of the fourteen signers of
this petition, only Gookin, Champney and Robert
Parker were probably not then living in the town,
to Job Lane, of Maiden.
A larger grant was made in 1640, — 3000 acres, to
" Mrs. Winthrop," the wife of " our late Governor,"
which was located "about the lower end of Concord
Ryuer, near Merrimack," occupying the west part of
what is now the town of Tewksbury. And smaller
grants were made on the west side of Concord River,
of 500 acres each, to Increase Nowelland Mr. Thomas
Sterne(s) and William Chamberline.
The purchase by Woburn men of the Dudley farm
and the lease of the cliurchs farm to John Piirker,
gave Woburn a leadership in the beginning of the
town, seven of these petitioners being from Woburn.
Stearns was from Watertown, and Danforth and the
Frenchs only from Cambridge.
Four hundred acres in the heart of the town,
Allen, and 533 acres to Mr. Thomas Welde, pastor of I bounded west by the river and south by the farm, were
Roxbury. Meanwhile Cambridge was taking note of I appropriated " by the Church in Cambridge for a
Shawshin with increasing interest. A second dis- i Towneship." It was located north of the Dudley
ruption of the town was threatened, by the proposed
removal of Mr. Shepherd and a large part of his
flock, whom Hooker and his company sought to draw-
after them to the Connecticut. To prevent this, 1641,
June 21st, "Shawshin is granted to Cambridge, pro-
farm, Charnstalfe Lane being the line between them,
and the lane leading east from the Lowell road to the
old Bridge-Farmer place is very near its north bound.
The east line crossed Andover Street between the
Kimball place and that of Eben Baker. House-lots
vided they make it a village, to have 10 families there I of twenty to thirty acres were granted " upon the
settled w'^in three years, otherwise the Court to dis-
pose of it." Later, as it appeared that Cambridge was
not readv to effect a new settlement so far " in the
Township " to most of the early settlers and " they
upon the township" held by agreement a prior claim
over "those on !Mr. Dudlev's farm," in thefuture dis-
wjlderness," the restriction was removed, and 1643-44, I tribution of the common lands. This grant fixed
March 7th, "Shaweshin is granted to Cambridge
w"'out any condition of making a village there, &
the land between them & Concord is granted to them
. . . provided the church & present elders con-
tinued at Cambridge." This was successful, and the
mother town was saved from a second dismember-
ment.
Cambridge could now take her time, and in spite
of some efforts of Woburn to secure a part of Shaw-
shin, she made no haste. Four years paas, and 1648,
April 9th, she sets aside 1000 acres for a church farm
and votes that sundry of her citizens who have " no
house right in town " may have " farms at Shawshin."
Among others. President Dunster and Daniel Gookin
received 500 acres each, and Mr. Mitchell, the minis-
ter; and in 1652, she granted more than a hundred
lots, varying in size from ten to 450 acres, and a total
of 9800 acres, to her citizens. A few months earlier,
1651-52, February 28th, Governor Dudley had sold his
large farm to four Woburn men, and alter ten years
of negotiation and effort the way is at last open for
settlers in Shawshin. There are hints of an early
" trucking" house near Vine Brook, which may have
preceded the actual coming of setilers in 1652. The
death of an infant daughter of Henry Jelt'>, May,
1653, is the earliest event noted in the records. The
first birth, of Samuel, son of George, Farley, occurred
the last week in March, 1654, and in October follow-
the site of the village from the beginning — a site
well chosen.
The earliest settlers whose house-lots were on the
common land, not on the township or the farm, were
William Hamlet and William Tay, in 1656. The
grant to Hamlet exhibits the common form used, with
slight variations, in case of all the early settlers; and
I quote :
"They liRTe granted fo him and assigiies forever, one lenne-acre lot,
or one eingle share ; that i^, one liuiidreil :inil Ihirtene ncre^ uf upland
and twelve acres of meadow land, together with all tuune priviled^ea,
after additioDa and divitioos of lands and nieaduwa made or to be made,
or gmnted by the towoe, acordiog to any their towneordei-a, covenants,
or agreements, to any free deoison amongst them, according to y" pro-
portion of a ten-acre lot, and on this account are the rullowiug grants."
His first grant is of fifty-six acres, more or less, "on
the North-East corner of bare hill, and on y' south
of hogrooten meadow." This meadow of unsavory
name lies southeast of the Tompson or Tufts place,
and the hill is between the Boston and Lexington
Roads, southeast of the village, and east of Dr.
Xoyes' house. Hamlet's house must have stood near
the Crosby place. Tay was on the west of the same
hill, at Dr. Xoyes' place.
A Braintree company came soon after, and, by
1660, had well occupied the line south ;ind east of the
village, along Loes' Plain as far as Fox Hill. North
1 Framingham, ia England, the native town of Daofortb, was in
BILLERICA.
t 325
from the township ran another line of the earliest
farms, Paterson, Hubbard, Bird, Currant and Haile,
who was near the Great Bridge, or Fordway, with
Toothaker at the extreme point, the old Rogers place
of a latter day by the canal.
The allotment of the common lands to the settlers
began promptly, and it was almost 100 years before
this land fund was exhausted. The earliest assign-
ments were made to several of the township proprie-
tors in Loes Plain ; but the first general distribution
was of meadow land, which was specially important
and valuable, before clearing and culture had made
higher grounds productive of the needed supply of
grass for winter use. The farm settlers did not share
in this first meadow distribution, which was intended
to equalize the privilege of the township men with
these farm purchasers.
Jonathan Danforth was the early surveyor, as well
as for many years the careful town clerk. His hand-
writing, still beautiful and wonderfully legible, is for
the period most remarkable ; and the two early vol-
umes of " Land Grants " — the earlier and finer almost
entirely written by him — afford ample material for
pursuing the details of the land distribution of the
town. His record of " Births, Marriages and Deaths,"
a small and well-preserved parchment-bound volume,
is believed to be the most complete and convenient
record of the kind which any town in New England
has to show for that century. His skill as a surveyor
brought his services into requisition in all the region,
and very many of the early surveys of towns and
farms, preserved in the State Archives and elsewhere,
come from his hand. He was the younger brother
of the eminent deputy-governor, Thomas Danforth,
and of the Rev. Samuel Danforth, colleague, of John
Eliot, of Roxbury. He was the intimate and life-
long friend of Rev. Samuel Whiting, the first pastor,
and it is hardly too much to say that he still.deserves
recognition as the " first citizen of Billerica."
Billerica had also certain land-grants and dealings
beyond her own bounds which furnish an important
chapter of her early history. The small grants made
by Cambridge in the bounds of Shawshin, numbering
more than 100 and embracing 10,000 acres, were not
easy to dispose of in a way that would not embarrass
the settlement. They were not valuable and attrac-
tive enough to draw many of these Cambridge fami-
lies here to occupy them ; but the owners would natu-
rally seek to make as good a sale of them as they
could. While these rights were thus held in suspense,
the chance that they might be enforced in some un-
welcome form would make the rights in Billerica less
attractive to persons who might otherwise purchase
and settle here. As a measure of relief from this dif-
ficulty, application was made to the General Court
*' Loea Hundred." He gave the name to tbe plain and a meadow south
of Fox Hill, and exteudiog as far ai the Church Farm.
for a grant of lands elsewhere, which met with favor,
as follows : '
"In ans' to the peticon of the Inhabitants of Billirrlkey, this Coart
doth grauDt the toune of Billinikey eight thousand acree of landa, for
the endH desired, in any place or places that are ffree, and not capeable
of making a toune, provided that the aajd lands be laid out before the
next Court of Election, and that the inhabitants of Cambridg doe accept
thereof L diaiogage the lands desired at Billirikey, k. also that the tonne
of Billirrike; be seted W twenty familyes at least w^in three yeares,
y> the ordinances of God may bo setled A encouraged in the ssjd place of
Blllirikey ; i it is ordered, y' Majc Willarxl, Cap'. Edw. Johnson, Mr.
Edward Jnckeon, or any two of them, wOi Thomas Danforth, or anj
other surveyor, shall lay y* same out at the peticoners charge, making
r«tourne to the next Court of Election."
The survey was made by Jonathan Danforth. As
described and approved by the Court,' it was located
as follows:
AncittU Mapiand Plam (in SUte ArchiTes). Vol. li, Index," Billerica."
" Layd out to the yso of the inhabitants of Billirrikey. eight thousand
acres of land, lying vpon Merremacke Riuer, on both sides thereof, taking
in the trucking howse now inhabitted by Jn". Cromwell, the sajd land
iMing la>d out about sixe thousand three hundred acres, on the East side
the riuer, and about seventeene hundred and fivety acres on the west side
the »0d riuer. and is bounded by the wildemes surrounding the same, as
is demonstrated by a plott thereof, taken and made by Jonathan Dan-
forth, Burvejor, and exhibbited to this Court by U^or Symon WiUard
and Cap'- Edward Johnson, appointed by this Court, Octob. 14, ICOG, to
lav out the same.
"SniON WlLLiBD.
" Edwabd Johnson."
This survey was the earliest ever made, it is safe to
say, in the Merrimack Valley beyond Chelmsford,
and is the starting-point in the history of Dunstable.
The location was in a part of the valley commonly
called Naticook, spelled by Danforth " Naticott."
The grant began at the Penichuck Brook, which
forms the north bound of Nashua, and extends on
the west of the river as far north as the Souhegan
River. Then it follows the Souhegan. and for nearly
a mile the Merrimack, passing two islands, the larger
of which received the surveyor's name " Jonathan;"
then runs eastward two or three miles and southward
five or six. returning to its starting-point. This
Naticott grant remained for a year in the hands of
Billerica, when John Parker received authority to
dispose of it. {Grants, page 7.)
"9tt, 6i7i., 1058. It is jointly agreed by vs, the Inhabitance of Bil-
lerica. That John Parker hatli given to him (by the towne) full power
to make sale and give a&iuraoce of that eight thousand acres of land
granted to ua, and for our use, hy the Honc^ Generall Court, which
land lyeth at Natticott. upon merimack River. Aud we do hereby, fully,
clearly, and absolutely give up our whole interest, right, and title in the
same unto the aforesaid John Parker, to make sale of and dispose of as
he shall see good for himself k bis assigns. Provided oJtro^c, that the
aforesaid John Parker shall purchase, for y* vse & behoofe of the Towne
of Billerica aforesaid, all the severall lotts, to ths valine of eight thous-
and acres (granted by the towne of Cambridge to thoir inhabitance),
which grants are already entered in their towne booke, which land lyeth
within the bounds and liraitB of our town. . . . And In case any of y*
proprietors of the aforesaid alotments shall refuse to sell or give them,
then the said John shall returne vnto the towne of Billerica six peoc«
per acre for so many acred ae shall remain unpnrchased, to y» valine of
(or short of the numtierof ) eight thousand acree, which money eball
remain to Public Towne use."
1 Colonial Recorda.
2 Colonial Records.
Vol. iv, part i, p. 269.
Vol iv, part i, p. 302.
326
HISTORr OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
A month later Parker had sold the land to "William
Brenton, a Boston merchant and leading business
man, who soon alter removed to Rhode Island, and
was Governor of that Colony in 1666-68, and died in
1674.
In 1661 the town received another grant of 4000
acres, which was sold to Parker and Danforth. The
proceeds wereapplied to the completion of the meeting-
house, to Mr. Whiting's salary and to the purchase of
the Weld farm west of Concord River.'
The progress of population was not rapid. Begin-
ning in 1652, probably with three or four families — in
1659 the number had reached twenty-five. Four years
later the minister's rate implies that nearly fifty were
in town, but for the twelve years following the in-
crease was small.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
BILLERICA -( Continued).
THE INDI.\.>'S AND IXDIAX W.VRS.
The relations of Billerica with the Indians were
intimate and important. The Shawshin territory I
was a favorite resort of the red men. The Paw-
tucket tribe occupied the vicinity of the mouth ■
of the Concord River, on both sides of it, as ;
their headquarters. From this place they went j
forth; to this they returned; here they planted '
their corn. Wamesit, or Weymesit, was originally j
the name of the eastern angle, between the Concord j
and Merrimack Rivers, around Fort Hill and the mod-
ern " Belvidere " of Lowell. Here many, if not the
majority, of the Indians lived, giving ancient Billeri-
ca a large Indian population, though the town never
probably exercised civil jurisdiction over them. This
Indian settlement confronted the fathers of Billerica
as they looked northward. Their road down the Con-
cord River was the road to Wamesit.
This Indian reservation, specifically granted by the
General Court, was surveyed and described by Dan-
forth in 1664, April, as follows: ^
** . . . There is laid unt unto the IcdlaDS, who are the inhabitanta
of Waymedck, fine buudred acres of land oo the east side of CoDcord
Blaer and Joyning to the aajd riuer and to ^lerremack Biuer ; it runnes
npoa Concord Riner about one mile & three quarters, which reacbeth
to Bacon Brooke, &. bounded by the sajd brooke on the south fownr score
poole ; it runnes from the mouth of the Concord Ryuer doune Merre-
macke Riuer two hundred &. fifty poole, where it is bounded by a red
oake marked ; from thence it runnes according to the bound marke trees
w^ two angles, unto Bacon Brooke ; ail which doe more plainly appeare
by plott of it under written. This tiue hundred acres is part of that
three thousand w«i» waa layd out to M". Winthrop formerly, only in the
retume of s^d three thousand there is mention made of one hundred
acires allowed in that farme, in reference to laud the Indians bad im-
1 For fuller details of these and other land grants and transactions,
see the present writer's " History of Billerica," pataim.
2 Colonial Record: Vol. it, part li, p. 108.
prooved w^i^in the bounds of it. This worke was done by the Comittee
appointed to y« same by thisGenerall Court
"Simon Waiaan,
'* John Pabkeb,
"Jonathan Danfoeth, Stxrieyor."
In place of this four hundred acres taken out of
Mrs. Winthrop's farm, her heirs were granted six
hundred acres elsewhere. The mouth of Bacon Brook,
which bounded this Indian plantation southerly, is a
few rods south of the Salem Railroad bridge. The
present boundary of Lowell on the east of Concord
River falls a little below the lines of the Indian sur-
vey. There is no evidence that these Pawtucket In-
dians were ever troublesome or unfriendly neighbors.
In common with other tribes, their numbers bad
been greatly reduced by a desolating pestilence not
long before the period of the English colonization ;
and the wise and Christian missionary labors of
Eliot and Gookin among them did not fail to bear
important fruit. Had the Indian policy of the coun-
try been moulded in later years by the same spirit
of benevolence and justice, the nation would have
been saved much disaster, expense and reproach.
John Eliot, pastor of Roxbury, 16.32-90, began to
devote himself to labors among the Indians .ibout
the time that the Shawshin settlement became a
practical question. Beginning at Xonantum and
Natick, the success of his ertbrts encouraged their
extension, and he soon sought out these Wamesit
Indians. Passaconaway, the aged sachem, became
friendly, if not Christian, and, in 16G0, in a fare-
well speech to his children and people, he " warned
them to take heed how they quarrelled with their
English neighbors, for though they might do them
some damage, yet it would prove the means of their
own destruction." His death did not follow immedi-
ately, for, in 1662, he asked and received from the
General Court a grant of land "about Xaticot,
above Mr. Brenton's lands, where it is free, a mile
& a halfe on either side Merremacke River in
breadth & three miles on either side in length."
" Mr. Brenton's lands," here mentioned, were the
early grant of eight thousand acres to Billerica,
which the town had sold to that gentleman, and this
grant to the sachem was beyond the Souhegan, near
Manchester.
In 1670 Wannalancet had succeeded his father
as sachem, also inheriting his peaceful spirit. He
yielded to Eliot's faithful persuasions and avowed
himself a Christian, 1674, May 5th. The account giv-
en by Captain Daniel Gookin of Wamesit and its
population and the conversion of this chief is inter-
esting.''
The picture of this faithful magistrate and friend of
the Indians, accompanied by his " brother" Eliot, on
his annual visit to Wamesit, dispensing justice and
the Gospel to the red men there, is full of suggestions,
and the conversion of Wannalancet might furnish a
3 ilauachvMttt Hulorieal Colleclumi. Fint series. Vol. i, p. 186.
BILLERICA.
327
paioter with an attractive subject. Its interest to
Billerica would be increased by the presence in it of
Mr. Daniel, an "English gentleman," who for ten
years resided here with his "noble" wife, and then
returned to England.
Wannalancet is credited with building the fort from
which " Fort Hill " takes its name ; and traditions
which seem trustworthy fix the site of the log chapel,
in which Mr. Eliot preached to the Indians, very
near the fine edifice of the Eliot Church.
In the summer of 1675, when the alarm and peril
of King Philip's War assailed the Colony, these In-
dians retired to the wilderness at Penacook (Con-
cord, New Hampshire,) to avoid being involved.
Still, they were suspected, and in September a com-
pany of 100 men was sent to ascertain the position of
Wannalancet in regard to the war. On their ap-
proach the Indians concealed themselves in the
woods, and their deserted wigwams were wantonly
burned. But, though thus sorely tempted to join Philip
in retaliation, the sachem did not forget his father's
counsel, and restrained his young warriors, who were
eager to attack the whites. He soon afier went far-
ther, to the head-waters of the Connecticut, and there
spent the winter. The next year the Indians were
allured to Dover and unjustly imprisoned ; but they
were soon set at liberty and returned to their Merri-
mack home. After the conclusion of the war the
sachem visited the Reverend Mr. Fiske, of Chelms-
ford. To his question, whether Chelmsford had suf-
fered much, the clergyman replied that they had not,
and devoutly thanked God. " Me next," said Wan-
nalancet, implying that he had restrained the Indians
under his control. Billerica perhaps owed her secur-
ity during those dark days to the same friendly
sachem.
But the Indian occupation of Billerica was not con-
fined to Wamesit. The frequency with which their
arrow-points and other articles are found, shows how
numerous they once were. Graves and the site of a
wigwam are still shown north of Jaquith Brook, near
Concord River; and the north shore of Nutting's
Pond was so distinctively theirs as to be sold by them
in 1665. The hill north of this pond was known as
Indian Hill. In May, 1665, the town granted to
Henry Jefts '" four acres of land, lying at the Indian
Hill on the north of y' Indian field at Nuttins pond."
Danforth records the death of his Indian servant,
John Warrick, 1686 ; and, in 1681, James Speen, In-
dian, receives " eight pounds due to y' Indians for
four wolves heads,'' and other records occur of the
same sort. These dusky forms must have been fre-
quently seen in the early homes of Billerica. Did
their coming excite fear or confidence, repugnance or
pleasure? Whatever it was, the sensation was a fa-
miliar one. And, however they had learned to trust
their Wamesit neighbors, as they observed the labors
of the saintly Eliot among them and the fruit they
bore, the fathers could never be long forgetful of the
darker fringe of savage humanity beyond, the work-
ing of whose policy or passion might at almost any
moment involve them in peril or ruin. This danger
hung over the pioneers of Billerica for more than
fifty years, and their slumbers were likely to be
broken by a war-whoop. In our estimate of their
faith and courage in planting the town, this fact
should be remembered.
The earliest indication of this danger afforded by
the Records occurs in '' 1667, 9"°, 11. At a meeting
of the selectmen. It is agreed concerning fortifica-
tion in this Town, That ther shall be a house built of
stone & brick w" a chimney at y' west end of it, y*
dementions of y' house to bee twenty-six foote in
length, twenty-two foot wide from outside to outside,
with a doore three foot wide on y" south side, near y'
west end, & two windows, one at y' east end & y'
other on y" south side, being each window three foot
wide & two foot & a half in height, all in y' clear ;
y° walls of y* house shalbe nine foote in height from
y° floore to y' under side of y° plate; also, a floore,
lying one foot below y' plate, with crosse runners, y'
long girt lying cross y'^ house ; also, ther shalbe iron
barres in each window & one window at y' gable end
on y' east; y" roofe of y' house to be sawne stuft'e,
covered with bords, chamfered & after shingled. And
for y' effecting of y' premises, we do agree that hands
shall forthwith be employed to digge clay and stones,
& y' rest of y' work to be carried on with as much
convenient speed as may be, according to y" order of
y' gen" Court.
The order of the General Court was passed in May,
1667, requiring every town to erect, " either inclosing
the meeting-house, or in some other convenient place,
a fortification, or fort, of stone, brick, timber, or
earth, as the place maybe most capable, of such di-
mensions as may best suit their ability, where women,
children & the aged maybe secured in case of sudden
danger, whereby the souldjers maybe more free to
oppose an enemy."
But this fortification never was built, whether be-
cause the tax was too great, or the alarm less, we can
only conjecture ; but this description is interesting
in depicting the house the fathers would have built
for such a purpose.
Eight years passed, and the peril came in earnest,
the most critical hour, perhaps, in the history of New
England. The Indians, alarmed at the growing num-
bers and strength of the settlements, and incited by
resentment for fancied and, perhaps, some real inju-
ries, rose in a determined effort to exterminate the
colonists. Philip, chief of the Pokanokets, was the
leader, enlisting the Narragansetts and as many
others of the natives as he was able. They fell upon
Swanzey, and soon after Brookfield suffered. Deer-
field was burned and Hadley attacked. Springfield,
Northfield, Lancaster, Medfield, Weymouth, Groton
and Marlborough were successively the victims of
savage assaults ; and where the next blow might fall
328
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, -MASSACHUSETTS.
was an ever-present dread in every hamlet and home.
Had the Wamesit Indians joined in the fray, i3iller-
ica would probably have been among the first to suf-
fer. The town, and perhaps the Colony owed its sal-
vation to their friendly neutrality. Eliot and Gookin
had such reward aa they did not foresee for their ben-
evolent labors. Other reward they had, too, in the
suspicion and bitter denunciation of many of the
people, because they would not turn away from the
friendly Indians, when the popular feeling included
all red men in a common conspiracy and malignity.
The alarm came unexpectedly upon the town. On
the 3d of May the selectmen " order the constables
watch to cease this present sumer unless greater need
appear." The need did appear, and the succeeding
pages of the record suggest how great and urgent the
emergency was. Some items must be quoted:
"13. 6". 73. At apubticli Towrte Meeting.
"The Towne, coDsideriDg the providence of God at the p'sent calUog us
to lay aside our ordinary occations in providing for our creatures and to
take special care for the pfaerving of our lives and the llTes of our wives
and children, the enemy being near and the warnings hy gods provi-
dence upon our neighbors being very solemne and awfull, do therefore
order & and agree joyntly to p'pare a place of safety for women and
children, and that all persons and teams shall attend y* said works
untill it be finished ; and account of y« wholl charge being kept, it
BhRlbe equally divided upon the inhabitants with other Towne charges.
.\Iso they appoint Serj"' ffoster, Serj"* Tompson, Sam» Manning i Jon-
athan Danforth to be oveiBeers of y" same."
" i. SM. To. At a tru€tiny of ye sehctinen t£- t:omitte« of willUia.
" In pursuance of an order from the Hon-^ Conncill, sent unto them
by warrant from y" worahp" Simon Willard Ksquir, Serg"* Major, in ref-
erence to the gathering the inhabitants of the towne into severall garri-
sons according to their beat capacity. i
'• Impn. They have ordered serg"' Hill's house to be a garrison for
that end of y» towne, taking to it Nathaniel .t Jonathan Hill, Tho :
DuttonJun', L'. W". ITrench, Willm Chamberline Sen', X' Isaac Cham- I
berline, X two soldiers ; nine soldiers A: live houses. I
I
*'4. They onier to the Tlevereod Mr. Samuel Whitinc, his house
Thoniaa Dtitton Sen' Jc hia son John, Daniel Shed Sen' A; Iiib son John !
Shed, John Durrant, John Rogera Sen' i his three sons, John Thomas
A Nathaniel Rogera, and two soldiers ; eleven soldiers <t eix families; .t
this to boe y» maine garrison A y« lost refuge in case of extremity.
"7. Whereas aevenill at y Dortb end of y« towne have already de-
parted their own Habitations &. several of y" vnwllling to returne to ym
agftine at y» present, Hence they order them to be entertained in y»
body of y« towne.
"9. They order that y« p*on8 ordered to each garrison shall dispose
of their corne (acording to y» order of y Councill) neer unto their owne
garrlsoDB, unless they can ele where better secure the same.
•* 10. They order that every p^on afores^ shall equally contribute in
labour or otherwise to fortify each house of garrison to which they are
appointed and seasonably to attend y same, acording to y* CounciU's or-
der, both p«on3 A teames to attend y« same as in y order of highway
worke is required untill y« worke be done. Only in case 3Ir. Daniel and
Mr. Laine fortify themselves (they being very far from neighbours) they
shall then be freed from fortifying y« garrisons to which they are ap-
pointed. .\nd are also impowered to keipeawatch at their owne and
to exatuioe p^ns as other watches may do.
" 11. They order that the Comitee of millitia A selectmen, each person
that do pertaioe to any garrison, shall order jc regulate y« work* of y«
sameaa overseers, i Serg«» Kidder is appointed overseer of Mr. Whit-
ing's garrison, Jos«ph Tompson of Thomas Pattin's, & Jonathan Dan-
forth of James Paterson's garrison, A that any three of y s^ Comitee A
selectmen may determine what shalbe done in reference to the fortify-
ing each garrison J: to determine any difference that may arise respect-
ing y* same.
" 12, They order that all brush X underwood near y aforesaid garri- ,
sons shal be cutt up and cleared away, according to the Council's order,
each person to attend y same both for time & place as they shall have
after order. .\l80 they order each inhabitant to attend their several
watches, as formerly, untill further order."
" 14. 8m. 1G75. At a meeting of y* Hon^ major Willard, The 3elect
men, & Comoiiitee of militia. These sevemll oidera were read before y
Hon^ Jlajor aforer*, considered and allowed by him, &, y Inhabitants
enjoyned to attend .v* same.
"Also, it is ordered that the severall soldiers sent hitherto garrisoD
shall assist in fortifying y severall houses to which they are appointed^
as also to clear away such brush as is near such houses appointed for
garrison, as tbey shall be ordered from time to time.
'* .\lso, it is ordered that no listed soldier of the Troop, or of y« foot
company, shall remove their habitations & abode out of the town with-
out liberty hrst had ^ obtained from the Major of y* regiment or Comit-
tee of millitia ± selectmen of the town, on y peril uf such a line as
shalbe imposed on them by such authority as shall have power to deter-
mine y same.
" Neither shall any soldier afores^ absent himself out of the towne
about any private occations of his owne without leave. ffrst had and ob-
tained from y master of the garison to which they belung, vuder the
penalty of five shillings p duy for every such defect, to be levied by y
Clark of y band, as other fines for defect in training days are levied.
" And further, it is ordered, in case of an alarme every soldier shall
repair to y* garrison vnto which he is appointed.
" And in case any garison house be set upon by y enemje. Then y
garrisons next to them shall send reliefe to them as they are capable, not
leaving their owne garrision without competent security for tlie time.
" .\iid in case uf need, the women & children shall be conveyed to y*
maine garison, il it may bee with safety, that ^ there maybe the better
supply In case of need, the cheife ufficer to order and regulate the same,
where there may be time so to do.
"Also, it is ordered, that every pson that felmll ali>»ut off a gun, small
or great, without leave from a cumander or in cube of offence ur defence
against an eneiiiie, ahull pay as a ttne twu shillings Jl six iK-nce, or setoff
so much ol their wages if they be garison men.
'* .\lso, Job Laine was allowed to fortify his owne house, and to have
two soMiers for garrison nieu to defend Iiis liouse, in cade y loiiniry
could spare them.
" .\.1I this is allowed ± continued by nie,
" St : WiLLARP, Serg. -Major."
It does not need a lively imagination, reading be-
tween the lines of this record, to depict something of
the tumult, hardship and peril through which Bil-
lerica was passing. Families fled from their homes to
the garrison-hou-es, or the greater security of the lower
towns. The laborsof the field gave place to fortifying,
scouting and watching. The corn must be removed
to safer receptacles. They organize a military company
with Jonathan Danforth, lieutenant, and James Kid-
der, ensign. Some of their own brave sons enlist in
the service of the Colony and march to peril and
death. Timothy Farley waa killed at Quaboag,
August 2d, in the assault on Lieutenant Wheeler's
company, and John French carried through life the
effect of the wounds received there. And two
mothers approaching their confinement sought com-
fort and safety in Charlestown — the wives of John
Marshall and of the pastor ; nor is it too much to infer
that the anxiety and hardship they had suffered may
explain the death, in a few days, of the sons born to
them there.
Forty-eight families are enumerated in the list of
assignments to the garrison-houses. Rev. Samuel
Whiting's house, the main garrison, was north of
BILLERICA.
329
Charnstaffe Lane and just west of the brook. How
much labor was spent in fortifying we may gather
some idea bygleaning from the record the fact that
the work done on this house, under the charge of
Peter Bracket, employed thirty men, with several cat-
tle, a little more than two days each, and the amount
credited was eight pounds, six shillings and nine
pence. But the blow so long dreaded and guarded
against did not fall, and the town was mercifully
spared more than its common share in the burdens
and losses of Philip's War. That share was suffi-
ciently trying, and bore heavily upon the inhabitants.
It is suggested by items like these : Samuel Whi-
ting is enrolled among the troopers; Job Lane is
impressed, and Daniel Rogers, from December to
February, 1675. And when, fifty years after, Massa-
chusetts rewarded the soldiers in this war somewhat
tardily by land-grants, the following Billerica men or
their heirs shared in these " Narragansett " grants,
proving that they had been in the service : Samuel
Hunt, John Needham, James Patterson, Nathaniel
Rogers, John Shed, John Sheldon, John Stearns,
Joseph Tompson.
The position of the Christian Indians at Wamesit
and other " praying towns" was one of especial em-
barrassment and hardship during these dark days.
Gookin was their candid judge, as well as their true
friend, and bis estimate of their attitude was amply
vindicated by later developments.' They were hon-
estly friendly, and desired to act on the former ad-
vice of Passaconaway. Gookin wished that advan-
tage be taken of this fact, and that their forts at Fort
Hill and elsewhere should be manned by a few Eng-
lish soldiers, who could direct and use the activity of
the Indians in the public defence. But the excited
imaginations of the English, generally, could appre-
ciate no distinction of friendly and hostile Indians,
and every red man was a foe to be dreaded and dis-
trusted, if not shot at sight; and Captain Gookin's
wise plan of defence stood no chance of being accept-
ed. The hostile Indians, of course, sought every op-
portunity, and found many, to foment this jealousy,
if they could not win the Christian Indians to their
side.
Wannalancet, the Wamesit sachem, had retired, at
the beginning of the war, to the vicinity of Pena-
cook (Concord), and subsequently to the region of
the upper Connecticut, resisting overtures from the
English to induce him to return. A portion of the
tribe remained at Pawtucket. James Richardson, of
Chelmsford, was for a time in charge of them ; and
a barn or haystack belonging to him was burned by
skulking hostile Indians, as were two or three houses
in the same town. The unfortunate Wamesits were
falsely charged with these acts ; and a party of four-
teen Chelmsford men, under pretence of scouting for
1 See hie account of the Christian Indians, in Archfotogift JmerUana,
Tol. ii, p 411.
Philip's forces, went out to assiil them.^ Calling
the ansuspecting Indians from their wigwams, two
of the party fired. Five women and children were
wounded and one boy was killed. The others were
restrained from their murderous purpose," and the
outrage was severely condemned by the better part
of the English. The murderers were tried ; but the
juries, swayed by the popular feeling, would not con-
vict them. The Indians saw that however friendly
they might be, their lives were in peril, and fled to
the woods for safety. The Council sent Lieutenant
Henchman to persuade them to return, but at first
without avail. After three weeks of great suffering
for want of food, moit of them, however, did return.
The Council directed Major Henchman to treat them
kindly, and sent Rev. John Eliot, with Majors Gookin
and Willard, to encourage them and try to persuade
the Chelmsford people to treat them better.
It is not easy to determine the order of events, and
the following incidents were probably concurrent
with or prior to some of those above-mentioned.
The Court, as well as the Chelmsford men, under-
took to punish the Wamesits for wrongs of which not
they but others were guilty. They were summoned
and brought down to Boston, convicted on no good
evidence, of the Chelmsford fires, and for a time im-
prisoned. Most of them were soon liberated and
sent home under conduct of Lieutenant Richardson.
But a military company was encountered at Woburn
on their way, and one of the soldiers, against orders,
fired and killed a young brave. The murderer was
acquitted by a jury. The Indians, alarmed by these
repeated wrongs, again fled. They left behind six or
I seven persons too old or invalid to accompany them,
and the wigwam in which these unfortunates were
left was set on fire by inhuman white men and con-
sumed with all its inmates. The wretched remnant
of the Wamesits, convinced at last that there was no
peace for them in their Pawtucket homes, finally
joined their chief in the depths of the forest, and did
not return until the war was over.
It would not be strange if, in retaliation for their
wrongs, some of the Wamesits were responsible, as
was charged, for later assaults. Mr. Hubbard, in his
" Indian Wars," records the burning of a house in
Andover, and wounding of one Roger Marks, and adds :
" Two more houses about Shawshen, beyond the said
Andover, were burned about March 10 ; also they
killed a young man of the said Town, April 8, the
son of George Abbot. And another son of his wa«
carried away the same day, "who yet was returned
some few months after almost pined to Death with
Hunger." Mr. Abbot lived on the Shawshin, in the
west part of Andover, and the inference which has
been drawn from Hubbard's language, that the houses
" about Shawshen " which were burned were in Bil-
lerica, has no good foundation and is improbable.
' FeWt Atmdlt, vol. ii, p. 578.;
330
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUXTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Joseph Abbot, of Andover, was slain on April Sth.
The next day, which was the Sabbath, a special alarm
occurred in Billerica, and troops from below were
summoned to the defence of the town. Increase
Mather tells us : ' " This day, being ihe Lord's Day,
there was an alarum at Charlestown, Cambridge, &
other towns, by reason that sundry of the enemy were
seen at Billerica, and (it seemeth) had shot a man
there." A letter from John Cotton is also quoted,
saying : " the Indians beset Billerica round about, the
inhabitants being at meeting.''
Read Mather's doubtful statement about " a young
man murdered there," in the light of Hubbard's record
that Joseph Abbot was killed at Andover the day
previous, and it becomes clearly probable that the
trouble and bitterness of that anxious day were not
intensified by the actual death of any one here.
Another glimpse of this Sabbath alarm is seen in
the fact that twenty troopers were sent by Major
Willard, impressing horses and men in Woburn to the
relief of Billerica.
From the close of Philip's War, in 167G, a period
of peace with the Indians ensued for fifteen years.
These years were not, however, free from anxiety and
frequent alarms. The most interesting incident in
the Indian history of Billerica during this period was
the procuring an Indian deed. It bears date June
6, 1685. Whether the motive which led to the acqui-
sition of an Indian title at this late day was purely
benevolent may be doubted. A conflict of claims as
to the bounds of the town on the west side of Con-
cord River had arisen. The bounds of the grant
from the General Court were obscure, and, iu 1684,
the Bloods had obtained an Indian deed to ([uite a
large tract, claimed also by Billerica, in the vicinity
of the present Carlisle Village. The line described
in the deed to Blood included meadows which Biller-
ica had granted to her own citizens twenty years
earlier, and to which her right was confirmed, in 1700,
by the General Court. When Billerica obtained her
Indian deed, it was probably felt to be prudent to se-
cure whatever title the natives could give, and not
leave the benefit of it to the unjust claim of the
Bloods.
With the increase of English neighbors, the In-
dians at Wamesit found their home there less satis-
factory, or the prices ofi'ered for their lands more so,
and gradually sold their reservation. " Wanalanset,
Sachem," and others sell to Jonathan Tyng, 1687,
December 2d, two parcels, of which one was on the
east of Concord River, -and is described as containing
"the old Planting ground, which the Indians, who
were the former proprietors thereof, and their associ-
ates, used to employ & improve, by planting, fishing,
& Dwelling thereon, for many years past." With
this sale, the Indian titles in Wamesit were probably
terminated.
' Hutory (Reprint of 1862), p. 133.
In the abortive expedition of 1690 against Quebec,
Billerica was represented by Captain Danforth, and
when the Indians fell upon Dunstable iu 1691, the
alarm and the fugitives came to Billerica. At last
Ist August, 1690, the assault so long dreaded and
guarded against fell upon the town, and two homes
were made desolate, those of Benjamin Dutton and
Zachary Shed. They were on the plain, a half-mile
south of North Billerica. In each, the mother, with
her eldest and youngest child, perished at the bloody
bauds of the savages. Mrs. Dutton was thirty-six
years of age, one of the earliest natives of the town,
n^e Joanna Jefts, and widow of John Dunkin. Her
daughter Mary Dunkin was sixteen, and her son
Benoni, '' son of her grief," was less than two, born
two months .ifter his father's death. If Mrs. Shed's
age were the same as her husband's, she was also
thirty-six ; her daughter Hannah was thirteen, and
Agnes was a cbiid of two years. None seem to have
been made captives in this assault. Four families at
least were living as far north, or beyond, which were
for some reason spared by the savages.
Three years followed of anxiety and burdensome pub-
lic service, diversified by witchcraft excitements-when
the second massacre fell upon the town, 1695, August
Sth. The town clerk, who rarely turns aside from official
record to mention incidents, gives four lines to this
massacre ;• " This day received that awful stroke by
the enemy of fivetene persons slain & taken, more
sad than that we met withall three years before, when
we mett upon the like occasion. '
The blow fell upon four families, who were also in
or near the present village of Xorth Billerica. The
home of John Rogers stood about eighty rods due north
of the late Governor Talbot's house. The cellar and
brick from its chimney may still be seen. He was
fifty-three years old and his wife was not living. He
was killed and two of his children were taken
prisoners. Thomas Rogers, his brother, lived near the
present site of the village hall. He perished with his
eldest son, while his wife and two children escaped.
John Levistone lived farther east and lost five of his
seven children.
There was one other victim of that bloody day, whose
case was, if possible, more tragic. She was the wife of
Dr. Roger Toothaker, and her home stood at the
point where, in later years, the Middlesex Canal left
the Concord River. Tradition says it is still standing,
as the ell of the old brick Rogers house. Her per-
sonality and trials deserve special notice. Her name
was Mary Allen, and she was sister of that Martha
Allen who married Thomas Carrier and was a victim
of the witchcraft delusion at Salem three years before.
Xot only was Mrs. Toothaker's sister thus fatally in-
volved, but her husband, with more freedom and folly,
neglecting the claims of his family and disregarding
the appeals of the selectmen to return to his duty,
- Records, Vol. il, p. 58.
BILLERICA.
331
left wife and children to the charity of hie neighbors.
Trials like these were mingled in the bitter cup of
Mrs. Toothaker, with the Indian alarms and the
massacre of her neighbors. At last the war-whoop of
the savages sounded her death-knell, at the same
time that her youngest daughter, Margaret, was borne
into captivity. If the remembrance and sympathy of
later generations could afford any compensation for
the sorrows of such a life, we might search far to fiud
a person better entitled to them than Mary Allen
Toothaker.
Of the agitation and alarm which ran through the
town, as the tidings of this bloody work spread, we
can form slight conception. The day was Monday,
not, as some traditions affirm, the Sabbath. The
"garrisons" would be soon filled with excited women
and children; the men would prepare for defence and
attack, for pursuit of the retreating foe was the first
impulse ; every nook, every tree and bush would be
watched for a concealed foe ; and for many days the
dread of another and deadly blow must have shaken
their hearts. There is no evidence that either of these
attacks were preceded by any warnings, or that any
other towns suffered at the same time. ^
The insidious foe chose to fall upon some unsus-
pecting settlement and beat a hasty retreat before
neighbors could rally to the rescue. Three weeks
passed and the alarm continued. Colonel Lynde, of
Charlestown, was commissioned to pursue the foe, and
his report discovers to us glimpses of what Billerica
was passing through:
** Aug. 23, 1695. Receiving commission from the Honorable William
Stoughton, Lieutenant-Governor, Coniniender-in-Chief over all tbe
prorince of Massac hu setts, with toBtructions for bis Majesty's service in
tbe county of Middlesex : pursuant ^bereunto I went that night to
Billerica, where I found about three hundred men in arms from Wo-
burn, Reading, Maiden, Medford, Cbarlestowo, Cambridge, Watertown,
under conduct of Major William Johnson, Major Jeremiah Swaine,
Major Wade, Capt. William Greene, Capt. John Greene, Lt. Remington,
Lt. Homan, Capt. Gerfield. Sergeant Bond and Mr. Sherman.
"That night we marched to the river of Merrimack, guarded the
fords, there being three between Andover and Chelmsford, with about
forty men at each ford, and with about oce hundred meo encamped that
Dight at Prospect Hill, that lies between Chelmsford and the river, on
the northern side of the great swamp ; leaving the remaining forces to
guard the town. As soon as it was light, on the 24th of August instant,
TO sent men to the top of the said hill, where we hud a view of the said
swamp and the countrj' far about, but could discover no fire anywhere.
Thence we proceeded to range the woods between Andover and Chelms-
ford, but finding no sigu of our enemies, we rendezvous at a place called
Bandy Pond, about eight miles from Billerica eastward ; from whence
about eleven of the clock that day we went to the great swamp, dls-
XDOunted half our men, the other half taking their borvea. We caused
the men on foot to paas through tbe swamp in a rank, each man at a
distance aa much as was convenient ; appointed to rendezvous again at
Proepect Hill ; Major Johnson, with about forty men, compaasing the
awarap on the west side, and myself with tbe rest of tbe soldiers on tbe
eait side. Oar men on foot, with much difficulty having got through
the swamp, gave us account that they saw a new track and smelt
Indiana in one place, but did not Judge by their track there were above
two ; having a^in rendezvous about four o'clock, afternoon, near Pros-
pect Hill, having before noon ranged tbe woods belonging partly to
Andover to the aaatward of Prospect Hill, we proceeded to range the
woods towards Chelmnford ; rendezvousing again near the time of sun
setting at tbe chief fording place on tbe Merrimack below Hunt's gar-
rison, where I advised with all our officers. Having no proepect of
doing service against tbe enemy, considering tbe evil tb&t bad accraed
by drawing ofi^ all forces at once, I left a guard of ten men to guaxd
that ford, under the direction of Hunt and Foster, of Billerica, until
tbe 29th day of August Instant, at night, and then to be dismlased with-
out further order. Marching then up to Billerica town in diveree par*
tiee, we rendeivous at the Ordinary, where p«ying off tbe army with
thankful acknowledgments for their ready and willing aerTlce, at their
request I dismissed them according to their desire, to make tbe best of
their way home, which without doubt they attended ; though with diffi-
culty by reason of tbe darkness of the night.
"So concluding, I am, sir,
" Tour servant,
" Joseph Ltndk, LL-CoL
"Dated at Charlestown, Aug. 26, 1695.
"P. S. We have left about five hundred of bread In tbe hands of
Capt. Danfortb, who was not so prudent In tbe disposal of some of what
was spent as, in my way home I was informed, he should have been. I
directed him at my coming away to preserve what was left until further
order. Toure, as above. J. L."
Eight months later, we read the situation in the
following from the Town Records :
** AprU 6, 1696. Training day evening. At a meeUng of the com-
misioD officers, both of borsu and foot, by vertue of a warrant from our
M^or,wenew erected our watcbesand ordered the repairing of garisons,
and appointed the masters of them and the number of souldtera belong-
ing to them, and other persons &, families.
" At the samH meeting tbe comition officers with tbe telectmeo ordered
that the remainder of the old pouder be dispersed among tbe severall
garisons acording unto the number of souldiers appointed unto tbem, to
be eaqually distributed, and tbe master of the garison or tbe masters of
the severall garisons unto whom the pouder is distributed to t>ecom re-
sponcible for it, and to secure it and return It, or tbe vallue of it in
money, except there be occation for to make use thereof In their own
defence.
*' The same day the selectmen compounded with our drummers, John
Shead & Samuel Froet, To pay forthwith unto John Shead twenty shil-
lings, to clere with him while that day ; i to pay to Samuel Frost ten
shillings, L to clere with bim while that day ; but It had not been at-
tended.*'
Account was taken in July of the ammunition
stock in the hands of Captain Danforth. It consisted
of a barrel of powder, 110 pounds; part of an old
barrel, sixty-eight pounds; lead, 120 pounds; flints,
130; bullets, thirty-eight; and match ** suflicient."
These Indian alarms and sorrows were incidents of
the long conflict between France and England for
supremacy in America, which ended only in the
victory of Wolfe at Quebec, in 1759. Treaties would
bring short periods of dubious peace, and the conflict
would break out anew. And while there is no evi-
dence that the Indians ever came again to Billerica,
the records show abundant activity of her citi-
zens. Colonel John Lane became a prominent mili-
tary leader, often called to service. In the famous
Lovewell expedition Billerica had two representa-
tives, Jonathan Kittr dge and Solomon Keyes, while
Chaplain Frye had been a teacher in the town, and
Seth Wyman, Lovewell's brave and skillful lieuten-
ant, had a Billerica wife, and was of that family
which, living just overthe line in Wobum, was often
and intimately connected with Billerica.
In 1743 Pepperell's expedition against Louisbourg
included more than ten brave Billerica men, and
in the defensive military operations on the Con-
necticut River of this period, soldiers from Billerica
had a share, and in one disaster were the principal
332
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
sufferers. Fort Dummer, in Brattleborough, was the
earliest post established above Northfield, in 1721, and
twenty years later a fort was built at "No. 4," which
was the origin of Charlestown. Around these posts
very vigilant and useful scouting and some brave
fighting were done, under the command of Capt.
Josiah Willard and Capt. Phineas Stevens. In the
muster-roll of a company which served under Cap-
tain Willard from February 10 to October 6, 1748, at
Ashuelot(now Hinsdale), New Hampshire, the follow-
ing Billerica names are found : Josiah Crosby, Jona-
than French, John Frost, Samuel Hill, Benjamin Os-
good and Joseph Richardson, and probably Daniel
Farmer.
On June 16th a squad of fourteen men set out from
Ashuelot for Fort Dummer by way of Colonel Hins-
dale's fort.' The party was waylaid opposite the
mouth of Broad Brook by a large company of Indi-
ans. The surprise was complete and disastrous.
Three men were killed and scaiped,and,by a singular
fatality, they were all from Billerica, — Jonathan
French, John Frost and Joseph Richardson. Seven
were taken prisoners, of whom one was killed at the
first encampment, William Bickford, and his body
buried a month later. Four escaped across the river,
one of whom, Daniel Farmer, was severely wounded.
Il response to the great gun from Fort Dummer, a
relief party went up the next day from Northfield.
They found and buried our Billerica dead, scoured the
countn.- and found "great signs of the enemy," show-
ing that a large Indian force had been in ambush
around the forts for several days.
Of the captives, Benjamin (Jsgood, of Billerica, and
William Blaochard, of Dunstable, reached home
October 15th ; Henry Stevens, of Chelmsford, No-
vember 12th, and Joel Johnson, of Woburn, early in
October. They all suffered great hardships, were im-
prisoned till Augui>t 29th, and Osgood with most of
the others had to run the gauntlet. All were feeble
and emaciated on their return, and Osgood died soon
after from the effect of his sufferings.
Josiah Crosby was one of the four who escaped ;
and of his experience we have an interesting account
in a letter from John Farmer to Hon. Nathan Crosby.-
It differs somewhat from Mr. Temple's narrative out-
lined above.
"In 1748 he was a soldier on Connecticut River.
He, with fifteen more, commanded by a lieutenant,
was ordered from Fort Dummer to Fort Hinsdale,
about fiiurmile.", and when they were within one mile
of Fort Hinsdale they fell into an ambush of one
hundred and twenty Indians and French, who rose
and fired. The commandingofEcer ordered each man
to take care of himself. Two men escaped by secret-
ing themselves ; one reached Fort Hinsdale. Crosby
ran up the river towards Fort Dummer followed by
1 S«e " Hbtory of Northflel*," by Rer J. H. Temple, p. 262.
-"A Croiby Family," p. 11. TbtB volume irt a record of Josiah
Crosbj'a desceoduDts.
an Indian, who, coming up within a few rods of him,
discharged his piece at him. The ball pas.^ed near
his right ear; he then turned and fired at the Indian,
who fell, and he saw no more of him. He pursued
his way up the river until he came opposite Fort
Dummer, where he attempted to swim the river, but
before he could reach the opposite shore his strength
failed him, and he sank to the bottom and was taken
out by men from the fort." So narrowly escaped the
only one of the five sons of Billerica known to have
been in that fatal encounter. Few days have brought
as deep and sudden sorrow to so many families in the
old town.
The " History of Billerica " (pp. 147-9) has a list
of 212 soldiers from the town, enrolled in the various
expeditions and campaigns of 174.>-6'.i. This number
exceeds by fifty the enrollment of the town in the
War of the Rebellion, though the population was less,
— probably less than 1000. And while the average
length of service and loss of life was not as great, the
patriotism of the people and hardships borne in that
French and Indian War are vividly suggested by
these facts.
CHAPTER XXIX.
BILLERICA— [ Continued\.
RELKJIOr:^ HI.STORY.
Ix the petition to the General Court, 1054, mention
is made of Rev. !Mr. ^Miller, but the movement to se-
cure him as a minister failed. May 1 1,1056, Mr. Samuel
Whiting is admitted as a freeman. Two years later
the town entered into a permanent engagement with
him as its minister, stipulating as follows:
" 1. Wee doai^ree to give Mr. Samuel Whiting, Jnn'., (our minister,)
that houpe which is now vpoii y* townesliip, comfonably finished, for
him, and liifl heirs, if be contioues amongst us during his life. But if
he shall remove from amongst us, then the said house with all the
acomodations of the same shall return agaioe to the towne, to be at their
dispose ; or, if 3lr. Whiting shall dye with vs, then the towne shall have
the refuseing of the said house and all other acoiuoUaclous aforesaid be-
longing to the same, if Ur^. Whiting do belt y* same.
'•2. We do proiiiiae to give to him y» sume of fourty pounds per year,
for his maintenance, for the tir3t two years of bis selling with vs, and
for the third year fifty pounds, and for the fourth year sixty pounds,
and for afterwards we do promise and inguge to better his maintenance
as the Lord shall better our estates.
"3. We do Joyntly pmise to cary at c owne charge, from year to
year, so much of the pay (a3 doth amounte to twenty pounds) as shall be
brought in to him in-wbeat or in other graine, or porke ; to deliver the
same either at Mtstick mill or at Cbarleatowne, which Mr. Whiting
shall apointe, and to deliver the same as such prizes as such pay shall
or doth at such times pass fro man to man, vnleas Mr. Whiting and the
Towne shall make any olher agreement concerning the same.
"4. We do promise to pvide his firewood la. to bring it home to hit
hotise, from year to year, at our owne charges.
" 6. We do promise to fence him in a paster for to keape his horse in,
as convenient as we may.
" uU. for his acomodations, we do promise to lay to y* said house, a
ten-acre lot, for his house-lot and twelve acres of meadow, with other
acomodations convenient to the same, i. e. to grant to him all other diTi-
tions of lands and meadows, with other lots of y* like quantity.
BILLERICA.
333
** The personB subecribiog to the preaiises^ who were then the iohabi-
taDCe. were :
* R.\LPii Hill. Sen'.
\VlLL«». FFEENCH.
John RoDt^ERs, Seu^.
GeOHUE tABLET.
Will™. Pattix.
Sa3j|". Chamne.
John Sternes.
JON.*.TH. IJaNFORTH.
Ralph Hill, Ju'.
John Parker,
James Parker.
Will"". Tav.
Wlixn>. ChaUBERLINC.
John Trull.
James Patterson.
John Marshall.
John Suildon.
HCNERY JeIFFS.
JoMN Baldwin."
"Also, at a. towne Meeting of v« inbabitaoce, y* IC, Inm.^ 1661.
" It iei agreed, That whatever charges Mr. Whiting ehall be at, in
makein^ bis hou&e and land more convenient for hie comfortable Bue-
iatence and livelihood amongBt vs, In erecting any more building,
feoceing, or breakeing of land, or clearing of meadows, and the like;
That lo case the providence of god so orders it that afterwards be sball
remove from us, and so (by our former agreement) leave all bia acorn-
modatione to the use of tbe Towne, the towne du prouiiae that what the
whole premises shall be the better, at hie leaving it, by reason of bis
co6t and charges upon ft. It shall at that time be returned to him by
tlie towoe, OB it shall be adjudged by men indifTerently cbosen."
It speaks well for the courage aod faith of these
founders of the town that, numbering only nineteen
men, they were ready to put their hands to such an
instrument and assume all it^ responsibility. It
speaks well for the young Harvard graduate, of good
birth and sterling ability, that he was ready to
identify himself with the rising town and make his
home in this wilderness, when not even the little
meeting-house of logs and thatch was yet erected.
Where Mr. Whiting preached for the first two
years, we can only conjecture ; perhaps at John
Parker's, where early tuwn-meetings were held ;
perhaps in his own house. A year later, the follow-
ing vote appears :
"It is agreed, by the major prt of the Towne, that Mr. Whiting shall
have 50 p. fortbie year, fur his maintenance, and caring down corne,
and making a well and hovell for bis catell ; which is 10 p. more than
o' agreement for his yerely maintenance , the caring hid corne or other
pay dowue tu towne and getting hie firewood included, to be done at
Mr. Whiting's own charges."
When the earliest families had been five and six
years in town, when their number had increased to
thirty and they had secured a minister, they were at
length prepared to grapple with the serious problem
of a house of worship :
. .09, 9, 59. it is Agreed by the major prt of the Towne, thai there
shall be a meeting house built this winter foiling; thirty foote Longe
and tw-enty and foure foot wide, and twelve fuot high ; the stnds to be 3
foot asunder, the Committee apoynted to agree with workmen, to bild
and finish the said bouse, are Ralph Hill, Sen^, George Farley, Jona-
than Danfortb ; it is agreed, also, that tbe sides and euda shall be
covered with bonis and the Roof with thatch."
This primitive meeting-house stood south of the
centre of the present common, having its length east
and west. Probably the inhabitants contributed
labor and lumber liberally to its erection, but John
Parker was the principal builder, as appears from the
following :
"16, 10.01. The town doe apoyote Will™ Tay, Willm Hamblet, i
Jonathan Danfortb. &s a Comitee to exunime the acontes about y« bild-
inge and tinisbing tbe meeting bouse, and to consider some way to pro-
pose to tbe towoe for satisfying John Parker for bis dishuraements,
what they in their judgment ■ball se meet, and in their best understand-
iog shall coDseive ritasly due to him for the work done."
"6:11:61. the comitee abovesaide did meet together with the
Townsmen, and examined the aconts, aod they make tbia return fullow-
inge : to the Towne, we doe finde that acordinge tobiBaconta (which we
judg to be Just and equall) there is due unto him The Just sume of
eigbteeiie pounds, fifteen shillings, three pence, we say, 18 ; 15 : 3, and
in consideration of tbe nature of the pay disbursed by him, ezce«dioge
the quality of the pay received by him from tbe Towne, we Aprebend
that the Towne may do well to make up the former sume full Twenty
poundes.
" this was excepted and granted by the Towne."
We have already seen that the proceeds of the
land grant received in 1661 were used in part to pay
Mr. Parker.
No church was yet organized, and the citizens of
Billerica sought occasional church privileges with
neighboring churches. The Rev. John Fiske, pastor
of Chelmsford,^ mentions such courtesy to Ralph
Hill and George Farley, and the case of Jonathan
Danfortb is given at length. The latter is too inter-
esting an account of the way the fathers felt and
acted on such questions to be abbreviated :
" Jonathan > He, about 7 ef 12, '66, proposing bimaelfe to this cb.
Danford. J for fellowship. It was concluded to answer him ma
follows: Jonathan Danford, hie desire beiog proposed to this cb., [?7
of 12], to joyne himself in rollowsbip w^'* vs, it was considered of, and
agitated, and in fine determined by joyntt; assent to returne bim this
answer, in effect as followeth : Namely,
"That in case y" ch at Cambridge shall graunt him a permision so to
doe, yeelding vp what right they have in him vnto this ch, and we shall
receive satisfactione touching his being meetely qualified for y eojoym'
of all church Priviledges, we shall wlltiugly attend bis desire to y« re-
ceiving of him: otherwise we know nit Rule of orderly pnK>eeding with
him, in this way ; he being by vertue of his father's covenant vnder the
imniediatt) inspection and charge (as we conceive) of y* cb. of Cam-
bridge.
" Afterward, y« Elders of Carabr. Ch., writing to vs a.« from them-
selves their apprehensions as to this effect, they conceived we might
notwithstanding, receive y> said Jonathan without offence to that ch."
" vpon 22 of 1" ■{ ''6-57. It wna returned thus: Jonathan Damford,
bis desire being vpon this day a 2*'> time proposed to this cb. with L"
from y* Elders of Canibr. Ch. Tbe result of our cb. agitation ami-unted,
in effect, to thie, viz : that we supposing he may be fitt to enjoy all cb.
priviledges, can not otherwise but sympathise wti" him ; and therefore,
as y< case to veappean»at present, we are nut apprebenshe we are order-
ly culled as yet to satisfy his desire, for our pmtE, couceiving be belong-
eth to them whose we think he is, either plainely to disowne him or to
diamisse him ; and, in caae neither of these maybee, we know no rule or
reason why he may not firstly joyne himself in personall covenant with
that ch, and afterward, as just cause is offered, to be either recommended
or dismiseed, or both, vnto vs. Or else, if by reaaon of his distance
from that cb, this be refused, whereas yet there are, as we suppose,
! members ofy* said ch residing nigher to bim than any of ours, be
I geeus called, for his owne parte, to sit still a while & wayie till God
I more fully shew vp his way.'*
] Almost three years pass and the case is reopened.
"In 7, 59, ll""*, Jonatbon Dafford brings L", from y* ch of Cambr.,
wherein they resign vp all their right in bim VDto vs to proceed with,
bim.
"After some long agitation, at 3 several times, and divers qn. in
poynt of order proposed, y* case at length came to be stated, and y*caM
as touching order vpon several grounds, concluded; and thereupon y«
whole cb. agreed to send a l^ to y* Brethren at Billerica, to take off
occasion of offence, and to cleere more fully our way, as foUoweth :
^ MSS. Record, now in possession of Mr. David Pulsifer, at tbe State
House. Fur penuiasion to make extracts from this Record, X am indebt-
ed to the courtesy of Rev. H. 51. liexter, D.D., who has a copy-of the ob-
scure original, which was made for bim by Mr. Pulsifer.
334
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
" Ye Lr to |
Billerica -*
To o' Belovep Bbbtbhe.v, ic. at Billeeica, Jcc. :
Bel. Br. Whereaa,
'*Jo:DaDf: an Inhabitant amoDRst you, bath, for some time since
propoeeii himself as desirous to joyne w^ v^ iu ch. fellowship, and hath
obteyned Liberty from y« ch at Cambridge so to doe, as by L^^* to th from
that cb is manifest to VB. And whereas w« have been ia soniH doubt
about it since that time, as being; hopefully persuaded that v" longing
desires of their soules, after y" enjoying of y" Ordinances of X. amongst
yourselves, would have set them vpon y« worke of Gatbering a ch and
ordeyoing an Officer in yr place; and that y* experience and obeerra-
tion of y* said Jonathan would have led you to have encouraged him in
his desire after y* Ordin ; in taking him amongst you in y" 8*^ worke
and Tnto the same : or otherwise, in case of personal exception ag^' him,
as regularly unmeete for fellowship, to have cleered yi'selvea in the
matter. But perceiving that neither this nor that is attended by you,
eo as we, for o» parties, are ready to apprehend, had we been in yo' case,
it had concerned vb ; Therefore, we have thought fitt to write vnto you,
to desire you would speedily and with the first operlunity enforme vs
of these two things ; First, whether indeed you bee, or due intend soone
to be, in band w*'' y" s"* worke of gatbering a cb. and within what space
of time there is an intendment or Hkelyboode of accomplishing the
same ? and wht-ther you doe intend to accept of y" a** Jonathan amongst
you vnto the worke ? and, if not this or not that, then, if we maybe so
far in yo^ favor, we should look at it as an ace of Brotherly Love, to be
enformed from you, of the grounds wch, if we may apprehend Just,
you shall have vs (thro' y" grace of Christ) in a readiness to strengthen
yo'' hands in wbat may concern vs. If otherwise, we shall desire to act
o* owuo apprehensions as in what we shall conceive o^ duty, and in par-
ticular in reference to s^ Jonathan, without just cause of olTense to you,
in caso you doe not lay before us grounds of conviction to the contrary.
How niefte we may find bim for Fellowship, we can not yet determine.
To rob you of him, in case meete, far be It from vs. To receive him,
you regularly judging him unmeet, and so to retayne him to vs, when
once you have a ch amongst you, be it as far from vs as y« other. Testi-
mony from amongst you, we doe (in part, at least) expect : and on y»
other side, as you will approve yofseWes faithful to Jesus X., and to the
aoule of y« s*i Jonathan, we doe looke you should, and hope you will,
orderly remove matters of just offence, if any there be, or seiisonably
and regularly enforme us.
"Seriously we doe desire you would not slightfas we dare not con-
clude you will) this o^ Ad'lresse vnto you, hy a silent Answer, or by re-
tarding a returne to vs from you, but that you would let us, within a
short time heare from you, and for the interim we commeud you to y«
Guidance of y« good Spirit of God and rest. Vu" *tc.
" ClIELMBrORD, 29 of 11, "o9."
" 12 of 2, '61. Also about Jon : Daford : when voted that we should
proceed to tryal with him, in order to his joining. A Testimony vnder
Mr. ^^^litiug'B, W'tn. French, Jam : Parker's hand being Redd." A month
later, " 12 of 3, 'CI. On this day Jonath. Dafford joyned in covenant
with this ch, promising to attend y" Rule .\: order of y" Gospel, as touch-
ing joyning the ch at Billerica, if once gathered, or else to remove his
station to this or some other Towns where a church aball bee." Mr.
Danforth kept his promise and took letters of dismission to the church
in Billerica, '* 15 : 11: 05 ; "
The formation of a church was felt by the fathers
of New England to be serious business, not to be
lightly or hastily undertaken ; and the importance of
membership was viewed in the same light. We can-
not read this record between the lines without sus-
pecting some difference of opinion among these Bil-
lerica men, and that the delay of the church organ-
ization is partially explained by that fact. To the
valuable record of the Chelmsford pastor we are in-
debted for fuller light on this subject. This fortun-
ately preserves the story of a hitherto mysterious
council, held in April, 1663, and mentioned in an
item of the town treasurer's record, which makes it
clear that Billerica was agitated by the question, so
seriously disturbing the churches of the day, respect- !
injC the relation of baptized children to the church, I
and whether they could acquire, by infant baptism
alone, the rights of citizenship in the Slate.
;Mr. Fiske's record is as follows ;
" Billerica'a case.
"On 12 of 2<>, G3, we received let' from 31' Whiting i y Bretb" for
y* Pastor it Brethren to joyne with y» other luesaengers of X» in coun-
sel! to be given y™ about y"* proceeding to X» state. Bro. Burge being-
chosen with ye paaf. Attendance was accordingly thr given on 27"> of
2*1, as appointed, whr met us the messengers of y" X of Ooburne : but
Cambr i: Watertowne messengem ca not, being as seemed by L" Uin-
dred by Prvd. The messengers of y* 2 s^ X* befores-^, being p'sent were
desired by y* Breth of Billerica, notwithstanding, to hr y» case i if pos-
sibly to help y™ ; Accordingly, it was Attended upon the desire, i on
the 2d day. being tbe sitting day, Mr. Whiting k the rest, on both ap-
prehensions, met. But we could not co to state y* qu between them till
the Afternoon. So after we had made many asaaies with them togethr
& ap'te. At length Anding: 1. That y was u willingness ^S: desire on
both p^tes, to joyne together in y» worke of gathering a X and carrj'ing
on of y« ordin : amongst them, notwithstanding y» differance of y» Ap-
p'bensiona aboute Children's state in y" X concerning y» [?] 2. That
y" dissenting brethren to 3lr. Whiting's pi^tehad declared thereof:
*' 1. That y« child' of parents in full coion were to be Baptized.
"2. y«" children, being baptized, are vnder thecare of y» Church, wei»
is to see to y pious [nurture .'] in y» heart *i; feare of God, i to be cate-
chized, Jtc. Onely so* of y™ would not have y™ vnder y poW" of y« X
to be censured, tho so' of y™ yielded it y' [.'] now members, 6: miglit be
exco'icated if deserving, only y* could nut convey any right of mem-
bei-sh to y Childr, nor cuuld thr childr be reputed niembrb, vnless y
imediate pnts were in full coion vpon this account. Tbe fallowing
question being drawne vp 6: p'[iosed, was consented to, on all hands, to
be The Question."
" The Copy uf y" qu : i\: Answer given by y" Counsel to the Billericay
Brethren is as follows : JS of 2*^, 63, Biilericy.
** (ju. Suppose an equall number of perrons differing in thr opinions
aboute cbildrens intereste in tbe Church (both lufants j: .\dult) x both
willing to practice their Opiuiun : How may such psond Joyne
together according to a Rule i live together in church state according
to a Rule ?
" A, We conceive as followeth :
"1. That the two dissenting parties doe each uf them choujie equally
(suppose fower), each uf y°* uf y o«ne App'^heuMon?', tu be the matter
of y foundation. 2. Thai these idl mutually X joyntly due take Si
give satisfaction, each to other, touching there meetnca vnto ibis greule
worke, as in all ulher Kespi*. 3, That if there iipp any just cause of
laying by any one of these vpon tbe fores-' accouut, that then One othr
pion be chosen, according to y Hrat rposai, in his Roome : -4. That
oach trouble not the Other :ia to tbe matter of there app'hension aboute
tbe question betweene them, utherwise than by a Meeke, Brotherly &
niotlest resoning out tbe ca^ie uf difference by the Word of Ood, as oc-
Ciision is offered, for the mutual help one uf another. 0. That the
matter of difference as to the i.ase of children simply beco no barr or
lett to any, othrwise fitt to be received in, or added to them.
*' Poslscr. And we due liope, ihro the Lurd's help, that if you can
thus joyne in all Brotherly love ,v goe on together in the due exercise
of the same Love, forbearance & Tendernes.- ; you may longe continew
together with the Lord's blessed p''senc6 in the midst of you, clearing
up bis will X way more fully to you in his owne season : wb<^^ we shall
pray for on y<»' Behalves.
" Subscribed:
"Jo : rrisKE, ■
Tuo : C.\HTEa,
Edw. Johnson,
Jot". BUBGE."
The men who were interested in and moved by
such questions as these had mental powers of no
mean order. It is not easy for ua fully to understand
their position, but it does not become us to underes-
timate them or smile at their difficulties. They were
dealing at first hand with fundamental problems of
church and state, and they had not the light of two
hundred and fifty years' experience to guide them.
This possible church, outlined by the April council,
smacks suspiciously of Presbyterian eldership and
BILLERICA.
335
authority. It can hardly be the same as the founda-
tion which was actually laid six months later. Again
the Chelmsford record aids us :
'• 11 of 0, M, Billerica.
" MesseDgers fro y> ch. attended ye ch. gathering at BillericaT where
they all made a Relatio of y* worke of grace .^ consenied in a written
profeuiou of faith ; Jt Mr. M'hitiog ordayoed pa«tor. ye day com.
fortable."
The assembling of this council and its proceedings
hare formed a notable day in the lives of the fathers.
It will help us revive the memory of the scene if we
recall the names of those who were likely to have
composed it.
Roxbury was certainly represented by its junior,
pastor, Samuel Danforth. He was the colleague of
John Eliot, the devout and active Indian missionary,
whose marvelous translation of the Bible into the
language of the Indians was printed that very year.
His labors among the native." at Wamesit must often
have led him through Billerica, and it is pleasant to
think that he also was probably present. Lynn must
have sent her pastor, Samuel Whiting, gr., the father
of our candidate. And the mother church at Cam-
bridge, with her pastor, Jonathan Mitchell, would
not fail to share in the joys of the day. Chelms-
ford, which had received as settlers a church already
organized, with its pastor, John Fiske, gave gladly
the hand of fellowship to a nearer sister. Concord,
■\\'oburn and Andover would complete the circle of
neighboring churches, and their pastors were Peter
Bulkley, the cousin of Mr. Whiting's mother, Thomas
Carter and Francis Dane. The first minister of
Boston, John Wilson, may have been present with
bis church ; and Thomas Shepherd, who had been Mr.
Whiting's classmate at Harvard College, as pastor
of Charlestown. Maiden, Reading and Watertown
would make up twelve churches, and their pastors
were Michael Wigglesworth, the poet, John Brock,
the devout, and John Sherman, the eminent mathe-
matician.
Whether all these were present or not it was a
grave and reverend council which convened here on
that November day. Our old town perhaps never
had a more notable assembly. The candidate was
most carefully examined in his doctrine and experi-
ence. He would have occasion to exercise all the
logical skill acquired in his Harvard training and
displayed in his graduating thesis on the question
"An detur Maximum et Minimum in Natura."
There was at least one sermon, and the organization
of the church at the same time may have required an-
other ; and if the custom of a later day then obtained,
the candidate preached his own ordaining sermon.
The possible duration of these public services is sug-
gested in the Woburn experience. There, when the
church was organized, Mr. Symmes introduced the
services and "continued in prayer and preaching
about the space of four or five hours." What would
follow such an introduction we may imagine I What-
ever the order or length of the services, the little,
thatched meeting-house was well filled by a congre-
gation too much interested, as well as too devout, to
betray weariness or to thank their descendants for
sympathy.
Mr. Whiting remained the pastor of the church un-
til his death, 1712-13, February 28th. He was son of
Rev. Samuel Whiting, of Lynn, who was also minis-
ter of Lynn Regis, in England, and at Skirbeck,
where his son Samuel was bom 1633, March 25th.
His mother was of a noble family, the daughter of
Rt, Hon. Oliver St. John, a member of Parliament.
Her brother Oliver married a cousin of Oliver Crom-
well, and was one of the first lawyers and most pro-
gressive men in England.
This first pastorate of fifty years, or rather of fifty-
seven, was a vital element in the planting and mould-
ing of the town. Mr. Whiting brought to it his heri-
tage of high thought and ardent sympathy with the
new life which was pulsating in England, Old and
New ; his Harvard training and his thorough scholar-
ship and piety, and the testimony is clear to his qual-
ity as a preacher and a pastor. The influence of such
a man carrying the respect and love of those around
him for almost two generations is measureless.
During his ministry the primitive meeting-house
gave place, in 1694, to a new one. In 1698 his health
made assistance necessary, and the question of a
colleague was considered. But the town did not feel
able to support two pastors, and probably Mr. Whit-
ing became stronger again.
In 1707 Samuel Ruggles was employed by the town
and was ordained May 19, 1708.
The venerable senior pastor was spared for five years
longer, rounding out, in serene age, one of those
pastorates which constitute an epoch in the history
of any community. His pariah was wide, extending
with the town from Concord and the modern Acton to
the Merrimack and Andover. For fifty-six years he
preached the gospel to hearers who came five or six
miles to listen. They heard two sermons, and we
may be sure they were not short ones. The modern
demand for a sermon not over half an hour long would
have surprised these fathers as much as would the
railroad, the telegraph or a daily newspaper. They
sought at church not merely spiritual food, but much
of the intellectual and social stimulus which their
children draw from other sources, and hence would
listen without weariness and eagerly, and go home to
discuss sermons which a modern audience would not
tolerate. The demands of such a ministry Mr. Whit-
ing satisfied with honor to himself, "holding forth
the word of light," and winning souls to his divine
Master. He baptized the children and buried the
dead ; but he did not always, probably not often, per-
form the marriage service. The fathers thought that
it smacked of popery for the minister to marry them,
and went to the magistrate instead.
Casting in his lot with the young town, and meet-
336
HISTORY OF JIIbDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ing patiently and bravely the hardshios it involved,
he reaped his reward in the respect and affection
which surrounded his old age. His influence was
stamped upon the character and history of the town.
At last his work was done. Jonathan Danforth,
companiun and friend of many years, died in Sep-
tember, 1712. Then, on February 15th, the dearer com-
panion of all his joys and sorrows was taken away.
Without her the good man could not live, and death
separated them but thirteen days. On the last day of
February, 1712-13, the faithful shepherd went to his
rest. Cotton Mather tells us, and we may ihank him
for the item, that he died '" an hour before Sunset."
And, not for their poetry, but their truth, we may re-
peat the lines :
" Whiting, \re here heboid, a starry light,
BunitDg; in Christ's right hand, and shining bright ;
Yeara seven limes seven sent forth his precious rays,
Unto the Gospel's profit and Jebi'vaii's praise."
The pastorate of Mr. Ruggles continued a few
months more than forty years, and was terminated by
his death, 1748-49, March 1st. The rapidity with which
oblivion covers the lives .and deeds of men has a
striking illustration in the scantiness of our knowl-
edge of Billerica's second pastor. For more than a
generation he lived and labored, a foremost figure in
the life of the town, preaching the gospel from week
to week in the pulpit and by the way, satisfying so
well the lofty Puritan ideal of a pastor that no whisper
of dissatisfaction is preserved. Yet what manner of
man he was, or what were the characteristics of his
ministry, we have no hint. But lives happy and
useful are often quiet, sounding no trumpets, and this
is the just account of many a rural pastor whose record
is on high.
A negative inference is suggested by the absence of
Mr. Ruggles' name from all the narratives and testi-
monies which.inhia later years, grew out of the presence
of Whitefield in New England, and the controversies
which accompanied him. He was not the first or last
reformer not always temperate or wise, and good men
were divided in their opinion. Testimonies and
counter-testimonies multiplied and the lines were
tightly drawn on every hand. There were few of the
ministers whose names do not appear and whose
position was not recorded on one side or the other.
Mr. Ruggles was one of the few. This may be
partially explained by the fact that the infirmity of
age began to tell upon him early. Yet the suspicion
is natural that he sympathized with the position of
his son-in-law, Mr. Morrill, of Wilmington, of whom
tradition relates, that when Mr. Whitefield had an
appointment to preach there, he rode all over town
and warned his people not to attend ihe service. The
result was natural : a first-rate notice and a great
congregation.
The building of the third meeting-house occurred
during Mr. Ruggles' pastorate. The raising took
place in 1738, May 24th, and March (ith following.
the town voted, "after large debate," to "sell the
pue ground in our new meeting-house, under such
Restrictions and Regulations as the town shall here-
after see best, which money coming by the sale of the
pues shall be improved towards the finishing our new
meeting-house." In May it was voted " that when
any pue is granted to any man in our new meeting-
house, that the man and his family shall sit in said
pue if there be conveniency of room in said pue."
The early years of Mr. Ruggles' ministry were sig-
nalized by the appearance of a bell. At a meeting,
1710-11, March 9th, it was voted " that the money
that the land was sold for to Captain Reed, on the
west of Concord River, shall be laid out to buy a bell
for the meeting-house." Captain Lane and Lieuten-
ant John Stearns were appointed "a committy to
provide a Bell for the Town, not exceeding sixty
pounds prise."
This bell was used until 1753, January 23d, when
a committee was appointed "to take down the bell and
convey it to Boston and dispose of it in the best way
they can towards the procuring another ; and indent
with some Gentleman for another . . . and to Run
the hassard of said bell from Ingland to Boston ; the
bell to be procured by said committee is not to ex-
ceed five hundred pounds in weight." At the same
time the town voted to sell " so much of the hind
seats on the lower floor on the south side of our
meeting-house, on each side of the middle or broad
alley, as will be convenient for six pues, three on a
side, to be sold to the highest bidder ... in order
to purchase a meeting-house bell.''
This second bell, it appears, came from England,
and was probably the same which was " cracked " by
violent ringing on July 4, 1812. The memory of our
older citizens recalls the fact that it bore an inscrip-
tion including the name " Billericay," a form of the
word which English workmen would be very likely
to use. But known facts do not prove the pleasant
tradition that the first bell in town was a gift, suita-
bly in."cribed, from the English Billericay, and it is
hardly possible that such an incident could have oc-
curred at any later date and left no trace in the
records of either town.
The question of a colleague for the pastor came
before the town March 3, 1746-47, and a committee
reported that Mr. Ruggles was " very free," and "de-
sired that the town would proceed in that affaire."
Another committee, of seven, was then directed to
"desire Mr. Ruggles to assis with them in calling iu
some of the neighboring ministers to keep a D.iy of
prayer, to seek divine direction in that affaire. " On
the report of this committee, April 6th, the question
arose, whether " the Town would proceed to hear any
Gen" to preach upon probation," and " it passed in
the negative by a great majority." Plainly the
mind of the town was made up as to the call to be
given, and a young Harvard graduate, who taught
the school iu 1746, had won their hearts. It is not
BILLERICA.
337
in evidence that tlie proposed " Day of prayer" was
held. The church waived its legal" right to the first
vote in the choice of a pastor, and, "at a General
Town Meeting,'' April 28th : " The church and town
unanimously voted and made choyce of M'. John
Chandler, of Andover, to settle in the work of the
ministry amongst us, with the Rev"". Mr. Samuel Rug-
gles, our aged pastor." They promise him, " in a
Reasonable time," £C00, old tenor, as a settlement,
and a salary of £200 while Mr. Ruggles was able to
carry on a part of the work, and to add £100 more
after Mr. Ruggles' death. The answer of Mr. Chan-
dler was delayed for farther negotiation. He asked
that the settlement be paid in two years, and, if he
outlived Mr. Rugbies, that the ministry land, which
was west of Concord River, might be sold, and " laid
out either for mowing or pasturing within half a mile
of the meeting-house," he to hive the improvement
of it, during his ministry, in either location. The
town consented. But the uncertain value of the
currency still embarrassed them. To meet the diffi-
culty the town voted that the salary should be at a
standard of twelve shillings a bushel for Indian corn
and sixteen shillings for rye. Mr. Chandler proposed,
instead, that the- standard be between ten and twelve
shillings for corn and thirteen and fifteen for rye, and
to this the town assented. They also offered him £20
a year for " fewel for his fire," but, " it appearing that
it was more accommodating to Mr. Chandler to have
wood in the stead of it," they promised him twenty
cords of wood annually. The salary was payable
semi-annually.
When these engagements were embodied in a for-
mal covenant, the way was prepared for Mr. Chan-
dler's ordination, which occurred October 21, 1747.
" Eight churches came together to carry on the sol-
emnity- The Rev". Mr. Rogers, of Littleton, began
with prayer; the Rev'' Mr James Chandler, of Row-
ley (brother of the candidate), preached, from John
iii: 11 ; the ReV Mr. Phillips, of Andover, gave the
charge and also added an exhortation to the people,
wherein he pressed upon 'em the particular duties of
a people towards their minister; and the ReV. Mr.
Bowes, of Bedford, gave the Right hand of fellow-
ship. No objections were laid in against their pro-
ceeding in the ordination by any person whatso-
ever."
An ordination was a great event in those days. In
preparation for this the town appointed a committee
to " make suitable and descent provition, at the
Town's cost, for Mr. Chandler's ordination, at one or
two places, for all the ministers and messengers, and
Mr. Chandler's Relations, and for steudants of har-
vard Colledg, according to their best prudance."
They also reserved the front seats for members of the
council, and the front seats in the gallery for the
church members.
The pastorate of Mr. Chandler began under bright
auspices, and for eleven years was prosperous. He
was a man of ability, and the church was united and
happy in his ministry. But a cloud arose, and the
end came soon and in trouble. It is due to the truth
of history that the facts, condensed from many pages
of the church record, be stated. Mr. Chandler's wife
died June 28, 1757. It is charitable to suppose that
grief for her loss and the absence of her good influ-
ence may have prepared the way for a measure of in-
dulgence in " spiritual " consolations which were not
from above. That he kept the means for such indul-
gence, the contents of his cellar, as shown by his in-
ventory, reveal, though it is doubtful if he had more
than the best of his neighbors. He was married,
January IS, 1759, to Elizabeth White, of Haverhill,
a cousin of his first wife. Soon after the church
record tells us: "Feb. 18. The Sac', omitted, by
reason of some being dissatisfied at y"^ chearful behav-
ior of y' pastor at y^ bringing of a second Wife into
his house, when a large concourse of people assem-
bled. The Pastor stayed the church after services
and gave leave for the congregation to stop also ; and
represented his case to 'em in what he then appre-
hended its just light, upon which they voted to pa'S
over the offense, sit down satisfied, and that the Sac"
should be administered to 'em by the Pastor the next
Lords Day." This record, like the long account of
following troubles, stands in the very neat handwrit-
ing of Mr. Chandler himself, who shows throughout
a frankness and apparent honesty which wins respect
and sympathy for his weakness.
The trouble, however, continued, and was too deep
to be so easily disposed of; and, in August, articles of
complaint were laid before a council, with specifica-
tions of four cases in which the pastor's weakness had
been manifested. The council met September 18th,
consisting of the First and Second Churches in Cam-
bridge and that in Chelmsford. They found three of
the charges sustained ; but, in view of a confession,
to be read to the church and congregation, they re-
commended its acceptance, and that " whatever hath
been grievous and offensive in y'^ Pastor" be over-
looked. They proceed to a frank and faithful state-
ment to Mr. Chandler, and appeal to him tenderly
to free himself from reproach by a sober and godly
life, and remind the church of the good character he
has maintained among them "till of late," and that
" the sin which he has fallen into is what you have
not ... so much as suspected him of till y' last win-
ter;" for which reason they urge the members of
the church to pray and strive together for the recovery
and usefulness among them of one who might be so
good a pastor. But the evil could not be exorcised,
and June 5, 1760, another council convened, and the
church with them, when a show of hands so " dis-
couraged the pastor as to tarrj'ing," that by advice of
the council he tendered his resignation and it was ac-
cepted. Two years later Mr. Chandler died here, at
the early age of thirty-eight.
This sad story does not stand alone. Concord had
338
HISTORY OF iMIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
a similar esperience. Nor need the occasional lapse
in this way of a minii-ter surprise us. AVhen every
cellar was stored with cider, and good Deacon Abbott
would be as sure as any other to invite the minister
to drink whenever he called, the wonder would be if
here and there one did not stumble. But while we
give sympathy to the unfortunate young p.astor, the
bright morning of whose ministry was so soon and
sadly overcast, we may also with joy set up a wayraark
of progress, and deny that "the former day.s were
better than these."
CHAPTER XXX.
BILLEEICA—( Continued).
LAND DISTRIBUTION — DISMEMBERMENT.
The use of the common lands, and their equitable
distribution, long and often engaged the attention of
the town. The adjustment of important lines, westof
Concord Eiver, by appeal to the General Court in
1701, prepared the way for extensive divisions of the
commons. But a new question arose : Could the orig-
inal rights, in which the purchasers of the "Dudley"
and " Winthrop " farms had nosbare.still hold exclu-
>-ively the common lands? or had Colonel Lane and
other " (arme " proprietors, by sharing for a genera-
tion in the common burdens and duties of the town,
acquired a claim to share also in future distributions
of land ? After much debate and agitation, appeal
was taken to the General Court, whith affirmed the
equity of their claim, and on this basis, in 1705-08,
the largest distributions of the remaining commons
took place, leaving little for later division. Small
items here and there claimed attention for another
generation, and the last record occurs, 1755, February
3d, when report was made that there were £60 in bank,
and the treasurer, Josiah Bowers, was instructed " to
pay out to each proprietor two shillings and two
pence. Old Tenor, upon an acre Right."
So ended, almost exactly a century from its begin-
ning, the town's care for, and distribution of, its com-
mon lands. The questions involved in this charge
had been many and delicate, and the wisdom of the
fathers in dealing with them should be recognized.
They were not lavish or parsimonious in the use of
tueir land fund, but employed it in a proper and gen-
erous "encouragement" of such as bore the burden
of laying the foundations, while they guarded it from
any unjust appropriation by individuals. The record
proves them true and honest men.
The town was large, nearly twelve miles long and
eight wide, the rivers making the width, for practical
purposes, as great as the length, and as the population
increased in the more remote parts of the town, ques-
tions of diviaion naturally arose. Convenience of
public worship was the controlling principle in
shaping the early towns, and the same principle de-
manded new adjustments. But the demand was one
which would naturally be unwelcome, and met with
debate and opposition. After seventy-five years the
process began, and did not cease until the old town
was shorn of more than half of her ancient territory.
The earliest movement towards this end was made,
1725, December 4th, in " a petition of Jonathan Bowers,
Samuel Hunt, and divers others. Dwellers on the
Land called Wamesick Purchase and Winthrop's farm,
wc' lands ly adjacent to Biilerica, between Pautucket
and Chelmsford Line, praying lor reasons therein as-
.^igned, to be erected into a separate and distinct
Town." This petition was referred to the next ses-
sion of the General Couit, but there is no record of
action upon it.
The General Court, 1729, April 9th, however, consid-
ered favorably a bill to establish Wam€.'^f t Parish,
with bounds including " Wamasset, or the Whole In-
dian Purchase ;" but it failed of final consummation.
Bedfokd. — In the opposite direction the movement
was more successful. The General Court received, 1728,
June ISth,' "the petition of Andrew Watkins, John
Wilkius and John Wilson, and a considerable number
of others, setting forth their great difficulties by reason
of their distance from the xneeting-houscs in Concord
and Biilerica, to which they belong, and that they
have been neccsitated to get a minister among them
for the winter season, and therefore ])raying that they
may be set otf a separate Townshiii." The petition
was referred to the next session, with order of notifi-
cation to the towns of Biilerica and Lexington. In
July the Court, on farther petition, directed a com-
mittee, already sent to examine the lines of the pro-
posed Wamesit Parish, to extend their labors and go
over the proposed bounds of Bedford.
Biilerica had beard of the proposal, and as early
as May 14, 1728, voted, that they " will act no farther at
this time on the petition of the southerly part of the
town as to their being set off as a Township." The
matter came up again, January 27th, and the town
chose a committee of eleven, who were " Impowered
to manage the afl^air Referring to our brethren, the
petitioners of the southward part of our Town, ac-
cordiug to their best discretion, in agreeing with said
petitioners at home concerning the line between the
Town and them (if they can), but if not, then to draw
up what they think proper by way of petition to the
General Court and to choose two men out of said
committee to manage S'' alfair at said Court." This
committee was not able to agree upon the line of di-
vision, and petitioned the Court, 1729, April 2d, " pray-
ing that the new town, proposed to be erected in the
1 MauachiiteUa Recordt. Vol. XIV, p. 91. ilr. Sliattuctc {'* History of
Concord," p. :2j5) meutiuna a petiliun, tinted 1725, as if it related to Hod-
fjnl. But tie probably referred to the petitioD quoted abo%-e, niibtaking
tlie identity of the " Winthrop's farm " there tueotioned, wliich wua m
fact the larui near WauieBit.
BILLERICA.
339
County of Middlesex, to be called Bedford, and which
is principally taken out of the towa of Bille:ica, may
not be extended according to the lines set forth for
making said Town, but that some of the families may
remain in the town of BiUerica." The petition, how-
ever, wasdismissed.aud Bedford wasincorporated,1729,
September 23d. The line of separation began at the
Two Brothers, on Cjncord River, either following the
Winthrop Farm line or more probably diverging
a little to the north of it, and thence extending
nearly as at present to Woburn, (now Burlington). It
was changed, by consent of the two towns, in 1766,
so as to transfer Edward Stearns and his farm to
Bedford.
The claim that Bedford was principally taken out
of BiUerica has been overlooked, but is correct. The
old line with Concord was parallel with the present
Main Street in Bedford, and sixty-four rods south of
it. It is still easily traced, nearly touching the rail-
road at the curve east of the station. Its easterly
point is shown in the record of a committee, February
11, 1699-1700. They " began at Concord southeast
corner, which was a stake and stones about it, stand-
ing on the southeast of Shawshin River about forty
jioles from it." This point would be very near an
ancient Page house, standing on the old road south
of the main road to Lexington, and on the County
Atlas of 1875 marked by the name of Brennan.
^Vestward of the cedar swamp, where the marks could
not be found, the committee ran, by mutual agree-
ment, north fifiythree degrees west to Concord River.
This line includes about three-fifihs of Bedford.
Of the families transferred no list is known to
remain. Of the first church members Mr. Shat-
tuck,' with suffiiient probability, credits these names
to BiUerica: Obed Abbott, Jonathan Bacon, Thomas
Dinsmore, Samuel Fitch, Jacob Kendall, Benjamin
Kidder, Job Lane, John Lane, Christopher Page,
Nathaniel Page and Israel Putnam ; and Jo;iah Fas-
sett should doubtless be added. Of other citizens
there was John Wilson, and probably more than as
manv otiiers, younger members of the same families
and of other familes. Of the division of the prop-
erty of BiUerica we have an approximate assurance.
The Province tax assessed in 1729 amounted to
£125 5s. 8i/., of which the part belonging to Bedford
was £18 12jf. 3d. Samuel Fitch was the first town
clerk, and Israel Putnam was the first constable of
the town and the first deacon of the church.
Tewksbury. — Tbe succfes of the Bediord petition
encouraged a renewal of the movement in the north
part of the town, but Chelmsford held all west of the
Concord River so firmly that the proposal took a turn
farther eastward. The consciousness of separate in-
terests appears frequently in references to the inhabit-
ants of Winthrop Farm. In 1731 they prepared a
draft and laid it before the town of a road which they
1 *' UtBtury of CoucoiJ," p. 2CJ.
desired, and received favorable answer. In 1733,
May 13th, they asked the town to " erect a meeting-
house in the center of the town, or so as to accommo-
date the northerly part of the town, upon the Town's
cost, or set them off, so that they may maintain preach-
ingamongthemselves.'' Thisthetown was hardly ready
to grant ; but they had discovered that it was useless
to oppose the separation, and a town-meeting was
held, December 19th, at which the above request was
renewed, or, as an alternative, that the town would
" please to set them off, with two-thirds of the land
lying between Andover and BiUerica meeting-house,
from Wilmington line to Concord River, for a Town-
ship." Others desired that the organization should
be a " Precinct, for their better accommodation in
public worship." At this meeting a committee
was appointed to " view the land " and report, which
they did, January 9, 1733-34, and the town voted, " that
the northerly and northeasterly part of the Town, ac-
cording to their petition, be set off as a Township,
Granting them two-thirds of the land from Andover
line to our meeting-house, by a parallel line with said
Andover line, extending from Concord River to Wil-
mington line (if the inhabitants on the southeasterly
side of Shawshin River be willing to join with them)."
This final condition called out a petition from
Samuel Hunt and others to the General Court,
" praying an absolute grant of this Court for their
I being made a Towne with these bounds," or the ap-
pointment of a committee to examine and report.
The latter was done, with the result that Tewkabury
i was incorporated December 23, 1734. The new town
was taken wholly from BiUerica, receiving, in round
numbers, 9000 acres of the 25,000 which remained
after the separation of Bedford, which had taken
nearly or quite 4000. The following list of families
included in Tewksbury is imperfect, but will have
interest:
Joseph Brown, William Brown. Richard Farmer, Thomas Farmer,
John French, Thomas French, Dnniel FrOBt, Edmund Frost, Joseph
Frost, Richard Hall, Samuel Uull, Samuel Hsseltine, Stephen Hasel-
tine, Jeremiah Hunt, John Hunt, Joseph Hunt, Peter Hunt, Samuel
Hunt, Kphraini Kidder, Daniel Kitlredge, Daniel KittreUge, Jr., Frun-
cit Kittrcdge, James Kittrpdge, James Kittreilge, Jr , James Kittredge,
Dr. John Kittredge, John Kittredge, Jr , Joseph Kittredgc,
Tliomas Kittredge, William Kittredge, John Levestone, Seth Levestone,
Eliphalet Manning, Thumus Muuning, Thomas Marshall, John Need-
ham, Stephen Osgood, John Fatten, Kendall Patten, Nathaniel Patten,
Samuel Pearock, Audrew Richardson, Nathaniel Rogers, Nathan Shed,
Abraham Stickney, Samuel Trull, John Whiting.
To these forty seven names enough should proba-
bly be added to make the number sixty. They in-
clude all then on our list of the names Hall, Hasel-
tine, Hunt and Kittredge. The latter family had be-
come so numerous in that part of the town exclusively
that it is not strange they have been credited with
original settlement there. In fact, their ancestor,
John Kittredge, lived and died southeast of Bare Hill,
in BiUerica.
WlLMlNc;TO>r received the next segment taken
from BiUerica. That town was incorporated Sep-
340
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tember 25, 1730, consisting of the north part of
Woburn. The line on the west included " the farm "
of Abraham Jaquith, which was partly in Billerica.
In March, 1737-38, Billerica received a "Petiiion of
several persons, on the southeasterly side of Shawshin
River, to be dismissed from the Town of Billerica, to
be annexed to the second preicenct in Woburn, in
order to be Erected into a Township." On the ques-
tion of granting this petition, " it passed unanimously
in the negative." Two months later the General
Court received ihe petition of John, Ebenezer and
Jacob Beard, Jonathan Baldwin, Peter Cornell and
Richard Hopkins, saying that their farms were con-
venient to Wilmington, and that they had attended
worship in the meeting-house there since its erection,
as it was two miles nearer than Billerica, and at some
seasons they could not cross the Shawshin. They
refer to the petition to be set off which Billeiica had
refused, and ask that their request be granted with-
out reference back to Billerica. To this petition the
House, in June, refused to consent; but in Decem-
ber, 1737, Ihe Council gave a favorable hearing, and
voted that the petitioners be annexed to Wilming-
ton, provided they should pay their proportion of
charges for the meeting-house which Billerica was
building. The house concurred, and this section of
600 acres was transferred to Wilmington.
Carlisle. — After these losses on the south, north
and east, it remained only to complete the circuit in
the west; but although the movement there began
early, it was not consummated for more than a gen-
eration. At the same meeting, in March, 1737-38,
when the town refused the Wilmington petition, it
postponed one of similar tenor from "several persons
on the westerly side of Concord River," who desire
to be set off " to Joy n with part of the Towns of Con-
cord and Chelmsford, to be erected into a Township."
After debate, the town. May 11th, " voted their willing-
ness (when it was the Hon"" General Court's pleasure
to erect them into a Township) to set thera otf by the
bounds following : . . ." But sixteen years passed
before the General Court incorporated Carlisle,' April
19, 1754, as a district of Concord. In 175.5 Billerica
refused the consent once given to the separation, and
the elements seem to have been inharmonious, or the
location of the meeting-house a knotty problem, for
after struggling with their difficulties until January,
1757, the people in Carlisle were granted a diirsolu-
tion of the district. In their request for this they
say ' that only asmall majority originally favored the
district, and that after many trials in various ways to
come to some amicable agreement for building up the
place all means fail, and they apprehend the utter
impossibility of ever coming into any further agree-
ment.
The dissolution of the district did not bring peace,
1 Shattuck's " Hielory of Concord," !>. 321.
- " Mu£8acbu8eUa Arcllivts," vol. cxvii., 204 auU 290.
and a petition to the Court followed, June 1, 1757,
bearing fifty-one signatures, of which Timothy Wil-
kins' is the first, asking to be incorporated as a town-
ship or district, to include one-half the land between
the meeting-houses of Concord and Chelmsford, the
new meeting-house to be at the centre point of a line
connecting the two.
In March, 1760, the subject was again before the
town, which voted to set off the inhabitants on the
west side of Concord River. The new meeting-house
was begun at this time, but not finished for several
years ; and the town itself was only a name and an
endeavor for some years longer. The subject was re-
vived by petition to the General Court, June 1, 1772.
The petitioner.-' say that the desired bounds include
about seventy-six families,'' and that they have erected
a meeting-house.
But Carlisle's long struggle for life did not end in
success until 1780, though Billerica again gave her
consent, March 1, 1779.
After forty-two years of various action on the sub-
ject, she seems at last to have given her youngest
daughter a hearty send-off. Here ceased the process
of dismemberment of ancient Biilerica. .\lter the
lapse of a century it is fair to hof e that it will not be
resumed.
CHAPTER XXXI.
BILLERICA— { Continued).
DILLERIC.V IN THE REVOLtTIOX.
In the contest of the Colonies for independence
Billerica bore her part. Her minute-men ^rere at
Lexington, and the first soldier who fell at Bunker
Hill W.1S Asa Pollard, one of her sons. As early as
1731, September 14th, the underlying principle of the
national contest found expression in a vote, "that it
is our opinion that our Representative hold fast all
our charter priviledges; and, in particular, that he
give his voice in no suply of the Treasury, that de-
prives the house of their priviledg in passing accounts
before payments." In 1766 "the late troubles" in
connection with the Stamp Act came before the town,
on the question of recompense to the sufferers, and
'it passed in the affirmative," with a reference to the
discretion of their representative.
December 21, 1768, a town-meeting "took into
Consideration the present Distress! and Impoverished
State of this Province, That some effectual measures
might be agreed upon to promote Industry, Oecon-
omy, & Manufactures, thereby to prevent the unnec-
essary Importation of European commoditie.", which
threaten the Country with poverty & Ruin." Reso-
lutions were unanimously passed, favoring home
3 " MaEBUcliuBatts Archives," vol. csviii., 024.
BILLEllICA.
S41
manufactures and disapproving the use of imported
articles, of which a lon^ list is named, beginning with
loaf-sugar. A committee reported a form of subscrip-
tion, pledging tho^e who signed to promote these
objects. "The late regulations respecting Funerals "
are specially emphasized, and the signers agree
that they **will not use any Gloves but what are
manufactured here, nor procure any new Garments
upon such an occatioa but what shall be absolutely
necessary;" to all which the patriots of Billerica, it is
quite certain, generally agreed. This non-importation
action became very general, and produced no little
effect on the popular mind.
In September, 1768, resolutions from Boston were
responded to; and, '"taking into Consideration the
Critical State of our public aflairs, more especially
the present Precarious situation of our Invaluable
Rights and priviledges, Civil and Religious,*' the
town voted to choose *'one person a committee for s*"
Town, to meet at B9ston at Funel hall, the 22*^ inat..
to act for them in a Convention, with such as may be
sent to join them from the several towns in this prov-
ince, in order that such measures may be consulted
and advised as his majesty's service and the peace
and safety of his majesty's subjects in the province
may require." William Stickney, Esq., was chosen
delegate to this convention. In this way the towns
furnisbed the basis for efiective discussion and action
on the vital problems which stirred the Colonies; and
it is not strange that the English Ministry were
alarmed and incensed at the activity of these minia-
ture republics. They were, in fact, the palladium of
our rising liberties. A town-meeting was held in
]773, February Ist, and its action took shape thus:
"Tlie lolmbitantfi, having deliberately Considered the Critical and
ulannlDg SituatioD the Colonies upon this Continent are Reduced to, by
renaoii of the unconstitutional proceedings of the Britiab Miuistn.' and
parlijinieot of late years; k also the expediency of their, bs well aa the
Iiiliiibiuints of every otlier town, Adopting some nietliod to Coniinuoi-
cite their Sentiments in Regard to the Disputes Subdiating between Great
Britain and the Colonies, more espocially on account of the late cliange
in tlie American Department, that his Lorddliip tlie present Secretary of
State for the said Department may be Convinced that a General lineosi-
ues-f prevails throughout the Country in Consequence of tlie late meae-
ured of the British Administration, notu jtbstandiug any Repor».« to the
Giutrury, i may thereiiy be Iiilltienced to use his best Interest and en-
deavours to procure a Removal of the causes thereof, and a Restoration
of that peace Ai Harmony which so long Subsisted Between the Mother
Couutr>- A: her C-olonicfi, i are undoubtedly Necessary t" the political
Happiness and welfrtte of each : Unanimously Voted and Resolved —
** 1. That the late Acts of Parliament for raising a Revenue in the
Colonies; the establishing a Board of CoramiBSiouers with exorbitant
powers ; the granting of such extensive powers to the Court of Admiralty ;
the fixing a sallary on the Governor of the province, and on the Justices
ol the Superior Courts, ludependant of the Grants of the General As-
sembly; the exlenrling to America the late Acts of parliament, Entitled
nil Act fjr better preserving his Majesty's Dock yards, ic; the Station-
ing tieets and armies to enforce a Compliance with Minbterial i parlia-
meniury measuree, together with many other things that might be men-
iioned, are Repugnant to the principles of the British Constitution, Sub-
versive of their Charter Rights and pnvileges, & therefore Intolerable
Grievances.
'■ 2. That those Reports which Represent the I nhabitants in General,
in the Country, aa acquiescing in and ready to Comply with the lute
measures of Administration, are, as far as they Respect them, false and
groundless.
"3. That tUey will heartily Concur with and fKithfully nwist tlieir
brethren in the common cause, throughout the Continent, in all prudent,
legall, and Constitutional measures that shall be Adopted, to obtain a
Redress of tlieir present Griev.inces &. a Reetoration of their Just Rights
and priviledges ; and will also at all times Unit« with them In Zealously
and Streanously Asserting their Rights and Vigorously maintaining their
freedom.
"4. That they would take this Occation publickly to Declare their
Cordial Affection A unfeigned loyalty to his present majesty George the
3'J, and to express their Sincear wish that the Union Between Create
Britain and her Colonies may never be broken, but be preserved upon
Such an EquiUble foundation as Shall Conduce to the prosperity &. Ad-
vanuge of both. Wlierefore,
" 5. That they Commit in trust to our Represontative in the General
Court, to use Such measures as hid prudence Jt wisdom Shall Dictate, to
obtain in a Constitntional way a Redress of all Grievances.
"6. That the foregoing votes be Recorded In the town Book, and that
the town Clerk transmit a Copy of the same to the Committee of Corre-
epondence of the town of Boston."
Billerica responded, 1774, June 6th, to an appeal
from the Boston committee as follows :
"The Inhabitanta, having taken into Consideration the opprcsive
Measures, adopted and prosecuted of late, by the British Ministry and
Parliament against the Colonies ; and more especially having Consid-
ered the ver>- alarming and vindictive act paaaud for the Blocking up
of the harbour of Boston and |)Uttiug a atop to the trade, unanimously
came into the following Resolves :
"I. That a Right in the British Parliament to Tax his Majesty's
American Subjects and to make laws Binding upon them in all Cases,
without their Consent by Representatives, effectually deprives thorn of
those Rights and Privile jgep which as men and as British Subjects they
have a Just Claim to ; and has nu l>etter foundation in Reason &
Equity than the unlimited Prerogative, contended for by those arbi-
trary and miaguided Princes, Charles the first and James the second, for
the which the one lost his life and the other hid Kingdom.
" That the Colonies are as Justifiable in opposing this unrighteous
Claim of the British Parliament k all AcU Resulting from it, with all
the attempts to Oirry the same into execution, as the people of England
were in opposing Charles JL James, & aettiug William, Prince of Orange,
of ever Glorious Memory,- upon the Throne in the Boom of the latter.
Since the measures of those Arbitrary Princes were not more Inconsidt-
ent with the Liberties of the People of England than the late measures
of the British Parliament, in consequence of the above-mentioned claim,
are with the Liberties of the People in America.
"3. Tliat our Vigorous Contests for our Llbertiea.in Opposition to
the said Claim of Parliament and the Oppressions with which we have
been loaded in Consequence thereof, Cannot Consistently bo Denonii*
nated Faction a»d Rebellion by any who are friendly to the Principles
of the Rovolution upon which bis Present Majesty's Right to the Crown
Depends; and therefore there is Reason to Suspect that those who call
our manly Struggles for Liberty Opprobrious names are difatfected to
the Hannoveriau Succession, &. aiming to Restore the Bacc« of the
Stuarts.
"4. That the act for Blocking up Boston Hartrar ia Hostile, Arbi-
trary & Cruet, and a Solemn Alarm, Sounded to alt America, to Unite aa
one miin and Stand more firm thau ever in Defence of its Liberties, aa it
Discovers implacable Resentment in the British Mini-try and a fixed
Intention to treat these Colonies as Rebels, without even the formality
of a trial, and to condemn i punish then nnheard if they Do not yield
a tame Subniis^on to their Sov* reign Mandates, which is a mode of pro-
ceeding Against Real offenders Scarcely to be parrelled by any iustauce
in the most arbitrar>- &. tyrannical Reigns.
" 5. That we consider the Blow Struck at Boston as aimed at I he
Province in General, and as a Prelude to something further. Equally
Vindictive, yet in Store for thia and the other Colonies, and as we have
a fixed Reliance upon the Viriue of our Brethren in Boston to persevere
in the noble Cause of }jiberty, which they have hitherto mointaioed
with Such laudable fortitude- and Resolution, and, looking upon our
Selves as Bound to animate and encourage them, we hereby promise A
Declare our Readiness to Support and Strengthen them in the present
conflict to the utmost of our power, and to joyu with them in any meas-
ures that shall be Judged expedient for our Common Safety and Defence,
and for Defeating every vengeful machination of those that would pun-
ish ns for Shewing our Selves men, and Dragoon ue into Slavery because
ue Dibdain patiently to take tbi- Voak upon our Necks at their Bidding.
342
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
"6. That, if ibe Respectable Body of Jlercbnnts throiiphoiit the
CoJoniea might come into an ftgrecmcnt to import no Uritibli Goods and
carry on no foreign trade whereby the merchuntu in England should Re-
ceive any Create Benefit or Emultmient, we liiinibly Conceive that a
plan would be laid for Ibe Sjieedy Removal of our DifTicnlties ; and lliat
we should have nothing to Do but to Sit Still arxl See the Solvation of
our Country. We therefore Ardently Recommend this meagure to them,
proniiBing that nothing Hball be \\'antine upon our part for the Encour-
agement of the Same.
" Lastly. That as it would be an Indellible Dipgrnce and a Violation
of the Sacred Obligation we are under, to God, to our Country, to ^lur
Selves, and to Pobterily, for us tamely and ruRillauimousIy to give np
these invaluable Liberties, which our worthy .^ncehtors purchased for
us at Such Vast Expense of Blood & Treasure, We are Determined to use
our utmost efforts to maintain them, and not part with them atu Cheaper
Rate than they were at Brat obtained."
It waa also voted to choose a Committee of Corre-
spondeuce, which consisted of Mr. Ebenezer Bridge,
Mr. Joshua Abbott, Capt. Josiah Bowers, Mr. Ralph
Hill, Dr. Timothy Danforlh, Mr. William Tompson
and Mr. Solomon Pollard.
On June 27th, after considering two covenants sent
from Boston " The Town, after Serious Deliberation
upon the Difficulties & Distresses in which the Prov-
ince, as well as the Colonie.s in General, are involved
at the present Day ; also upon what Method will
have the greatest tendency to Cause a Suspension of
all Commercial Intercourse with the Island of Great
Britain (that being adjudged a Measure the most
Salutary and Prudent that can be adopted, and most
likely to eifect the end proposed), Voted, That the
Inhabitants of this Town come into an Agreement,
faithfully and Religiously to be observed, that they
will not buy, purchase or Consume, or suffer any
person by, for, or under them, to purchase or Con-
sume, in any way or manner whatsoever, any Goods,
wares or merchandise that shall arrive in America
from Greate Britain aforesaid, from and after the 31
Day of August next ensuing, for and until such time
as they shall have Received the Result of the Conti-
nental Congress, upon whose wisdom, Prudence and
Integrity they Rely, & to whose Determjnation they
shall Readily Conform. Voted, That if any person
or persons shall Discover such a want of regard for
the Interest and Good of the Country, aa to import
any kind of merchandise from Great Brittain albre-
said, after the aforesaid 31 Day of August until the
publication of the aforesaid result, they will not pur-
cha-ie of them any article of British goods whatever,
when or howsoever imported. Voted, That a Cove-
nant comprising the Spirit and intention of the fore-
going Vote be forthwith Subscribed to by the Inhabi-
tance of the Town," and a committee was appointed
for the purpose.
September 12th it was "Voted, that the Town Jus-
tifie the Committee of Correspondence for their Go-
ing to Concord to join with the committees of the
other towns of this County to Consult upon measures
proper to be taken at the present important day,"
and " that the town iully accept of the Resolves
passed at said meeting in Concord." At the same
time the town voted to choose two persons " as a com-
mittee to attend at the Provincial Congress to be
I
held at Concord on the second Tuesday in <)ctober."
William Stickney, Esq., and Mr. Ebenezer Bridge
were chosen. Already the First Continental Con-
gress was iu session at Philadelphia, and the active
union of the Colonies wiis taking practical form.
Two weeks later Mr. Stickney was also elected Repre-
sentative to the General Court, " to be held at Sa-
lem,'October 5th; and he was instructed "to pay
no Regard to the King's new mandamus Council, as
a Council, nor proceed to act with them ;" and, " if
the Governor Should Dissolve, prorogue or adjourn
the Court, that our Representative joine the House in
forming themselves into a provincial Congress," and,
in the latter case, Mr. Bridge was also to attend it.
The progress of sentiment and action was swift,
but not unanimous. A vital step waa taken when the
constables were instructed, 1774, December I'Jth, to
pay the Province tax to Henry Gardner, Esq., of
Stowe, appointed receiver-general by the Provincial
Congress. But, about the same time, the town says,
in resolutions adopted: " It is with most painful Sen-
sations we see the supineneas and inattention to our
Common Interest, that seems to prevail in the minds
of many people in this town : we are sorry that there
is so much uneasiness in the minds of some people in
Regard to settling the melitia.'' But the organizing
and training of this militia was pushed to good pur-
pose.
It was .stimulated by an incident which a few days
later occurred in Boston, and has made the name of
a young man from Billerica famous in the history
of these days. Thomas Ditson, Jun., being in
Boston, was seized by the British troops, March 8th, on
the pretence that he was urging a soldier to desert ;
without any esaniination kept a prisoner until the
next day, when he was stripped, tarred and feathered,
and dragged through the principal streets on a truck,
attended by soldiers of the Forty-seventh Regiment,
led by Colonel Nesbit, to the music of Yankee Doodle,
the original words of which, it is said, were then fir.it
used. The outrage produced great indignation, and
the selectmen of Boston sent a letter reporting the
case to the selectmen of Billerica, who presented a
remonstrance to General Gage, and submitted the
case to a town-meeting, on March 20th. The town
thanked them " for the wise and prudent measures "
they had taken, expressed its dissatisfaction with
the reply of General Gage, and instructed them to
carry the case to the Provincial Congress.
Debates and events were becoming very serious,
and the drilling of train-bands and minute-men
foreshadowed the work before them. The stern re-
solve of the patriots expressed itself in a vote, the
same day, " to look up the old Bayonets ; " and, April
14ih, four days before the Lexington and Concord
alarm, they voted to "furnish the minute-men with
Bayonets and Cartridge Boxes." It was also voted
that " as every method oug'ht to be pursued which
may tend to promote the arts & manufaclurta of the
BILLERICA.
343
Country, eipecially that of wool, The Inhabitants of
this town Shall not Kill any lambs forthe marketttill
after the first Day of August next; and also that no
one ought to sell any to any Bitcher or Petty Chap-
man, at any time whatever." " Voted, That the In-
habitants of this Town will, on the Death of a friend
or Relative, Conform to the 8'" article of the Ameri-
can Association, & go into no further mourning than
such as is therein Recommended, and will entirely
Discontinue the Giving of any Gloves whatever at
Funerals."
To prevent the troops in Boston from being sup-
plied with materials for hostile operations, the town
voted not to permit any team " to Load in, or, after
loaded, to pass through, the Town, with Timber,
Boards, Spars, Pickets, Tent-poles, Canvas, Brick,
Iron, Waggons, Carts, Carriages, Intrenching Tools,
Oats," etc., without satisfactory certificate from the
Committee of Correspondence, as to load, destination
and abode.
When the day of Con'iord and Lexington came,
Billerica was ready to do her part. The midnight
riders spreading the alarm, probably reached this
town by two o'clock. The Ditsons on the Woburn
Roai would be among the first to receive the sum-
mons, and very ready to respond to it after their re-
cent experience. Colonel Thompson and Lieutenant
Stickney, would be promptly notified; and Ebenezer
Bridge, who was captain of the minute-men. There
was hurrying to and fro, and in the early dawn, when
the first encounter took place at Lexington, few fam-
ilies, if any, had not heard the call to arms. Mus-
kets and accoutrements were hastily made ready and
donned; the alarm-list no doubt turned out as well
as the train-band and the minute-men ; and gathering
at the Common for muster and orders, they hurried
off towards C )ncord. Meanwhile, the British had
pushed on to Concord, and after the fight there found
reason for hurrying back towards Boston. They had
not gone far when, at Merriam's Corner, the Billerica
troops came and joined in the assault and pursuit of
the retreating foe. They came under the command
of Colonel William Tompson. Some Billerica men
were naturally in the Bedford company and arrived
earlier, and when Captain Jonathan Wilson was killed,
the command devolved upon his Billerica lieutenant,
Eiward Stearns. Nathaniel Wyman, of the same
company, was killed, who was probably from Billerica,
although his name is also credited to Lexington. No
other man from this town was killed, but John Nickles
and Timothy Blanchard were wounded.
The day of Lexington and Concord decided the
issue of war , and in the rapid mustering of provincial
forces, Billerica furnished her share of men.
The Committee of Correspondence was recon-
structed, William Stickney, Esq., taking the place of
Colonel Bridge, who was absent in the army. Other
members were " Joshua Abbott, Co'. W". Thompson,
Capt. Daniel Stickney, Capi. Josiah Bowers, Dr.
Timothy Danforth, D»a. Joshua Divis, Lt. John
Parker, Mr. Henry Jefr.s, Mr. Isaac Foster, and Mr.
Benj°. Lewis." Powers and duties are fully defined
and very extensive, and the exercise of them was
by no means nominal. Very much was due to the
vijjilance and discretion with which these committees
discharged their various and delicate functions.
At a meeting. May 23d, the town voted " to send
another Representative this year," and chose Colonel
Tompson. It then adds a resolution which showed
the progress of public sentiment after a year in the
school of war, and that they were finding out that
loyalty to Great Brita'.- could not much longer be
made consistent with the defence of their rights.
" The Question was put whether the Town will, in
Conformity to a Resolve of the Hon"' the House of
Representatives oi this Colony, advise our Represen-
tatives that, if the Hon"' Congress Should for the
Safety of the Colonies Declare them Independent of
Great Brittain, they the said Inhabitants will engage
with their lives & fortunes to Support them, and it
passed unanimously in the affirmative." They were
patriotic men who were ready for r.his action. With
such leaders as Dr. Cumings and William Stickney,
we may be sure it was not taken without intelligent
consideration of its significance and what it was likely
to cost them.
The battle of Bunker Hill was fought on June
17th, and in that battle the company from Billerica
served in the redoubt under Prescott. Its former
captain was now Colonel Bridge, and Lieut. Jonathan
Stickney was in command. Asa Pollard, whose home
was near the " fordway," was the first soldier killed,
and was buried on the field. Samuel Hill was also
killed, and probably Benjamin Eaate. who was re-
ported as dead soon after ; and Timothy Toothaker
died a few days later of wounds received. Colonel
Bridge was wounded on the head and neck by a sword-
cut, and was one of the last to retreat. In the severe
scrutiny which followed, he did not escape charges of
misconduct, in seeking too cautiously the cover of the
redoubt. He was tried, but acquitted on the ground
of indisposition of body.'
The town adopted, October 14th, resolutions urging
the speedy erection of a Stale Government, and in
1777 sent Rev. Dr. Cumings delegate to the conven-
tion, which framed the first Constitution of Massa-
chusetts. Until this was adopted, the towns acted on
a theory of their semi-independence; for instatice,
" the Question was put whether the town will heartily
Submitt to the Reagulating bill, & it passed in the
affirmative."
As the war went on, and the calls for troops were
repeated, the people found it more difficult to respond.
The country was poor and'the tax of maintaining the
contest in both men and money was severe. 1777,
March 10th, the town chose "a committee of five per-
* "Siege of BoBlOD," p. 176.
344
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
sons to Indent with persons to Inlist into the Conti-
nental service," and the records abound in details,
showing the activity and embarrassments of this and
similar committees to the end.
The pecuniary embarrassments became more and
more serious as the Continental currency depreciated,
and persons with fixed incomes suffered most. This
appears in a vote, 1777, December 1st, " that the
selectmen make Mr. Jonathan Kidder, our school-
master, an addiquate reward for his services in some
measure, as things have risen." The extent of this
inflation is illustrated in the salary of Dr. Cumings.
This was £80. But for the year ending in July, 1779,
he received £380 ; for the next half-year, £830 ; and
for the year 1781, £9000. In other words, this " Con-
tinental currency" had fallen to less than one per
cent, of its face value. It had become too attenuated
to be reclaimed, and tlie unfortunate holders of it,
soldiers as weil as citizens, suffered greatly in its utter
loss. In 1782 the taxes were raised in specie, and the
pastor's salary was again £80.
In 1778 the proposals for the Confederation came
before thetown, January 23d ; and they say, "although
they apprehend some things therein Contained are
not so agreeable, yet, considering the vast Importance
of the whole for the well being i Happiness of the
united States of America, Voted & agreed to the whole
of s'' Confederation, and that Col. W"'. Tompson.our
Representative, be and he is hereby Instructed to Joy iie
with the honorable house of Representatives in any
measures they Judge best, in order to forward the
same to Congress."
Another call for recruits, in 1778, war met by the
town's offer of £30 to such able-bodied men " as shall
Inlist themselves to Joyne Gen. Washington's army
for the space of nine months, except sooner Dis-
charged, in order to fill up the Continental! army ; "
and £00 to such persons "as shall Inlist themselves
as militia-men to go to the North River for eight
months." In October, 177S, we have a glimpse of the
hopes which cheered them during these trying years
in the report of a committee, appointed to estimate
the back services in the war, who say : " That con-
sidering the many services done since our appoint-
ment and the Difficulty of estimating them Separatel v
and the hopeful prospect that this sumer's campaign
will put a finall end to services of this sort, it is our
oppinnion that one Committee Consider the whole."
Whereupon the town appointed a committee of seven,
" to estimate the back services since they went to
Ticonderogue, since the war rate was made in 1777,
having Refference to the former settlement Respecting
some grievances that some persons sustained in said
settlement, according to their Discreti(m." This
committee made a report' in December, which was
adopted, 1779, January 4lh, as follows:
" May, 1777. Two monlbs to Rhode Island, set .-it . . £2 0 0
July, 1777. Sis mouths to Rliude Island 0 0 0
Auguut, 1777. Three moutligauda half to Bennington 15 4 0
October, 1777. Forty-one days to Saratoga 0 10 0
j l'Vlirii:iry, IT7S. Three months to Boston ti Ki II
[ April, ITTS. Three months to Oanibridge 'J 10 u
[ .Inly, 1778. To IJhoiJe Island; all hired men . . .
July, 177.S. Six mouths to the Hill li; 111 ii
.Viiqust, 177!<. Six weeks lo Rhode Island 11 ii il
September, 1773. Three months to Boston u 10 0 "
If we had the names of the men employed in these
various service.", the record would have greater
interest; but it is safe to assume that the town was
represented in all.
More men were needed in 1779, and, June 22d, a
committee was appointed to secure the town's quota,
"to go into the Continental army and to Rhode
Island." July 5th, a tax was levied, of "thirteen
lhous?nd dollars, " for the purpose of paying and
securing the needed men — the first use of the word
"dollar'" in the records. As prices rose and the
value of the currency became more doubtful, men
had reasonable fears as to enlisting and trusting
promises of future payments. A State Convention
was held, and resolutions were passed " for the Re-
treiving the Credit of our Currency," which Billerica
adopted, also apjiointing delegates to a County Con-
vention, August 5th, at Concord, "to regulate the prices
of produce and manufactures," whose proceeding-)
were also adopted; and a committee of fifteen was
"chosen of Observation to see that the Resolves and
Recommendations of the State and County Con-
vention be punctually complyed with." But the task
laid upon them was much more hopeless than that of
finding men whose patriotism would respond to the call
of Washington ; and although a week later the select-
men and Committee of Correspondence were united
wiih this one, and " Impowered and directed in the
most Vigorous Manner to .see that there be ao break-
ing over or evading the doings of the said Convention,
and that the breakers thereof be proceeded against
according to their offences; ;ind more especially to
see that there be no bartering in Gold and Silver, to
the Ingury of our paper Currency," prices continued
to rise, the regulations could not be enforced, and the
end came in the utter worthlessness of the paper
currency they strove so resolutely to sustain.
CHAPTER XXXII.
BILLERICA— ( Conliiiiicd).
EULX'ATIOX.
I.N" 11)47 a free school was made compulsory in any
town having fifty householders.
Billerica could not at once meet this requirement.
But, " 1, o, Gl. The Townsmeu doe agree y' Lieften-
ent Will ffrench and Ralph Hill, senior, doe take care
and [examine] the seurll famelies in or Towne,
whethr there children and servants are Taught in the
precepts of relidione, in reding and Lerninge their
BILLERICA.
345
Catechism." How this duty was discharged is sug-
gested in the record by the selectmen : " 10, 9"°, 68.
they apoint y" next secondiiy to go y' rounds to ex-
amine y* teaching of children & youth, acording to
law." If we could accompany thefe selectmen on
that annual examination, we should learn something
of education under difficulties: and might gain re-
spect for the fathers, with appreciation of the fact of
progress in two centuries.
Mr. Whiting's name first appears in this record,
" 19 March, 74-5. In reference to the catechising of
y' youth of y° towne and examining them concerning
their reading, a duty imposed on y" selecf" by y'
Hon"* Court, to take care that children and youth be
instructed in both. The selectmen doe order, that
all children and youth, single psons from eight years
old upward, their parence and masters shall send
such their children and servants to y' Reveiend Mr.
Samuel AVhiting, at such time* as thalbee afterward
a])pointed by him, to be examined of both, as hoping
this might be a good expedient for y' encouragement
of all superiours and youth."
We may well believe that such an examination, by
the pastor, would be no small incentive to study on
the part of the " youth " who must appear before
him. But many of the parents could give but little
instruction, and another step in advance greatly
needed was taken when, "19, 11", 79, Ens. Tompson
was chosen school-master, to teach such to read and
to write as shall come to him to learn." Joseph
Tompson, Billerica's first school-master, was the son
of a minister, and, with the posnble exception of
Danforth, was the best educated man in town. He
continued to be the school-master for more than
thirty years. Of the studies pursued we are not in-
formed, nor of the "times and sea.sons;" but the cul-
ture of the town owes much, we may be sure, to En-
sign Tompson's school, and we may lemember with
interest the place to which the children of two hun-
dred years ago wended their way for the instruction
he had to give them. His house was in the southeast
part of the village, at the end of the lane leading east
from the Boston road. Whether the services of Mr.
Tompson were gratuitous or he had a tuition fee does
not appear; but no item is found among the town
charges until 1710, when he received one pound as
school-master, and another the next year.
About the same time the question of a new school-
master was raised. We may hope that the reason
was not because Captain Tomp.son found occasion in
liis age to charge something for his services. Per-
haps after thirty years his methods had become too
old-fashioned, and a younger man was called for. In
the autumn of 1709 one ol)ject of a town-meeting was
" to incoridg a schoole-master for Reading and Writ-
ing," and, judging from the records of Mr. Needham,
the new town clerk, there was need of a school-mas-
ter. But four years later a master was still needed,
and, November IG, 1713, " it was voted, that the se-
lectmen shaill mak yous of their best descrastion in
providing a scoull-master for a quarter of a yeare; "
and, January 18th, the selectmen were instructed " to
se out for a schoolmaster against March Court, and
to provide a house." Towns were frequently com-
plained of for neglect to provide good schools, and
the last record implies that Billerica had been thus
charged, as it had been at least once before, in 1692,
"for want of a schole." Probably Mr. Tompson's
l?.bors were occasionally suspended and resumed.
The same presentment was made in 1718, and an-
swered by Captain Whiting, at Charlestown.
The fir--t appearance of a successor to Mr. Tompson
is in 1715, when Mr. Shattuck is paid £8 ISs., and
the town voted, that he " shall keep the school an-
other half-year." In 1716 Mr. Isaac Branch was em-
ployed, receiving £10 for two quarters and £22 for
the year 1717. The germ of the system of school
districts then appears: "The Town Impowered the
eeleclnieu to order & appoint in what parts of the
town the school shall be kept & how long at a place."
In November. 1718, the town votes "to hire our pres-
ent schoolmaster for another quarter, Provided he
move to the several Quarters of the town ; " also, "to
give but four shillings p. week for the schoolmaster's
board for the future." This master was John Gra-
ham, and he boarded .with Mr. Ruggles. December
29, 1718, it was voted, that " for about five months
the school should be moved to accommodate the out-
scirts of the Town, and the Rest of the year to be
kept in the middle of the town ; " and a committee
of five was to order the places where it should be
kept. It was also voted "to give Mr. Grimes, our
present schoolmaster, forty pounds for one year. Pro-
vided that he board himself and keep a moving
school." In March the selectmen gave leave to John
Hartwell's wife " to keep a school to Instruct chil-
dren to Read." Mr. Joseph Houston was master for
three or four years from 1719, and was succeeded by
Benjamin Ruggles, the pastor's brother. Then for a
short time the master was Jonathan Fry, of An-
dover, the ill-fated young chaplain of Lovewell's ex-
pedition. The next year the town paid Mr. William
Smith for services, and also Nicholas Bowes, the
future pastor of Bedford. Then comes Mr. Isaac
Abbott, who was master for six years, who was also
employed to copy the early volume of records of
" Births, Marriages, and Deaths," in a new book.
Benjamin Bowers follows, 1736-39; Jonathan Sted-
man, 1739; Joseph Manning, 1740; Robert Cutler,
1741-45, who found his wife here, and became pastor
in Epping, New Hampshire ; and John Chandler, in
1746, who was thus introduced to his future pastorate
here. Joseph Bean succeeded, and then came Jona-
than Kidder, in 1753, who served the town for a gen-
eration, and whose fame lingers still among the tra-
ditions of our older people.
The sections of the town where schools were kept
were at first and long called squadrons; and a divi-
346
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
sion of the school money to the squadrons began to be
made about 1760, with attending questions and jeal-
ousy as t9 the division. A school-house is mentioned
in 17()C, but had perhaps been built earlier, as the
town in 172o voted grants of land to the squadrons
for school- houses, to be located by the selectmen. In
1742 a committee reported that the school be kept six
months in the centre of the town, two in the east
squadron (one of which should be east of the river),
two on the west side, and one in the south squadron.
But the squadron school-houses were still wanting,
and, 1791, September 12th, a committee on the location
of such houses made a report which was adopted.
Wards which chose not to build might draw the
interest of the sura allowed the said ward, to hire
places to keep their school; but the litter privilege
W.1S not to extend beyond two years ; and the com-
mittee was to settle disputes as to locations not yet
decided on. When the district system of schools dis-
placed the earlier squadrons is not clear ; but for two
generations districts had charge of their own .schools,
locating and supporting as they ple.ised. Within a
few years the town has reassumed the entire charge,
seeking more harmonious and efficient management.
The employment of school " dames " is mentioned
as early as 1080, and in March, 1718, John Hartwell's
wife had leave " to keep a school to Instruct children
to Read; '' but it is not clear to what extent females
were thus employed, and it is only within a few years
that most of the schools have passed into their hands.
Before the Revolution, only English text books were
to be had, which were sometimes reprinted, but al-
ways costly and ill-adapted to use in this country.
After that, improvement, sure if not rapid, was made,
and has contributed much to the usefulness of the
schools.
It was a not.able d.ay in the history of Billerica
when Mr. Pemberton, who had been for eight years
the first principal of Phillips Academy, at Andover,
came from that position to Billerica, and in 1794 es-
tablished a school, which is properly known as the
Pemberton Academy. He was one of the notable
teachers of his time, and counted such men as James
Madison and Aaron Burr among his pupils. Here he
conducted a school fourteen years, which was highly
successful, numbering at times sixty pupils, many of
whom graduated at Harvard College and became em-
inent. At first a training-school for boys, its scope
was enlarged and girls were received ; and Deacon
Samuel Whiting assisted in the instruction.
After an interval of some years a priv.ite school was
established by Mr. Bernard Whitman and his sister
Batbsheba, their brother being the colleague pastor
of the church. It was kept in a hall of the old hotel.
But, in 1820, the Billerica Academy was established,
and Mr. and Miss Whitman assumed the charge of it.
The school was good and useful, but it lacked the
pecuniary foundation needful for permanence, and its
career closed in 1836. From that time, until 1852,
the only opportunity for higher instruction in the
town Wis a private school, taught for some years by
Reverend Mr. Stearns, in ihe vestry of the Congrega-
tional Church, of which he was the pastor.
Dr. Howe, near 1850, set about a more substantial
foundation; and the results of his benevolent plans
remain, and must long endure, in the Howe School.
The deiign had occupied his thoughts before his
death, in 1857, and the lot was selected and purchased
by himself. By his will, a board of trustees, to be
incorporated, received the bulk of his estate, and were
charged with the duty of carrying his plans into exe-
cution. The building was erected in 1852, and dedi-
cated with an address by Mr. Whitman, who remained
i until 1875, the diligent and faithful secretary of the
trustees.
The school was opened at once under the charge of
Mr. William C. Grant. He was succeeded, in 18.55,
by Mr. Stephen Gilman, and, in 1864, by Mr. Francis
German. The present principal, Mr. Samuel Tucker,
assumed his charge in 1868. Tuition was free at the
beginning, but in recent years the income of the fund,
somewhat more than 620,000, has not been sufficient
alone for the support of the school, and a small
tuition fee has been charged.
Early in 1879 Professor M. C. Mitchell removed
his Biys' School froai E Igartown to Billerica. For
eight years he occupied the fine building on the
corner of Main and Andover Streets, which was
burned in January, 188S. A lirge stone building
was promptly built on the Bedford road, and the
school continues prosperous.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
BILLERICA (Continued).
RELIGIOUS HISTORY.
The dismission of Mr. Chandler left the church
for the first time without a pastor ; and the devout
fathers set apart a day of fasting and prayer. 1760,
October 2d, " to supplicate the throne of grace for
divine direction in the choice of a minister." A town-
meeting was held, 1762, November 18th, and this is
the record : " The church of Christ in this town hav-
ing at their meeting on the 25 Day of August, 1760,
Voted to give up their Right and Priviledge of Choos-
ing a Gospei minister by themselves, and to act in
conjunction with the Town in this Important tfTair ;
and the Church and Town Having mett together up-
on this occasion, . . . and the meeting being opened by
a prayer to god for his Gracious Influence, guidance,
& Direction, The question was put whether we
would proceed at this Time To the Choice of a Gen-
tleman to settle with us in the work of the Gospel
ministry, and it was voted in the affirmative. Then
BILLERICA.
347
the members of the Church & the Inhabitants of the
Town were desired by the Moderator to Bring in their
votes coDJuDCtly.iii order to the choosing sucli a min-
ister, which being done and the votes examined, it
appeared that Mr. Henry Cumings was chosen by
all the votes. Then the town voted to the said Mr.
Henry Cumings, as an Incouragement to settle with j
us, for his settlement Two Hundred Pounds Law-
full money, one Hundred to be paid " at the time of
his ordination, and the remainder a year later. His
salary was to be eighty pounds, paid annually, and
he was to have the use of the " Parsonage pasture.'
The question of acting on "the article of wood"
passed " in the negative,'' and ministers have since
been permitted to furnish their own wood. In paying
Dr. Cumings the promised "settlement," the town
appropriated £73 lis. llrf., which had been received
from the State for the care of the French neutrals.
The ordination took place, 1763, January 26th.
Henry Cumings was born in the part of Dunstable
which soon became HoUis, New Hampshire, 1739,
September 16th. He graduated from Harvard Col-
lege 1760 and studied theology with his pastor, Rev.
Daniel Emerson, who was a man of character and
spiritual force, and a powerful preacher; and many
young men went from Hollis under his influence to
take high positions in the pulpit and at the bar. He
had been in ardent sympathy with the Great Awak-
ening and the labors of Edwards and VVhitefield, and
Mr. Cumings brought the tonic of this training to his
ministry in Billerica. He brought also a fine physi-
cal manhood, a culture and a piety, which gave him
good equipment for his office ; and for almost two
generations he led his people a good example of the
old-time pastor, holding their respect and love with a
rare force to the end. He was a diligent student,
wrought out his sermons with great care, and
preached them with efl'ect. Then he was a man of the
people. He had known in his own early experience
what poverty and trial were, and was prepared to
sympathize with the trials through which the people
were passing. The testimony is abundant how heart-
ily he shared in the patriotic discussions and action
which bore fruit in the independence of the States
and establishment of the Union. He was a leader in
the patriot councils, and the action of the town was
often shaped by him. His election as a delegate to
the Convention which framed the Constitution of
Massachusetts, in 1780, was only the proper and nat-
ural recognition of his standing among his townsmen.
He was often called on councils, far and near, and to
preach on public occasions, in a way to show that his
merits were appreciated beyond the bounds of his
rural parish. But if he was ever called, in the mod-
ern fashion, to leave his chosen field, the temptation
did not move him, and he was content to live and to
die among che people who gave him in youth unani-
mously their confidence and love, and continued it to
the end.
A new and more commodious meeting-house was
found necessary and was erected in 1797. It stood
near, but a little southeast of, the place to which it
has been moved, and then faced the north. By some
accident the first steeple fell, and the builder received
$500 compensation from the town. The cost of this
house was provided for by sale of the pews, the sum
received being $8504.50.
The church continued united and prosperous dur-
ing the long pastorate of Dr. Cumings. A just esti-
mate of his theological attitude, in relation to the ques-
tions on which the separation among the churches,
about the time of his death, took place, is not easy to
reach . A characterislic tendency of his preaching is to
limit his statements of the doctrines of the trinity, of
sin, of redemption and retribution to the language of
the Scriptures, seldom interpreting them in phrase-
ology of his own. His sympathies were with the
Arminian, rather than with the high-Calvinistic opin-
ions of his time ; but when his colleague was or-
dained, in 1814, it was understood by the council that
he held evangelical opinions. On the other hand,
it is to be remembered that the church, with substan-
tial unanimity, accepted the views of the " liberal "
party, under the lead of Mr. Whitman, and that Dr.
Cumings' influence, negative if not positive, must
have contributed to this result. He is named with
Unitarian ministers in the histories of the period ;
and whether any injustice is done to him in this
classification is a question on which opinions will
differ.
In February, 1813, Dr. Cumings preached his Half-
Century Sermon. On account of his age and infirm-
ity, he requested a colleague, and the church at once
took measures which resulted in the ordination of
Mr. Nathaniel Whitman, on the fifty-first anniver-
sary of the day when Dr. Cuming." had been himself
ordained, 1814, January 26th. The life of Dr. Cum-
ings was spared for almost ten years longer, and his
pastorate extended to nearly sixty-one years, his death
occurring 1823, September 6th.
To the last Dr. Cumings held the respect and love
of the people, and, when the end came, he was buried
by the town with revereni affection, the third and the
last pastor to whom the town has rendered this service.
Mr. Whitman brought high character, scholarship
and piety to his new position. He was two years an
usher at Phillips Academy, Exeter, and there began
the study of theology with Dr. Buckminster, of Ports-
mouth, completing Ijis course at Cambridge. He was
received with great cordiality and considerate kind-
ness by his venerable colleague, and a warm friend-
ship grew up between them. His ordination was at-
tended by a multitude of people, and the hospitality
of the town was full and generous. Mr. Whitman
was a good preacher and active pastor. He estab-
lished a Bible Society and a Peace Society, as well as
the first Sunday-school in town, and he used his in-
fluence effectively in improving the common schools.
348
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
His pastorate, however, fell upon a period of agitation
and disruption among the churches, when iiiHuences
which had been gathering force, some of tbera for a
hundred year?, came to a head ; and it ia scarcely
any fault of this worthy man that they culminated in
his day and disturbed the peace of his ministry. The
discussions which preceded and attended the separa-
tion of the Unitarian Churches were not the only and
scarcely the most seriom of the influences which
threatened the peace of the local pastors. The prac-
tical union of Church and State, which had been
naturally inherited from England, and illustrated in
all our previous history, as the constable gathered the
pastor's salary, was out of place in the free a'r of
America. With independence the demand for a
change grew stronger and stronger; but it involved
considerations so serious and was so startling to good
but conservative men, that the resistance was long,
and many pastors were unsettled in the process. The
age of Dr. Cuminga and the honor in which he was
held delayed its coming in Billerica, and the town
collected the salary of Mr. Whitman until 1834. In
that year the usual article in the warrant was '' passed "'
by the town and was not again inserted. The parish
was then called to meet, and raised somewhat less
than the salary, §700, which Mr. Whitman had re-
ceived. He remained a year longer, and, in 1835,
resigned and removed to Wilton, New Hampshire.
It may be doubted whether the doctrinal discus-
sions and ecclesiastical separations had as much to do
with terminating Mr. Whitman's pastorate ; but they
form a vital part of the history of that period. Here,
too, Dr. Cumings' position, while he lived, held the
redtle.s8 spirit somewhat in check which broke forth so
soon after his death. Theological questions were de-
bated with great feeling and often with bitterness.
Good men sometimes forgot the possible honesty of
those who held opinions differing from their own and
the charity to which they were entitled, and neighbors
were at times estranged. The friends of the old order
could not appreciate the force of the convictions
which sought change, and those who were striving for
change were not always considerate of the feelings or
the reasons of those who wished to perpetuate the
order of things they had inherited, and which had
worked so satisfactorily for almost two centuries.
The efforts to establish another church in the town
were met by a protest, which Mr. Whitman embodied
in a fast-day sermon, which was printed, and must
win respect and sympathy for its author even from
those who are not fully persuaded by its argument.
He was contending with the inevitable ; and, had he
now the opportunity, he would not probably desire to
replace the ecclesiastical order, which was giving way
around him, to his discomfort and alarm.
Mr. Whitman was dismissed March 30, 1835, and
was succeeded by Rev. William E. Abbot, who was
ordained February 8, 1837, and dismissed February
10, 1839. Mr. Abbot was graduated at Bowdoin Col-
lege, 1S30, and at Harvard Theological School in
1833. The next pastor was Rev. Theodore Haskell
Dorr, a graduate of Harvard College in 183-5, and
Theob gical School in 1838. He was ordained ilay
28, 1839, and dismissed May 28, 1843. Succeeding
ministers have with one exception received no for-
mal installatiou. Their names and dates of service
are .is follows: James Thurston, November 15, 1844,
to May 15, 1850; Samuel Pettes, June 16, 1850, to
May 14, 1855; Nathaniel O. ChatBn, June 17, 1855,
to May 10, 1857 ; Norwood Damon, 1857 to 1860 ;
Livingston Stone, 1801 to 1862; James Gallaway,
installed January 28, 1863, dismissed in 1865 ; Chris-
topher Coffin Hussey, October 1, 1806, who is still in
charge.
In 1844 the meeting-house was moved, and turned
half around to fi'ce the east; but it was allowed to
retain its primitive structure and graceful spire, which
furm a landmark visible from afar. The longer min-
iotry of Mr. Hussey lias witnessed improvement in
several directions. In 1879 a fund of §10,000 was
contributed by several members of the society, the
interest of which only can be used to support preach-
ing. The conditions of the gift are that the minister's
salary be kept at a. specified rate, and that the preach-
ing be distinctively Unitarian. In 1881 .1 house was
bought for a parsonage, and so fully repaired as to
make it substantially a hew, as well as pleasant and
convenient, home for the minister.
The First Baptist Church was the earliest sep-
arate organization, after the First Church hadforone
hundred and and sixty-five years existed alone in the
town. There were Baptists here at an early day,
William Hamlet at least and probably George Far-
ley ; and a letter from Hamlet rela'ing to the early
troubles is published by Backus, the Baptist histor-
ian. But the number did not increase until after the
Revolution, when the tendency to resist payment of
"minister's rates" had influence in increasing the
number of Baptists. Not long after the death of Dr.
Cuminga they had become numerous and strong
enough for organization. Meetings were first held in
the school-house near the Fordway, in the spring of
1828. A church was organized, 1828, September 30th.
It consisted of twenty members, of whom thirteen
were dismissed from the South Chelmsford Church.
The list of its ministers is as follows, omitting
students and others who served for shorter periods:
Otia Wine, March, 1829, to March, 1830.
Jededifth W. Sargent, urdiiiut-'d JiitiuHry H, 1S35. to January, 1S37.
Jonathan E. Vorhush, 3Iarth. 1^3T, to Au^iBt, 1838.
Warren Cooner, October, 1S3S, to (jctober, 1S3'.I.
George W. Randall, ordained Fehrnury IS, 1S41, to May, l«4i.
Denjainin Knight, May, 1812, to Aliril, 1840 ; and Fubnial-y, 1807, to
January, 1860.
Beujaniin Putnam, June, 1S45 ; ilied December 21, 18.'.0, aged OJ.
Zenaa P. Wilde, April, 1S.JI, lo .\prll, IS.nS.
Homer Sears, January, 1S,'>4, to .lannary, IS.'jfi.
ThouinsC. Russell, August, 18r,0, to March, 1803.
Johu D. Sweet, ordained October Jl, 1803, to March, 1808.
Clifton Fletcher, February, ISO'J, lo July, 1S75.
William II. Fish, ordained December 3U, 187o, lo Juuo, 1S77.
BILLERICA.
349
Robert M. Nell (alius O'Neil or McKfil). October, 1877, to July, li,76,
*• DistiiJBflett from the fellowbhip of the church aud miui&Ii7."
EdWiinl T. Ljfonl, Way, 1670 to 6a.
L. B. LawlOQ, 18S4-1887.
K. 0. Taylor, 18S7-60.
The first meeting-bouse stood on the east side of
Concord River, very near the middle bridge. The
frame was raised, 1830, November 30lh, and the house
was dedicated, 1831, September 14tb. In the spring
of 1844 it was removed to its present location in the
village, on Bedford Street. A bell was procured in
1872, and in 1877 it received an addition of a conven-
ient chapel.
The Congregational Church was organized,
1829, April 30th, a society having been formed Jan-
uary 17th. This was a more direct result of the theo-
logical controversy, and of the ecclesiastical separa-
tions, which were atill agitating the Massachusetts
churches ; and the presence of Dr. Lyman Beecher,
as moderator of the council which organized the
church, was a significant expression of the general in-
terest in this and similar movements. The unity and
strength of the First Church was, however, less afi'ected
by the separation, in Billerica, than in many towns.
The number of its members who did not sympathize
with, or yield to, the Unitarian position of the church
was small. Two women, Huldah Blake and Martha
Bowers, entered a protest, 1820, October 8th. They
affirm their belief in the true and proper deity of
Jesus Christ, in the atonement, in the entire deprav-
ity of unregenerate men, and their need of supernat-
ural grace to fit them for the happiness of heaven ;
and generally in the doctrines of the Westminster
Confession and Catechism. With thes-e views they
believed their pastor and many of their brethren in
the church did not agree ; and they therefore asked
the favor of a regular dismission. This the church,
affirming the right and duty of each individual to be
guided by his own conscience, granted. No other
dismissions for this reason are recorded, and not more
than four or five members of the First Church ever
joined the new Cougregational Church, which began
with twenty-five members. The meeting-house, on
Andover Street, 60x40 feet, was raised October 28tb,
and dedicated, 1830, January 13th. It was exten-
sively repaired in 1885. The record of its ministera
has been as follows:
Johti Starkweather, ordained April 22, 1830 ; dismisaed Aug. 2, IS.'il.
Isaac Jones, acting pastor Jtlly, 183-2 ; April, 1S34.
Joseph Haven, installed June is, 1836 ; dismissed September 27, 1840.
Benjamin Ela, ordained April 2'J, 1841 ; dismissed Wiiy, 1842.
Jesse G. D. Stearns, ordained May 2'J, 18« ; dismissed May S, 16C7.
John P. Cleveland, D D., acting pastor 1867-7U.
Evarts B. Kent, acting pastor 1870-71.
John M. Lord, actin;; pastor 1871-72.
Henry A. Hazen, Installed May 21, 1874 ; dismissed May 4, 1879.
John Haskell, acting pastor May, 1S79, to Kclober, 1861.
Charles C. Turrey, acting pastor November, 1881. to 1SS2.
Frederick \ Wilson, ordained October 2G, 1882; ioBtulled September
23, 188o ; dismissed June 2.j, 18^'J.
Augustus H. Fuller, acting pastor 1880.
The long and faithful pastorate of Mr. Stearns de-
.«erves especial recognition. A scholar of exceptional
diligence and culture, modest and devout, and active
in every good word and woik, he commended himself
to the citizens of the town as well as to his own
charge.
A Universalist Society was fnrmed January 10,
1842, and a meeting-house erected the same year. It
stood on the north side of West Street, where the
school-house now stands. In 1868 it was sold to the
Roman Catholics and removed to North Billerica,
where it is still in ine by that society. The minis-
ters of this church were Rev. Varnum Lincoln, or-
dained September 8, 1843; Rev. L. P. Landers, of
West Cambridge. 1845-47 ; Rev. George Proctor,
1847-53, and again, 1855-63; Rev. P. Htrsey, 1853-
55 ; and Rev. R. M. Byram.
A Roman Catholic Society was organized and
purchased the Universalist meeting-house in 1868,
removing it to North Billerica. It has prospered and
the number of its communicants is large. The priests
who have been in charge came from Lowell, and no
record of their narats or dates of service has been
furnished.
The youngest church in the town is the Baptist
Church at North Billerica. which was organized May
14, 1869, receiving twenty-two members from the
Centre Church. Its pleasant meeling-boiise was a
gift from the Hon. Thomas Talbot; built in 1870, and
dedicated January 19, 1871. Its pastors have been
William M. Ru8«, June 2, 1869 ; Nathaniel L. Colby,
ordained July 2, 1872 ; and William A. Farren, or-
dained September 24, 1879-1887; J. B. Robinson,
1887.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
BILLERICA— ( Continued).
MISCELLANEOUS.
The early roads were often called paths, and the
name describes them. Carts could pass over the better
roads, but many were passable only on horseback or
on foot. Wagons were unknown. The earliest chaise
was owned in town not much, if any, before 1800, and
marked the aristocracy of the few who could afford
such luxury.' The first great improvement in the
means of transportation was the Middlesex Canal.
This first important canal in America passed through
Billerica, and its path is still to be seen at many
points. The company was incorporated in June,
1793, to connect the Merrimack with the Mystic and
Charles Rivers, and save the trade of New Hampshire
to Boston. The preliminary surveys consumed more
than a. year, and ground was first broken at Billerica
^ Sec " LoweU Contributions," etc., vol. i. p. 254.
350
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
" Mills " in the spring of 1795. The canal was twen-
ty-seven miles long, thirty feet wide, and three feet
deep. It was navigable to the Charles River in 1803 ;
but its income was absorbed for years in alterations
and repairs, and no dividend was declared until 1819.
The total cost of the cp.nal was $1,164,200. From
1819 to 1843, dividends were paid, amounting to $504
. per share. The receipts then fell below the expenses ;
in 1851 the charter was surrendered, and in 1852 the
canal was sold in sections, owners of adjoining lands
being generally the purchasers. The charier was
farther declared forfeited in 1859.
The Middlesex Turnpike was an enterprise of sig-
nificance in its day, chartered in June, 1805. Its route
extended from Tyngsborough to Medford and Cam-
bridge. The line at first was to pass Billerica meet-
ing-lioi;se; but, in 1806, the route was changed, by
permission of the General Court, from a point in Bed-
ford, crossing ^Nutting's Pond, to Buisket bridge in
Tyng-iborough. Some lack of friendly co-operation
in Billerica may have influenced this change, and the
managers were ambitious to make their great road as
near an air-line as possible. Hills and ponds must
not stand in their way, and they accordingly fol-
lowed a route straight through the town, crossing
Concord River a mile above the centre bridge, and
leaving the village as far one side. This line would
attract very little local travel and support, and exper-
ience soon proved that the visions of a great through
travel and traffic were delusive. The canal and the
railroad left little for the turnpike, and its charter
was repealed in 1841.
The stages also entered largely into the life of
that period. " The first stage-coach passed through
Billerica about 1795. It was a two-horse, covered
vehicle, owned and driven by Mr. Joseph Wheat, and
ran from Amherst, X. H., to Boston and back again,
once a week. It stopped at Billerica over-night,
making the trip in about four days. The same team
performed all the journey." ' The business increased.
In 1803 the stage from Boston to Amherst set off from
King's Inn every Wednetday and Saturday, leaving
at 5 A.M. and arriving at 7 p.m., returning Mondays
and Thursdays at the same hours. For several years
before the opening of the railroad from twelve to
sixteen stages passed daily through Billerica, Sun-
days excepted. After work was begun on the new
mills at East Chelmsford, in 1821, Mr. Richardson,
who kept a hotel at the "Corner,' sent a hack Mon-
days and Saturdays to accommodate gentlemen who
wished to connect with the Amherst stage at that
point. Lowell could hardly be served in that way
now ! All this staging and teaming made a demand
for taverns, which were numerous and busy. There
were two, and sometimes three, in the village: one
or two at the Corner, and 'he Manning Tavern on the
Chelmsford Road ; and these were not all. Men and
1 "Bi-CeDteonial," p. 152 (note;. '
j beasts must be provided for, and this provision ofien
suggests FalstafT's "intolerable deal of sack," as one
reads the items in old ledgers.
But canal and turnpike gave way to a more revolu-
tionary improvement. The Boston & Lowell Rail-
road was chartered in June, 1830, and opened June
25, 1835. But the benefit which the railroad brought
to Billerica has been much less than it would have
been if it had followed a more direct line, through
Woburn, and passing between the village and Fox
Hill. Such a route would have made the pleasant
high lands on which the village is located a very ac-
cessible and attractive suburb of Boston, and with
the growth of both Lowell and Boston, Billerica
might have shared. But some feared and repelled
the railroad ; others, more sagacious, saw its benefits
and sought its location on a more northerly route ; and
the growth of the village has been hindered by its
distance from the stations. Relief for this difficulty
was sought in 1876, by the building of a narrow-
gauge railroad from Bedford to North Billerica. It
waa opened with its two-foot track and two locomo-
tives, in the autumn of 1877. The novelty of its nar-
row track and cheap construction attracted much at-
tention. For a few mouths the village had railroad
connection with the cities. As a mechanical experi-
ment the road was a success. But it soon struck
financial rocks. Burdened with debt at the first, it
was thrown into bankruptcy and sold out, its equip-
ment being sold to a Maine company.
The roadway was secured in 1884 by the Boston &
Lowell Railroad, which laid out a route with better
grades west of the village, and re-opened the road of
standard gauge, giving the town facilities more per-
manent and satifactory, under the stimulus of which,
business and population are increasing.
John Parker built the first mill in town, on Content
Brook, about 1660, and the mill at the falls of the
Shawshin is mentioned in 1707. But the water power
at North Billerica was first granted in 1708, to Chris-
topher Osgood, and all later owners get their title
from him.
He built and maintained a grist-mill and saw-mill.
Thomas Richardson was its owner after the Revolu-
tion, and the Middlesex Canal Company purchased
of him, 1794, March 25th, the title, which was held
for the use of the canal until 1851, .September 22d,
when it was sold for §20,000 to Charles P. and
Thomas Talbot. These gentlemen were released, by
vote of the town, 1864, March 7ih, from the obliira-
tion to maintain a grist-mill, contained in the Osgood
grant, the town judging, no doubt correctly, that the
use of the water-power in their extensive manufac-
turing would be a greater public benefit than the
grist-mill.
Prior to this action the owners of the water-power
had prosecuted successfully before the Legislature a
contest wiih the towns of Way land, Sudbury, Concord,
Bedford and Carlisle, and the owners of meadows
BILLERICA.
351
above, on the river. The latter had petitioned the
Legislature, in 1859, claiming that the dam had been
raised and was maintained at a height which dam-
aged the meadows and reduced their val»e. and they
a-ked for redress. A joint committee, heard botli
parties at length, and the petitions, arginnrnts and
documents were published in a report {House Doc.
Ko. 100, 1860). The general conclusion was that
" the dam at North Billerica is not the only nor the
chief cause of the wet state of the meadows above.
The bars across the stream, especially the Fordway
bar; the weeds filling the channel in many places,
often for long distances ; the discharge into the river
during the summer of water stored in reservoirs and
mill-ponds upon the Sudbury and Assabet and their
tributaries, in their combined effect, do far more
damage to the meadows than the Billerica dam."
Tbey say that the effect of the dam becomes appre-
ciable at Robbins bar, and its entire removal would
not affect the upper meadows; that effectual relief
could come to the meadows only by reducing the
dam thirty-three inches or more, cutting out. the
Fordway and other bars, deepening the shallow
places, straightening the channel at some points, .and
keeping the river free from weeds. This programme
was more extensive than the Legislature felt itself
called upon to undertake, especially as it was proved
that similar trouble and complaint had been chronic
from the first settlement of the country.
In 1811 Francis Faulkner came from Acton and
began the manufacture of woolen goods. It was the
second enterpris-e of this class in New England,
Abraham Marland being the pioneer, at Andover, in
1810. Mr. Faulkner soon purchased of the Canal
Company the secondary water-privilege. He could
draw water until it was " threo-quarlers of an inch
below the top of the dam and flash-boards," when he
must close his gates, under a penalty of one dollar
for every half-hour they were left open. By his
thrift, skill and enterprise Mr. Faulkner made his
business very successful, and transmitted it to his
sons. The firm-name is still J. R. Faulkner & Co.,
and his grandson, Mr. Richard Faulkner, is the agent
now in charge of its business. From a modest begin-
ning, with a single set of carde, the business has in-
creased until the monthly pay-roll is about $2500.
Charles P. Talbot came to Billerica in 1839 and
was soon joined by his brother, Thomas, in laying the
foundations of their extensive and successful enter-
prise. The dyewood-mill was their earliest undertak-
ing, for which they hired a building of the Canal
Company. In 1844 they bought the saw-mill of
Nathaniel Stearns, on the northeast side, and used it
for a dyewood business until it was burned, in 1853.
They then sold this site to Mr. Faulkner, having pur-
chased the prior and larger rights of the Canal Com-
pany on the other side of the stream. There they
rebuilt the dyewood-mill, which is still in vigorous
operation; and, in 1857, they built their woolen-mill.
This at first had eight sets of cards; six were added
in 1870 and as many in 1880. Two hundred hands
are now employed, and the monthly pay-roll is $7000.
In 1849 the Messrs. Talbot began their chemical
works, which were at first in a. building near the
depot, but removed later to their present location,
sixty rods farther east, by the railroad. These now
employ sixteen hands, and produce a daily average
of five tons oil of vitriol, one ton of blue vitriol and
as much muriatic acid.
The next most important manufacturing enterprise
was begun soon after 1830, in the south part of the
town, by Jonathan Hill, Esq. Its specialty was, and
still is, a useful machine for splitting leather, invented
and patented by Samuel Parker. This machine has
had a very wide sale in this and other countries,
being almost indispensable in the manufacture of
leather. The business was sold, in 1853, to Charles
H. Hill, who continues it with much success. In
1875 the value of the work done was $28,000.
In the east part of the town, where there had long
been a saw-mill, on Content Brook, Theophilus Man-
ning had also a grist-mill. He sold both, in 1825, to
Dea. Aaron H. Patten, who began, in 1845, the manu-
facture of cabinet-work. The business grew to con-
siderable proportions, and Pattenville became a
definite local name in town. The business reached a
value of 820,000 to 830,000 per year, and was con-
tinued by his sons ; but, in the financial depression
of 1874-78 it suffered, and the shops were sold, in
1879, to Walter J. Petlingell, who carried on
busine.'-s, making tanks, until the mill was burned,
January, 1882.
Most recent is the growth of an extensive glue
factory, which was commenced in 1867 by the
Jaquith Brothers, near the old bridge of the Middle-
sex Turnpike. It has been quite prosperous, doing a
business amounting to nearly 815,000 annually. For
many years the Winnings maiut&ined a saw-mill on
the brook running from Winning's Pond ; and there
has long been a saw-mill, now owned by Mr. John O.
Richardson, on Content Brook, near the railroad
station at East Billerica.
Libraries. — Billerica instituted the first "Social
Library" in 1772, one of the earliest in Ma3:;a-
chusetts, and a second was incorporated in 1807.
But it had long been felt that the provision for the
needs of the town in this respect was inadequate ; and
in 1880 the generous munificence of Mrs. Joshua
Bennett laid the foundation for their better supply.
A handsome building standing just north of the First
Church, has been erected at her expense and deeded
to the Bennett Public Library Association ; and her
daughters, Mrs. Holden and Mrs. Warren, have con-
tributed $2000 to its furnishing and the purchase of
books. A fee of five dollars is received for member-
ship, and twenty-five dollars constitutes a life member
of the association ; but the use of books, without other
privilege, is granted for the annual payment of one
352
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
dollar. The building contains a library, with
capacity for ten or twelve thousand volumes, which
less numerous would be to repeat most of the names
from the pages of the Genealogical Register. Any
owes i "''" ^' ''''"■»". 3'D., Y. C, ISID ; Rev. Jbiucs Bowers, H. f., 179+ ;
Josiah Bowers, 51. D., Y. C, ISlC ; Josinh Buwers, M.Il., riiiladelpliia,
1S54; Willinm Bowers. M.D., H. C, 17U3 ; Kev. Thadileus H. Brown,
V. C, 18CII ; Oliver Crosby, H. C, ITSo ; William Crosl.y, H. C, 1T'J4 ;
llonry Comings, H. C, 1705; George Faulkner, M.D , II. C, IS4t ;
Joseph F. Hill, H. C, .U.D., l^,30 ; Henry D. Judkiris, Law Department
II. C. ; Jonathan Kidder, H, C, 17.51 ; Rev. Joseph Kidder, Y. C, 17r,4 ;
.lames Lewis, D. C, 1807 ; Dauiel Parker, B.C.. M.D., .\S:;:i ; Frederic .\.
Parker, M.D., H. C, 1S13; Rev. .^bel Patten. D. r., 1827 ; George II.
Preston, H. C, 1S4C; Rev. Joseph Kicliards<in, D. C, iMii ; .\rteuinn
Rogers, H. C. nm : Mieajali Rogers. H. C, 1S17 ; Rev. Thomas Skil-
ton, II. ClSuli; Kev. Benjamin .V. Spauldiug, II. C, 19+U; Rev. Jo-
siah Stearns, H. C, 17.11 ; Rev. Timothy ^;tenrns, .\. C, 18W; .\ugnstiis
Whiting, H. C, 1S16; Rev. John Whiting, H. C, ICSJ; Joseph Whit-
ing, H. C, 16W.
The record of the legal profession in Billerica is
brief: William Crosby, LSOO, Samuel De.xter, Timo-
may be doubled by the use of alcoves ; a reading- j ji'.st presentation of this subject would develop facis
room, a committee room, and a handsome entrance : of which the town might be proud. She has never
hall and cloak-room. The reading-room is ornament- ■ been populous; but her sons and daughters abroad
ed with a wide fireplace and beautiful mantel of | are many.
unique design, contributed by William W. Warren, The list of Billerica graduates from colleges and
Esq., and the front of the building is enriched by a I professional schools is as follows:
fine rose-window, the gift of Mr. Joshua Holden, j David Abbot. H. C. 17M ; Henry Blanchard, m.d, H. C.lSSi; .\n-
Mr. William H. Osborn, of New York, also gave the j drew Bowers, H. C, niO-. Rev. Benjamin Bowers. H. C, 1733; Benjn
lot on which the library stands. The town
much to Mrs. Bennett and her family for this timely
and good foundation. It must exert a stimulating
influence, and give a most generous culture to the
coming generations who shall enjoy its privileges; and
will contribute much to the prosperity and attractive-
ness of the town.
A similar service has been rendered at North Bil-
lerica by the Messrs. Talbot; although the library
which they have founded is intended primarily for
their own employees', and its management is in their
hands ; but its use for a small fee is open to all. They
erected, in 1880, a building connected wiih their fac-
tory, the second story of which is devoted to the
library and reading-room. It is supplied with more j '''y Farnham, Joseph Locke, 1801-33, Marshall Pirs-
ton, about 1820-49, George H. Whitman, 1849. Of
course, in the absence of lawyers who were such by
profession, other well-informed citizens have often
been called to aid their neighbors in legal matters.
■So much of this service devolved ujion some of them
that practically it would be just to mention, in this
connection, such names as Jonjthan Danforth, Jo-
seph Tomson, Oliver Whiting, Joshua Abbott, Wil-
liam Siickuey.
PlIvsiriANS.— Benjamin .Vtheiton. 1730; JoFiah Batcheliler; Ilez.e-
kiah Bickford, 18il-iil ; Williajn Bowers, lf2U ; Tliaddens Brown, l.v;0 ;
Frank E. Bundy, I8C4-t(; ; Timothy Danforth, 171IJ ; Jo.-eph Foster,
ISlll ; Samuel Frost, 1717 ; William Grey; Joseph F. Hill. ISJ'J ; J W.
Hood; I'liarle.. E. Ho.smer, ).'.74~-.9; Z.idok Howe, 1S",7 ; Wni. II. Iluli-
hard, 1S77 ; Isaac Iluiil 177^- (M, in Concord, 1844 : Jacoli Kiltiedge,
I811U-I0 ; John Kittredge, 1714 , J. din Kittredge, 17511 ; Rufiis Ivillredge ;
Albert C. Lane, 1.^79 ; Manning; .Vugustns Mason. IS44-."-4. in
Brighton, 1MS2; George .\. Monroe, 18t'.':-77 ; Daniel Parker, 184"-s'J;
Roger Toothaker, 1745; Roger Toothaker, 1709, Willialu Wilkins,
17S9-1SI.I7.
The first post-o(fice in Billerica was established Oc-
tober 7, 1797. The postmasters, with date of their
appointment, have been :
Jonathan Bowers, October 7, 1797; William Richardson, Jlay 26,
1P24; 31arshall Pn-'ston, January II, 1626 : John Baldwin, ir., October
1(3, 1R4'J; William U. B anchard, June 11, 1855; William Blanciiard,
April!, 1857; Benjamin L. Judkins, April 27, 1859; Charles II. Parker,
May S, 1SU2 ; Bernard M. Canu, September 21, ISCfi ; Franklin Ja-
quith, Jr., July 15, 1SC7; Charles 11. Parker, June 5, 1873.
yortb DtHerica. —Joaeph \. Burt, .lanuary 26, 1852 ; James Faulkner,
July 213, 1855 ; James Wbittemore, May 25, IHiC ; Uiruui C. Brown,
March 2.5, 1878.
Euil BiHer/c.i.— Peter B. Botaonan, December 27, 1877.
Soiilli f.VHcrica.— George W. Hill, March 4, 187S ; Mary E. A. Libby,
December 1.1, 1878.
The population of the town at different periods is a.
subject of interest, but the material for estimat<sat
first is scanty. In ltj59 there were twenty-five families ;
than a 1000 volumes, a number which will be in
creased and well used under the judicious care of the
Talbot Library Association.
It is proper that record be made here of two his-
torical incidents. In 1855 the town formally and fitly
celebrated the two hundredth anniversary of its
foundation. The Rev. Joseph Richardson, of Hing-
ham, a loyal son of the town, gave a historical oration,
which was published, with other proceedings of the
day, in a valuable pamphlet. The celebration had no
little influence in awakening and stimulating the
interest in the early life of the town, which has found
expression in its repeated later action.
A similar event was the celebration held, 187G,
July 4th. The centennial year of the United States
naturally awakened renewed interest in hi.-torical
subjects and led to many local commemorations. The
Rev. EliasNason responded effectively to an invitation
of citizens to give a historical oration in Billerica;
and the day will be long remembered by tho.se who
shared in the festivities in the beautiful grove south-
east of the middle bridge. This or.-ition also, with
other record of the day, has been published.
That the contributions of Billerica to the popula-
tion of the country have been large and valuable, is
suggested by the fact that all families hearing the
names of Farmer, Jefts, Kidder, Kittredge, Pollard,
Shed and Toothaker, whose lines in this countrv o-q
back to 1700, find their American progenitors in Bil-
lerica. Not less numerous or important are the
branches here found of the Crosby, Danforth, Farley,
French, Frost, Hill, Manning, Parker, Patten, Rich-
ardson, Rogers, Stearns and Whiting families; while
to enumerate the significant names of families simply
BILLERICA.
353
four years later the number had nearly doubled ; but
for the next twelve years there was small increase, ex-
cept as children multiplied in the homes already
formed. The tax-list for 1679 has only forty-seven
names, but that for 1688 has seventy-three names,
showing that a new impulse had followed the anxie-
ties nf Philip's War, and, in spite of the Indian perils
of the time, the progress continued, and, in 1707, the
number of polls was 140.'
The tax-list for 1733 includes 228 names, but, in
1735, when Tewksbury had been taken out, the num-
ber was only 187, which, in 1755, had increased to
206. In 1765 a careful enumeration was made, show-
ing for the first time the exact population, when this
town had 1330. Only seven towns in Middlesex
County then exceeded Billerica. In 1776 a census
gave Billerica a population of 1500, and the tax-list
for the same year contained 273 names. In 1778
there were 286 polls, but, in 1781, they had fallen to
271 polls, a decrease more than explained by the loss
of the Carlisle names, in 1780. Assuming an equal
number of polls and names on tax-list, and that the
proportion of this number to the whole population in
177G was the same in 1687, 1733 and 1755, we reach
this estimate for the periods named, the decades after
1790 being supplied by the United States Census, and
the years 1855, 1865 and 1875 by the State Census.
1686,401 ; 1707, 769 ; 17.-?3, 1252 ; 1735, 1028 ; 1T55, 11.32 ; 1705, 1332 ;
1776, l.iOn ; 1790. 1191 ; 1800, 1383 ; ISIM, 1289 ; 1820, 1380 ; 1830, 1368 ;
1849, 1632 ; 18.50, 1646 ; 1855, 1772 ; 186(1, 1776 : 1805, 1808 ; 1870, 1833 ;
1875, 1881 ; 1880, 2000; I860, 2161 ; 1890, 2369.
The fact is significant that after 1800 there was no
increase for more than thirty years ; and it seems to
confirm the opinion that the Middlesex Canal, by
preventing the use of the water-power, exerted an un-
favorable influence upon the progress of this town.
A similar result has followed the deflection of the
railroad line so far from the centre of the town.
A census taken in 17.54 brings out the curious fact
that Massachu'etts had 2717 slaves. Of this number
Billerica had eight, of whom five were females. In
18S0 the census reports nine colored persons ; but
they are not slaves.
Other details of the census are interesting, and a
summary of them follows. The details of the census
for 1890 are not yet available.
The 2000 inhabitants of the town in June, 1880,
were grouped in 449 families, who lived in 436
houses. There were 1662 over ten years of age, of
whom 46 could not read and 56 could not write ; of
the latter, 51 were foreigners. The nativity stands
thus: Native born, 1552; foreign, 448; born in
Massachusetts, 1237 ; New Hampshire, 133; Maine,
73; Vermont, 56 ; other States, 53; British America,
C7: Ireland, 226; England, 118; Scotland, 20; other
countries, 17.
This sketch mav fitly conclude with
1 CoUectionB: American Stalistical Affoeiaiion, pp. 146, 150, etc.
BiLLERICi IX THE REBELLION. — Of the part which
this town took in the War of 1812, and in the Mexi-
can War, the town and State archives contain no
record. Probably Billerica had soldiers in both, but
I the number was small, and the scenes of action were
too remote to leave any distinct impression. Far
, otherwise was it in the great Secession contest. When
the life of the nation was assailed by the Southern up-
j rising, the people all felt the blow and the danger,
I and the towns asserted their vital relations to the con-
flict as they did in the Revolutionary contest, to the
disturbance of British councils. No one who expe-
rienced it can ever forget the thrill of patriotic emo-
tion which went through the North when Sumter was
assailed and President Lincoln called for seventy-five
thousand volunteers to defend the Union. Public meet-
ings, enlistments, and aid societies and labors en-
grossed the public mind. In Billerica the town hall
was thrown open, the church bell, aided by the drum
and an old ship-gun, sounding the call to meetings for
action and organization. John A. Burrows and
Charles N. Fletcher were the first soldiers mustered
from Billerica. The number increasfd rapidly.
Richardson's Light Infantry, of Lowell, afterwards
the Seventh Light Battery, and the first three years'
company in the field from Massachusetts visited the
town for a reception and a drill ; as did a rifle com-
pany. Albert E. Farmer, who was taken prisoner at
Bull Run and died ic Richmond, was the first soldier
from Billerica to fall. In 1862, after the defeat of
McClellan, the call for troops was responded to by a
town-meeting and the ofl"er of a bounty for enlist-
ments. They were easily obtained, and the town's
quota was mustered into the Thirty-third Regiment.
An interesting meeting was held in the town hall the
night before their departure. A call for nine months'
men followed, and after the supposed quota had been
filled it was found that more men were needed, and
town-meetings and bounties were again called into
requisition. In the summer of 1863 came the first
draft, with but small results from this town. In the
autumn eflbrts for volunteers were renewed, and a con-
siderable number of veterans, whose three years' term
would expire in 1864, re-enlisted " for the war."
These brave men, who after so long and severe a term
of service were ready to rededicate themselves to the
great work, should be held in especial honor, and
their names can be traced in the list below. In the
summer of 1864 came a second draft quite as meagre
in results as the first, for only two men from Billerica
were accepted. Other calls were filled by such volun-
teers as could be secured in town or beyond, and large
bounties were paid. The town was represented in
army and navy by 173 men, whose names are recorded
in the " History of Billerica."
The news of victory and peace filled the land with
joy in the spring of 1865, and though a deep shadow
followed with the assassination of the beloved Lin-
coln, the substantial fruits remained. The returning
35-4
HISTORY OP .MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
veterans were welcomed ou the Fourth of July at a
picnic in the grove by Concord River, near the middle
bridge. The exercises were hearty and impre.ssive,
including an address of welcome by Dr. Frank E.
Bundy. In farther testimony to the valor of her sol-
diers and the memory of her dead, the town has
erected an appropriate monument. It stands upon
the Common, a shaft of white granite, six feet square
at the base and twenty-five feet high. The shaft is
crowned with the figure of a soldier, in easy position,
with musket at rest. In raised letters are inscribed
the names "Petersburg," "Gettysburg," "Newbern,"
"Lookout MouDtaiu," "Bull Run," " Chancellors-
vilie," "Baton Rouge " and " Cedar Mountain." A
carved eagle surmounts a shield, and upon the pedes-
tal is the inscription: "Billerica to her heroes, in
grateful recognition of that steadfastness of purpose,
devotion to principle, loyalty to country, and trust in
God, which enabled men to die for Liberty and
Union " On the east and west sides are the names of
twenty dead soldiers :
" Edward .\, Adania, Dennis Buckley, William S. Collins, James F.
Edmaodd, Albert E. Farmer, Cbarlea N. Fletcher, George C. Oilman.
Reuben J. Oilman, Franklin Hanaford, William Hayes. Edwin \V. Huse,
"Ward Locke, Thoiuafl II. Maxwell, Stephen H. Parker, .^aaJohn Pat-
ten, Joseph F. Richanlson, Charlea A. Saunders, James Shields, Pollard
R. Shumway, John C. Stewart."
Four other names would properly have been in-
scribed with their comrades' upon the monument.
It is due to them that they be honorably mentioned
here :
Hir.im E. Davis, Henrj* Xewbury, Edward H. Persons, Calvin G.
Tultie.
The monument was dedicated with appropriate
ceremonies and in the presence of a vast assemblage,
Wednesday. 8th October, 1873. Hon. Thomas Tr.lbot
presided ; the prayer of dedication was offered by
Rev. Mr. Hussey, and an oration given by Col. Russel
H. Conwell, of Boston. Governor Washburn, Hon.
E. R. Hoar, of Concord, ex-Gov. Onslow .Stearns, of
New Hampshire, a son of Billerica, and others par-
ticipated iu the exercises, which were held in a mam-
moth tent south of the monument.
The '■ History of Billerica " records the names of
173 soldiers and sailors who represented the patriotism
and sacrifices of the town in this great contest for our
national life.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
GOV. TH05IA.S TALBOT.
Thomas Talbot was born in Cambridge, Washing-
ton County, New York, Sept. 7, 1818. He was a lineal
descendant of John Talbot, first Earl of Shrewsbury.
His grandfather came from Ireland to America in
1807. His father, who was a practical woolen manu-
facturer, died when the son was only four years of
age, leaving a family of eight children. In 1825 the
family removed to Northampton, Mass., where
Thomas, at the age of twelve years, found employ-
ment in a woolen factory. At the age of seventeen
years he became an employee in the broadcloth
factory of his elder brother, Charles, in Williamsburg,
Mass., and after a service of three years he was made
an overseer in the establishment. It was while em-
ployed in the latter position that for two winters he
attended the academy in Cummiugton, Mass. At
the age of twenty-two years (in 1840) he entered into
a partnership with his brother Charles in the dye-
wood business in North Billerica, where he resided
during the remainder of his life.
So rapid and so remarkable was the success which
crowned their first enterprise that the firm, from lime
to time, greatly extended their operations. They
became very largely engaged in the manufacture of
woolen fabrics, and also of oil of vitriol and other
chemicals used in the arts.
These various enterprises, conducted with the energy
and skill which distinguished the men, brought them
an ample fortune. Few manufactories iu the State
have been managed with so much ability, or have
met with so great success, or have gained for their
owners so honorable a name.
The tlowage of the meadows along the Concord
River, deemed by the owuers to have been caused by
the dam belonging to this firm, brought on a long
and bitter contest before the Legislature of the State.
In this protracted and perplexing altercation, in which
the firm were the victors, Thomas Talbot displayed a
mental power, a firmness and manliness of character
and a knowledge of men and of business, which gave
him a high reputation and laid the foundation of
his subsequent political advancement. From this
time he took rank among the foremost men of the
State. Political honors came to him. He was re-
peatedly elected to the State Legislature. From 18G4
to 18t)9 he was a member of the Governor's Council.
In 1873 and 1874 he was Lieutenant-Governor of the
State. In the latter year. Gov. Washburne having
been elected United States Senator, Mr. Talbot
became Governor of Massachusetts.
Governor Talbot was a firm supporter of the pro-
hibitory liquor law of the State, and his veto of the
legislative act repealing that law cost him the loss of
many of his political supporters. On account of this
veto and other similar acta of independence, he failed
of re-election in the following year. But in 1878
popular favor returned and he was chosen Governor
of the Slate by a large majority. After one year of
highly honorable service he refused to accept fur-
ther political honors.
But though Governor Talbot filled the chair of
political office with dignity and grace, it was not in
public life that the trQe nobleness of his character
found its highest exhibition. It was as a high-
minded man of business,^s the liberal patron of
enterprises of benevolence, as the benefactor of his
//^^^/•-/ y c^' c
BILLERICA.
355
town, as the generous friend of the poor and unfor-
tunate, that his character shone most brightly. His
treatment of the numerous workmen in his employ is
above all praise. He took delight in making them
happy. He paid them the highest rate of wages.
He built for them convenient tenements, each with
its garden for vegetables and flowers, and demanded
for them only the lowest rent. Though not a Catho-
lic, he generously aided the Catholics in his employ
in securing a house of worship. He was so charita-
ble as to believe that any Christian church was a
blessing to the community. Though not a Baptist,
he, at his own expense, erected for the small Baptist
society of the village a very tasteful and commodi-
ous church. Though himself a Unitarian, he found
in his generous heart a place for every Christian
man.
There is something very touching and tender in the
love with which the em'^loyees and neighbors of Gov-
ernor Talbot cherish his memory. He has left a very
honorable name on the roll of the statesmen of Massa-
chusetts, but a far more precious record in the hearts
of his fellow-men.
While in the enjoyment of vigorous health, having
before him a fair prospect of a prolonged life and a
cheerful old age, he was suddenly arrested by a pain-
ful disease, of which he died on October G, 1885, at
the age of sixty-seven years.
JOSHUA BEXNETT.
Joshua Bennett was born in Billerica, Mass., Nov.
27, 1792, and was the son of James Bennett, a pros-
perous and respectable farmer of that town. He
passed his boyhood upon his father's farm, obtaining
his education in the common schools of the town and
in the academy at Westford, Mass. When about
twenty-four years of age he engaged in teaching a
grammar school in Dorchester, Mass. Although al-
ways fond of books, he relinquished the work of teach-
ing at the end of three years, and entered upon a
business career in which few men have shown equal
sagacity and few have met with equal success. Even
while a teacher he devoted his evenings to trade.
Ab the leading partner of the firm of Bennett &
Felton, in Boston, he early laid the foundations of his
future success and fortune. His active mind fouud
many sources of wealth. He became a very exten-
sive dealer in hops, a business in which his father had
preceded him. He had transactions with most of the
hop-growers and brewers of the country. He became
an exporter of hops and a distiller. It is told of him,
as an interesting incident, that in 1849, being in Lon-
don at a time when the hop trade was depressed, he
actually purchased a large lot of hops which he had
himself exported, and sent them back to America,
thus making two profits upon the same goods.
It was by the skillful use of the property early ac-
quired in trade, that Mr. Bennett amassed most of
his ample fortune. He was a very shrewd and a very
successful dealer in real estate, making his invest-
ments with distinguished sagacity. He became the
possessor of a large amount of property in the city of
Lowell, and of a much larger in Boston.
Mr. Bennett was not a politician, and he only ac-
cepted those offices which his compeers in the busi-
ness world bestowed upon him on account of his ac-
knowledged ability to fill them with honor and suc-
cess. He was a director of the Providence and Wor-
cestor Railroad, and was on the first board of direc-
tors of the Old Lowell Bank, the earliest of the dis-
count banks of Lowell, having received its charter in
1828. This board consisted of men of high character,
among whom were Kirk Boott and Samuel Batchel-
der, two of the most diiitinguished founders of Amer-
ican manufactures, and Josiah B. French and Na-
thaniel Wright, both of whom subsequently became
mayoi-s of the city. ' After a service of thirty-three
years as director, Mr. Bennett was, in 1861, elected
president of the bank. This office he filled with
great ability through the entire period of the Civil
War, resigning it on account of failing health, only a
few months before his death. As a bank officer he
was conservative and sagacious, and was esteemed the
highest authority upon the question of investing the
funds of the institution. An excellent portrait of
Mr. Bennett, the gift of his grandson and namesake,
Joshua Bennett Holden, Esq., of Boston, adorns the
directors' room of this bank.
As a citizen Mr. Bennett gained his highest honor
by his patriotic conduct in the early days of the Re-
bellion. When others faltered and held back he
stepped boldly forward. Not only did he proffer to
his country his own wealth, but he exerted his great
influence as a financier to bring to the rescue the
monied institutions with which he was connected.
He had full faith in his country, and freely intrusted
to her his wealth. It was the noble conduct of men
like him who, in that hour of peril and alarm, in-
spired new hope and courage in the national heart.
Throughout the war his patriotism never faltered.
To every soldier who enlisted from his native town of
Billerica he gave, from his own wealth, a special
bounty.
Mr. Bennett resided in Boston in his early business
life, but in his later years his favorite residence was
upon his farm in Billerica. Notwithstanding his in-
tense and life-long devotion to business he was wont
to take due time for national recreation, having made
one visit to Europe and being accustomed to spend
several weeks of each summer ai Saratoga and Sharon
Springs. In the culture of his farm of fifty acres he
also took a special pleasure.
In his will he gave $25,000 to the Washingtonian
Home in Boston, an institution in which he was
greatly interested. He also gave $3000 to each church
of the various denominations in the town of Billerica,
as well as small legacies to their respective pastors.
356
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
It is greatly to the credit of his heirs that, though this
will waa not signed, all the legacies for benevolent
purposes were honorably paid in accordaoce with the
known wishes of the te-tator.
On October 8, 1815, Mr. Bennett married Eleanor,
daughter of Ebenezer Richardson, of Billerica. She
still survives him at the great age of ninety-six years.
Of his two children, Ellen, the older, became the wife
of George Holden, Esq., of Boston, and Rebecca be-
came the wife of William Wilkins Warren, E^q., of
Boston. The widow of Mr. Bennett, in honor of her
husband, has given a library to the town of Billerica,
erecting for it a substantial brick edifice.
Mr. Bennett died August C, I860, in the seventy-
third year of his age, and was buried at Mi. Auburn.
ALEXANDER COCHRA>-E.
Alexander Cochrane was born in Neilston Parish,
Renfrewshire, Scotland, August 11, 1813, and died at
Swampscott, Mass., August 11, 1865. He was the son
of John Cochrane and Isabella Ramsey, of Glander-
stcn House, and grandson of Hugh Cochrane and
Bethia Douglas, daughter of Francis Douglas and
Elizabeth Aucterlonie, of Inch Abbot. His family
had been long settled in this country, and Crawford
states in his " Description of the Shire of Renfrew,"
Edinburgh, 1710, that the name is of great antiquity in
this shire. They had been among the earliest to en-
gage in manufacturing in its infancy in this part of
Scotland during the latter half of the last century,
and it is stated by Taylor, in his " Levern Delineated,"
Glasgow, 1831, that Bailie Cochrane, owner of part of
the lands of Ferguslie, and great-grandfather of the
subject of our sketch, had built a tiax or linen-mill
called Fereneze, on the River Levern, in 1798. The
name of this worthy Bailie appears on the fine mon-
ument in Paisley to the memory of the Covenanters,
erected during his magistracy. About the same time,
1798, Hugh Cochrane, son of the latter, built Gland-
erston Bleachery, and planted additional trees about
the house, and his son John, the father of Alexander,
continued the business and died there in 1832.
Alexander lived with his mother and the family in
Glanderston House until the failure of his elder
brother, Robert, necessitated their giving up the
place. There is a print of this ancient mansion in
the "Levern Delineated" and it illustrates the te-
nacity of custom and the resistance to change even in
modern Scotland, that although long in ruins, this
house still carries with it the right to occu^iy one of
the two cushioned pews which are permitted in Neil-
ston Church.
Thrown upon his own resources for support, he, in
company with one of his brothers, essayed the new
process of making starch from potatoes, but this cre-
ated great alarm and disturbance among the peas-
antry and poor people, who feared an advance in the
price of one of their chief articles of food, and this
feeling resulted in an attack on and partial destruc-
tion of the works by a mob. With our ideas of to- day
an occurrence of this kind seems to belong in the
Middle Ages, but it only serves to show the rapid
strides we have made since these beginnings of uiid-
ern manufacture; the old has passed and the new has
come, in hardly more than a short hundred years.
He had opportunity to observe, and, it is apparent,
early took an interest in such chemical changes as
took place in his father's works, and it is related that
the ancestor of the since famous Tennant family here
made some of his early experiments with bleaching
chemicals. He took advantage of all this to enlarge
his knowledge of chemistry, then just coining forward
as one of the most useful of the sciences, and he more
I especially investigated its practical application in the
I manufacture and decoration of textile fabrics. He
I subsequently mastered processes for making Muriatic,
I Nitric and Sulphuric acids, Aqua Ammonia, Sui-
i phate of Copper, Extract of Indigo, Gum Substitutes,
I and learned the secret of making and using various
j mordants. Some of the information collected at this
I time and still extant among his papers is more curi-
I ous than useful. Empirical and rule of thumb meth-
I ods still had a firm hold, and the element of secrecv
still lingered in chemical processes, allying them to
Alchemy, their predecessor.
Amusing stories are told of the devices resorted to
in getting knowledge of one works from another,
much of which would excite only smiles of com-
passion from the well-instructed student of to-day.
He was in the neighborhood of Manchester, Eng-
land, in 1846-47, in charge of a branch of textile fab-
rics, but while there still kept up his interest in and
added to his knowledge of chemistry.
He was engaged to come from there to the United
States to take charge of a similar industry, and ar-
rived in New York September 27, 1847. He remained
in charge of this work for rather more than a year,
when he finally got an opportunity to put into priictice
what he had been so long preparing for. April 1,
1849, he entered into business with C. P. Talbot &
Co., of which firm the late Governor Thomas Ttlbot
was the junior partner. They wished to add chemi-
cals to their manufacture of dye-stutfs, in North Bil-
lerica. He was to plan and build a chemical works,
and take the conducting and management of manu-
facturing the chemical products, and for this he was
to receive one-thind of the net profits. He was in
Billerica more than half the portion of his life spent
in this country, and he entered fiilly into the life of
the New England village, half farming, half manu-
facturing, in which his lot was cast. He assisted in
the schools and in the church ; being Scotch, he natu-
rally took an interest in the religious life of the com-
munity, and although, like all his family, he belonged
to the Church of Scotland, he here found himself act-
ing with the sect that would best harmonize the
somewhat scattered elements; the minister filling at
/i72?^5:^72^*^t-^^
TYNGSBOROUGH.
357
times the double r6le of schoolmaster during the week
and preacher on Sunday. His relations with his
workmen were of the most friendly character even for
those days of close contact between employer and
employed, when he who gave the opportunity of work
was looked upon for that very reason as the friend of
the workman, and as a manifestation of interest which
they valued more than money, he gave an entertain-
ment for them once a year in his own house. He
kept up his connection with Europe by correspond-
ence and by occasional visits, which in those days
were still an event, and when he landed from those
early side-wheel Cunarders, the " Canada," " Asia " or
"Africa," it was subject for congratulation no longer
thought of in these days when the Atlantic has be-
come a ferry. The relations with the Messrs. Talbot
while he was with them were mutually satisfactory,
and it does them both credit that their personal re-
gard stood the strain unusually well when he after-
ward became their active competitor ; as an evidence
of this Governor Talbot offered one of his family a
position of high trust on one of the State boards,
which for personal reasons was declined.
During his residence in Billerica the business of
manufacturing a general line of chemicals gradually
increased, and the articles produced early obtained
the highest rauk for standard quality, including
Muriatic, Nitric and other acids. Sulphate of Copper,
Extract of Indigo, Aqua Ammonia and many other
articles. AVhen the Roxbury Chemical Works,
whose tall chimney was so long a landmark in that
part of Boston, gave up business, there was more
room for competition, and in 1859 Mr. Cochrane
erected works in Maiden and began business for him-
self and laid the foundation for the business subse-
quently carried on by the corporation which bears
his name. His business grew very slowly, as his pro-
ducts were largely the same as were already produced,
but without going into the details of the hard work
involved in building up a business, which is so much
alike in general characteristics in all fields of enter-
prise and effort, suffice it to say that all these diffi-
culties had been surmounted, and the business,
which has since become the largest of its kind in New
England, was successfully established before his
death at the age of fifty-two, at Swampscott, where he
was spending the summer with his family. An ac-
count of the events of a man's life is incomplete with-
out some hint as to the personality that marked him.
Mr. Cochrane wagtail, of fine presence, unassuming
in manner, and in character was simple, sincere and
kindly, winning and retaining affection and esteem.
His generosity was proverbial and laid him open to
imposition on this side of his character.
Although genial in feeling, he always preserved a
touch of austerity that did not invite undue familiarity,
and was an inheritance of his early training in the
atmosphere of the Kirk ; as an instance of which he
used to recall the line of children who, on Sunday,
walked from the house to Neilston Church under his
father's eye, who always brought up the rear that no
youthful escapades should interrupt the solemnity of
the day. With no reading allowed on that day but
the Bible and a few other books of religious charac-
ter, it gives point to the observation that the Scotch-
man is the New Englander of Europe.
His life, like bo many other lives, was spent in the
day of small things, in sowing seed for others to reap ;
and the parable of the sower was selected as best
illustrating his life, when his family placed a window
to his memory in Trinity Church. In a somewhat
trying battle with fortune both in the Old World and
in the New, he did what his hands found to do with
true Scotch courage and perseverance.
CHAPTER XXXV.
TYNGSBOROVGE.
BY CHARLES C. CHASE,
TYNGSBOROUGH is a small agricultural town, hav-
ing for its northern boundary the State of New Hamp-
shire, and upon the other sides the towns of Dracut,
Chelmsford, Westford, Grotonand Dunstable, and the
city of Lowell. It is pleasantly situated on both
sides of the Merrimack, and presents to the traveler,
as he passes along the winding banks of the stream,
an attractive panorama of rural beauty. The fertile
soil, the well-tilled fields, the many signs of thrift
and enterprise which meet his view, add to the natural
charms of the scene, while the graceful iron bridge
which spans the Merrimack completes a picture of no
ordinary loveliness. The placid scene, however,
which meets the eye in these latter days of peace and
abounding prosperity, was, during the long years of
Indian warfare, the theatre of many an act of blood-
shed and cruelty, of dwellings from which the inmates
have fled in terror, of households clothed in sackcloth
for a father or a brother slain. When we add to these
historic memories the fact that this rural town has
been honored as the birthplace of many distinguished
men of our country, its history becomes one of pecu-
liar interest.
Its territory claims our attention. As the St. Law-
rence is the outlet of a chain of magnificent lakes,
so, in primeval ages, as geologists aver, the Merri-
mack bore to the ocean the waters of a series of lakes,
only a few of which, like Lake Winnipiseogee, any
longer remain. By some convulsion of the titanic
forces of nature their barriers have been burst and
their basins are now the fertile meadows which lie
along the stream. One of these primeval lakes, in
whose basin were the fruitful fields of Tyngsborough,
found its outlet at Pawtucket Falls. Perhaps the
same convulsion which rent asunder the barriers of
358
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the lake also changed the course of the river ; for
geologists find clear iadications that the Merrimack,
after passing the towns of Tyngaborough and Chelms-
ford, instead of deflecting toward the east, as it no w does,
and reaching the ocean at Newburyport, continued
to pursue its direct southerly course, and had its
mouth at the harbor of the city of Lynn.
To what extent this town, before it was settled by
civilized man, was the abodeof the American Indian, it
is impossible to tell. The nomadic character of those
children of the forest, the facility with which they
changed their frail and humble wigwams, the brief
period which sufficed to obliterate every trace of their
former habitation, and the utter absence of all written
records, render it almost impossible to identify the
place of their abode. And yet we are not wholly
without testimony ; for in certain places along the
banks of the Merrimack, the rude implements of the
Indiana, their arrow-heads and gouges and tomahawks,
found buried in the earth, often mark the spots which
they most frequented. Such buried implements
have, in greater numbers, been found near the Paw-
tucket Falls in Lowell, as well as upon Wicasuck
Lsland, which is a part of the town of Tyngsborough.
This island of sixty-five acres seems to have been a
favorite possession of the red men ; and it is a fact
of sad and peculiar interest that it was the last abode
in New England of the Pawtucket tribe, which had
once occupied so conspicuous a position, and to which
the apo9tle Eliot had once preached the Gospel on
the Merrimack. From this island in the town of
Tyngsborough the feeble remnant of the tribe, prob-
ably less than sixty in number, mostly women and
children, took their sad journey to the north, and
mingling with the St. Francis tribe, lost their honor
and their name forever. Several years earlier Wan-
nalancet, the powerless and disheartened chief, had
gone before them. A few Indians, however, perhaps
fifty in number, dispersed in various places among
the white settlers, still lingered in New England.
Two causes served to make Wicasuck Island the
favorite abode of the Indians. Here were the Wica-
suck Falls in the Merrimack, at the foot of which the
Indians found fish in abundance for their sustenance,
and their crops of corn upon the island were safe
from the inroads of bears and deer, being surrounded
by the river.
It is an impressive proof of the humiliation of Wau-
nalancet that about twenty years after, his departure
to Canada he wandered back once more to the spot
where he once ruled as chief, and for two years, 1696
and 1697, lived in a condition not differing much from
that of a public pauper. The General Court paid
twenty pounds to Colonel Jonathan Tyng for " keeping
him."
The record of the Pawtucket tribe, which for many
years had mingled with the early settlers in the towns
which lie along the Merrimack, is not without his-
toric interest. The Pawtuckets embrace several other
subordinate tribes, having their headquarters far
asunder — the Nashaways, in the fertile meadows of the
town of Lancaster ; the Nashobas, in the forests of
Littleton ; the Pennacooks, on the rich, alluvial soil
of Concord, N. H. ; the Naticooks, near the junction
of the Souhegan River with the 3Ierrimack, a few
miles north of the town of Nashua, and the Wame-
sits around the Falls of the C oncord, in Lowell ; while
the controlling tribe, the Pawtuckets, had their ren-
dezvous near the Pawtucket Falls in the Merrimack,
also within the precincts of Lowell. At this rendez-
vous were held the great councils of the tribe. Here
every year they gathered to supply themselves with
their annual quota of fish, and here, too, once a year,
the devout apostle Eliot, of Roxbury, " spread the
net of the gospel to fish for their souls."
So large is the space in history which this tribe has
filled that one is surprised to learn upon investigation
how very small was their number. The Pawtuckets,
with all their subordinate tribes, numbered only
about one thousand souls, a number which appears
truly insignificant when we reflect that it equals only
one-seventieth part of the present population of
Lowell.
The mystery which hangs about the origin and early
history of the American Indians, their wild, nomadic
life, their humiliating retreat before the advancing
hosts of civilized men, and the cruel wrongs which
they have too often sult'erpd, have aroused the sympa-
thies of mankind and have been a fruitful theme of
poetry and song. But this kindly sympathy has been
too often undeserved. The Pawtuckets were an indo-
lent and stolid people. They were very poor husband-
! men ; they were very poor Christians. The devout
Eliot could never form among them a Christian
church. The Bible translated by him in the Indian
dialect with infinite labor, has had, for generations,
probably not a solitary reader. They have left not
a single monument, unless the rude implements ex-
humed from the soil and the few remaining indications
of the ditch which once separated the village of the
Indians at Pawtucket Falls from the possessions of the
English settlers, may deserve the name of monu-
ments.
The aversion of the American Indian to the arts
and manners of civilized life, is one of the most re-
markable phenomena in the history of the human
race. The Caucasian presses forward with eager zeal
to reach a higher plane of living, in which his intel-
lect may be cultivated, his manners refined, and the
comforts of home enjoyed ; but the Indian has not
only shown to all these blessings a stolid indifference,
but has even rejected the proffered boon when pre-
sented by the hand of benevolence.
The Indians of the United States at the present
time about equal in number the inhabitants of the
single city of Boston. The country, with generous
hand, has lavished upon them millions of money, and
secured to them the possession of immense tracts of
TYNGSBOKOUGH.
359
land. In an official report by the late General Sheri- I
dan, they are pronounced the richest people, per cap-
ita, in the Nation ; faithful missionaries have been
sent among them ; poets have sung their praise ; sen-
timental writers innumerable have proclaimed their
wrongs and cursed the heartlessness of American
statesmen, and yet a United States Senator, an advo-
cate of the Indian's cause, has confessed that if farms
should be allotted to the Indians in severalty, they j
are not yet sufficiently enlightened to cultivate them |
and maintain themselves without further aid. An- j
other member of Congress, also an ardent friend of ■
the Indian, recently, upon exhibiting at one of his
lectures, some photographs of Indians taken on his
visit among them, remarked to his audience that this
method of looking at an Indian was far preferable to
seeing him face to face, because the beholder was thus
saved from the intolerable odor of the living speci-
men. Such is the American Indian after a contact ;
with civilization of more than 200 years.
Doubtless the fertile lands of Tyngsborough, like
those of other towns along the Merrimack, had from
remote ages in the past been subject to the rude til-
lage of the Indian. What that tillage was history af-
fords abundant testimony. I will quote here a brief
extract from the writings of Jacques Cartier, who
sailed up the St. Lawrence in 15.35, as given by
Hakluyt : "They digge their grounds with certaine
peeces of wood as bigge as a halfe a sword, on which
ground groweth their corn, which they call 'offici.'
It is as bigge as our small peason (peas). They have
also great store of Mu.^kemilions, pompions. Gourds,
cucumbers, Peason and Beanes of every colour, yet
differing from ours." We are told by Cartier, in
speaking of the tobacco-plant, that " they fill their
bodies full of smoke till it cometh out of their mouth I
and nostrils, even as out of the Tonnell of a chimney.
AVe ourselues have tried the same smoke, and having
put it in our mouths it seemed almost as hot as pep-
per.'' Roger Williams also tells us that the Indians
cultivated a vegetable called " Askutasquash." From
this we derive (for short) the name of the squash.
The vegetables cultivated by the Indians appear to
have been of diminutive size, the seeds of some of
which were brought, in a manner unknown to history,
from southern climes. i
But the earliest civilized settlers on the banks of
the Merrimack belonged to the sturdy class of men
brought to America by that remarkable movement of i
the English people in the early part of the reign of
Charles I., known in history as the " Puritan Migra-
tion.'' Of this great enterprise John Winthrop, the ;
first Governor of the Colony of Massachusetts Bay,
was the truest and noblest exponent. To understand
the character of the earliest settlers of Tyngsborough,
it is important, first, to learn the principles which
governed and the spirit which moved this remarkable
movement of the English people. Before this migra-
tion two Colonies had been planted in America by
the English people. The first Colony, planted at
Jamestown in 1607, consisted to a very large extent,
of enthusiasts misguided by visions of untold wealth, of
" broken men " who hoped to retrieve their fortunes,
and of adveuturers, who loved tbe excitement of this
novel and untried enterprise. Religion was scarcely
one of the impelling motives. Adventure was the
most potent factor. To command success something
better was required. To bear the inevitable hard-
ships of this new life in the wilderness there were
needed a firm religious faith, and an intelligent and
heroic devotion to some great and sacred cause.
These were wanting at Jamestown, and the enterprise
failed.
The colony planted by the "Pilgrims of Plym-
outh," in 1620, possessed precisely what that at
Jamestown wanted — a sublime, religious faith and a
courage and self-denial which do eternal honor to the
human race. But they did not come to colonize
America. Their purpose and aim were almost purely
religious. They came not with the aggressive spirit
of those who dream of empire and renown. They
sought a home for their faith, a refuge from persecu-
tion, a place to worship God. They were an isolated
sect, Brownists or Separatists, not Puritans. Their
object was a noble object, and it was nobly attained ;
but compared with the great Puritan migration of
which we shall now speak, the Plymouth Colony was
but a small factor in the settlement of the towns of
the New England States.
The Puritan migration had its origin in the dissat-
isfaction and disgust of the middle class of English-
men with the government of the Stuarts, and the cor-
ruption both in church and state which pervaded the
kingdom. After the long and brilliant reign of
Qyeen Elizabeth, the English people were not elated
at the accession of James the First. It wounded
their pride, that a pedantic Scotchman should fill the
throne of their glorious Queen. His first appearance
in London disgusted his new subjects.
The author of "The History of the English Peo-
ple," says of him : " His big head, his slobbering
tongue, his quilted clothes, his rickety legs stood out
in as grotesque a contrast with all that men recalled
of Henry or Elizabeth, as his gabble and rodomon-
tade, his want of personal dignity, his buffoonery, his
coarseness of speech, his pedantry, his personal cow-
ardice." King James and the English people never
understood each other. The King bad his merits, but
the people could not see them ; the people had their
rights, but the King never acknowledged them. The
King demanded higher prerogatives, the people de-
manded greater liberties. As time passed on the
breach grew wider. The twenty-three yearsof his reign
were years of comparative peace, but " the King oc-
cupied them industriously in rendering monarchy
odious and contemptible." The King impoverished his
exchequer to enrich his parasites and degrade the pre-
rogatives of the Crown by the sale of titles. The ac-
360
HISTORY OF .MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
cession of his son, as Charles the First, did not restore
to the Crown the love or confidence of the people.
There sprang up on every side among the men of the
middle class, especially among the Puritans, a pro-
fouud conviction that merit and worth were no longer
rewarded in England. This sentiment pervaded the
minds not alone of the poor men and artisans, but of
the professional classes, " men of large landed estate,
zealous clergymen, shrewd London lawyers, and
young scholars from Oxford."
The leader of this great enterprise was John Win-
throp, a man of whom it has been said : " He had
more influence probably than any other man in form-
ing the political institutions of the Northern States
of America." He was born in Groton, SuflFolk
County, England, and was bred to the law. When
only eighteen years of age he was commissioned jus-
tice of the peace. On account of the excellence and
piety of his character he was elected Governor of
the Company of Massachusetts Bay. This otEce he
held by annual re-election for nineteen years. He
died in Boston, in 1649, at the age of sixty-one years.
His home was on Washington Street, in Boston, ni-ar
the site of the Old South Church. The excellence
and greatness of his character have been honored by
the people of Boston, who have placed his statue in
one of the public squares of the city.
Governor Winthrop was a man of no ordinary lit-
erary attainments. His numerous writings, still pre-
served, give us a clear insight into the motives which
led to the great Puritan Emigration. A few extracts
willsulfice: " It will be a service to the church of
great consequence to carry the Gospell into those
parts of the world, to helpe on the cummiuge of
the fullnesse of the Gentiles." " This land [Eng-
land] grows weary of its Inhabitants, soe as man,
who is the most pretious of all creatures, is here more
vile and base then ihe earth we treade upon, and of
less prise among us then an horse or a sheepe." " We
are grown to that height of Intemperauce in all ex-
cesse of Riott, as noe man's estate almost will sutfice
to keepe saile with his equal Is ; and he whoe failes
herein must live in scorne and contempt." " Men
scraine at Knatts and swallowe camells, use all sever-
ity for mainetaynance of cappea and other accomply-
mects, but suffer all rufBanlike fashions and disorder
in manners to passe uncontrolled."
Soon after his election in 1630, Governor Winthrop
came to America with 800 colonists. A company of
200 had gone before, and before the close of the first ,
year of his Governorship another company of 700 fol-
lowed him. These colonists all landed at Salem.
During the first eleven years of this emigration 200
emigrant ships had crossed the Atlantic, bringing
with them 20,000 Englishmen, very many of whom '
were men of devout religious character, inspired with
a high purpose of founding iu America institutions
free from the corruptions which had impelled them to
leave the land of their birth.
Of these 20,000 colonists a very large portion set-
tled in Charlestown and Boston. Boston soon became
the residence of the Governor and the seat of govern-
ment. It had its name from the English Boston (St.
Bodolph's town), from which many of the colonists
had come. Among the settlers in Boston there were
men of wealth and enterprise. The rapidly increas-
ing colony spread out into the neighboring country.
Especially were the fertile meadows that lay along
the rivers sought for new plantations. Haverhill was
planted on the Merrimack, and the lands lying far-
ther up the stream were eagerly sought for settle-
ment. And at this point the history of the settle-
ment of the town of Tyngsborough claims our atten-
tion.
In performing my task I am greatly aided by the
valuable histories of the town of Dunstable by Charles
J. Fox, Esq., and the Rev. Elias Nason. and by the
article upon Tyng.^borough written by Mr. Xason for
Drake's "History of Middlesex County." I also am es-
pecially indebted to the Hon. William A. Richard-
son, chief justice of the Court of Claims at Wash-
ington, a native of Tyngsborough, who has gener-
ously put into my hands very valuable documents
pertaining to the history of the town.
In August, 16.32, the valley of the Merrimack, as far
north as the outlet of Lake Winnipiseogee, was sur-
veyed by Captain Simon Willard and Captain Ed-
ward Johnson. This survey was made by the order
of the General Assembly uf Massachusetts to deter-
mine the northern boundary of that Colony. The re-
port of this survey brought to public notice a knowl-
edge of the rich alluvial lands in the valleys of the
Merrimack and Nashua Rivers. The Indians had al-
ready cultivated fields all along these valleys, and
thus had invited the more enterprising white man to
"go up also and possess the laud." It was a time
of peace between the two races, and no fear of hostile
foes deterred the English settlers from pressing north-
ward. In 1655 grants of land were made by the gov-
ernment of Massachusetts Bay to those who belonged
to the exploring expedition of Willard and Johnson.
In the next year a large tract including the greater
part of the town of Litchfield, New Hampshire, was
granted to William Brenton, whioh was known as
Brenton's farm. Other grants rapidly followed,
among which were large grants on the Souhegan
River, the meadows in Amherst, New Hampshire, 500
acres to Captain William Davis, of Boston, and Cap-
tain Isaac Johnson, of Roxbury ; 500 acres to Mrs.
Anna Lane, 1000 acres in 1G59 to Captain Thomas
Savage ; Captain Francis Norton, William Hudson
and Jeremiah Houston, to each 250 acres ; 300
acres to John Wilson, of Boston ; 1000 acres on
the Souhegan in Milford, to the town of
Charlestown, Massachusetts, for a school farm ; 500
acres " adjoining thereto " to Mrs. Anna Cole, and
400 acres, embracing a part of the village of Nashua,
to John Whiting. In 1662, 500 acres in Litchfield
TYNGSBOROUGH.
361
were granted to the town of BillericA for a school
farm, and 300 acres adjoining to Phinehas Pratt and
others " for straights and hardships endured by them
in planting at Plymouth of which he was one." Four
hundred acres in the town of Pelham were granted to
Governor Endicott. A large tract of land in Hudson
and Pelham was granted to Henry Kimball, known
afterwards as "Henry Kimball's Farm." Samuel
Scarlet also had a farm on the north side of Merri-
mack River, perhaps in Tyngsborough.
In 1673 a tract of 1000 acres in Nashville was
granted to " The Ancient and Honorable Artillery
Company of Boston," embracing the village of Nash-
ville and known as the " Artillery Farm," the little
pond in it being since known as " Artillery Pond."
As earl}' as 1673 various individuals had received
grants of 14,000 acres on both sides of the Merrimack
and lying north of Chelmsford. These latter grants
must have included a large part of the town of Tyngs-
borough.
So many separate and independent grants had now
been made that it became evident that the common
welfare demanded that they should be consolidated
into a single plantation, thus securing to them all the
advantages of mutual interest and reciprocal aid.
To secure this end the proprietors of these grants and
others who proposed to settle on adjacent lands, in
1673 addressed a petition to the General Assembly of I
Massachusetts, the closing clause of which and the
names of the subscribers are here transcribed :
** Tour PetitioDen therefore hamblj request the favour of the UoDora-
ble Court that they will please to ^rant the said tract of laud to your
Pelittonerd and to luch as will joiu with them in the settlement of the
lands before mentioned, so that those who have improved their farms
there and others who speedily intend to do the same, may be in a way
for the support of the public ordinances of God, for without which the
greatest part of the year they will be deprived of, the farms lying so far
remote from any towns , and further that the Honorable Court will
please grant the like immunities to this plantation, as they in their
favoura have formerly granted to other new Plantations : — So shall your
Petitiouers be ever engaged to pray :
" Thomas Brattle, Thomas Edward,
Jonathan Tyng, Thomas Wheeler, Sen.
Joseph Wheeler, Peter Bulkley,
James Parkerson, Joseph Parker,
Robert Gibbs, John Morse, Sen.
John Turner, Samuel Combs,
Sampson Sheafe, James Parker, Jr.,
Samuel Scarlet, John Parker,
William Lakin, Josiuh Parker,
Abraham Parker, Nathaniel Blood,
James Knapp, Robert Parris,
Robert Proctor, John Jolliffe,
Simon Willard, Jr., Zachariah Long."
A charter was granted containing in substance the
following conditions: that a minister should be pro-
cured within three years; that there should be twenty
or more actual settlers, who should build houses cap-
able of defence, at least eighteen feet square ; that the
owners should live on and improve their lands, and
that a meeting-house should be erected.
The closing clauses of the charter, which are not
without obscurity, are these : "The court judgeth it
meet to grant their request, provided a farme of 500
acresof upland and medow be laid out of this tract for
the country's use, and that they shall in settling the
plantation endeavor so to finish it once within three
years, and procure an able and orthodox minister
amongst them."
A large tract of land thus granted contained about
200 square miles, or 128,000 acres. The villages of
Nashua and Nashville, N. H., are near the centre of
the plantation, which included also the towns of
Hudson, HoUis, Dunstable and Tyngsborough, as
well as parts of Amherst, Milford, Merrimack, Litch-
field, Londonderry, Pelham, firookline, Pepperell and
Townsend. The plantation received the name of
Dunstable in honor of Mrs. Mary Tyng, wife of Hon.
Edward Tyng, one of the magistrates of the State,
who came from Dunstable in England.
The high character of many of the grantees of this
plantation is worthy of especial notice. John Endi-
cott was a man severe, devout and stern, a valiant
leader in Indian warfare, and Governor of Massa-
chusetts for fifteen years. Joseph Dudley was a
graduate of Harvard, president of New England,
having the noted Andros as his successor. Governor
of Massachusetts and chief justice of the State of
New York. Wm. Brenton was Governor of the State
of Rhode Island, and once a noted fur-trader.
Thomas Brattle was a graduate and treasurer of Har-
vard College, and a writer on Astronomy. Peter
Bulkley was Speaker of the House of Deputies. Jon-
athan Tyng was a highly honored man, distinguished
for his courage, and the man most renowned among
the early settlers of Tyngsborough. Thomas Weld
was the first minister of Dunstable, and Sampson
Sheafe was a member of the Provincial Council of
New Hampshire. Many of these grantees belonged
to Boston, having among them " Assistants and Mag-
istrates," and men who held honorable positions in
life.
This large plantation, when it received its charter,
was covered with a heavy growth of pine, oak, wal-
nut, maple, birch and other kinds of timber. There
were fertile valleys lying along the Merrimack, the
Nashua and Souhegan Rivers and their many tribu-
tary streams. Wild fowl and fish abounded. The
forests were tenanted by bears, wolves and cata-
mounts. Here and there were Indian trails leading
to their favorite waterfalls and fishing-grounds,
around which were their scattered and humble wig-
wams. Also, far apart in the wilderness, a few trad-
ing-posts had been established by venturesome and
enterprising men. Sixteen years before the planta-
tion received its charter the General Court had sold
the exclusive right of trading with the Indians to Mr.
Simon Willard, Mr. Wm. Brenton, Ensign Thomas
Wheeler and Major Thomas Henchman, for £25.
These trading-posts reached out into the forests far
in advance of the dwellings of the ordinary settlers.
Of these four traders, Major Henchman, resided in
Chelmsford. Eight years later came another "In-
362
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
dian trader," John Cromwell, who established his
triding-poat in Tyngsborough, and who thus became
probably the earliest inhabitant of that town. Of
this Cromwell there are sundry traditions more or
less apocryphal. He was said to have been one of
that numerous class of traffickers whose foot weighed
just a pound. The Indians who sold him furs and
accepted his method of weighing began at length, it
was said, to suspect that his foot actually weighed
considerably more than a pound, and so, to adjust
matters, they drove him away and burned his house.
Rev. Mr. Lawrence, in his account of Tyngsborough,
as given in vol. iv, p. 192 of the second series of the
Massachusetts Historical Collections, tells us that
" the present owner of the place was plowing near the
spot and found his plow moving over a flat stone
which gave a hollow sound," and that "on removing
the stone he discovered a hole stoned about six
inches in diameter, from which he look a sum of
money."
In more recent years a doubt has arisen in regard
to the truth of the tradition of the burning of the
house, and it is asserted that the inventory of Crom-
well's property indicates that he had suffered no such
disaster. But Daniel Perham, Esq., of Tyngsbor-
ough, a gentleman better versed in the history of
Tyngsborough, probably, than any other person, as-
sures the writer that the tradition of the house-burn-
ing is well founded, and has never till recently been
questioned. He has often heard the story from his
mother, whose ancestors were among the early set-
tlers. The tradition is that a friendly Indian in-
formed Cromwell of the proposed attack, and that
Cromwell took care of his treasures, and escaped to
a place of observation where he witnessed the burn-
ing of his house. The kettle which contained the
buried silver was long kept and used in a family in
Tyn^borough. It is somewhat difficult to see how
the burning of a trader's log shanty, from which
everything valuable had been removed, could so af-
fect the trader's property as to show the effect of
the disaster long afterwards. The tradition seems
reliable.
What seems to be authentically known of John
Cromwell, the fur-trader, is this, that he came from
Boston to what is now Tyngsborough, prior to 1661,
for the purpose of trading with the Indians; that he
purchased of Captain Edward Johnson, of Wo-
burn, 300 acres of land on the right bank of the Mer-
rimack, and built a house and improved bis farm ;
that he died in 1661, leaving a widow, and an estate
valued at £608 2s. 8d. He had two servants, Thomas
Williams and Walter Shepherd, who, more than
forty years after, testified in respect to this estate.
The estate subsequently fell into the possession of
Henry Farwell, and afterwards into that of the Ban-
croft family. But in regard to Cromwell there is a
discrepancy of dates; for while one author says that
he died in 1661, another records that "about 1665"
he built a trading-house in the town of Merrimack,
near the falls which have since, from him, been called
"Cromwell's Falls."
The date of the first settlement of the plan-
tation of Dunstable is not given in history. It is
evident that there were settlers established at a period
earlier than 1673, the year in which the charter was
granted, for Farmer, in his " Catechism of the His-
tory of New Hampshire," says: "This town had
been settled several years before the date of the char-
ter." And in the charter, farms belonging to the plan-
tation are mentioned and the names of farmers given.
Two years after the date of charter, orchards are
mentioned as already existing on the plantation.
The house of Lieutenant Wheeler is designated as a
place for the meeting of the proprietors of the plan-
tation. Lieutenant Wheeler was a fur-trader and
has been thought to be the earliest settler on the
plantation. He was evidently a young man, for Cap-
tain Thomas Wheeler, of Groton, the noted Indian-
fiehter, was his father, and at one time resided with
him.
The extensive plantation, chartered in 1673, with
the name of Dunstable, .ind embracing a territory of
about 200 square miles, included within its bounds
several townships and parts of townships, which,
subsequently, one by one, as their increasing popula-
tion enabled them to do it, withdrew from the plan-
tation and received charters of incorporation as inde-
pendent towns. And here, perhaps, is the proper
place to speak of these towns in the order of their in-
corporation. Hudson, N. H., was set off as a town-
ship by the General Assembly of Massachusetts, in
1732, under the name of Nottingham. In 1830 the
Legislature of New Hampshire changed its name to
" Hudson." It was settled thirty-seven years after
the plantation was chartered, and became a township
fifty-nine years after that date. The open fields ly-
ing on the banks of the Merrimack, which the In-
dians had cleared of the forest for their planting-
grounds, were the first parts of the town to be set-
tled. The town is mainly devoted to agriculture. In
the Revolutionary War it took a patriotic part.
Litchfield, the intervale lands of which, along the
Merrimack, were cultivated by the Penacook Indians,
a tribe more warlike than the other Pawtucket In-
dians, was settled about 1720, and was incorporated
as a township in 1734 by the General Assembly of
Massachusetts. In the days of the Revolutionary
War, out of fifty-seven men of age for military ser-
vice, it furnished its quota of seven for the service of
the country. Among the early inhabitants of the
town Hon. Wiseman Claggett is mentioned with spe-
cial honor. He was born in Bristol, England, his
father being a wealthy barrister. He was bred to the
law. After ten years spent In seeking his fortune in
the West Indies, he came to New England, and, at
the age of thirty-seven years, established himself at
Portsmouth, N. H. At the age of fifty-four years he
TYNGSBOROUGH.
3C3
was appointed by the British Government attorney-
general of the Province of New Hampshire. Hav-
ing, however, espoused the cause of the Colonies in
the years preceding the Revolutionary War, he was
removed from his office, and he settled upon a farm
in Litchfield. Here he was a member of the Coun-
cil and the Committee of Safety in the time of the
war. He represented Litchfield and other towns
in the New Hampshire Legislature. " He was a clas-
sical scholar, a good lawyer, a wit and a poet.'' The
collections of the New Hampshire Historical Society
contain an interesting biography of him written by
the Hon. Charles H. Atherton.
The town of Merrimack was set off from the Dun-
stable grant in 1733, first under the name of " Sou-
hegan East," afterwards "Rumford," and at length
Merrimack. It was settled in 1722. John Cromwell,
the Indian trader, heretofore mentioned, built a
trading-house at Cromwell's Falls in this town about
1670. The Souhegan River, which runs through the
town, affords a water-power. The mills which were
erected at the water-fall in 1818 afterwards were
consumed in succession by fire. The disaster seems
to have long discouraged attempts to improve the
water-power. The Hon. Matthew Thornton, one of
the signers of the Declaration of Independence, was
for many of the last years of his life a citizen of
Merrimack. He was born in Ireland and came to
America at an early age, practicing as a physician
until the Revolutionary War. He held the military
oflBce of colonel, and in 1 775 was president of the
convention at Exeter, which assumed the government
of the Colony. He was in 1776 a delegate in Con-
gress at Philadelphia, and thus became one of the
signers of the Declaration of Independence. He
was subsequently a member of Congress, both as
Representative and Senator from New Hampshire-
He also held the office of judge of the Supreme
Court of the State. He died at Newburyport, Mass.,
in 1803, while on a visit to that city. His age was
eighty-eight years. His grandson, James B. Thorn-
ton, who died at the early age of thirty-eight years,
was a young man of high promise, having been
Speaker of the House of Representatives of New
Hampshire, second comptroller of the United States
Treasury and charge d' affaires of the United States
at Callao, Peru.
The township of Hollis, whose Indian name was
Nisitisset, was set off from the Dunstable grant as the
West Parish of Dunstable in 1739, and was soon after
incorporated as a town with the name of Hollis. The
town WES first settled in 1730 by Capt. Peter Powers,
one of the soldiers, who under Capt. Lovewell fought
that bloody battle with the Indians in Fryeburg,
Maine, so well known in history and song. Two
years after his marriage, the soldier, with his
young wife, crossed the Nashua River from
Dunstable, and built the first cabin in Hollis. The
remains of the cabin were visible in 1830. Soon
followed other settlers, and in 1736 Hollis had nine
families. Fox, the historian of Dunstable, gives us
the muster-roll of a military company made up from
Hollis, Nashua and vicinity, in the old French War.
The company consisted of nearly sixty men, and had
Peter Powers, of Hollis, for its captain. Hollis also
had a company of seventy men at the battle of
Bunker Hill under Capt. Reuben Dow. This com-
pany, under the command of Col. Stark and Col.
Prescott, were in the thickest of the fight and lost
seven men. The soldiers of Hollis also participated
in the military operations at Ticonderoga and Ben-
nington, the town having during the war furnished
250 men, of whom thirty died in the service. Up to
1823 thirty-five young men of Hollis had graduated
from Harvard, Dartmouth and other colleges.
In 1740 " the broad and good plantation " of Old
Dunstable was reduced to that portion only which is
now embraced in the towns of Nashua, Nashville,
Dunstable and Tyngsborough. But in 1741 it suf-
fered a still further reduction, for in that year, after a
long dispute, the boundary line between Massachu-
setts and New Hampshire was fixed. This line sep-
arated the already reduced plantation into two nearly
equal parts. The part which fell to New Hampshire
was called Nashua, which, 101 years afterwards (in
1842) was itself divided, the northern part taking the
name of Nashville.
Of all the sub-divisions of the old Dunstable plan-
tation Nashua has had by far the greatest prosperity
and the most rapid growth. The vast hydraulic
power afforded it by the fall of sixty-five feet in the
Nashua River within the distance of two miles, has
made the city of Nashua one of the most important
manufacturing places in the nation.
Nashville, situated on the north side of the Nashua
River, shares with Nashua the benefits of the water-
power. The Jackson Manufacturing Company and
other extensive works make it a thriving town.
In 1675, only two years after the plantation of
Dunstable received its charter, began King Philip's
War, in which the inhabitants of Tyngsborough bore
a conspicuous part both in respect to the sufferings
which they endured and the bravery with which they
waged the conflict. This war demands our especial
attention from the fact that while in other Indian
wars the red men engaged in petty acts of cruelty and
revenge, as local hostilities grew up between the two
races, or else in subordination to the French partici-
pated in the wars which had arisen between the
French and English people, in this bloody and fearful
conflict almost all the Indian tribes of New England,
impelled by one common impulse, acting upon one
common plan, led on by one leader of consummate
skill and undaunted courage, had united with the
avowed purpose and firm resolve of exterminating by
fire and the tomahawk every trace of the settlements
of the white men throughout the land. The war was
waged not for victory, but for annihilation. There
364
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
was to be no quarter and no mercy. The little child
was not to be spared for his innocence, nor delicate
woman for her loveliness. It was a war not of re-
venge alone, but of cold, settled, well-matured policy,
whose success was to be secured not by open conflict,
but by infamous treachery, not by a disciplined sol-
diery, but by fiends and "hell-hounds" of war. This
war continued one year. The plantation of Dunsta-
ble, being on the frontier, being very sparsely settled
having on the north the warlike Pennacooks and on
the south the Wamesits, was specially exposed to
attack. To add to the alarm the heretofore friendly
Wannalancet withdrew from Wamesit. His flight
betokened war.
Seven Narragansett Indians, who for seven weeks
had worked for Jonathan Tyng, of Tyngsborough,
having received their wages, stealthily departed. In
their distress the settlers appeal for help from the
Colony, and eighteen men are sent by Captain Mose-
ley to protect them. In September Lieutenants Brat-
tle and Henchman were ordered by the Governor to
take measures to defend the settlement. Wannalan-
cet was reached by scouts and urged to return, but he
persistently refused. Captain Moseley, with a hun-
dred men, marched to Pennacook (now Concord) and
to Xaticook (now Litchfield) to disperse the hostile
Indians in those places. While in the forest they
fell into an ambuscade in which they might easily
have been cut off. Their escape has been attributed
to the persuasion of the friendly Wannalancet, who,
in his flight, forgot not his friendship to the white
man. The dying speech of his father, the aged chief
Passaconaway, in which he was implored " to take
heed how he quarreled with the English,'' seems to
have restrained him. Decisive proof that Wanna-
lancet, in his flight and wanderings, did restrain the
warlike Indians from destroying the whites is found
in what he said, after the war, to the Rev. Mr. Fiske,
the pastor of the Chelmsford Church. When Mr.
Fiske remarked to Wannalancet that he desired to
thank God that during the war his people had been
so highly favored, the chief replied : " Me next.''
But although, by order of the Governor, garrisons
were established and troops were sent for the defence
of the settlers, every house on the plantation, with one
exception, was deserted by its inmates. That excep-
tion is worthy of record among the grandest deeds of
human bravery. Jonathan Tyng had established
his home on the banks of the Merrimack near Wica-
suck Island, about a mile below the. present village of
Tyngsborough. He was the son of the Hon. Edward
and Mary Tyng, from the latter of whom the planta-
tion of Dunstable received its name, she having come
from Dunstable, England. The parents of Jonathan
Tyng first settled in Boston, but had removed to the
plantation, probably to Tyngsborough, where the father
died in 1681, at the age of seventy-one years. His
grave is in the old Tyng burving-ground, near the
village of Tyngsborough. Jonathan Tyng, the son.
: who was then thirty-three years of age, disdained to
flee. Alone in the wilderness, while during the long
j and fearful winter the war waged around, he made hia
I house his garrison, and held his ground. He believed
it to be for the common good that the plantation
I should not be utterly deserted, and he bravely remained
I at the post where duty called him to stand. Well
may the town of Tyngsborough and the honored
Tyng family be forever proud of such a conspicuous
example of braver)'. Mr. Tyng having, during the
winter of 1675, been the only white settler on the
Dunstable grant, seems to give to Tyngsborough the
honor of being permanently settled earliest of all the
towns which composed the plantation.
Although Mr. Tyng, in his petition to the General
Court, in the time of greatest peril, declares " there is
never an inhabitant left in the town but myself," we
cannot suppose that he was the only tenant of the
house during those months of impending danger, for
he was a man who largely employed the service of
others. We have just told of seven Narragansett In-
dians who left his employ, and we read also of one
Robert Parris " who is Mr. Tyng's vail." Moreover,
in this petition he u?es the word " we " instead of " I "
in reference to the tenants of his garrison. This peti-
tion was dated February 3, 1676, and reads as follows:
" The petition of Jonathan Tyng Humbly Bheweth ; That ye Peti-
tioner, living in the uppernioet house on Merrimack river, lying open to
the enemy, yet being so sefited that it is, as it were, a watch-house to tba
neighboring towns, from whence we can easily give them notice of the
approach o( the enemy, and may also be of use to the publique in many
respects ; also are near to the place of the Indian's ffishing, from which,
in the Treason thereof, they have great supplies, which I doubt not we
niuy be a great means of preventing them thereof; .tnd there being
never an inliabitant I»*ft in the town but myself:
" Wherefore your petitioner doth humbly request that your Honours
would be pleased to order him three or four men to help garrison his said
house, which he has been of great charge to ffortify, and may be of ser-
vice to the publique : Your favour therein shall further oblige me as in
duty bound to pray for a blessing on your Councils, and remain your
Honourables' humble servant, Jonathan Tvng."
This petition was dictated by discretion — not by
cowardice, for the enemy was near. In this very
month of February the Indians attacked the adjoin-
ing town of Chelmsford, burning several buildings,
and in the following month made still another ar.tack
upon that place, wounding Joseph Parker, the consta-
ble of the town of Dunstable. In reply to the peti-
tion the General Court immediately dispatched to
Mr. Tyng a guard of several men, who remained with
him during the war.
It is a significant mark of the utter desolation of
the plantation during that winter of terror that Mr.
Tyng was compelled to send to Boston for the neces-
sary provisions for supplying his little garrison. Mr.
Tyng was not attacked during the winter, and in the
spring, by order of the Governor and Council, a gar-
rison was established at Pawtucket Falls, and this, to-
gether with a force stationed at Capt. Henchman's
house in Chelmsford, secured the brave man from
further danger.
TYNGSBOROUGH.
365
The war soon closed. It was begun with much to
flatter the red man with hopes of victory. It had for
its leader a crafty, skillful and courageous chief,
Philip, son of Massasoit, once the generous friend of
the Pilgrims of Plymouth. The alliance with the
Narragansetts, a powerful tribe, gave firmness and
strength to the cause. Their fort, manned by 4000
warriors, was doubtless deemed impregnable, but, in
December, 1675, one thousand troops under the lead-
ership of Josiah Winslow, son of Governor Winslow,
stormed the fort and utterly destroyed their village and
all their stores. His allies being thus conquered, Philip
retired to his home on Mount Hope, near Bristol, R. I.,
where he was attacked and slain in August, 1676, his
head being sent to Plymouth, where it was fixed upon a
gibbet for many years as a warning to his country-
men. This war, so short, yet so atrocious and bloody,
fell mainly upon the two colonies of Massachusetts.
When we consider how few in number and how feeble
in resources these colonists were, the ruin caused by
the war is almost appalling. Thirteen towns were
burned, 600 buildings were laid in ashes, 600 colon-
ists were slain, and a million of dollars expended.
Although in subsequent years Indians were employ-
ed in the fiendish work of treachery and murder in
the wars of the white men, the war of King Philip
was the last effort of the Indian tribes to blot out the
settlements of the white man in New England.
After the war a party of the Praying Indians at
Wamesit on the Concord River, about sixty in number,
were removed to Tyngsborough, and placed in charge
of Col. Jonathan Tyng. They occupied Wicaauck
Island and its vicinity for about ten years, and then
departed to St. Francis, in Canada. In 1686 this isl-
and was granted to Col. Tyng to compensate him for
his care of them. It seems to have been the part of
the town of Tyngsborough to have been the earliest
home, in the Dunstable plantation, of the permanent
white settlers, and the latest home of the sons of the
forest. It was in this year (1686) that the Wamesit
and Naticook Indians sold to Col. Tyng all their pos-
sessions in the neighborhood. This purchase, togeth-
er with 3500 acres received of his father, Edward
Tyng, in 1668, and 1800 acres granted by the proprie-
tors of the township in discharge of a debt of about
S75, made Col. Tyng by far the largest landholder in
the region. This land together with other large addi-
tions, extended six miles from the Merrimack River,
the tract being one mile wide. Until recent years it
remained in the possession of the Tyng and Brinley
families. Upon this subject Mr. Nason remarks: "It is,
perhaps, the only instance in Massachusetts where such
an extensive territorial domain has remained so long
undivided and under the control of the descendants of
the original proprietor." This tract constituted a very
large portion ot the territory of Tyngsborough. It is
questionable whether such a tenure of land has been
favorable to the development and welfare of the
town.
Having brought the valiant Col. Tyng so promi-
nently before the reader's mind, it is here proper that
we should give a brief sketch of what remains untold
of the history of this distinguished man.
His father was Hon. Edward Tyng, who was born in
Dunstable, England, in 1610, and at the age of twenty-
nine years came to America and settled as a mer-
chant in Boston, where he held, as a citizen, positions
of honor. He represented Boston in the General
Court in 1661 and 1662, was coionel of the Suffolk
Regiment, and held the office of assistant from 1668
to 1681.
The opinion seems to have been entertained that
the vast Tyng or Brinley estate in Tyngsborough,
having an area of six square miles, had for its
founder, not Edward Tyng, but his distinguished son.
Col. Jonathan Tyng. This opinion has been contro-
verted by the researches of Judge William A. Rich-
ardson, who has found that Edward Tyng, who was a
merchant both in London and in Boston, purchased
in 1660, thirteen years before the incorporation of the
Dunstable plantation, a tract of land from James
Parker, of Chelmsford, containing 3000 acres. This
tract, together with 500 acres otherwise acquired, was
given by deed to his son, Col. Jonathan Tyng, in
1668, and forms the foundation of the great Tyng
estate.
The deed of this land, given by Parker to Edward
Tyng, is written on pari-hment and is in the posses-
sion of Judge Richardson. This interesting docu-
ment, written in fair and legible hand, was dated
August 14, 1660, and is therefore 230 years old. The
portion of this deed which gives the historj' of the
transfer of the land by the Indians to James Parker
has a unique interest, and I therefore give it here for
the edification of the reader:
** To all people to wbom this present shall come to be seen or read^
James Parker, of Chelmsford, in the County of Middleeex, io New £og-
land, yeoman, aod Elisabeth, his wife, seeds Qreetlog : Whereas, the
Honoered GeoDerall Court of the Maseacbosetts JnrisdictioD io new
EnglaDd, aforesayd, of tbeii benefficeut bouDty did Give and Grant unto
{ the ludiane of Patuckett a parcell of land adjoyning to the ktounds of
Chelmsford Plantation, and Whereas, Puntahhun John Tobatowon Pa-
I mobotiquin Wonoint Nompbon Rolinansad Peter and WampamootiD,
cheif Indians of said Pauhtuket, at a lan'futi public meeting of theirs,
I the fourtenth of the third moneth, 1660, with the approbation of John
] Elliott, senr.. teacher of the church of Christ in Boxbury, did Give and
' Grant unto the above Mentioned James Parker, a certain parcell of land
pert of the above mentioned Graunt, lying and being at the west end of
their sd Graunt, out of the bounds both of the sayd Pauatukit and
Chelmsford, in relation of any exchainges by them made to each other,
and that In CoosideralionBof the great pains aod covts, the mjd James
Parker hath heeo at for the setting of the bounds accorrdlng -to Agree-
ments with the Indians of sayd Pauatucket and iDbabitants of Chelms-
ford, as in a deed bearing date the third of April, 1660, with the Beconls
of the Generall Court concerning the same more amply appeareth. Now
Know all men by these presents, that the sayd James Parker and Elise-
beth, bis wife, in consideration of sixty pounds to him payd lu hand by
Edward Tyng.^of Boston, Ac, Ac."
The following is a quotation from an article writ-
ten by Judge Richardson for the Lowell Daily
Courier, April 4, 1881 :
" It is under«ood that bis [Edward Tyng'e) wife, Mary Sears, was
366
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
bom In Dunstable, England, from which place the old township [of
Dunstable] took its name in honor of her. Mr. T>'ng whs a benefactor
of the college [Harrard], to a small extent, as early as 1658, according to
President Quincy's * History of Harvard CniTersity,' and 3Ir. Quincy re*
fers to him as of ' one of the earliest, wealthiest and moet inlluential
families in the Colony.' His second daughter, Rebecca, married Joseph
Dudley, who was the Colonial Qovemor of Mossacbosetts and N'ew
Hampshire, and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of New York ; his
third daughter, Hannah, married Abijah Savage, a graduate of Harvard
in 1659 ; his fonrth daughter, Eunice, was the wife of Samuel Witlaid,
who was vice-president and acting president of the college from 1701 ta
1707. The landed estate of Edward was given to his only son Jonathan,
who resided upon it and was a man of much distinction and influence."
Two years before his death, Edward Tyng, then
sixty-nine years of age, came from Boston and set-
tled probably near the residence of his son, in Tyngs-
borough. He died in 1681 and was buried in the old
Tyng burial-ground, about one mile below the village
of Tyngsborough. His grave is covered with a
granite slab, on which is the following inscription :
" Here lyeth the body of Mr. Edward Tyng, Esq.i
aged 71 years. Died December 17 Day 1681."
Edward Tyng left six children — Jonathan, who
will be noticed elsewhere. 2. Edward, who was one
of Sir Edmund Andros' Council and governor of
Annapolis. 3. Hannah, who married Habijah Sav-
age, son of the celebrated Major Thomas Savage,
commander-in-chief in King Philip's War. 4.
Eunice, who married Samuel Willard, pastor of Old
Soiith Church in Boston and vice-president and acting
president of Harvard College. 5. Rebecca, wife of
Joseph Dudley, Governor of Massachusetts and chief
justice of New York. 6. A daughter who married a
Searle, her son, Samuel Searle, being mentioned
in Mr. Tyng's will.
The will of Edward Tyng, which is dated August
25, 1677, four years before his death, clearly indicates,
when we consider the times and the high value of a
pound sterling in those days, that he was a man of
large estate. His oldest son, Jonathan, is not men-
tioned in this will for the obvious reason that his
father had already given to him a very large estate.
To his son Edward he gives 100 pounds, adding the
words : " having given him a considerable estate
already." He gives his daughter Eunice 500 pounds,
and to each of his nine grandchildren 100 pounds, to
be paid after the decease of his wife. His wife is
made executrix and is to be assisted by the following
four " overseers : " Hon. Edward Friend, John
Leverett, Esq., Anthony Stoddard and Capt. Thomas
Brattle. The number and rank of these " overseers"
indicate that the widow was placed in charge of an
estate whose settlement was a work of no ordinary
responsibility. Indeed, it is highly probable that his
widow had herself inherited an estate, and this estate
may have constituted a portion of her husband's
wealth. The fact that Dunstable received its name
in compliment to her, and the other significant fact
that 30 many of her daughters married men who occu-
pied high social and political positions, seem to in-
dicate that birth or wealth, or both, had given her a
high claim to peculiar honor.
Col. Jonathan Tyng, son of Edward Tyng, was
born in 1642, three years after his father had settled
in Boston. Early in life he settled on the banks of
the Merrimack, on lands in the Dunstable plantation,
now belonging to the town of Tyngsborough, and, as
already shown, was the first permanent settler of the
plantation. The exalted character of the man is shown,
not only by his own brave deed:?, but by the offices of
trust and honor bestowed upon him through life. He
was made guardian of the Wamesit Indians ; he was
a member of the Council of Sir Edmund Andros, the
royal Governor ; he represented Dunstable in the
General Court ; he was for many years selectman of
the town ; he was colonel of the upper Middlesex
regiment, and was entrusted with the care of all the
garrisons within its bounds. He was always at the
front. He held a high position in the church and
was sternly orthodox. We must, however, be im-
partial. One act of the gallant colonel will hardly
meet the approval of this liberal age. John Ather-
ton, a soldier belonging to Col. Tyng's company, was
fined forty shillings by the colonel for wetting a piece
of an old hat on the Sabbath day for the sake of
putting it into his shoe, which chafed his foot while on
the march. To one who believes that a man of so
noble a nature actually committed an act apparently
so unjust, it is sufficient to say that the act was fully
justified by thespirit of the age, and the punishment
by fine was infinitely less severe than that inflicted
by the Mosaic law, so much revered by our fathers.
For the man who was found, as recorded in the book
of Numbers, gathering sticks upon the Sabbath, was
"stoned with stones " until he died. The fault of
the good and brave colonel was that he was not a
century in .idvance of his time. Indeed his act, when
stated abstractly, does not appear so very severe. A
small fine of less than seven dollars was imposed to
prevent cobbling on the Sabbath day. Moreover, the
act of the soldier may have been repeated in defiance
of previous warnings and admonitions and under
circumstances insulting to his commander and sub-
versive of his authority.
An interesting incident in the life of Colonel Tyng
is thus given by Mr. Nason: " Early in this year (1697),
the celebrated heroine, Hannah Dustan, who, with
her assistants, Mary Neff and the boy Leonardson,
had taken the scalps of ten Indians at Contoocook,
New Hampshire, was kindly entertained at the house
of Col. Tyng, as she was on her way to her desolate
home in Haverhill." Mr. Fox, however, relates that
the first house reached by Mrs. Dustan was that of
" old John Lovewell," which was on Salmon Brook.
The two authors do not contradict each other, but
Mr. Fox speaks only of " Old John Lovewell," and
Mr. Nason only of Colonel Tyng. Lovewell lived
several miles north of Tyng, and perhaps the brave
woman, sufiering from extreme weariness and weak-
ness, sought rest at the homes of both. Joseph Neff,
son of Mary Neff, in a petition to the General Court
TYNGS BOROUGH.
3C7
in 1738, forty-one years after the exploit of Mrs.
Dustan, in speaking of the sufferings eodured by his
mother and the others on their return home, declares
that " they suffered distressing want, being almost
starved."
It has been plausibly suggested that Colonel Tyng's
motive in fixing his abode on the Merrimack was to
take charge of his father's large estate in Dunstable
(now Tyngsborough).
The first wife of Colonel Tyng was the daughter of
Hezekiah Usher. She died in 1714. His second
wife, Judith Fox, of Woburn, died in 1736, living,
to the great age of ninety-nine years. His children
who lived to mature age, were: 1, John, who graduated
at Harvard College in 1691, and died in England.
2, William, whose birth is the first recorded in the
records of the town, who was born in 1G79, and was
killed by the Indians in 1713 at the age of thirty-
four years. 3, Eleazar, who graduated at Harvard
College in 1712. 4, Mary, who became the wife of
Rev. Nathaniel Prentice, minister of the town. Col-
onel Tyng died in 1723, at the age of eighty-one
years, leaving to his family a very large estate and
an honored name. The very name of Tyngsborough
attests the honor in which the family is held, and will
remain a perpetual monument of ancestral bravery
and worth. Of the descendants of Colonel Tyng we
shall speak more fully hereafter.
The death of King Philip, in August, 1676, put an
end to the war, and the dispersed settlers returned to
their deserted homes. While the towns of Lancaster,
Groton and Chelmsford were destroyed during the
war, the plantation of Dunstable suffered little loss.
The fact is supposed to be due, in part at least, to
the friendly offices of Wannalancet. Peace brought
with it more extended settlements. The larger num-
ber of settlers seem to have found homes on Salmon
Brook, near its junction with the Merrimack. This
is indicated by the location of the first meeting-house,
which was begun before the war and completed soon
after it, for, according to Mr. Fox, it was located near
the site of the present village of Kashua, not far
south of Salmon Brook, and probably about six miles
north of the village of Tyngsborough. However, the
opinion of Mr. Nason is, that the meeting-house was
on the river road, between the villages of Nashua and
Tyngsborough, not far north of the line which sep-
arates the two towns. If this be the correct supposi-
tion, it would indicate that there were about as many
settlers in Tyngsborough as in Nashua.
A very large portion of the land of Dunstable plan-
tation was purchased by men of wealth upon specu-
lation. Tht cheapness of the land invited spetu-
latioD. Such, doubtless, was the purchase of 3000
acres by the elder Tyn j. Henry Kimball purchased
a large tract of land in Pelham and Hudson, known
since as " Henry Kimball's Farm." While as yet few
settlements had been made, 14,000 acres on both sides
of the Merrimack had become the property of indi-
viduals, lu 1682, six years after King Philip's War,
Hezekiah Usher, father of the first wife of Colonel
Tyng, purchased " Mine Islands," a few miles north
of Tyngsborough village, so named because there was
a rumor that there were mines upon them which the
Indians had worked. Usher was a man of wealth.
He seems to have indulged the belief, once so prev-
alent, that New England contained vait stores "of
mineral wealth. Lead in small quantities was found
on Mine Islands, but so intermingled with rock spar
that the working of the mine was not warranted.
Though Usher failed in this enterprise, he still
dreamed of treasures hidden among the hills of New
England. In May, 1686, as we are told, " Mason, the
proprietor of New Hampshire, farmed out to Heze-
kiah Usher and his heirs, all the mines, minrraU &
ores within the limits of New Hampshire, for the term
of 1000 years, reserving to himself one-fourth of the
royal ores and one-seventeenth of all the baser
metals."
A very marked indication that the settlers upon
the Dunstable plantation were not the principal own-
ers of the soil is the fact that for thirty years after
King Philip's War the town-meetings of the proprie-
tors and settlers of the plantation were commonly,
perhaps usually, held in the town of Woburn, which
was doubtless conveniently situated between the
wealthy owners residing in Boston and vicinity on
the one hand, and the actual settlers on the other.
The residence of the officers chosen at these meetings
points in the same direction. At the earliest recorded
town-meeting (which was held in Woburn), the
selectmen chosen were Capt. Thomas Brattle, of Bos-
ton ; Capt. Elisha Hutchinson, of Worcester ; Capt.
James Parker and Abraham Parker, of Groton, and
Jonathan Tyng, of Tyngsborough (then Dunstable).
Col. Tyng was the only one belonging to the Dun-
stable plantation.
Only three years after the close of the war the first
minister of the plantation, the Rev. Thomas Weld, was
settled. The early settlers were a devout and ortho-
dox people, in full sympathy, probably, with the ex-
isting laws of the Colony, which forbade " dancing at
weddings, wearing long hair or periwigs or supersti-
tious ribands, keeping Christmas, turning the back
on the preacher profanely before he had pronounced
the blessing, and courting a girl without the leave of
her parents."
Not alone for fear of the Indians did the good
people of the plantation suffer, for one reason as-
signed by the Governor of the Colony for proclaim-
ing a " general fast " was the appearance of the
comet of 1680, "that awful, portentous, blazing star,
usually foreboding some calamity to the beholders
thereof."
The peace which reigned in the Dunstable planta-
tion from 1676 to 1688 was attended with a rapid in-
crease in the number of settlers. A church was
formed, a pastor settled, new roads laid out, and there
368
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
were prospects of better days. But in 1688 another
war-cloud cast its gloom over the infant colony. The
English people, weary of the house of Stuart, and
especially of the reigning prince, James the Second,
had compelled his abdication of the Crown. He ap-
pealed to France. This nation, which, on account of
both the birth and the religion of James, sympathized
with his cause, took up arms in his defence. The war
is known in history as " King William's War," be-
cause William, of Orange, husband of Mary, the
daughter of James, sat upon the British throne, shar-
ing it with Mary, his wife. The war fell with terrible
effect upon the New England colonies. The French,
being in possession of Canada, found in the Indian a
most efficient ally. It was their favorite method of
warfare to "instigate the Indians to lay waste the
English colonies, in violation of all the rules of civi-
lized war. The peaceful farmer was butchered in the
field, his humble home was laid in ashes, his wife and
children murdered or carried into captivity. This
barbarous war was waged for ten weary years. But
only four years of peace followed the treaty of Rys-
wick in 1098. Upon the death of both William and
Mary, Anne, the sister of Mary, came to the throne.
Upon her accession the King of France renews the
war, and ten more years of bloodshed and cruelty af-
flict the New England colonies. The war is known
as "Queen Anne's War." Of the twenty-five years
following 1688 less than five were years of peace. At
length the treaty of Utrecht closed the protracted
struggle.
In this long period of twenty years of Indian war-
fare the Dunstable plantation, being on the frontier,
bore its full share of dangers and suffering?. In July,
1689, it petitioned the Governor and Council for
" twenty foot-men for the space of a month to scout
about the town, while we get our hay." In the
homely language of this petition there is hidden a
most painful suggestion of the terror which brooded
over the humble cabins of the settlers. In regard to
the actual sufferings of the plantation we have the
following records: "Anno Domini, 1691, Joseph
Hassell, Senior, Anna Hassell, his wife, Benjamin
Hassell, their son, were slain by our Indian Enemies
Sept. 2, in the evening. Mary Marks, the daughter of
Peter Marks, was slain by the Indians also on Sept. 2''
day in the evening." "Obadiah Perry & Christopher
Temple dyed by the hand of our Indian enemies on
Sept. the 28th day in the morning." Eight years
after the war began two-thirds of the settlers had left
the plantation. But, as in King Philip's War, one
man holds his position, the brave Col. Tyng, of
Tyngsborough.
In 1702, the first year of Queen Anne's War, a new
garrison was established having among its defenders
Jonathan and Wm. Tyng. Robert Parris, who was
denominated Col. Tyng's " vail," was slain by the
Indians. His wife and oldest daughter shared the
same fate. When the men sallied forth on expedi-
tions .igainst the foe their wives took their places in
the garrisons. In the winter of 1703, "Capt. Wm.
Tyng, with a small company of snow-shoe men, made
his way through the deep snows to Winnepiseogee
Lake. Near this lake the Indian known as ' Old
Harry,' who led the attack upon Lancaster, had his
headquarters. Capt. Tyng made an attack upon him,
killing 'O.d Harry' h'mself and five of his men.
For this act of bravery the General Court granted to
the heirs of those composing this company a tract of
land, at first called ' Old Harry's Town,' then Tyngs-
town, and afterwards Manchester."
Capt. John Tyng, in 1704, on a like expedition to
Pe(iuawket, killed five of the enemy. Capt. Jona-
than Tyng, the chosen commander of all the garri-
sons of the plantation, went to Lancaster to aid the
inhabitants in repulsing the Indians. And here he
met with a misfortune, which is thus quaintly told :
[His] " horse was, by the Indians, taken out of the
said pasture & driven into the woods, where they
killed and ate the s'* horse."
In 1706 270 Indiaus attacked one of the garrisoni
commanded by Captain Pearson, and Mrs. John Cum-
mings was killed and her husband taken captive. In
the bloody fight which followed several were killed of
both parties. Joe Enelish, a friendly Indian, the
grandson of Masconomo, Sagamore of Ipswich,
was shot near Holden's Brook, in Tyngsborough.
This faithful Indian was acting as a guard of Cap-
tain Butterfield and his wife. Captain Butter-
field escaped, while his wife was taken captive.
Joe English, to avoid a death by torture, provok-
ed the Indians to murder him upon the spot. In
1711 the plantation had seven garrisons, one of which
was the house of Colonel Tyng and another the house
of Henry Farwell, also in Tyngsborough. In these
seven garrisons were thirteen families and nineteen
soldiers.
Near the beginning of Queen Anne's War the first
and beloved pastor of the plantation. Rev. Thomas
Weld, died at the age of fifty years. He was a native
of Roxbury and the grandson of Rev. Thomas Weld,
first minister of Roxbury. He was a graduate of
Harvard College and was esteemed as a man of ex-
emplary piety. He had preached in the plantation
about twenty-three years. His first wife was Eliza-
beth, daughter of the Rev. John Wilson, of Medford,
an eminent divine. She died at the age of thirty-one
years, and was buried in the old burial-ground just
north of the line which separates Tyngsborough from
Nashua. Writers have heretofore asserted that the
second wife of Mr. Weld was Hannah, the widow of
Habijah Savage and sister of Colonel Jonathan Tyng,
but Mr. J. B. Hill, author of " Reminiscences of Old
Dunstable," controverts the statement, and Judge
William A. Richardson, who is very high authority,
concedes the correctness of Mr. Hill's assertion. The
graves of Mr. Weld and his first wife are side by side
in the old cemetery, each covered by a granite slab.
TYNGSBOROUGH.
369
On that which lies above the grave of Mr. Weld there
is no inscription.
Djring Queen Anne's War, which followed the
death of Mr. Weld, the plantation was unable to
support a minister. Indeed, from 1702 to 1720 there
was no settled pastor. In 1720 Rev. Nathaniel Pren-
tice, a graduate of Harvard College, was settled over
the church, and remained in office until his death, a
period of seventeen years. His wife was Mary, daugh-
ter of Colonel Jonathan Tyng. He died at the age
of fifty-nine years, and was succeeded in 1738 by Rev.
Josiah Swan, who remained in office eight years.
The treaty of Utrecht was followed by about eleven
years of peace, but both Frenchman and Indian
thirsted for revenge. The Marquis de Vaudreuil,
Governor of Canada, and the celebrated Jesuit, Se-
bastian Rale, instigated the Indians, whose head-
quarters were in Norridgewock, on the Kennebec, in
Maine, to begin anew the work of depredation and
murder upon the frontier settlements. In August,
1724, the English made an attack upon Norridge-
wock and a large number of Indians were slain.
Among the slain also was Father Rale. This atiack
did much to alarm and weaken the Eastern Indians,
but it seems to have inaugurated a new Indian war,
during which a band of Mohawks, on September 4,
1724, made an attack on the Dunstable plantation.
Xathao Cross and Thomas Blanchard were taken
captives, and Lieutenant Ebenezer French, Thomas
Lund, Oliver Farwell and Ebenezer Cummings, of
Dunstable, were slain, There were eight victime, and
their burial-place is marked by a monument. A part
of the inscription referring to Thomas Lund is in
quaint langu;ige and reads as follovs : " This man
with seven more that lies in this grave, was slew all
in a day by the Indians.'' This attack aroused the
people of Dunstable to efficient and aggressive action.
John Lovewell, Josiah Farwell and Jonathan Rob-
bins petitioned the General Assembly for leave to
'• raise a company and scout igainst the Indians.''
The petition was granted and a bounty of 100 pounds
was offered for every Indian's scalp. John Lovewell
organized the expedition, and the enterprise is known
in history as " Lovewell's War." Especially has the
bloody battle which closed the campaign, and which
is known as "Lovewell's Fight," been the theme of
poetry and song — a sad theme indeed, but one which
has given to the brave actors immortal renown —
" With footsteps slow shall travelers go
Where Lovewell's pond shines clear and bnght,
And iDRrIi the place where those are laid
Who fell in Lovewell's hloodj fight.
Old men shall shake their heads and saj ;
' Sad was the hour and terrible,
When Ixivewell brave 'gainst Pangus went
With fift.v men from Dunstable.' "
The limits of this article will allow only the brief-
est record of this expedition, so full of dramatic and
tragic interest.
24-ii
John Lovewell was a man who delighted in adven-
ture. He was born in 1691, and was now in the prime
of manhood, being nearly thirty-four years of age.
He was the son of John Lovewell, whose house was
on the north side of Salmon Brook, in Nashua, where
its cellar is still to be seen. Tradition says that he,
too, had been a soldier.
Late in the year 1724, Captain Lovewell, with his
company of picked men, at one time eighty-eight in
number, started upon an excursion into the Indian
country. Success and victory everywhere attended
him. His third and last expedition was in the spring
of 1725 against the headquarters of the Pequawketta,
on the Saco River. It was in the town of Fryeburg,
Me., near what is known as " Lovewell's Pond," that
the final and historic battle occurred on May 8, 1725.
The Indians were defeated and their chief, Paugus,
slain, but at a fearfal cost. Captain Lovewell and
eight more were killed upon the spot. Subsequently,
Colonel Eleazer Tyng, with his company, visited the
scene, and found the bodies of twelve men, whom
they buried, carving their names upon the trees where
the battle was fought. They also found the body of
the Indian chieftain, Paugus. This battle, following
the destruction of Norridgewock, so terrified the In-
dians, that they removed at a greater distance from
the plantation, and from this time the inhabitants
suffered very little from Indian depredations. Doubt-
less it was the happy results of the " Lovewell Fight"
that made it, in subsequent years, the theme of so
many ballads and songs. Rejoicing in the safety of
their homes, the people loved to sing of the valor of
those whose blood had purchased the blessing. Fifty
' loag years of war and massacre had ended.
i We will not, however, dismiss our notice of " Love-
I well's Fight " without a brief mention of one of the
I heroic band who fell in the encounter. Jonathan
! Frye, of Andover, a young man of devout piety, the
son of a clergyaian and a graduate of Harvard Col-
lege, was, though only twenty years of age, the chap-
lain of the company. He seems to have joined the
expedition as a solemn religious duty. When he saw
that death from the dangerous wound received in the
battle was soon to come, he sent word to his father by
his comrades, that he was not afraid to die. Hon.
George B. Loring, who was a native of the same town
with young Frye, thus gracefully speaks of him :
" Many a time have I, when a boy, paused to rest be-
neath the shade of a graceful, sturdy and imposing
elm-tree, which crowns one of the finest hills in my
native town of North Andover, and I have mused
there upon the sad and tragic story of that young
man, Jonathan Frye, who, when he left his home to
join Captain Lovewell's expedition, planted that tree,
that he might, as he said, leave his monument be-
hind, should he fall in the service." The beautiful
town of Fryeburg, in which the battle was fonght,
perpetuates his name.
Upon the return of peace, the plantation, " so well
370
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
stored with timber and so rich in pasturage,"' invited
new settlers from Chelmsford, Billerica, Woburn,
Concord and other places. A settlement is begun on
the east side of the Merrimack, which was first culled
Nottingham, and, in 1830, received the name of Hud-
son.
In 1734 an extensive tract called Naticook was set
otf from the plantation. This tract embraced the
towns of Litchfield and Merrimack, N. H.. Nissi-
tisait, which now embraces the towns of HoUis and
Brookline, was incorporated in 1739 as the " West
Parish of Dunstable." The running of the divis-
ional line, in 1741, between Massachusetts and New
Hampshire, about which there had been a long and
bitter dispute, still further curtails and subdivides
the Dunstable plantation. The part which fell to
New Hampshire became the towns of Nashua and
Nashville, while Dunstable, including Tyngsborough,
fell to Massachusetts. The easterly part of Dunsta-
ble, lying on both sides of the Merrimack, was known
as the First Parish of Dunstable until 17S9, when it
was incorporated as a district under the name of
Tyngsborough, which became an incorporated town
in 1809.
The principal cause of the disintegration of the
Dunstable plantation was that the new settlements,
which rapidly increased in numbers af'er the return
of peace, desired the control of their own civil affuirs
" for greater convenience of public worship." The
modern reader is surprised at the importance which the
question of public worship assumed in that early day.
The choice of the minister, the location of the meet-
ing-house aroused passions, and created hoslilrties and
personal animosities, and violent prejudices between
different sections of the plantations, the heat of which
still sleeps in the embers. The Rev. Joseph Emerson,
at the dedication of the second meeting-house in Pep-
perell, in referring w this bitter coutentiou, declares
that the devil was at the bottom of it, because he
was a great enemy of settling ministers and building
meeting-houses. We can hardly believe that these
animosities were the fruit of that piety which sutTer-
eth long and is kind. Even the clergymen were not
always profoundly devout. It is told of the Rev. Mr.
Swan, the second settled minister, that once, having
forgotten the day of the week, he compelled his hired
men, in spite of earnest protest, to go to work on his
farm on Sabbath morning, and was only undeceived
when he saw " Old John Lovewell " coming up the
hill on his way to church. The location of the meet-
ing-house was the cause of much bitter feeling and
of the final separation of the present town of Dun-
stable from Tyngsborough, and it is only a few years
since a literary gentleman who proposed to write
the history of Dunstable, was requested to say as
little as possible about Tyngsborough.
In 1732, on thequeslion whether the people " would
build a decent meeiing-house or rectify and mend the
old one," it was decided not to rectify, but to build,
whereupon nineteen persons entered their dissent, the
new location being four rods westward of the old one.
\Vheu upon the division of the plantation it became
necessary for ihe town of Dunstable (including Tyngs-
borough) to build a new church, no location proved
satisfactory, and it was voted on June 20, 1746, " that
the place of preaching the gospel this summer be at
Epbraim Lund's barn."
The settlement in 1747 of Rev. Samuel Bird, who
was a " New Light," was the occasion of great dis-
satisfaction on I he part of orthodox men, and the i)eo-
ple of Dunstable and Tyngsborough, with olhe.'s,
formed a separate church, worshiping in the old meet-
ing-house just north of the Tyngsborough line.
It was voted in 1749 " to hire a school for 3
months," but soon the French War iute.-veni.'d, and
there is no further record of a school till 1701. After
this date money for schools was voted almost every
year, and in 177o the township was divided into five
school districts, and in that year school-houses were
first erected.
After long contention, a meeting-house was at
length erected by the people of Dunstable and Tyngs-
borough on a rocky knoll upon the road leading from
Dunstable to Tyngsborough, about one mile from the
former place. The frame was raised on July IS,
1753. So dissatisfied were the people of the easterly
part of the township (now Tyngsborough) with the
location of the meeting-house, that in 1755 ihey
formed themselves into a precinct called tfie First
Parish of Dunstable. This was the initial act which
resulted in the complete separation of the towns of
Tyngsborough and Dunstable.
At a meeting of Ihe First Parish in August, 1755,
it was voted ihat " the Place tor a Meeting House lor
the Publick worship of God in this precinct (Tyngs-
borough) be on the west of ilerrimack River, near
Mr. James Gordon's mills, where a fraim is erected
for that purpose. Also Voted to accept the Fraim
that is Now on the spot. Mes>rs. John Tyng & Jona-
than Tyng came to the meeting & gave the Precinct
Glass for the meeting-house." Eleazer Tyng was
moderator.
The meeting-house was erected near the site of the
present Unitarian Church. The new church seems
to have been extravagantly decorated, having two
porches and a tall steeple. Hon. John Pitts is said
to have written of it :
*'.\ ven- srnull uieetiui; bouse,
A very lall bteeplo,
A very proud parson,
A ijueer sort of people.'*
The members of the First Parish (now Tyngs-
borough) in 1702 were : Eleazer Tyng, John Tyng,
John A. Tyng, James Tyng. Wra. H. Prentice, Wm.
Gordon, Robert Fletcher, Samuel Gould, Joseph
Butterfield, Reuben Butterfield, John Perham, Joseph
Perham, James Perham, Jacob Fletcher, Elijah
Fletcher, Zaccheus Spaulding, Thomas Jewell, Benoni
TYNGSBOROUGH.
371
Jewell, John Ingles, Jonathan Perham, Samuel
Fletcher, John Littlehale, Abraham Littlehale, Tim-
othy Bancroft, Jonathan Butterfield, Jonathan Far-
well, Joseph Winn, Eleazer Farwell, Benjamin Far-
well, Simon Thompson, Ezra Thompson, Silas Thomp-
son, Asa Thompsjn, John Alls, Thomas Esterbrook,
Thomas Esterbrook, Jr., Timothy Barron, Wm. Bar-
ron, Robert Scott, Jacob Reed, John Scott, Willard
Hale, John Lewis, Reuben Lewis, Archibald Robin-
eon, Joseph French, Esq., Lieutenant John Varnum,
James Littlehale, Daniel Fletcher, John Didson,
Samuel Howard, Oliver Colburn, Ezra Oolburn, John
Ayres, John Haddock, John Hamblet. Seven of the
above lived on the east side of the Merrimack. The
town owned a ferry-boat which plied upon the river.
" The mill of Wm. Gordon, on Bridge Meadow
Brook and the tavern were the general places of
resort. Several slaves were held in easy bondage
and some person was annually chosen to protect the
deer, which were still occasionally found in the ex-
tensive forest."
Although the township was ecclesiastically divided
into First and Second Parishes, still in civil affairs it
Was a single township. In 1760, for example, all the
selectmen were chosen from the First Parish. They
were Eleazer Tyng, Major John A. Tyng and Joseph
Dan forth.
Our narrow limits demand that we pass over the
unimportant even'.s of the next fev! years and come
to the years which immediately precede the War of
the Revolution.
Hon. John Tyng was in 1768 chosea to represent
Dunstable (including Tyngsborough) in the conven-
tion held in Boston for the preservation of the public
peace and safety, and in 1775, John Tyng and James
Tyng represented the town in the Provincial Congress.
In the battle of Bunker Hill a Dunstable company
having Ebenezer Bancroft for captain and Nathaniel
Holden as lieutenant, both belonging to the precinct
of Tyngsborough, performed effective service. Captain
Bancrolt, in 1825, then at the age of seventy-seven
years, gave to J. B. Hill, Esq., interesting reminis-
cences of that battle, from which we quote the follow-
ing. '"Col. Prestcott came to me and said if you can
do anything with the cannon I wish you would. I
give you charge of them . . . The British troops had
begun their march. They were steadily and confident-
ly advancing directly in our front — a veteran army
marching on firmly to the attack directly in [our]
front. It was an awful moment. The enemy had
advanced perhaps half the way from their station
towards us, and our men, seeing no reinforcements,
began by a simultaneous movement to draw off from
the east side of the redoubt. Col. Prescott hastened
to them and I followed him. We represented with
earnestness that they must not go off; that if they did
all would go. They cheerfully took their places again.
Our first fire was shockingly fatal. There was scarcely
a shot but told. The enemv were thrown into confu-
sion and retreated a abort distance. They formed
again and advanced, and were a second time driven
back. They formed a third time and flanked us.
Our ammunition was now nearly expended. We were
soon surrounded on all sides. The day was over, and
we had nothing more but to retreat as well as we
could. I soon lost my gun, a remarkably long one
which I had taken from the French at Chamblee in
the old French war."
Colonel Bancroft was at the battle of Bennington,
and continued in the service during the war. He
held many civil offices and lived on his farm in
Tyngsborough to the age of seventy-nine years.
Among the soldiers from Tyngsborough in this war
were : " Sergeant Jonathan Bancroft, Captain Reuben
Butterfield, Captain Nathaniel Holden (whose house
is still standing on the left bank of Holden's Brook),
Captain Jonathan Fletcher, Eleazer Farwell, Nathan-
iel Ingalls, Lieutenant John Farwell, Levi Butter-
field, Salathiel Frost, Wm. Perham, Robbin Skinner,
John Merrill, Daniel Jaques, Benjamin Swan, Asa
Emerson, Noah M. Gould and Sergeant Reuben But-
terfield, Jr., who was killed in the battle of White
Plains, October 7, 1777." For this list I am indebted
to Mr. Nason, as also for much else.
The sacrifices made by the town during the war are
indicated by the fact that its number of inhabitants at
the beginning (in 1775) was 705, but in 1783 only
578.
In 1776 the committee of the precinct of Tyngs-
borough were Captain Ebenezer Bancroft, Captain
Reuben Butterfield and Lieutenant Nathaniel Holden.
The parish voted in 1777 " to pay the soldiers for 8
months' service in the war at Cambridge eight pounds
to each man who belonged to the parish."
Colonel Eleazer Tyng died in 1782, at the age of
ninety-two years. He was the third son of Colonel
t Jonathan Tyng, and a graduate of Harvard College.
He was buried in the old Tyng burial-ground, about
I a mile below Tyngsborough village. The horizontal
: tablet above his grave bears the following inscription :
I "Underneath are entombed the remains of Eleazer
i Tyng, Esq., who died May 21, 1782, aged 92; Mrs.
' Sarah Tyng, who died May 23, 1753, aged 59: John
! Alford Tyng, Esq., who died Sept. 4, 1775, aged 44;
j John Winslow, Esq., who died Nov. 3, 1788, aged 88;
Mrs. Sarah Winslow (the last surviving child of the
said Eleazer Tyng & the truly liberal benefactress of
the church of Christ & Grammar School in this place,
in honor of whose name & family it is called Tyngs-
borough), who died Oct. 29, 1791, aged 72."
At the close of the Revolutionary War the town
was divided into two parishes, each having its own
house of worship. The First Parish in 1809 became
the town of Tyngsborough, the second became the
town of Dunstable. The two churches were both
feeble, and for very much of the time were unable to
support a settled minister.
In 1780 there arose a very earnest desire to unite
372
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the two parishes and thus form one strong consoli-
dated church. On November 20, 17SIj, it was voted
by the Second Parish "to Joyn with the 1st jiarish in
this Town in applying to the General Court to dis-
solve the Line between the two parishes and to erect
a house for the publick worship of God at the place
where Mr. Ezra Thompson's barn now stands & will
give up our meeting house for the use of the Towu
upon Condition that the First Parish give their meet-
ing house for the same use." In January, 1787, simi-
lar action was taken by the First Parish. But dis-
sensions arose, and the union so much desired failed
to be accomplished.
In January, 1789, an event occurred which rendered
vain all further attempts at union and resulted in the
complete separation of the two parishes into two in-
dependent municipalities.
Mrs. Sarah [TyngJ Winslovfr, widow of John Wins-
low, and daughter of Colonel Eleazer Tyng, shortly
after the death of her husband, made a donation to
the town upon conditions wliich, instead of "uniting
the town in peace," as was her de.tign, only tended to
strengthen and confirm tbe spirit of dissension. She
gave the income of 1333 pounds to the town "to pro-
mote learning and piety & to unite the town in
peace." The offensive conditions were these (1).
"That the towu repair the East meetinghouse, &
that the meeting-house be forever upheld on the spot
on which the said meeting-house now stands." 2.
"That a convenient houre for a Grammar School be
built within one year as near the said meeting-house
as the grounds will admit a house for said purpose."
These conditions locating both church and school
in the First Parish could not be accepted by the
Second Parish. Whereupon Mrs. Winslow tenders
the donation to the First Parish instead of the town,
and in order to possess the legal right to receive and
appropriate the property thus donated, the First
Parish procures, in June, 17S'J, an act of incorpora-
tion into a district under the name of Tyngsborough.
Dunstable and Tyngaborough now became two dis-
tinct muDicipalitie-*, and now for the first time the
writer has the pleasure of using the name "Tyngs-
borough" in a strictly appropriate sense.
In regard to this separation it would be somewhat
difficult to decide whether Tyngsboroiigh was cut off
from Dunstable or Dunstable from Tyngsborough.
It was a question of |irecedence. In favor of Duns-
table is the fact that she retained the old plantation
name, while on the other hand Tyngsboroueh was the
First Parish and Dunstable the Second. Perhaps also
Tyngsborough had the larger poptilation, (or in an
enumeration taken in the next year (1790) Tyngsbor-
ough had 382 inhabilant-i and Dunstable 380.
These towns continue to be among the smallest
towns in the State; the population of Tyngsborough
in 1885 being 604, and that of Dunstable, 4;!1.
On January 6, 1790, one hundred years ago, a
church was formed in Tyngsborough, and the Rev.
, Nathaniel Lawrence, a young man who, two years
before, bad graduated from Harvard College, was
settled as pastor. His pastorate was remarkable for
having coniinued forty-nine years. At the age of
seventy-two years, while apparently in good health,
, he died suddenly on the Sabbath when reiurning
j from church.
I Rev. Mr. Lawrence, in 1815, wrote a brief account
1 of the town of Tyngsborough, from which I take the
j following items: "Tbe greatest length of Tyngsbor-
ough is 9 miles, the greatest breadth 5 miles. The
Merrimack is here 35 to -W rods wide. Tyng's Pond
I was named from Hon. John Tyng. The soil of the
' intervale lands of the town is luxurious. Few towns
formerly contained more beautiful forests; yellow
: pine, various kind of oak and the walnut most ))re-
i vail. Many farms produce annually from 100 to 200
I barrels of cyder. The town has three saw-mills and
' one grist-mill, one woolen-carding machine, two tav-
1 erns, two stores, one publick (grammar) school, usu-
[ ally taught by a student from Harvard or Dartmouth,
on a salary of about $300; also a library of 140 vol-
! umes well selected. The religious society enjoys
i much peace and harmony. The income from Mrs.
' Winslow's fund is about SO pounds per year. Since
the formation of the church, in 1790, eighty members
have been added. Health has prevailed, though in
j 1813 there were 00 cases of spotted fever, none of
j which were fatal. Population at the last census 704.
1 The oldest person of those who have died was Hon.
John Tyng, who died in bis 93d year. Mrs. Winslow
died of a lethargy. She was esteemed in life, at her
death embalmed with tears, and to this day her mem-
ory is precious."
The limited space of this article forbids a full
i chronological record of the town. Tbe re^t of its
] history must be very brief and confined to a few im-
portant topics somewhat independent of chronologi-
cal order.
! Soxs OF Tyxcscorocgh. — When we consider
; that the popolation of Tyngsborough is less than one
■ hundredth of that of Lowell, it will be readily con-
; ceded that this small town has been the birth-place
aud residence of a remarkable number of dis(in-
guished men. Of these men a few deserve a special
! record: Edward Tyng, the founder of the Tyng fam-
j ily, his son, CjI. Jonathan Tyng, and his grandson,
Col. Eleazer Tyng, were all among the most distin-
guished men of New England in those early days.
We have already given each of them especial notice.
Judge John Tyng, grandson of Col. Jonathan Tyng,
was chief justice of the Court of Common Pleas,
and was a man " distinguished for his ability and
I force of character." Hon. John Pitts, son-in-law of
Judge Tyng, was a graduate of Harvard and at one
time Speaker of the Myssachusetta House of Repre-
' scntatives. Dudley Atkins Tyng was a graduate of
i Harvard and received from that college the title of
' LL.D. Dr. Samuel L. Dana, a distinguished physi-
TYNGSBOROUGH.
373
cian, cbemi;t and author, was a graduate of Harvard
and received the title of LL.D. Daniel S. Richardson,
Wm. A. Richardson and Geo. F. Richardson, the three
sons of Daniel Richardson, a lawyer in Tyngsborough,
have conferred especial honor upon their native town.
They are all graduates of Harvard, in the years 1S36,
1843 and 1850, respectively ; they all entered the .pro-
fession of law and became prominent and honored res-
idents of the city of Lowell, and, what is a most
remarkable fact, which probably has no parallel in the
history of the cities of America, each brother in succes-
sion had the honor of being elected to the pre.'fidency
of the Common Council of the city of their adoption.
Daniel S., who has been called the Nestor of the
Lowell bar, recently died at the age of seventy-three
years. Wm. A., now chief justice of the Court of
Claims at Washington, has reached the hightest offi-
cial position among the sons of Tyngsborough, having
been at one time Secretary of the United Slates
Treasury. Geo. F., afrer ably and gracefully filling
the positions of Senator in the General Court of Mas-
sachusetts, and mayor of the city of Lowell, has
withdrawn from political l^e, and holds a dis-
tinguished position at the bar of Middlesex County.
Of other residents of Tyngsborough who have re-
ceived a college education are, Francis Brinley, who
graduated from Harvard iu 1818, Charles Butterfieid
(Harvard, 1820), Dr. Augustus Peirce (Harvard, 1820),
Lendall P. Cazeaux (Harvard, 18-12), Roger B. Hil-
dreth (Harvard, 1843), Joseph Danforth (Dartmouth,
1811), Geo. Bancroft (Dartmouth, 1830). This list
does not include various pastors of the churches of
Tyngsborough who have been graduates of colleges.
Of the above listof college graduates Dr. Augustus
Peirce should receive special notice. He was born
in New Salem, Mass , March 13, 1803, and graduated
from Harvard in 1820. In college he was the wit of his
class. In his junior year, when only seventeen years of
age, he delivered before the " College Engine Club "
a humorous poem entitled " Rebelliad," which was re-
ceived by his comrades with unbounded applause, and
which was far more acceptable to the students than
complimentary to the members of the faculty. Presi-
dent Kirkland, having called young Peirce before
him ostensibly to censure him for his habit of "cut-
ting prayers," dimissed him with the following re-
proof: " I think, Peirce, you would be more regular in
attending morning prayers if you retired earlier in
the evening and did not sit up so late writing poor
poetry." However, the popular estimate of the poem
prevailed, and a copy of it is now preserved in the
college library.
Dr. Peirce was a man of quick perceptions, agree-
able manners, and of a cast of mind admirably
adapted to the practice of his profession. After a prac-
tice of ten years in Tyngsborough, having, as was
supposed, been poisoned from a lead pipe which en-
tered his well, his health failed, and, in the prime of
his manhood, he died in 1849, at the age of forty-seven
years. His son. Dr. Augustus F. Peirce, wboBucceeded
his father in the medical practice in Tyngsborough,
wasgreatly beloved as a man, and gave high promise
as a physician. But his career was brief. He died of
consumption in 1855, at the age of only twenty-eight
years.
Dr. Calvin Thomas, the predecessor of Dr. Peirce,
though not a graduate of Harvard, received, in 1824,
the honorary degree of M.D. from that University,
when at the age of fifty-nine years.
Dr. Thomas was born in Chesterfield, N. H., Dec.
22, 1765. Having lost his parents in his early years, he
learned the trade of a carpenter, which, however, he
soon relinquished on account of failing health. Atthe
age of twenty-four years he commenced the study of
medicine. At theage of twenty-eight years, beingre-
solved to find an eligible field for the practice of
his profession, he started on horseback from Putney,
Vt., where he had studied medicine under Dr. Josiah
Goodhue, and in his journey stopped over-uight in the
town of Tyngsborough. Something attracted him to
the place, and he made it the field of his long profes-
sional practice of fifty-six years.
Dr. Thomas wasno ordinary man. "He was over six
feet in height, of a florid complexion and a large and
compact frame. The day before bis last sickness,
being then almost eighty-seven years old, he success-
fully reduced a dislocated humerus with only the
assistance of a neighbor." In one of his thirty large
books of memoranda, which he diligently kept for
many long years, he made the following record for
December 22, 1849 : " This day I am 84 years old,
and crossed the Merrimack River in a canoe, walked
one mile to visit a patient." He died in 1851 at the
age of nearly eighty-seven years.
Dr. Charles Dutton, now the practicing physician of
the town, keeps in his office the portraitof his revered
predecessor. Dr. Thomas, while in his large and suc-
cessful practice he follows the footsteps of the aged
physician. Tyngsborough is the birth-place of John
S. Sleeper, formerly mayor of Roxbury and author of
" Salt Water Bubbles " and other pleasing literary
works. Mr. Sleeper was for twenty years, from 1834
to 1854, the editor of the Boston Journal. He was
born September 21, 1794.
The population of Tyngsborough in 1790 was 382 ;
in 1800", 696; in 1840, 870; in 1870,626; in 1880,
629 ; in 1885, 604.
From this statement it appears that there was a
rapid increase of population following the incorpora-
tion as a district in 1789, and that for the last forty
years there has been a gradual decline. The town
has fcharad, with almost all other agricultural towns
in New England, the depletion in population conse-
quent upon the establishment of the great manufac-
turing enterprises of recent years in other localities.
In the War of the Rebellion Tyngsborough, though
she sent forth no organized company, contributed of
her sons to swell the ranks of companies elsewhere
374
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
formed. The following is a list, probably not com-
plete, of the soldiers sent by this town :
Corporal Peter Littlehale and Corporal Solomon
t?paulding, Company D, Sixth Regiment Infantry.
M. v. M. ; Charles A. Gordon, Erasmus Holmes, Geo.
F. Laird were privates in the same company ; Charles
E. Andrews, Company A, Sixth Regiment; Francis O.
Bntterfield, Nathaniel Brinley, Jr., Samuel Burrows,
Charles Burrows, Reuben O. Coburn, Samuel N. Young,
James Murphy, Warren Pierce, Company K, First
Regiment Heavy Artillery. Of these soldiers Brinley
died in prison at Andersonville, Sept. 16, 1864; Sam-
uel Burrows died in Baltimore, July 27, 1864, and
Pierce was appointed hospital steward May 11, 1864.
In the same regiment was Daniel B. Lawrence, of
Company L. In the Second Regiment of Heavy
Artillery was Francis A. Sawyer, of Company E, and
in the Third Regiment, Richard Feighely, of Com-
pany G.
Henry H. Babb, Michael Carney, Russell S. Horton,
Lemuel B. Jones and James E. Moulton were in Fourth
Regiment of Heavy Artillery.
Frank Wilson, Company E, Twenty-sixth Regiment
Infantry ; John F. Blodgett, corporal. Company C,
Thirtieth Regiment, died at Carrolton, La., Oct. 12,
1862. Peter Butterfield, of the same regiment, died at
Xew Orleans, Nov. 5, 1862. Andrew J. Cummings
was in the same regiment. In the Thirty-third Reg-
iment were Benj. Frost, Winfield S. Hunier, Josiah S.
Jaques, Martin Davis. In the Fifty-seventh Regiment,
Jeremiah Dacy. In the Fifty-ninth, Charles R
Berry. In the Sixty-second ; Geo. M. Kimball, Patrick
Bryan, Company A, Ninth Regiment; John Burns,
Company K, Ninth Regiment ; Joseph E. Lewis, Com-
pany G, Seventeenth Regiment ; John H. Hutchinson,
Company C, Eighteenth Regiment; Geo. W. Butter-
field, Company E, Twenty-fourth Regiment ; J. A. Sar-
gent, Twenty-sixth Regiment : John D. Littlehale,
Company E, First Regiment C ivalry ; Owen Clancey,
Company E, Second Regiment Cavalry ; Geo. Emerson
Company I, Second Regiment Cavalry, killed at
Opequan Creek, Va.
Churches. — When Tyngsborough became a parish,
in 1755, it acquired the authority for managing its re-
ligious affairs independently of Dunstable. The
parish proceeded to erect a house of worship, but for
many years possessed no organized church or settled
pastor. On becoming a district, in 1789, it acquired
the additional power of holding property in its own
right. In 1800 it formed a regul.ir church organiza-
tion and settled a pastor, Rev. Nathaniel Lawrence,
of whom we have already spoken. Mr. Lawrence
was in sentiment an Orthodox Congregationalist,
Upon the close of the service of Mr. Lawrence, in ISSi*
the church settled a Unitarian pastor, Rev. Horatio
Wood, who officiated until 1844, wheu he became
Minister at Large in Lowell, in which ciiy he still re-
Hides. From 1844 to 1854 the pastor was Rev. Wm.
Morsj. Rev. Geo. Osgood was the pastor from 1854 to
I 1859. Rev. Nathaniel O. Chaffee followed Mr. Osgood
I in a brief pastorate. The Rev. Stillman Barbour held
the pastoral ofiice until 1868. The succeeding pastor-
ate, that of Rev. Mr. Knowlton, was cut short almost
at its beginning by the death of Mr. Knowlton. From
1869 to 1871 the pastor was Rev. Angus R. Kennedy,
who was succeeded by Rev. John S. Smith in a pas-
torate of eight years. Rev. Wm. W. Tufts, afterwards
a physician in Arlington, Mas?., succeeded Mr. Smith.
Rev. James Danforth was pastor of the church from
1884 to 1887, when Rev. Henry C. Parker, of Nashua,
was employed to preach every Sabbath afternoon.
In 1888 the present pastor, Rev. J. M. W. Pratt,
was settled.
Brief mention should also be made of a church in
Tyngsborough which continued for about a quarter
of a century, but has for more tlian a quarter of a
century ceased to exist. Its records even have dis-
appeared.
This was the Baptist Church of Tyngsborough
which was probably organized as early as 1835. The
church erected e, house of worship and had a succes-
sion of settled pastors, among whom were Rev. Mr.
Parkhurst and Rev. Mr. Herrick.
The church was abandoned more than twenty-five
years ago, and in 1864 the house of worship was sold
to the town. This house is now used for public pur-
poses, the first story being devoted to the Wicslow
Grammar School, and the second story to a town hall
and public library.
There is an interesting tradition respecting the
piety and constancy of Deacon Thaddeus Davis, an
honored officer of the Baptist Church. For
twenty years he was in his place in church on every
Sabbath day. At the end of this time a severe sick-
ness confined him for a season to his house. On his
recovery he resumed his habit of church-going, which,
without the interruptiim, continued for fifteen addi-
tional years. The good deacon was equally constant
in what he didn't do as in what he did do, for during
his I'lng residence in Tyngsborough he never once
crossed the Merrimack River, which runs through the
centre of the town.
The Univenalist Church of Tyngsborough was or-
ganized about 1840. A small house of worship was
erected and a succession of pastors was installed.
Among these pastors were Rev. Josiah Oilman, who
served about two yeirs; Rev. Wm. Hooper, lour or
five years; Rev. J. V. Wilson, one year; Rev. Q. A.
Shinn, one year; Rev. A. R. Wright, one year. Since
Mr. Wright's pastorate (1882) no staled preaching has
been held. Rev. J. M. Usher for two years occupied
the pulpit one-half of the Sabbaths for about two
years, giving to Dunstable one-half of his services.
The house is now in the control of the " Universalist
Convention," and is ouly occasionnlly used.
TIte Evangelical Church of Tt/ngiborough was estab-
lished in 1868 mainly through the efforts of Miss
Sarah Coburn and Miss Elizabeth Coburn. Henry
TYNGSBOROUGH.
375
F. Duraiit, Esq., also rendered valuable pecuniary
aid in giving success to the enterprise. The firist
preacher of this church was Rev. Samuel E. Lowry.
The first settled pastor was Rev. Charles S. Brooks,
who was succeeded by Rev. John Haley. The pres-
ent pastor, Rev. Charles M. Carpenter, was ordained
April 22, 1890. The church has erected a house of
worship at the cost of $7000.
Public Schools. — The town of Tyngsborough,
during the school-year ending in March, 1890, sus-
tained six puolic schools during the spring term, two
during the summer term, five during the fall term,
and three during the winter term, the entire expendi-
ture for schools being $1833.
The school founded by Mrs. Winslow had an aver-
age membership of twenty-one scholars. The income
of the Winslow fund was $120, which was between
one-third and one-fourth of the entire sum expended
for tuition in that school. The Winslow School, in
which the studies appropriate both for a high school
and a grammar school are taught, has never had a
house erected especially for its permanent accommo-
dation, but occupies the lower story of the town-
house, which was constructed as a house of worship
by the Baptist Society. The School Committee con-
sidered the room ill adapted to the wants of such a
school. The School Committee, in their report pre.
pared by Channing Whittaker, Esq., take high
grounds in favor of the appointment of such teachers
as have been especially trained to the performance of
the duties of an instructor, and for appropriating the
money justly demanded for securing such instructors.
Makufactures. — The manufactures of Tyngsbor-
ough are limited by the wantof sufficient water-power.
Mill Brook and one or two other streams afford a
small amount of power, and there are in the town two
box manufactories in active operation, a brush manu-
factory, two grist-mills and two saw-mills.
The box manufictory and eaw-mill of John G. Up-
ton, dealer in lumber, are somewhat extensive, giving
employment to about twenty men.
The brush manufactory of H. A. Washburn gives
employment to about five men. The bo.x manufactory
of E. O. Fifield is on the Dunstable road.
On the east side of the Merrimack a saw-mill is
operated by W. A. Sherburne.
The manufacture of boxes has been carried on in
the town for twenty-five years or more.
The Social Libraey of Tyngsboeodgh. — As
early as 1794 a small library was started in the
town, which in 1797 contained twenty-six volumes.
In 1798 the libraries of Tyuj^sborough and Dunbtable
were united. The library thus formed was sustained
until 1833, when the books were distributed among
the proprietors. A new library was organized in 1831,
called "'The Social Library of Tyngsborough," hav-
ing for its directors Dr. Calvin Thoma.s, Daniel Rich-
ardson, Esq., and Robert Briuley, Esq. In 1878 this
library was donated by its proprietors to the town,
and it constitutes a part of the free public library,
which is controlled by trustees. It now contains 3319
volumes. The librarian is Mrs. Lizzie T. Curtis. In
1880 Hon. Geo. F. Richardson, of Lowell, donated to
this library 100 volumes.
The Brinley Mansion. — As the traveler passes
up the right bank of the Merrimack the most impos-
ing object which meets his eye is the Brinley Man-
sion. It is a stately structure of three stories, tower-
ing aloft upon the summit of a high sTrell of land
admirably adapted to such an edifice. On either side
of the mansion are spacious verandahs two stories in
height, and in the rear the various out-buildings are
tastefully arranged. The mansion is about fifty rods
from the street, having in front, covering the lawn,
a grove of lofty elms, while across the river the banks
are clothed with a forest of evergreen trees. The
whole scene produces a fine effect, both for its grand-
eur and its esthetic beauty. One thing only breaks
the charm. On one of the elms near the gate-way is
a placard on which, in large letters, is the very un-
poetic legend: "For Sale."
So much interest attaches to this mansion, and the
vast Tyng estate on which it stands, that a very brief
history will be given. Edward Tyng, a merchant in
London and afterwards in Boston, was, as has already
been told, the founder of this estate. An account of
Edward Tyng and of his son. Col. Jonathan Tyng,
has already been given. William Tyng, the second
son of Col. Jonathan Tyng, was the father of Judge
John Tyng, chief justice of the Court of Common
Pleas after the Revolution. Judge Tyng, being an
only son, received the estate from his grandfather,
Col. Jonathan Tyng. Mary, the only daughter of
Judge Tyng, became the wife of John Pitts, of Bos-
ton, who graduated at Harvard in 1757, and, at one
time, was Speaker of the Massachusetts House of
Representatives. It was Mr. Piits who erected the
Brinley Jlansion, just described, on ihe site of the old
and rambling house in which his father in-law. Judge
Tyng, had lived.
Mrs. Pitts having become the inheritor of her
father's large estate, she and her husband resided a
part of the time in Tyngsborough, Mr. Pitts being
the clerk of the district in 1789.
Having thus far traced Ihe family of William Tyng,
we return to trace that of his younger brother, Colo-
nel Eleazer Tyng.
Colonel Eleazer Tyng was the third sou of Colonel
Jonathan Tyng. He graduated at Harvard in 1712,
and was, in both civil and military affairs, one of the
most important men of the town. Sarah, the only
daughter of Colonel Eleazer Tyng, became the wife
of John Winslow, of Boston. Having outlived her
husband, and having no children, she persuaded
Dudley Atkins, of Newbury, a distant relative, to as-
sume the name of Tyng, and made him the heir of
most of her large estate. The estate was sold by him
to Nathaniel Brinley in 1779. Robert Brinley, son of
376
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the purchaser, not only inherited from bis father the
Winslow estate, but, having married Elizabeth Pitts,
a granddaughter of Judge John Tyng, he became the
proprietor of most of the property left by Colonel
Jonathan Tyng to his two son?, William and Eleazer,
He was familiarly called Sir Robert Brinley, and was
a highly honored gentleman of the old school. He
took an active interest in the affairs of the town. His
son Robert was never married. His son Nathaniel
lived in Tyngsborough, occupying the Brinley man-
sion. Of the children of Nathaniel Brinley, William
Brinley is a resident of Meredith, N. H. ; Mary E.
Kennedy, whose husband, the Rev. Angus R. Ken-
nedy, was pastor of the Unitarian Church in Tyngs-
borough, resides in Lowell, and Nathaniel Brinley,
Jr., died in prison at Andersouville in 1864.
Too often in recent years has the community been
startled at the sudden downfall of men who have long
he'd the highest positions of trust and honor in the
religious and commercial world, a downfall which
brings with it disaster and ruin to confiding bond-
men and creditors. A conspicuous example of this
class of men was Abraham Jackson, of Boston, by
whose astounding defalcations the time-honored Brin-
ley estate suffered irrevocable loss. The question is
yet to be decided by the courts of law how much can
be saved to the rightful owners from the general
wreck.
The Tyxgsborough Ieon Bridge. — In 1871,
when the only public means of crossing the Merri-
mack River, between Lowell and Nashua, was a chain-
ferry at Tyngsborough, a petition, very numerously
signed by citizens of Tyngsborough and Lowell and
adjacent towns, was presented to the Legislature,
praying for the construction of a bridge across the
Merrimack at Tyngsborough. The population of
Tyngsborough being only 631, and its total property
valuation being oniy S321,000, this town was incapa-
ble of building the bridge or of even bearing a very
large portion of the expense of its construction.
After considerable hesitation and delay the com-
missioners decided to construct the bridge. The work
begun was twice swept away by the force of the cur-
rent, but at length the graceful and beautiful iron
bridge which now spans the river was completed. It
is 600 feet long and twenty feet wide, and its cost
was $94,000. Of this sum $14,000 was assessed upon
Tyngsborough, together with the expense of main-
taining the bridge.
After bearing the heavy burden of maintaining the
bridge for ten years, through the persistent and
earnest efforts of a committee of the town, consisting
of Dr. Charles Dutton, J. H. D. Littlehale, Esq., and
S. S. Sherman, Esq., this burden was transferred to
Middlesex County. In this work of relieving the
town of th\8 unfair division of expense, the commit-
tee were aided by Hon. George F. Richardson, of
Lowell, a member of the Massachusetts Senate.
Traditions. — There are interesting traditions re-
specting various localities in the town of Tyngsbor-
ough. It is said that the Indians were wont to keep
the higher lands about Tyng's Pond clear from trees
and bushes by frequently burning over the surface of
the ground, while the woods were allowed to grow in
the marshes around the pond. By this device they
were able to kill the deer when they emerged from
the woods and crossed the cleared lands. Elisha's
Brook is said to derive its name from the fact that a
friendly Indian, whose name was Elisha, aroused the
hate and jealousy of other Indians by entering the
service of Col. Tyng. On one occasion, when bring-
ing hay from Tyng's meadow, he was waylaid and
killed. A brook and an apple-tree near the scene of
the murder received, respectively, from this event,
the names of " Elisha's Brook " and " Elisha's Sweet-
ing." The apple, " Elisha's Sweeting," was long per-
petuated in the vicinity by grafting. On the occa-
sion of the murder of Elisha, the " alarm drum," kept
at Co!. Tyng's, was beaten and three guns were tired
to warn the people of the presence of hostile Indians.
The "Haunted House," in Tyngsborough, so often
referred to in the history of the town, was the old
residence of the celebrated Col. Jonathan Tyng, who,
when all the other inhabitants fled from the neigh-
borhood in King Philip's War, fortified his home and
remained alone at the post of danger. What gave to
it the name of the " Haunted House " is matter of
obscure tradition. It is said that Cul. Tyng con-
structed underground a gallery which, in case of an
attack by Indians, might afford the means of strategy
or escape. The story is told of two girls who crossed
the river from the eastern side. As they approached
Col. Tyng's house, to visit at which they had come,
one of them suddenly disappeared from human sight.
The story is vaguely told, but there was something
mysterious about that vanishing girl. What other
girl would afterwards dare to pass the house in the
dark? Col. Tyng's house stood upon a bold swell of
I land and the site was admirably selected for defence,
i having in plain view the shores of the Merrimack,
I both up and down the river, and overlooking Wica-
i suck Island. The cellar is still to be seen and the
I fine view from the spot well rewards the traveler for
pausing on his way and climbing the hill.
Improvements. — Although the small agricultural
towns are wont to fall far behind their more populous
neighbors in the race of modern improvement and in-
vention, yet in one respect Tyngsborough is far in
advance of many of the cities of Massachusetts. It
has an electric railroad. This road, four miles in
length, which connects the town with the city of
Lowell, was constructed by the Lowell and Dracut
Street Railway Company. This company has erected
on the borders of Tyng's Pond, on grounds lying
partly in Tyngsborough and partly in Dracut, a
dance-hall, a pavilion and various buildings, and have
equipped them for a popular and elegant resort for
parties of pleasure from the city and elsewhere. The
SUDBURY.
377
woods on the borders of the pleasant lake, where 200
years ago the Indian hunted the wild deer, will often
now resound with the voice of merriment.
The town of Tyngsborough, with its excellent rail-
road facilities, affording easy access to the great cities
of Lowell and Boston, with its beautiful river running
through its centre and spanned at the village with a
graceful bridge, with ils charming scenery and rich
historic memories, has before it a hopeful future and
will ever be to its inhabitants a pleasing and attrac-
tive home.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
SUDBURY.
BY REV. ALFRED SERENO HUDSON.
The town of Sudbury was settled in 1G38, and re-
ceived its name in 1639. It was the nineteenth town
in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, and the second
situated beyond the flow of the tide. Originally it
was bounded on the east by that part of Waterlown
which is now Weston, on the north by Concord, and
southerly and westerly by the wilderness, or the un-
claimed lands of the Colony.
The Indian name of the river and country adja-
cent on the north was Musketaquid, or Jlusketah-
quid, and it is presumable that the same name was
applied to this region. Musketahquid is supposed to
be made up of two Indian words — musLeht, meaning
"grass," and alikeit, which signifies "ground ;" and if
applied to the river, "grassy brook," or "meadow
brook." The name formed by these words, it is
stated, as nearly resembles Musketahquid as the In-
dian dialect will allow. (Shattuck.) As the same
stream runs through Concord and Sudbury, and the
meadows in these places ?.re equally green and broad,
it is not by any means unlikely that the same term
was applied to each place and the river, as it runs
through them both. This is rendered still more
probable by the fact that Karte, the Indian owner of
the land first granted at Sudbury, was also an owner,
with others, of the territory at Concord ; as the Col-
ony records inform us that Karte, with Tahattawan,
the sachem of that place, with some others, consented
to the sale of territory to the English in 1637. As
Karte lived in the territory that is now Sudbury, and
his wigwam was not far from the river, it is presuma-
ble that he would call the stream, as it flowed near
his home, by the same name that it was known by as
it flowed through his domains a few miles farther
north.
Indians. — The discovery of numerous relics indi-
cates that the land was once considerably occupied by
Indians, but at the time of the town's settlement
probably but few lived there. The names of Karto,
Nataous, Peter Jelhro, Old Jethro or Tantamous be-
longed to prominent native^ and of these some few
facts are preserved. Karto was the Indian owner of
that part of Sudbury which was first granted to the
English. His home was at a hill a little south-
east of Sudbury Centre, called Goodman's Hill. The
name Goodman was given him by the English. It is
I said he was an attendant on the preaching of Rev.
Edmund Brown, the first minister of Sudbury, and
that by his preaching he was converted to Christi-
anity. NatHOUs, also called Netus, and sometimes
William of Sudbury, was prominently connected with
the events of King Philip's War. la the destruction
of the Eames homestead at Framingham, and the
capture of the inmates, he took a conspicuous part by
acting as leader. He was also present at the mid-
night encounter between the English and Indians
near Sudbury, on the night of March 27, 1676, on
which occasion he was slain. He was associated with
the Nipnet Indians, who inhabited the interior of
Massachusetts, and was sometimes called the Nip-
muck Captain.
Tantamous, who was also called Jethro, and more
commonly Old Jethro, to distinguish him from his
son, Peter Jethro, or Jethro the Younger, lived at
Nobscot during a portion of his later life. In his
earlier years it is supposed he lived at Isabaeth, the
country about the Assabet River, now Maynard. He
was a prominent personage among the Indians, and
known as a powwow, or medicine-man. Uookin
says of him : "This man and his relations were not
praying Indians;" that "they lived at a place near
Sudbury, Nobscot Hill, and never submitted to the
Christian profession (except his son, Peter), but sep-
arated from them."
Peter Jethro was also callsd Animatohu and Han-
tomush. In 1650 he lived at Natick, and was one of
Rev. Mr. Eliot's converts. He had a good education
for an Indian, and was held in high esteem. Gookin
speaks of him as a "grave and pious Indian." He
was sent to Washakin (Stirling) as teacher and
preacher to the Indians. The indications are that
the Indians had homes and favorite hunting-grounds,
not only about Nobscot and Goodman's Hill, but
also along the river course and about Cochituate
Pond. Tradition says they had a burying-ground at
what is now Wayland ; and on West Brpok, a little
southerly of Sand Hill, was the Indian bridge. Prob-
ably the country was largely depopulated by the re-
peated plagues which devastated the region of Mas-
sachusetts Bay, about the time of its occupation by
the English. As a general thing the whites and In-
dians lived on friendly terms in Sudbury prior to
King Philip's War. And when that war began
and the town was attacked, it was mostly by invaders,
and not by parties who ever had a rightful claim to
the soil.
The town was settled by Englishmen. The plan of
settlement originated at Wa'.ertown, which was set-
378
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tied a few years previous by Sir Richard Saltonstall
and company, who came to America in the ship
"Arbella."
To a large extent, the settlers came direct from
England. Bund, the historian of that town, says:
" Only a small proportion of the names of the early
grantees of Sudbury are on the Watertown records ;
and some who went there returned. Some, whose
names are on the records of both places, were either
residents of Sudbury but a very short time, or, it
may be, never lived there at all.'' The explanation
of this may be, first, that the plantation was not pro-
posed because all the petitioners designed to make it
their permanent home, but that it might be an outlet
to an over-populous place. Watertown, it was con-
sidered, had too many inhabitants. The emigrants
of ship after ship, as they arrived at these shores,
went to the older places ; and this led to what
w.as called " straitness of accommi.dation." New
land would present greater allurements to ihe new
comers, and the earlier settlers would thus be left un-
disturbed in their original estates. Secondly, specu-
lative purposes may have led some to engage in the
scheme for the Sudbury settlement. More or less,
doubtless, enlisted in the enterprise designing to
transfer their titles to others, as fresh emigrants came
to the country. Sharing with the residents of the
settlement the expense of the undertaking, they had
a right to convey the lands that were allotted them,
and receive such compensation therefor as their in-
creased value might bring. Thus, while the plan of
the settlement of Sudbury originated at Watertown,
and some of the settlers came from there, yet largely,
as we have said, it was settieJ by emigration direct
from England. Most or all of the names of the ear-
lier settlers have been preserved, and are repeatedly
given in connection with land divisions prior to the
close of 1640.
From the town records we have compiled the fol-
lowing list of the early grantees or settlers, wbo went
to the Sudbury Plantation about 1638 or 1639 :
Mr. William Pelhnna^ 3Ir. Edmund Browne. Sir. Peter Xoyse. Bryan
Peualeton, Walter Uaine, ,)olia llaine, Juhn Btinjrunl, Hugh Gritfyo,
Ediiiond Goodouwe, Robert Deust, Tliontiu Noyae, Tboinaj Urowue,
Rolit-rt Dirnill, Willinm Browne, Thorn i9 Gi>odiiow, John Freeinitn,
Solomon Johnson, Willium Ward, Riclianl Newton, .lohn Howe, George
Munnings, Anthony Whyte, .Andrew Belcher, John Goodnowe. John
Reddock, Thomas Whyte, John Kliigbt, Willium Parker, John Par-
nienter, Sr., Edmond Rico, Henry Rice, Wyddow Bulfiinithyte, Henry
Curtis, John Stone, John I'armenter, Jr . John Suiter, John Toll,
Henry Loker, John Wood, John Luker, Widow Wright, John Bent,
NutliHiiiel Treailuwny, Itohert Hunt, Widow Hunt, John Maynurd, Jo-
seph Taiiitor, Roliert Fi.rdun , or Ki.r.lliani, Thomas Joslyn, or Jhlen,
Richnril Sanger, Richard Bililcoine, Rolierr Davis, Henry Prentiss, Wil-
liam Kerley, Thomas Hoyte, Thomas Flyu.
The following are names of persons who were at
the settlement soon after it began :
ThomM Axdell, Thomas Read. John Moore, Thomas Bisbie, Thomas
Plyniptoii, llii^h llrury, I'htlfinoii Whale, William How. John Sniiih,
Thomas Burkiuiutir. John Grout, Tlioiinis Cnkebivuil, John Redit,
John Waleriniin, Goodman Witherell, John George, Thomas King,
Peter King, Jonas or James I'eudleton, John Woodward, Shadiucb
Uapgoud, Edward Wright.
Of the Sudbury settlers who once lived in Water-
town, we have the following names : Robert Belts
(Beast), Thomas Cakebread, Henry Curtis, Robert
Daniel (Darnell), John Grout, Solomon Johnson,
John Knight, George Munnings, William Parker,
Bryan Pendleton, Richard Sanger, Joseph Tainter,
Anthony White, Goodman (John) Wecherell, Na-
thaniel Treadaway, John Stone.
Some of these men were prominent and valuable
citizens of Watertown. Bryan Pendleton was one of
its early selectmen. Nathaniel Treadaway and John
Stone were sons-in-law cf Elder Edward How.
Robert Betts had a share in the Great Dividend Al-
lotment, and the Beaver Brook "plow lands." Of
tho-e who came direct from England, we have on a
single ship's list of passengers the names of some of
the most prominent persons in the Sudbury Planta-
tion, namely :
" The list of the naiiu-s of the Passeng^' Intended for New Englantl In
the good shipp the Coiitideiice, of London, of C C. tonnes. John Jobson
M' and thus by vertue of the Lord Treus" warr' of thexjth of April,
1038. Southampton, 24" .Aprill li;:',.S.
*' Walter Hnyne of Sutton .^tandifield in the
Comity of Wilts Lennen Weaver 5'i
Eliz: Hayne his wife
Thomas Hayne . their sonnes
John Hayne J- under lli
Josias Hayne > yearesofage
SufTenince Hayne 1 their
Blaiy Hayne i daughters
John Blanford ^ their 27
John niddett Jfi
Rich Bildcombe' servants IG
carpenter 50
Peter Xoycc of Peiiton in the
Tounty of .Souths 'Southam|iton) yeoman 47
Thomas Xoyce his Sonne 16
Eliz: Xuyce liis tiaughter
Robert Davis •. his -0
.lidm Riitter - 11
Margarett Davis / servants 2G
...,,„ f I'pton Gray, Co. of '
Xicholas Guy 1
t- Southampton
Jane his wife
Mary Guy his daughter
Joseph Taynter 1
Robert Bay ley i "
Joiin Bent of Penton in the
County of ^^oiitb'' Uusbaud-
nian 35
Martha Bent his wife
Robert Bent "1
\ servants
I their chihlren
r all under y age
of 12 vears
il
William Bent
Peter Bent
John Dent
Ann Bent J
John Goodenowe of Seniley
of Welsheir Hiit^bandinan
.lane (ioodenowe his wife
Lydia Goodenowe I their
Jane Gooilonowe ^ daiivhteri
Edmund Goo4lenowe of Dun-
head in Wilsheira Husbandman
Ann Goodenowe his wife
Jnh.. Gnn<l^nowe ) 'hHrsonnPs
Thoiiiaa »^uod«..o«-e ,- ^ >'*"*' "• '^"^
J nniier
Richard Sanccr his sprvant
Tlionma Goodenowe of Hhiiabury \
Jauti GoodeUuwe lusuifti
SUDBURY.
379
Thomns GoodeDowe his soDDe
UrsuIiL GoodeDowe bis slater
Edmond Kerley ) of Aehmore 22
William Kerley / HuebunUmen "
It is not certain that the young men mentioned in
this ship's list as "aervantP," or " hired men," ever
came in that rapacity. John Ruttrr was by trade a
carpenter ; Richard Sanger was a blacksmith ; one
had a family when he came; two others were after-
ward sons-in-law of the persons in whose employ they
ostensibly came; and all of them took their place
among the substantial men of the settlement.
It was a tradition among the descendants of John
Rutter, without their ha%-ing a knowledge that this
ship's list was in existence, that their ancestor came
to this country disguised as a servant.
The state of the times and the strictness of Eng-
lish laws at that period, with regard to ships and em-
igrants coming to America, might be a reason why
some might come in disguise. If this was so in the
case of one, it might have been so with regard to the
rest.
In connection with the names of the settlers, it is
appropriate to ttate something of their characier. In
attempting this, perhaps we can do no better than to
say that they fitly represented the noble element
that came to the New England shores at that period.
They were Puritans both in theory and practice; and
afar from the conveniences and luxuries of their na-
tive land, sought in a new country a home remote
from ecclesiastical and political strife. They em-
burked for America at a time when England was in
an unsettled condition, and when ship after ship was
bringing to these shores some of her purest and
Btanchest citizens. The whole trend of their conduct
is indicative of self-reliance, though they recognized
all proper authority. What the common weal re-
quired they took hold of with zest ; and in their adher-
ence to what they thought suiiable, they showed a
perseverance truly commendable. Their proceedings
in town-meeting.and the mannerin which the records
were kept, indicate that the education of a part of
them at least was good for the times; and the meas-
ures enacted for the common convenience and wel-
fare show common sense and sagacity.
As a religious people, they in no way lacked what
we ascribe to the historic Puritan. Althoueh com-
pelled by circumstances to economize all their re-
sources, and to make the most of time, talents and
strength to meet the demand-i of every-day life, yet
they found time to serve their Creator, and praise and
adore Him in their forest home. Their Christianity
manifested itself in their steadfast adherence to the
Christian faith, in their reliance on God, and their
love for His holy law.
Industry was a prominent characteristic. From
the minister down to the humblest citizen, each had
a share in the manual work of the settlement. Though |
the minister's salary was in part paid in produce,
yet he was assigned lands and attended to husbandry.
Another characteristic trait of the settlers seems to
have been their desire for territorial enlargement and
possession, and for the pioneering of new places. To
snch an extent did this spirit prevail in Sudbury and
its neighboring town, Concord, that the following
law was passed by the Court in 1645:
" In reeard of thegnsat danger that Concord, Sudborr and Dedbam
will be exp laed uoto, being inland Townee and but thinly peopled, It ii
irdered that no roao now inhabiting and eettled in any of the i'd
Townes (whether married or single) shall remove to any other Town
without the allowance of the magistrates or the lelecttueo of the towns,
until tbcy shall obtain leaTe to settle again."
The settlers of Sudbury were young men, or in the
prime of stirring manhood ; they were not patriarchs
near the close of their pilgrimage. Even those with
whom, because cf their prominence, we most associ-
ate dignity and gravity, were comparatively young
men when the settlement began. By the passeoger-
list of the " Con6dence " it will be noticed that only
Walter Hainc had reached the age of fifty-five, and
John Rutter was only twenty-two ; Robert Davis,
thirty; John Blandford, twenty-seven ; John Reddet,
twenty-six ; Peter Noyes, forty-seven ; John Bent
thirty-five; John Goodenowe, forty-two; Edmond
Goodenowe, twenty-seven ; Thomas Goodenowe,
thirty. These ages are doubtless correct, as we have
in 1666 a deposition made by one of them, Edmund
Goodenowe, in which he alleges that he is about
fifty-five years old. Rev. Edmund Browne was in
about the prime of life when he came to the planta-
tion ; and Edmund Rice was about thirty-four. In
fact, we find in an old petition presented at the close
pf Philip's War, in 1676, from a dozen to a score or
more of names that may have belonged to the earlv
g'antees. Probably from a quarter to a half century
passed before there was a generation of old men in
Sudbury. ♦
Land Grants. — The territory of Sudbury was in
part granted to the people collectively who formed
the plantation and established the town, and in part
to individuals. The grants to the former were allowed
at three different times, and were preceded by three
different petitions. The first petition met with a re-
sponse November 20, 1637, of which the following is
a copy :
" Whereas a great part of the chief inhabitants of Watertown have pe-
titioned tliitf Court, that in regard to their Btmitnefls of accommodation,
and want of meadow, they n ight have leave to remove and settle a plan-
tition upon the river, which runs to Concord, this Coort, h iving respect
to their necesBlty, doth prant their petition, and it i^ hereby ordtnd, that
Lieut. (Simon) Willanl, Mr. (Willi.iiii) Spencer, Mr. J.iaeph Weld and Mr.
(Uicliard).Iackson shall take view of the places upon said river, and shall
set out a place for them by marks and bounds sufficient for fifty or sixt^
families, taking aire that it be so set out as it may not hinder thesettliiig
of some other plantation upon the same river, if there be meadow, and
other eccommotlarions sufficient fur Ibe same. And it is ortiered, further
that if the said inhabitantii of Watertown. or any of them, phall not have
removed theirdwellingB to their said new (•lanlntion tH'Toreoney ear after
the p'anlution shall be sot .nut, I hut then the interest of all such persons,
not so removed to the said plantation, shall t>e void and cease, and it
shall be lawful fur such as are rvniuved and settled there, or the greater
part of them, being freemen, to receive other persons to iohabit id their
380
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
roomv, in the snid plantation ; provided, that if there shall not be thirtv
faniities at leiist there settled before the said time limited, tliat then tliis
Court, or the Court of Asxistants, or two of the Council, shall dis-
pose of the said plantation to any other. And it is further ordered, that
after the place of the said plantation shall be set out, the said petition-
ers, or any such other freemen as shall join them, shall have power to
order the situation of their town, and the proportioning of lots, and alt
other liberties as other towns have under the proviso aforesaid. .\nd it
is lastly ordered, that such of the said inhabitants of Watertown, as shall
be accommodated in their new plantation, may sell their houses and im-
proved grounds in Watertown ; but all the rest of the laud in Water-
town, not improved, shall remain freely to the inhabitants, which shall
remain behind and such others as ahull come to them.
** And the said persons appointed to set out the said plantation, aredi-
rected so to set out the same, as there may be ISOO acrr-s of meadow al-
lowed to it, if it be there to be had, with any convenience, for the use of
the town." ("Colony Records," vol. 1. p. 210.)
The Court, having granted the request for a planta-
tion at Sudbury, allowed the petitioners to go on with
their work, and appointed a committee to establish
the bounds and make a.n allotment of land.
The land first appropriated was supposed to com-
prise a tract about five miles square. It had for
boundaries Concord on the mrth, Watertown (now
Weston) ou the east, and on the south a line running
from a point a little east of Nobscot Hill along
the present Framingham and Sudbury boundary
direct to the Weston town bound, and on the west a
line two miles east of the present western boundary.
The second grant was of an additional mile. This
was allowed to make up a deficiency in the first
grant, which deficiency was discovered on making
a survey a few years afler the settlement began, and
it was petitioned for May 13, 1640. The petition
was fi.ir a mile in length on the southeast and south-
west sides of the town ; and it was allowed on condi-
tion that it would not prevent the formation of another
plantation, " or hinder Mrs Glover's farm of six hun-
dred acres formerly granted." (Colony Record, vol. i.
p. 289.)
The third tract was granted in 1649. It coniained
an area two miles wide, extending along the entire
length of the western boundary. The Colony Ri»cord
concerning this grant is : "That Sudberry is granted
two miles westward next adjoining to them for their
furth' inlargement, provided it [prejudice] not W°
Browne in his 200 acres already granted." (Vol. ii.
p. 273.)
Besides these three grants there were others made to
individuals. One of these was to William Browne, of
which the record ia as follows: "In answer to the
petition of W° Browne ffor two hundred ac" dew for
twenty five pounds putt into the joynet stocke hy
M" Ann Harvey, his Aunt, from whom he made it
appear to the Court he had sufficyent deputacon to
require it, his request was grannted ; viz., 200 ac" of
land to be layed out to him w^^out the west Ivne of
Sudbury, by Capt. Simon Willard & 8eargeant
Wheeler.'* All this land was probably in that part
of Sudbury which is now ilaynard. The first tract
for the plantation was purchased in 1638 of Karte,
the Indian proprietor, and it has been supposed that
a deed was given ; but this is not essential as evidence
of the purchase, since, in the deed given by Karte for
land subsequently bought, he acknowledged the sale
of the first tract in the statement that it was sold to
"George Munnings and to the rest of the planters of
Sudbury." In this first bargain of real estate it is
supposed that Mr. Munnings acted as agent for the
settlers, and that he, together with Brian Pendleton,
advanced the money for payment.
The second tract was also purchased of Karte, who
gave a deed, of which the following is a true copy :
Inpiav Deed.
" Bee it known vnto all men by Ihese presents timt I Cato otherwise
GooiJnian for Jc in considerution of fyve pounds u^ti I have received in
coninioiiities A w >nipunipeage of Walter Hayne A: IIn;;h GriJfin of Suil-
Imn* in behalf of themselves A the reat uf tlie planters of Sudbury ; doe
this my writ*? in give .t grant bargain 6: sell vnto the said Waller Hnyiie
—{ Haine)— it Hugh Griffin i the said planters of tlie town of Sudbury
so much land sonihward i so much Und westward next adjoining to a
tract of land «ci' I said Cato formerly wiuled vnto George Munnings i
the rest of the pianters t>f Siidlmry as may make tlie Injunds of the said
town to he full fyve miles square w'h jill meadows, brooks, liberties, priv-
iledges <k apperienances thereto belonging w"* all the said tract of land
granted. And I grant vnto them for me A mine heirs A bretliren that I
A: they shall &. \%ill at any tytiie make ariy further iissurance iu writing
for the more pft assuring of the s'd land ^t all tlie pretnises w't> ihs
apperteiiances vnto the s'd Walter Huine A Hugh GrilRn Jt the S-*
planters A: their successors forever as tliey shall require.
'■ In witness wlureof I herevnto put my hand A; seal the twentieth
day of the foiirtli month one thouaind six hundreil forty eight.
*' Signed sealed and delivered in the presence of
'* Emmasc'el Downing
Ei-iiB.\iM Child
CuTfiniicKiN [mark] I
JojENNV [mark] l
"This deed was sealed \' acknowledged by the s-^ Cato (who truly
understood the contents of it the day A year abo\o written i Before
mee.
"John AVinthhop, Governor.
'■ Registry of Deeds
"Suffolk Co. 3Ia33.'*
The deed for the land last granted, or the two-mile
tract to the westward, is on record at the Mitidhsex
Registry of Deeds, Cambridge, and the following is a
true copy of a portion of it :
'* For OS much as the Gen' Court of the Massachusetts Colony in Xew
England hath formerly granted to the Towns of Sudbury in the County
of Middlesex iu the same Colony, an addition of land of two miles west-
ward of their former grant of five miles, which is also layd out A: joyneth
to it : and whereas the English occupiers, proprietors and possessors
thereof have chosen Capt Edmond Goodenow, LeJP Josiah Uaynea,
John Goodenow, John Brigham A Joseph Freeman to be a comittee
for themselvH A for all the rest of the English proprietors thereof, giving
them their full power to treat with <k to purchase the same of the Indian
projirietors of the s"* tract of land Ji to saiis'y Jc pjiy them for their
native, ancient Sc liereditary right title &. intrest thereunto.
"Know all People by these presents — That wee, JehoJaUlin, John
Magus, John Muskqua Ji his two daughters Esther A: Rachel, Itenjamen
Bohue, John Speen A. Sarah bis wife. James Specn, Dorothy Wennetoo,
i Humphrey Bohue her son, Mary N'eppamun, .Abigail the daughter of
Josiah Harding, Peter Jethro, Peter JIuskquamogh, John Boman,
David Mannoan -k Betty who are the ancient native tt hereditary Indian
proprietun of the hforcs*' two miles of land (for £ io consideration of the
just i full sum of twelve pounds of current niony of New England to
them in hand well if: truly paid at or before the ensealing A: delivery
hereof by the eaid Cap' Edmond GocftJenow, Leift. Josiah Haines, John
Goodenow, John Brigham &, Joseph Freeman in behalfe of themselves
and of the rest of the English pojiseasore, occupiers, proprietors Jc fel-
low-purchasers) the receipt whereof they Jo hereby acknowledge Jt
brothers of Cato
SUDBURY.
381
therwith to l>e fully mtisfied, contented & pnid & thereof and of every
part A: parrel! tliprt-of tliey do liereby fur tliemBelvs & their heyra Kxe-
cuturs AJniirii^tMlore i iisbiirns cleHrly fiillv A absolutely rele«Bc, ac-
qiiitl fxunemte k discharjre them ^ all the English poetieBSt^ini, occnpiere,
propricl(Hs A fcllow-purcbasers of tlie eanie i all A: every one of tht-ir
lipyro Executnra, AdniiniKtrMt tb, AMijrns A Buccessora forever) Hare
piven, pranterl, barpHiiied, sold, alliened, eiiseoRsed, made over it cod-
firnieil, <t by these presents, do pive, grant, barpam, sell, alien, enseoase,
make over, contirme &. deliver all thai their 8<i tract ^ p.irceIlB of lands
of two mileii (Ifee it more or less Kritunie lying A' beiug) altogether in
one entire parcell in the p* Town of Sudbury in the County of Middle-
Bex afores*^ A lyelh al along throughout on the westeme side of the old
fivemileHof the f* Tuwne A: adjoyneth thereunto (together with the
farme lauds of the heyrs of William Browne that lyeth within the same
tract, unto the 6* Capt. Edmond GtxKiennw, Leif^Jueiah Uninee, John
Gnodeiiuv, John Briglmm A: Joseph Freeman 4 unto all & everj' one of
the rest of the Kugliah possusanni, occupiere, proprietors &. fellow-pur-
rliasers thereof hb the same is limited, butted A: bounded on the East by
the old part of the e^ Towne of Sudbury (whiL-h was the five miles at
firet granted to the ir* Towne) & is butted A: bounded northerly by the
line or bounds of the Towne of Concord, Westerly by the line or bounds
of the Towne of Stow A: is bounded southerly &. partly westerly by the
lands of M' Thomas Daofurth. . .
" FnrUitrmore wee the above named Indian Grantora do hereby oblige
k engflpe ourselvc* all and every one of our heyrM executors Adm" ua-
eigns A buctehsurs unto tlie b'' English possessors occupiers i proprietors
A: fcllnw-purchasers ^ to atl and every one of their lieyr? executors ad-
niinistraters nud assigns that wee and every one of us «fc ours aa aforee^
bIiuII A: will from time to time L at at all times readily A' eCTectually do
(at our own propper costs and charges) or cause (o be so done any other or
further act or acts thing or things that the law doth or may require for
more sure making and full contirming of aM A singular -the lterel<y
granted premises unto the b^ Eduiond Goodenow, Josiuh Haioes, John
Goudenow, Julin Bnghani & Joseph Freeniau a. unto ull A; every one ol
llie rtsi of the English posseesoi-s, occupiers proprietors and fellow-
purchasers of the premises A- unto all A every one of tlieir heyrs exec-
utors admiiiiatrators and assigns fur ever. In Witne*9 whereof tbe above
mtmed Indluu Grantors have hereunto each for tliemselves k altogether
sett their liHiids and eealti dated the II''' day of July in the year of our
Lord God one thousand six hundred eighty A: four. Annoqe ILegui
Kegia Caroli Secundi XXXVI.
"jEiiojAKrM Ilia mark ■; for kimselfd 4 by order of A: for John
Uonian A: seule. O
John Maoos fur hiniBelfe •& by order of A: for Jacob Uagoe hia
fiilher a scale. O
Mt>yLA John A: for his two daughters Rachel k Esther i
seiiU". O
John ^pehn his niarke | <t for A: by order uf Sarah his wife k
scale. O
ABi'i.ML Daughter of Josiah Harding and his sole heyr (^ her
niiukeand senle. Q
Sarah C her nia'ke who is the widdow of JosiaU Uardiug and
mother of s^ Abigail k her Guardian.
Peteb MisquAMor; -f- his mark and seale. O
Bf.njamen BoHtw his li iiuirke ami B«ale. O
iJotiOTHV Wf.nneto her (> mttrke and aeale. O
Marv Nepasiin be v niaik and seule. O
Bettv her ) murkc A' scale
PrTEtt Jethuo k a seale
John x Bumav hia maike A scale
Ja»es Speen A; seals
*' Cambe lo Octo*' 1C8I All the persons that have signed A: sealed
this instrument appeared before me thie day A year above written k
freely acknowledged this writing to be their act and deed
" Daniel Gookin Sen' Assist.
'•Endorsement — All the Grantors of the instrumeot within written
beginning witli Jehojakim k ending with Peter Muskquamog did 6ign
Seale k deliver e^ instrument in presence of us.
*' John Gueese— James Beenaed—
"Moreover wee underwritten did see Benjamin Bohew Dorothy Wan-
neto A: Mary A Betty Nepamun sigoe seale A deliver this mstrumeut the
li"* day of Octo'' IGSl. "Andrew Pittamee *" his marke
James Ulmnv marke
Samuel Gorr, James Babnabp
Daniel Sacowambatt
** Feb^ 1, 18G4 Memorandum — Wee wbo«e nnmee are underwritten did
see Peter Jethro signe A seale k deliver y» within written tustrument
" Jauls Bahnaqi) — Stephen pj Gate£ his marke
" Peter Jethro, Indian, appeared before me the fifth day of Februarj —
! 1C84 A freely acknowledged this writing within to be his act i deed k
\ ythe put his hand k »eale thereunto. Daniel Gooki.n Sen' Affift.
"John Boman did signe seale & deliverthe within written deed the
23 : of February in the year of our Lord one thousand aiz hundred
eighty and four in presence of ns
'* JouN Balcom -^ -f- Samuel Fbeeuan bis marke.
" James Speen k John Bowman appeared before me in court at Natirk
A acknowledged they have signed A: sealed this instrument noiung
others May 13*^ 1684. Jamm Gookik Sen' Affist,
"Roxbury April 16. 86.
'* Cliurles Josiac, Sachem of tbe MnBsachnsetIs, baring read k consid-
ered tbe within written deed with the consent of his Guardians k Couu-
cellur^ underwritten doth for himself k his heyrs allow of, ratify k con-
firm the within wnten sale to the InhabittinlB of Sudbury k their
heyrs for ever, the lands therein bargained k sold. To have d to h>dd
to the s'd lodabltiinis of Sudbury their heyra and asaigUB fur ever & hath
hereunto set his baud k seale the dny above written.
"CiiABLS^ JofiiAB hie marke k Seale
*' Allowed by U8
AVlLMAU STOUnHTON
Joseph Dudley
Guardians to)
y* Sachem i
Robert ^ Montague.
William W. Auowtok
"Recorded 19. 3. 1685
" by Tho. Danfobth Recorder.
'* A true copy of record Book 9 Pages 3M to 352 inclusive
** Attest Cha* B Stevens Reg."
From lands thus allowed, the Plantation of Sud-
bury was formed. It required, however, more than
the allowance and layiug out of the land and the
settlement of it to make it a town. A separate act of
incorporation was necessary to compJete the work.
This was done September 4, 1639, when the Court
ordered that ** ihe newe Plantation by Concord shall
be called Sudbury.'* (Colony Records, Vol. 1, p.
271.)
The name ordered by the Court is that of an old
English town in the county of Suffolk, near the parish
of Bury St. Edmunds, at or near which place it is
supposed the Browns may have dwelt. It is not im-
probable that the name was given by Rev. Edmund
Brown, the first minister of Sudbury, who sold lands
in the district of Lauham to Thomas Read, his
nephew, and who, it is supposed, may have also
named that locality from Lavenham, Eog., a- place
between Sudbury and Bury St. Edmunds. The place,
though spelled Lavenham, is pronounced Lannam in
England (Waters), The proximity of Sudbury and
Lavenham, Eng., to what was probably the original
home of Mr. Browne, together with the fact that he
was an early owner of tbe lands at Lanham, and a
prominent man at the settlement, affords at least a
strong presumption that Mr. Edmuud Browne named
both Sudbury and Lanham.
The settlement of the town began on the east side
of ihe river. The first road or street, beginning at
Watertown (now Weston), extended along a course
of about two miles: and by this the house-lots of
the settlers were laid out and iheir humble dwellings
stood.
382
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Town-Meetixgs. — Uutil as late as the nineteenth
century the town-meetings were held in the meeting-
house. Aft^rthe meeting-house was built aomelimes
they were held in a private house or at the "ordi-
nary." As for example, Jan. 10, 1GS5, and again
Feb. 18, 1686, there was an adjournment of town-
meeting to the house of Mr. Walker, " by reason of
the extremity of the cold." In 1764 the town ad-
journed one of its meetings to the house of '" William
Rice, innholder." In 1782, " adjourned town-meet-
ing to the house of Mr. Aaron Johnson, innholder in
s'' town." After the division of the town into the East
and West Precincts, the town-meetings alternated from
the east to the weat side.
In 1682-83 the time of meeting was changed from
February to October, the day of the week to be Mon-
day.
The reason of this change may be found in the
fact that it was dithcult at tome seasons to make a
journey to the east side meetinghouse; the passage
of the causeway was occasionally rough, and town
action might be thereby delayed or obstructed. The
other irregularities, and to the paper is attached a
list of names of prominent persons.
The town officers were mostly similar to those
elected at the present time. At a meeting of the
town in 1682-53, it was ordered that thetown-mee'ing
'"shall be for the electing of Selectmen, Commission-
ers and Town Clerk." Names of otBcers not men-
tioned here were "Constables, Invoice Takers, High-
way Surveyors and Town Marshal.'' About 164S,
the persons chosen to conduct the affairs of the town
were first called selectmen. The number of these
officers varied at different times. In 1646 there were
seventeen selectmen.
The service expected of the selectmen, beside
being custodians at large of the public good, and
I acting as the town's prudential committee, were,
I before the appointment of tithingmen (which oc-
curred first in Sudbury, Jan. IS, 1679), expected to
look alter the morals of the community. This is in-
dicated by the following order : At a meeting of the
inhabitants, Jan. 18, 1679, " It is ordered, that the
selectmen shall visit the families of the town, and
meeting was for a period warned by the Board of I sptedily inspect the same, but especially to examine
Selectmen. At the date of the change just mentioned,
it •' WHS voted and ordered, that henceforth the select-
men every year for the time being shall appoint and
seasonably warn the town- meeting ; " but afterwards
this became the work of the constables. In the
warning of town-meetings at oce period, the " Old
Lancaster Road " was made use of as a partial line
of division. A part of the constables were to warn
the people on the north side of the road, and a part
thi se on the south side.
The town-meeting was opened by prayer. There
children and servants about their improvement in
reading and the catechi.sm. Captain Goodnow and
Lieutenant Haines to inspect all families at Lanbam
and Nobscot and all others about there and in their
way, . . . and these are to return an account of
that matter at the next meeting of the selectmen,
appointed to be on the 30th of this instant January."
We infer from certain records that the selectmen's
orders were to be audibly and deliberately read, that
the people might take notice and observe them.
The officials known as " highway surveyors" had
is a record of this about 16.54, and presumably it was I charge of repairs on town roads. This term was
practiced from the very first. At an early date
voting was sometimes done by " dividing the house,"
each party withdrawing to different sides of the
room. An example of this is as follows: In 1654, at
a public town-meeting, after " the pastor by the de-
early applied, and has continued in use until now.
As early in the records as 1639, Peter Noyes and John
Pjrmenter are mentioned as surveyors.
The business of town clerk, or " dark," which office
was first held iu Sudbury by Hugh Griffin, is .-.hown yy
sire of the town had sought the Lord for his blessing | the following extracts from the town-book : " He is to
in the actii'gs of the day, this following \ote was
made. You that judge the act. of the selectmen in
sizing the Commons to be a righteous act, di.scover it
by drawing yourselves together in the one end of the
meeting-house." After that was done, " It was then
deiired that those who are of a contrary mind would
discover it by drawing themselves together in the
other end of the meeting-house."
In these meetings, marked respect was usually had
for order and law. We find records of protest or
dissent when things were done in an irregular way,
as for instance, in 1676, we have the following record:
" We do hereby enter our Decent against the illegal
proceedings of the inhabitants of the town
take charge of the records and discharge the duties of
a faithful scribe.'' " To attend town-meeting, to write
town orders for one year, . . . for which he was to
have ten shillings for his labor." In 1643 he was " to
take record of all births and marriagrs and [deaths],
and return them to the recorder." " It is a so agreed
that the rate of eight pound 9 shillings [be] levied
upon mens estate for the payment of the town debt
due at the present, and to buy a constable's staff, to
mend the stocks, and to buy a marking iron for the
town, and it shall be forthwith gathered by Hugh
Griffin, who is appointed by the town to receive rates,
and to pay the town's debt." (Town-Book, p. 7.3.)
Feb. 19, 1650, Hugh Griffin " was released from the
for the said proceedings have Ben Directly Contrary i servic? of the town." The work that he had to per-
to law. First, That the Town Clerk did not Solemnly j form was " to attend town-meetings, to write town or-
read the Laws .against Intemperance and Immorality ders, to compare town rates, to gather them in, and
aa the Laws Require." Mention is also made of pay them according to the town's appointment, and to
SUDBURY.
383
sweep the meeting-Louae, for which he is to have fifty
shillings for his wages."
Other officers were "commissioners of rates," or
"invoice-takers." These corresponded perhaps to
" assessors," which term we find used in the town-
book as early as the beginning of the eighteenth cen-
tury. The oflGce of marshal was the same as that of
constable. There is the statement on page 34 " that
theie shall be a rate gathered of ten pounds for the
finishing of the meeting-house, to be raised upon
meadows and improved land, and all manner of cattle
above a quarter old to be prized as they were formerly
prized, the invoice to be taken by the marshall."
At »n early period persons were appointed for the
special purpose of hearing " small causes." In 1655
" Lieutenant Goodnow, Thomas Noyes and Sergeant
Groute were chosen commissioners to hear, issue and
end small causes in Sudbury, according to law, not
exceeding forty shillings." In 1G48 Peier Noyes was
" to see people ioyne in marriage in Sudbury." (Colo-
nial Eecords, p. 97.)
In the early times towns could send deputies to the
General Court according to the number of their in-
habitants. Those that had ten freemen and under
twenty, could send one; thoee having between twenty
and forty, not over two. (Palfrey's History.)
We infer that if a person was elected to any town
office he was expected to serve. It is stated in the
records of 1730, that David Rice was chosen con-
stable, and " being called up [by] the moderator for
to declare his exception, or non-exception, upon which
David Rice refused for to serve as constable, and paid
down five pounds money to s'' town, and so was dis-
charged."
Having considered the nature of the town-meeting,
the place where works of a public nature were dis-
cussed and decided upon, we will now notice some of
the works themselves. First, Highways, the Cause-
way and Bridge.
Highways. — In providing means for easy and
rapid transit, it was important for the town to make
haste. Indian trails and the paths of wild animals
would not long suffice for their practical needs. Hay
was to be drawn from the meadows, and for this a
road was to be made. Another was to be made to
Concord, and paths were to be opened to the outlying
lands. The first highway work was done on the prin-
cipal street, which was doubtless at first but a mere
wood-path or trail. An early rule for this labor, as it
is recorded on the Town Records, Feb. 20, 1639, is as
follows : " Ordered by the commissioners of the town,
that every inhabitant shall come forth to the mend-
ing of the highway upon a summons by the survey-
ors." In case of failure, five shillings were to be for-
feited for ever}' default. The amount of labor re-
quired was as follows :
" 1st. The poorest man shall work one day.
" 2nd. For every six acres of meadow land a man
hath he shall work one dav.
"3d. Every man who shall neglect to make all
fences appertaining to hU fields by the 24th of April
shall forfeit five shillings (Nov. 19th, 1639)."
Highways and carl-paths were laid out on both
sides of the meadows at an early date. The town
records make mention of a highway " from below the
upland of the meadow from the house-lot of Walter
Haynes to the meadow of John Goodnow, which
shall be four rods wide where it is not previouoly
bounded already, and from the meadow of John
Goodnow to the end of the town bound." Also of a
highway on the west side of the river, "between the
upland and the meadow six rods wide from one end
of the meadow to the other." These roads, we con-
jecture, have not entirely disappeared. On either
side the meadow margin, ii hay-road, or "right of
way," still exists. It is probable that the town way
called " Water Row " may have been a part of those
early roads.
Bridges. — In the work of bridge-building Sudbury
has had fully iis share from the first. Its original
teiritory being divided by a wide, circuitous stream,
which was subject to spring and fall floods, it was a
matter of no small importance to»the settlers to have
a safe crossing. Ford-ways, on a river like this, were
uncertain means of transit. Without a bridge the
east and wiest side inhabitants might be separated
sometimes for weeks, and travellers to the frontier be-
yond would be much hindered on their way. All this
the people well knew, and they were early aatir to
the work. Two bridges are mentioned in the town-
book as early as 1641. Ttie record of one is as fol-
lows: "It was ordered from the beginning of the
plantation, that there should be two rods wide left in
the meadow from the bridge at Munning's Point to
the hard upland at the head of Edmund Rice's
meadow." The other record is of the same date, and
states that there was to be a road " between the river
meadow and the house-lot from the bridge at John
Blandlbrd's to Bridle Point." The bridge referred to
in the lormer of these records may have been the
"Old Indian Bridge," which is repe.itedly mentioned
in the town-book. From statements on the records
we conclude it crossed the lower part of Lanhani
Brook — sometimes also called ^\'est Brook — at a point
between Sand Hill and Heard's Pond. This bridge
was probably found there by the settlers, and may have
been nothing more than a fallen tree where but one per-
son could pass at a time. It doubtless was of little use
to the settlers, and may only have served them as a
landmark or to designate a fording-place where at
low water a person could go on foot. The bridge re-
ferred to in the latter record was probably the first
one built by the English in Sudbury. It was doubt-
less situated at the locality since occupied by suc-
cessive bridges, each of which was known as the " Old
Town Bridge." The present one is called the Rus-
sell Bridge, after the name of the builder. The loca-
tion is in Wayland, at the east eud of the old cause-
384
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
way, near the house of Mr. William Baldwin. The
first bridge at this place w.is probably a simple con-
trivance for foot- passengers only, and one which
would cause little loss if swept away by a flood. The
reason nhy this spot was selected as a crossing may
be indicated by the lay of the land and the course of
the river; at this point the stream winds so near the
bank of the hard upland, that a causeway on the eastern
side is unnecessary. These natural features doubtless
led to the construction of the bridge at that particular
spot, and the location of the bridge determined the
course of the road. About the time of the erection of
the first bridge a ferry is spoken of. In 1642 Thomas
Noyes was "appointed to keep a ferry for one year,
for which he was to have two pence for every
single pass' nger, and if there be more to take two
apiece." This ferry may have been used only at
times when high water rendered the bridge or meadow
impassable. As in the price fixed for transportation
only " passengers '' are mentioned, we infer tliat both
the bridge and ferry were for foot-passengers alone.
But a mere foot-path could not long suffice for the
settlement. The west side was too important to re-
main isolated for want of a cart-bridge. About this
time it was ordered by the town, "That Jlr. Noyes,
Mr. Pendleton, Walter Haynes, John Parmenter, Jr.,
and Thomas King shall have power to view the river
at Thomas King's, and to agree with workmen to
build a cart-bridge over the river according as they
shall see just occasion." The following contract was
soon made with Ambrose Leach :
"BRIDGE CONTRACT 1043.
" It 19 .i(;reed betwpene tlie iiitiuliitnnts of tbe towne of andbury and
.\uilirDae Leech, Tlmt tbe tuunc will pive itntu the Baid .\nibro8e ti iicres
III Jl' Pendleloufl '^'^'^ Addition of meadow ^^^^^ ehidl run on the north i
Bi-le of liis meadow lyinge on tlie west aide of Iho river. A; tthall run from '
the river to the upland. Alldoe foure acres of meadowe more wch ahalt I
be wlh convenient uis nmy be. .\ll30e twenty ucrefl of upland lyinue on ,
tlie weat Hide of the river on the north aide of tlie lande of Walter i
H.ijnea if he approve of it else so much upland where it may be conve-
nient. For and in conaiderution whereof the aaid .Vmbroao doth pro-
pose to build a aufficient curt bridge over the river ihrf e feet above hiph
water mark, twelve loot wyde from the one side of tbo river to theother,
provided that the towno doe fell and cross ciut the timber mid auw all
the plunk and carry it all to place, and when it la ready framed the
towne doth promiae to help him ruiae it, so that he and one man be at
the charge of the sayd .\uibroae, and he doth proiiiite to HCcompliah the
work by the last day of .\iis- uext. Allaoe the towne doth adiiiitt of
him aaa townsman wth ri^llt to comonatre aud upland as more shall be
laid out and allsoe ten acrea of meadowe to bo luyed out which other
meadowe is in firbt addition of lueadoMe.
"Amdcoee Leech,
'* BllI.\.V I'ENDLETO.V,
" Walter Hajxes."
The next contract for building a bridge was with
Timothy Hawkins, of Waterfown, and is as follows :
" The 26th day of November, 1C«*.
'•Ajrreed between the Inhabilaiita of Stidbury on the one part, and
Timothy Hawkins, of Watertowii. on the other part that the said Tim-
othy shall build a sufficient curt bridire ovi-r the 1 iver, lieginninc at (he
weat Ride of the river, riinninc across the river, five rods iongaud twelve
feet wide, one foot above hii;li wiiler mark, the arches to be . . . toot
wide, all but the middle artb, which la to be 11 feet wide, the BiltB —
incbea square '26 feet long, the posts Iti inches Bqiiare the cupa A''d
]ti, the braces 8 Inches square, the bridge must have a mil on each side.
and the mild must be braced at every post, the plank niuat he two inches
thick sawn, there mutt be o hraccB for the plunk, — tlio bridge the
bearers I'J inches square, the bridge is hy him to be ready to raise by the
last day of 3Iuy next. For which work the iDhubitants do consent to
pay unto the fcaid Timothy f-ir his work ao done, the sum of 1:1 pounds to
be paid in corn und cattle, the corn at the general price of the country,
and the cuttle at Iho price as two men shall judge them worth.
*'Tlie said Timothy is to fell all the timber and saw it, and then tbe
town is to carry it to the place."
Cacseway. — Westerly beyond the bridge was built
a raised road or causeway, which was sometimes called
the '■ Casey " or " Carsey." This is a memorable
piece of highway. Kepeatedly has it been raised ;o
place it above the floods. At one time the work was
apportioned by lot, and at another the Legislature
allowed the town to issue tickets for a grand lolterv,
the avails of which were to be expended upon this
causeway.
Stakes were formerly set as safeguards to the trav-
eller, that he might not stray from the way.
Church. — The town being laid out, and the nec-
essary means for securing a livelihood provided, the
people turned their attention to ecclesiastical matters.
The church was of paramount importance to the early
New Eugland inhabitants. For its privileges they
had in part embarked for these far-oflf shores. To
preserve its purity they became pilgrims on earth,
exiles from friends and their native land. Borne
hither with such noble desires, we have evidence that
when they arrived they acted in accordance with
them. In 1C40 a church was organized, which was
Congregational in government and Calvinistio in creed
or faith. A copy of its covenant is still preserved.
The church called to its pastorate Rev. Edmund
Brown, and elected Mr. William Brown deacon. It ia
supposed that the installation of Rev. Edmund Brown
was at the time of the formation of the church. The
town in selecting Mr. Brown for its minister secured
the services of an energetic and devoted man. Ed-
ward Johnson says of him, in his " Wonder- Working
Providence :" "The church in Sudbury called to the
office of a pastor the reverend, godly and able minister
of the word, Mr. Edmund Brown, whose labors in the
doctrine of Christ Jesus hath hitherto abounded
wading through this wilderness work with much
cheerfulness of spirit."
The home of Mr. Brown was in the territory of
Wayland, by the south bank of Mill Brook, on what
was called "Timber Neck." Mr. Brown's salary the
first year was to be £40, one-half to be paid in money,
the other half in some or all of these commodities:
" Wheate, pees, butter, cheese, porke, beefe, hemp
and flax, at every quarters end." In the maintenance
of the pastor and church the town acted as in secular
matters. The church was for the town ; its records
were for a time town records. Civil and ecclesiastical
matters were connected. If there was no state church,
there was a town church, a minister and meeting-
house, that was reached by and reached the masses.
" Rates " were gathered no more surely for the " king's
tax " than to maintain the ministry. To show the
SUDBUliY.
385
manner of raising the money for ihe minister's salary
shortly after his settlement, we insert the following:
" The first day of the second month, 1643. It is agreed
upon by the town that the Pastor shall [have] for this
year, beginning the first day of the first month, thirty
pound, to be gathered by rate and to be paid unto
him at two several payments, the first payment to be
made one month after midsummer, the other payment
to be made one month after Michaelmas, for the gath-
ering of which the town hath desired Mr. Pendleton
and Walter Hayne to undertake it, and also the town
hath discharged the pastor from all rates, for this year,
and the rate to be levied according to the rate which
was for the meeting-house, the invoice being
taken by John Freeman." Of the prosperity of this
little church, Johnson says, in his " Wonder- Work-
ing Providence : " "This church hath hitherto been
blessed with blessings of the right hand, even godly
peace and unity ; they are not above fifty or sixty
families and about eighty souls in church fellowship,
their Neat head about 300."
A meeting-house was built in 1642-43 by John Rat-
ter. It was situated in what is now the old burying-
ground in Wayland.
Laxd Divisions. — The settlers had little more
than got fairly located at the plantation, when they
began dividing their territory, and apportioning it in
parcels to the inhabitants. Before these divisions
were made there were no private estates, except such
house-lots and few acres as were assigned at the out-
set (or the settler's encouragement or help, or such
land tracts as were obtained by special grant from the
Ciilonial Court. But divisions soon came. Piece
after piece was apportioned, and passed into private
possession. Soon but little of the public domain was
left, save small patches at the junction of roads, or
some reservation for a school-house, meeting-house or
pound, or plot for the village green.
From common laud, which the undivided territory
was called, has come the word "common " as applied
to a town common, park or public square. And from
the division of land by lot, the term " lot'' has come
into use, as " meadow-lot," " wood-lot," and " house-
lot." The early land divisions w€re made, on per-
mission of the Colonial Court, by such commissioners
as the town or court might appoint.
Three divisions of meadow-land had been made by
1640. A record of these has been preserved, and the
following are the preambles of two of them :
"A record of the names of the lobnbitaDts of Sudbury, with their
Beveml quantity of meadow to every one granted according to their es-
tates or granted by gratulation for iervices granted by them, which
Dieadow is ratable upon all common charges."
" It is ordered that all tbe inhabitants uf this town shall have ^,^ of
tlieir total meadows laid out this present year, viz. : the fint divided ac-
cording to discretion, and the second by lot."
Not only the meadows but the uplands were par-
celed out and apportioned, some for public use, some
to the early grantees and some to individuals in re-
turn for value or service.
25-ii
In 1642 an addition of upland was made " in acris
according to the 1st and 2oad divisions of meadows
granted unto them by the rule of their eatate; and
Peter Noyes, Bryan Pendleton, George Munuings,
Edmund Rice and Edmund Goodenow were to have
power to lay out the 3d division at their discretion."
While the early land divisions were being made,
reservations were also made of lands for pasturage,
which it was understood were to remain undivided.
These lands were called " Cow Commons," and the
record of them explains their use. The first was laid
out or set apart the 26th of November, 1643, and was
on the east side of the river.
The cow common on the west side was reserved in
1647, and is thus described in the Town Book :
*'It is ordered by the town that there shall be a cow common laid out
on the west side of the river to remain in perpetuity, with alt the up-
land within these bounds, that is to say, all tbe upland that lies withiu
the t)ouod that goes from Bridle point through Hopp meadow, and so to
the west line, in the meadow of Walter Uayoe, and all the upland with-
in tbe gulf and the pantre brook to the upper end of tbe meadow of Rob-
ert Darnlll, and from thence to tbe west line, as it shall be bounded by
some men appointed by the town, except it t>e such lands as are due to
men already, and shall be laid out accoi'ding to the time appointed by
tbe town. Walter Hayne and John Groute are appointed to bound the
common, from Goodman DarniU's meadow to tbe west line."
The territory which was comprised in this common
may be outlined, very nearly, by the Massachusetts
Central Railroad on the south, the Old Colony Rail-
road on the west, Pantry Brook on the north, and the
river on the east. It will be noticed that these two
commons included most of the hilly portions of the
town, on both sides of the river ; and it was doubtless
the design of the settlers to reserve for common pas-
turage these lands, because less adapted to easy cul-
tivation. But in process of time they ceased to be
held in reserve. More or less controversy subse-
quently arose about what was known as "sizing the
commons," and by the early part of the next century
they were all divided up and apportioned to the in-
habitants ; and now over the broad acres of these
ancient public domains are scattered pleasant home-
steads and fertile farms, and a large portion of three
considerable villages, namely, Sudbury, South Sud-
bury and Wayland Centre.
Besides the reservation of territory for common paa-
turage, lands were laid out " for the use of the minis-
try." Two such tracts were laid out on each side of
the river, consisting of both meadow and upland,
which were let out to individuals, the income derived
therefrom going towards the minister's salary. The
lands that were situated on the west side have passed
from public to private possession, being sold in 1817
for J3200.98.
Between 1C50 and 1675 the west side had rapid de-
velopment. Prior to the beginning of this period the
pioneer spirit of the settlers had led to a thorough
exploration of this part of the town, and they had lo-
cated by its hills and along its meadows «nd valleys,
as if undaunted by distance from the meeting-house
386
HISTORY OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
and mill, and indifferent to the perils of the wilder-
ness. But although there was, to an extent, au occu-
pation of the west part of the town from the very be-
ginning of the settlement, yet the greater activity was
for a time on the east side ; in that part was the cen-
tralization of people, and things were more conven-
ient and safe. Indeed, the settlers for a season may
have regarded the west side as a wilderoess country,
destined long to remain ic an unbroken state. The
view westward from certain points along the first
street was upon woody peaks and rocky hillsides.
Beyond the valley of Lanham and Lowance towered
Nobscot ; its slope, thickly covered with forest, might
look like an inhospitable waste; while the nearer
eminence of Goodman's Hill, with its rough, rocky
projections, may h£ve had a broken and desolate as-
pect. It is no wonder, then, that in the earlier years
of the settlement we read of so many corn-fields on
the east side of the river, and find parties desirous of
obtaining new farms seeking them iu a southerly
rather than a westerly directiou. But when absolute
wants were once met, and things essential to existence
were provided; when the settlers had acquired a bet-
ter knowledge of the country and of the character of
its native inhabitants, and a subsiantial causeway
was made, — then began a greater development uf the
west part of the town.
The indications are that these things were accom-
plished about the year IGjO. At this time we begin
to notice the mention of homesteads on the west >ide,
and the construction of works for public convenience.
The lands first occupied, probably, were ihose near
Lanham and Par.try, and along the meadows by the
river course; while the more central jiortion, called,
" Rocky Plain," was not taken till somewhat later.
This is indicated, not only by the known locations of
early homesteads, but by the locality of the west side
cow common. These sections may have been first
taken on account of the abundance of meadow land,
and the existence of roads which had been made for i
the transportation of hay. ;
A prominent person who early located there was ]
Walter Haynes. He had a house by the meadow
margin, which, in 1676, was used as a garrison, and
which early in town history was called '" Mr. Haynes' <
old house." In 1646 he was granted liberty to run a 1
fence "from his meadow, which lies on the west side |
of the river, across the highway to his fence of his ,
upland at his new dwelling-house, provided that
Walter Hayne do keep a gate at each side of his !
meadow for the passing of carts and the herds along '
the highway that his fence may not be prejudicial to
the towu." Bath record and tradition indicate that
John and Edmund Goodenow early had lands near ;
the Gravel Pit, and also at or near the present Farr i
and Coolilge farms. By 1059, Thomas Noyes and !
Thomas Plympton had e>tabli3hed houses on the \
west side, — the former on lands at Hop Brook, and
the latter at Strawberry Bank. As early at least as ■
1654, Thomas Read was at Lanham ; and by 1651)
Peter Bent was there also.
Some public acts which indicate activity on the
we^t side, as set forth by the record.-*, are as follows :
In 1054 it was ordered that Walter Hayne and John
Stone " shall see to the fences of all the corn-fields
on their side the river;" and in 1059 a committee
was appointed to look after the highways there. The
mention of biidges by 1641, the ferry of Mr. Noyea
in 1642, and the contract for a cart-bridge in 1043,
are all indications of^arly activity in the west part of
the town. But the more important matters of a pub-
lic nature were in connection with the laying out of
new lands, ttie construction of important roads, and
the erection of a mill.
LA'i'iXG Out of New Laxds. — In 1651, John
Sherman and others were appointed to lay out the
'' New Grant Lands." Alter some delay the plan
was adopted of dividing it into squadrons, the ar-
rangement of which was as follows : " The south ea.st
was to be the first, the north east the second, the north
west the third, and the souih west the fourth." It
was voted there should be a highway extending north
and south, " 30 rods wide in the new grant joining
to the five miles first granted;" also, "Voted that
there should be a highway 30 rods wide, from south
to north, parallel with ihe other said highway in the
middle of the remaining tract of land."
These squadrons were subdivided into parcels of
equal size, each containing one hundred and thirty
acres, and were apportioned to the people by lot. It
was voted that " the first lot drawn was to begiu at
the south side of the first squadron running east and
west betwixt our highways ; the second lot to be in
the north side of the first, and so every lot following
successively as they are drawn till we come to Con-
cord line and s) the first and second squadron."
This land, laid out so regularly, was good property.
Some of the most substantial homesteads of the low n
have been, .and still are, upon it. Persons by the
name of Howe, Parmeuter, Woodward, Moors,
Browne, Walker, Noyes, Balcom, and Rice, of the
older inhabitants, and, later, of Fairbanks, Stone,
Willis, .Smith, Hayden, Maynard, Perry, Bowker,
Vose, Brigham, and others, — all had residences there.
The possession of this new grant terrirory, and its
early apportionment, would serve naturally to keep
the people in town. It opened new resources to the
settlers by its timber lands ; and the circuitous course
of Wash Brook gave meadows and mill privilegfs
which the people were not slow to improve. Prob-
ably the earlier settlers of this tract went from the
east side of the river as into a new country or wil-
derness. There they erected garrisons ; and that
there were in this territory at least three of these
houses indicates the exposed condition of the place
at the time of its early occupation by the English.
" Willis," the largest pond in town, a part of " Nob-
scot," the highest hill, and the most extensive tim-
SUDBURY.
387
ber tracts, are in this new grant. la it have been lo-
cated no lesi than five saw or grist-milli. From this
territory was taken part of the town of Maynard, and
in it were located for years two out of five of the old-
time district school-houses. The Wayside Inn and
the Walker Garrison are still there ; and although
the stirring scenes of the old stage period, which gave
liveline^ to the one, and the dismal war days, which
gave importance to the other, have passed away, yet
there remains a thrift and prosperity about the sub-
stantial farms of the ancient new grant lots that
make this locality one of importance and interest.
The Thirty-Rod Highway. —While these new
lands proved so beneficial to the town, the " Thirty-
Rod Highway " in time caused considerable trouble.
It was laid out for the accommodation of the owners
of lots, and, as the name indicates, was thirty rods
wide. The unnece.ssary width may be accounted for
as we account for other wide roads of that day: land
\\\i* plentiful, and the timber of so large a tract wuuld
be serviceable to the town.
But the width tended to cause disturbance. The
land was sought fo.- by various parties, — by abuttors
on one or both sides, it may be; by those dwelling
within the near neighborhood; and by such as de-
sired it for an addition to their outlying lands, or a
convenient annex to their farms. Tiie result was that
to protect it required considerable vigilance. En-
croachments wdre made upon it, wood and timber were
taken away, and at successive towa-meetings what to
do with this Thirty-Rod Highway was an important
matter of business. But at length it largely ceased
t) be public property. Piece after piece had been
disposed of. Some of it had been purchased by pri-
vate parties, some of it exchanged for lands used for
other highways, and some of it may have been gained
by right of possession.
But though so much of this road has cea'ed to be
tised by the public, there are parts still retained by
the town and open to public use. The Dudley Road,
about a quarter of a mile from the William Stone
place, and which passes a small pond called the
Horse Pond, tradition says, is a part of this way.
From near the junction of tiiis with the county road,
a part of the Thirty-Rod Way runs south, and is still
used as a way to Nobscot. On it, tradition also savs,
is the Small-Pox Burying-Ground, at Nobscot. A
part of this road, as it runs east and west, is probably
the present Boston and Berlin Road, or what was the
" Old Lancaster Road.'' Other parts of this way
may be old wood-paths that the Sudbury farmers still
use and speak of as being a part of this ancient lanJ-
mirk.
" Old Lancaster Road." — This road, which was
at first called the "Road to Nashuway," probably fol-
lowed an ancient trail. In 1653 it was " agreed by
the town that Lieutenant Goodenow and Ensign
Noves shall lay out the way with Nashuway men so
tar as it goes within our town bound.'' A record of
this road is on the town-book, and just following is
this statement :
" This IB a true copy of the commiaioQenftppoloted by the town takao
from theorigioiii and exaiuiaed by me.
"Booh Gairriif."
This record which is among those for 1646, by the
lapse of time has become eo worn that parts are en-
tirely gone. It is supposed, however, that some of
the lost parts have been restored or supplied by the
late Dr. Stearns. We will give the record, so far as
it can be obtained from tne town-book, and insert in
brackets the words that have been supplied from other
sources :
" We whose Dames are hereuDto sahscribed appoint[ed by] Sudbnry
aud the towo of Lancaster to lay out the high[way over thej river mea-
dow io Sudbury □e.ir Linraater to the [towo] bound according to the
Court order, have agreed as follows [viz] That the highway beginoiiig
at the great river meadow [at the gravel] pitt shall run from theoce
[to the northwest side of| Thom-is PlymptoD's bouse, [aod from Ibence]
to timber swafmpas] marked by ui and so on to Hart Hood leaving
the [rock] on tlie north side of the way and from thence to the ex-
treme [Sudbury bounds] a£ we have now marked it the breadth of the
way is to be th-* gravel pitt to the west end of Thomiis Plymptou's
lot aud . . . rods wide all the way to the utmost of Sudbury bound
and thence upon the common highway towards Lancaster through
Sud[buryj therefore we have hereunto set our hand the 22o^ day of
this pres[eat month]
*' Edudnd Goodemow
Date 1653 "TuoMiS Notes
•'WiLioAM Kehley"
This road has for many years been a landmark in
Sudbury ; but the oldest inhabitant cannot remember
when, in its entire length, it was used as a highway.
Parts of it were long since discontinued, and were
either sold or reverted to the estates of former owners.
The Hop-Brook Mill. — In 1659 a mill wms put
up where the present Parmenter Mill stands in South
Sudbury. This mill was erected by Thomas and
Peter Noyes. In recognition of the serviceableness
of their work to the community, the town made them
a land grant, and favored them with such privileges
as are set forth in the following record :
" Jan. T'f" 1659. Granted unto Mr. Thomas Noyea and to M' Peter
Noyes for and in consideratiou of buildin;; a mill at Hop brook lay-
ing and being on the west side of Sudbury great river rwlow the cart
way that leads to Ridge meadow viz: fifty acres of upland and fif-
teen acres of meadow without commonadge to the said meadow four
seres of thp said fifteen acr^a of meadow lying and being within the
demised tracts of uplands ; Also granted to the above named parties
timber of any of Sudbury's common land, to build and maintHio the
said mill. Also the asid Thomas and Peter Noyes do covenant with
the town for the foregoing cousideratioo, to build a sufficient mill to
grind the town of Sudbury's com ; the mill to be built below the
cart way that now is leading to Ridge mendow, the said Gruntees,
their heirs and snccessors are to have nothing to do with the stream
above four rods alrove the aforementioned cartway of said mill Co be
ready to grind the corn by the first of December next ensueing, and
if the said grante«B, their heirs or assigns shall damags the high-
way over the brook, by building the said mill, they are to make the
way as good as now it is, from time to time, that is to say, the above
specified way, over the Mill brook of said Thomas Noyes and Peter
are ali^o to leave a highway six rods wide Joining to the brook
from the east way that now is to the Widow Loker's meadow." (Town
Records, vol. i )
While the new mill was being built, a way w^s
beiug made to it frjm the causeway, as we are in-
388
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
formed by the followiDg record, dated February 7,
1659:
" We, ibe SclcclDien of Sudlmn', finding jundry incooTeuieuces, by
reoBun of bad aod ill bighwayB not being passable to meadow-luDda
and otber towDP, and finding the law dolb couiiuit Ibe stating of
the bighwaya to the prudence of the selectmen of towna. we tbeiefure,
being met the day and year above wiitten, on purpose to view the
bighviayB in tbe v^eet side of siidbury river, and having taken paius
to view tbem, do v*e Fay, ctnclude and jointly agree that the higli-
v^ay from the Gravel pits shall go through the lanil newly purchased
of Lieut. Goodeoow to that end, and from ihence down tbe brow of
the bill tbe now passed highway, unto tbe place where tbe new mil'
is building, that ie to eay, ihe way that is now in occupation, w-e
mean Ibe way that goelh to the eouth and 31r. Beibbeich his bouse,
we conclude and jointly agree, that the way to the meadows, as
namely, the meadow of John Grout, Widow Goodenow, John May-
Dard, Lieut. Goodenow, iball go as now it doth, that is to say, in tbe
hollow to tbe said meadows, the highway to be six rods wide all
along by tbe side of the said meadows.'^
In 1652 a contract was made for a new house of
worship. This contract is on the Town Records, but
has become considerably worn and defaced, so that
parts are almost or quite unintelligible. There is,
however, a copy in the "Steams Collection," which,
with some slight immaterial alterations, is as follows :
** The town agreed with Thomas Plynipton Peter King A: Hugh Grillin
to build u new meeting bouse which was to be lorty feet long ,t twenty
feet wide measuring from outside to oulfcide, Ibe studda were to he G
inches by 4 to stand for a four foot clapboard. There were to be 4 tran-
suiii windows five feet wida ,^ G feet higb, and in each gable end a clear-
bloiy window, each window was to be 4 feet wide and ^ feet liigii. There
were to be sutticient doiments across the house for galleries if there
should oflerward be a desire for galleries the beams to be 12 inches by
14 and Ibe ground silts were to be of white oak S inches square. The
posts were to be a foot 6(|iiare, and the 2 middle beams to be smoothed
oil three hides and the lower corners to be run with a hotclell. They the
said Plynipton King k Gritfin are to find timber to fell, hew, saw, cart,
frame, curry to place ,!t they are to level the ground and to find them
sulhcieut help to raise tbe house, they are to inclose the house with
clap boards and to lyne tbe inside with cedar boaids or olbeiwis« with
good spruce boards, A- to be smoothed !i over lapped and to be lyned up
the windows, k tliey are to hang the doors ao as to bolt. One of the
doors on the inside is to be sett with a lock. They are to lay tbe sleep
ers of the tioors with while oak or good swamp pine, ± to lloor tlie house
with plank. They are to finish all tbe works but the seats, for which
the town do covenant to give them ... 5 pound iiU to be paid in
march ne.\t in Indian [corn] or cattle, ;J0 more to be paid in Sep' ne.\t
to be paid in wheat, butter, or money A: the rest to bu paid as soon lul
the work is done in lnd}un corn or cattle the com to [be] merchantable
at the price current.
"Witness En.Mn. GoonNow.
" Thomas Novkb."
The new building was to be erected on the site of
the old one. The town ordered " that the car-
penters should provide 12 men to help them raise the
meeting house," for which they were to be allowed
half a crown a day. The roof was to be covered with
thatch, and the workmen were to have " the meadow
afterwards the minister's to get their thatch upon."
In 1654 a committee was appointed " to agree with
somebody to fill ilie walls of the meeting house with
tempered clay provided ihcy do not exceed the sum
of 5 poundLi 10 shillings." The parties who were to
build the house were employed " to build seats after
the same fashion as in the old meeting house." and
they were to have for every seat one shilling eight
pence. The seats were to be made of white oak,
"both posts and rails and benches."
But while the town was growing and irjcreasiiig in
strength, a controversy occurred which was ot a
somewhat serious character. Questions arose relat-
ing to the division of the "two-mile grant," to the
title of parties to certain lands, and to rights in the
east side cow common. The controversy concerning
this latter subject was in relation to "sizing" or
"siiuting " the common. It waa specified when this
land was reserved, that it " should never be ceded or
laid down, without the consent of every inhabitant
and townsman that bath right in commonage ;" aud
the rule for pasturing cattle upon it was, "The in-
habitants are to be limited in the putting in of cattle
upon the said common, according to the quantity of
meadow the said inhabitants are rated in upon the
division of the meadows." The rule of allowance on
this basis was as follows: "For every two acres of
meadow one beast, that is either cow, ox, bull or steer,
or heifer to go as one beast and a half, and every six
sheep to go for one beast, and that all cattle under a
year old shall go without sizing." The endeavor to
define rights of commonage, or the relation of the in-
dividual to this piece of town projjerty, proved a
difScult task. As might be e.\pected among a people
of positive natures, strong opinions were entertained,
and decided attitudes were taken concerning a matter
of individual rights. The ali'air was not wholly con-
fined to the town in its social and civil relations, but
the church became connected with it. The result
was that a council was called to adjust ecclesiastical
matters, and advice was also sought and obtained of
the General Court.
In 1675 King Philip's War set in ; and Sudbury, on
account of its frontier position, was badly harassed
by the enemy. The princiiKil means of defence in
this war were the garrison-houses. Of these places
we give the following information :
The Browx Garrison. — This stood on the i)res-
ent estate of Luther Cutting, about a dozen rods
southeasterly of his residence, or a few rods east of
the Sudbury and Framingham road, and about a half
mile from the town's southern boundary. I: bi.d a
gable roof, was made of wood, and lined with briik.
It was demolished about thirty-five years ago, when
in the possession of Mr. Conant.
The Walker Garrisox. — The Walker garrison-
house is in the west part of the town, a little south of
the Massachusetts Central Railroad, on the Willard
Walker estate. This building is a curious structure,
with massive chimney, large rooms and heavy frame-
work. It is lined within the walls with upright
plank fastened with wooden pins.
The Goopnow Garrlson. — This garrison .stood a
little .southeasterly of the present Coolidge house, or
a few rods northeast to ea.it of the East Sudbiirv
Railroad Station, and perhaps twenty or thirty rods
from the South Sudbury and Wayland highwaj*. A
lane formerly went from the road to a point near the
garrison.
SUDBURY.
389
The Haynes Garrison. — This garrison stood on
the Water-Row Road, by the margin of the river
meadow, a little northerly or northeasterly of the
Luther Goodenow house. It was about an eighth of
a mile from the Wayland and Sudbury Centre high-
way, two or three rods from the road, and fronted
south. In later years it was painted red. In 1876 it
was still standing, but has since been demolished.
One of the buildings which common tradition says
was a garrison, but whose name is unknown, stood
near the Adam How place, about twenty-five rods
northwest of the house. It was one story high, and
had a room at each end. For a time it was owned
and occupied by Abel Parmenter,-and was torn down
years ago. It is stated by tradition that, when the
Wayside Inn was built, the workmen repaired to this
house at night for safety.
The garrisons previously mentioned were named
from their early occupants. Parmenter was the name
of the first occupant of this house of whom we have
any knowledge ; if he was the first, then doubtless
this house was formerly known as the Parmenter
Garrison.
The other garrison, the name of which is unknown,
was north of the Gulf Meadows, and on or near the
present Dwier Farm (Bent place). Tradition con-
cerning this one is less positive than concerning the
other. An old inhabitant, ouce pointing towards the
old Bent house, said, "There is where the people
used to go when the Indians wereabout." It isquite
evident thai the Bent house was not a garrison, for
that was built about a century ago ; but across the
road southwesterly there are indications that some
structure once stood, which may have been a garri-
son.
The Block-House. — A block-house stood in the
north part of the town, on the Israel Haynes farm.
It was situated, perhaps, from thirty to fifty rods
southwest of the house of Leander Haynes, on a
slight rise of ground. It was small, perhaps fifteen
feet square, more or less, and so strongly bulk that it
was with difficulty taken to pieces. It was demol-
ished about three-quarters of a century ago, when
owned by Mr. Moses Haynes. Mr. Reuben Rice, of
Concord, a relative of Mr. Haynes, when over ninety
years of age, informed the writer that when it was
torn down he chanced to be passing by, and looked
for bullet-marks, and believed he found some. He
stated there was no mistake about the house being
used as a garrison.
Besides the garrison-houses, the town had a small
force of militia. Says "The Old Petition:" "The
strength of Our towne upon y' Enemy's approaching
it, consisted of eighty fighting men." These men
were able-bodied and strong for the work of war,
liable to do duty for either country or town; while
others, younger and less vigorous, could stand guard
and do some light service. When the war was fairly
begun, the town's force was replenished by outside
help. So that, with the people collected in garrisons,
and the armed men able to fight in a sheltered place,
a stout defence could be maintained against a con-
siderably larger force.
At the beginning of the war the town of Sudbury
was not attacked, as the Indians chiefly confined hos-
tilities to the county of Plymouth, yet it was soon
called upon to send aid to other places. November
22, 1675, a warrant came from Major Willard to John
Grout, Joaiah Haynes and Edmund Goodnow, who
called themselves the "humble servants the militia
of Sudbury," requiring the impressment of nine able
men to the service of the country. They state to the
Governor and Council that they have impressed the
following men, namely : William Wade, Samuel Bush,
John White, Jr., Thomas Rutter, Peter Noyes, Jr.,
James Smith, Dennis Headly, Mathew Gibbs, Jr.,
and Daniel Harrington; but that they wish to have
them released. Joseph Graves, master of Harring-
ton, states that his servant had not clothing fit for the
service; thit he was well clothed when he was im-
pressed before, but that he wore his clothes out in
that service, and could not get his wages to buy more.
The service that he was formerly impressed for was
the guarding of families in "Natick Bounds." One
of those families is supposed to be that of Thomas
Eames, which was attacked by the Indians near the
outbreak of the war. A further reason for their re-
lease from this service is found in the following ex-
tracts from their petition : " Considering our condition
as a frontier town, and several of our men being al-
ready in the service, our town being very much scat-
tered;" furthermore, that, several families being
sickly, no use could be made of them for "watching,
warding, scouting or impress, whereby the burden
lies very hard on a few persons."
It was not long after hostilities began before the
foe approached Sudbury. The first blow that fell on
the town that has been noted by historians of that
day was on March 10, 1676. Says Mather, "Mischief
was done and several lives cut off by the Indians."
While the prospect was thus threatening, the design
of the Indians for a season was effectually stayed, and
a disastrous invasion prevented by a bold move made
by the inhabitants of the town. The event referred
to occurred March 27, 1676. A force of savages, near
three hundred in number, were within about a half
mile of Sudbury's western boundary. The force was
led by Netus, the Nipmuck captain. This band was
intent on mischief. It was on the trail for prey.
Flushed with the expectation of easy victory, they
waited the dawn of day to begin their foul work, and
seize such persons and spoil as were found outside the
garrisons. On Sabbath night they made their en-
campment within half a mile of a garrison. Their
mischievous course through the previous day had
been so little opposed that they felt secure as if in a
world of peace. But the English were on their track.
Intelligence of their presence at Marlboro' had reached
390
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Sudbury, and a movement was made to oppose them.
A score of bold citizens set forth for the beleaguered
place. On their arrival at Marlboro' they were rein-
forced by twenty soldiers, who were taken from the
garrisons, and the two forces went in search of the
enemy. Before daybreak they discovered them asleep
about their fires. The English, in night's stillness,
crept close upon the camp. Wrapped in slumber,
and unsuspicious of what was so near, the Indians
were suddenly startled by a destructive volley from
an unexpected foe. The English took them by com-
plete surprise. So effectually had they directed their
tire that the Indians speedily fled. About thirty of
their number were wounded, of whom it is said four-
teen afterwards died. Not only were the Indians
numerically weakened, but demoralized somewhat by
such a bold and unlooked-for assanlt. Probably this
act saved Sudbury for a time. Netus was slain, and
for nearly a month there was a cessation of hostilities
within and about the town.
That Sudbury people in this affair acted not simply
in their own defence is implied in "The Old Peti-
tion," in which it is stated that " the Indians in their
disastrous invasions were resolved by our ruine to re-
venge y' reliefe which our Sudbury volunteers ap-
proached to distressed Jlarlborough, in slaying many
of y° enemy & repelling y' rest."
Attack ox the Town by Ki>'Ct Philip. — Al-
though this sudden assault on the savages may have
checked their course for a time, they soon rallied for
further mischief. In the following April a large
force, headed by Philip in person, started for Sudbury.
At the time of the invasion there was nothing west of
Sudbury to obstruct his course. The last town was
^[arlboro', and this was devastated as by aclosegleaner
in the great field of war. The people had almost
wholly abandoned the place; the dwellings were re-
duced to ash-heaps, and a few soldiers only were
quartered there to guard the road to Brookfield and
the Connecticut. Sudbury at this time was the objec-
tive point of King Philip. That he had a special pur-
pose in assailing the place, other than what led him
to conduct the war elsewhere, is implied in " The
Old Petition," in the words before quoted, where the
object of revenge is mentioned. Certain it is, he had
a strong force, and fought hard and long to destroy
the place.
Date of Philip's Attack ox the Town. — Before
entering, however, on the details of the conflict, we
will notice the time at which it occurred. Previous
to the discovery of " The Old Petition," two dates had
been assigned, namely, the 18th and the 21bt of April.
Various authorities were quoted in support of each.
So important was the matter considered, that a com-
mittee was appointed to examine evidence on the sub-
ject. The committee reported in favor of the 21st.
(Report of Kidder and Underwood.) Notwithstand-
ing this decision, opinions still differed ; but the dis-
covery of " The Old Petition " has fully settled this
' matter, and est^lbli^hed beyond question that the date
i of Philip's attack on the town and the garrison.', and
the 'Sudbury Fight,' was the 2Ut. We can under-
stand how, before the discovery of this paper, opinions
might vary ; how an lii.«-toriaii might mistake as to a
date, and a monument might perpetuate the error.
When President Wadsworth erected a slate-stone at;
; the grave of Captain Wadsworth, the date inscribed
[ might have been taken from the historian Habbard,
who might have received it from an unreliable source.
But we can hardly suppose that a mistake could occur
in the paper above referred to concerning the date of
j this event. This paper is a calm, deliberate docu-
ment, signed by inhabitants of Sudbury, and sent to
the Colonial Cf.urt less thac six months after the in-
vasion by Philip. It gives the date of the invasion in
the fdllowing words: "An Account of Losse Sus-
' tained bySeverall Inhabitants of y' towne of Sudbury
by y' Indian Enemy 21" April 167G."
Ni.MiiER OF the Enemy. — Philip arrived with his
force at Marlboro' on or about '.he ISth of April, and
soon started for Sudbury. The number of bis warriors
I has been variously estimated. In the " Old Indian
! Chronicle " it is given as " about a thousand strong."
I Gookin states, in his history of tbeChristian Indians,
j "that upon the 21" of April about mid-day tidings
: came by many mes^f-engeis that a great body of the
: enemy not less as was judged than fifteen hundred,
: for the enemy to make their force seem very large
■ there were many women among them whom they had
fitted with pieces of wood (Ut in the forms of guns,
which these carried, and were placed in the centre,
I they had assaulted a place called Sudbury that morn-
ing, and set fire of sundry houses and barns of that
I town . . . giving an account that the people of the
! place were greatly distressed and earnestly desired
succor."
j The Attack, — During the night of April 20th
Philip advanced his force and took position for the
coming day. It was early discovered by the inhabit-
ants that during the night-time the Indians had got-
ten possession of everything in the west part of the
town but the garrisons, and that they bad become so
scattered about in squads, and had so occupied various
localities, that at a given signal they could strike a
concerted blow. Says the "Old Indian Chronicle,"
'The houses were built very scatteringly, and the
enemy divided themselves into small parties, which
executed their design of firing at once." The smoke
of dwellings curled upward on the morning air, the
war-whoop rang out f'r6m the forest, and from the
town's westerly limit to the Watertown boundary the
destructive work was begun. It is said by tradition
that the Indians even entered the Watertown terri-
tory, and set fire to a barn in what is now Weston.
About the time of firing the deserted houses the
Indians made their attack on the garrisons. The de-
tachments for this work were'probably as specifically
set apart as were those for burning the dwelling-
SUDBURY.
391
places; and doubtless hours before daybreak the foe
lay concealed in their picked places, ready lo pour
their shot on the wall. The attack on the Haynes
house was of great severity. The position of the
building favored the near and concealed approach of
the enemy. The small hill at the north afforded a
natural rampart from which to direct his fire; behind
it he could skulk to close range of the house and
drive his shot with terrible force on the walls. There
i? a tradition that, by means of this hill, the Indians
tried to set the building on fire. They filled a cart
with flax, ignited, and started it down the hill towards
the house; but before it reached its destination it
upset, and the building was saved. Tradition also
states that near the house was a barn, which the In-
dians burned : but that this proved advantageous to
the inmates of the garrison, as it had afforded a shel-
ter for the Indians to fire from. Probably this barn
was burned with the expectation of setting fire to the
house.
But it was not long that the Indians were to fight at
close range; the bold defenders soon sallied forth,
and commenced aggressive warfare. They fell on
the foe, forced them back, and drove them from their
"skulking approaches." The service at the other
garrisins was probably all that was needed. That
none of these houses were captured is enough to indi-
cate a stout and manly defence. They were all cov-
eted objects of the enemy, and plans for the capture
of each had been carefully laid.
While the town's inhabitants were defending the
garrisons, reinforcements were approaching the town
from several directions. Men hastened from Concord
and Watertown, and some were sent from the vicinity
of Boston. The Concord company consisted of
'■ twelve resolute young men," who endeavored to
render assistance in the neighborhood of the Haynes
garrison-house. Before they had reached it, how-
ever, and formed a junction with the citizens of the
town, they wereslain in a neighboring meadow. The
men thus slain on the meadow were left where they
fell until the following day, when their bodies were
brought in boats to the foot of the old town bridge
aud buried. The reinforcements from Watertown
were more fortunate than those from Concord, and
were spared to assist in saving the town. They were
led or sent by the gallant Hugh Mason, of Water-
town, and assisted in driving a company of Indians
to the west side of the river.
The Wadsworth Fight. — Another company of
reiuforceraents were commanded by Samuel Wads-
worth, of Milton, who was sent out for the assistance
of Marlborough. The number in this company had
been variously estimated. Mather sets it at seventy.
"The Old Indian Chronicle" says, "Wadsworth
being designed of a hundred men, to repair to Marl-
boro, to strengthen the garrison and remove the
goods." Hubbard says, "That resolute, stout-hearted
soldier, Capt. Wadsworth . . being sent from
Boston with fifty soldiers to relieve Marlboro." It is
not remarkable that estimates should differ with re-
gard to the number in this compauy, since all the
men who accompanied Wadsworth from Boston were
not in the engagement at Sudbury. When Capt.
Wadsworth reached Marlboro' he exchanged a part of
his younger men, who were wearied with the march,
for some at the garrison, and accompanied by Captain
Brocklebank, the garrison commander, started back
to Sudbury. Lieutenant Jacobs, who commanded
the garrison in the absence of Brocklebank, in re-
porting to the authorities in regard to the number of
men left with him, states as follows: "There is re-
maining in our company forty-six, several whereof
are young soldiers left here by Captain Wadsworth,
being unable to march. But though he left a part of
his men he took some from the garrison at Marlboro."
From what we know of the fate of a large part
of this company, and the circumstances attendant
upon the expedition, we conclude the number en-
gaged in the Sudbur/ fight was not much over
fifty. If twenty-nine men were found slain after the
battle, aud fourteen escaped, and about a half dozen
were taken captive, the number would not be far from
the foregoing estimate.
Captain Wadsworth arrived at Marlboro' some time
during the night of the 20th. Upon ascertaining
that the Indians had gone in the direction of Sud-
bury, he did not stop to take needed refreshment, but
started upon the enemy's trail.
The English encountered no Indians until they had
gone some distance into Sudbury territory, when they
came upon a small party, who fled at their approach .
Captain Wadsworth with his compiny pursued until
they found themselves in an ambush, where the main
body of Philip's forces lay concealed. The place of
the ambush was at what is now South Sudbury, a
little northeasterly of the village and on the west-
erly side of Green Hill.
The force that lay concealed is supposed to have
been quite strong. Gookin speaks of " the enemy
being numerous." "The Old Indian Chronicle"
speaks of it as about a thousand. As the foe appeared,
the English pursued, and followed hard as they
withdrew. But the pursuit was fatal. The Indians
retreated until the place of ambush was reached.
Then suddenly the foe opened his fire from a chosea
place of concealment, where each man had the oppor-
tunity of working to advantage.
But, though suddenly beset on all sides, they main-
tained a most manly defence. It may be doubtful if
there is its equal in the annals of the early Indian
wars. From five hundred to one thousand savages,
with Philip himself to direct their manoeuvres, pour-
ing their fire from every direction, and this against
about four-score of Englishmen, hard marched, in an
unfamiliar locality, could do deadly work. Yet there
is no evidence of undue confusion among the ranks
of the English.
392
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The sudden onslaught of the savages was attended,
as usual, with shoutings and a horrible noise, which
but increased the threatening aspect, and tended to
indicate that things were worse than they were. In
spite of all this, the brave company maintained their
position, and more than held their own. Says Mather,
"They fought like men and more than so." Says
"The Old Indian Chronicle," " Not at all di.smayed
by their numbers, nor dismal shouts and horrid yell-
ingB, ours made a most courageous resistance." Not
only was the foe kept at bay, and the English force
mainly kept compact, but a movement was made to
obtain a better position ; hard by was the summit of
Green Hill, and thitherward, fighting, Wadswonh
directed his course. This he reached, and for hours
he fought that furious host, with such success that it
is said he lost but five men.
The Forest Fire. — But a new element was to be
introduced. The fight had doubtless been prolonged
far beyond what Philip had at first supposed it would
be. Desperate in his disappointment that the
English had not surrendered, they again resorted to
strategy to accomplish their work. The day was
almost done. Philip's force had been decimated by
Wndsworth's stubborn defence. Darkness was soon
to set in, and under its friendly concealment the
English might make their escape. New means must
be employed, or the battle to the Indians was lost,
and the fate of Philip's slain warriors would be
unavenged. Wadsworth might form a junction with
the soldiers at the east side of the town, or make
his way to the Goodnow Garrison just beyond Green
Hill. A crisis was at hand. Philip knew it, and
made haste to meet it. The fight began with strategy,
and he sought to close it with strategy. He set tire
to the woods and the flames drove Wadsworth from
his advantageous position.
The Retreat.— With this new combination of
forces pressin g hard upon them, nothing was left but
retreat. But the results of the retreat were disastrous
and exceedingly sad. There is something melancholy
indeed attendant on that precipitous flight. For hours,
shoulder to shoulder, these men had manfully stood.
Inch by inch they had gained the hill-top. The
wounded had likely been boroe with them, and laid
at their protectors' feet; and the brave company
awaited night's friendly shades to bear them gently
to a place of relief. But they were to leave them now
in the hands of a foe less merciful than the flames
from which they had been forced to retire. Their de-
fenders had fired their last shot that would keep the
foe at bay, and in hot haste were to make a rush
for the Hop Brook Mill. It was a race for life; a
gauntlet from which few would escape.
The flight of the men to the mill was doubtless at-
tended with fearful loss. It was situated at what now
is South Sudbury Village, on the site of the pres-
ent Parmenter Mill. The distance from the top of
Green Hill is from a quarter to half a mils. This '
distance was enough to make the staughter great. A
break in the ranks and the foe could close in, and the
tomahawk and war-club could do a terrible work.
Loss OF THE English. — As to the number of
English slain, accounts somewhat differ. This is not
strange, when men diflfer as to the number engaged.
Mather says " that about fifty of the men were slain
that day." Gookin speaks of " thirty-two besides the
two captains." Hubbard says, " So as another cap-
tain and his fifty perished that time of as brave sol-
diers as any who were ever employed in the service."
Lieut. Richard Jacobs, of the garrison at Marlboro',
in his letter to the Council, dated April 22, 1676 (Vol.
LXVIIL, p. 223, State Archive-), says, " This morn-
ing, aboutsun two hours high, ye enemy alarmed us by
firing and shouting toward ye government garrison
house at Sudbury." He goes on to state that " soon
after they gave a shout and came in great numbers on
Indian Hill, and one, as their accustomed manner is
lifter a fight, began to signify to us how many were
slain ; they whooped seventy-four times, which we
hope was only to affright us, seeing we have had no
intelligence of any such thing, yet we have reason to
fear the worst, considering the numbers, which we ap-
prehend to be five hundred at the most, others think a
thousand."
Thus, according to the various accounts, by far the
greater part were slain. There is one thing which
goes to show, however, that Mather may not be far
from correct, — that is, the evidence of the exhumed
remains. When the grave was opent d a few years
ago, i)arts of the skeletons of twenty-nine men were
found. We can hardly suppose, however, that these
were all the slain. Some who were wounded may
have crawled away to die. Others, disabled, may
have been borne from the spot by the foe; and,
in various ways, the wounded may have been remov-
ed, to perish near or remote from the field of battle.
The CAPTtjEED. — But the sad story is not wholly
told when we speak of the slain. The tragedy was
not complete when the surviving few had left the
tield and taken refuge in the mill. Some were cap-
tured alive. These were subjected to such atrocious
treatment as only a savage would be expected to give.
Says Hubbard, " It is related by some that afterwards
escaped how they cruelly tortured five or six of the
English that night." Mather says, "They took five
or six of the English and carried them away alive,
but that night killed them in such a manner as none
but savages would have done, . . . delighting to see
the miserable torments of the wretched creatures.
Thus are they the perfect children of the devil."
The Survivors. — The few English who escaped
to the mill found it a place of safety. Says tradition,
this was a fortified place, but it was then left in a
defenceless condition. This latter fact the Indians
were ignorant of, hence it was left unassailed. The
escaped soldiers were rescued at night by Warren and
Pierce, with some others, among whom was Captain
SUDBURY.
393
Prentis, " who coming in the day hastily though some-
what too late to the relief of Capt. Wadsworth having
not six troopers that were able to keep way with him
I'ell into a pound "or place near Sudbury town end_
where all passages were stopped by the Indians."
Caf)tain Cowell also gave assistance, and thus these
weary, war-worn men, the remnant of the gallant
company that fought on that memorable day, were
conducted to a place of safety.
Burial of the Dead.— The morning light of the
22d of April broke upon a sad scene in Sudbury. The j
noise of the batile had ceased, and the fires had faded
away with the night-shadows. Philip had betaken
himself from the field of his hard-earned and unfor-
tunate victory, and nothing of life was left but the
leafless woods, and these charred as if passed over by
the shadow of death. It was a scene of loneliness
and desolation. The dead, scalped and .stripped, were
left ."cattered as they fell ; while their victors by the
sun-rising were far on their way back over the track
which they had made so desolate. This scene, how-
ever, was shortly to change. Warm hearts and stout
hands were pushing their way to see what the case
might demand, and, if possible render, relief.
Before nightfall of the 21st, so far as we have learned,
little, if any intelligence was received by the parties
who had rushed to the rescue, of the true state of
things about Green Hill. Wadsworth and Brockle-
bank were encompassed about by the foe, so that no
communication could be conveyed to the English, who
anxiously awaited tidings of their condition. It was
known at the easterly part of the town that hard
fighting was in progress at or near Green Hill. The
shouting, firing and smoke betokened that a battle
was in progress, but how it would terminate none
could tell. After the Sudbury and Watertown men
had driven the Indians over the river, they strove
hard to reach the force on the hill. Says Warreij and
Pierce, in their petition : " We who were with them
can more largely inform this Honored Council that as
it is said in the petition, that we drove two hui.dred
Indians over the river and with some others went to
see if we could relieve Capt. Wadsworth upon the
hill, and there we had a fight with the Indians, but
they being so many of them, and we stayed so long
that we were almost encompassed by them, which
caused us to retreat to Capt. Goodnow's garrison
house, and there we stayed it being near night till it
was dark."
But another force had also striven to reach the town,
and join in the work of rescue. This was a company
from Charlestown, commanded by Captain Hunting.
Of this company, Grookin says (" History of Christian
Indians") : " On the 21" of April, Capt. Hunting had
drawn up and ready furnished his company of forty
Indians at Charlestown. These had been ordered by
the council to march to the Merrimac river near
Chelmsford, and there to settle a garrison near the
great fishing places where it was expected the enemy
would come to get fish for their necessary food." But,
says Goosin, " Behold God's thoughts are not as ours,
nor His ways as ours, for just as these soldiers were
ready to march upon the 21" of April, about midday,
tidings came by many messengers that a great body of
the enemy . . . had assembled at a town called Sud-
bury that morning." He says "that just at the begin-
ning of the lecture there, as soon sa these tidings
came. Major Gooken and Thomas Danforth, two of the
magistrates who were there hearing the lecture aer-
mon, being acquainted, he withdrew out of the meet-
ing bouse, and immediately gave orders for a ply of
horses belonging to Capt. Prentis's troop under con-
duct of Corporal Phipps, and the Indian company
under Capt. Hunting, forthwith to march away for the
relief of Sudbury ; which order was accordingly put
into execution. Capt. Hunting with his Indian com-
pany being on foot, got not into Sudbury until a little
within night. The enemy, as is before [narrated],
were all retreated unto the west side of the river of
Sudbury, where also several English inhabited."
But though the rescuing parties were either re-
pulsed or too late to render assistance at the fight,
they were on hand to bury the dead. Says Warren
and Pierce, — "After hurrying the bodies of the Con-
cord men at the bridge's foot, we joined ourselves to
Capt. Hunting and as many others as we could pro-
cure, and went over the river to look for Capt. Wads-
worth and Capt. Broklebank, and we gathered them
up and hurried them."
The manner in which this burial scene proceeded is
narrated thus by Mr. Gookin (" History of Christian
Indians"): "Upon the 22°" of April, early in the
morning, over forty Indians having stripped them-
selves and painted their faces like to the enemy, they
passed over the bridge to the west side of the river,
without any Englishmen in the company, to make
discovery of the enemy (which was generally con-
ceded quartered thereabout), but this did not at all
discourage our Christian Indians from marching and
discovering, and if they had met with them to beat
up their quarters. But God had so ordered that the
enemy were all withdrawn and were retreated in the
night. Our Indian soldiers having made a thourough
discovery and to their great relief (for some of them
wept when they gaw so many English lie dead on the
place among the slain), some they knew, viz., those
two worthy and pious Captains, Capt. Broklebank, of
Rowley, and Capt. Wadsworth, of Milton, who, with
about thirty-two private soldiers, were elain the day
before. ... As soon as they had made a full discov-
ery, [they] returned to their Captains and the rest of
the English, and gave them an account of their mo-
tions. Then it was concluded to march over to the
place and bury the dead, and they did so. Shortly
after, our Indians marching in two files upon the
wings to secure those that went to bury the dead, God
80 ordered it that they met with no interruption in
that work."
394
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Thus were tiie slain soldiers buried on that April
morning, in the stillness of the forest, far away from
their kindred, friends and homes. Those who,
through inability, had failed to defend them in the '
day of battle, now tenderly took them to their last, i
long reating-place. A single grave contained them. |
Though scattered, they were borne to one common ■
place of burial, and a rough heap of stones was all
that marked that lone, forest grave. Such was that •
soldiers' sepulchre — a mound in the woods, left to
grow gray with the clustering moss of years, yet
marking in its rustic simplicity one of the noblest and j
most heroic events known in the annals of King '
Philip's War. They sleep |
'* while tho bells of autumn toll, ;
Or the murninring sonp of apriuc Hits by.
Till the crackliug heavens in tliiiDder roll.
To the bilgle-blast on high,"
Place of Burial. — The grave was made on the !
westerly side of Green Hill, near its base, and was in the
northeast corner of the South Sudbury Cemetery be-
fore ita recent enlargement. In our recollection the
grave was marked by a rude stone heap, at the head
of which was a plain slate-stone slab. The heap was
made of common loose stones, such as a man could
easily lift, and was probably placed there when the
grave was made. It was perhaps three or four feet
high, and a dozen feet wide at the base. The slab ,
was erected about 1730 by President Wadsworth, of :
Harvard Collfge, son of Captain Wadsworth. As we '
remember the spot, it was barren and briar-grown ;
loose stones, fallen from the top and sides of the
mound, were half concealed in the wild wood gra«s i
that grew in tufts about it. It remained in this con- 1
dition for years, and the villagers from time to time !
visited it as a place of interest. ]
In the year 1851 the town agitated the matter of I
erecting a monument, and the Legislature was peti-
tioned for aid, which was granted. But the monu- |
ment does not mark the original grave. The com- >
mittee who had the matter in charge located it about
fifty feet to the north. The old grave was at or
about the turn of the present avenue or path, at the
northeast corner of the Adam Smith family lot in the
present Wadsworth Cemetery. After it was decided
to erect the monument in its present position, the re-
mains of the soldiers were removed. The grave was
opened without ceremony in the presence of a small
company of villagers. It was the writer's privilege to
be one of the number, and, according to our recollec-
tion, the grave was about six feet square, in which the
bodies were placed ia tiers at right angles to each
other. Some of the skeletons were large and all well
preserved.
The war with King Philip being ended, the way
was open for renewed prosperity. New buildings
went up on the old estates, garrisons again became
quiet homesteads, and the fields smiled with plenti-
ful harvests.
Erection" of Saw-Mill. — A movement that de-
notes the town's activity and recuperative power was
the erection of a saw-mill. A town record dated
March 26, 1677, imforms us it was ordered that
" Peter King, Thomas Read, Sen., John Goodenow,
John Smith and Joseph Freeman have liberty granted
them to build a saw-mill upon Hop Brook above Mr.
Peter Noyes's mill, at the place viewed by the commit-
tee of this town chosen the last week, which if they do,
they are to have twenty tons of timber of the common
lands for the building thereof, and earth for their
dam, and also they are to make a small dam or suffi-
cient causage so as to keep the waters out of the swamp
lands there, provided also that if Mr. Peter Noyea
shall at any time throw up his corn-mill they do in
room thereof set up a corn-mill as sufficient to grind
the town's corn and grain as Mr. Noyes's present mill
hath done and doth, and see to maintain the same,
and whenever they or any of them their heirs, execu-
tors, administrators. Assigns, or successors, shall
either throw up their said corn-mill or fail to grind
the town's corn and grain as above said, the towns
land hereby granted shall be forfeited and returned to
the town's use again, and lastly the said persons are not
to pen up the water, or .saw at any time between the
middle of April and the fi.'St of September, and they
are also to make good al! the highway that they
shall damage thereby."
Death of Rev. Edmund Browne. — The town
had not moved far on the road to renewed prosperity
before another caLimity came. This was the death of
its pastor, Rev. Edmund Browne, who died June 22,
1078.
Mr. Browne came from England in 1637, and, ac-
cordingly to Mather, was ordained and in actual ser-
vice in that country before he came to America. He
WHS a freeman of Massachusetts Bay Colony, May
13, 1640. He married, about 1G45, Anne, widow of
John Loveren, of Watertown, but left no children. He
was a member of the synod that established " The
Cambridge platform," 1646— 18 ; was on the council
that met in 1657 to settle the difficulties in Rev. Mr.
Stone's church, Hartford; preached the artillery elec-
tion sermon in 1666; and his name is attached to the
testimony of the seventeen ministers against the pro-
ceedings of the three elders of the First Church, Bos-
ton, about 1669.
Mr. Browne was quite a land-owner, his real estate
as it is supposed, amounting to three hundred acres.
His early homestead at Timber Neck had originally
belonging to it seventy acres. He received from the
General Court a grant of meadow land situated in the
present territory of Framingham, and from time to
time became possessed of various lands both within
and without the town. ilr. Browne hunted and
fished, and it is said was a good angler. He played on
several musical instruments and was a noted musi-
cian. In his will he speaks of his " Base Voyal " and
musical books and instruments. He was much interest-
SUDBUKY.
395
ed in educating and CbristianiziDg the IndiaDf, and at
nne time had some of them under his specisl care.
His library was for those times quite valuable, con-
taining about one hundred and eighty volumes. He
left fifty prunds to establish a grammar Bchool in
Sudbury ; but by vote of the town, in 1724, it was
"diverted to another purpose. He also left one hun-
dred pounds to Harvard College.
Sonn after the death of Mr. Browne the town
called the Rev. James Sherman to the pastorate, and
bought for his use, of John Loker, "the east end of
his house, standing before and near the meeting-
house; and the reversion due to him of the western
end of the house that his mother then dwelt in."
The town also agreed to pay Mr. Sherman eighty
pounds salary, part in money and part in produce.
New Meeting-House. — In 168.5 the town made a
coD'ract for a new meeting-house which was to "stand
upon the present buryingplace of this town, and on
the most convenient part thereof, or behind or about
the old meeting-house that now is."
Military Matters. — In the wars that occurred
in the last of the seventeenth and the early part of
the eighteenth centuries, Sudbury soldiers did valiant
service. The town was represented in the ill-fated
expedition of Sir William Phipps, in 1690, and in the
expedition subsequtnlly made against the eastern In-
dians. They also later did good service in and about
Rutland, Ma's. Repeatedly are the town's soldiers
on the muster-rolls of a company of rangers who
served in that vicinity. One of <the commanding
officers was William Brintnal, a Sudbury school-
master.
Schools. — A prominent feature in the history of
Sudbury at the beginning of the eighteenth century
was the attention given to schools.
November 17, 1701, at a town-meeting, "it was
voted to choose Mr. Joseph Noyes as a grammar
school master for one year. . . . Also chose Mr. W°
Brown and Mr. Thomas Plymptnn to present the said
school master ucto the Rev. ministers for their appro-
bation of him, which are as followeth, Mr. James
Sherman, Mr. Joseph Esterbrouks, Mr. Swift, of Fra-
mingham." This reverend committee duly met, and
examined the candidate, and reported as follows,
Nov. 21, 1701: '• We, the subscribers, being desired
by the town of Sudbury to write what we could testify
in concerning the justification of Mr. Joseph Noyes,
of Sudbury, for a legall Grammar School master, hav-
ing examined the said Mr. Joseph Noyes, we find
that he hath been considerably versed in the Latin
and Greek tongue, and do think that upon his dili-
gent revisal and recollection of what he hath formerly
learned, he may be qualified to initiate and instiuct
the youth in the Latin tongue.
"Joseph Esterbrooks, Johk Swift."
On the strength of this careful approval and
guarded recommendation the successful candidate
went forth to his work. He did not, however, long
i retain his position. For some cause not mentioned
the place soon became vacant ; and February of the
same year Mr. Picher became Mr. Noyes' successor.
I The contract made with Mr. Picher was as follows :
"It is agreed and concluded that the town will and
doth grant to pay unto Mr. Nathaniel Richer six
pounds in money in course hee doth accept of the
Towne's choice as to be our Grammar scool master,
also for one quarter of a yeare, and to begin ye third
of March next ensuing, and to serve in the place the
full quarter of a yeare, one half of the time on the
east side of the River, and the other half of the time
on the west side of the river. This Grammar scool
ma-ster chosen if he accepts and doth enter upon the
work it is expected by the above said Towne, that he
should teach all children sent to him to learn Eng-
lish and the Latin tongue, also writing and the art
of Arithmalic." In 1703 it was voted to pay Mr.
Picher for service done that year twenty-eight
pounds, "he deducting a months pay . . .for his
being absent one month in summer time from keep-
ing of scool, which amounth to twelfeth part of time ; "
"also voted and agreed, as a free will, to give unto
Mr. Picher two days in every quarter of his year to
visit his friends, if he see cause to take up with it."
In 1711, Lieut. Thomas Frink and Quartermaster
Brintnal were "to agree with some person who is
well instructed in ye tongues to keep a scool." His
pay was not to exceed thirty pounds.
The place of the school was changed from time to
time. In 1702 it was voted " that the scool master
should keep y* scool on y' west side of y' river at y*
house of Thomas Brintnell, which is there parte of
time belonging to y' west side of y' river." The
custom of changing the place of the school was con-
tinued for many years; for we find the following
record as late as 1722: "Voted by the town that y'
scool master shall keep scool one half of y' time on
y' west side of y' river in Sudbury, voted by y' town,
that y' scool master shall keep y' first quarter at y'
scool house at y' gravel pitt, voted by y' town that
y' second to bee keept on y* east side y' river as Near
y' water as may be conveniant, voted by y* town
j that y' third quarter to be keept at y' house of Insign
John Moore, voted by y' town that y' fourth quarter
to be keept at y' house of Clark Gleason." In the
year 1717 Samuel Paris was to keep school four
months of the year at the school-bouse on the west
side of the river, and at his own house the rest of the
year. If he was away part of the time be was to
make it up the next year.
In addition to these means for obtaining advanced
instruction, there were schools of a simpler character.
About the time that provision was made for a gram-
mar school, we read of " masters who were to te.acb
children to rede and wright and cast accounts " This '
was done in 1701, at which time the town "voted and
chose John Long and John Balcom " for the purpose
just stated, "and to pay them for one year thirty
306
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
shillings apiece." From this time repeated reference
is made in the records to schools of a primary or
mixed character.
Amongthe schoolmasters who served before 1750 are
William Brintnal, Joseph Noyes, Nathaniel Picher,
Jonathan Hoar, Samuel Paris, Nathaniel Trask, Jon-
athan Loring, John Long, John Balcom, John Mel-
len, Samuel Kendall, Ephraim Curtis and Zichery
Hicks. Some of these laught for a succession of
terms or years. William Brintnal taught a grammar
school as late as 1733-34, and receipts are found of
Samuel Kendall in 1725 and 1736.
Prior to 1700, school-house accommodations were
scant. There was no school building whatever. In
1702 '' the town agreed that the school should be kept
at the meeting-house half a quarter and the other half
quarter at the house of Benjamin Morses." But it is
a law of progress that improvement in one direction
suggests improvement in another; so with better
schools better accommodations were sought for. Jan-
uary 1, 1702, the "town voted and paste into an act,
to have a convenient scool-hous;" also voted "that
the scoolhouse that shall be built by the town shall
be set and erected as near the centre of the town, as
may be conveniantly set. upon the town's land;" also
"that it be twenty feet in length, : : : eighteen feet
in breadth, seven feet from the bottom of the cell to the
top of the plate, a large chimney to be within the house,
the house to be a log-house, made of pine, only the
sides to be of white oak bord and shingles to be covered
cells with. Also the chimney to be of stone to the
mortling and finished with brick. This was paste into
an act and vote Jan. lo"" 1701-2.'' At another meeting
it was decided " that there should be two scool-
houses ; " that they should be of the same dimensions ;
and "that the one on the east side should be set near
to Enoch Cleavland's dwelling-house." It was after-
wards voted that "the scooi-houses should be builte
by a general town acte and that the selectmen should
make a rate of money of 20 pounds for their erection."
One of the houses was to be placed " by Cleatflands
and the other near unto Robert Mans." In 1711 the
town voted to have but one school-house, and this
school-house was to be built at " y' gravel pitt." " Y'
scool-house" here mentioned was "to be 20 foot long,
IG foot wide, six foot studd, nine foot and a half sparrl.
Ye sills to be white oak ye outside, to be horded, and
ye bords to be feather-edge. Ye inside to be birch and
horded with RufTbords, lower and uper flower to be bord
anda brick Chemne, and two glass windows 18 Enches
square pe"^ window, and the Rutfe to be horded and
shingled." It was to be ready for a school by the last
of May, 1712. Joseph Parmenter was to make it, and
have for pay fourteen pounds.
The evidence is that the desire for school privileges
spread, and that the extremity of the town soon
sought for increased advantages. April 17, 1719, the
town was called upon "to see if it will grant the
North west quarter of the towns petition, they desir-
ing the school master some part of the time with
them."
Division of the Town' into Two Precincts. —
As in educational matters, so in those i)ertaining to
the church, we find the period prolific in change.
Great and important events transpired relating to the
meeting-house, the minister and the people. The
first change was the dismission of the pastor. On
May 22, 1705, the pastoral relation between Rev.
James Sherman and the people of Sudbury was dis-
solved. But not long wa.s the church left pastorless.
The same year of Mr. Sherman's removal a town-
meeting was held, in which it was voted " y' y° town
will chose a man to preach ye word of God unto us for
a quarter of a year." The Rev. Israel Loring was
chosen for the term mentioned. He began to preach
in Sudbury, Sept. 16, 1705; and the result was he was
ordained as pastor, Nov. 20, 1706.
After the settlement of Mr. Loring, ecclesiastical
matters were not long in a quiet state. A new sub-
ject soon engrossed public attention. There was an
attempt made to divide the town into two parochial
precincts. The west side people doubtless loved the
little hill-side meeting-house, about which were the
graves of their friends, and whose history was asso-
ciated with so much of their own. Their fondness
for it had doubtless increased as the years passed by,
and there clustered about it memories of things the
sweetest and the saddest that had entered into their
checkered experience. Here their children had been
offered in baptism ; here had been the bridal and the
burial, the weekly greetings and partings, the e.\-
change of intelligence of heart and home. It had
been the place for prayer and the preached v/ord ; a
place of watch and ward, and a place of resort in
times of danger. But notwithstanding their fondness
for the sacred spot, they were too practical a people
to allow sentiment to interfere with their true pro-
gress, and what they believed to be their spiritual
good.
With their extremely slow means of transit, and the
rough roads of that period when at their best, it was
a long and weary way they had to travel every Sab-
ba'hday; but when the roads became blocked with
the drifting snow, or the river was swollen with
floods, then it was sometimes a perilous undertaking
to reach the east side meeting-house and return. In
that primitive period the people of Sudbury did not
desire even a good excuse to keep them from public
worship ; they were Puritanic in both precept and
practice. They would allow no small obstacle to
cheat their soul of its rights; but if there were hin-
derances in the way to their spiritual helps, they re-
quired their immediate removal.
Hence, a movement was inaugurated to divide the
town, and make of it two precincts, in each of whieli
there should be a church. A primary act for the ac-
complishment of this purpose was to obtain the con-
sent of the General Court. To do this a petition was
SUDBURY.
397
presented, which, aB it telle its own story, and sets
forth the entire case, we will present :
*' PetitioD of tlie West Side people of Sudtury to Governor iJndley and
the General AsEembly.
•'The petition of us who are the subscribers living on ye west side of
Sudbur>- great River Humbly sliowetb (bat wereas ye All wise and over
Ituling pro\idence of ye great God, Lord of Heaven and Earth Mho is
God blessed forever nioore, liatli cast our lott to fall on that side of the
Kiver by Reason of the find of walare, which for a very great part of the
yeare dotli verj' much inconiode us, and often by extremity of water and
terrible and violent winds, and a preat part of the winter by ice, oa it is
al this present, so that wee ere shut up and cannot come forth, and many
times when wee di>e atempt to git over our tlud, we are forced for to seek
uiir spiritual pood with the peril of our Lives.
" Beside the extreme Tmvill that many of us are Exposed unto sum
3 : 4 : 5 : G : miles much more that a Sabbath days Jurney, by Reason of
these anirfuany more objections, to many here to enumerate, whereby
many of our children and little ones, ancientand weak persons, can very
Harly attend the public worship. The cods dered premises we truly
]'rny your Excellency and ye Honorable Council and House of Repre-
sentatives to consider and compassionate ue in our Extreme Buffering
condition, and if we may obtain so much favor In your Eyes as to grant
us [our presents] as to appoint us a Comniily to 84e and consider uur
circumstances and make report thereof to this honorable Court. And
your pore petitioners sluill ever pray.
"^udbur^, Jaiitiary IS**" 170?.
" John Guodoow . John haynes, Jr.
John baines. Robert Man his mark.
John Bripham. Beiijiiuiiii wright.
AN'illiuni Walker. liuvid Hayues.
George Parnietlter. Prefer haloes.
liuvid how. Thoum.s Itrilitnal.
tieorgc Parnienler, Jr. Edward GoodnoM his mark.
Joseph Purmenter. John Goodenoxv, jr.
John brighiiin. Ephniim Garfield, his mark.
jNiinu*'l Willis. Thomas Suiitli, Juuior.
Joseph wiUis. Jouathan Rice."
Richard Sanger.
Tho : Smith.
Jusel)h Hayes [Haynes].
tliuolhy gibbon, J'.
Juscjih F. Jewel (his maik).
Isaac Mellen.
Jlelo C. Taylor (his mark).
John Bulconi.
Joseph Balconi.
(State Archives, voL ii., page 221.)
After repeated discussion of the subject, and years
had elapsed, permission was given to the west side
people to erect a meeting-house and maintain a min-
ister. At a town-meeting, December 26, 1721, held
at the house of Mr. George Pitts, it was agreed " to
grant 24 pounds for preaching for the present on the
westerly side of the river.'' It was also decided at
that meeting to choo.se a committee to present a peti-
tion to the General Court, " that y' west aide inhabit-
ants may have liberty to place their meeting-house
on y' rocky plaine ; " which request was granted.
The preliminary work of forming two parochial
precincts was now completed ; it only remained to
adjust ecclesiastical relations to the new order of
things, and provide whatever was essential to its suc-
cess. The church was to be divided, ministers se-
cured aud a meeting-house built. All these came
about in due time. After the decision, in December,
1721, "to have the preaching of the word amongst
us," and the granting of money to meet the expense.
Rev. Mr. Minot was invited to preach six Sibbaths in
the West Precinct. It may be that about this time
Mr. Loring preached some on the west side, since on
the town debt, as recorded April 9, 1722, there stands
this statement: "To Mr. Israel Loring to y' nupport-
ing y' ministry on both [sidet] y' river in Sudbury
80. 0. 0."
But more permanent arrangements were soon
made. On the 6th of June, 1722, they extended a
call to Rev. Israel Loring, and oflered £1()0 for his
settlement." July 10th Mr. Loriug responded to the
invitation in the following word^: "To the Inhabit-
ants of the west Precinct in Sudbury : I accept of the
kind invitation you have given me to come over and
settle and be the minister of the Westerly Precinct."
A few days after the above invitation the east side
invited him to remain with them, arid took measures
to provide for " their now settled minister, Mr. Israel
Loring." The day after replying to the tirst invita-
tion, he wrote to the east side people informing '.hem
of his decision to leave them and settle in the West
Precinct. Mr. Loring moved to the west side, July
25, 1723. (Siearns Collection ) He lived about a
mile toward the north part of the town, in what was
afterwards an old red house, on the William Hunt
place, that was torn down some years since. He sub-
sequently lived at the centre, on what is known
as the Wheeler Haynes place.
The church records by Mr. Loring state as follows :
" Feb. 11, 1723. The church met at my house, where,
after the brethren on the east side had manifested
their desire that the church might be divided into
two churches, it was so voted by majority." At the
time of the division of the church, the number of
communicants on the west side was thirty-two males
and forty-two females. (Stearns Collection.) The
church records went into the possession of the West
Parish.
While ecclesiastical matters were in process of ad-
justment on the west side, they weie progressing
towards a settlement on the east side also. It is
stated that the East Precinct was organized June 25,
1722. When the effort to secure the services of Mr.
Loring proved futile, a call was extended to Rev.
William Cook, a native of Hadley, Mass., and a grad-
uate of Harvard College. The call being accepted,
Mr. Cook was ordained March 20, 1723, and continued
their pastor until his death, November 12, 1760. The
town granted eighty pounds to support preaching on
both sides of the river for half a year.
New Meeting-Houses. — An important matter,
in connection with the new order of thing'", was
the erection of new meeting-houses. This work re-
ceived prompt attention. " At a town-meeting, Jan-
uary 22 : 172s 'he town granted five hundred pounds
to build a new meeting-house on the west side, and
repair the old one on the east side, three hundred and
eighty pounds for the new, and one hundred and
twenty pounds for the repairing of the old on the east
side." The turn for repairing the old houise was at a
398
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
subaequent meeting made one hundred and fifty
pounds.
The meeting-house in the West Precinct was placed
on the site of the present Unitarian Church in Sud-
bury Centre. The location was probably selected
because central to the inhabitants of the West Pre-
cinct.
The French and Indian Wars. — In the French
and Indian Wars the town repeatedly sent soldiers to
the field who did valiant service for their country.
In the third French war it sent men for the capture
of Cape Breton; and in the defence of No. 4, a fort on
the Connecticut River, at what is now Charleston,
N. H., Captain Phineas Stevens, a native of Sudbury,
did conspicuous service. Mr. Stevens was born in
Sudbury, February 20, 1700, and a few years later he
went with his father to Rutland. About 1740, he
went to the New Hampshire frontier, and after the
construction of Fort No. 4, he became its commander,
and assisted bravely in its defense. In^the arduous
task he was aided for a lime, in 1746, by Captain
Josiah Brown, who went from Sudbury with a troop
of horse. In the fourth French and Indian War
Sudbury soldiers were again at the front, and did ser-
vice in the various expeditions of that period.
In 1755 a regiment was raised, and placed under
command of Colonel Josiah Brown, of Sudbury, for
the purpose of preveiting the encroachments of the
French about Crown Point and upon '' Lake Iroquois,
commonly called by the French. Lake Champlain."
The regiment belonged to the command of William
.Johnsiin. The following is a list of the field and statf
otticers :
.rasi:ih Brown, Col.
Juba (JuritrnJiigB, Lt. Col.
.'*lev(,'U .MilliT, Slujor.
Sduiuel DuDbar, Cbuplain.
Sumnel BriKbani, Snrceon.
Be[i.juniiii tJott, :»uriieun'(i Mate.
David Miuion, CoDiniie!uiry.
Joseph Loverilig, .AUjuUiljl,
Sept. 10, 1755, Samuel Dakin received a commission
as captain of foot in this regiment. The muster-roll
of h:s company cnnlaios forty-eight names, of which
sixteen are supposed to be from Sudbury.
In a second list of Capt. Dakin's men eighteen
are supposed to be from Sudbury ; and in a third list
are seventeen names supposed to be of Sudbury men.
Besides tdeae, there were s .me who served in other
companies. Some were in Capt. Josiah Rich-
ardson's company, and some in Capt. John Nixon's.
In one of the expeditions'of this war the town sus-
tained the loss of Capt. Dakin and several others of
its citizens, who were killed by the Indians at Half-
Way Brook, near Fort Edward, July 20, 1758. At
the lime of this event Capt. Dakin and his company
were connected with the expedition of General Am-
herst again>t Crown Point. The following brief ac-
count of the attendant circumstances are stated in a
diary kept by Lieut. Samuel Thomson, of Woburn :
"July 20, Thursday in the morning, 10 men in a
scout waylaid by the Indians and shot at and larmed
the fort and a number of our men went out to assise
them, and the enemy followed our men down to our
Fort, and in their retreat Capt. Jones and Lieut.
Godfrey were killed, and Capt. Liwrence and Capt.
Dakin and Lieut. Curtis and Ea^" Davis, and two or
three non-commissioned officers and private<, to the
number of 14 men, who were brought into the Fort,
all scalped but Ens" Davis, who was killed within .30
or 40 rods from the Fort : and there was one grave
dug, and all of them were buried together, the otticers
by themselves at one end, and the rest at the other
end of the grave ; and Mr. Morrill made a prayer at
the grave, and it was a solemn funeral ; and Nath'
Eaton died in the Fort and was buried ; and we kept
a very strong jiuard that night of 100 men. Haggit
[ami] W° Cnggin wounded."
Then follows a list of the killed, beginning :
"Capt. Ebenezer Jones of Willmington
Capt. Dakin of Sudbury
liieut. Samnell Curtice of Ditto
Private Grout of do "'
Samuel Dakin was a son of Deacon Joseph D.ikin,
whose father, Thomas, settled in Concord prior to
10.50. In 1722 he married Mercy Minott, daughter
of Col. Minott, who built the first framed house in
Concord. The farm of C.ipt. Dakin was in the north-
ern part of Sudbury, on the road running northerly
to Concord, his house being very near the town boun-
dary. As early as 1745 he was appointed ensign of
the second company of foot in Sudbury, of which
Josiah RiL'hardson was captain and Joseph Buck-
inlnster was colonel. Sept. 10, 1755, he received the
commission of capt;tin in C il. Josiah Brown's regi-
ment.
Capt. Dakin was a devout Christian. Just before
going on this last expedition, he renewed a solemn
covenant with God which he had made some years
previous. This covenant is still extant.
Among other services rendered by the town was
the maintenance of what were termed French Neu-
trals, the people whom Longfellow has described in
his poem "Evangeline.''
One thousand of these French Neutrals arrived in
the Massachusetts Bay Province, and were supported
at public expense. Different towns, among which
was Sudbury, had their quota to care for. Repeatedly
is there a record of supplies furnished them by the
town. The following is a general statement of some
of these :
" An Kccount of what bath been expended by s^ Town of Sudbury on
Sundry French Penona eent from Nova Scotia to this province aud by
!jj government lo town of Sudbury.
'The riubsiatiug of Eighteen persous tec daya — six persons three
weeke, and four persons twenty-three weeks, the whole amounting to
one hundred and twenty-seven weeks for one person charged at lour
sbilliogs week for each perdoo £25 — S«.
Epbraiui Curtis Ebenezer Boby
Jusiuh Brown Josiah fiayues
John Noyes Samuel Dakin
Eliiah Smith. Selectmen.
'* Some of thetu being aick a great many comers and goers to visit them
made the expense the greater even thirteen or fourteen at a time foi a
week together."
SUDBURY.
399
The Wokk-House.— In 1753, a movement was
made to eslablish a work-house in Sudbury. At the
above-named date a vote was taken, when " it passed
very fully in the affirmative, that it [the town] would
provide a Work House in sd town, that Idle & Dis-
orderly People may be properly Employed."
As evidence of further modes of discipline em-
ployed in this period, we 6nd that, in 1760, the town
allowed payment to Col. Xoyes for making stocks,
and also for four staves for the tithingmen. In the
warrant for a town-meeting in 1757, is the following
article : '' To see what the town will do with regard
to Dido, a Negro woman who is now upon charge in
this town." With regard to this Dido the town or-
dered the selectmen " to make strict inquiries who
brought Dido into town.''
Another institution introduced into the town in
this period was the pest-house. Tradition poinia to
several locajities, which at that time were within the
town limits, where pest-h' uses were siluaied. The
site of one of these )s at Isobscot Hill. On the east-
ern side of the hill, on land owned by Mr. Hubbard
Brown, and a short distance from a smjll pond, are the
graves of the small-pox victims. They are clustered
together biUtath a small growih ol' pines that are
now scattered over that briar-grown i-pot; and the
wind, as it sweeps through the branches of this little
pine grnve, and the occasional note of the wildwood
bird, alone break the stillness and disturb the loneli-
ness of that f >rest burial-place.
lu 17iJ0, Rev. William Cook died, and Nov. 4, 1761,
Rev. Josiali Bridge was ordained his successor. On
March 9, 1772, Rev. Israel Loring passed uway, and
Nov. II, 1772, Rev. Jacob Bigelow was ordained for
the pastorate.
Sketch of Mr. Loring.— The service of Mr.
Loring in the church at Sudbury was long and fruit-
ful. He died in the ninetieth yearof his age and the
sixty-sixth year of his ministry. It was said of him
that "as he earnestly desired atid prayed that he
might be serviceable as long as he should live, so it
pleased God to vouchsafe his request, for he continued
to preach 'till the last Sabbath but one before his
death, and the next day prayed in the town-meeting,
which was on the 2"'' day of the month. The night
following he was taken ill, and on the O"" of March,
1772, he expired." Mr. Loring had pious parentage.
His father, Mr. John Loring, of Hull, came from
England, December 22, 1634. It has been said of him
that, like Obadiah, '"he feared the Lord greatly."
His mother was also religious, and " prayed with her
family in her husband's absence." Mr. Loring was
born at Hull, Ma.-s., April 6, 1682. It is supposed he
was converted in his youth. He graduated at Har-
vard College in 1701. He began to preach at Scituate,
Lower Parish, August 1, 1703, and preached first at
Sudbury July 29, 1705. On the fidelity of Mr.
Loring's ministry we need offer no comments : his
worka are his meuiorials. At the time of his installa- ,
tionatSudbury the church numbered one hundred and
twenty, — forty-one males and seventy-nine females.
During his ministry four hundred and fifty were
added to it; of these, forty-two males and seventy-two
females were added before the division of the church,
and, after the division, there were added to the West
Church one hundred and twenty-nine males and two
hundred and seven females. The whole number of
children baptized by Mr. Loring in Sudbury was
fourteen hundred.
For a time preceding the Revolution, the West
Side was divided into the North and South Wards.
In 1765, Richard Heard offered to collect the taxes on
the East Side the river for three pence per pound if
they would appoint him collector and constable ; and
Aarcm Haynes offered to collect them for the North
Ward, West Side, and Jedediah Parmenter for the
South Ward at the same rates.
In 1765, the town " voted to build a new stone
pound between Lieut. Augustus Moors' dwelling-
house at the gravel pit, on Col. Noyes' land which he
promised to give the town to set a pound on by
Dead." The pound waa to be " 30 feet square from
Eadside to Endside, 6 ft. high with pieces of limber
locked together round the top 8 inches square, for
six pounds and the old pound."
In 1771, the town voted to build a powder-house in
which to keep the town's stock of ammunition. It
granted for this object "7 pounds 9 shillings and 4
pence, and agreed with Col. John Noyes to build it,
and place it near or on W"" Baldwin's land near
Major Curtis '." Another record of the same year
states that " the town voted to erect the powder-house
on the training field near Mr. Elisha Wheelers." In
1773, it " voted to remove the powder-house to some
suitable place on or near the gravel pit hill, and
chose a committee to remove the same, if the com-
mittee stiould think the house will be sufficient for
the use it was built for, and rough cast and underpin
said building."
Revolctionary War. — The period from 1775 to
1800, in this country, may truly be termed the period
of the Revolution. It witnessed the commencement
and close of armed opposition to the Britsh Crown,
and the establishment in America of a new nation-
ality. In the work of overthrowing the old and es-
tablishing a new government, the several provincial
towns had a common concern ; each supplied its
quota and each stood ready to respoiKi to the
country's call. Sudbury, on account of its situation
and size, bore a prominent part. It was the most
populous town in Middlesex County ; its territory was
extensive, and for a time in close proximity to the
seat of war; for these reasons much was expected of
it, and its patriotism was equ.il to the demand.
The town was usually present, by delegates, in re-
sponse to all calls, and her vote was stanch for the
Continental cause. In 1770, the people manifested
their hearty appreciation of the agreement of
400
HISTORY' OF MIDDLESEX COUNTS, MASSACHUSETTS.
merchants in Boston '* to atop the importation of
British goods, and engaged for themselves and all
within their influence, to countenance and encourage
the same." At an early day they chose a committee
to prepare and present instructions to Peter Noyes,
Representative to the General Court, in regard to the
Stamp Act, which set forth their opinions very
strongly concerning that petty piece of tyranny.
Record after record appears on the town-book, of
resolutions and acts that show how positive the people
were in their patriotism, and how pronounced they
we^e in declaring it. These are of such a character
that to give a few of them will suffice.
"I77.i. The Town being met the committee appointed by the town
to t^ike into conaideratioD the affair relating to the Ttiasent here by the
EuBt India Company, reported aa foUows, viz. :
"Taking into Consideration the late Conduct of administration, to-
gether with an act of Parlianient enabling the Eaat India Company to
expo t their Teas unto .\,meric;i Free of all Duties and Cuiloms, Kegu-
hitioQi and penalties in America as are pr )videJ by llie Revenue Act ;
we are justly alarmed at tti is Djteatable Craft and Policy of the Min-
istry to deprive ua of our American Liberties Transmitted to us by our
Worthy Ancestors, at no less expense than that uf their Blood and
Treasure. That price our Renowned Forefatherj freely paid, that they
might tran-*[nit thoseGlorious Liberties, as a frt-o, full, and fair inher-
itance to Posterity, which liberties thVough the Iiidvilgent Smiles of
Ileaven, we have possessed in peace and Quietness, till within a few
years Past (Excepting in the reign of the Detestable Stewarts) liut now
Behold I the pleasing scene is changed, the Uritish tuinistry, assisted by
the Invctenite Enemies to .American Liberty on this as well aa uu the
other side of the Atlantick, Combining together to Rob us of our dear
bouglit freedom, have Brought us to this sad Dilemma, either to re-
solve like men in defenseof our just Rights and Liberties, or sink under
the wtight of their Arbitrary and unconstitutional measures into a
State of abject Slavery. Therefore as Freeborn Americans Intitled to all
the immunities, Liburties and Piivileg^s of Freeborn |£n^lishmen, we
look upou ourselves under the Strongest Obligations to uee our utmost
Exertions in defense of our just Rights in every constiiutioual method
within our power. Even though the Cost of the Defense should equal that
of the purchase. Therefoie resolved
" 1'* That us we are entitled t'' all the Privileges of British Subjects,
we liave an undoubted and e.xclusive Right to Urant our own monies
fur the bupport of Government and that no Power on Earth has a right
to Tux or make Lt. •' binding ua, without our consent.
" Jdly That the British Parliament laying a Duty on Tea Payable in
America, fur the Express purpose of Raising a Revenue, is in our
opinion an unjust Taxation, and that the specious method of permitting
the Eii6t India Company to export their Teas into the Colouie.1, has a
direct tendency to rivet the Chain of Slavery upon us.
" lidly. That we will lend all the aid and assistance in our Power in
every Rational .Method, to binder the Importations of Teus, so lung as
It is subject to a duty ; and that this Town are well pleased with and
highly approve of that Resolution iu particular entered into by the
Town of Boston, viz. : that they will not suffer any Tea to be imported
into that Town while subject to an unrighteous Duty; and it is the
desire and expectation of this Town that said resolution be not relaxed
in any Degree ; which if it uhould it would much lessen that cunndeuce
(which we hope we may juatly say) we have reosun to place iu that re-
spectable nictropolis.
"4ibiy That the Persons appointed by the East India Company to re-
ceive and vend their Teas ^by their obsiiuatu refusal to resign their
odious Comniiasiou) have shown a ready dispotiitioiT to become the TouU
of our Enemies, to oppress und ennUve their Native Ctiuniiy, uud hav**
niunirestcd auch stupidity and wickedness to prefer privute Interest to
the good of their Country, and therefore can expect no favor or respect
from lis ; but we leave them to accumulate a load of Infamy, propur-
tiuuute to their vileuesa.
"o That whoever shall sell, buy, or otherwise use Tea, while bubject
to and poisoned with a duty, shall be deemed by ua Enemies to their
Country's welfare; and sliutl be treated by ua as such. The Town by
their Vute Ordered ihe foregoing resolves to be recorded in the Tuwn
Book, and a Copy of the same to be forwarded to the Committee of Cor-
,- Committee."
respondeuce at Boston, with our sincere thanks to that Respectable
To« n, for their 3Iauly Opposition to every minist'^rial measure to en-
slave .\merica.
" Thomas PlyinptoQ, Ezekiel Howe, John Maynard |
"Sampson Belcher, Phinenas Glezen, Joaiab Langdoa i
3riHtart/ Preparations. — November 14, 1774, " it was
voted, that the town recommend to the several com-
panies of militia to meet for the choice of officers for
their respective companies, as recommended by the
Provincial Congress. Also voted, that a company of
militia on the Eist side, meet on Thursday next at
twelve o'clock at the East meeting house in Sudbury,
to choose their officers; and that the companies on
the West side to meet at the West meeting house at
the same time and for the same purpose.''
Besides locking afcer the militia, the town took
measures to form companies of minute-men. These,
as the name implie-f, were to h'*ld themselves in read-
iness to act at a minute's warning. The officers re-
ceived no commissions, but held their positions by
vote of the men. Two su-iih companies were formed,
one on each side of the river. There was also a troop
of horse composed of men from both precincts. Be-
sides these companies of able-bodied men, there was
an alarm company romposed of men exempt from
military service. The names of the companies
were, —
North Militia Co., West Side, Capt. Aaron Hnynes, *V) men.
East Militia Co., East Side, Capt. Joseph Smith, T-i men.
South Militia Co. (LuubaMi District), both sides, Capt. Moses Stone, 9Z
men.
Troop of Horse, both t^ides, Capt. Isaac Loker, 21 men.
^linuic Co., West Siilt-, C.ipt. Juhii Nixon, '>>i men.
^liuutu Co., Eiujt Side, Capt. Nathaniel Cudworth, 40 men.
These make, besides the alarm list of Jabez Puffer,
six companies — 348 men — \n process of preparation
for the coming struggle.
In 1776, the town " voted to pay each of the minute-
men one shilling and sixpence for training one half
day in a week, 4 hours to be esteemed a half day,
after they were enlisted and until called into actual
service or dismissed; and the Captains 3 shillings
and Lieutenants 2 shillings and sis pence and the en-
sign 2 shillings."
The muster-rolls are preserved and represent about
one-fifth of the entire population. The number in
actual service at the Concord and Lexington fight,
three hundred and two. The following report shows
to what extent these companies were equipped :
*• Sudbno*. March y« ^T**" 1775 :
"The return of the Several! Companya of Militia and Minute inS<*
Town viz.
•* CAipt. Moses Stone's Company — 92 men of them, 18 no f;Tina. at
Leatt one third part )• forelocks unfit for Sjir^is uthti^ waib uii a ijuipt.
"Capt. Aaron Huyns Company— 00 men weel provided Wiih Arms
the most of them provided with Duyooets or hatchets a boute one qunr-
ler Part with Catrige Boxes.
"Capt. Joseph Smith's Company consisting of ■ 7"i able
Bodied men forty well a ipiipt twenty Promis to find and a quip them-
selves Emcdetly fifteen no guns ami uther wuis nn a qiiipt.
"The Troop Capt. Isaac Locer (Loker)— zl Besides what are on the
minit Role well a quipt.
" Returned by Ezekiel How. Left" Con' " ^Stearns Cullectiou.)
SUDBURY.
401
It is not strange that, at the time this report was
given, the troopj had not been fully equipped. It,
was not easy to provide for so many at once, but the
following record may indicate that the town had been
endeavoring to bupply the deficiency since the preced-
ing fall, Octobers. 1774:
To Capt. Eieklel How for 20 guns and Bayonets 27-0—2
COW pounds Lead 8— IG— <l
Early on the morning of April 19th the Sudbury
people were astir. The news of the march of the
British proclaimed by Paul Revere came by a messen-
ger from Concord to Thomas Plympton, Esq., who
was a member of the Provincial Congress. In a little
more than a half hour after, and between four and
five o'clock in the morning, the bell rang and a mus-
ket was discharged as a signal for the soldiers to re-
port for duty. The West Side companies arrived at
the North Bridge about the time that the firing com-
menced there, and joined in the pursuit of the retreat-
ing Briiish. In the memorable fight that followed
the town lost two men, viz. : Deacon Josiah Haynes
and Asahel Read. The former was eighty years old
and was killed at Lexington by a musket bullet. His
remains are buried in the " Old Burying-Ground " at
the centre. Asahel Read was son of Isaac Read and
a member of Nixon's minute company.
It is said that he exposed himself rashly to the fire
of the enemy, and although warned to exercise more
caution, persisted in his venturesome conduct until
he fell.
Sudbury was represented by three companies at the
battle of Bunker Hill. These were commanded by
.Sudbury captains and made up mainly of Sudbury
citizens. The town also furnished ihree regimental
officers,— Col. John Nixon, Major Nathaniel Cudworth
and Adj. Abel Holden, Jr. Capt. John Nixon of the
minute-men was promoted to the rank of colonel, and
was authorized, April 27th, to receive nine sets of
beating papers. Capt. Nathaniel Cudworth was made
major in the regiment of Col. Jonathan Brewer, who
received enlistment papers April 24th, and Abel
Holden, Jr., was made Colonel Nixon's adjulant.
The three Sudbury companies were commanded by
Capts. Thaddeus Russell, Aaron Haynes and David
Moore. The companies of Russell and Haynes were
in Col. Brewer's regiment, and that of Moore in Col.
Nixon's. The total number in these companies was
one hundred and fifty-two. In the engagement of June
17th, these men were in a very exposed condition.
The regiments of Nixon and Brewer were at the left
of the American line, in the direction of the Mystic
River. A part of the men had no breastwork what-
ever to protect them. An efi'ort was made to form a
slight breastwork of the newly-mown hay about there,
but the British advanced and they were forced to
desist. In their exposed position they held their
ground, and fought till the order came for them to re-
treat. The ammunition of the men in the redoubt
2C,-n
had failed and it was useless to protect the flank.
Both the colonels, Nixon and Brewer, were wounded
and the regiment of the lormer was one of the laat to
leave the field. In Capt. Hayneo' company, two men
were killed, viz.: Corning Fairbanks, oi Framingham,
and Joshua Haynes, of Sudbury. In Capt. Russell's
company, Leblaus Jenness, of Deerfield, was slain.
As the war progressed Sudbury soldiers were still
in the service. Capt. Asahel Wheeler commanded a
company in the Ticonderoga campaign, and Capts.
Abel Holden, Caleb Clapp and Aaron Haynes had
command of Sudbury soldiers elsewhere. In 1778,
several companies were still in the field. Four of
these had 327 men, and were commanded as
follows: West Side men, Capt. Jonathan Rice and
Capt. Asahel Wheeler; East Side men, Capt. Na-
thaniel Maynardand Capt. Isaac Cutting.
GovernmeiU Storehouses. — Besides other responsi-
bilities, the town had charge of some govern ccent
storehouses containing munitions of war, which the
Sudbury teamsters, from time to time, conveyed to the
front. Various receipts are still preserved which
were received by these teamsters. Thtse buildings
were situated on the northerly part of Sand Hill, eaat
of the county road. Several squads of soldiers were
employed to guard them, and at one time Captain
Isaac Wood was commander of the guard. In 1777,
the following soldiers did guard duty : " Corporal
Robert Eames, Silas Goodenow Jr, Philemon Brown,
Elisha Harrington, Jon" Clark." A guard of the
same number was there in 1778 and 79, but all the
i men were not the same. The field in or near which
these buildings stood was used as a training-field in
former years, and at one time a militia muster was
held there. But now all trace even of the site has
become obliterated, and for years it has been a quiet
feeding place for cattle, and all is as | ^.ixeful there as
if the slow pacing of the old Continental guard had
never been heard at Sand Hill. The town had a pop-
ulation of 2160, with about 500 rauble pools; and it is
supposed that, during the war, from 400 to 500 men
had some service either in camp or field. Of these
soldiers, one was brigadier-general, three were col-
onels, two were majors, two were adjutants, two were
surgeons, twenty-four were captains and twenty-
nine were lieutenants. That the soldiers were in
places of peril is indicated by the following records of
casualties :
CA&t7ALTl£8 TO 6UDBDBT 60LDIKB£.
i'aied— Deacon Joeiah Haynee, A(ted 80. April 19" 1776 : Aaahel
Read April 191' 1776 ; Joshoa HaynM Jr, of Capt Aaron Hayne'a Com-
pany, June " 1776, at Bunker Hill ; Sergeant Thadena Moore, 1777. at
Saratoga ; Benjamin Whitney,— By accident —
Wounded. — Geo. John Nixon and Nathan Maynard, at Bunker HUl ;
Lieut. Jueliua Clapp, at Saratoga ; Cornelius Wood, Nahom Baynei,
Cai,tain David Moore, Joshua. Uaynea ; Benjamin Barry, lust an arm in
Canada Expedition, 177G.
Died of 6ici-.iM«.— Sergeant M»jor JetBc Moor* ; Sergeant Samuel May-
nard, of the small pox at Quebeck with Arnold, 177li ; Sergeant Hope-
still Brown, Sergeant Ehjah Willis.
At Ticonderuga.—E.uBigu Tiiuothy L'nderiAood, Oliver Sandefwin,
Daniel Lnderwood, J^uiei Puffer, PUioebas Glcaaou, Stephen Puffer, of
402
niSTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
In considering the military service of the town in
('apt Dflniel Bowdtr's To., Col ^\■el>b'8 Reg'died Oct 3** ; St'lomon Rice,
Timorliy Hice, Josirth Cutter. 1 , t^ , ■ ,tt i i ■ j j
Taken Pruon^ and Xner Uear.i „/-Timdeu8 HarringtoD, Thoma, ! "-he Revoiulionary War, We bave Only Considered a
Dulriniple, Tliuniss ^loore, Daniel Hayoea.
part of her history. During tliat time important civ-
Lo,i lYicaUeHng-Unax Moore, Silas Goodenow, Lemuel Goodenow, | ;] transactions Were taking place also. There Were de-
' privations to be endured by those at home; the coun-
Pertoui Who 31tt With Casvaltiei the XatuTe of ichich in .Not Specined. —
Juhu Brewer, Jamea Deinauder, John Beniia, Timothy ^losaDian.
In closingthisaccount of Sudbury's military service
we will give some facts in the life of General Xixon.
Sketch of General Nixon. — Gen. John Nixon, was a
son of Christopher Nixon, who went to Framingham
about 1724, where seven children were born, of whom
John was the oldest. At an early age, being but a
mere boy, he entered the army, and at the instiga-
try was burdened with debt, the currency was in a
very uncertain state, and, because of its depreciated
condition, there was more or less confu?ion in com-
mercial afl'airs. There was as much need of sagacity
on the part of the civilian in council, as of military
men in the field, to direct the afliiirs of Slate and
town. The town-meetings of thobe days were very
important occasions, and, unless the people met enier-
tion of older persons he left unlawfully, but clemency j geucies there in a prompt and efficient manner, the
was shown him and he was allowed to return to the [ fi^btiugelementiu the field could accompli.-h but little.
ranks. His subsequent career proved him to be a ' In thisrespectthepeopleofSudbury werenot deficient,
true soldier. I We have heard of no instance where a Tory spirit
In 1745, when he was but twenty years old, he was | was manileat nor where a patriotic purpose was want-
in the Pepperell Expedition to Louisburg, and lieu- i ing. During the war a large share of the town war-
tenant in Captain Newell's company at Crown Point rants set forth the needs of the county or town which
in 1755. Later in the war he served as captain. At . were caused by the war; and the town-meeting that
one time, when operating against the French forces, followed was about sure to result in a generous re-
he was led into an ambuscade and only forced his sponse to the demaml.
way out with the loss of most of his men. As before l Another man who wa.s prominent in military mat-
noticed, at the beginning of the Revolutionary War ters was Col. Ezekiel Howe. He belonged to the old
he served as captain of a company of minute-men. ! Howe family in Sudbury, and was a former proprie-
April 24, 1775, he received the commission of colonel. | tor of the Red Horse Tavern.
He fought and was wounded at the battle of Bunker [ In 17S0 the town was divided. The part set off
Hill. He went with the army under Washington to 1 was called East Sudbury, siuce WayluJid.
New York, and was promoted, .August 9th, to briga- i In 1792 the town voted to sell the training-field in
dier-general. His promotion to the rank of general the southeast part of the town, and " the Committee
of brigade was on recommendation of Washington, i formerly employed to sell the Work house " were ap-
who stated to Congress that Nixon's military talents pointed to attend to the work. The same year
and bravery entitled him to promotion. In his new measures were taken for the prevention of the small-
position he had, for a time, command of two regi- J pox. The article concerning it in the warrant was
ments and a force of artillery at Governor's Island,
New York Harbor. August 27th he left there, and
"To see if the town would admit the Small-Pox into
sd town by Inoculation." " It passed in the nega-
subsequently operated with the army in the northern I tive." The following year the selectmen were in-
campaign in New York State against Burgoyne. i structed " to take measures to prevent the spreading
When it was decided to advance against the latter, i of tiie small-pox, and to prosecute the persons who
General Gates ordered Nixon and two other com- | transgressed the laws respecting the disease." In-
manders to make the attack. A cannon-ball passed i structions were also given "to make diligent search
80 near his head that the sight and hearing on one side I to see if tbere were any persons who had been iu-
were impaired. After the surrender of Burgoyne,
General Nixon and some others were detailed to
escort the prisoners to Cambridge. About that time
oculated for small-pox contrary to law."
On Oct. 5, 1795, the town again voted " to build a
new Meeting-House, that it should be erected on the
he had a furlough of several months, in which time I common land near to the present meeting-house, and
he married his second wife. General Nixon was on I that the south and west cells of sd house should
the court-martial — with Generals Clinton, Wayne and occupy the ground on which the south and west cells
Muhlenburg, and of which Gen. Benjamin Lincoln
was president — for the trial of General Schuyler for
the neglect of duty in the campaign of 1777, by which
of the present meeting-house now stand upon, and
that the enlargement of the meeting-house should ex-
tend North and East. Voted to accept a plan drawa
Ticonderoga was surrendered. The trial was at the ! by Capt. Thomson which plan is GO feet by 52 with a
request of General Schuyler, and by it he was fully i porch at one end with a steeple or spear on the top of
acquitted with the highest honors. In 1777, General i sd porch. Voted that the Commitee for building the
Nixon's brigade had headquarters for a time at Peeks- I house should consist of nine persons, and that they
kill, N. Y., and for a time in 1777, at Albany. On Sept.
12, 1780, he closed his military career by resigning his
commission as general, and retired to private life.
should receive nothing for their services." In 179(j
it was voted that a bell should be purchased for the
meeiing-houiie. October, 1798, the building com-
SUDBURY.
403
mittee presented to the town the aummary of receipts
and expenditures which was six thousand twenty-five
dollars and ninety-three cents.
In 1812 the number of soldiers reported to be in
readiness was eighteen. " Voted to give them $1.25
per day while in service and doing actual duty." The
following persons from Sudbury were in service a
short time during the war: Aaron Hunt, Jonas
Tower, James B. Puffer, Josiah Puffer, John Carr,
Cyrus Willis, George Birker, Leonard Button, Otis
Puffer, Jesse Puffer, John Sawyer. Warren Moor was
being in a dilapidated condition, it is desirable that it
be rebuilt in a more durable form. Wherefore, at a
legal town-meeting held for that purpose, your peti-
tioners were chosen for a committee and instructed to
petition your Honorable body for aid in erecting a
suitable monument to the memory of aaid officers and
men.''
Signed, " Drury Fairbank and thirteen others.''
Accompanying this report is the resolve, " That a
sum, not exceeding five hundred dollars in all, be and
the same is hereby appropriated towards defraying the
in the naval service on a privateer, was taken prisoner expense of repairing or rebuilding, in a substantial
and spent some time in Dartmoor Prison.
In 1814, the town settled a new pastor, Uev. Jacob
Bigelow having become infirm. In 1810 B,ev. Tim-
othy Hillard had been invited to preach as a candi-
date, and June 1, 1814, he became colleague pastor
at a salary of six hundred and fifty dollars and five
hundred dollars to begin with.
Sept. 20, 1815. Mr. Hillard was dismissed. The
next year Rev. Mr. Hurlbut was called to the pastor-
manner, the monument in the town of Sudbury,
erected by President Wadsworth of Harvard College^
about the year 1730, to the memory of Captain Samuel
Wadsworth and a large number of other officers and
soldiers and others in the service of the colony, who
were slain upon the spot marked by the monument,
... in the defence of that town against the Indian?",
the said sum to be expended under the direction of
His Excellency the Governor, in connection with a
ate. Sep;. 12, 181G, Rev. Jacob Bige'.ow died. In i committee of said town of Sudbury."
1823 a Methodist class was formed, which resulted in I Agreeable to the fjregoing resolve, at a legal town-
the formation of a Methodist Episcopal Church. A meeting held June 14, 1852, it was voted that Nahum
meeting-house was soon erected which was dedicated Thompson, Drury Fairbank, Ephraim Moore, Enoch
in 1836. j Kidder and J. R. Vose be a committee to superintend
March 5, 1832, the town voted to buy a town-farm, i the building of the Wadsworth Monument. It wai
In 1815, it voted to build a town-house. | then voted to appropriate a sum of money, sufficient
In 183<J, a new religious society was formed called to complete said monument and finish about the same,
the Sudbury Evangelical Union Society. The same
year it voted to build a meeting house which was
completed and dedicated Jan. 1, 1840.
May 11, 1839, Rev. Bulus Hurlbut died.
March 2, 1841, Rev. Josiah Ballard was installed
his successor.
Jan. 5, 1845, Rev. Linus Shaw was installed as pas-
tor of the old parish, which position be retained till
his death, Jan. 5, 1866. Since his death the follow-
ing ministers have acted as pastors for the First
Parish: Revs. Bond, Dawes, Webber, Knowles, Will-
ard, Sherman, E. J. Young and Gilman. For several
years the church has had preaching but a small por-
tion of each year.
In 1852 Rev. Josiah Ballard was dismissed from the
Evangelical Union Church ; and the following per-
sons have beec his successors : Reverends C. V. Spear,
E. Dickinson, W. Patterson, P. Thurston, G. A. Oviatt,
C. Fitts, D. W. Goodale, W. Richardson.
The Wadsworth Monument. — An important
event that occurred early in the last half of the present
century was the erection of tbe Wadsworth Monu-
ment. February, 1852, a petition was presented to
the Legislature of this Commonwealth, in which, after
a brief rehearsal of the events in connection with the
Wadsworth fight, the petitioners say " that a small,
temporary monument was erected many years ago by
the Rev. Benjamin Wadsworth, President of Harvard
College, over the grave of his father. Captain Wads-
worth, and his associates in arms. Said monument
out of any unappropriated money in the treasury,
said sum not to exceed five hundred dollars. His
Excellency George S. Boutwell, then Governorof this
Commonwealth, in connection with the committee of
the town, " procured a handsome monument, consist-
ing of three large square blocks of granite, one and
one-half, two, and three feet thick, raised one above
the other ; from the upper one of which rises a granite
shaft, tapering towards the top ; the whole being
twenty-one and one-half feet in height. On the front
of the centre block appears the following inscription :
" Thi6 monument is erected by tbe Commonwealth of Maaaachusetta
fliid tbe town of Sudbury, in gmteful remembrance of tbe eervices and
Buffeiing of the founderH of the Sute, and especially iu honor of
CaPT. S.\31fEL WiDgWoaTH, OF UlLTON ;
CaPT. BaOCKLEBANK, OF EoWLET ;
LiEin. Shaep, of BaooKLiNC ;
and twenty eix others, men of their command, who fell near this epot,
on tbe I8tb of .\pril, 16TG, while defending the froDtier aettlemeota
against the allied Indian forces of Philip of Pobauoket.
1852."
(The date of the fight as above given is incorrect,
the true date being April 21st.)
Schools since 1850. — Wadsworth Academy. — In
1856, measures were taken to establish an academyat
South Sudbury. A corporation waS formed, the object
of which was to hold property, consisting of a build-
ing, land and suitable fixtures for educational and re-
ligious purposes. The design of the projectors of the
enterprise wis to erect a building, the upper part of
404
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
which could be used for a school, and the lower part
for social and religious services.
The first meeting was held March 11, lSo7, and the
following officers were elected : President, Dr. Levi
Goodenough; directors, Roland Cutler, Samuel
Puffer; treasurer, Samuel D.Hunt. The land was
purchased of Nichols B. Hunt, and the building was
erected by Arthur Bowen, of South Sudbury. It was
two stories high, had a colonnade in front and faced
the west. It was named in honor of Captain Wads-
worth.
The school flourished for some years, until the de-
mand for its continuance ceased. The school-rooms
in it were then used for one of the town's common
schools. A few years later the building was destroyed
by fire, and on its site was erected a Congregational
chapel in 1880.
Important changes took place during this period in
connection with the common schools. Old districts
were divided, and new ones were formed ; old school-
houses were moved and new ones built. A large share
of the territory of the Northvrest District was taken
from Sudbury by the incorporation of Mayuard; but
in the districts that remained, the schools and school-
houses remained. The Centre School-house, that had
stood on the common, was moved to its present loca-
tion south of the Methodist meeting-house, and after
its removal was fitted up for the use of two schools, —
a primary and grammar. In 1868, the Lanbam
School-house was moved from the road corners by the
Coolidge place to its present location, north of the
Boston and Worcester highway, on land that once be-
longed to the Goodnow farm. In 18(39, eight hundred
dollars was granted for repairs on the Southwest
School-house. In 1870, the town voted to build a
new school-house in the Xortheast District, to be lo-
cated at or near the junction of Puffer Lane and the
north road. The building was erected at a cost of
S2884.S2. The same year measures were taken for
the removal of the old Pantry School-house, and the
result was that a new school-house was built in the
southerly portion of the Northeast District, and the
Panlry School-house was moved and became the depot
of ihe Framingham & Lowell Railroad. The new
school-house was located near the house of Alfred
Thompson, and coat $3825.23. About the same time
the town voted to build a school-house in the west
part of the town in a locality where, hitherto, there
had been none. It wa.s erected on the Boston and
Berlin road, near the house of John Cuughlin, at a
cost of $2508.77. The building committee reuderea
their report to the town March 4, 1872, and at the
same meeting the committee appointed to number the
school districts reported that plates had been pro-
cured, lettered, and numbered, at a cost of §7.50, and
that commencing with the Centre Di^trict, which they
designated as number one, the committee next pro-
ceeded to the house in the Southwest District, which
they numbered two. Thence, passing to the right of
the centre of ttie town, the remaining houses were
numbered in their regular order, closing with the
new house near the residence of John Coughlin,
which was numbered six. The lown opened a new
school at South Sudbury, and March 1, 1875, " voted
to allow the proprietors of Wadsworth Hall SlOO for
rent of said hall for school purposes."
In ISSl, a school-house was built in the Wadsworth
District by C. O. Parmenter, at a cost of $2560.61. It
was placed on a lot containing a half acre of land,
which was purchased of Walter Rogers, and situated
on the south side of the Sudbury and Marlboro' road,
about midway between the Masiachusetts Central aud
Old Colony Railroads.
The Goodxow Libk^ry. — In 1SC2, the town re-
ceived the means of establishing a public library
through the generosity of John Goodnow, of Boston.
The gift came in the form ola bequest, which was set
forth in his will as follows :
" First : I give, devise, and bequeath unto my native
Town of Sudbury, in the County of Middle.sex, the
sum of Twenty Thousand Dollars, to be appropriated
for the purpose of purchasing and keeping in order a
Public Library, for the benetit of the inhabitants of
that town."
"Second: I also give, devise and bequeath to the
said Town of Sudbury, three acres of land on the
northerly part of the Sudbury Tavern Estate, adjoin-
ing the land of Howe Brown, beginning at the Meet-
ing-house road, and running with equal width witli
Brown's line to the brook, for the purpose of erectiug
thereon a suitable building for a Library ; and the
further sum of Twenty-five Hundred Dollars for the
erection of such building; and whatever portion
of said land shall not be needed for the purposes of
said Library building, tlie said Town of l^udbury shall
have full power and authority to apply to any other
Town purposes, but without any power of alienation."
"At a legal meeting held at Sudbury, on the seventh
day of April, 1862, the Town voted to accept the
bequest contained in the first and second clauses of
the last Will and Testament of John Goodnow, late
of Boston ; and Messrs. James Moore, John H. Da-
kin, and George Parmenter, Selectmen of the Town,
were appointed and authorized to receive and receipt
fur the said bequest." At the same meeting it was
voted to adopt the following resolution : " Resolved
bv the inhabitants of Sudbury, in Town meeting as-
sembled, that we accept with thankfulness thenoble
bequests given to the town by the late John Goodnow
of Boston ; and that, as an evidence of our gratitude,
we pledge oiarselves to endeavor to the utmost of our
ability, honestly and honorably to carry out the be-
nevolent intentions of the donor."
July 14th, the town instructed the committee to
erect a building for the library given by John Good-
now, according to plan reported to them, the sum not
to exceed $2500. April 4, 1864, the committee re-
ported the ecst of the building, including S32.43 for
SUDBURY.
405
Betting out shade trees, to be $2691.35. The buildiog
was enlarged several years ago by an addition on the
west; and at present there is'little, if any, unoccu-
pied space. Four catalogues have been issued ; the
first, at the opening of the Library, when it contained
less than 2300 volumes ; the second in 18G7 ; the third
in 1874, when it contained nearly 5000 volumes ; and
the fourth in 1887, when it contained over 9700.
The grounds about (he library are ample, and taste-
fully laid out, consisting of a level lawn adorned wirh
shade trees. The building is reached by a circular
driveway extending from the county highway. In
the rear the land extends to Hop Brook.
John Goodnow, the donor of this library fund, was
a son of John and Persis Goodnow, who lived at Lan-
bani. He was born at Sudbury. Sept. 6, 1791, and
died in Boston, Dec. 2-i, 1861. His remains were
placed in hia tomb at Sudbury Centre.
Railroads. — No railroad passed through the pres-
ent limits of the town until about the beginning of
the last period of the present century. About 1870
the Franiingham & Lowell Railroad was begun, and
in the fall of 1871 the cars began passing through the
town. A station was built at North and South Sud-
bury and at the centre. The one at South Sudbury was
built a little northerly of the junction of the Sudbury
and Marlboro' and Franiingham highways, and baa
since been moved.
July 22, 1870, it was voted "That the Town Treas-
urer be authorized and instructed to subscribe for,
take and hold Capital Stock in the Framingham and
Lowell Railroad Company to the amount of Thirty
thousand dollars. . . . Provided said Railroad shall
not be located in any jilace more than half a mile
from the last survey in the Town of Sudbury."
The road Las recently been leased to the " Old Col-
ony " Company, and is now known as the "Northern
Branch of the Old Colony Road." In 1887 every
station of this road within the limits of Sudbury was
burned. Recently new and more commodious ones
have been built on or near the sites of the former ones.
Massacliusetls Central Eailrvad— In October, 1880,
the first rails were laid at South Sudbury on the track
of the Mas^^achusetts Central Railroad, beginning at
its junction with the Framingham & Lowell road.
During the following winter the road was continued
towards Hudson on the west and Boston on the east ;
and July 22, 1881, nine car-loads of rails passed over
the Central road, entering upon it at Waverly and
going to Hudson. April 20, 1881, a train of cars
passed over the road from Boston to Hudson ; and
October 1st, the same year, regular trains began to
run. May 16, 1883, the cars stopped running, and
commenced again Sept. 28, 1885, under the manage-
ment of the Boston & Lowell Railroad. Recently
the road was leased to the B(jston & Maiue Railroad
corporation. The Junction Station is a fine one, and
the town is now provided with excellent railroad
facilities.
The Civil War. — In the Civil War Sudbury was
fully abreast of the average New England town in its
promptness and zeal. The first war-meeting was a
citizens' mass-meeting held in the Town Hall. The
people did not wait for the rIow call of a warrant.
They assembled spontaneously to consult as to what
was required of them, with full confidence that in a
town-meeting to be subsequently called their acts
would be ratified and made legal. This meeting was
characterized by unanimity and enthusiasm. The
spirit of the heroes of '75, when they were assembled
on Sudbury Common, with arms in their hands as
militia and minute-men, to start on their march to
Concord, was evinced on this April evening nearly a
century later, when the citizens of Sudbury were
again met to defend their homes and native land.
The principal business of this meeting related to
the fitting out of the " Wadsworth Rifle Guards."
This was a company of State Militia which belonged
to Sudbury, and was attached to the Second Battal-
lion of Rifles, which was commanded by Major Eph-
raim Moore, of Sudbury, until his death, which oc-
curred some years previous. The following record of
a legal town-meeting, held April 29, 1861, sets forth
the business that was transacted at the mass-meeting,
and its ratification by the town :
"The town voted to furnish new uniforms for the
members of the Wadsworth Rifle Guards, Company
B, Second Battallion of Rifles, M. V. M., forthwith;
also to furnish each member of said company with a
revolver, in case said company is called into the ser-
vice of the country, the revolvers to be returned to
the selectmen of the town when the holders of them
shall return home and be discharged from the service;
also the uniforms to be returned to the town if the
members of the company are not held in service more
than three months. Voted also to pay to each mem-
ber of said company, in case they are called into ser-
vice, a sum of money in addition to their pay re-
ceived from the government, which shall make the
whole amount of their pay twenty dollars per month
while they are in such service, and that ten dollars of
the above sum be paid to each member whenever he
shall enter such service. Voted also that the families
of those who may leave shall be furnished with all
necessary assistance at the expense of the town, and
the business of those who may leave it shall be prop-
erly cared for by the town, and not allowed to suflier
by their absence." " Voted, also, that each coramis-
sioned officer of the company belonging in town be
presented with a suitable sword at the expense of the
town, and that the other commissioned officers not
belonging in town be furnished with the same, if they
are not otherwise provided for." " Voted to grant the
sum of one thousand dollars," for the purposes above
mentioned.
The amount of money actually expended in fitting
out this company was $987. About the time of the
holding of the first war-meeting there were enlist-
40G
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
nient.s into the Sudbury company, with tlie expecta-
tion of 3uon being called into the service for three
months, and the company for a time continued to
drill. No call, however, came tor this term of ser-
vice. The emergency had been met, Washington for
the time was safe, and it was at length discovered
that the company as such would not be received into
any existing regiment for the term of three months.
The next demand was for soldiers to serve for three
years or the war, and the " Wadsworth Rifle Guards '
were soon ordered to Fort Independence that they
might enlist in the Thirteenth Regiment for this
length of time. Twenty-five of them enlisted, and
July 30th the regiment left the State. This was the
largest number of Sudburv men who enlisted at any
one time, and they have the honor of being the first
Sudbury soldiers who enlisted from the town.'
From the time of the first enlistments there were
repeated calls for troops. " Three hundred thousand
more'' became a familiar term, and at each new call
the town took measures to fill its quota. July 4,
18C2, the President issued a call for volunteers for
three years, and July 2Sth the town "voted to pay a
bounty of one hundred and twenty-five dollars to each
volunteer who h.is enlisted or may enlist into the ser-
vice of the U. S. . . . to the number of fourteen."
Also, "Voted to instruct the selectmen to look after
and provide for any sick or wounded volunteer be-
longing to the Town of .Sudbury." In August of the
same year a call came for soldiers for nine months'
service; and Aug. 19, 1862, the towu "voted to pay
the sum of one hundred dollars to each person who
voluntarily enlists into the service of the United
States for the term of nine months, on or before the
first day of September next, to a number not exceed-
ing the quota of their town."
Dec. 17, 1862, the town voted to fill up their (luota
by paying one hundred and forty dollars bounty.
December 22d the committee reported at a town-
meeting held in the evening, " that they had pro-
cured sixteen men to fill up the town's quota for the
military service of the United States, that said men
had been accepted and sworn into thesaid service, and
had been properly accredited to the town of Sudbury,
and that said committee paid the sum of one hundred
and thirty dollars for each man."
Oct. 17, 1863, the President issued another call for
three hundred thousand man, and December 7th the
town " voted to authorize the selectmen to use all
proper and legal measures to tili up the town's quota
of volunteers, agreeable to the call ot the President of
the United States for three hundred thousand volun-
teers, dated Oct. 17, 1863."
March 14, 1804, the President issued a call for two
hundred thousand men, and March 22d the town ap-
pointed a committee " to take all proper and legal
•A sketch of Sudbury soldiers, and of the regiments in which they
eult6ted is given in Ilutlsun's " History of :>u(lbiii'y."
measures to fill the quota of the town " under this
call. June 9th the town voted to " raise money sutfi-
cieat to pay one hundred and twenty- five dollars to
each volunteer who shall enlist into the service of the
United States and be duly accredited as a part of the
quotaof the Town of Sudbury in anticipation of a call
from the President to recruit the armies now in the
I field, and that the selectmen be retiuired to use all
I proper measures to procure said volunteers." It was
voted also "that the selectmen be authorized to pro-
cure not less than seventeen men." At the ?ame
, meeting "the committee appointed by the town at a
' meeting held March 22, 1864, to take all proper and
I legal measures to fill the quota of the town under
the call of the President of the United States for two
hundred thousand men, dated March 14, 1864, re-
' ported that the town's quota w,as ten men ; that there
hi;d been seven men accredited to the town by volun-
teer enlistment at an expense of nine hundred and
ten dollars, and that the remaining three were
drafted and accepted."
Nov. 8, 1SG4, it w.is "voted to grant the free use
of the Town Hall for the Soldiers' Aid Society. "
This was an organiz ition formed in the war period
I for the purpose of assisting the soldiers. May 29,
I 1S6J, it was "voted to refund all money contributed
: by individuals to fill the quotas of the town of Sud-
bury in the year 1864."
List of Cascaltie.s. — The fatal casualties that oc-
curred to persons who were accredited to or natives of
Sudbury, as we have found them recorded in the
town-book or the adjutant-general's printed report,
are as follows :
KilUd .>r mnrUiIhi woHnilrd in battle. — Horace Sanderaon, John For-
nylli. Kd« in S. Fiinuentcr.
Died i>i nen-ict of ilineane or li-irdsliip inctdetit to arm// life. — John P. Hud*
-'in, Cnrtid Mutth. George T. Diciley, Abel l[. Li.ilcin, Thomas Coreonin,
Uurtson D Sinclair, Thonius .Smith, Cyrus E. Bnrker.
Su.MMARY OF Service. — According to Schouler,
in h's " History of Massachusetts in the Civil War,'
Sudbury furnished 168 men, which was eleven over
and above all demands. He states that " four were
commissioned officers. The whole amount of money
appropriated and expended by the town on account
of the war, exclusive of State aid, was $17,575. The
amount of money raised and expended by the town
during the war for State aid to soldiers' families, and
repaid by the Commonwealth, was S6, 199.18."
"The population of Sudbury in 1860 was 1691 ; the
valuation, $1,043,091. The population in 1865 was
1703; the valuation, §1,052,778. The selectmen in
1861 and 1862 were James Moore, John H. Dakin>
George Parmenter; in 1863, A. B. Jones, George
Goodnow, H. H. Goodnough ; in 1864 and 1865,
ThomiLs P. Hurlbut, Charles Hunt, Walter Rogers.
The town clerk during all the yenrs of the war was J.
S. Hunt. The town treasurer during the years 1861,
1862 and 1863 was Edwin Harrington; in 1864 and
1865, S. A. Jones.
SUDBURY.
40"
Shortly after the war Sudbury's rank among the
towns of the county in population was the thirty-
ninth. In 1776 it was the only tciwn in Middlesex
County having a population of 2000.
Bi-Cextexxial. — April 18, 1870, the town cele-
brated what was supposed to be the two hundredth
anniversary of Wadsworth's Fight at Green Hill.
At early dawn a salute was fired, and a procession of
'■ Antiques and Horribles " paraded, making a trip to
South Sudbury. Later in the day a procession of the
citizens, including the school children, was formed and
marched to Wadsworth Monument, which was deco-
rated with the national colors. Services were held at
the Unitarian Church. The oration was delivered by
Professor Edward A. Young, of Harvard College.
The George Goodnow Bequest. — In November,
1884, it was voted to " accept of a donation of Ten
Thousand Dollars offered the Town of Sudbury, by
George Goodnow, of Boston, for the purpose of es-
tablishiug a fund, the income of which he desires to
be used by the selectmen of said Town for the time
being, to assist such citizens of the Town who are
not, at the time of receiving the assistance, paupers,
but who may for any cause be in need of temporary
or private assistance. By motion uf Rev. George A.
Oviatt, the town voted that, " we do now as a town
by vote express our hearty thanks to the donor of
this generous Fund, assuring him of our apprecia-
tion of his love of his native town, and equally of his
noble desire to render aid lo the needy therein. And
may his sunset of life be bright to the last, and ter-
minate in the day of endless light and blessedness."
March. 1885, a committee consisting of Ciipt. James
Moore, Jonas S. Hunt, Esq., and Horatio Hunt was
appointed " to confer with Rev. A. S. Hudson in re-
gard to a publication of the History of Sudbury."
April 6th, of the sameyear, the committee reported to
the town the result of their interview. This was in
part that the work be devoted to the annals of the
town, but not any part of it to genealogy as it is usu-
ally inserted in books of this kind.
April 2, 1888, the town "voted to publish not less
than 750 copies of the History as written and com-
piled by Rev. A. S. Hudson, and to pay him $1500
for his services in writing and sufierintending the
jjublication of the work ; and that the Trustees of the
Goodnow Library be a committee associated with him
to have charge of the publication of the work." The
town also voted at the same meeting $1500 for the
publication.
Arraxge.mexts for the 250th Axxiversary
Celebratiox. — At a meeting held November, 1888,
the town voted to petition the Legislature for permis-
sion to giant money to be expended in the observ-
ance of the 250th Anniversary of the Incorporation
of Sudbury. Permi.osion having been obtained, at a
subsequent meeting the sum of 4300 was appropriated,
and a committee w.is appointed to make and carry
oat such arrangements as would be appropriate to
the proposed celebration. The committee consisted
of Jonas .S. Hunt, Rufus H. Hurlbut and Edwin A.
Powers, who were to co-operate with a committee
from Wayland, and the joint committee were to act
for the two towns.
The joint committee met at Sudbury and organ-
ized with J. S. Hunt for chairman, and R. T. Lom-
bard, Esq., of Wayland for secretary. The following
outline of a plan was proposed, and left open, subject
to change if deemed expedient before the day arrived.
1. A gathering of the children of the two towns at
Wayland on the morning of September 4th, when
entertainment and a collation would be furnished.
2. A return by railroad at noon to South Sudbury,
when a procession will form and march to Sudbury
Centre.
3. Dinner in the Town Hall.
4. Speaking from a platforn on the Common, if the
day is fair, and if not, in the Unitarian Church.
5. Fireworks and music in both towns, with ring-
ing of belis morning and night.
It was voted to extend an invitation to Hon. Homer
Rogers, of Boston, to act as president of the day; to
Richard T. Lombard, Esq., of Wayland, to serve as
chief marshal, and to Rev. Alfred S. Hudson, of Ayer,
to deliver the oration.
Ample opportunity was to be provided for addresses
by speakers from abroad, who are expected to be
present and assist at the celebration.
The programme as thus outlined was carried out. A
large company gathered in the morning at Wayland,
where the school children listened to addresses in the
Town Hall by Rev. Robert Gordon and William
Baldwin, E^q. A col!at)on was then served to the
children, after which a part of the large company
went to South .Sudbury, at which place a procession
was formed which moved about one o'clock to Bud-
bury Centre. The following is a description of the
exercises at Sudbury as given in a report by a Boston
daily newspaper dated September 5, 1889 :
The procession from South Sudbury to Sudbury
Centre was quite an imposing one ; in fact, the occa-
sion quite outgrew the expectation of its originators.
The houses all along the way and through the town
generally were profusely decorated.
" R. T. Lombard, chief manbnl ; E. H. Atwood and A. D. Rogen,
aids.
Drum Major, Cyme Roak.
Fitchbtirc braas band. 23 pieces J. A. Patz leader
Detachment of the Grand Army Po*t. under E. A. Carter.
Boody Hook and Ladder Company of Cochitaate, L. Dumpby com-
manding.
J. M. B«nt Hose Company of Cocbitnate, D. W. Mitchell commanding.
Capt I). W. Ricker, with 4.'> mounted men.
Slounted Peqaot Indians from Wayland, "Spotted Thooder" command-
ing.
Carriasrp contafninp invited guenlE. Hon. G. A. Mnrden, State Treoa-
urer; Hon. HoniT Rogers, President Boston Board of Aldermen
and president of tbe d%}'.
Ex-Gov. George S. Boutwell.
Bev. Alfred F. S. Hudson, hiBtorian of tbe tnwn.
Hon. C. F Gerry, Edw.ird B. Mclntyre, Hod. Levi Wallace, Judge
408
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
North, Middlesex District Conrt, Hon. E. Dana Bancroft, Hon
James T. Josliu of Hiidtwn, Rev. Brooke Herfonl.
Wadawortb Gunrdd.
Thirty carriages cuntainiug citizens and guests."
Arriving at Sudbury, a half an hour was given for
rest, the Unitarian Church being decorated very
handsomely and turned over to the people as a rest-
ing and fraternizing spot.
The dinner was gotten up by Elgin R. James, of
Waltham, who expected to feed about .500 people, but I
found 600 hungry ones demanding admission. The j
dinner was first-class in every respect, and after doing !
justice to it the party repaired to the green in front '
of the Town Hall, upon which seats had been ar-
ranged and a very tasty stage erected, covered with i
bunting and surmounted by banners and glory fl.ngs !
and bearing the inscription " 1639 Quarter Millennial
1889."
On the desk was the original Bible presented to the ;
First Church and printed at Edinburgh by James
Watson, printer to the King's most excellent majesty,
in the year MDCCXXII.
After music by the band, Kev. D. W. Richardson, j
ot Sudbury, invoked divine blessing. I
Jonas S. Hunt, chairman of the Executive Com- i
miltee, welcomed fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers,
not forgetting " cousins and aunts," and took great |
pleasure in introducing a Sudbury boy as president j
of the day — Hon. Homer Rogers, of Boston. I
Alter some very appropriate remarks, Mr. Rogers ]
introduced the orator of the day, Rev. A. S. Hudson, i
Following the oration a poem was read by a young !
lady, which was written for the occasion by James j
Sumner Draper, of Wayland. Short addresses fol- j
lowed by George A Marden, of Lowell, the State i
Treasurer, who spoke for the United States and the j
Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Hon. William N. i
Davenport, of Marlboro' ; James T. Joalin, of Hud- ,
son ; Ex-Governor George S. Boutwell ; Rev. Edward 1
J. Young, formerly a professor at Harvard College, j
who spoke for the clergy of 1639 ; Rev. Brooke Her- \
ford, of Boston, who spoke for " Old England," and j
W. H. Baldwin, who spoke for Wayland. The day ]
closed with a concert on the Common by the Maynard i
Brass Band, and fireworks in the evening. |
Burying-Grocnds. — Sudbury has at present five |
cemeteries within its limits — one at South Sudbury, j
one at North Sudbury, and three at the centre. The |
oldest one is at the centre. It is situated in the north- |
easterly part of thfi village, along the Concord Road, !
east of the Methodist Church. In this old graveyard I
for more than a century and a half what was mortal I
of many of the west side inhabitants was laid. Here [
are the names of Haynes, Hunt, Parmenter, Goode- I
now, Browne, Moore, Howe, Bent, Rice, Richardson, i
Willis, Wheeler, Jones, Puflfer, Hayden, Walker and
a host of others long familiar in Sudbury. Unlike
some other old graveyards, the stones here are numer-
ous; but though many, they do not mark ail the
graves, which nearly cover the entire space of that
" thickly-peopled ground." The encloiiure is encom-
passed by a substantial stone wall, which within a few
years has been well repaired. The place has but
little shrubbery and few trees. Just beyond the road
was the pound, near by or on the site of which
the hearse-house now stands. Within the past few
years this yard has been but little used. Now and
then the ground has been broken as the fragment of
some ancient family has found its resting-place among
a group of old graves ; but these instances are fewer
and farther between as time passes by, and it will
probably soon cease to be used for new burials, but
remain with unbroken turf until the morning of the
resurrection. It is a place of sacred association, and
aa such has been regarded by the town's people; es-
pecially was it much visited by them during the inter-
mission between the Sabbath services, when two ser-
mons were preached in one day. Then they visited
this quiet spot, read epitaphs, talked of the past, and
derived, it may be, such lessons from the suggestive
scenes as were a moral and spiritual help. Along the
northerly side of the yard is the Sudbury and Con-
cord highway; and ranged beside this are family
tomba. One of these is that of Mr. John Goodnow,
the donor of the Goodnow Library. Upon others
are names of old Sudbury families. Within the yard
is only one tomb and that is underground and about
westerly of the Plympton monument, and surmounted
with a small brick-work upon which lies a slate stone,
with these words :
IIOPESTILL anoWX, ESQ., TOMBE,
IT.-il.
This tomb contains the remains of descendants of
Dea. William Brown, an early grantee, who once re-
sided near Nobscot. The tomb was years ago nearly
full, the last burial being about 1852. This burying-
ground contains several marble monuments of some
considerable size. The first one was erected in 1835,
and is commemorative of the Plympton family.
Mount Wadsworth Cemetery. — This cemetery is at
South Sudbury, and formerly belonged to the Israel
Howe Browne estate. It was originally quite small,
and has been enlarged several times. The entrance
was formerly south of Dr. Levi Goodenough's house
and joined his grounds, but it was changed about the
time the Wadsworth monument was erec'.ed, and now
leads from the avenue that goes to the monument.
The oldest graves are near the centre of the yard.
Probably for the first few years after the lot was laid
out burials were less numerous than a little later, as
the associations connected with the more ancient
church-yard in the east part of the town would nat-
urally lead to its somewhat continued use by the west
side inhabitants.
A few years ago there was a small growth of trees
along the avenues and about more or less of the lotn,
but they were recently removed lest they should de-
SUDBURY.
409
face the Rtones. The arch at present over the east
entrance to the cemetery was erected in 1879, by Mr.
Israel H. Browne over the west enlraoce. It was
completed July, 1879.
Soon after the death of Mr. Israel H. Browne, the
former owner of the cemeterj- grounds, his heirs sold
their interest in the property to five persons, who
conveyed it to the present Mount Wadsworth Cor-
poration soon after its organization.
In the Dorthea-sterly corner, as it was about 1850,
was the original Wadsworth grave. Bt'caufe of the
former existence of that grave and the present Wads-
worth monument, this cemetery is of more than ordi-
nary importance, and will long be visited by those
interested in ihe history of Captain Wadsworth and
his men.
Mount Pleasant Cemetery. — The third cemetery laid
out in Sudbury is at the Centre, and called Mount
Pleasant. As its name suggests, it is pleasantly situ-
ated on a hill, and is just north of the Common. The
original name was " Pine Hill," and later it took the
name of " Pendleton Hill."
The New Cemetery.— year Mount Pleasant is a new
cemetery that is owned by the town. It was pur-
chased a few years ago, and has an entrance on the
pouth to the county road, near the tomb of John
Goodnow.
Xorth Sudbury Cemetery.— T:)!^ North Sudbury
Cemetery is situated upon a sunny knoll, and con-
sists of one and six-tenlhs acres of land, formerly
owned by Reuben Haynes, and purchased by a com-
pany for a cemetery in 1843. It is about one-eighth
of a mile from North Sudbury Village, on the country
road leading from Framingham to Concord.
The Wayside Inn. — On the Boston road through Sud-
bury is the old " Howe Tavern," or the famous " Way-
side Inn " of Longfellow. It was built about the be-
ginning of the eighteenth century by David Howe, who,
in 1702, received of his father, Samuel Howe, a son of
John, one of the early grantees, a tract of 130 acres in
the " New Grant " territory. During the process of
constructing the house, tradition says, the workmen
resorted for safety at night to the Parmenter Garrison,
a place about a half mile away. The safety sought was
probably from the raids of Indians, who, long after
Philip's War closed, made occasional incursions upon
the borders of the frontier towns. At or about the
time of its erection it was opened as a public-house,
and in 1846, Colonel Ezekiel Howe, of Revolutionary
fame, put up the sign of the " Ked Horse," which gave
it the name that it went by for years, namely, the
"Red Horse Tavern." In 1796, Colonel Ezekiel
Howe died, and his son Adam took the place and
kept the tavern for forty years. At the death of
Adam it went into the hands of Lyman, who contin-
ued it as an inn until near 1866, about which time it
paased out of the hands of an owner by the name of
Howe. In the earlier times this house was of consid-
erable consequence to travelers. It was quite capa-
cious for either the colonial or the provincial period,
and was within about an ea>y day's journey to Mas-
sachusetts Bay. The road by it was a grand thorough-
fare westward. Sudhury, in those years, was one of
the foremost towns of Middlesex County in popula-
tion, influence and wealth, while the Howe family
took rank among the first families of the country
about. The seclusion of this quiet spot to-day is not
indicative of what it was in the days of the old stage
period, and when places since made prominent by the
passage of a railroad through them were almost
wholly or quite unknown. In the times of the wars
against the Indians and French it was a common
baiting-place for troops as they marched to the front
or returned to their homes in the Bay towns. It was
largely patronized by the up-country marketers, who,
by their frequent coming and going, with their large,
canvas-topped wagons, made the highway paat this
ordinary look like the outlet of a busy mart. Stages
also enlivened the scene. The sound of the po^t-
born, as it announced the near approach of the coach,
was the signal for the hostler and housemaid to pre-
pare refreshment for man and beast. In short, few
country taverns were better situated than this to gain
palronage.in the days when few towns of the province
were better known than old Sudbury. This place,
noted, capacious and thickly mantled with years, is
thus fitly described by Mr. Longfellow, —
"As ancient Is this bo8telr7
Ae Hoy In tbe land may b«.
Built in the old Culonial day,
When men lired in a (rrander way
With nmpler hospitalItT:
A liind of old Hol'eoblln Hsll.
Kow somewhat fallen to decay."
There is now about the place an aspect of vacancy,
as if something mighty were gone, and very appropri-
ate are still further words of tbe poet Longfellow:
*' Round thin old-fflshloned, qnaint abode
Peep Hlence reipned, save when a pout
Went mahing: dt'wn the conntry road.
And skeletonB of leaves and dnst,
A moment qnlrkened bj ite breath,
Fhnddered. and danced their dance of deatb,
Anrl, through the ancient oaks o'erhcad,
BlTsterious Toices moaned and fled.
With weather-staine upon tbe wall.
And stairways worn, and cmzy doore,
And creaking and uneven floors.
And cbimneys huge and tiled and tall."
The region about this old ordinary corresponds to
the building itself, reminding one of the Sleepy Hol-
low among the highlands of the Hudson described by
Washington Irving. It is on the edge of the plain
lands of the Peakham District, just at the foot of the
j northernmost spur of Nobscot Hill. To the west-
! ward, a few rods, is the upper branch of Hop Brook,
' with its faint fringe of meadow lands, over which the
j county road gently curves. In the near neighbor-
hood are patches of old forest growth, whose tall
410
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
trees tower upward like sentinels in the view of
passers along the county road. Indeed, so aptly does
Mr. Longfellow describe the place where the house is
situated that we quote further from his beautiful
verse:
•* A region of repose it seemR,
A place of slumber and of dreams,
Bemote amoop; the wooded hills !
For there do Doisy railroad speeds
Ita torch-race, scatterlug smoke and gleeds."
Along the highway to the eastward, in the direction
of South Sudbury, which from this place is about two
miles distant, are still standing several ancient oaks.
These trees were, doubtless, standing and had consid-
erable growth when lot number forty-eight was of the
town's common land, and owned by Tantamous and
others who signed the Indian deed in 1684, by which
the new grant lands were conveyed. Beneath them
Wiishington and his retinue passed, and perhaps
Wadsworth and Brocklebank when they sped in haste
to save Sudburj' from Philip, and a long procession of
travelers, since the opening of the way to Marlboro'
from the Hop Brook mill, has passed under their
venerab'.e shade. Soldiers to Ticonderoga and Crown
Point, and the various expeditions to the west and
north in the Revolutionary and French and Indian
Wars, have halted in their march as they approached
this picket-line of ancient oaks that were deployed at
the approach to the inn.
The Scdbury River. — The Indian name of this
stream was " Musketahquid," meaning gra=sy mead-
ows or grassy brook. It was also called the "Great
River." It takes ia rise in Hopkinton and Westboro',
the branch from the latter town having its source in
a large cedar swarap. Passing through Framinghara,
it enters Sudbury on the southeast, and forms the
boundary line between it and Way land. After leav-
ing the town, it runs through Concord and borders on
Lincoln, Carlisle and Bedford, and empties into the
Merrimack River at Lowell. It is made use of for mill
purposes at Framingham and Billerica.
Within the present century iron ore dug in town
was laden in boats at the Old Town Bridge and taken
to Chelmsford.
The width of this river where it enters the town is
about fifty feet; where it leaves the town it is about
two hundred feet; at the latter place it is one hun-
dred and fourteen feet above low water-mark at Bos-
ton, Ita course is very crooked, seldom running far
in one direction, but having many sharp curves. The
banks are quite bareof shubbery, except the occasion-
al bunches of water brush that here and there assist
in tracing its course. Fish abound in this river, of
which the more useful and commonly sought are the
pickerel [Esox retieulatus), perch {Perca fiaveicens),
bream or sunfish {Pomolis vulgaris), horned (Piine to-
du.icatus), and common eel {Anyuilla tenuirostris).
The kind most sought for the sport in taking is the
pickerel. Indeed, Sudbury River baa become some-
what noted for the pastime it affords in pickerel fish-
ing. .Specimens weighing a half dozen pounds are
sometimes caught.
There is an old tradition in connection with the
river meadows given as follows by an old inhabitant :
" An old tinker used to go about the country with his
hit of tools, mending brass and other wares, and wassup-
posed to have accumulated some money, and, the say-
ing was, turned up missing, and no one seemed to know
what had become of him. Very soon afterwards per-
sons passing near the meadows could distinctly hear
the old tinker busy at his work tinkering, and the
sound would follow along beside them in the evening,
but would not pass beyond the meadows, and my
grandmother used to tell many stories to the younger
ones of the family how bevies of young people would
go down to the meadows to hear the old tinker — per-
haps he would not be at work, and some one would
say, 'I guess the old tinker isn't at work to-night,'
and in an instant, very like, he would strike up, and
then they would surround him — but no — he would
strike up in another place and so forth and so on.
Sometimes they would ask or suggest that he had got
out of brass, and the sound would come as if he had
thrown a whole apronful. This thing lasted for years,
at last an old lady died near the meadows, and the
sound followed along beside the funeral procession
as long as it went beside the meadows, and this was
the only instance of his working in the day-time, and
no tinkering was heard afterward."
The horned pout may be caught almost at the rate
of a peck in an evening, when the water and season
are right. The fisherman simply ties his boat to a
stake in a suitable place, perhaps some quiet, snug
nook where the waters are still, and on a warm nislit
in late spring or summer, between the mosquitoes and
pouts his time will be fully occupied.
In early times the river abounded in fish now un-
known in its waters. Of these were the alewives, sal-
mon and shad. The obstructions caused by the dam
at Billerica long ago prevented these valuable fishes
from ascending the stream, and petitions were early
presented to the General Court to have the obstruc-
tion removed on account of the fisheries. Shattuck
informs us that at certain seasons fish officers of Con-
cord went to the dam at Billerica to see that the sluice-
ways were properly opened to permit the fish to pass,
and he states that the exclusive right to the fisheries
was often sold by the town; the purchasing partv
having a right by his purchase to erect what is called
a weir across the river to assist in fish-takinp.
A chief characteristic of this river is its slow-mov-
ing current, which in places is scarcely perceptible
at a casual glance. The slowness of the current is
supposed to be occasioned by various causes, any
one of which may, perhaps, be sufficient, but all
of which at present doubtless contribute something to
it. The chief reason is its very small fall, which may
be occasioned bv both natural and artificial causes.
/:
cf
/fC^<^7
SUDBURY.
411
It is said to be but two inches to the mile for
twenty-two miles. This slow current tends to keep
the river from straightening its course, and to in-
crease the water weeds that grow in the channel.
PHYSICIAN'S. — A prominent physician who lived in
the original limits of Sudbury, and for years prac-
ticed in the town, was Dr. Ebenezer Roby. He lived
on the east side of the river, and mention is made of
him in the sketch of Wayland History.
Josiali Langdon, M.D. — Dr. Josiah Langdon was
in Sudbury at the time of the Revolutionary War.
He died in 1779, and was buried in the"01dBury-
iug-Ground " at Sudbury Centre.
Moses Taft, M.D. — Dr. Moses Taft practiced medi-
cine in Sudbury towards the close of the last century.
He lived at the "Centre," in what has been known
subsequently as the " Barker house," and where a
grocery store was once kept. He was buried in the
western part of the Oid Burying-Ground.
Moses Mossman , M.D. — Dr. Moses Mossman was
one of the old-time physicians of Sudbury. He prac-
ticed medicine there towards the close of the last and
the early part of the present century. His profes-
sional work extended over quite a portion of the
neighboring country, reaching to Stow, Acton, Con-
cord and Marlboro'.
His home was in the northerly part of Sudbury, at
the Mo«man place, and it is said that, about the
locality of his garden plot, the herbs still grow which
the doctor used to cultivate. He was much beloved
and respected as a citizen.
Thomas Stearns, M.D. — Dr. Thomas Stearns prac-
ticed medicine in Sudbury for some years previous to
1840, about which time be died. He lived at the
Centre, in the second house west of the Unitarian
lueeting-house, on the north side of the road, and
since used as a tavern. He was an active citizens of
a positive nature, and energetic in Ihe prosecution of
his plans. He was interested in what pertained to
the history of Sudbury, and gathered quite a collec-
tion of old documents, which, since hi.s death, have
been purchased by the town and are known as the
"Stearns Collection." He was buried in Mount
Pleasant Cemetery.
Levi Goodenough, M.D. — Dr. Levi Goodenough was
born in Derby, Vt., Oct. 30, 1803. He received his
diploma from the Medical School of the University of
Vermont, Sept. IG, 1828, and settled in Sudbury Feb.
12, 1830, where he remained till his death. He was a
typical country physician. Asa citizen, Dr. Good-
enough was public-spirited, a stanch advocate of re-
form, and in temperance his name stands among the
pioneers. He was a professing Christian from early
youth.
Ashbd Kidder, M.D. — Dr. Ashbel Kidder practiced
medicine in Sudbury for about twenty-five years in
the early part of the present century. He was born
at Sutton in 1770, and studied medicine at Harvard
College. He lived at Sudbury Centre in a house at
the corner of the roads, which was used for many
years as a tavern and was burned near half a century
ago.
Otis 0. Johnton, M D. — Dr. Otis 0. Johnson prac-
ticed medicine in Sudbury for some years about the
middle of the present century.
George A. Oviait, M.D. — Dr. George A. Oviatt was
born in Boston, March 30, 1849. He fitted for college
at Hartford Latin School, and graduated at Yale in
1872. He received his medical diploma at the Col-
lege of PbysiciHDS and Surgeons, New York, March,
1875. April of the same year he commenced the
practice of medicine in Sudbury, where he still
rcjides.
The following is a list of college graduates and pro-
fessional men since 1800:
George H. Barton, Francis F. Brown, E. R. Cutler,
Joseph Cutler, Charles F. Gerry, Adoniram J. Good-
enough, George M. Howe, Alfred S. Hudson, Edward
B. Hunt, Edwin Hunt, Otis E. Hunt, Sereno D. Hunt,
Herbert S. Jones, Harriet M. Pratt, Luther PufTer,
Homer Rogers, Henry Shaw, Joseph A. Shaw, Charles
Thomson.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
JOHN GLEA80N.
The subject of this sketch was a native of Ireland
and was born March 2, 1833. His father was one
of the celebrated Gleason family of Scotland, and
his ancestors were among the leading politicians of
their time, some of whom were members of Parlia-
ment. His early days were spent in his native
land, where he acquired a good practical educa-
tion. At the age of sixteen his parents moved to
America and he accompanied them. He landed at
Boston on the 17th of June, 1850, and one of the first
sights that greeted bis wondering eyes, upon his ar-
rival in the " land of the free," was the enthusiastic
celebration of the battle of Bunker Hill. His father
settled in Boston and the boy went to learn the ma-
chinist's trade. He proved an apt scholar, and made
good progress, but the confinement proving irksome,
he started out in the spring of 1853 and found employ-
ment on the extensive market farm of Major Jonas
Barker, of Carlisle, who finding the young man sober,
industrious and fully trustworthy, soon gave him
charge of his extensive business, which he conducted
with great credit to himself and to the entire satisfac-
tion of his employer.
As the years passed by, he became more and more
identified with the place and came to be considered
as a member of the family. Major Barker had but
one child at home — a daughter, who had been a very
.successful teacher in the public schools, and what
could be more natural than that these young persons
should be attracted to each other. On April 11, 1858,
412
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
they were united in marriage, after which they resided
for a short time in Framinp;ham, but the major could
not spare the strong arm upon which he had learned
to lean in his advancing years, and, after a brief ab-
sence, at the earnest request of his bride's parents, the
young people went back to Carlisle, where they lived
until the death of Major and Mrs. Barker. An idea
of the extent of the confidence which the major re-
poaed in his aon-in-law is found in the fact that he
was one of the two executors of the will.
On November 23, 1872, Mr. Gleason removed with
his wife to Sudbury, where he lived until his death,
August 15, 1879. Conscientious in the discharge of
his duties, strictly honest in his business dealings, of
unimpeachable character and happy in his domestic
surroundings, he lived respected by those with whom
he came in contact and mourned by all who knew
him.
CHARLES L. GOODNOW.
Mr. Goodnow is descended from a family which was
prominent in theearly settlement of Sudbury. Among
the passengers who enbarked from Southampton for
New England April 24, 16^8. in the "Confidence,"
John Jobson, master, were John Goodnow, of " Wil-
sheir," husbandman, aged forty-two, with his wife
Jane and children Lydiaand Jane; Edmund Goodnow,
of'Dunhead in Wilshire," husbandman, aged twenty-
seven, with Ann, his wife, and two sons, John and
Thomas; and Thomas Goodnow, of Shasbury, aged
thirty, with Jane, his wife and two children, Thomas
and Ursula. John, Edmund and Thomas Goodnow
were evidently three brothers seeking their fortunes in
the new world. John was made a freeman June 2,
1641, and in 1644 was one of the selectmen of Sud-
bury. He died March 28, 1654. Edmund was made
a freeman May 13, 1640, and occupied the house in
Sudbury known by tradition as the Goodnow gar-
rison. He was a representative in the Colonial
General Court, a. captain in the militia and a regu-
larly appointed surveyor to lay out granted lands.
He died April 6, 1688. Thomas Goodnow, the third
brother, was made a freeman in 1643, and afterwards
removed from Sudbury to Marlboro' Plantation,
where he had grants of land. In 1661-62 and 1664
he was one of the selectmen of Marlboro. He was
married twice, and by his first wife, Jane, he had seven
children, two of whom, Thomas and Mary, were born
in Sudbury. The daughter Mary was killed and
scalped by the Indians. Samuel, another child, oc-
cupied a house in Marlboro', which during the In-
dian troubles was made a garrison.
The great-grandfather of Charles L. Goodnow, the
subject of this sketch, lived in Sudbury, and had a
son Nahum, a farmer, who married Ruth Brown.
The children of Nahum were Nahum, Susanna, Jonas,
Martin, Joseph Warren, Eliot, Joanna and Jesse.
Of these children Nahum married his cousin Betsey,
daughter of John and Persis Goodnow, and was the
father of the subject of this sketch.
Chirles L. Goodnow was bore in Sudbury, Mass.,
and was educated in the public schools of the town.
A*, the age of eighteen he went to Boston, and not;
long after associated himself with the late Charles
Slack in the produce business, which he pursued
twenty-five years and will be remembered by many
readers as one of the prominent occupants of the
Boylston Mntket. He remained in Boston seven or
eight years after his retirement from business and
then returned to Sudbury, where, during the last few
years, he has lived. He was the owner of a large farm
about a mile from the South Sudbury Railroad Sta-
tion, on the road to Framingham, seventy acres of
which were under his own management or that of his
lessees, and the remainder under that of his son,
Charles Frederick Goodnow, who carries on an ex-
tensive business in raising vegetables and flowers for
the Boston market.
Mr. Goodnow married, first, Ruth Lapham, who
was the mother of the son above-mentioned, and sub-
sequently Harriet Brigham, of Boston, who has no
children. At the present time the home farm is car-
ried on by Mr. Cutting, a lessee with whom Mr.
Goodnow made his home. With abundant means
he led a retired life, somewhat.feeble in health, though
far from advanced in years.
In religion, though bore in an orthodox family,
Mr. Goodnow was a Universalist. In politics,
brought up in the Whig faith, he was a Republi-
can and actively interested in the welfare of his
party. He held no office and neither sought nor
consented to hold one, with its duties an 1 responsibil-
ities far outweighing in his opinion its profits and
honors. Mr. Goodnow died August 8, 1890.
The family of Mr. Goodnow has always maintained
its prominence in the town where it early found a
permanent home. The Goodnow Library in South
Sudbury was established in 1862 under a bequest
made by John Goodnow, a brother of the mother of
the subject of this sketch, who was born in Sudbury
September 6, 1791, and who died in Boston December
24, 1861. At a later date George Goodnow, a brother
of John, bequeathed, by his will, the sum of tea
thousand dollars for the benefit of the poor of his
native town. John B. Goodnow, a brother of Charles
L. Goodnow, and Martin Goodnow, an uncle, are liv-
ing in South Sudbury in substantial comfort, — the
latter over eighty years of age, — and both enjoying
the confidence and respect of the community of which
they are members. Others bearing the name are
scattered through the town and all are worthy descend-
ants of the early settlers of 1639.
HON. HOMER ROGERS.
Homer Rogers, son of Walter and Emily Rogers,
was born at South Sudbury October 11, 1840.
WAYLAND.
413
He studied at Wadsworth Academy, entered
Williams College in 1858, and graduated in
1862. Soon after leaving college he enlisted in Co.
F, Forty-filth Regiment M. V. M. At the expira-
tion of his term of service he taught school one year
in Douse Academy, Sberborn, and from 1864-66 in the
Natick High School, since which time he has been
engaged in business. Jan. 15, 1868, he married Ellen
E. Perry, of South Natick, and had seven children.
Mr. Rogers is a successful business man and has for
years been connected with the firm of S. B. Rogers &
Co., manufacturers of leather board. He is the presi-
dent of the Allston Co-operative Bank in Allston,
Mass., which he was instrumental in organizing, and
is a director of the National Market Bank, of Brigh-
ton. In 1888 he was elected alderman of the
Eleventh District of Boston and re-elected the follow-
ing year, at which time he was chosen chairman of
the board. He was largely instrumental in the for-
mation of the Congregational Church of Allston,
where he now resides.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
WAVLAM).
BV ALFRED SERENO HUDSON.
Waylaxd was formerly a part of Sudbury. It was
set apart as a town in 1780, under the name of East
Sudbury, and took its present name in 1835. It is sit-
uated on the Massachusetts Central Railroad, about
fifteen miles from Boston, and lies mostly on the east
side of Sudbury River. It is bounded on the north
by Lincoln, east by Weston, touth by Natick and
west by Sudbury. It has two villages — Waylaud Cen-
tre and Cochituate.
The town is pleasantly situated, and its rural quiet,
beautiful drives and varied scenery render it peculi-
arly attractive as a summer residence. Here the set-
tlers of Sudbury first located, and nearly two-thirds
of the land first graiited them by the General Court
for the township of Sudbury was within the territory
now Wayland. As the acts relative to the obtaining
of the land have been given in connection with the his-
tory of Sudbury in another part of this work, it is
only necessary to say that on petition of those pro-
posing the settlement, the Court allowed them a grant
of land, which was purchased of the aboriginal own-
ers, and for which a deed was given in due form. Be-
sides the large tract of land granted the settlers col-
lectively, there were several smaller tracts allowed to i
individuals. This is true of some of the land about j
Cochituate Pond, which was a part of the tract granted
the widow of Rev. Josse Glover. Another grant was
that of the " Dunster Farm," sometimes called the
" Pond Farm." This was a tract of 600 acres granted,
in 1640, to Henry Dunster, the first president of Har-
vard College, who, in 1641, married Mrs. Elizabeth
Glover. This land was situated southeaat of the
"Glover Farm," and had Cochituate Lake for its
western boundary. Beyond this farm, easterly, was a
tract of 200 acres extending towards the Weston town
bound, and called the " Jennison Farm." This was
granted, in 1638, to Capt. William Jennison, of Wat-
ertown, for service that he rendered in thePequot War.
It was laid out in 1640.
Another grant was to Mr. Herbert Pelham, Sept.
4, 1639. This land grant was situated in the pr^ent
territory of Wayland, and was what is called "The
Island." For many years it was mostly owned and
occupied by the Heards. Mr. Pelham came to Amer-
ica in 1638, and for a time lived at Cambridge. Sav-
age states that he was a gentleman firom the county
of Lincoln, and when in London, where he may have
been a lawyer, was a friend of the colony.
The Indian owner of all these land tracts was Karto,
alias Goodman, whose wigwam was at Goodman's
Hill, about a mile west of Sudbury River. The ter-
ritory was especially attractive to the settlers because
of the broad meadow lands along the river. These
in early times afforded bountiful crops of hay, which
were so serviceable to the possessors that " they took
in cattle for wintering." The uplands were more or
less covered wii.h heavy timber growth. " Pine
Plain " and " Pine Brook," early names of localities
east of Wayland Centre, probably derived their names
from the heavy growth of pine forest about there; and
" Timber Neck," just south of Mill Brook, is sugges-
tive of what the soil there produced.
Notwithstanding these large forest tracts, however,
the people were careful to guard against wastefulness
in their woodland, and enacted laws relating to it,
among which are the following: 1646. " Ordered, that
no oak timber shall be fallen without leave from those
that are appointed by the town to give leave to fell
timber, that shall hew above eighteen inches at the
butt end." Also, "That no man that hath timber of
bis own to supply his want, shall have any timber
granted upon the Common." In 1647, " it was ordered
that the people should have timber for ttiat year to
supply their wants, for every two shillings that they
paid the ministry, one tree."
At the time of English occupation the Indian pop-
ulation was scant; there are, however, indications
that at some time considerable numbers dwelt in the
neighborhood of Cochituate Pond.
Tradition locates an Indian burial-place near the
old graveyard westerly of the centre of the town.
Probably the pestilence that occurred among the
Massachusetts Bay tribes, in the early part of the
seventeenth century, largely depopulated the country.
A noted Indian trail, at the time of English occupa-
tion, passed through the southeasterly part of the ter-
ritory. This was part of an ancient way to Connecti-
cut. It passed from Watertown at what is now known
a= Wayland and Weston Corner, and parsed into
414
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
what waa then the wilderness land near Framingham
on the north side of Cochituate Pond. The strip now
in Wayland was called " the road Irom Watertown to
the Dunster Farm." The town's early grantees were
Englishmen. Some of them came to the place of set-
tlement directly from England, and some after a
brief sojourn at Watertown, which waa then the town
next adjacent on the east. Tnese settlers probably
arrived at the place of their future home by the fall
of 1638. Some of those whose names appear upon
the "records "at a very early date, and whose de-
scendants long lived there, are Noyes, GriflBn, John-
son, Ward, Pannenter, Rice, Curtis, Stone, Rutter,
Loker, Bent, Maynard, Grout, King and Woodward.
The first dwellings were erected along three roads,
which afterwards became the common highway. The
principal one of these roads, called " the North " or
" East Street," and also the " Old Watertown Trail,"
started at what is now " Weston and Wayland Cor-
ner," and probably followed the course of the present
road over "The Plain " and Clay-pit Hill to a point
near the Abel Gleason estate; from this place it is
supposed to have made its way a little northerly of
Mr. Gleason's house, and winding southwesterly,
passed just south of Baldwin's Pond, and thence to
the river at the bridge. The road originally called
" Northwest Row," ran from this street to what is still
called " Common Swamp," and by the spot desig-
nated as the house-lot of Walter Haynes. This spot
still bears the traces of having, long years ago, been
the site of a house. The cart-path which ran from it
to the meadow is still used.
Along this road traces and traditions of homesteads
are unmistakable ; old building material has been
unearthed, and depressions in the ground are still to
be seen. Mr. Draper, a little east of his houce, by
the brook, unearthed the stones of a fire-place, with
fragments of coals still upon them. Between this and
Clay-pit Bridge (the second bridge or culvert from the
mill-pond, or the first above " Whale's Bridge ") there
are, north of the road, several depres-sions indicating
the sites of old houses. Just beyond Clay-pit Bridge
the writer, with Mr. Draper, went to look for traces of
houses on the lots assigned to Bryan Pendleton and
Thomas Noyes ; and there, in the exact locality, were
distinct depresjions, just where they were looked for.
The Curtis homestead, until within a very {ew years,
was standing in about the place assigned for the
house-lijt. Thus strong is the probability that the
lots on this street were largely built upon.
Another of the principal streets was that which,
starting from a point on the North Street near the
town bridge, ran easterly along what is now the com-
mon highway, to the head of the mill-pond, and then
to the mill. Upon this street was the first meeting-
house, at a spot in the old burying-ground, and tjje
Parmenter Tavern. The hou^ie-lots were mainly at
the west end of this street, and the road was probably
extended northeasterly to give access to the mill.
Here, again, tradition confirms the record of house-
lots, and shows that the lots were more or less built
upon. The John Maynard and John Loker estates
were kept for years in their families, and the Par-
menter estate is still retained in the family. Jn later
years the descendants of John Rutter built on that
street.
The third road waa called the " Bridle Point Road."
This started near the Parmenter Tavern, crossed the
knoll at the Harry Reeves place, and ran along the
ridge of " Braman's Hill " for about two-thirds of its
length, when it turned southerly, and, crossing Mill
Brook, ran towards the town's southern limits. While
tradition positively locates this road, it points to but
one homestead upon it, and that the residence of Rev.
Edmund Brown, which it undoubtedly declares was
at the spot designated by the house-lot data. Along
this street are no visible marks of ancient dwelling-
places north of Mill Brook ; but beyond, various de-
pressions in the ground, and remnants of building
material, indicate that at one time this street hart
bouses upon it. With the exception of those on the
south street, the dwellings were about equally distant
from the meeting-house, and all within ea:^y access to
the River Meadows and the mill. Probably they set-
tled largely in groups, that they might more easily
defend themselves in case of danger. They were in a
new country, and as yet had had little experience
with the Indians ; hence we should not expect they
would scatter very widely. In the early times so es-
sential was it considered by the Colonial Court that
the people should not widely scatter, that, three
years before Sudbury was settled, it ordered that, for
the greater safety of towns, " hereafter no dwell-
ing-house should be built above half a mile from the
meeting-house in any new plantation." (Colony Rec-
ords, Vol. I.)
It will be noticed that the positions selected for
these streets were, to an extent, where the shelter of
upland could be obtained for the house. The sandy
slope of Bridle Point Hill would aflford a protection
from the rough winds of winter ; so of the uplands
just north of South Street. It waa also best to settle
in groups, to lessen the amount of road-breaking in
winter. It will, moreover, be noticed that these
groups of house- lots were near, not only meadow
land, but light upland, which would be easy of culti-
vation. Various things indicate that the most ser-
viceable spots were selected for homesteads, that roads
were constructed to connect them as best they could,
and that afterwards the roads were extended to the
mill. Probably the people on North Street made the
short way to South Street, that now cornea out at Mr.
Jude Damon's, in order to shorten the way to church.
Those midway of that street, for a short cut to the
mill, the church and the tavern, would naturally open
a path from the turn of the road by the clay- pits to
the mill. To accommodate the people on "The
Plain, ' a road was opened to the mill in a southwest-
WAYLAND.
415
erly course, which is in part the present highway, but
has in part been abandoned — the latter part being
that which formerly came out directly east of the
mill.
These several sections of road probably formed
what was called the " Highway." A large share of
it is in use at the present time, and is very buggestive
of historic reminiscences. By it the settlers went to
the Cakebread Mill, to the little hillside meeting-
house, and to the John Parmenter ordinary. By
these ways came the messenger with fresh news from
the seaboard settlements, or with tidings from the
tribes of the woods. In short, these formed the one
great road of the settlement, the one forest pathway
along which every one more or less trod.
The erection of dwelling-places along these first,
streets probably began in 1638 ; but we have no tra-
dition or record of the week or month when the in-
habitants arrived at the spot, nor as to how many
went at any one time. They may have gone in small
companies at different dates; and the entire removal
from Watertown may have occurred in the process of
months. It is quite probable, however, that they
went mainly together, or in considerable companies,
for both the sake of convenience and safety; and
that they were largely there by the autumn of 1G38.
We have found no record of the dimensions of any
of the first dwelling-places, but we may judge some-
thing of their size by that of the first house of wor-
ship, and by the specifications in a lease of a house to
be built by Edmund Rice prior to the year 1650.
This house was to be very small — " 30 foot long, 10 !
foot high, 1 foot sill from the ground, 16 foot wide, |
with two rooms, both below or one above the other,
all the doors, walls and staires with convenient fix-
tures, and well planked under foot and boored suffi-
ciently to lay corn in the story above head." But
it is doubtful if this small, low structure fitly repre-
sents the settler's first forest home ; very likely that
was a still more simple building, that would serve as
a mere shelter for a few months or years, till a more
serviceable one could be built.
Very early after their arrival, the people began to
provide means for more easy and rapid transit. In-
dian trails and the paths of wild auiuals would not
long suffice for their practical needs. Hay was to be
drawn from the meadows, and for this a road must
be made. Another was to be made to Concord, and
paths were to be opened to the outlying lands. The
first highway-work wag done on the principal street,
which was, doubtless, at first a mere wood-path or
trail. An early rule for this labor, as it is recorded
on the town records, February 20, 1639, is as fol-
lows: "Ordered by the commissioners of the town,
that every inhabitant shall come forth to the mend-
ing of the highway upon a summons by the survey-
ors." In case of failure, five shillings were to be for-
feited for every default. The amount of labor re-
quired was as follows :
" Isl, The poorest man shall work one dav-
'*2Dd. Fur everj six acn-s o( ineaduw laud a man batb he shall work
ooe day.
" 3d. Kvery man who shall neglect to make all fences appertaining to
bis fielda by the 24lb of April shall forfeit five shillings (Not. 19tb,
1639)."
An important road, laid out in 1648, was that from
Watertown to the Dun^ter Faim, or, the "Old Con-
necticut path." The records state : " Edmund Eice
and Edm" Goodenow, John Bent and John Grout are
appointed lo lay out a way from Watertown bouud to
the Dunster Farm."
Another important road laid out in the first decade
was that which went to Concord. In 1648, " Edmund
Goodenoweis desired to treat with Concord men, and
to agree with them about the laying out of the way
between Concord and Sudbury." The term " laying
out," as it was employed at that period, might not al-
ways imply the opening of a new path, but, perhaps,
the acceptance or formal recognition of an old one,
which hitherto had been only a bridle-way, or mere
forest foot-trail, that had been used as the most avail-
able track to a town, hamlet or homestead.
Bridge-building was early attended to, and a con-
tract was made with Ambrose Leech, and another
with Timothy Hawkins, of Watertown, for structures
to span the river at the site of the present stone
bridge by the William Baldwin estate.
A grist-mill was erected by Thomas Cakebread in
the spring of 1639. The following is the record con-
cerning it :
'* Granted to Thomas Cakebread, for and In consideration of build-
ing a milt, 40 a. of uplunil or thereabout now adjoining to the mill, and
a little piece of meadow downwards, and a piece of meadow upwards,
and which may be IG or 20 a. or thereaboat. Also, there is given for bis
acconimodiition for his estate 30 a. of meadow and 40 a. of upland."
Mr. Cakebread did not long live to make use of his
mil;. His widow married Sergeant John Grout, who
took charge of the property. " In 1643 the Cranberry
swamp, formerly granted to Antient Ensign Cake-
bread, was confirmed to John Grout, and there was
granted to Sargent John Grout a swamp lying by the
house of Philemon Whale, to pen water for the use
of the mill, and of preparing it to remain for the use
of the town."
Probably the house of Philemon Whale was not far
from the present Concord Road, near Wayland Cen-
tre, and possibly stood on the old cellar-hole at the
right of the road, north of the Dana Parmenter
bouse. The bridge at the head of the mill-pond long
bore the name of Whale's Bridge. This mill stood on
the spot where the present grist-mill stands, and
which has been known as Reeves', Grout's and, more
recently, Wight's Mill. Some of the original timber
of the Cakebread Mill is supposed to be in the pres-
ent structure. The stream by which it is run is now
small, but in early times it was probably somewhat
larger. The dimensions of the mill are larger than
formerly, it having been lengthened toward the west.
In 1640 a church was organized, which was Congre-
gational in government and Calvinistic in creed. A
416
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUXXy, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
copy of its covenant is still preserved. The church
called to its pastorate the Rev. Edmund Brovru, and
elected Mr. William Brown deacon. Ic is supposed
that the installation of Rev. Mr. Brown was at the
lime of the formation of the church. The parsonage
was by the south bank of Mill Brook, on what was
called "Timber Neck." The house was called in the
will of Mr. Brown " Brunswick," which means "mau-
aion by the stream," and stood near the junction of
Mill Brook with the river, a little southeast of Farm
Bridge, and nearly opposite the Richard Heard place.
Nothing now visible marks the spot, but both record
and undisputed tradition give its whereabouts. The
salary of Mr. Brown the first year was to be £40, one
half to be paid in money, the other half in some or
all of these commodities, viz., " wheaie, pees, butter,
cheese, porke, beefe, hemp and flax al every quarter's
end."
Shortly after the formation of the church and the
settlement of a pastor a meeting-house was built The
spot selected was at what is now the " Old Burying-
ground." The building stood in its westerly part, and
the site is marked by a slight embankment and a row
of evergreen trees set by Mr. J. S. Draper. The house
was built by John Rutter, and the contract was as
follows:
" Fedduaby 7th, lG4'i.
** It ia agreed between the townHmen of this town on the one part, and
John Rulter on the other part, that the Huid Juba Riilterfor bid piirtt^hull
fell, saw, hew and ftuDie a bouse for a meeting-house, thirty foot long,
twenty foot wide, eight foot between joint, three foot between sude,
two cross dorniants ill the house, six clear alory wiiidowa. two with four
lights apiece, and four with three tights apiece, aud to ententise betweeu
the stude, which frame is to be made ready to raise the tlritt week iu
May n»-xt. JoHX Ri:TTEa.*'
"And the town for their part do covenant to draw nil the timber to
place, and to help to raise the house being fnuned. and also to pay to the
BHid John Rutter for the said work six pounds; that is to say, three
pound to be paid in corn at three shilllugsa bushel, or in Dioney, in and
upon this twenty seventh day of this present month, aud the other three
pounds to be paid in money, corn and cattle to be prized by two men of
the town, one to be chosen by the town and the other to be chosen by
John Rutter, and to be paid at the time that the frame is by the said
Juho Butter fimslied. I
*' Pfter Nqtse,
" Brian Pendleton,
** William Wacd,
" Walter Uaynes, '
"JcjHN How, 1
"Thomas Whyte.'*
('•Town Book," p. iT.)
t
Aa act relative to the raising and locating of the
building is the following, dated May, 1643 : The town
" agreed that the meeting-house shall stand upon the i
hillside, before the house-lot of John Loker, on the
other side of the way ; also, that every inhab-
itant that hath a house-lot shall attend [the raising '
of] the new meeting-house, or send a sufficient man
to help raise the meeting-house." The year after the i
contract was made a rate was ordered for the finish-
ing of the house, to be raised on " meadow and upland
and all manner of cattle above a quarter old, to be
prized as they were formerly — Shoates at 6 shillings 8 [
pence apiece, kids at 4 shillings apiece." '
A further record of the meeting-house is as fol-
lows ;
"Nov. 5th, 1015.
"It is ordered that all those who are appointed to have seats in tt^e
meeting-house that they shall bring lu their tirst payment for theiraeats
to Hn-h Griltin, or agree with him between this and the 14tli day of
this uiontn, which is on Friday next week, and those that are |d>rflcieat|
wo do hereby give power to the .Marshall to distrain both for their pay-
ment for theirseata and also fur the Uarahall's own labor according to
a former order twelve pence.
" Walter Hayne,
"Edmund Goodnow,
" William Waqde,
"Joa.v Reddicke,
[ *' Hugh Griffin."
Considerable importance was attached in the early
: times to the .^eating of people in the meeting-house,
and in the records of new houses of worship mention
is made of this matter. Rejpecc was had to social
condition and circumstance ; committees were chosen
to adjust these matters in the payment of raes, and
references are made in the records of town-meeting to
the requests of parties about their seals in the meet-
ing-house. A rule that was general was that the men
should sit at one end of the pew and the women at
the other. In the third meeting-house erected iu
Sudbury it was a part of the plan that the pews should
be so arranged as to seat seven men on one side and
seven women on the other. In this first meeting-
house of Sudbury the people purchasing seats had a
right to dispose of their purchase, in case they should
leave the settlemf^nt; but the right was reserved by
the town of seating the parties who purchased, as is
declared by the following record, January 26, 1G40 ;
It was "ordered that all those that pay for seals in
the meeting-house shall have leave to sell as many
seats as they pay for, provided they leave the teatiug
of the persons to whum they sell to the church offi-
cers, to seat them if they themselves go out of town."
About this first meeting-house a burial-place was soon
started.
In meeting public expense, rates were made on the
meadow lauds, or in proportion as the people were
possessed of them. These meadows were early divi-
ded among them, three apportionments having been
made by 1640.
This division of meadow land was an important
transaction. It was not only a disposal of common
property of the proprietors, but it established a stand-
ard of rates, and in a certain sense of valuation. For
example, money to pay for land purchased of Karte
was to " be gathered according to such quantity of
meadow as are granted to the inhabitants of the
town." In the division of "uplands," the rule of re-
ceiving was according as a person was possessed of
" meadow." In the pasturage of the extensive cow
common, the people were to be limited in the number
of cattle put in by their meadows, or their rates as
based upon them.
In the erection of the meeting-house aud pay of the
minister, reference was had to rates paid on the
WAYLAND.
417
meadows. Perhaps the meadows thus assigned might
properly be termed meadow-rights. As in some
places the "acre-right" would procure lands or
privileges in proportion to the part paid into the
common venture by the proprietor, so in Sudbury the
meadow-right might do likewise ; and a person who
possessed an original meadow-right might possess a
right to subsequent land allotments, or the right of
his cattle to commonage, so long as the town had un-
divided territory. Thus it might be said that the
proprietors received values on their investment in the
enterprise, not by monied divisions, but by land
divisions. Hence, these divisidns of land might be
called the dividends of those early days, ar;d the
money raised by the town on the basis of these early
divisions of meadow might be called assessments on
the stock made to meet public expenses. We con-
clude that these meadow-rights or dividends were
merchantable, to the extent that a person in selling
them might or might not convey the right that
belonged to them, as related to commonage and other
allotments. The lands that were given by gratu-
lation, for worthiness or work done for the public,
might or might not have the privileges of an original
meadow-right or dividend. In raising money to pay
Karto for the land which the town last bought of him,
it was ordered that " all meadow was to pay at one
price, and that all meadow given by way of gratu-
lation should have right of commonage."
That the original grantees, and those subsequently
given the privilege of such, as a "gratulation " for
services performed for the settlers, could transfer the
right to subsequent divisions of the common and un-
divided land, is indicated by the records of the pro-
ceedings of the proprietors of these lands many years
after the settlement of Sudbury. In the Proprietors'
Book of Records, as will be noticed further along, are
given repeated Hats of the names of the early grantees,
even after the most, if not all of them, had parsed
away. These list-) are referred to as those possessing
an original right to the town's undivided land, and
may indicate that wherever or whenever one pos-
sessed that right as it had beeu conveyed through
the years, in whatever way, that person could claim
land when a division was made, or could vote on the
disposal of the proprietors' undivided territory.
An early rule for the apportionment of meadow is
the following :
" If was ordered and agreed that the meadows of the town of Sudbury
shall be laid out and given to the present inhabitants as much as shall
be thoui^ht meet, according to this rule following ;
Imprimif, —
Tu every Mr. of a ffamilie 6 akers
To every wilTe 6J4 akers
To every child 1)^ akers
To every mare, cow, ox, or any other cattle that may
amount to 20j;., or so much money 3 aker3 "
\\e conjecture that the meadow lands allotted by
this rule were for encouragement, and to give the in-
habitants at the outset a means of maintenance for
2T-ii
their flocks ; and that other rules were made use of
when the division became the basis of aasessments of
rates, as bestowal of meadow dividends.
A record of the divisions is presented in the town
books, and the following is the preamble to one of
them:
" A record of the names of the Inhabitants of Sudbury, with their seT-
eral quantity of meadow to every one granted, according to their estates,
or gmnted by gratulation for services granted by them, which meadow
is ratable upon all common charges."
While land divisions were being made, reservations
were also made of lands for pasturage, which it was
understood were to remain undivided. These lands
were called "Cow (Commons," and the record of them
explains their use. The first was laid out or set apart
the 26th of November, 1643. The record concerning
the location is as follows :
" It is concluded by the town that all the lands southward that He from
the southeast comer of the bouse-lot of Robert Darolll, unto the romroon
cartbridge going to Edmund Goodoow's meadow, and so upon a strait
line to Watertown boood, which lands so granted, for a cow common,
shall never be reserved or laid down without the consent of eveiy In-
habitant that hath right in commonage. All the Uiuds we say that are
contained within these terms, that is between the honseiot of Robert
Daruili and the cartbridge before specified, southward within the five
miles bound first granted, down to the great river, and bounded on the
Bide which the extremity of our line bounding Watertown and Sudbury,
all our land contained within these terms, except all such land as have
been granted out in particular ; that is to say, a neck of upland lying
between Mill -brook and Pine brook; also another neck of land, with the
flat belonging to it, lying between the aforesaid neck and the great
river on the other side ; also another plat of land that lyeth westward
from them, coutainlug some 3 or 4 score acres, and granted out to par-
ticular uien-
*' The Inhabitants of the town are to be limited and sized, in the put-
ting in of cattle upon the said common In proportion, according to the
quantity of meadow the said Inhabitants are stated in upon the divi-
sion of the meadow, or shall be instated in by purchase hereafter pro-
vided they buy with the meadow the liberty of commonage allotted to
such u quantity ot meadow as shall be purchased."
It is somewhat difficult to define the bounds of this
cow common exactly from the description given in
the records, but the following may be considered its
general outline : From Weston bound direct to Way-
land Centre, thence west of south to the river, and
thence again direct to Weston bound.
The following are some of the early laws enacted
by the town :
Laws Relating to Domestic Animals. — In
1641 it was ordered that " every one that keeps any
hoga more than his own within one fortnight after
this day shall rid them out of this town only that for
every hog that shall be taken in to be kept by any
won more than his own for every week shall pay five
shillings." In 1643 it was ordered " that every in-
habitant should drive out his hog every morning into
the wood, and when they come home at night to see
them shut up safe, or else, if they be about the street,
to ring and yoke them." In 1648 it was voted in
town-meeting, "thatevery swine that shall be found of
any man out of his own properity, without a sufficient
yoke and ring, after the first of March next, the
owner thereof shall forfeit for every swine so taken
one shilling, and if the swine be yoked and not ringed,
418
HISTORY OF 3IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
or ringed and not yoked, then six pence for any swine
80 taken, beside all the damage done by any such
swine." It was also "agreed that all yokes should be
under the throat of the swine, and so long as the
Bwine was high and a rope go up on each side to be
fastened above, and that swine i^hould not be ac-
counted sufficiently ringed if they could root."
In 1643 it was "ordered by the freemen of the town
that all the cattle within this town shall this summer
not be turned abroad without a keeper, and the keeper
shall not keep any of the herd in any of the great river
meadows, from Bridle Point downwards towards Con-
cord, the intent of ihe order to preserve the river mea-
dows." In 1655 it was ordered that " all young, new-
weaned calves shall be herded all the summer time."
It was ordered that "every goat that is taken in
any man's garden, orchard or green corn shall be im-
pounded, and the owner shall pay for any such goat
so taken 3 pence."
In 1754 it was voted " that a fine of two shillings be
laid upon the owner of any dog or dogs that should
cause and make any disturbance at either of the meet-
ing-houses on the Lord's day, or Sabbath day, one-
half of the fine was to go to complainant and the
other half to the use of the town."
LA^ys CoN'CERXixG Am.munition and Fire-ar.ms.
— In 1653, "The town appointed Edmund Goodnow
and Hugh Griffin to divide the shot and overplus of
bullets to the inhabitanis, what was wanting m shot
to make up out of the overplus of bullets, and the
shot and bullets to be divided to each man his due
by proportion according to what every man paid so
near as they can."
In 1669, " Edmund Goodnow, John Parmenter, Jr.,
and John Stone were to see to the barrel of powder,
to the trial of it, to the heading it up again, and to
take some course for the safe bestowing of it."
The same year the selectmen not only ordered for
the providing of a barrel of powder, but a hundred
pounds and a half of musket bullets, and a quarter
of a hundred of matches. When the third meeting-
house was built, it was ordered that there should be
in it "a convenient place for the storing of the am-
munition of the town over the window in the south-
west gable." About that time the town's stock of
ammunition was divided and intrusted to persons who
would " engage to respond for the same " in case that
it was " not spent in real service in the resijtance of
the enemy."
The Colonial Court at an early date ordered that
" the town's men in every town shall order that ev'y
house, or some two or more houses ioyne together for
the breeding of salt peetr i' some out house used for
poultry or the like." The duty of looking after this
matter for Sudbury was assigned to Ensign Cake-
bread. The saltpetre thus obtained was for the man-
ufacture of gunpowder. In 1645 Sudbury was " freed
from y" taking further care about salt peeter houses
: : : in answer to their petition."
In 1642 the Court made more stringent the laws
previously existing against selling fire-arms to the
Indians, exacting a forfeiture of £10 for the sale to
them of a gun, and £5 for a pound of powder.
In 1643 the Court ordered "that the military offi-
cers in every town shall appoint what arms shall be
brought to the meeting-house on the Lord's days, and
other times of meeting, and to take orders at farms
and houses remote that ammunition bee safely dis-
posed of that an enemy may not possess himself of
them."
Common Pi-antixg-Fields. — In the town's earlier
years it was the practice to plant fields in common ;
and repeatedly in the records are these common fields
referred to. These planting-places were situated in
difl'erent parts of the town : between the old North
and South Street in the neighborhond of the Glea-
sons, also between Mill Brook and Pine Brook along
"the Plain" in the vicinity of the Drapers, and
toward the south bound of the town, near the new
bridge.
Fence-Viewers and Fences. — A good degree of
attention was early bestowed by the town on its I'ences.
Several surveyors were appointed each year to look
after them; and although the office of '• fence-viewer"
has now gone into disuse, it was once one of consid-
erable responsitiility. As early as 1655, "Surveyois
were appointed to judge of the sufficiency of the
fences about men's particular properties in casei of
damage and difference." We read in the records that
John Maynard and John Blanford were, a certain
year, to at;end to the fences "of the fifid and the
cornfield on the other side of the way from the pond
to the training place." "Edmund Rice and Thomas
Goodenovv for all the fences of cornfields from new
bridge southward within the town bound."
In 1666 the records state that " Persons were ap-
pointed surveyors for this year over the fiflu's where
Henry Loker dwells, and the field fences, where Solo-
mon Johnson dwelleth." Field fences are mentioned
as being on the south side of Pine Brook, also as
being between Mill Brook and Pine Bro'ik; also,
"upon the hill from the little pond by the dwelling-
house of John Blanford unto Mill brook." Several
kinds of fences were used. One kind was made by
ditching. It was ordered, iu 1671, "That all the
great river meadows shall be fenced, that is to say
that all the proprietors of the great river meadows
shall fence the heads or both ends of the meadows,
and where it may be necessary, to have a ditch made
from the upland to the river at the charge of the
squadron that shall lie on both sides of the suid ditch
according to their benefit." For the upland, also,
this mode of fencing was sometimes used. By the
roadside, about half-way between Wayland Centre
and the Plain, are distinct traces of one of these an-
cient fences.
Hedges were sometimes made use of. Mention is
made of fences that were to be made up " of good rails
WAYLAND.
419
well set three feet and one-half high or otherwise
good hedge well btaked or such fences as would be an
equivelant the fences to be attended to by April 1" if
the frost give leave if not then leu days after." After
a certain date all the field fences were to be closed, as
is indicated by the following: "It is ordered, that all
the fences that are in general lields, in this town of
Sudbury, shall be shut up by the 10th May or else to
forfeit for every rod unfenced five shillings."
Staple Crops. — Some of the staple crops were
Indian corn, — sometimes called by the one word
" Indian," — rye, barley, wheat, peas and oats. Hemp
and fiax were also raised.
Hay was early a great staple article; this, as we
have noticed, the river meadows bountifully pro-
duced. To such an extent did this crop abound, that
the settlers not only kept their own stock, but they
received cattle from abroad.
The time for cutting the meadow grass is indicated
by such statements as these. When Sergeant John
Rutter hired the Ashen swamp meadow, ''he was to
cut the grass by the 10"" of July, or else it shall be
lawful for any other man to cut the said meadow."
He was to pay for it that year four shillings and six
pence. Such prices as the following are also men-
tioned: two bushels of wheat and one bushel of In-
dian corn for Long Meadow. Strawberry Meadow
was let out the same year, 1(567, for one bushel of
wheat ; also the minister's meadow in Sedge Meadow
was let out for eight shillings to be paid in Indian
corn; Ashen Swamp Meadow was let out the same
year to Ensign John Grout for three shillings, to be
paid one-half in wheat, the other in Indian corn.
The meadow on the southeast side of the town was
let out to Henry Rice for a peck of wheat. These,
we think, were probably common meadows of the
town, and let out from year to year.
Measures were taken from time to time for improving
the meadow lands. Id 164-j a commission was granted
by the colonial authorities (Colony Records, Vol. II.,
p. 99) "for y^ btt' & impvng of y' medowe ground
vpon y" ryver running by Concord & Sudberry."
Later, also in 1671, a levy of four pence an acre was
to be made " upon all the meadow upon the great
river for the clearing of the river ; that is, from Con-
cord line to the south side, and to Ensign Grout's
spring."
Climate. — The following records will serve to in-
dicate the character of the climate at that period com-
pared with the present. It was at one time ordered
by the town that the fences should be set by the 1st
or the 10th of April. In 1642 " it was ordered that
no cattle were to be found on the planting fields and
all the fences were to be up by March 1st."
Cake of the Poor.— In 1G49 it was ordered that !
certain persons " have power to speak with Mrs. Hunt .
aboul her person, house [or home] and estate, and to I
take some care for her relief" The following vote
was recorded years afterwards : that " Mrs. Hunt
shall have fifty shillings, out of a rate to be made this
present February, 1665, this in respect of her poverty."
In 1669 [or '67] Mrs. Hunt was to have fifty shil-
lings pension paid out of the town rate. In 1673,
" because of the poverty of her famely, it was ordered
that Mr. Peter Noyes do procure and bring sergeon
Avery from Dedham to the Widow Hunt, of this
town, to inspect her condition, to advise, and direct,
and administer to her relief, and cure of her dis-
temper." Ten pounds were also to be put " into the
hands of Peter Noyes with all speed to assist Mrs.
Hunt with."
About 1663 a contract was made with Thoman
Rice to keep a person a year, " if he live as long,"
for which he was to have five pounds sterling; and if
the person kept had any, or much eickneas during the
year, the town was to give Mr. Rice " satisfaction to
content, for any physic, attendance or trouble." In
1663, £7 were added to the present rate, " for the use
of Thomas Tfling's sickness, and to pay for inlend-
anceofhim." In 1664 John White was "exempted
from paying his present rate to the town, and also
unto the minister." Dr. Loring, in his diary, give*
repeated instances of collections taken for the af-
flicted in the time of his ministry ; as, for example,
in 1750: " Lord's day, had a contribution for Thomas
Saunders, laboring under a severe and incurable
cancer; collected £16-8-0." In 1757 or '59, " had a
contribution for our brother, Tristam Cheeney. £31
was gathered." About 1762, October 7th, public
Thanksgiving : " A contribution was made for the
wife of Asahel Knight, of Worcester. £18 was col-
lected."
But, while the people, as shown by such iastHnces,
were generous to the deserving poor, as a wwn they
took stringent measures for the prevention of pov-
erty. This they did, both by discouraging its importa-
tion, and by encouraging what tended to thrift. In
the records we find the following : " In consideration
of the increase of poor people among us, ... as
also considering how many poor persons from other
towns come in to reside. Ordered, That not any one
who owned houses or lands in town should either let
or lease any of them unto any strangers that is not
at present a town-dweller, without leave or license
first had and obtained of the selectmen in a select-
men's meeting or by leave had and obtained in a gen-
eral town-meeting or otherwise shall stake down, de-
positate, and bind over a sufficient estate unto the
selectmen of Sudbury, which said estate so bound
over unto the said selectmen, that shall be in their the
said selectmen's judgment sufficient to have and se-
cure the town of Sudbury harmless from any charge
that may so come by the said lands so leased, and if
any person notwithstanding this order shall lease any
houses or lands unto any stranger as above said with-
out lisence and giving good security as above said,
shall for even.' week's entertainment of a stranger
into his houses or lands forfeit the sum of 19 shillings
420
HISTORV OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
6 pence to the town of Sudbury ; and any ])erson
bringing a stranger presuming to come as a truant
contrary to order as above said, shall for every week's
residence forfeit 19 sliillings 6 pence to the town of
Sudbury."
In 1683 Mathew Rice was to be warned to come
before the town cleric, for admitting to some part of
bis land Thomas Hedley, who brought his wife and
child. Thomas Hedley was also to be warned
to quit the town. Another person was cen-
sured for "taking in and harboring of Christopher
Petingal, who is rendered tn be a person of a vicious
nature, and evil tongue and behavior, and otherwise
discouraging enough." In 1692-93 a law was enacted
by the Province, by which towns were allowed to
warn away strangers. If the warning was not given
within three months, then the parties so far became
residents, that, if in need, they were to receive
assistance from the town. If persons warned did not
leave within fourteen days, the constable could re-
move them by law. The town repeatedly made use
of this power.
Means were also taken for the encouragement of in-
dustry.
About 1663 the town voted to grant " Mr. Stearns
of Charlestown, ironmonger and blacksmith," certain
meadow lands, and " firewood for his family use, and
wood for coals for to do the smithy work." He was
also to take timber in the commons "to build his
house and shop and fence." A little later Joseph
Graves was allowed to take timber to build a house,
and part of the land formerly given him to erect a
smith shop upon. Also there was granted to Richard
Sanger "six acres of meadow, on the west side of the
river, upon the condition he stay amongst us to do
our smith's work for four years, the time to begin the
twenty-fourth day of August, 1646."
Education. — The following records afford some
information concerning early educational advantages.
In 1664 " the town promised to give answer at the
next meeting whether or no they will accommodate
Mr. Walker [wilh] any lands towards his encour-
agement to keep a free school in Sudbury." We infer
that Mr. Walker was encouraged in his project by
the following report on educational matters rendered
in 1680 :
"And as for schools, tho' there be no stated school
in this town, for that the inhabitants are so scattered
in their dwellings that it cannot well be, yet such is
the case that, by having two school dames on each
side of the river, that teacheth small children to spell
and read, which is so managed by the parents and gov-
ernors at home, and prosecuted after such sort as
that the selectmen who distributed themselves did
withia three months last past so examine families,
children, and youth, both as to good manners, orderly
living, chatechizing, and reading, as that they re-
turned from all parts a comfortable good account of
all these matters, and render them growing iu several
families beyond expectation, rarely reprovable any-
where, encouraging in most places, and in others
very commendable, so as that the end is accomplished
hitherto. And for teaching to write or cypher, here
is Mr. Thomas Walker, and two or three others
about this town, that do teach therein, and are ready to
teach flll others that need, if people will come or send
them."
From the report rendered the court for the county
of Middlesex, in reference to education in morals, we
infer that attention was early turned to that matter.
In IGo') persons were " appointed for to take pains for
to see into the general families in town, to see whether
children and servants are employed in work, and
educated in the ways of God and in the grounds of
religion, according to the order of the General Court."
The same year John How was "appointed by the
Pastor and Selectmen to see to the restraining from
the profanation of the Lord's day iu time of public
exercise. '
The stocks were employed as a means of punifh-
ment. In 16.31, "John Rulter promised to mend
the stocks." They were used as late, at least, as
1722, when it was voted " by y' town to grant five
shillings to bye to pad Locks for y' pound and
stocks." This old-time appliance was for a period
near the meeting-house, as the records state
that in 1681 "Samuel How was to build a new
pair of stocks," and was to set them up before the meet-
ing-house. ' In subsequent yearj, lything-men were
appointed, and duly sworn before the selectmen, as
the law directed. All these agencies were made use
of to maintain a wholesome morality. That they
succeeded in accomplishing something, the following
from the foregoing report of 1680 indicates : "And
the selectmen having also been made acquainted that
the court expects their inspection touching persons
who live from under family government, or after a
dissolute or disorderly manner, to the dishonor of
God, or corrupting of youth, the selectmen of the
town as above having personally searched and en-
quired into all families and quarters, in and about
this town, do return this answer, that they find none
such amongst us."
Commercial relations were not always carried on
by payments in money, but sometimes wholly or in
part in produce. Edmund Rice, in 1654, "for service
as deputy," was to have " six pounds to be paid in
wheat at John Parmenters senior, and so much more
as shall pay seven pence a bushell for the carriage of
it, to be paid within one week after next Michelmas."
For work on the meeting-house, about the year 1688,
" he was to have country pay, at country price." The
country pay was to be "in good sound merchantable
Indian corn, or rye, or wheat, or barley, or malt, or
peas, or beef, or pork, or work." At a meeting of the
selectmen, Oct. 25, 1678, it was ordered that "Mr_
Peter Noyes, Peter Kinge and Thomas Stevens or any
of them are appointed to collect of the Inhabitants
WAYLAND.
421
of this town what may be wanted of the sum granted
by any person or persons towards the new college at
Cambridge in building according to an order by the
Gen C . . ." This being attended to, the town re-
ceived its discharge.
Sometimes payments were promised either in pro-
duce or money, as, in 1696, Benjamin Parmenter was
to sweep the meeting-house, from April Ist of that
year to April 1st of the next year, " for ten bushelis
of Indian corn, or twenty shillings in money."
Whether Mr. Parmenter was to take which he chose,
or the party engaging him was to give which they
chose, is not stated. Sometimes the produce was
rated, or paid for town ratea, in accordance with what
the produce was rated or paid for in county rates ;
as, in 1673, it wasordered that" all corn or grain, paid
into the towns rate for this year, shall be paid in at
such prices as the county rate is paid in at for the
year." We conclude that the town had the liberty to
establish the value of produce that was to pay the
town rates ; as, for the year 168G, wheat was rated at
five shillings per bushel, peas at four shillings, oats at
two shillings, Indian corn at two shillings nine pence.
Philip's War. — In 1775-76 the people suffered
hardship in consequence of King Philip's War. Be-
fore the town waa invaded by the Indians it rendered
valuable assistance to the Colony by the service of
Ephraim Curtis, a famous woodsman and scout. He
was a carpenter by trade, about thirty -three years of
age. He had an intimate acquaintance with the
country and its native inhabitants, and could speak
their language with fluency. After the breaking out
of Philip's War the Colonial authorities, wishing to
secure the Nipnet Indians in western and central
Massachusetts before they should ally themselves to
King Philip, selected Ephraim Curtis for this most
important and hazardous enterprise. In the ill-fated
e.vpedit on sent out to the Xipnet country under
Capt. Edward Hutchinson, Curtis went as a guide.
When the expedition retreated to Brookfield, and the
soldiers were besieged in a garrison-house there, and
it was necessary to send some one for assistance, the
task fell upon Curtis. The bold adventurer set forth
from the garrison, a lone soldier, to rely on his prow-
ess and a protecting providence to shield him on his
course. Capt. Wheeler, in his official report, states
of the affair as follows: " I spake to Ephraim Cur-
tis to adventure forth again on that service, and to
attempt it on foot as the way wherein was the most
hope of getting away undiscovered. He readily as-
sented, and accordingly went out ; but there were so
many Indians everywhere threatened that he couid
not pass without apparent hazard of life, so he came
back again, bur towards morning the said Ephraim
adventured forth the 3d time, and was fain to creep
on his hands and knees for some space of ground that
he might not be discovered by the enemy, but
through Gods mercy he escaped their hands, and got
safely to Marlboro', though very much spent and
ready to faint by re.oson of want of sleep before he
went from us, and his sore travel night and day in
that hot season till he got thither." On arriving at
Marlboro' he met Major Simon Willard and Capt.
James Parker, of Groton, with forty-six men, who
were there to scout between Marlboro', Lancaster and
Groton. These, on receiving intelligence of affairs
at Brookfield, hasteued at once with relief. They ar-
rived August 7th, just in season to rescue the sur-
vivors. After this narration, it is unnecessary to
speak of the bravery of this adventurous scout, or
the value of his services to the country.
Ephraim Curtis was a son of Henry Curtis, one of
the original grantees, and whose house was on the old
North or East Street, a little easterly of the Abel
Gleason estate. It remained standing till within a
few years.
When Indian hostilities were imminent. Rev. Ed-
mund Brown was active in making preparations for
the defence of the people on the east side of the
river. In a letter sent to the Governor Sept. 26, 1675,
he statei as follows : " I have been at a round charge
to fortify my house, and, except finishing the two
flankers and my gate, have finished. Now, without
four hands I cannot well secure it, and if for want of
hands I am beaten out, it will be very advantageous
to the enemy, and a thorn to the town." The men
asked for were granted him ; and his house afforded
a place of defence to the inhabitants of that locality,
who were directed to resort to it in time of peril.
After the war began the meeting-house was made a
! place of security, and fortifications were constructed
about it.
When the hostilities began Mr. Brown sent a letter
to the authorities, in which he says: " It is reported
that our woods are pestered with Indiana. One
Adams within our bounds was shot at by a lurking
Indian or more. He was shot through the coat and
i-hirt near to the arm-pit. One Smith walking the
woods was assailed by 3 or 4 Indians, whom he dis-
covered swooping down a hill toward him, but Smith
saved himself by his legs. One Joseph Freeman
coming up about 4 mile Brook discovered two Indi-
ans, one in the path presenting his gun at him in the
way (in a bright moonlight night), but Freeman dis-
mounting shot at him, and mounting rode for it. One
Joseph [Shaley] coming home from Marlboro' on
Thursday last discovered Indians in our bounds, one
of which made a shot at him, the bullet passing by
him, but being mounted and riding for it he escaped.
One Joseph Curtis, son to Ephraim Curtis on Satur-
day last heard 3 volleys of shot made by Indians be-
tween us and Watertown. This being to long, Ensign
Grout can give a full narrative to your Honor and
Councill. The consideration of all which I hope will
e.xcite you : : : to order that these woods may be
scoured and that our town of Sudbury a frontier town
may be enabled to contribute aid therein and defend
itself with its quantity of men, I humbly move. And
422
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
this I shall [present] unto the Honorable Councill
that we may not have men pressed out of our small
town." Dated, "Sudbury 26'" T"" mo."
Philip made his attack on Sudbury the 21st of
April, 1676, on which day he also engaged at Green
Hill with the forces of Captains Wadsworth and
Brocklebank. The same day a detachment of his
men crossed the Town Bridge and began their devas-
tating work on the East Side. They doubtless in-
tended to take what spoil they could and then burn
the place ; but they were effectually checked in their
work. The inhabitants fell upon them with fury.
They beat them from the very thresholds of their
humble homes, and snatched the spoil from their sav-
age clutch ; they even forced them to retreat on the
run, and seek safety in precipitous flight. While
the work of beating back the enemy was going on, a
company of reinforcements arrived from Water-
town, by order of Captain Hugh Mason. These
reinforcements probably arrived some time before
noon. As the attack began about daybreak, and took
the inhabitants somewhat by surprise, it is hardly prob-
able that the news would reach Watertown until the
morning was well advanced. Watertown was the bor-
der town on the east. The part now We.tton was called
the "Farmers' Precinct." At this locality the sound
of guns could without doubt be heard, and the smoke
rising over the woods in dark, ominous clouds might
bespeak what was befalling the neighborhood. More-
ever, the intelligence may have reached Watertown
by couriers, who carried it to Boston, arriving there
about midday.
When Mason's force reached Sudbury, about two
hundred Indians were on the east side the river en-
gaged in mischievous work. The little company of
town's people who could be spared from the stockade
was too small to drive them back over the river. The
best they could do was to keep them from too close
range of their little stronghold, and save a part of
their property and dwellings. But when these rein-
forcements arrived, the united forces compelled the
foe to make a general retreat.
The contest that preceded this retreat of the sav-
ages was doubtless severe. Two hundred Indians
were a force sufficient to offer stubborn resistance.
They were near a large force held in reserve by King
Philip on the west side of the river, and might at any
time receive reinforcement from him ; andif they could
hold the causeway and bridge, the day might be won.
On the other hand, the English had a vast deal at
stake ; if the foe was forced over the stream, the east
side would for a time be safe. They could defend the
narrow causeway and bridge, while the high water
would protect their flanks. Such were the circum-
stances that would cause each to make a bard fight.
But the English prevailed. The foe was forced back,
and the bridge and causeway were held, so that they
could not repass them.
A company of twelve men who came to the rescue
from Concord were slain upon the river meadow.
I The bodies were left where they fell until the follow-
ing day, when they were brought in boats to the foot
j of the Old Town Bridge and buried. The burial-
place may be on the northerly side of the Town
Bridge on the eastern bank of the river. The suppo-
sition is based on the fact that it was high water on
the meadow at that time, and hence this place was
probably the only one suitable for the burial. A
monument to this brave relief company would be
very appropriate, and serve to mark a locality which
on that day was full of stirring events.
Shortly after Philip's War occurred the death of
Rev. Edmund Brown. He died June 22, 1678. The
town soon called as his successor Bev. James Sherman.
Active measures were immediately taken to provide
the minister with a house. The town bought of John
Loker the east end of his house, standing before and
near the meeting house, and his orchard, find the
whole home lot of about foui acrfs; it also bought of
him the reversion due to him of the western end of
the house that his mother then dwelt in. This part
of the house was to be the town's property at the
marriage or death of the said Widow Mary Loker.
For this property the town was to pay John Loker
fifty pounds. The Widow Loker appeared at town-
meeting, and surrendered all her reversion in the
western end of the house to the town, reserving the
liberty to have twelve months in which " to provide
her.-elf otherwise." She also promised in the mean
time " to quit all egress and regre-s through the
eastern end of the house and every part thereot." In
consequence of this the town agreed to pay her annu-
ally— that is, till she should marry or die — twenty-
five shillings, money of New England. The town
also voted to raise twenty-five pounds with which to
repair the house. The records inform us. that "the
said town doth freely give and grant unto Mr. James
Sherman, minister of the word of God, all that house
and lands which the said town bought lately of John
Loker, and twenty pounds to be paid him iu [country]
pay towards the repair of the said house, and also
twenty pounds more to be paid him in money, for and
towards the purchase of the widow Mary Loker's lot
that lies adjoining to it, when she shall have sold it to
the said Mr. James Sherman, and also six acres of
common upland lyrng on the back side of the town at
the end of Smith field, and also six acres of meadow
ground some where out of the common meadows of
this town. These foregoing particular gifts and
grants the said town doth engage and promise to the
said Mr. James Sherman minister and his heiis . .
. in case he shall settle in this town and live and
die amongst them their Teaching Elder. But in case
the said Mr. Sherman shall not carry out the con-
stant work of preaching in and to this town, during
his life, or shall depart and leave this town before his
death, then all the premises shall return to the said
town's hands again to be at their own dispose forever.
WAYLAND.
423
only they are then to pay to the said Mr. Sherman all
the charges he hath been out for the same in the
meantime, as [they] shall be judged worth by indif-
ferent men mutually chosen, unless both parties shall
agree therein among themselves "
The town also agreed to pay Mr. Sherman eighty
pounds salary; twenty pounds of this were to be paid
him in "money, twenty pounds in wheat, pork, beef,
mutton, veal, butter, or cheese, or such like species
at country price, and the remaining forty shall be
paid him in Indian Corn and Rye, or Barley or Peas,
all at country prices." He was to have five pounds
added per annum to his salary for the cutting and
carting home of firewood. He was also to have the
use of the minister's meadow lands, and could pasture
his cattle on the common land, and have firewood and
timber from the common land of the town.
Mr. Sherman was son of Rev. John Sherman, of
Watertoivu. He married Mar>-, daughter of Thomas
Walker, of Sudbury, and had two sons, John and
Thomiis. He was ordained in 1678, and wss dis-
missed May 22, ITOJ. After leaving the pastoral
office he remained in town for a time, occasionally
preaching abroad. Afterwards, he practiced medi-
cine in Elizabethtown, N. J., and Salem, Mass. He
died a'. Sudbury, March 3, 1718.
New Meetisg-House. — During the pastorate of
Mr. Sherman the town took measures for the erection
of a new house of worship. October C, IGSG, " it was
determined, ordered, and voted, that a new meeting-
house be built within this town with all convenient
speed, after such manner as shall be resolved upon by
the town." " It was ordered that the said new meet-
ing-hnuie shall be erected, fiuished and stand upon
tlie present Burying place of this town and on the
must convenient part thereof or behind or about the
old meeting-house that now is. "
The business of building the meeting-house was
entrusted to Deacon John Haines, between whom
and the town a covenant was made at a town-meeting,
January 10, 1085. It was to be raised on or before
the 1st day of July, 1G8S ; and for the work Mr.
Haines was to have two hundred pounds, — one hun-
dred and sixty pounds of it to be paid in "country
pay and at country price," and the other forty pounds
to be paid in money. The country pay was to be in
"good sound merchantable Indian corn, or Rye, or
wheat, or barley, or mall, or Peas, or Beef, or Pork,
or work, or in such other pay as the said Deacon
Haines shall accept of any person."
The meeting-house was to be " made, framed and
set up, and finished upon the land and place ap-
pointed by the town on the 6"" of October last past,
in all respects for dimensions, strength, shape, . . .
and conveniences, as Dedham meeting-house is, ex-
cept filliug between studs; but in all things else ad-
mitting with all in this work such variations as are
particularly mentioned in the proposition of Corporal
John Brewer and Sam' How." The town was to help
raise the building, the clapboards were to be of cedar,
the inside to be lined with either planed boards or
cedar clapboards, and the windows were to contain
two hundred and forty feet of glass. It was voted,
"that Leut. Daniel Pond shall be left to his liberty
wheiher he will leave a middle alley in the new
meeting-house, or shut up the seats as they are in
Dedham meeting-house, provided always that the
seats do comfortably and conveniently hold and con-
tain seven men in one end of the seats and seven
women in the other end of the seats."
A few years after this meeting-house was built a
bell was provided for it. It cost " twenty and five
pounds in money."
In the succession of wars that occurred during the
last of the seventeenth and the first of the eighteenth
century the east side was well represented, and famil-
iar names arc preserved on the muster rolls of that
period. In the State Archives is a petition on which,
among others, are the names of Noyes, Rice, Allen,
Curtis, Gleason and Rutter. This petition, which is
supposed to have reference to the ill-fated expedition
of Sir William Phipps in 1690, presents a sad story of
suflTering. The following is a part of the paper :
" To the boDorable Governor, Deputy-Governor, and to all our honored
Blti^istrates and Pepresentatives of the Maffiachiuetta Colony, now
eittiiig in General Court in Boston.
" The hutAhle petition of U6 who are somo of us for ourselves, others
for our children and servanta, whose names are after BUt>Kril>ed humbly
ehowetli that being impressed the last winter several of us into dreadful
service, where, hy reason of cold and hunger and in tedious marches
ninny score of tulles in water and snow, and laying on the snow hy night,
having no provision but what they could carry upon their hacks, beside
hard arms and ammunition, it cost many of them their lives. Your hum-
ble petitioners seveial of us have been at very great charges to set them
out with arms, and ammunition, and clothing, and money to support
them, and afterwards by sending supplies to relieve them and to save
their lives, notwithstanding many have lost their lives there, others came
home, and which were so suffered, if not poisoned, that they died sine*
they came from there, notwithstanding all means used, and charges out
for their recovery, others so surfeited that they are thereby disabled
from their catlings. Likewise your humble petitioners request is that
this honored court would grant this favor that our messengers may have
]ibei-ty til speak In the court to open our cau-e so as to give the court
satibftiction. Your humble petitioners humble request is farther that
you would please to mind our present circumbtances, and to grant us
such frtvors as seems to be just and rational, that we niiiy have some
compensation answerable to our burden, or at least to be freed from fur-
ther charges bv rates, uiitil the rest of our brethren have twrue their
share with us, and not to be forced to pay others that buve been out but
little In respect of u^. whereas the most of us have received littleor nolh-
ing but have been at very great charges several of us. If It shall please
this honorable General Court to grant us our petition we shall look uiioQ
ourselves as duty bindj us ever pray.
" John Haynes Sen.
Joseph Noyes Sen.
Peter Haynes Sen. [or Xoyee],
Tbnmai Walker.
John Barrer.
Samuel Glover.
Joseph Gleaaon sen.
Thomu Rutter.
Joseph Rotter.
Bet^amin Wight.
Peter PlyiuptoQ.
Israel Uiller.
Stephen Cutis."
p. 69.)
the east side are also found
Mathew Rice.
John Allen.
Mathew Glbbs sen.
Thomas Rice,
.tames Rice sen.
Joseph Curtis.
Jueiah llayues sen.
(Stat*.- Archives, vol. x.\xvi.
Names familiar on
among those who performed ranger services at Rut-
land in 1724.
424
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Education. — About the beginning of the eigh-
teenth century there was an increased interest in the
matter of education. Comparatively little was done
before by way of providing public schools. Previous
to this time encouragement, we conclude, was given to
Mr. Thomas Walker, to keep a " free school in town."
It is stated that Mr. Walker taught the youth to
" write and cypher ; " and that besides this service
there were two " school dames on each side of the
river that teacheth small children to spell and read."
After 1700 new school laws were enacted by the
Province ; and about that time Mr. Joseph Noyes
was chosen a gramisar school-master. For a time
schools were kept in private houses ; but by 1725 'he
town had voted that each precinct be empowered
to build a school-house. In 1729 a vote was passed
by which there was to be built in the East Precinct a
school-house "18 ft. wide by 22 ft. long and 8 ft.
between joints, with a good brick chimney and fire-
place at one end and a place to hang a bell at the
other end." By 1735 two school-masters were em-
ployed in each precinct at a salary of £t50 each.
In 1751 the selectmen agreed " with Mr. W°. Cook
[only son of Eev. Mr. Cook] to keep a grammar
school . . . for six months, beginning the school
the first day of November; and also to teach children
& youth to Read English and wright and Instruct
them in Eethmetick, and to keep the school in the
Town School House as the Selectmen shall from time
to time order For the sum of Twelve pounds
Exclusive of his Board." It was voted that year
that the grammar schools should be kept in
the two town school-houses by each meet-
ing-house. This shows us where two of the town
school-houses stood at that time ; and this, with other
records, show that school matters were at that time
conducted by the Board of Selectmen. Another record
of 1756 shows where two other school-hous-es stood,
inasmuch as the town voted that year that the gram-
marschool should be kept at four places, — "two at
the school-houses near the meeting-house, one at the
school-house near Joseph Smith's, and the other at
that near Nathan Goodnow's." John Monroe was to
keep the school, and have five pounds, thirteen
shillings, four pence for a quarter, and the town was
to pay his board.
In 1755 the town " voted for Grammar school 30
pounds, three-fifths to be spent on the west side, and
two fifths on the east side of the river; for the west
side the school was to be kept at the farm." la 1752
it " voted for the support of the Grammar school in
sd town the year ensuing 37 pounds, 6 shillings, 8
pence." The school was to be held in five places, —
" two on the east side of the river and three on the
west, in places as followeth : In the school-house near
the house of Mr. Joseph Smith, and in a convenient
place or near the house of Dea. Jonas Brewer as may
be, or in a convenient place as near the house of
Mr. Edward More as may be, and in a convenient
place as near the house of L' Daniel Noyes as may
be, and in the school-house near to and northerly from
the house of Dea Jonathan Rice all in sd town."
The same year the town voted that "the Reading &
writing school should be kept In the two Town school
houses the year ensuing." During this period several
school-houses were built, w hich siood about half a
century.
A prominent man who taught school in town, and
who tradition says lived on the east side, was Samuel
Paris, who was prominently connected with the
witchcraft delusion. In the household of Mr. Paris
at his former home, in what was once Salem Village
(now Dan vers), the Salem witchcraft sensation began.
The records state that in 1717, Mr. Samuel Paris
was to teach school four months of the year at the
school-house on the west side of the river, and the
rest of the year at his own house. If he was absent
part of the time, he was to make it up the next year.
In Book III., Sudbury Records, we have the following
statement, with date May 25, 1722 : " These mav cer-
tify that ye 28 pounds that ye town of Sudbury
agreed to give Mr. Samuel Paris late of Sudbury,
for his last yeares keeping school in s"* town, is by
Mr. John Clapp, Ire.isurer for said town by his self
and by his order all paid as witness my band, John
Rice, executor of ye last will and Testament of ye >,*
Mr. Paris."
I There are graves of the Paris family in the old
1 burying-ground at Wayland. Towards the southea-sl
j side of it stands a stone with the following inscrip-
! rion : "Here lyes ye Body of Samuel Paris, Who
Died July 27'" 1742 in y' 8'" year of his age." On
I another stone is marked : " Here lyes ye Body of Mrs.
! Abigail Paris who departed this life February ye 15'"
i 1759 in ye 55"' yeir of her age."
j As the years advanced school privileges increased.
The town was divided into districts, in each of which
a substantial' school- house was built. For a time the
Centre School-house wa.s situated a few feet easterly
of the Massachusetts Central Railroad, and was subse-
quently used as a grocery store by the late Newell
Heard. In 1841 a private academy was kept by Rev.
Leonard Frost in the Town House, which had at one
time one hundred and seven pupils. In 1854 the
town established a High School and erected a commo-
dious building just south of the Congregational
Church. Among its early principals, who were natives
of the town, were Miss Lydia R. Draper and Miss
Auna Dudley.
Ecclesiastical. — On May 22, 1705, Rev. James
Sherman was dismissed from the pastorate, and No-
vember 20, 1706, Rev. Israel Lorii g was installed .ns
his successor. Shortly after the occurrence of these
events a movement was made to divide the town of
Sudbury into an East and West Precinct. The division
was accomplished about 1723, and although Mr.
Loring was invited to remain, he moved to the wf st
side of the river, and idenlified his interests with the
WATLAND.
425
West Precinct. While at the east side he resided nA
the house which the town had provided for Rev.
James Sherman. Concerning the division, the church
records kept by Mr. Loring stale as follows :
" Feb. 11. 17i3.
"The Cbnnrh met at my house, where, after the brethren on the
Ka£t Side bad nianifefited tlieir de«ire that the cburcb might be divided
into two cburcbeB, it waa Bo voted by uiajority."
When the effort to secure the services of Mr. Loring
proved futile, a call wa."* extended to Rev. William
Cock, a native of Hadley, Mass., and a graduate
of Harvard College. The call being accepted, Mr.
Cook was ordained March 20, 1723, and ontinued
their pastor until his death, Nov. 12, 1760.
The town granted £80 to support preaching on both
sides of the river for half a year.
After the setting off of the West Parish, it was con-
sidered advisable to move the East Side meeting-
house nearer the centre of the East Precinct. Jan-
uary 2!i, 1721-22, "the town by a vote showed its
willingness and agreed to be at the charge to pull
down y' old mee ing-house and remove it south and
set it up again." At the same meeting thay chose a
committee to petition the General Court for permis-
sion. In a paper dated DeL-ember 28, 1724, and
signed by Mr. Jennison, Zechariah Heard and
Phineas Brintnal, it is stated that they were "the
committee who pulled down and removed the old
meetinghouse in the East Precinct of Sudbury."
About 172o was recorded the following receipt : '" Re-
ceived from Mr. John Clap, late treasurer of the town
of Sudbury, the sum of four hundred pounds in full,
granted by said town to carry on the building of a
meeting-house in the East Precinct in said town.
We say received by us, Joshua Hay nee. Ephraim
Curtis. John Noyes, Samuel Grave-", Jonathan Rice,
Committee." This building was located at what is
now Wayland Centre, on the corner lot just south of
the old Town House. The town instructed the com-
mittee " to make it as near as they can like the new
house in the West Precinct, except that the steps
"are to be hansomer; " it was also to have the same
number of pews.
Thus at last both precincts were provided with new
meeting-houses, and a matter was settled that had oc-
casioned much interest and more or less activity for
nearly a quarter of a century. Doubtless participants
in the affair at the beginning and during its progress
had passed away, and, before its settlement, worshiped
in a temple not made with hands, whose Builder and
Maker is God. The intercourse between the two
precincts was pleasant, and for a while the ministers
exchanged once a month. For years the salaries of
the two pastors were equal, and again and again is
there a rectript on the town-book for eighty pounds
for each.
Frexch axd Indian Wars. — In the inter-colonial
conflicts known as the French and Indian Wars the
East Precinct bore its proportionate part. On the
muster-rolls of the town East Side names repeatedly
appear. Shoulder to shoulder men marched to the
front, and as townsmen and kindred endured in com-
mon the rigors of those arduous campaigns. At the
disastrous occurrence at Halfway Brook, near Fort
Edward, July 20, 1758, where tlie lamented Captain
Samuel Dakin fell, the East Precinct lost Lieutenant
Samuel Curtis, who, with eighteen men, had joined
Captain Dakin's force but a short time previous.
Among the reported losses on the same occasion were
William Grout, Jonathan Patterson, Nathaniel Moul-
ton and Samuel Abbot. Most of the men in the East
Precinct in both the alarm and active list of militia
turned out for service at the alarm about Fort Wil-
liam Henry.
In 1760, Rev. William Cook died. That year the
town voted " sixty-five pounds to each of the Rev''
ministers for the year ensuing, including their salary
and fire wood ; in case they or either of them should
decease before the expiration of the year, then they
or either of them to receive their salary in propor-
tion during the time they shall live and no longer."
This may indicate that their death was anticipated.
Another record indicates that Mr. Cook had been sick
some time when this vote was passed, as the town-
book goes on to stale: "The same meeting granted
thirty-three pounds, six shillings, six pence to pay
persons who had supplied the pulpit in Mr. Cook's
confinement, and tlso granted thirty pounds more to
supply the pulpit during his sickness, and chose a
committee to provide preaching in the meantime."
May 11, 1761, the town appropriated seventeen
pounds, six shillings, eight pence 'out of the money
granted for the Rev. Mr. Cook's salary in the year
1760, to defray his funeral expenses."
Mr. Cook had one son who taiight the grammar-
school for years in Sudbury, and died of a fever in
1758. After the decease of Mr. Cook, another min-
ister was soon sought for on the east side. A little
disturbance, and perhaps delay, was occasioned by a
petition sent to the General Court relating to the set-
tlement of another minister on the east side the
river. But the matter was amicably adjusted by a
vote of the town, whereby it decided "not to send an
agent to the General Court to show cause or reason
why the petition of Deacon Adam Stone and others
relating to the settlement of a Gospel minister on the
E.HSt side the river should not be granted." The town
furthermore voted, that the "prayers of the petition
now in Court should be granted. Provided the Court
would Grant and confirm the like Privilege to the
West Church and Congregation when there shall be
reason. John Noyes Moderator."
The way cleared of obstructions, a new pastor was
soon found. Choice was made of Rev. Josiah Bridge.
October 14, 1701, Ciiptain Moses Maynard was al-
lowed twelve shillings "for his travel to Lunenburg
to wait on Mr. Bridge; " and, at the same meeting, it
was "voted to grant to Mr. Bridge his settlement and
426
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
salary as he had contracted with the East Precinct
for, and ordered the assessors to assess the inhabitants
of the town for the same." Mr. Bridge was a native
of Lexington, and graduste of Harvard College in
1758. He was ordained November 4, 176L
Revolutionary War. — In the Revolutionary
AVar the east side shared in common with the west
side the deprivations and hardships incident to that
protracted and distressing period. In the matter of
men, the east side was represented on April 19, 1775,
by two distinct companies, be-ides having its share of
soldiers in two companies that were made up of men
from both sides of the river. The two distinct com-
panies were a minute-company of forty men, com-
manded by Captain Nathaniel Cudworth, and a
militia company of seventy-five men, commanded by
Captain Joseph Smith. The companies representing
both the east and west sides were a company of mili-
tia of ninety-two men, under command of Captain
Moses Stone; and a troop of horse of twenty-two men
under command of Captain Isaac Loker. The com-
pany of Captain Smith, it is supposed, attacked the
British on the retreat from Concord at Merriam's
Corner; and the company of Captain Cudworth at
Hardy's Hill, a short distance beyond. Both of these
engagements were of a spirited nature; in the former
two British ."oldiers were killed and several of the
officers wounded. After the 19th of April the east
side soldiers were still in readiness for service. Cap-
tain Cudworth became major in Colonel Jonathan
Brewer's regiment, and Lieutenant Thaddeus Russell,
of Captain Cudworth's former company, secured the
re-eclistment of most of the company and was made
captain of it. His company consistel of forty-nine
men when he reported lor duty .\pril 24th. His lieu-
tenant was Nathaniel Maynard and his ensign Na-
thaniel Reeves.
These soldiers did valiant services at the Battle of
Bunker Hill. They were in the regiment of Colonel
Brewer, on the left of the American line to the north-
erly of the summit. Their position was very much
exposed; a piirt of the line had not the slightest pro-
tection. The only attempt that was made to construct
a breastwork was by the gathering of some newly-
mown hay that was scattered about the place ; but
they were prevented from the completion of evensach
a slight breastwork as this. The foe advanced and
tbey were compelled to desist. But no exposure to
the fire of well-disciplined, veteran troops, and no
lack of breastwork protection ied those brave Middle-
sex colonels and companies to turn from or abandon
this important position. Says Drake, " Brewer and
Nixon immediately directed their march for the un-
defended opening so often referred to between the
rail-fence and the earthwork. They also began the
construction of a hay breastwork, but when they had
extended it to within thirty rods of Prescott's line the
enemy advanced to the assault. The greater part, of
these two battalions stood and fought here without
cover throughout the action, both officers and men dis-
playing the utmost coolness and intrepidity under
fire." The sime author also says of Gardiner, Nixon
and Brewer, " Braver officers did not unsheathe a
sword on this day; their battalions were weak in
numbers, but, under the eye and example of such
leaders, invincible."
As the war progressed the east side soldiers stiil
gallantly served. Captains Nathanial Maynard and
Isaac Cutting each commanded a company in 1778,
and in the muster-rolls presented to the town of Sud-
bury, of that year, we have given by these captains
132 names.
IXCORPORATION OF E.^ST Sl'DBURY. — In 1780 the
town of Sudbury was divided, and the east side became ,
East Sudbury. The proposition came before the town
by petition of John Tilton and others, June 25, 1778,
in the east meeting-house. "The question w.os put
whether it was the minds of the town, that the town
of Sudbury should be divided into two towns, and it
was passed in the affirmative. And appiiinted the fol-
lowing gentlemen to agree on a division line and re-
port at the adjournment of this meeting, viz. : Coloml
Ezekiel How, Cap'. Richard Heard, M'. Nathan Lor-
ing, M'. Phinehas Glezen, M'. John Maynard and
M'. John Meriam." The committee reported that
they were not agreed as to the line of division.
At a meeting held Jan. 1, 1779, the town appointed
Major Joseph Curtis, Thomas Plympton, Esq., Mr.
John Balcom, Capt. Richard Heard and Capt. Jona-
than Rice to agree on a line of division. At the same
meeting measures were taken to petition the General
Court. Strong opposition at once manifested itself,
and the town was warned tc meet at the West meetiug-
house December 6th, —
" 1". To choose a inodertttor.
" •J''. To 6ee if llie towu will choose a CoinmiMee to act in beh.Tlf itf
this Town at llie Great *iii(l General C'oiiit of thid State to uppose .i Iii-
Tiuion of 3** Town, and ;iive the foiii'" So chosen ^uch Insti'iiciion Re-
lating to Bai<l alTair as the 'J'own may think propel-, and ^rauc a Sniu of
Money to Enable siild Com'" to Carry on Said Businees."
The meeting resulted as follows :
"1". ChoBe Asahel Wheeler moderator.
"■_**'. Colonel Ezekiel Howe, M'. W'". Rice, Jiiu'. and Thomas Plynip-
ton, Edq., a conimi'tee for the Puriiose coittaiued in thisi article, and
granted the sum of three hundi-ed Pounds to Enable their Com''' to
Carry on said affair ; then adjourned this meeting to tomorrow, at
three odock, at the eame place.
"Tuesday, Decern' 7th. The Town met according to adjournment,
proceeded and gave their Com"* Chosen to opp<j.se a division of this
Town, Ac, the following Instructions, viz. :
"ToCol". Ezekiel Howe, Th.,". Plympton, Esq. and 51'. Rice, Ju' ,
you being chosen a Coni'« by the Town of Sudbury to oppose a division
of s^i Town, as Loitely Reported by a Com'^ of the Hon'' General Court
of this State.
" You are hereby authorized and Instructed to preferr a Petition or
memorial to the G<-neral Coun in behalf of Said Town. Praying Ihat
the Bill for Dividing S"* Town ?Iay he set a tire or altred setting forth
the Great Disadvantages the Westerly part of the Town will Laltoiir
under by a Division of said Town, a-s iepi,rled by s"* t'oni'«, viz. : as wild
report deprives them of ail the gravel, and obliges them to lilailitaiil the
one half nt the Great Cuiisewaya oij the EiL-tt-rly part of said Town liot-
withslaiiding the necessary repairs of Ihe >ligtiwa>8 on the westeily
part of said Town are nearly double to that on the East.
" Said Report alao deprives them of the Pound, it also deprives them
WAYLAND.
427
nf a Traininjr-tield thouph Given hy the Proprietors of Said Town to the
■\\ fsterly side for r Tmining-field (or Ever.
" And further, as tlieri- is nu provision nmde in ^aid report for Ihe Sup-
port of ilie Poor in Said Town whicli will l»e a %err>- heavj- burthen to
the West side of the Town as the report now Biands. Aleo, at faid ad-
joufDDient, the Town Granted thesnoi of three Hundred i»oundf, in ad-
dition to the other Grant of three Hundred Puunds to F.Duble their
Coni'" to mm on paid Petition.
"Then the town hy their vote dissolved this meeting."
But, notwithstanding the vigorous protest made by
prominent citizens, their arguments did not prevail
•with the Court, and an article was passed April 10,
1780, which authorized a division of the town. A
committee was appointed by the town to consider a
plan for the division of properly and an equitable adjust-
ment of the obligations of the esst and we«t parts of
the town. At an adjourned meeting, held March 14th,
the committee rendered the following report, which
was accepted and agreed upon :
" AVe, the Subecribeis, being appointed a committee to Join a Com"<
from East Siulbnry to make a Division of Ihe Money and Est«te beluiig-
itip 1^1 the Town of SniUjury and Eapt Sudburj". apreeable tu an Ait of
the General Court Passed ihe lo'b of April, 178ii, for Dividing the Town
of budbury, proceded and ugrted us hilluweih, viz. : that all the Money
I)ue UD the Bonds and Noiea. hfiug the l)i>natiun uf lUary I)uun to Ihe
East Side of the River, be Disposed of to EuRt Sudburt- according to the
will of the l>onor. And the money Due on Bonds an<l Notee, given by
'Mr. Peier >oyes and CHpt. Jobliua Haynet, fur the lienefii cf ihe i'oor
and Schooling, be tf|iiully I>ividt-d between Eatli of the S'^ Towns, whitU
Sum i& 4.;i : 3 : 4. That all the Money Due on Bondu and Notes fur the
Kew Grant Lunds, or Money Now jn the Treasury, or in Constables'
Ijand^, be Equally Divided between Ench of ^aid Tow ne, which Sums
are as fulloua, viz, :
" Due on New Grant Bonds and Notes, 133 : 14 : 7
Due frnni Constable, 3110 : 10 ; 7
Due from the Town Treasurer, 348 : C : o
" .\nd that all Land that belonged to the Town of Sudbury, or for the
benelit of the Poor, ^Imll be Dnided agreeable to the Act of the General
Court foi Dividing Said 'J own. And that the Pound and Old Beli, and
the Tow u Siandard of Veights aad Sleasures which beluDged to the
Tuwn uf Siidbun, be euld at publick vandue and the proceeds to be
E«iually dnided between tiie towns uf Sndbur\ and East Sudbury.
" Altso, that the Town Stock uf Anna and Aniunitiuii be Divided as set
furili in the Act uf the General Cuiirt fur Dividing the Town of Sudbury.
And if any thing shall be made to appear tu be Estate ur property that
Shuuld belong tu the tov^'u uf Sudbury betore the Division of the above
Riticleti;, it Shall be Equally Divided between the Tuwn of Sudbury and
the Town of E«8l ?udbur\. And that the Town of East Midbury (tliall
Snp|»ort and Muintaiu as their I'oor During their Life, the Widow \ick-
rv and Abigail legate. And all Such Persoiiri us have Gained u Residence
ill the Tow u uf Sudbury before the di\ isiou of S'^ Town, and shall here-
alter be brought tu the Town of Si'dbury or the Tow n of East Suabury,
OS their Pour Shall be SiipjKJrted by that Town in which Ihey Gained
their Inhabitance. Also, that the Debts Due from Said Town of Sud-
bury Shall be paid, the one half b}' the Town of Sudbury, and the other
hall by the Town of East Sudbury, which Sum is 2'.»T7 : 7 : 1.
'■ASUER ClTLEB AS.VIIEL WllEELER
'Tmo* Walker
'James Thousos
Isaac Matnard - Ctrinmitlee'
J
Other committees concerning the matter of divi-
sion were appointed the same year. The assessors were
to make a division with East Sudbury of the men re-
quired of Sudbury and East Sudbury for three years;
also to malce division of clothing, beef, etc., required
of said town. A committee, April 23, 1781, made the
following finantial exhibit :
" Due to Sudbury iu the CuDstable's aud Treasurer'^
hands £!«: . 0 . in
That the town had to pay Ihe sum of 16bl . 19 . 5
Sudbury's part of the Powder 142 lbs.
Their pan of the Lead 391 Iba.
Itii'ir part i.f the Gnne on hand 4
The old Bell, Pound and Town Standard of Weights
and Jleasnres sold for £1183 . 10 . 0
Sudbury's part of the above sum is 391 . 15 , 0
Received of niouey 27 . 0 . 0
The charge of sale 20.8 .0
The remainder to be paid hy Ihe treasurer of E. Sudbury.
Money due to the town in M'. Cutler's Imnds biken out of
the StJite Treasury for what was advanced by the Town
of Sudbury for the Support of Soldien^' families who
are in the Contineutal .Vrmy. 12iiG . 2 . 0."
In the division Sherman's Bridge was left partly in
each town, and the river formed about half the town's
eastern boundary.
June 19, 1801, Rev. Josiah Bridge passed away at
the age of sixty-two. The following persons have
served as his successors in the pastorate: Revs. Joel
Foster, John B. Wight, Richard T. Austin, Edmund
H. Sears. George A. Williams, Samuel D. Robins,
Jaraes H. Collins, William M. Salter, Edward J.
Young, N. P. Oilman, Herbert Mott.
Soldiers of 1812. — The following men were vol-
unteers in the War of 1812: Abel Heard, James
Draper, Rufus Goodnow. The following men were
drafted : Reuben Sherman, Daniel Hoven, John
Palmer. The first served, the last two procured the
following substitutes: Cephas Moore, Jonas Aobot.
June 1, 1814, the frame of a new meeting-house
was raised. The structure was completed January
19th and dedicated January 24, 1815, on which day
Rev. John B. Wight was ordained. This building is
the one now in use by the First Parish or Unitarian
Church. Before the erection of this meeting-house
there was a prolonged discussion as to where it should
be placed. It is stated that a seven years' contest
preceded the decision, and that on thirty-four occa-
sions the question was discussed as to which side of
the brook the building should stand on. About the
lime of the completion of the new meeting house the
old one was conveyed to J. F. Heard and Luther
Gleason, who were to remove it and provide a hall in
the second story for the free use of the town for thirty
years. It was known for many years as the old Green
store. It is the first building ea^terly of the Unitarian
Church, aud now the summer residence of Mr. Wil-
lard BuUard. The land on which the old meeting-
house stood was sold to Mr. James Draper, who about
1840, erected & new building on a part of the same,
which contained a Town Hall, school-room and ante-
rooms for the use of the town. The building cost
$1700, and was first used for town-meetings November
8, 1841, and served the town for that purpose till the
erection of the new building in 1878.
In 1835 the town took the name of Wayland, after
President Francis Wayland, of Brown University,
and the generous donor to the Public Library. In
1851 an invitation was extended to Dr. Wayland to
visit the place, which was accepted August 2tith of
that year. The occasion was observed in a marked
428
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
manner by the people who assembled together to wel-
come him.
Formation of the Evangelical Tiiisitarian
Church. — May 21, 1828, a new church was organized
called the Evangelical Trinitarian Church. The fol-
lowing are the names of the original members: Wil-
liam Johnson, Edward Rice, Ira Draper, Esther
Johnson, Nancy Rice, Ruth Willis, Susan Roby,
Susan Grout, Eunice Rutter, Sophia Moore, Betsey
Allen, Elizabeth ShurtlifT, Martha Jones, Eliza New-
ell, Martha Carter, Fanny Rutter, Sophia Cutting,
Abigail Russell.
The February previous to the act of church organi-
zation, a hall, belonging to Luther Gleason, was made
use of for religious purposes. The first preaching
service was held by Rev. Lyman Beecher. Subse-
quently the tavern hall was engaged for religious
meetings, in which there was preaching by various
persons. Very .soon eff.<rt3 were put forth for the
erection of a chapel, which was completed by May
21, 1828, at which time it was dedicated. In 1834
and 1835 funds were collected for building a meeting-
house; $3000 was secured and the house was soon
erected. S. Sheldon, of Fitchburg, was the bi'ilder.
Some of the material grew in Asliburnham, and was
hauled in wagons a distance of forty miles. The
building spot was given by Samuel Russell. The
bouse was dedicated July 22, 1835, and four days
afterwards no bill relating to the work remained un-
paid. The bell, which weighed 1100 pounds and
cost S400, was procured in 1845. It was subsequently
broken, and in 1874 was re-catt. The following is
the succession of pastors, with the date at which their
service began : Revs. Levi Smith, June, 1828; La-
vius Hyde, July 22, 1835; John Wlieelock Allen,
December 29, 1841 ; Henry Allen, September 30,
1852; Adin H. Fletcher, ; Henry Bullard,
October 1, 1863; Ellis R. Drake, November 10, 18G8;
Truman A. Merrill, April 27, 1873 ; Ruhen F. Gordon,
settled November, 1888. The parish connected with
the new church was organized April 5, 1828, at the
house of William Johnson, and was called the Evan-
gelical Society of East Sudbury.
The Civil War.— In the great Civil War the
town of Wayland took an active part. Repeatedly,
her quota was made up wholly or in part of her sub-
stantial citizens. The total number of men furnished
for these quotas was 129, of which seventy were from
Wayland. Of this latter number, twelve were killed
in battle or died in the service. The patriotic senti-
ment of the town was of a fervid nature, and found
e.xpression from ti;ne to lime in a way to enkindle
enthusiasm and encourage enlistment. Men lefc the
farm and the work-shop. The young men turned
from the quiet of the ancestral homestead to the tu-
mult of the camp and the stirring scenes of the front.
Some of these soldiers sulfered the privations of the
shameful and pestilential " prison pens " of the South ;
some came home wounded to die ; and some found a
soldier's resting-place on the soil they sought to save.
Not only did the men well perform their part during
the war, but the women also wrought nobly. They
were organized as a "Soldiers' Aid Society " and
' "Stldiers' Relief Society," and furnished such sup-
' plies for camp and hospital as their willing hearts and
j hands could contrive and furnish. Clothing, medi-
j cine and miscellaneous article^ were generously con-
I tributed, and the soldiers of Wayland had substantial
j reasons for believing that their friends at home were
[ not forgetful of them. The total amount raised by
I the town's people for recruiting purposes was $18,000.
The following is a list of Wayland men who were
[ either killed in battle or died of wounds or sickness :
I Beiijamio Corliss, sicl^ness ; Sumner .\aron Diivis, killed ia buttle ;
George Tiiylor Dickey, sickness : Willium Dexter Diaper, wounds itnd
sickness; Eliiis Wliitfield Farmer, ^fickuess ; William Thomas Hiirlow,
' sickness; Edward Tlionias Loker, Andersonville Prison; John Mellen,
killed iu buttle ; Juiue-4 .\lvin Uice, killed in battle; Himm Leonard
Thurston, sickness ; Alpheus Bigelow Welliogtoa, killed ia battle;
Juiues Dexter Luker, sickness.
The town has honored her soldiers by the publica-
tion of a volume, giving a biographical sketch of each,
with an outline of his military service. Tiie book is
entitled " Wayland in the Civil War," and is dedi-
cated as follows: "To the Heroic men whose deeds
are here recorded, whether returning in the glory of
victory from battle-fields or leaving their bodies in
honored graves."
Railroads. — In 18i39 the Massachusetts Central
Railroad was chartered, and Oct. 1, 1881, regular trains
ran over the road. May IK, 1883, the cars ceased run-
ning, and commenced again Sept. 28, 1885, under the
management of the Boston and Lowell Railroad. Re-
cently the road had come under the control of the
Boston and JSCaine Company, and e.xcellent accom-
modations are afforded. There is a tastily built depot
at Wayland Centre, kept in an e.xceptionally orderly
manner by the station agent, Mr. Frank Pousland,
who has thus officiated for the company since the
opening of the road.
The town subscribed for three hundred and twenty-
five shares of the stock. Mr. James Sumner Draper
was one of the original directors and an early and
earnest promoter of the road. Subsequently, litiga-
tion occurred between the town and the Railroad Com-
pany concerning the former's liability to pay the full
amount subscribed for the stock, the objection of the
town being that, because of the circumstances of the
road, a fair equivalent had not been received for the
money demanded.
Public Libraries. — Wayland has the honor of
establishing the first Free Public Library in the State.
It was founded in 1848, and opened for the delivery
of books Aug. 7, 1850. The first funds were given by
Francis Wayland, D.D., late Professor of Brown
University, who ofl'ered $500 in case the town would
raise a siiuilar sum. It was voted to accept of the
proposition of Dr. Wayland, and $500 was raised by
subscription aud given to the town to meet the stip-
WAYLAND.
429
ulated condition. The library was kept in the old
Town Hall till the completion of the new one, when
it was removed to the commodious apartment pre-
pared for it in that building. It is stated that the
difficulties incident to the estabiishement of this
library were, through the agency of Rev. J. B. Wight,
the cause of such legislative action as enables any
city or town to establish and maintain a library for
the free use of the inhabitants at public expense.
In 18G3, James Draper, deacon of the first Church
in Wayland, gave S500 as a permanent fund, the in-
terest of which was to be expended annually in the
purcliase of books for the library.
Prior to the establishment of this library the peo-
ple of East Sudbury believed in tiie benefits of a free
use of good books by the community. As early as
April 6, 1796, what was called the " East Sudbury
Social Library Association " was formed. It had
thirty-two original members, who paid a member-
ship fee of $4, with annual assessment of twenty-five
cents. In 1832 the library contained 227 volumes,
and was kept at the private houses of the successive
librarians. When Rev. J. B. Wight came to Way-
land he made a collection of moral and religious
books for the free use of the citizens, which increased
to 300 volumes. The books were kept first at Mr.
Wight's house, and afterwards at the Unitarian
meeting-house; 71 of the books are now in the Town
Library. In 1845 the town procured a small library
for each of the six school districts, for the use of schol-
ars and others. These libraries contained about 60
volumes each. In 1S.')1, by vote of the town, they
were placed in the Town Library.
New Town- Hall.— In 1878 a new Town Hall was
erected. The plan was made by George F. Fuller, of
Boston, and William R. Stinson, of Maiden, was the
contractor. The building cost S9700. It was com-
menced in May, completed October 26th, and dedi-
cated Dec. 24, 1878. The address was given by Mr.
Elbridge Smith, a native of Wayland, and principal
of the Dorchester High School.
Buryixg-Grouxds. — The first burial-place is on
the north side of the road leading to Sudbury Centre,
and about a half-mile from the railroad station. It
has the general appearance of an old-time graveyard.
The wild grass covers the toughened and irregular sod,
and the uneven surface of the ground indicates that it
was long, long ago broken by the sexton's spade.
These indications of the existence of old graves are
correct. It was the burying-ground of the settlers,
and here —
" Where heaves the turf in many a moulderiog heap,
Encli in his narrow cell forever laid.
The rude forefathers of the bauilet Bleep."
The older part of this cemetery lies near or beside
the county highway, and may be the half-acre bought
of John Loker for a burial-place. Tradition says that
prior to the selection of this spot a few interments
were made just over the hill to the north, where tra-
dition also states that there was an Indian graveyard.
These traditions have perhaps some confirmation in
the fact that on the northern hillside remains of
human skeletons have been exhumed. An old citi-
zen, Mr. Sumner Draper, states that in his boyhood,
when men were at work in the gravel pit in what was
known as the " old Indian graveyard," he saw bones
which they dug up, that he thought belonged to
several human skeletons, and that he had himself in
later years dug up a human skull. He also stated
that there were two or three flat stones on some
graves, which he believed were without any inscrip-
tion, and that he thought some such stones were re-
moved from the spot long ago.
The town owned thereabouts two or three acres of
land, which was generally known as the " old ludian
graveyard." But if this land was reserved by the
settlers for a burial-place, it was not long made use
of; for the soiaherly slope was soon set apart for this
purpose, and has continued to be used for more than
two centuries and a half. Additions have repeatedly
been made to this latter portion, as the generations
have passed away, and new graves have been opened
to receive them ; and thus has the slow, solemn march
of that silent company been moving over that midway
space, until the two portions are almost joined. Be-
sides the age of the yard, there are other things that
make it an interesting spot to the inhabitants of
Wayland. Within its enclosure stood the first meet-
inghouse. Here lie buried the bodies of those who
bore the name of Goodnow, Curtis, Grout, Rutter,
Parmenter, Rice, Bent, and others of the early
grantees, besides still others of Sudbury's most promi-
nent citizens before the division of the t;)wn. Be-
cause of the interest that thus attaches to the place,
we will give the inscriptions on some of the older
gravestones which lie along the common highway.
ME31ENT0 310EI.
" Here lyethe remains of Ephmim Curtis ESQ' who departed this Irfe
Nov tlie 17^ X 1> \7r,[t iu the HO^ Year of his age. He was a Loving
Husband and a Tender Parent u faithful Friend, as a Justice of the
Peace he Hou'd his Commission by aillieriiig steadily to the Kulea of
Justice, he was SiHJor of a Regiment, in which Office he conducted in
such a manner as pave General Satisfaction. He was many years Kep-
rebentjitive in the Genenil Coui-t, a lover of True Piety, belov'd by all
that knew hiui and Equally Lamented at his death."
" Here lea'n
the end of man
Know that thy life
is but a spau."
On this gravestone is a skull and crossbones.
" In memory of Capt. Joaepk Smith Wbodied Uarcb 9<<> 1803, aged 87
years.
"Farewell ray dear and loving wife
Farewell my children and my friends
Until the resurreclion day."
Probably the captain of the east side militia. .
I " Here lyest y* Body of M'* .\bagnil Paris wtfe to 31' Samuel l^iria,
who departed this life Febrr y« 10'^ I'o'J in y< 5o^ Year of her age."
Probably the wife of the son of Samuel Paris of
witchcraft fame.
430
HISTORY OF 5IIDDLESEX COUNTY", MASSACHUSETTS.
** Here Lyea y* Body of Mrs. Patience Browne wife to 31ajr Thomas
Browne Aged 59 yeurs. Died Aug*' ye Ij, ITOti."
Major Thomas Browne was a very prominent Sud
bury citizen.
"In memory of Mr. Joseph Kuttor, who died Dec. 19" 1781 in y"
^S^ year of his age.
"Down to the dead, nil mnst descend,
The saints of God must die .
While Angels guard their souls to rest,
In dust their Bodies lie.
** Erected In memory of Mary Butter wife of .Mr. Joseph Rutt«r who
died Sept 2™'' A.- E S2."
Joseph Rutter was a descendant and probably
grandson of John Rutter, builder of the first meeting-
house, which stood just beside where the remains of
Joseph Rutter now lie.
" Memento Mori.
In memory of
Mr. Thomas Bent who died Wed- Mr«. Mary Bent wife of Mr.
nwday morning July the 20^ 1775. Thomas Bent who died Wednes-
day morning July y« 2ti^^ 1775
.^tatis 09. .Etatia .i7.
Our term of time Is seventy years Tet then our boasted strength de-
An age that lew survive cays.
But if with more than common To sorrow turns and pain
strength S3 soon the slender thread is cut I
To eighty we arrive And we no more remain "
Two notable stones are those that mark the graves j
of Capt. Edmund Goodnow and wife. They are in a i
horizontal position, and just east of the old meeting- ]
house site. The inscription is rudely cut, and in the
language of other years. It is as follows :
YE- DfST-
" HEARE-LYETH- PRETIOUS-
ST-
OF-THAT-EMENAKT-SARVA
OF-
G0D-CAP-EDMUN"D-G0ODE.\OW-
YEARE-
WHO-DIED-YE-77- OF-HIS-
AYGE-APRIL-YE-6-1088."
" HERE-LYETH-YE-B0DY-OF-\NSE-YE
WIFE-OF-CAP-EDMOXD-GOOUESOW-
WHO-DYED-YE: 9: UK: MARCH lo76 : .\GED-
07-YEAl!S."
" HERE-LYETH-YE-BODY-OF-JOSEPH-
GOODENOW-WUO-DY ED-YE-^iO-i JF-M AY :
1076 : AGED-31-YEARS. FEBBV-18-1G91. '
" Here lies Buried The Body of y» worthy Joshua Haynes Esq De.
ceased March >« 20, 1757 in the 86 year of His Age. He was a Hearty
Promoter of the Public wedl and Whose . . Humanity, Integrity and
Laudable Muniflcenco Embalm His name. He w^s charitable to the
PiHjr and at his Death gave many Gifts to Particular . . Besides 2 Thttu-
sand Pounds Old 1 euor to a Publick School and y* Poor of y* Town of
Sudbury."
Joshua Haynes was ths donor of the fund called,
in the list of bequests to Sudbury, the " Ancient
Donation Fund.''
" HERE-LYES-YE-BODT-OF-MR-JOSATHAN-
SIMPSON-LATE-OF-HOSTON-WHO-UE-
PARTED-TniS-LIFE-NOVR-l"-1773-IN-THE
54"' YEAR-OF-HIS-AGE.
" rharlestown doth claim his birth,
Boston his habitation ;
Sudbury hath his grave,
Where was liis e.tpiration."
In 1800 this old burial-place was enlarged by land
purchased of Abel and Luther Gleason, and a strip
of land was bought of the William Noyes heirs, to
connect the yard with the old Indian burying-ground.
In 1835 land was set apart for a new cemetery. It
was purchased of Joseph Bullard, and is situated a
little northerly of Pine Brook, about a quarter of a
mile south of the Centre. In 1871 a cemetery was
laid out at Cochituate.
The piety of our ancestors left little room for cus-
toms that were sensele.'<8 or uninstructive. If they
were severely solemn, they were devoutly so; and, if
they employed some curious devices, it wai for the
promotion of good. The position of their grave-
stones shows that the dead were laid with the feet
toward the east, or, as it was termed, " facing the
east." Whence and why this cu-^tom, we know
not. It might have had reference to the star of the
east that announced the birthplace of Christ; but
whatever the cause, it doubtless was suggested by
some religious idea. To us it is a strong reminder of
the words of John Bunyan : "The pilgrim they laid
in a large upper chamber whose window opened
towards the sun rising; the name of the chamber was
Peace, where he slept till break of day, and then he
awoke and sang."
The character of the grave-stones was another
peculiarity of those primitive times. It would seem
the object was to impart to these mementos of the
departed the most sombre aspect imaginable. As no
flowers but those that were strewn by God's pitying
hand were ever suflTered to intrude their g«y, sweet
presence within the solemn enclosure, so the nearest
approach to anything like sympathetic embellishment
on those dark slabs was the weeping willow, which
drooped its long branches over a i'uneral urn. But
the more common ornament was the " skull and cross-
bones," under which were uncouth markings and
strange inscriptions. Sometimes the stones were
placed in groups, sometimes in irregular rows. Some
were placed upright and others horizontal on the
ground ; but, as the latter are few and of very early
date, we infer that this mode was exceptional or that
it soon passed out of use. Perhaps it was a wise pre-
caution in those far-off times to protect the grave
from the wild beasts which were prowling about
through the adjacent forests in search of prey.
Another peculiarity is the fewness of thestones in bur
old graveyards. A casual glance mijiht lead one to
think they were full of slate-stone slabs, but actual
count gives only a few hundred for all who died in
the first century and a half. Indeed, in the older
portion of East Sudbury grave-yard there are only
two or three scores of stones, yet the yard contains
the remains of a large portion of the town's early
inhabitants, and a new grave can hardly be dug with-
out intruding upon an old one. This seems to show
that the practice of marking graves in old times was
the exception and not the rule. Still another charac-
teristic feature of these ancient grounds was their
barren and neglected aspect. The graves were gradu-
WAY LAND.
4:;i
ally leveled by the touch of time, the ground became
uneven and rough and covered over with briars and
wild grass. Yet we may believe these spots were not
in reality neglected nor forsaken, for, though the
floral and decorative oflering was a thing unknowD>
many an irregular, beaten paih testified that the place
of their dead was an oft-frequented spot.
In early times the dead were carried to the place of
burial by the hands of friends. No hearse was used
till about 1800, when one was purchased at a cost of
fifty dollars. In process of time a bier was used, and,
as late as the beginning of this century, the body was
carried on the shoulders of the bearers. In J715 the
town granted '" three pounds for providing a burying
cloth for ye town's i:se." In 1792 it voted to provide
two burying cloths ; these were to throw over the re
mains in their transit to the grave. This is indicated
by the following record :
" Lieut. Thomas Rutter is chosen to dig graves, to
carry the bier and the cloth to the place where the
deceased person hath need of the use thereof, and
shall be paid two shillings and six pence in money
for every individual person."
In early times, gloves were provided for funeral
occasions. We are informed of this repeatedly by the
records of the town. About 1773, " To James Brown
for G pairs of gloves for Isaac Allen's child's funeral —
11—"
" To Col. Noyes for 7 pairs gloves for Isaac Allen's
burial— 13— " '
" To Cornelius Wood for 3 pairs gloves for John
GooHenow's funeral." This wan about 1C73.
Almost down to the present time the good old cus-
tom prevailed of ringing the bell on the occasion of a
death. How it used to break into th-i; monotony of
our daily loil to have the silence suddenly broken by
the slow tolling bell, that said plainer than words that
another soul had drop]>ed into eternity. Now a pause
— listen I three times three — a man, or, three times
two — a woman. Another pause, and then strokes
corresponding in number to the years of the deceased.
On the morning of the funeral the bell tolled again,
and also when the procession moved to the grave.
As late as 1800 it was common to have a note read —
" put up," the phrase was — in church on the Sabbath
following a death, in which the nearest relatives asked
" the prayers of the church that the death be sancti-
fied to them for their spiritual good."
The grounds early used for burial were owned by
the town and set apart for its common use. No priv-
ate parties possessed " God's acre '' then. Proprietary
lots were unknown one hundred yef.rs ago. Every
citizen had a right to a spot for burial wherever in the
town's burying-ground the friends might choose to
take it. The rich and poor were alike borne to this
common spot ; caste was laid aside, and nothing save
the slab at the grave's head might indicate the former
position of the silent occupant of the old-time burial-
place. The graves of households were often in
groups, reminding one of our present family lots, but
this was by common consent, and not by any titled
ri{!ht to the spot.
The public-house was from an early date considered
in Sudbury an important place. In 1603 or 1G54 we
find it on record that "John Parmenler, stnior, shall
keep a house of common entertainment, and that the
court shall be moved on his behalf to graut a license
to him."
The business of these places was to provide travelers
with lodging and food, or to lurnish "entertainment for
man and beast." They were to an extent under the
control of the town, as is indicated in a record of Oc-
tober 4, 1684, when it was ordered that upon the "un-
comfortable representations and reports concerning
the miscarriage of things at the Ordinary . . . three
or four of the selectmen, in the name of the rest, do
particularly inquire into all matters relating thereto."
In all of the.se taverns strong strong drink was proba-
bly sold. Licenses were granted by the Provincial
or Colonial Court, and the landlords were usually men
of some prominence. Taverns were considered useful
places in the early times, and laws existed relating to
the rights of both landlord and ^uest. In the period
of the Revolutionary War, when a price-list was de-
I lermined at Sudbury for various common commodi-
ties', the following was established for taverns:
" 1779— Mugg West India Phlip 15
New EDgUntl Do 12
Toddy iu proportioa
A Good Dinner 20
Common I>o 12
BeBt Snppvr & Breakfast 15 Each.
Comniuu Do 12, Lodging 4.
The " Parmenter Tavern " was the first one kept in
town, and was on the late Dana Parmenter estate, a little
westerly of the present Parmenter house. The build-
ing was standing about eighty years since, and was
looking old then. It was a large square house, and in
the bar-room was a high bar. There the council was
entertained which the Court appointed to settle the
famous " cow common controversy." Subsequently,
taverns at East Sudbury were kept as follows : one a
little easterly of William Baldwin's, one at the Centre
called the " Pequod Houne," one at the Rceveo'
place, one at the Corner, and one at the end of the old
causeway, near the gravel pit. The tavern at the East
Sudbury Centre was kept nearly a hundred years ago
by John Stone, father of William, who afterwards kept
one at Sudbary.
About 1814 the tavern at the centre was kept by
Heard & Reeves. The building had a two-story front
and over the kitchen in the rear was a low sloping
roof. The barn stood sideways to the road, with
large doors at each end. In the bar-room was a spa-
cious fire-place where crackled the huge wood-fire on
the stout andirons. Near by were a half-dozen log-
gerheads ready for use whenever the villager, team-
ster or transient traveler came in for his mug of hot
flip. Here more or less of the townspeople gathered
432
HISTORY OF -MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
at intermission between the long sermons on Sunday,
while their good wives were spending the " nooning"
at neiglibor Russell's, just over the brook. The boys
bought a small piece of ginger-bread for their lunch,
and while they devoured with avidity the rare morsel
of " bcughten " 3weet cake, their fathers sat by the
fireside and talked of the war, of the crops and the
cattle. Before departing they showed, in a substan-
tial way, their respect for the landlord and their ap-
preciation of the warmth and cheer of the place by
the purchase of a mug of flip.
The Reeves tavern was situated on the road from
Weston to Framingham, on the " Old Connecticut
Path." This was a favorite resting-place for team-
sters and travelers. The last landlord was Squire
Jacob Reeves, a popular citizen of East Sudbury and
an excellent man for his business. He was courteous,
cheerful and kind Uy his patrons. The confidence
reposed in him by the community as a business man
was evinced by the positions of public trust in which
he was placed. He was town clerk eighteen years,
was justice of the peace and was several times sent as
representative to the General Court. He was also
deacon of the First Parish Church, and it is said that
his character was in harmony with the functions of
his o£Bce.
Old Roads. — There are several old roads in town,
some of which have been discontinued, yet of which
brief mention should be made.
Bridle Point Road. — This was early constructed.
It began at a point near the Harry Reeves place, and
coming out near the Dr. Ames place, passed between
the present Branian and John Heard places, and ex-
tending along and over the ridge, crossed the site of
the present Sudbury and Wayland highway, a little
east of the Samuel Russell place, and Mill Brook a
little east of its junction with the river. By this way
Rev. Edmund Brown's house was reached at Timber
Neck, and the Rices who lived by the "Spring" after
it was extended to the latter locality, in 1643. It
doubtless also served as a hay-road and a short way
from the centre of the settlement to the "Old Con-
necticut Path." Until within less than a century
this road was for a time the regular way to the " Isl-
and." Before the building of Farm Bridge tradition
says that a fording-place near the new causeway
bridge (Bridle Point Bridge) was made use of for
reaching that place; and that the ro&d over the
"Island" passed souih of its present course until
near the Abel Heard farm; and beyond the house it
went north of the present road to Lanham.
The road from the centre to the " Bridge Parson-
age " (present VVettingtoc place) was laid out about
1770.
In 1773 town action was taken relative to the "dis-
continuance of the road from Dr. Roby's to Zecheriah
Briant's" (Braman place).
In 1653 "it was voted to accept of a highway laid
out from Pelatiah Dean's north east corner unto y'
town way leading from the Training field by Ephraim
Curtis, Esq., by Lt. Rice's to Weston."
The same date a road was laid out from " Mr. Jon-
athan Grifiin's Corner running southwesterly into the
way by Mr. Eliab Moore's north corner, formerly Mr.
John Adams'."
In early times there was a road from Pine Plain to
the Cakebread Mill, which entered the riiill road at a
point just ea^it of the mill.
Traces of this road are still visible by the bank.
It is stated that about 1735-36 there was a change of
highway from Whale's Bridge over Pine Plain.
In 1736 a new highway is spoken of over Pine
Brook at John Grout's. Formeily a read passed
northerly from the Pine Plain Road, starting at a
point a little east of Clay-pit Bridge Hill, and passing
"the ponds" went to the north part of the town.
The road from the centre to the south part was early
opened and called " Cotchituatt Road."
The Castle- hill Road is in the town's northwesterly
part, and probably so called from the peculiar-shaped
hill or knoll along which it passes.
"Northwest Row" was a road still open as a pas-
ture-path or hay-road, from the neighborhood of the
Gleasons to the river meadow margin.
The new "great road" from Wayland to South
Sudbury was made in the early part of the present
century.
In 1743 an offer was made of land by Edward Sher-
man and John Woodward for a " good and conven-
ient way, two rods wide," in case the town would
erect a bridge over the river. The same year a sub-
scription was made for a bridge between the land of
Jdha Haynes on the west side of the river and John
Woodward on the east side of the river.
A lane to the Cakebread Mill formerly extended
from the Wayland Weston " Great road," beginning
at a point just west of Deacon Noyes Morse's house.
Pl.^ces of Interest. — WJiale's Bridge. — This is
a small bridge or culvert at the head of the mill-pond,
and early referred to in the town records. It took its
name from Philemon Whale, one of the early settlers,
whose home may have hem near by.
Clay-pit Hill. — This is on the east branch of Mill
Brook, about an eighth of a mile above the mill-pond.
There is a bridge near by, called Clay-pit Bridge or
Clay-pit Hill Bridge. Both of these places took their
names from the clay-pits near by, where bricks were
early made. Other clay-pits were at Timber Neck,
near the junction of Mill Brook and Pine Brook, a
short distance southwesterly of the High School
building.
Pine Plain. — This consists of the plain lands east-
erly of Wayland Centre, in the vicinity of the Sum-
mer Draper place. The locality is early mentioned
in the records, and probably took its name from the
growth of pine forest found there.
Pine Brook. — This is a small stream that skirts a
part of Pine Plain on the easterly. It is crossed by
WAYLAND.
433
a small bridge near the Joseph Bullard place, and
just below forms a junction with Mill Brook.
The Till I iiiii;/- Field. — This was situated just south of
the Abel (rleason place, and consisted of about nine
acres of laud. It was set ajiart in 1640, and in 1804
was .sold to Nathan Gleason.
T/ie Street. — This is tliat part of the old road of the
selllenieiit which e.Ktended from the Parmenter tav-
ern to the town bridge. It was a terra used by the old
inhabitants, and is still familiar in the town.
The I'lick Pimture. — This is northerly of Pine Plain,
and now largely abounds with berry bushes or brush-
wood. A small-po.x hositital was formerly there, from
which it derives its name. There was also a small-po.x
hospital on the " Island." Tradition states that the
treatment in the two hospitals was different, and that
in one must of the patients died, and in the other most
of them recovered. There is the grave of a small-
po.x patient juvt east of Bridle Point Bridge.
Or I'luitnie. — This was a reservation set apart in
li)4il as a coinnion pasture for working oxen. It was
situated between the North and .South Streets towards
.Mill Brook.
Tlic Pumii. — These are small bodies of water near
the road, now discoMtinued, that extended from near
(,'lay-pit Hill to the norlli part of the town.
Ilridli Point. — This is often referred to in the early
re<ords, and is a well-known ami ancient landmark.
We have no knowledge of the origin of the name. It
is the extremity of the ridge of land by the new
causeway bridge. In a deeil of lIKid it was siielled
Bridell I'.iynt.
The yiw Caii-'^rwii/. — This, as the name implies, is
the causeway last ma<le, and is on the South Sudbury
aud Wayland great roa<l. At the eastern end is the
New faiiseway or Bridle Point Bridge.
I-itnii Brill;/'-. — This is the one that crosses the river
on the roail to the " Farm " or " Island.'' Recently
a new bridge w:is constructed, and the causeway about
it was considerably raised to take it above high water.
In 1880 a bridge was built to the easterly of this, to
allow the water to pass off from the meadows more
readily in flood-time. There are also other bridges
for this purpose on the other causeways that are call-
ed "dry bridges," under which little or no water pass-
es in a dry time.
The Common. — This public property was so called
because it was " the town's Common land." The
term, formerly, did not simply refer to a village green,
but to all the land that was held in common by the
early settlers. The old Common was at the centre,
and C(mta!ued about one acre of land that was bought
by the town in 172o-27, "as a site, ordered by a com-
mittee of the General Court, on which to place the
meeting-house." It was also to be used as a training-
field. It was nearly square, and bounded southerly by
the Farm road, easterly by the great road. The north
line, it is stated, would come within about fifteen feet
of L. K. Lovell's house; while the south line, or that
2.S-ii
on the Farm road, extended from the corner to just
beyond the house recently occupied by Jlrs. Josiah
Russell. At the southwest corner stood the school-
house; and at the southeast corner the old meeting-
house, which was removed about 1814. This land, as
before stated, was sold to Dea. James Draper. The
meeting-house was not moved entire, but was taken
to pieces and set up without the replacement of some
of its original external oruament«. When in ite new
position it had a common gable roof with slight pedi-
ments and covings, and stood fronting the main street
nearly on a line with the fence by the sidewalk as it
is at present. It had a projecting porch on the front
and also on each end. It had eight windows in front,
four on each end, four on the back, one large circular
top window back of the pulpit, and a semi-circular
one in each gable end. It had neither steeple, turret
nor chimney ; and near the beginning of the present
century its paint was so weather-beaten as to make
the original color quite indistinct. A fine sycamore
tree stood just back of the pulpit window, aud as it
towered high above the building added very much to
the otherwise plain appearance of the place. On the
corner just south of the meeting-house, near the spot
now occupied by Jlellin's "law office," stood the
" Pound." Just beyond the brook, on the right, stood
the Samuel Russell house, with two stories in front
and one back, within which the church-going dames
gathered on a cold Sunday to fill their foot-sUjves
with coals. There they also talked of the sick and
bereaved, for whom prayers may have been offered at
the morning service, and other matters of interest aud
curiosity.
The VlUngc Grocery. — In the early part of the pres-
ent century a small West India and dry-goods store
was kept by Heard & Reeves. Later it had but one
proprietor, and was known as " Newell Heard's
store." It was a low, red building, aud stood a few
feet southeasterly qf the present railroad station. It
was a genuine country grocery ; and old inhabitants
slill remember the tall, slim form of " Uncle Newell,"
as he was familiarly styled, who was in stature a typi-
cal Heard. Mr. Heard was cross-eyed, which may
have given rise to the story among the small boys that
he could see in different directions at the same time.
This store was a great resort for the staid villagers,
who, on a fall or winter evening, gathered there, and
many is the grave question of church and state that
has been settled by the social group as it sat on the
nail-kegs about the fire of that old-time grocery-store.
After the proprietor's death the building was removed,
and a part of it is now on the premises of L. K.
Lovell.
Physicians. — Ebenezer Roby, M.D. — One of the
most noted physicians of East Sudbury was Dr. Ebe-
nezer Roby. He was born in Boston in 1701, and
graduated in Harvard College in 1719. He settled in
Sudbury about 1725, and in 1730 married Sarah,
daughter of Rev. John Swift, of Framingham. He
434
HISTORY OF iMIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
lived in the old Eoby house, which was recently de-
stroyed by fire. He was prominently connected with
town matters in Sudbury, where he lived and prac-
ticed his profession till his death. He was buried in
the old grave-yard at East Sudbury, and the following
is his epitaph :
" In memory of Ebenezer Roby, Esq., s Native of Boston New
England.
*' He fixed his residence in Sadbory in the character of a Physician,
where he wafl long distinguished for bis ability and success in the heal-
ing art.
Born Sept 20" 1701
Died Sept 4t' 1772 aged 71."
His son, Dr. Ebenezer Roby, Jr., born in 1732, also
practiced medicine in Sudbury, and died July 16,
1786, aged fifty-four. Dr. Joseph Roby, son of
Ebenezer, Jr., was a practicing physician in East
Sudbwy till 1801.
The following is a specimen of Dr. Roby's bills.
It was rendered the town for attendance and medicine
furnished to some of the French Neutrals. These un-
fortunates were a part of the Nova Scotia exiles re-
ferred to by Longfellow in his poem "Evangeline."
One thousand of them were taken to the Massachu-
setts Bay Province, and supported at public expense.
Different towns, among which was Sudbury, had their
quota to care for :
Mabsachosetts PBo^^^•CE.
" For medicine and attendants for the French Neutrals from Nova
Scotia.
" 175.'>, Dec. 11— To Sundry Medicines for French young vironian— 27—
To Do. for girl i'
" 175fi, March 22, — To Sundry dledicines and Journey in the night
west side the river — 0-.'>-8
"To Sundry Medicines and Journey west side 0-4-0
" To Do. 4" To Journey and Medicines tf-7-0
** To Do. \ for the old Gentleman when he fell off the bouse and was
greatly bruised and sick of a fever the clavicula being brohe."
The following are the physicians who succeeded
the Dra. Roby : Nathan Rice, 1800-14; Ebenezer
Ames, 1814r-61 ; Edward Frost, 1830-38 ; Charles W.
Barnes, 1860-64 ; John McL. Hayward, 1874. Charles
H. Boodey located in Cochituate in 1874, where he
still resides.
Lawyers. — Othniel Tyler, Samuel H. Mann, Ed-
ward Mellen, David L. Child, Richard F. Fuller,
Franklin F. Heard, Gustavus A. Somerby, Richard
T. Lombard, Daniel Bracket, Charles Smith.
Sketches of Prominent Persons. — Edward
Mellen, Etq., was born at Westborough, September
26, 1802. He graduated at Brown University in
1823, and went to Wayland November 30, 1830, where
he died May 31, 1875. He was well known in the
legal profession. In 1847 he was made justice of the
Court of Common Pleas, and in 1855 was made chief
justice of the same court. In 1854 he received from
his alma mater the degree of LL.D.
Lydia Maria Child, whose maiden-name was Fran-
cis, was born in Medford, Mass. She married David
Lee Child, and went to Wayland in 1853. She was
celebrated as a writer, and her works have had wide
circulation. She was eminent as an advocate of free-
dom for the black man, and long evinced her sincer-
ity in his cause by substantial labors. She was an
intimate acquaintance of and earnest co-worker with
the prominent anti-slavery advocates of her time.
Her home was an humble, unpretentious dwelling,
situated about a quarter of a mile east of Sudbury
River, on the Wayland and Sudbury Centre highway.
Connected with her home was a small and tastefully-
kept garden-patch, where she and her husband culti-
vated flowers and a few vegetables in such moments
as they could spare from their busy literary life. It
was no uncommon thing for the passers-by to see one
or both of this aged couple quietly at work in their
little garden-plot, or perhaps toward the close of the
day " looking toward sunset," beyond the peaceful
meadows that fringe the bank of Sudbury River.
Since the death of Mr. and Mrs. Child the place has
gone into the posssession of Mr. Alfred Cutting, who
has built an addition to the original structure.
Genernl MUah Mtiyiiard Nutter was a descendant
of Joiin Rutter, who came to America in the ship
"Confidence," in 1()38. He was born in 1779, and
lived on his farm iu what has since been Tvnown as
the Rutter District, on the road from Weston " Cor-
ner " to the " Five Paths." He was a patriotic, pub-
lic-spirited man, and interested in all matters that
concerned the welfare of society. For years he had
the office of sheriflT, and received from Governor Lin-
coln the commission of major-general. He died in
1837, and his remains were interred in the Rutter
family tomb, in the old burying ground.
Frnnklin Fist Heard, Esq., was born in Wayland,
and graduated at Harvard University in 1848. He
studied law and became noted in his profession as a
writer and compiler of works of law. In his latter
years he resided in Boston, where he practiced his
profession until his death, which occurred in 1889.
Dr. Ebenezer Ames was born in Marlboro' in 1788. He
studied medicine with Dr. Kittredge, of Framingham,
and began th« practice of medicine in Wayland in
1814, and died in 1861. He early identified himself
with the Evangelical Trinitarian Church, of which he
was made deacon November 11, 1820. He was some-
what noted as a physician, and had an extensive prac-
tice, not only in Wayland, but in the adjacent towns.
As a citizen he was respected by all. He was emi-
nent for his wise counsel and noble, manly character.
As a Christian his conduct was exemplary, and he
was steadfast in what he believed to be right. At
first he lived in the centre village, but soon after
built the house upon the Sudbury and W.-iyland high-
way, about an eighth of a mile westerly, where he
lived and died. His design in building this house
was to provide a home for himself and his minister,
and the west end of it was used as the parsonage for
many years.
Rev. Edmund H. Sears, D.D., was born at Sandis-
field in 1810, graduated at Union College in 1834,
WAYLAND.
435
and at the Harvard Divinity School in 1837. He was
ordained February 20, 1S39, and installed at Lancas-
ter December 23, 1840.
Mr. Sears continued pastor of the Old Parish (Uni-
tarian) Church, Wayland, until 186/), when he took
charge of the Unitarian Church at Weston. He wa*
a useful citizen and greatly esteemed by his fellow-
townsmen. For years he served on the School Com-
mittee and also on the Library Committee, and per-
formed such other services as greatly endeared him to
the people. As a public speaker he displayed great
ability, being substantial in thought and clear and
forceful in expression. As a writer he excelled, and
his books have been popular among those who were ol
his school of theological thinking. He exhibited fine
poetical talent, and some of the sweet hymns of the
church are of his authorship. In theology he was ol
the conservative class of Unitarians. His residence
in AVayland was on the "plain," about a mile easterly
of Wayland Centre, near the Summer Draper place.
He died at Weston January It!, 1S7G.
The Riveh Meadomh. — These border on Sudbury
River, and are more largely in Wayland than Sud-
bury. They extend, with varying width, the entire
length of the river course, in some places they may
narrow to only a few rods, while iu others they ex-
tend from half a mile to a mile, where they are com-
monly called the Broad Meadows. They are widest
below the long causeway and Sherman's Bridge.
Comparatively little shrubbery is seen on these mea-
dows, but they strolch out as grassy jdains, uninter-
rupted for acres by scarcely a bush. .\t an early date
these meadows yielded large crops of grass, and
subsequent years did not diminish the quantity or
quality, until a comparatively modern date. From
testimony given in 18-")'.t before a Legislative Commit-
tee, it appeared that, until within about twenty-five
years of that time, the meadows produced from a ton
to a ton and a half of good hay to the acre, a fine
crop of cranberries, admitted of "d'all feeding," and
were sometimes worth about one hundred dollars per
acre. The hay was seldom " poled " to the upland,
but made on the meadows, from which it was drawn
by oxen or horses. Testimony on these matters was
given before a joint committee of the Legislature,
March 1, ISOl, by prominent citizens of Sudbury,
Wayland, Concord and Bedford. Their opinions were
concurrent with regard to the condition of things both
past and present.
From evidence it appears that a great and gradual
change in the condition of the meadows came after
the year 182-^. The main cause alleged for this
changed condition was the raising of the dam at Bil-
lerica. This dam, it is said, was built in 1711 by one
Christopher Osgood, under a grant for the town of
Billerica, and made to him on condition that he
should maintain a corn-mill, and defend the town
from any trouble that might come from damages
by the mill-dam to the laud of the tonus above. In
1793 the charter was granted to the Middlesex Canal,
and in 1794 the canal company bought the Osgood
mill privilege of one Richardson, and in 1798 built a
new dam, which remained till the stone dam was built
in 1828.
It would be difficult, and take too much space to give
a full and extensive account of the litigation and
legislation that has taken place in the past near two
centurieo and a half, in relation to this subject. It
began at Concord as early as September 8, 1636, when
a petition was presented to the Court, which was fol-
lowed by this act : " Whereas the inhabitants of
Concord are purposed to abate the Falls in the river
upon which their townestandeth, whereby suchtownes
as shall hereafter be planted above them upon the
said River shall receive benefit by reason of their
charge and labor. It is therefore ordered that such
towns or farms as shall be planted above them shall
contribute to the inhabitants of Concord, proportional
both to their charge and advantage."' On Nov. 13,
1644, the following persons were appointed commis-
sioners : Herbert Pelham, Esq., of Cambridge, Mr.
Thomas Flint and Lieutenant Simon Willard, of
Concord, and Mr. Peter Noyes, of Sudbury. These
commissioners were appointed " to set some order
which may conduce to the better surveying, improv-
ing and draining of the meadows, and saving and
preserving of the bay there gotten, either by draining
the same, or otherwise, and to proportion the charges
laved out about it as equably and justly, only upon
them that own land, as they in their wisdom shall
see meete." From this early date along at intervals
in the history of both Concord and Sudbury, the
question of meadow betterment was agitated. Atone
time it was proposed to cut a canal across to Water-
town and Cambridge, which it was thought could be
done " at a hundred pounds charge." Says Johnson :
" The rocky falls causeth their meadows to be much
covered with water, the which these people, together
with their neighbor towne (Sudbury) have several
times essayed to cut through but cannot, yet it may
be turned another way with an hundred pound
charge." In 1645 a commission was appointed by
the colonial authorities (Col. Rec. Vol. II., page 99)
"for ye btt' and imp'ving of ye meadowe ground
upon ye ryvr running by Concord and Sudbury." In
1671 a levy of four pence an acre was to be made
upon all the meadow upon the great river, "for re-
claiming of the river that is from the Concord line to
the south side, and to Ensign Grout's spring." Later
a petition was sent by the people of Sudbury, headed
by Rev. Israel Loring, for an act in behalf of the
meadow owners. But legislation and litigation per-
haps reached its height about 1859, when most of the
towns along the river petitioned for relief from the
flowage. The petition of Sudbury was headed by
Henry Vose and signed by one hundred and seventy-
> Slisttuck'i "Hiator; of CoDcord," page IS.
436
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
six others ; and that of Wayland by Richard Heard
and one hundred and sixteen others.
For any one to attempt with great positiveness to
clear up a subject which has perplexed legislators
and lawyers, might be considered presumptuous. It
is safe, however, to say that while there is evidence
showing that the meadows were sometimes wet in the
summer at an early period, they were not generally
so ; it was the exception and not the rule. It was a
sufficient cause of complaint if the settlers had their
fertile lands damaged even at distant intervals, since
they so largely depended upon them ; but the fact
that they did depend on them, and even took cattle
from abroad to winter, indicates that the meadows
were generally to be relied upon. Certain it is that,
were they formerly as they have been for nearly the last
half-century, they would have been almost worthless.
Since the testimony taken in the case before cited,
these lands have been even worse, it may be, than
before. To our personal knowledge, parts of them
have been like a stagnant pool, over which we have
pushed a boat, and where a scythe has not been
swung for years. Dry seasons have occasionally
come in which things were diflTereat. Such occurred
in 1883, when almost all the meadows were mown,
and even a machine could, in places, cut the grass
But this was such an exception that it was thought
quite remarkable. For the past quarter century peo-
ple have placed little reliance upon the meadows ;
and if any hay was obtained it was almost unexpected.
This condition of things in the near past, so unlike
that in times remote, together with the fact of some
complaint by the settlers, and an occasional resort by
them to the General Court for relief, indicates that
formerly freshets sometimes came, but cleared away
without permanent damage to the meadows. At
times the water may have risen even as high as at
present. It is supposed that at an early period the
rainiall was greater than now, and that because of
extensive forests the evaporation was less. The little
stream that may now appear too small to afford ade-
quate power to move saw and grist-mill machinery^
may once have been amply sufficient to grind the
corn for a town. But the flood probably fell rapidly,
and the strong current that the pressure produced
might have left the channel more free from obstruc-
tions than before the flood came. Now, when the
meadow lands are once flooded they remain so, till a
large share of the water passes off by the slow pro-
cess of evaporation. The indications are that some-
thing has of late years obstructed ita course. As to
whether the dam is the main and primal cause of
the obstruction, the reader may judge for himself.
Grass. — Various kinds of grass grow on the mead-
ows, which are known among the farmers by the fol-
lowing names : " pipes," " lute-grass," " blue-joint,"
" sedge," " water-grass," and a kind of meadow " red-
top." Within a few years wild rice has in places
crept along the river banks, having been brought
here perhaps by the water-fowl, which may have
plucked it on the margin of the distant lakes.
COCHITCATE. — This village is situated in the south
part of the town. Its name is of Indian origin, and
was originally applied, not to the pond nearby, which
was formerly known as Long Pond and at present
Cochituate Pond,but to the land in the neighborhood,
and the locality so-called gave its name to the pond.
The evidence of this is the use of the word in the
early records. In a record of the laying out of the
"Glover farm" in 1644, is this statement: "The
southwest bounds are the little river that issueth out
of the Great Pond at Cochituate." The word has
been spelled in various ways, some of which are Wo-
chittuate, Charchittawick and Cochichowicke. It is
said (Temple's "History of Franiingham '') that toe
word signifies "place of the rushing torrent "or "wild
dashing brook ; " and that it refers to the outlet of
the pond wlien the water is high. There are indica-
tions that on the highlands west of the pond the In-
dians once had a fort, and- it is supposed the country
about was once considerably inhabited by natives.
Oochitu;ite village is probably largely situated
upon lands which were once a part of the Dunsler
or Pond farm or on the Jenninon grant before men-
tioned. Both of these farms early came into the
possession of Edmund Rice, who purchased the Jen-
nison farm in 1687, and the Dunster farm in 1659.
The Old Connecticut Path passed by this locality and
took a course northerly of the pond into the territory
now Framingham. Not far from Dudley Pond a
house was erected, about 16-50, by Edmund Rice. This
was probably the " first white man's habitation in this
vicinity." The lands on which he built were a part
of tae Glover farm, and leased for a term of at least
ten years. One of the terras of the lease was that
Mr. Rice should erect a dwelling on the premises
within five or six years, and that it should be of the
following dimensions : " thirty foote long, ten foote
high stud, one fo^e sil from the ground, sixteen foote
wide, with two rooms, both below or one above the
other; all the doores well hanged and siaires, with
convenient fastnings of locks or bolts, windows
glased, and well planked under foote, and boarded
sufficiently to lay corne in the story above head."
Mr. Rice was probably the first white settler of the
place, and from this lone dwelling-place streamed
forth a light into the dark wilderness that must have
looked strange to the native inhabitants. The coun-
try in and about this village continued to be like the
other outskirts of the town, a quiet farming com-
munity, until the early part of the preseut century,
when the manufacture of shoes was commenced in
a small way by William and James M. Bent. In the
course of a few years, this business developed into
quite a source of employment, not only for people in
the immediate vicinity, but for some living in the ad-
joining towns. Stock was cut and put up in caiies at
the Bent shop, and workmen came and took it to their
MAYNARI).
437
homes to finish. The shoes were mostly what were
knowD as " kip " or " russet " shoes, and were sold in
cases of from fifty or sixty pairs.
The " russets " were for the Southern market and
used by the slaves on the plantations. Since the in-
troduction of modern machinery, the shoe business in
Cochituate has mostly been done in one or two large
sliops. The village has grown in size and prosperity
to an extent in proportion as the shoe busiuess has
increased; and a large share of the dwelling-houses
are owned or occupied by persons who are connected
with this important business.
Cochituate has two meeting-houses, one for the
Wesleyan Methodist, the other for the Methodist
Episcopal Church. The former building is situated
in Lokerville, and was erected in I80O. The latter is
at Cochituate village and was built about twenty-five
years ago. The construction of a Catholic Church
was recently commenced on Main Street. It is de-
signed for the use of the French Catholic people of
the place. Sabbath services are only occasionally
held at the Wesleyan meeting-house, but at the
Methodist Episcopal Church they are held regularly.
Cochituate has six public schools, five of which are
kept in the grammar school house in the central vil-
lage, the other is a primary school and kept at Lok-
erville. The village has a cemetery pleasantly located
near Cochituate Lake. The place is supplied with
watei from Kice's Pond l)y means of works, con-
structed in 187S, at an expense of S2.5,0(iO.
A street railroad was recently made from Cochitu-
ate to Natick, and arrangements have been made the
present year for the survey of a branch railroad from
Cochituate village to the Massachusetts Central
Railroad at Wayland Centre.
The place has several stores of various kinds, and
a bakery. Recently it has been provided with electric
lights.
The Quarter Millexsial Axxiver.saev. —
In accordance with a plan arranged by the joint
committee of Sudbury and Wayland, the Quarter
Millenial Anniversary exercises began at Wayland on
the morning of Sept. 4, 188i', by the firing of cannon
and the ringing of the meeting-house bells.
The exercises were of an interesting character.
The children of the public schools of Wayland, Co-
chituate, South, North and Sudbury Centre, all be-
decked in festal day attire, and headed by the Fitch-
burg Brass Band and a rear guard of the " Sudbury
Cavalcade," made a detour of the town, and then as-
sembled in the Town Hall, where they were ad-
dressed by Rev. Robert F. Gordon, pastor of the
Congregational Church, and William H. Baldwin,
president of the Young Men's Christian Union of
Boston.
When the speaking was ended, the children repair-
ed to the lower room, where a collation was served,
after which the people went to South Sudbury by
a special train. From South Sudbury a procession
moved to Sudbury Centre, where a dinner was served in
the town hall. At about half-past two an oration was
delivered by Rev. Alfred 8. Hudson, from a platform
erected just east of the old parish meeting-house.
After the oration, speeches were made by distin-
guished guests, and the services of the day closed
with a concert and fire-works at Sudbury Common,
and a ball in the Town Hall at Wayland.
The battery that gave the salute at Wayland in the
early morning was from Waltham, and was stationed
on the sandy knoll a little southeasterly of Wayland
Centre. During the firing, it is stated by those pres-
ent that a large eagle, a bird quite rare in any part
of the State at any time, alighted upon a tree not
far away from the batterj' and remained on its perch
;»s the salute went on. The attendance upon the ex-
ercises was greater than the most enthusiastic had an-
ticipated, and it was the general opinion of the great
multitude assembled that the day was very enjoy-
able and one long to be remembered by those who
love the two towns. Nature was at her best. The
summer lingered in its beauty, while the early au-
tumnal hues and breezes contributed just suflBcient to
what summer afforded to make the day one that was
exceptionally adapted to the celebration of a great
event.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
MAIWASD.
nv KE\ ALFREri SERES" HLtiSliN.
Maynaru is a new town incorporated April 19,
j 1871. Its territory consists of 1300 acres taken from
I Stow, and 1900 acres taken from the northwesterly
part of Sudbury. It is situated about twenty-one
I miles by highway west of Boston ; and is bounded
north by Acton, south and east by Sudbury and west
by Stow. The town contained in 1875 a population
of 1965 ; and has a central village, the principal busi-
ness of which is the manufacture of woolen goods.
The territory is divided by a stream now called the
Assabet River, but which has at different times been
known as Elzabeth, Elzibetb, Elzebet, Elisabeth and
Elizebeth. On an old map of Sudbury by Mathias
Mosman, bearing date April 17, 1795, and made
by authority of that town in obedience to an order
from the General Court of June 26, 1794, the name is
spelled Elsabeth. In a note explanatory of the map,
is the following statement by the author: "The
rivers are also accurately surveyed and planned ; the
river Elsabeth is from four to five rods wide, but
[there is] no public bridge over the river where it
joins Sudbury." On a map of Sudbury by William
H. Wood, published in 1830, the name is spelled
E'.zibeth. But although the river has at times been
called by what has sounded like an English word, it
438
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
is not probable that this was its original name. On
the contrary, the evidence is that Elzibeth or Elzibet
and similar ones are corruptions of the Indian word
Assabet or Assabaeth. At a date prior to the use of
the name Elzibeth, Elzibet, etc., as before given, the
terms Asibath and Isabaeth were used. When the
lands south of the Assabet River were being laid out
and apportioned to the settlers, about the year 1050,
the farm of William Brown is spoken of as being in
the " northwest angle beyond Asibath River," and in
the " Colony Records," vol. iii. page 225, with date
May 22, 1651, is the statement that " Captain Willard
and Lieutenant Goodenow are appointed to lay out
the thousand acres of land at Isabaeth which Jethro
the Indian mortgaged to Herraon Garret."
Another matter of consideration is that the tribu-
tary which flows into the Assabet River just above the
upper bridge, near the old Whitman place, was early
known as Assabet Brook. It has thus been designated
by tradition and document, and the term has come
down to the present, notwithstanding that the terms
Elzabeth, etc., have been applied to the river. We
consider it, then, fairly established that the river, the
locality and also the brook were all called by the Indian
name. The words Elaabeth, Elizabeth, etc., may
have crept into use as corruptions of the original
Indian name, and the map-makera doubtless took the
name that was popularly used. It is probable that
the Indians would have a name for a stream of such
size, and also that the settlers would call it by the
same name.
Assabet is a convenient form of the Indian names
before mentioned. The very sound is a reminder of
those far-away days when the home of the red man
was here, and the stream and its borders were his fish-
ing-place and hunting-ground. It is suggestive of
the murmur of pines, the rippling of water and the
rustling of leaves. Such a stream as the Assabet
would naturally be a favorite with the aborigines, and
attract them to its neighborhood. The Indians, to
quite an extent, relied upon fish for subsistence, which
they took at certain seasons in large quantities, and
preserved, by drying, for future use. The Assabet
River is a tributary of the Musketaquid (Concord and
Sudbury River), which stream was formerly well
stocked with salmon, alewives, shad and dace. These
were taken in abundance at diflerent points along the
river, one favorite fishing-place being near Weir Hill,
by the Concord and Sudbury boundary, and another
at Rocky Falls (Saxonville). Surely we may sup-
pose, then, that up a tributary like the Assabet many
of these fish would ascend in the spawning season,
and give ample opportunity to the natives for obtain-
ing them in abundance. Various methods were em-
ployed by the Indians in fishing. As the fish as-
cended the stream, they would watch at some fall or
where there was shoal water, and take them with the
arrow or spear. The scoop-net was also used at such
places. Many were captured at night, when the In-
dian sat in his canoe, with the blazing torch at the
bows, which attracted the fish. When the fish de-
scended the stream a weir was used. This was a
fence constructed from the bank towards the stream
centre, and running diagonally to an apex, where a
net was placed for their capture as they were
passing througli. Thus this stream, now so busy and
important, and associated with so much of the town's
life of to-day, was also important and serviceable to
the inhabitants long since passed away.
The sounds and the sights are as ilitl'erent from
what they once were as are the traits of the two races
who have dwelt on its banks. Instead of the hum of
machinery and the rumbling of the carriage and car,
was the dashing of waves on the rock, the lone whistle
of the wild wood-duck's wing, the occasional crash of
some worn-out hemlock or oak, the shriek of the wild-
cat or the howl of the wolf. Instead of the reflection
of scores of bright lights at night of the noisy mill
and quiet homes, was the flash of a birch-bark or
pitch-pine torch, as, borne at the bows of a light
canoe, it flitted noiselessly by inlet and curve. To
the very river bank the forest grew, and in place of
the meadow or well-tilled field was the oak and dark
evergreen grove or the tangled, swampy morass.
From these circumstances, then, we may su|)po3e that
the Assabet River has played an important part in
the history of the place. It is a beautiful stream,
with its swiftly-running waters at times and places,
and with its picturesque scenery outstretching to the
surrounding country.
As Maynard is composed of territory taken from
Sudbury and Stow, a few facts concerning the settle-
ments of these old towns m.iy be interesting, and as-
sist to a better understanding of the early history of
the place. Sudbury was settled in ir>;?8 by a com-
pany of English emigr.ants, some of whom came di-
rect from England and some from Watertown, after
a brief stay there. The lands were attained by per-
mission of the Colonial Court. The first grant was of
a tract about five miles square, and was purchased of
ihe Indian proprietor Karto, or Goodman, as he was
called by the English. This tract extended from
Concord on the north to what was then the " wilder-
ness land" (now Framingham) on the south, and
from Watertown (now Weston) boundary on the east
to a little westerly of the village of Sudbury Centre.
In 1G49 the settlers obtained by petition another
grant, which extended westward, and was called the
" Two-Mile Grant."
The town was incorporated Sept. 4, ICIO, when the
Court ordered that " The new plantation by Concord
shall be called Sudbury." The name was taken from
Sudbury in England, from which town some of the
settlers are supposed to have come. ( )iie great in-
ducement which ied to the selection of this spot for a
settlement was the extensive meadow lands along the
river. Upon these lands the people depended to a
great extent for their subsistence during the first
MAYNARD.
439
years of their pioneer life. So productive were they
that Johnson says " they tiike in cattel of other towns
to winter." The plantation prospered. In 1639 a
grist-mill was erected, and in 1040 a small meeting-
house was built, the dimensioiis of which were
"thirty foot long and twenty foot wide." The cost
was to be six pounds, to be paid in money, corn and
cattle to be prized by two men of the town, one to be
chosen by the town and the other by John Rutter,
the contractor and builder of the house.
The first minister was Rev. Edmund Browne, who
it is supposed was settled in England before he came
to America. He was a scholarly and substantial min-
ister, as well as an honored and useful citizen. The
town soon took rank among the best of the Massa-
chusetts Bay Colony. Not only did the people de-
velop the resources within their own territory, but the
spirit of colonization early prevailed, which led the
people to pioneer new places. They went south to
what is now Framingham and Natick, and westerly
beyond the " two-mile grant," to what is now Marl-
boro', where in 16.i(i a new town was incorporated.
The town of Stow in its original limits was com-
posed of a tract of country bounded by 8udbury, Con-
cord, Groton, Lancaster, Marlboro' and the Indian
plantation called Nashoba (now Littleton). The In-
dians called it Pompasetticutt. In lUtW a jiart of
this territory was formally laid out to Major Eleazer
Usher; and a little later about 500 acres were con-
veyed to Daniel Gookiu, and 1-50 acres to Richard
Heldredge.
In 16()9 George Haywood iictitioned the General
Court to appoint snme |>ers((ns "to view this land."
October loth his reijuesl was granted, and .May .'51,
1G70, the committee rendt red a report. In this re-
por' is the following statement : " We found by esti-
mation lU.OOo acres of country land, whereof 50ii
acres of it is meadow : the greatest part of it is very
meane land, but we judge there will be planting-land
enough U> accommodate twenty families. Also about
4000 acres more of land that is taken up in farms.''
They stated that the Indian town of Nnshoba, that is
adjacent, " is exceeding well nieadowed, and they
make but little or no use of it." The General Court
allowed the petitioners to take the land '' provided
the place be settled with not lesse than tenn familyes
within three years, and that a pious orthodox and
able minister be mainteyned there."
Daniel Gookin, Thomas Dan forth, Joseph Cooke,
or any two of them were appointed to regulate the
settling of the place, and Dec. 4, 1672, they appointed
a committee to lay out twelve farms of fifty acres
each, and to "cast Lotts for them " among those to
whom the land was allowed, provided that the parties
were " men of good and honest conversations, orthodox
in Religion," and would engage to help support " as
Godly minister among them," and also would settle
upon their lands within two years from the following
May ("History of Stow."j
May 16, 1683, the place was made by incorporation
the town of Stow, and March, 1686, twenty-six home-
steads were granted.
Eahly Purchase of Territory. — That portion
of Maynard which was taken from Sudbury was a
part of the land last granted to that.town by the Gen-
eral Court. It was five miles in length north and
south by two in breadth east and west, and its north-
erly boundary was a direct continuation of the Con-
cord and Sudbury old town line to the Assabet River,
at a point which Mathias Mossman on his map calls
the Acton, Stow and Sudbury corner. The Colonial
record concerning this grant is " Sudberry is granted
two miles westward next adjoining to them for their
furth' inlargement, provided it [prejudice] not W".
Browne in his 200 acres already granted." (" Colonial
Rec. " vol. ii. page 273.) This land tract was purchased
of the Indians for twelve pounds. A deed was given
which is on record at the Middlesex Registry of
Deeds, Cambridge, and of which the following ia a
true copy :
Indian Deed.
*' ForasmucL as the G€D' Court of the Maasachusetls Colony in New
Tngland hath formerly grunted to the Towne of Sudhury, in the County
uf Middle8i;x, in tlie Banie colony, ao addition of laud two miles west-
ward of their former grant of five milee, which iaalBo layd out A: joy net h
lu It; and whereas the Kngliah occupiers, proprietors and pOBsessunt
thereof have chosen Capt. Edmond Guodenow, Lelf^ Josiah liaynes,
.lohn Goodenow, John Brigh&m & Joseph Freeman to lie a couiittee
for themselves A for all the rest of the English proprietors of thes** tract
fi land and to satisfy k pay them for their native ancient ii hereditary
right, title i interest thereunto : Know all People hy these presents— That
wee, JehoJakiDi, John Magus. John Musqua & his two daughters
fCstlier it Rachel, Benjamen Bohue, John Speen A: Sarah liiH wife, James
Sp*;en, Dorothy Wennetoo A; Humphrey Bohue her eon, Mary NeppM-
iiiun, Ahipuil the daughter of Josiah Harding, Peter Jethnt, PeterMusli-
qiuuuogh. John Bomaii, David Maunoan i Betty, who are the ancient
native i hereditary Indian proprietors of the afore^"! two miles of land
(lor <& in consideration of the just & full sum of twelve pounds of current
money of Sew England to them in hand well i truly paid at or Itefore
Tile ensealing Jc delivery hereof by the said Cap'. Edmond Goodenow,
(,eifl. Josiah Haines, John Goodenow, John Brighaiu 4 Joseph Freeman
in behalie of themselves ii of the rest of the English posseasors, occu-
piers, proprietors A fellow.parchasers), the receipt whereof they do
hereby acknowledge & tberwith to he fully satisfied, contented ii paid 1
thereof and of every part & parcell thereof they dn hereby for themselves
A their heyre, lExeculors, Administrators 1 Assigns, clearly, fully ,t
absolutely release, acqnitt, exonerate i discharge them ii all the Eup-
slish possessors, occupiers, proprietors i fellow-purchasers of the same
.\: all and every one of these heyrs. Executors, -Administrators, Assigns A
successors forever. Have given, granted, hargaioed, sold, aliened,
enseossed, made over t confirmed, L by these presents, do give, grant,
I'SrgaiD, Bell, alien, enseosse, makeover, confirm ii deliver all that their
st tract A parcellsof lands or two miles (bee it more or less, situate lying
A being) altogether in one entire parcell in the s* Town of Sudbury in the
County of Middlesex afores^ & lyeth al along throughout on the westerne
side of the old five miles of the e^ Towns & adjoyneth thereunto (lo-
-ether with the farme lands of the heyrs of William Browne that lyeth
within the same tract, uoto the s^ iDapt. Edmond Goodenow, Leir. Josiah
IlaioeB, John Goodenow, John Brigham & Joseph Freeman & unto all £
"■very one of the rest of the English possessors, occupiers, proprietors
A. fellow-purchasers thereof as the same is limited, butted A bounded on
tlie East by the old part of the s-^ Towne of Sudbury (which was the
rive miles at first granted to the s^ Towne) £ is butted iS: bounded north-
t-rly by the line or bounds of the Towne of Stow Si is bounded southerly
A partly westerly by the lands of Mr. Thomas Danforth. All the lands
uithinsaid twunds of hills, vallies, planes, intervalls, meadows, swamps,
with all the timber, trees, woods, underwoods, grass & herbage, rocks,
' stones, mines, mineralls, with all rivers, nvoletta, brooks, streams,
' spriuga, jionds & all manner of water courses <& whatsoever is therein it
440
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
rhereupoo, above grotiuil ± under gruund, with all rights, iueinl>eis
titles, royaltyea, libertyea, pririledges, propriotyefl, uses, protfiiis A: coin-
niodityea, thereof, .t overy jMirt Sl purcell Ilierewf, A. tbat in every way i
in anywise thereuulo beloogiDg nod appertaioing,
"To Have, Hold, uee, occupie, poaaeaa, eujoy to the only abeoUite
propper iieo, beoefitt, belioofe and diapose of them the a^ English pusst^^^-
ora, occupiera, proprietoni i fellow-purclioaera of the Towne of Sud-
bury it their heyrv, executors, adminititratora, assigns JC aucceasMjfs in a
free, full i perfect estate of iDheritaoce from the day of ths date hereof
Jt ao for ever.
"And the above-named Indian Grantors do also hereby covenant, prom-
ise A grant to and with the above- nanieU Edmond Goodenuw, Josiah
HayDe8,JohD Goodeuow, John Brigham & Joseph Freeman, A witli all th^
restof theKnglish poaseaaora, occupiei-B,proprieiui-H^ fellow-purL-haaeni of
the >4aid two milesuf land i^bee it more or lesa) as al»ove bouudrd that at
the ensealing and delivery hereof, they are the only nnd Kbsolute In-
dian priiprietoi-s of the premises, \ that they (J: none else i have j iwt and
full power ill themselves the same ibua to sell, conv*-y, confirm, make
over A deliver, Jt they do hereby engage i bind themselves^ their beyrs,
executors, adininintrators A asaigiiM from time to time A; at all times
hereafter, fully and sutticieDtly to secure, save baiiuleas x forever de-
feud the hereby grunted X. bargained two miles ol land lua is abuve
bounded, bee it more or less), with all the rights, members Ji appurten-
ances thereunto belonging, iigaiost all manner .v singular other titles,
trotihlfs.chmgefl, demands and inctimbrancea that may be made or
niysed by any person or persons (especially Indian or Indians) elwi
whutaoever lawfully IiavMtg or claiming any right, title or interest ill
or to the preniisfB, or to any part or parcell theieof, to the trouble, vex-
ation, cliurges, intfrruption or ejection »( the ubo%-e s^ English |>oHs*-as-
3or, otcupiers, proprielois or fellow-purchaoei-s of the sauif, .tr :iny iMit?
■ if them, they or any one of their heyrs, executors, administiutoi-s or
nsMgtis, in his .T their 'juiet atid peaceable ]«.s»essiori, frt-e .t lull u^e.
eiijovnierit, nr diajtoae thereof, or auy part or parcell thereof, forever.
•* Furthermore, we, the above-named Imiiiui (inintor^ do hereby
oblige and eiigiigo ourselves, all and every one of us A ours as afore^J
shall and will from time to time .V at all times readily and c-nenuallv
do (at i-iir own propper cosU and cliargfsj, ..r cause t.. he s>i done, anv
olheror furlheract oracls, thingor things, that the law doth or may
reipiire for more Hure making A full coiihrming of all A Bingular the
hereby gniuted premises unto the s' Ednioutl (iot-leuow, Josiah ilaiiies,
John tjoodenow, John llrigham and Joseph Freeman A unto all A every
on** of the rest of the Kngiish possessors, i.ciupier8, pioprieloiis and tel-
luw-piinliaaera ttf the premises, .t unto nil \ every one uf heyrs, e\ecij-
lors, adriiinistnttorc and aaargnes, forever,
"In Witness whereof the ab-'Ve-nameil ludiuii (iraiitors have here-
iiuti», iMch for themselves .V all..gi-lhi*r, antt their haiidn ami seals, dated ;
the 1 1"- day of July, in the yeju of our LonI C.-d nnc- ihousand aix hiiii-
drc-d einhty i four, Aniio-ie Uegui Kegis Caioli .Si-cuudi, \.\XVL
" JelmjRkim his murk ■. for liiinaelf A by fMiler .tf X fur John Do-
uian A Nellie ^
" John .MagoH fwr himself and by order of Jt for Jacob .MngoH his
father and seale Q
"JohnSpeen his inarke [ .V for .v by order of Sarah his wife and
seule ^,
" Abiyail Daughter of Jo-siah Ilanling and hissole he) r (> her
marke S: aeale Q
" Samh C her niarko who is the widdow of Josiah Haidiog and
nudherof sd Abigail &. her Guardian.
" I'eter Mnsi|uaiiiog his marke A: seale -Z-
" Uuiijamin B«dieu his R marke A seal Q
" Doritliy Wenneto her *) marke Ji aeale ^
" Mary Ne|tamuii her < > marke A: seale ^
" Betty her ) marke Jl Seale
" I'eter Reihro A: a seale
" JuliD X Bowman his marke X aeale
'* James Speeu *& seale *
"Camlie 15 Octo'' IGH-i All the persona that have nigued A sealed this
instriinitmt appeared befoie me this day A year above written A freely
acknowledged this writing to l>e their itct A deed
"Daniel GoOKis, Gen' Assist
" Endorsement— All the Grantors of the instrument uiihin written
beKiiining with Jehojakim x ending with Peter Mnskquoniog did sign
seale and deliver n"^ instrument in presence of us,
"John Gbee.\— James BEHN.vaD—
"Moreo\er wee underwritten did see IltMijauHn Buhi-u, {lui -»iltv
waneto A; Mary A Bhiv \epamnu signe, x-al^ A ileli\ertliis iif*triiiiiej.t
the IJ'" day of (.!( to''lt■.^4
"A\nREW PiTTvsiEE* hisnuuke
"J.iMKS Kl MN^ niarUe
"SAMt »:i. Uott, JvMES Darsaiip
" DlNIEL Sa< oW.VMHATT.
"Feh'T, 1G84 Memorandum— Wee whose names are nn<lpr\\ritteu
did see Peter Jethro digue A ?«eHle A: deliver yf uithin written iiiBtru-
ineiit
"James BAitNAKn — Stephen ||] GArE> hi^ mark.
" Peter Jethro, Indian, ap[>earpd before uie the fifth -lay of F'.-I.nmry,
ir,84. X freely ucknowtt-dged this Hritiiig "itliin t.. he hi-t act A deed A
ythe put his band A seale thereunto.
•' DvNiEL G....hr.\, ^ell^ Aflifi.
"John Bowman did signe, seale A deliver the withiu-uritleit deed
the Xi : of February in the yearof our Lord one thousand t.i.v huuiired
eighty A four in presence of us
"JuMN Ballom^ -- Sami el Fueesian his imtrko
" Jamea Speeu and .lohn Bomau up^teared before me in court at Na-
tick and acknowledged they have smned and .-ealeil this iu^niiliient
among others May IJth, Io>>4
" J \MF.< (..u,KI\, >eU'' Arti-t
•' R..MM H\ Apitl ir., -•.
"f'Imrles Josias, Sarheni of the Massadiusetls, having read a o-usid-
ered the within-written deed with ih<- cu^ent >>t his (•u:udian> A
Counsellors uiideru lilteii doth for liim>elf and hi^ hens allow ••!. vniily
A couhrni the wilhiu-wrmeii sale to the ndialnlanli ol Miilbui\ A lln-ir
heyrs for iver. the lantJs therein bar-aiiied A ><dd. to liave A t-- hoM !-•
the aJ Inhabitants d Midhury their lieyiN and a-Muits bu- e\ei, a
hath hereunto set his baud and r^ale the day alu-ve wrilleii,
" ' "tl Alil.LS \ JtiM \^ hi!) iMiU ke A oeale
■* Allow. -.1 by \13
•' W'lIl.tlM >l"l ..'IIT-'N ] i.Uaidirtlis t"
'■.b-nllM III OLi;\ ) V Sill helU
' Itetordeil l>\ Thomas DaubTih
" Recorded I'J, 3, lfK<^.".
"by III... [taulMith, Rec-rder.
A irnecopy id' record B-fk H, I'.iin-' ."'.14 I
".\ttest CilA' B, Sti;\e.\s Reg."
' K'-i.Mii 8 .M"\i v. I
• Will M.i U \io.>.
* l;..l:Mil tJ M..NrA..l .
■ W II I 1 \ M \\ . AHuW lu.S
'.'.0-, in< lu>i\
The above (lee<l was nf»t iriven until \>nt> aftt*r tlit^
grant was made by tlie Court, and tbe land was di-
vided up'into portions ttt the inliabitants. 'J'he reconiH
do not state what ocoaMioneii the if)nt^ dehiy, but, a.s
wa-s the case elsewliere, perhaps the papers were not
pa-ssed until, in process ot* time, the «etliersiine.stioned
wliether the claim to the territory was valid until a
deed was obtained of the Indian proprietors. A >iuii-
lar instance occurred at (iroton, where the deed was
given long after tlie land was occupied. The grant
was allowed by the Court aa early as ir».V», but no title
was obtained of the natives till abfmt li;S8 or UIS4.
The 200 acres referred to consisted of land alloweil
by the Court to William Brown, of which the record
is as follows: "In answer to the petition of W'"
Browne flbr 2oO ac" dew for twenty-five pounds j>utt
into thejoynet stocke by Mrs. Ann Harvey, liis Aunt,
from whom he made it appear to tlie C'ourt he had
sutticyent deputacon to ret]uire it, liis retjuest was
graunted, viz.: 200 ac" of land to be layed out to him
w^'out the west lyne of Sudbury by Capt. Simon
^Villa^d and Seargeant Wheeler.''
Concerning the laying out and apportionment of
MAYNARD.
441
these lands, we have the following from the Sudbury | "'her aforegoinR. bem); bounded on the na by a highway tliinv rodi
records :
November 27, ICSI, "It is agreed in a public town-
meeting warned for that purpose, that the rate now to
be levied for the payment of John Sherman and
others for laying out the two miles westward joining
to our former bounds which was last granted by the
Court for our enlargement shall be paid by the inhabit-
ants, every man to pay alike, the same in quantity,
and when that the two miles shall be layed out that
every man shall ejijoy a like quantity of that land."
About two years later a dispute arose relative to the
manner in which ihe two-mile grant was to be divided.
"Two ways were proposed, neither of which gave sat-
isfaction ; the first was to divide them equally to every
man; the other was to divide by estate or family — to
every man four parts — to every wife, child or servant
bought or brought up in the family one part."
On January 4, 16J5, at a selectmen's meeting it was
" voted to take some means to get the new grants laid
out;" and it was also agreed "to keep a herd of cattle granted by this Court [General Court] to Watertowne
upon the land the nest summer.'' Thus the subject '" purchase of Hernion Garrett." Hermon Garrett
of the new grant was a prominent one, and how to I **'•'"* -i blacksmith who lived at Concord, and it is su))-
apportion it was an important matter. At length the : I'osed carried on his trade there before 1G38. lu a
plan was adopted of dividing it into squadrons, the ' petition dated May l!i, 1G51, he says that " 3 years
arrangement of which was as follows: "The south since he obtained a verdict against Jethro on £1(1 66.
east was to be the first, the north east the second, the ■'"'■ and £4 costs for dam.ige in a mare and colt done
north west the third, and the south west the fourth." ^y bim to your petitioner, and that said Jethro mort-
wide, UDd pun of the two miles last granted to .<!lldbur>', each lot coiiuiu-
' ing one linndred and tliirty nrren ; lliinl s<|nadruu are ER fullnwetli :
"Jolin Ward, J? ; Peter Kiiige, 'Jt ; Jolin Smith, JM i Hugh Griffin,
3"; Henry Rice, 31; John [ ], 3J ; Uohen Ileast, 3,i ; WIlllKni
Keriey, Sen, 34 ; John Wood, 3,'j ; .lohn Rutter, 3G ; Solomon Johnson,
•Sen , 37 ; Jolin Toll, 3« ; Widow Goodeuow, 30.
" Mr. W». Browne, his farm of two hundred acres, and hin lot of one
liuudred and thirty acres, beini; granted to be in the northwest angle
iK-yonJ .\»ibath river before Ihe lotK were laid out. Also the other (lort
of Sargent Keddicke'a lot adjoining to Mr. William Browne's farnion the
north.
"Tlie thirteen lots last written with Mr. \\'\ Browne's farm and lot.
aud the |iart of .Sernenl Reddirks lot, are the third siinadron Mr.
Ilrowne's farm joineth lo foncor.1 line on tlir- north, and the widow
lloodenow 8 lot joinelh Ihe same saiil Lancaster hi|:hway on the south,
the said s<|nadron of loin and farm being on Ihe eau the middle highway
thirty r.ids wide and the second squadron, aud butting on Ihe west upon
the wilderueas."
Another part of the Slaynard territory may have
been a tract of land which we will term the Tanta-
mous transfer. This tract is that before alluded to as
the property mortgaged by Indian Jethro to Hermon
Garrett. This land the Colony Records state " is
It was voted there should be a highway extending
north and south, '"M rods wide in the new grant join-
ing to the five miles first gianted;" also, "voted that
there should be a highway 3u rods wide, fniui south
gaged l(i(Kl acres of his lands tn secure siiid debt."
(Temple's "Hist, of Framingliaiii.") The permission
grunted to Watertown by the General Court may in-
licate that the mortgaged property came into the
to north, paralel with the other said highwav in the hands of (iarrett, who it is supposed sold a horse and
middle of the remaining trad of land." I <'olt to old .lethro and the default of payment may
The records further state, that, as there was a ' ''"^'^ ^^^° ^^^ damages. The s'atement that this
pond in the third and second squadrons, "so that the '^"'' ^^'*=* •'*'• Issabaeth, while it may locate the land
middle highway from south to north cannot pass i ''"• indefinitely, leaves us to infer that it lay along
strait," it was voted to have it "go round the pond.'' ^^^ "^" course. The vote of Sudbury that there
These squadrons were sub-divided into parcels of '*'>o"l'l I'e a highwi»y running north and south,
equal size, each containing one hundred and thirty through the " New Grant," forty rods wide, was ob-
acres, and were apportioned to the people by lot. It served in the laying out of the land. This reserva-
was voted that "the first lot drawn was to begin at the : '•°" "'*•'* doubtless made without the e.xpectation that
south side of the first .squadron running east and we.st 'twould ever become a regular town highway. It
betwixt our highways; the second lot to be in the "as proba'oly laid out for several objects; one of these
north side of the first, and so every lot following suc-
cessively as they are drawn till we come to Concord
line and so the first aud second squadron."
The Sudbury records give the following information
concerning the apportionment and ownership of the
second and third squadrons, a part of which are in the
present territory of Alaynard :
"The second squadron are: William Ward, 13; Josiah Hains. 14 ;
Henry Loker, 15 ; John How, Iti ; Edmund Ri<e, IT ; Tbilenion Whale.
18 ; John Loker, l;i ; Mr. Edmund Browne, Jii ; John Farnienter, Dea.,
21 ; John Maynard, 22 ; Robert Darnill,23 ; Thouiaa White, ^4 ; Rich-
ard Newton, 2-'. ; ,Iohn Reddicke, purl of his, 2ii.
•■ These thirteen lots and a part af.ire writlen are the second squadron,
the Brat whereof l>eiug William Wards, whojoinetb l.i Lancaster high-
way on the south; the lasl being part of iargeul Beddlck■^ lol which
joinetb to Concord line on the nonh all this squadron of lots, with the
may have been to give abuttors a right of way to
their lots; another may have been to serve the town
1 as a timber supply, and another object may ]iave
been that it could be exchanged by the town for land
lo be used in other places for highways. This high-
way subsequently became memorable by the discus-
sions that attended its final disposition. It was re-
' peatedly encroached upon by abuttors or others who
desired it for timber or as an annex to their farms ;
and at successive town-meetings the question came up
as to what to do with the thirty-rod highway.
The following extracts from early records relate to
this highway, the first to its direction, the last to its
disposal ;
•'At a town-meeting January y« 4, 1657, voted in y» Town UeetinK
442
IIISTORV OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tbat wliereaa there )■ a puod lyiug id y thirU and sM:oDd squadron that
Hoe uur middel Highway frum Suiith tu Nurth caiioot paa streJKht, uur
uill and vote is that >'*Baid uuy ahall gue round the ponil at y« nearest
end aiid alowanre he given by y Surveyor tu any penOD that shall be
damaged by y" Jiighway going at y« ^K>DdB end and, AImj let it be re-
membered that >• long Highway from South to north goeth at y« west
end of y* pond through y* land of John Toll and Solomon Johosou and
id twelve rode wide at y narrowest for which ntay y» said John Toll and
Johnson have sntBcieot allowance."
At a meeliDg held March 3, 1731 , " Voted that they
will diacODtiDue of the thirty Rod Highway or land,
so-called, twenty-six rods wide throughout the said
highway." It was also " Voted to give and grant to
every Proprieter owner one and one half acre of
meadow and swamp land in the lands called the New
Grants, thirty rod highway, also two acres of upland.
January 23'^'', 1732, let out to Jonathan Rice all the
highway meadow from the Long Pond to Concord
Road and to Marlborough Road, for five shillings."
That part of Maynard which formerly belonged to
Stow was probably a portion of a tract called by the
Indians, Pompasiticut. A hill in Maynard still
bears the ancient name. These lands may have been,
in part, some of the Tantauious transfer, and in part
may have been owned by Benjamin Bohue, or the
Speen family, or Musqua, or Musquamog, or Mugoa,
or others who owned land about the Sudbury and
Stow territory. It is said that soon after the incor-
poration of the town of Stow, which occurred May IG,
1683, " a town rate was made to pay Ben Bohue and
James Speen and others for lands purchased of them."
("History of Stow.")
Indiax OccrpASTS.— The lands at Isebaeth or
about the Assabet River were, it is supposed, at one
time considerably occupied by Indians. Numerous
relics have been discovered in various places; and on
the Benjamin Smith place on the west side of the
river Indian bones have been exhumed. These re-
mains were di.scovereJ when excavating for a barn
cellar some years .igo. The remains were, it is sup-
posed, those of six Indians who were buried side by
side. Various relics were found with them. Just
below this place, on the brow of the hill, is an exca-
vation, which, it is supposed, may be the remains of
an old cellar once connected with a wigwam or wig-
wams. This excavation may perhaps have been an
tild Indian store-house for corn or maize, to make use
of their terra for grain. These excavations for gran-
aries were probably commonly used by the Indians.
Their food was to quite an extent made of maize meal,
which was prepared by a rude process of pounding
with a small stone. From this meal they prepared a
rude cake called "Nokake," which it is stated they
carried on long journeys.
Their selections for corn-fields were on easily
worked, suuuy places, as on some plain land or warm
hill-side. The lands were broken up by the squaws
with a rurle hoe made of stone with a withe handle.
Their planting time was when the oak leaf had at-
tained the size of a mouse's ear or squirrel's paw.
The same fields were planted year after year and were
probably tilled by several families collectively, after
the manner of the English in their early occupation
of the country. As the fields were cultivated in
common, so the granaries were doubtless also com-
mon property. Temple, in his History of " Framing-
ham," says as follows of the granaries :
'* These Indian granaries were of two classes, one
large, the other small. Both were of similar con-
struction, t. e., circular excavations about five feet in
depth. The larger ones were from twelve to sixteen
feet across, while the small ones were only three to
five feet in diameter. They were commonly dug in
the sloping sides of a knoll or bank to secure dryness
jind the better to shed rain. A number were set
close together in order that they might be protected
from bears and other enemies by a picket; when filled
with corn, or dried fish, or nuts, they were covered
with poles and long grass, or brush or sods." Perhaps
why 80 few of the traces of these granaries are found
to-day in places once considerably inhabited by the
Indians is that English cultivation of the soil has
obliterated tbem. The warm hill-sides where they
may have been mostly constructed, in close proximity
to the corn-fieids on the soft plain lands, have largely
l)ecome pastures or orchards. The plow has passed
over them again and again in the long flight of years.
The recollections of the early settlers relating to the
Indians were not altogether pleasant, and there was
therefore little inducement to preserve the traces of
their wigwams, pianting-fields and granaries. The
indications about the Benjamin .Smith place are that
in that vicinity may have been a cluster of wigwams
iir an Indian village. The half-dozen skeletons de-
note the presence of an Indian burial-place, and this,
with the presence of a granary and the finding of
stone relics, are supposed to point generally to the
occupation of a locality by several families and per-
haps a clan.
On the farm of Asahel Balcom, Esq., at a place
called Pond Me.adow, various relics have been found,
such as arrow heads, stone axes, etc. ; relics have also
been found on the Putter lands, in the south part of
the town. No di-^tinct tribe is known to have occu-
pied the place ; but as it was a point intermediate be-
tween the Indian plantation of Occogoogauset (Marl-
boro'), and Nashoba (Littleton), and Musketr.quid
(Concord), it is probable that it was much traversed
liy the natives in their intercourse one with another;
and that the birch canoe glided frequently beneath
the hemlocks overhanging the Assabet, as the swarthy
occupant made his way to Concord to visit Tahatawan
and his family. Comparatively little is known in
detail of the character of the Indian proprietors of
Isabaeth, but some fragments have come down to us
which are full of interest. Tantauious, or Old Jethro
as he was called in English, it is supposed in early
life lived at Isabaeth. This supposition is based on
his ownership of the land, as set forth in his trans-
action with Garret. A deed dated July 12, 1684, of
MAYNARD.
413
land two miles iu width adjoiniug Sudbury on the west
and Marlboro' and Slow on the east, Peter Jethro, son of
Old Jethro, signed, in which lie calls himself "one of the
ancient, native, heredit^iry, Indian proprietors of the
said land." The residence of the Jethros subsequent
to their home at Isabaeth was at Nobscot Hill, which is
partly in Sudbury, but more largely in Framingham.
A large stone-heap on this hill, which it is thought
may have been Jetbro's lookout, is mentioned in the
records as early as 1654 ; and it is said that until re-
cently, at least, Jetbro's " granery " was still to be
seen there. (Temple's ''Hist, of Framingham.")
Old Jethro was not a praying Indian. Gookin
says of him that he had twelve members in his family
and " they dwelt at a place near Sudbury, Nobscot
hill, but never submitted to the Christian profes-
sion (except his son Jethro)." He also says that
the old man had the " repute to be a powwow," and
he was held in great veneration by the natives. Drake
says that at the time of Philip's War he lived at
Nobscot and was ordered by the Colony to Deer Isl-
and, Boston Harbor, for security. Re-'^enting the ill
usage that was received from those conducting them
there, Jethro aud his family escaped iu the darkuess
of night. He was betrayed, however, by his sou,
Peter Jethro, into the hands of the English, by whom,
according to Hubbard, he was executed, September
26, 1676.
Peter Jethro was one of Mr. Eliot's converts to
Christianity in 1650. Gookin characterizes hiui as "a
grave and pious Indian." He was at one time a " min-
ister and teacher" to the Indians at Wesbakim, a
place near Lancaster. His English name is attached
to the deed of the New Grant. His Indian name was
Hantomush and was sometimes written Ammatohu.
The Indians who lived about this vicinity probably
belonged to the Nipneta or Nipmugs, who dwelt in the
interior of Massachusetts, or in what was called the
fresh water country, which the word Nipnet signifies.
The characteristic, and modes of life of the aborigines
were like those of other Indians iu the near neigh-
borhood, and these were not of a high standard before
they were changed by the influence of Christianity.
At Concord, where Tahatawan was chief, rules were
adopted by the praying band that set forth the de-
pravity that existed among them both in nature and
practice. Johnson speaks of the Indians there in
1646 as " being in very great subjugation to the
Divel ;" and the pow-wows as being "more conver-
sant with him than any other." They were given to
lying, "greasing,'' " pow-wowing " and "bowlings."
But the light of the Gospel, as it radiated from the
praying stations, fostered by such men as Gookin,
Eliot and others, soon had a salutary efl'ect upon
them. Some of the chief men were reached and their
lives and characters changed. A large share of the
praying Indians were fast friends of the English, and
aided them in the war with Philip. There is no
evidence that the early English inhabitants ever came
into conflict with the aborigines of the immediate
vicinity, nor that there was ever unfriendly inter-
course between them.
King Philip's War was inaugurated by an invading
force. The enemy for the most part came from afar,
and the settlers defended their homesteads from those
who never had a title thereto. It is supposed that a
trail ran from the well-known missionary station at
N'atick northwesterly to Stow and Nashoba (Littleton);
such a trail would probably pass through Assabet ter-
ritory. The natives along its course would naturally
make use of it, and have intercourse with these In-
dian villages.
Condition of the Country.— The country at the
time of its early occupation by the English was
largely an unbroken wilderness. Pine trees are sup-
posed to have grown there very abundantly. Johnson,
in his " History of New England," dated 1654, speaks
of the "heavy pine forests on the west side of Sudbury
River." The Sudbury records state that in 1661
men were appointed " to agree with Richard Proctor,
of Concord, about his trespass of burning up our pine
for making tar." The committee were to sue him if
they conld not agree. The absence of extensive pine
woodland to-day, and the existence of oak growth, is
uo evidence as to what these lands formerly produced ;
for it is the nature of these lands to alternate between
the growth of pine and oak. The broad acres that iu
the present may have a mixed growth of bard woods
may two centuries since have been densely covered
with pine. The foresta of the primitive period were
largely clear of brush. Johnson says, in the work al-
ready referred to : "The forests, free from under brush,
resembled a grove of huge trees improved by art."
There may have been two causes for this freedom
trom underbrush — one, the natural tendency of the
larger aud stronger trees to crowd out the smaller aud
weaker ones, and the other, the forest fires set by the
Indians, as supposed, for this purpose, that they
might the easier capture their game. These fires
were set in the autumn, after the equinoctial storm,
that they might burn with leas intensity. Whatever
the cause, the primitive forests were so much like
huge groves, that the early settlers could travel over
portions of them on horseback, and a trail through
the woods, where the country was free from streams
and swamps, furnished quite a passable way. To-
gether with these extensive iorests were also broken
spaces, open meadows, and sunny spots which kept
the country from being one of continuous shade. Some
of these places were kept clear by the Indians for
corn-fields. Notwithstanding the plentiful timber
growth, the settlers from the beginning were very
watchful against waste ; and laws were euacted for its
preservation. In 1646 the town of Sudbury ordered
that " no oak timber shall be falleu without leave
from those that are appointed by the town to give
leave to fell timber that shall hew above eighteen
inches at the butt end." Again, it was ordered that
444
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
no man should have timber upon the commonage if
he liad a supply on his own land. la 1047 it was
ordered that for ihat year the peo])le should have
timber "for every two shillings that they paid the
nynistry one tree." In 1671, John Adams was "to
have liberty to feed his cattle on Sudbury bound, and
to take old and dry wood that shall be upon the
ground, the said Adams to prevent any tre'fpass by
Concord herds or cattle, also in our wood and timber,
forthwith to give notice to the town."
Because of the extensive woodlands, it is supposed
there were greater falls of rain and snow in former
times, so that the little stream, which now has but
small water-power, might then have been autficient
to grind the corn of a township. The Asaabet may
then have been a wild, dashing stream in the spring-
time, overrunning its banks in a furious Hood ; while
so much of the country from which it drew Its supply,
being overshadowed in the summer by the outstretch-
ing branches of the leafy trees, it may at that season
also have been a considerable stream. But although
the snow and rain were more abundant then, if tra-
dition is trustworthy, the climate was not of necessity
more severe. On the contrary, there are indications
that the spring opened early, and that the frost was
gone, and the fields ready for seeding at a very sea-
sonable time. In the Sudbury Records it is stated
that at one time the town ordered " that the fences
should be set by the 1st or luth of April " ; and in
1(J42 it was ordered that no cattle were to be found on
the planting fields, and all the fences were to be up
by March 1st." tinLHs was to be cut in some of the
.Sudbury meadows by the HHh of July.
Eari.v Enhlish UiiI'P.v.n rs. — Maynard territory
had but very lew settlers prior to King Philip's War,
and what few were there were driven out by the sav-
ages on their devastating raids. (.')n the Stow side of the
river two men took up their abode about KJOO. These
were .Matthew Boon and John Kettle, both of whom,
it is said, came from Uharlestown. Boon, it is thought,
settled in the south or west part of the original
Stow territory ; and Kettle in the vicinity of Pompas-
siticiitt Hill, on land now included in Maynard (Bal-
com.) Kettle married for his tirst wife, Sarah Goode-
now, of Sudbury, and by this marriage had three
children — .fohn, Sarah and Joseph. For his second
wife he married Elizabeth Ward, by which marriage
he had one child or more. When the Indians in-
vaded the Stow territory. Kettle tied to Lancaster,
where his wife and some of his children were cap-
tured.
Mr. Boon remained in the territory till the invasion
by Philip, .\pril, 1676. On the day before the attack
on Sudbury, which was made April ilst, Mr. Boon
and a son, while endeavoring to make their way with
some of their goods to a place of safety, probably one
of the Sudbury garrison- houses, were slaiu by the In-
dians. They were escorted by Thomas Plympton, of
Sudbury, who met with the same fate.
On the monument of the Plympton family, in the
old burj'ing-ground at Sudbury, is the statement that
Thomas Plympton was killed by the Indians at
Boon's plain.
We have found comparatively little by which to
determine with certainty the names of those who first
settled in the part of Maynard that was once Sud-
bury. The fact that the ■' New Grant " lands ^\ere
allotted to certain individuals is no evidence that they
were ever occupied by them. It is probable, however,
that some of the owners of the lots lived on them prior
to Philip's War. The names of the following, as ac-
tual settlers in those early times, have come down to us
either by record or tr.tdition — Smith, Wedge, Crane.
Freeman, Carley or Kerley, Taylor, Rice, Brigham,
Maynard, Wood and Skinner. Others, who settled
later, are Jonas Balcom, Phineaa Pratt, Jabez Puffer,
Simon and Zacheriah Maynard, Arrington Gibson,
.John Jekyl and Marble. It is probable that such of
these settlers as were occupying the ground at the
breaking out of Philip's War were driven away by
the savages, .as it is supposed that every dwelling on
the west side of Sudbury River, except such as were
garrisoned, was destroyed in those dismal, distressing
days, [n a list of .Sudbury inhabitants attached to a
petition sent the General Court, purporting to con-
tain " An Accompt of Losse Sustenied by Severall
Inhabitants of y towne of Suilbury by y" Indian En-
emy, y' 2l9t Aprill, lG7(i,'' are the fiillowing names,
which, with others in the list, may have been of the
New Grant occupants: Joseph Freeman, loss £80;
.lohn .Smith, £80; Thomas Wedge, £1.5; (.'orporal
Henry Rice, £1S0; Thomas Rice, £100: Benjamin
Crane, £20, and " Widdow " Habgood (Hapgood) £20.
Mrs. Hapgood's husband was probably Shadrack or
Svdrack Hapgood, who was killed near Brookfield in
the Hutchinson expedition. A son, Thomas, settled
in the northeast part of Marlboro'. .Sydrack or Shad-
rack, who may have been another son, wsts one of the
settlers of Stow about 1778 or 1779. After the close
of Philip's War we conjecture the settlement of the
territory progressed slowly. The country had been
so scourged by the torch and tomahawk that the
frontier was somewhat shunned. Savage incursions
were made at times for years, by small, predatory
bands from the north and east, and life was imper-
iled and property insecure. According to a map of
Sudbury bv John Brigham, bearing date 1708, which
gives the squadrons of the New Grant, and also pur-
ports to give the location of every homestead in
Sudbury at that time, we find but fifteen dwellings
designated in the second and third squadrons north
of the " east and west thirty-rod highway," or the
part which is now mostly in Maynard. It is true,
that in some instances two families may have lived in
one house; but still the fact remains that the territory
was sparsely settled for over a quarter of a century
after the conflict closed.
The same is true of the Stow side of the territory.
MAYNAKD.
445
Before Philip's War it was but sparsely peopled. Who
was the first settler afterwards Ls unknown (Hist, of
Stow). As before stated, December 4, 1672, a com-
mittee was appointed to lay out twelve farms of fifty
acres each, and " to cast lotts for them," yet as late
as June 1, 1675, most of these lots had been forfeited
by a failure of the owners to settle upon them. When
the war closed desolation brooded over the lonelv
lands and men were slow to return. In 1681 a list is
given of twelve allotments of laud, which lots, it is
supposed, were taken up by 1678 or 1679. These
were assigned to the minister and the following
named persons : Boaz Brown, (iershom Heale, John
Buttrick, Ephraim Heldieth, Thomas Stevens, Steven
Hall, Samuel Buttrick, Joseph Freeman, Joseph Da-
by, Thomas Gates and Sydrack Hapgood (Drake's
"County Hist.")
It it stated that the country about Stow, being de-
serted by its inhabitants during the war with King
Philip, was quite a place for the Indians to gather |
before making their devastating incursions on the
neighboring towns. " Tradition states that the In- ]
dians ouce held a consultation on Pompasitticutt
Hill, overlooking Concord and .Sudbury, relative to
which place they shouUl destroy. Sudbury was de-
cided upon because one of the leading warriors said,
' We no prosper if we burn Coucoid. The Great
S|nrit love that |)eoi)lf. He tell us not to go there.
They have a great man there. He great pray.' This
allusion was to Rev. Edward Bulkley, the Concord
minister. They feari'd hi.-- influence with the tireat
Spirit. Hence Concord was saved and Suilbuiy suf-
fered." (Drake's "County Hist."/
In the Stow "t)ld Proprietors' Book," with date
May 19, 1719, is the following record in relation to
selections of land :
'* Pitched on by nichiir-I Teiiipl<- bel""«*fn Piinn Hrook and WillHid'b
Pond. tRieal Huald, Ben'., "n Pumiiei^ili' iil Hill, .ioiniiiK lu Jotsejiti .lew-
eH'g land, Julni hulteiiik, iMi ruui|«itii-nt Hill, unti uu the nnrth i^idt-
of his ten acre*; uf inertdnw. .laiuli Stevens Ht tin- (»uk ^wiiniii at tjic ten
acres on Aesabelb ^^^K'1^ ati'l m F.lbow nieadou. 'riiomaR Wbituey-
gen' . juiniiifX tt> liib liivlf.niiKin ine;iit>>w and Mr. liiK-^enb land. Eliza-
beth Failbiink, uii Puniipisiticiit ilill and at i;reat meadow. John Whil-
aker, on Poni]>iticilt Hill and at gieeii Meadow. .Iidin Kvelelli, on
Poriip^iti'iit Hill. .Iiiccph Itaby, ri^lit acrnto. the Hill fioiti lilb loniw
lot to Sndbnry line Wetlierli.v'« line. Stephen Kaiidall, four acres by hir.
butue-lot and at his own nieailnw on .Awabeih Brook "
"Slow, t.tct. y an, l~3b. Voterl, on Niid day that Kjdiraini (jaten have
one acre and three ipiaiterd of tiphuid in the Lolunion laud >n Stow, lying
on the westerly Bide of Mid t^atef' House. lot, for consideration of ten
Shillttigs and one <iuart of Rntne.''
Philip's War. — As we have reason for supposing
that the part of Sudbury now Maynard was more or
less occupied by English settlers when Philip swept
the town with his besom of destruction, a few facts
relative to that Indian invasion may be both inter-
esting and important. The attack, as has been
stated, was on the 2l8t of Ai)ril, l(i7i>. It was a large
force that was led by Philip. According to some
writers there were 1500 warriors and squaws. There
was not a town to the westward of Sudburj' to serve
as a barrier to the conquering march of the chief.
Marlboro' had fallen, and her dwelling-houses, except
the garrisons, were ash-heaps. A few weeks before
this attack a repulse was given the enemy by men
from Sudbury and Marlboro', who surprised them
as they slept at night about their camp-fires, near the
town's western boundary. This attack, though it may
have hindered them from further depre<lations at the
time, served only as a temporary' check; and it is
supposed that to retrieve the loss sustained at that
time, and avenge the death of their slain, as well as
to wipe out another settlement towards the seaboard,
they rallied with a mighty force for the work. The
west part of the town was to feel the first efl'ects of
the onslaught, and there was no resource left the in-
habitants but to leave the farms they had cleared, and
the humble dwellings they had erected by unremit-
ting toil, and flee to the garrisons. The nearest of
these was, so far as we know, the Walker garrison,
which still stands in the " New Grant " territory, in the
third squadron, and not far from the southern bdun-
dary of the Northwest District. It is a quaint old
structure in the walls of which are upright plank to
resist the force of balls. Another place of refuge was
in the Pantry (Northeast) District of Sudbury. At this
place was a small block-houae, and, tradition says, a
garrison-house, .\nother garrison, on the west of
Sudbury River, was the Haynes garrison, near the
."^udbury River meadows; antl still another, the
Browne garrison, at Nobscol. in the fourth squadron
of the " New Grant.'' Probably within one or all of
I these, and other fortified farm-houses on the west
side, of which we have no information, the inhiibit-
I .ints of the "New Grant" lands were sheltered by
! the night of the 20th of .\pril. 'I'lic case of Thomas
Piympton and Boon, already mentioned as fleeing
before the savages to a place of refuge, pnibably indi-
cates the movements of all the settlers in that ex-
posed region at that time. Early on the morning of
the 21st the enemy applied the torch to the deserteil
I dwellings, having been distributed throughout the
town during the night for the purpose, and the settlers
saw, in the smoke borne aloft on the morning air, the
I la.st trace of their former dwelling-places. Around
the garrison-houses was a scene of tumultuous con-
flict. About the time of firing the deserted houses
the enemy attacked the fortified places with great
fury. The fight at the Haynes garrison lasted from
morning till midday, when the savages were re|)ul8ed
by the bold defenders who sallied forth, and, as the
record informs us, drove them from their " skulking
approaches." In all the sad scenes of those days —
the fight, the siege, the defense, the people of the
" New Grant " lands doubtless had their share, and
I none more than they would be likely to experience
j their desolating efl'ects. Relief was sent from neigh-
! boring towns, and from as far east as Boston. Twelve
I men came from Concord, eleven of whom were slain
1 in the river meadow near the Haynes garrison-hou.se.
Another parly came from Walertown, which then was
446
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the border town on the east. This whs commanded
or sent by Capt. Hugh Mason, and did valiant worii
in assisting to drive the Indians from the east to thf
west side of the Sudbury River, and so saving the
east side settlement. The other force was led bv
Captain Wadsworth, of Milton. Captain Wadswortb
engaged the main force of the enemy at Green Hill
South Sudbury. He was drawn into an ambush and
fought bravely till the approach of night and a forest
fire forced him from his position, when his rank.'-
were broken and most of his command were captured
or slain. A monument marks the spot where th<
slain soldiers were buried in one common grave, near
where they fell. (For details of the Wadsworth
Fight or Battle of Green Hill, see "History ol
Sudbury.") But though a part of the town received
assistance, nothing could .save the Northwe.st District,
which, from its isolated condition, was doomed from
the first approach of the savage.
LocATio>f OF Early Homesteads. — Tradition
and record have located some of the early home-
steads and given a few fragmentary facts concerning;
the early settlers.
Smith. — The lands at first possessed by the Smith
family were situated on both sides of the .\s3abet
River, and included all that now occupied by the As-
sabet Manufacturing Company. An old Smith home-
stead stood in the rear of Sudbury Street, on the
island side of the river, and other homesteads of thf
family were scattered about the territory. The only
person now left in town bearing the family name
is Benjamin, who lives on the Stow side of the river
Abraham and William built a family tomb on the
William Smith place. <3n the Levi Smith place, now
owned by the Levi Smith heirs, Jonathan kept a
hotel about eighty years ago. John n-as at Sudbury
in 1647. He may have been John Smith, an early
settler of Watertown. His wife's name was Sarah.
He had assigned him lot No. 29 in the Second Squad-
ron of the " Two-Mile Grant." The names Thomas
and Amos were early in the family.
There is a tradition that some time early in the set
tiement of the town, during a severe storm in the
spring of the year, several persons came to and were
quietly quartered in the bam of one of the Smiths,
perhaps Thomas, near where Mr. A. S. Thompson now
resides. The unknown visitors were afterwards sup-
posed to have been pirates, from the fact that they
were very free with their money, paying liberally for
what they obtained from the family. It was said that
they threw "pieces of eight" at the swallows for
amusement, and before leaving procured from the
house some clothing fitted for bags, and tools for dig-
ging. The bags, being filled with something appar-
ently heavy, were carried by them to the woodi*,
northerly of the house, and probably buried. The
suspected parties soon after left, no one knowing
whither they went. Subsequently Mr. Smith re-
ceived a letter from some pirates that had been cap-
tured, convicted, and were about to be executed, re-
questing him to come and see them, and they would
give him information that would be of value to him ;
but .Mr. Smith, with tlie feeling of distrust for crimi-
nals common to those days, paid no regard to the re-
quest, and, for aught known, the secret died with the
writers and may never be revealed, unless some for-
tunate person should discover the hiding-place.
Maynard. — It is supposed that Simon Maynard was
one of the original settlers of the soil. Another who
was there early was Zachariah. The Maynard home-
stead was probably near "the Spring," a few rods
east of the .fames McGrath, formerly the Otis PuflTer
place. Little or no trace now remains of this ancient
homestead, and the household that dwelt in it were
long ago gathered to their fathers. The first Maynard
in Sudbury was John, who, it is supposed, brought
with him to America a son Joseph, aged eight years.
He married for his second wife Mary A.xdell in 1646.
By this marriage he had a son named " Zachery,"
born in 1647, and three daughters, one of whom mar-
ried Daniel Hudson. Mr. Maynard was a petitioner
for the Marlboro' Plantation, and died at Sudbury in
1672. Descendants of the family still live in Sudbury
and M.iynard, among whom are John A., of the for-
mer town, and the Maynards of the latter, who are
proprietors of the Maynard Mills, and from whom the
town has received its name.
Rice. — It is supposed that Mathias was the earliest
of this name in the territory. He married a sister of
John and Joseph Balcom, and, it is supposed, owned
a strip or range of land running parallel with the
Balcom estate. The name of Jonathan has long been
familiarly associated with the Rice tavern. The first
to keep this old inn was Jonathan, Sr. It was
opened probably in the early part of the eighteenth
century, perhaps earlier, and was continued as an inn
until about 1815. The brother of Jonathan was
William. Jonathan, the successor of the first land-
lord, was his nephew. He was a bachelor, and in
stature tall and slim. He died about 1828, near the
age of eighty. The Rice tavern was kept at the place
now in the possession of John H. Vo%e.
Colonel Jonathan Rice was a prominent military
man. He is mentioned on the Sudbury muster rolls
as he passes through the various grades of office. In
1777 and 1778 he is mentioned as captain at Saratoga
in a three-months' campaign. The lands connected
with the Rice estate were conveyed by Benjamin
Crane, of Stow, to Joseph Rice, of Marlboro', in 1685,
and are described as follows :
"Six stone and five acree of lanil that he piircbafled of .lohn Woode,
Pen'., auil Jobn Riitter, Seu'., uod id )M>iinHe<j iiortlinHrd and westward
with the Ihu<I of TlioniHS Wedge, Hoiitliuard with (he land of Soluiuoa
■lohiiBoU, -Idu' , eaatward by a highway thirty roilfi wide, ruuniiig
I>etweeii tlie iM|iiadruii uf lots in I be New <.;miitauf Sudbtiry aforesaid, to
have and to bold the },aid ti-Hct uf lanil, six stone and tlve acrefl-{be the
haiue more or less) with the bouM tbereoo erected, and all the feocesbe-
loDging to the said tract of laud, and all timber and Uruwood and the
orclinnl Ibereou, with all the convenieucy of water thereon, whether uf
I'uudor Uruuk, and all jiroAt and advantage,"
A , //cci-/~, Lx:c i^ r
V
MAYNARD.
447
This land was conveyed by Jonathan Rice to Wil-
liam Rice, his son, and in 1733 described as bounded
by land now in possession of Ephraim Pratt.
Edmund Rice was one of the early grantees of Sud-
bury, and one of the petitioners for the plantation of
Marlboro' in 1656. His son Henry came with him
from England, and had as.«igned him lot No. 31 in
the third squadron of the " New Grant."
Brown. — The Brown farm, which consisted of two
hundred acres allowed to William Brown by the
General Court, wa.s situated north of the Assabet
River, mostly on the bend running westerly. It liei-
on both sides of the road to South Acton, and its north-
ern boundary reaches nearly to the Acton town bound
The Marlboro' Branch of the Fitchburg Railroad passes
through a part of it. We are informed by a deed
dated 1730 that it was conveyed by Edmund to
Josiah Brown, of Sudbury, for thesum of £1-500.
The following is a partial copy of the deed, dated,
Sept. 3. 1739 :
"Tn all people to wlioni these preeentE Kball come, Greetinc: Knowyp
that I. Edntuiid Bruwn, of towiiHliip of york, in the Province of y« Jlas
(iachii^etts Bay, in Neu Eugliind, yeoman, for and vpon coneideration of
y sum of Fifteen Hunqred Poiindb to nie in hand well and truly pniil
before the insealing here.if, ti\ Josiah Brown, of Sudbury, in the
County of Middlewx. ic(\ ... a cerlaiL tract of land t'ytuate,
Lying, and Beinp in Stow iu the County of Middlesex, and Province
aforesaid, contalniiii: by eslimation Two hundred acres, L>e the same
more or lese, Ijoillided its followeth, vi7.. ; Be|;inning at yt' Northwesterly
comer "f the preniiseg. at a Stake A" Stones thence, running easterly one
mile to a tbirty-rofi hij^liway tbeiice turns and runs southerly on
said bichway seventy-wven riKlp, or near lliereaboiits tti iandn in the
possession ot Edward Fuller, and thence run^ westerly one mile to lands
in the poaesBion of .\mos Brown (hence northerly to the Stake 1
Stonea where we began. Also, one other piece of laud lying lu Sbrwe-
burj-, Ac. EnsifM' HnowN.
The Brown farm has since been divided up, and is
now to an extent possessed by the Brown heirs.
Fifty acres belong to George Brnwn and another sec-
tion to Henry Fowler, who married into the family.
Rev. Edmund Brown was the first minister of the
Sudbury Church and died in 107S ; William was the
first deacon. They both came from England and
were of the town's original grantees.
Piiffei-. — Jabez and James, the first of this family
in Sudbury, came from Braintree in 1712. Capt. Ja-
bez married Mary Glazier in 1702. He had seven
children and died in 1746. Jabez (2d) married
Thankful Haynes, of Sudbury. A son of Jabez (2d)
was Rev. Reuben Puffer, who graduated at Harvard
College in 1778. He afterwards resided at Berlin, and
became somewhat distinguished in his profession. He
received the degree of D.D. from his Alma Maler.
The Puffer farm was in the southerly part of the
" New Grants," and was formerly the Wedge-Pratt
farm. In this vicinity were extensive woodlands,
which were the favorite resorts of wild pigeons.
These birds were caught in abundance by means of a
net ; and to such an extent was this done on the
Puffer place, that one of the late proprietors was
familiarly known in the neighborhood as "Pigeon-
Catching Pufier."
The process of capturing these birds was to spread
grain over the ground in some favorable place in the
woods for the space of a few feet or rods and thus
entice the birds to a spot where a net was so arranged
that it could be sprung by a person concealed in a
bow-house. Due precaution was taken by the pro-
prietor to prevent the firing of guns in the near
neighborhood, and the birds, for a time undisturbed,
lingered about the place until allured to the net.
This skillful pigeon-catcher once took thirty-nine
dozens and eleven birds at one draw of his net; the
twelfth bird of the last dozen was also captured, but
escaped before being taken from the net.
Freeman. — The mark of Samuel Freeman, with the
name of John Balcora, is attached to the Indian deed
of the ■' New Grants," testifying that John Boman,
oue of the Indian proprietors of the land, signed the
deed in their presence. We have no definite knowl-
edge of the exact place of the Freeman homestead.
The name of Joseph is among the eleven Stow set-
tlers who had lots assigned them in 1678 or 167!»;
and the same name is among the Sudbury petitioners
for relief because of loss in King Philip's War. John
Freeman was one of the original Sudbury grantees.
His wife's name was Elizabeth, and they had one
child named Joseph, born March 29, 1645.
The name of Joseph Freeman is among the names
given in the Indian deed of the " New Grant."
Giltfon. — The Gibson family early and for a long
time lived on the Stow side of the river, on what is
now known as the Summer Hill farm, on the south
side of Pomposetticut Hill. An early member of the
family was Arrington.
Taylor. — The Taylors lived west of the present
Balcom place, and their estate extended northerly
towards the river. The lands long since passed out
of the possession of the family.
Brighnm. — The Brighams lived on the old Sudbury
and Marlboro' road, near the Sudbury town line.
The old Brigham homestead, where Abijah formerly
lived, stood about ten rods west of the present Lucius
Brigham house. It was a large, old-fashioned, red
building, with a long sloping roof. The name of
John Brigham is on the Indian deed of the new grant
lands, and also on the petition to Gov. Dudley io
1706-07for a West Precinct in Sudbury. The ancestor
of the family in New England was Thomas, who came
from London to America in 1635. The name of John
Brigham is among the names given in the deeji of
the " New Grant."
Marble. — The Marble family lived on the Stow side
of the river. The marble place was probably that
occupied by the Daniel Whitman family, on the Acton
town line. None by the name now reside in town.
Pratt. — This family lived in the Northwest District
of Sudburj-, in the south part of the present territory
of Maynard. In 1743 the farm was sold to Jabez
Puffer, of Braintree.
Ephraim Pratt went to Shutesbury, where he died in
448
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
1804. It is said that he was one hundreil and sixteen
years old at the time of his death. The tbllowin);
is an account given of him in Dr. Dwight's " Travels:"
" He waa born at Sudbury, .^laHsachuselta, ID 1G8T, und iD uoe tuunth
from the date of our .irrival ^We^iue^day, Noveiuljer 13, 1.Sm:{), wimiIiJ
complete hie uoe liiioihed iimt ^l.xteeutb year. He wat> uf niJUdle
stature, Srnily built, plump. i>ul nut encnuiUrTe<l with Heali ; le&^ with. I
ered thiiQ iiitiltitiitle'i at aeverity ; po.ssessed coimideraUle strength, as waj*
evident froru the gra.sp uf his hand and the sound ut hia voice, and
without any marks of e.Mreme age. About two uionlhs before his r^iglI^
became 90 impaired (hat he was iiiial'le to distiugiii>h pei-solia. Ilia hear,
ing, also, for a shurt lime had been so iiiiperlect, that he could not dis-
tinctly hear cnraiiioii conversation. Uia memory wiu. still \igorons:
hia underutaodiiig nituiid, and bis mind sprightly and vigonms. The
principal pai-t ul the time which I was in the house, he held me by the
hand ; cheerfully answered all my •luestii-ua ; readily gave me all ac-
count of himself in such particulars as I wished to know, observed lo
Die that my voice iudicaled that 1 was not less than furty-tive yeara ol
age, and that he must appear very oUi to me; adding, however, thai
.^unie men who had not passeil tlicii ^e\eulielh year, probably looked
almost or '(Ulte as old .is Inmself. Tlieienialk was cerlainly just, bur
it was the hist liuie that 1 had Ih-ard persona who had reaclieil the age
of seventy considered ai being young. We are informed, partly by him
seW and partly l>y hi^ bM^r,lliat he bad been a lab.inuus man nil his life :
and, partiiMiIal ly. that he had mown gra.^s t-ne hnudred and one years
"iicL'es..*ively. The preceding summer he liail been nimble to pertorni
this labor. During litis season liis utmost elturt waf* a walk of half ■> [
mite. Ill this walk he stumbled uver a log anil fell. lliiiiiedlalel\ I
aflernal'da lie began evidently to decline, and lost in a innpiderable de ]
gree both hia sight ainl ht.aring. I
" III the slimmer -if Isiij he walked withoiil inci.nvenieni'e Iwoiiiiles. I
and mowed a -mall i|Uanlit\ of grass. Throu<:hout bis hb- be had
■ 'Hen uniformly retupci ate. .\idem npnits be rarely lasted. I'ider lie
■ Iralik al times, laii sparingly. In the vigorous pehisls of lite be hail
ao usIoine<l hiiuself to eat tii.sli, but more alisteinioiisly tlian most olliei i
jieople in tills i''oiiiir> . Milk, which bad always been a great part, wiin
now the whole of his diet. He i> naturally cheerful and liumoioils, |
and not mm h inclined bi serious ihinkiiig. .\ccording lo an aci'ioint I
which he gave liis host, lie made a public profession id' religion, nearly i
>eveiitj yeai-s liebire our visit to liiiii ; but was not siiplK'Si.-l by him. nor i
by others ac'iuainted with him, to be a religions man. lIi- ei-iiversed j
easily, and was plainly gratirti-d wiih the vi...its und conver.Tatioii -d
slriillger... U'lieii he was ninety. lliiee years old, he made a bargain w illi '
Ills bust I who told us the sloryi, thai he piioiild ..iipiixrt liiui during the <
remain<ier td In... life for C-U. lie \\iu« never ^n k but ouif, and then :
with fe\er and ague. It is -carccl\ necessary lo i.b-i.rx e llial a man ole- I
liiindred and sixteen years old, wilhoilt religion, was a nlelaiiclioly ..ighl
iViiod. — None of the former Wood family now
Jive in Maynard. A little more than a quarter of a
century ago two of the family resided on the Stow side
of the river and kept quite a popular ladies' boarding-
Charlestown, Mass., a blacksmith. He married Eliz-
abeth Haynes, of Sudbury. Soon after hi.s death, in
168'?, the family moved to Sudbury, and settled in the
locality above designated. The family has been a
prominent one, and the name familiar on the muster-
rolls of the town. Asahel Balcom, the only one of
the name remaining in town, is a prominent citizen.
Before the incorporation of the town he was one of
the familiar town officials of Sudbury. At one time
he taught the school in the Northwest District. He
was connected with the Sudbury military company, a
justice of the peace, and passed through the various
town offices with the esteem of hi.s townsmen. He
wrote the historical sketch of Maynard for Drake's
" County History."
As one by one the former owners of Ihese old estates
pa.ssed away, their remains were probably carried for
interment to the old burial-|ilaces of Sudbury and
Stow. The oldei burying-ground in Sudbury wa.« on
the east side of Sudbury River, near th^ i)resent Way-
I l.ind Centre, .\biiut the time of the erection of a
meeting-house at Rocky Plain (Sudbury Centre) land
was set apart for a burial-place there, and since then
j .slow proce.s.sion.-i from the Xorlhwe:«t District have
j mostly sttipped at it; gate. The ;;rave of Captain
' .fabez PiiHpr is iiist besitle the countv road, on the
niirth side of this yard ; and scattered throughout that
j " tliickly-peo|)led grouiul " are time-worn tombstones
I 111) which are in.'scribe'l the names of Rice, Balcoui,
j Smith, Pratt, Maynard, Willis and others,
i E.^r.LV RKi.iiiiofs ANi> KmtA riiiNAi. .Vpvaxt-
Aulis. — As Maynard territory was originally a part of
two towns.and situated on the outskirts, the inhabit-
ants were remote from churches and scliooU. Thoseliv-
ing in Sudbury were prior to 17J2-23,at which time a
meeting-house was erectetl at Rocky Plain (Sudbury
Centre), a half ilozen miles from church. On ;i petition
presented to the (ieneral Court by the people in the
west part of Sudbury, bearing date .January 15, 1707,
amongthetbirtyime signatures are the folio wing names,
of persons who probably lived in the Northwest Dis-
trict: " John Krigham,Tho. Smith, timothy gib.son, Jr.,
school. The house belonging to the family is near | .Joseph F. Jewel [his mark], .Melo C. Taylor [his
the old Sudbury and Stow town line. The bridge i mark], John Balcom, Joseph Balcom, Thomas Smith,
near the " Whitman Place," is commonly known as .Junior, Jonathan Rice." The substance of the peti-
the " Dr. Wood's Bridge." tion sets forth the liardships incident to the long
John Wood was one of the original grantees of I journey to the meeting-house, on the east side of Sud-
Sudbury. He was one of the petitioners for the i bury River. The following is the petition :
Marlboro' township, and was one of the selectmen of ,
that town in 1063-65. ; " r- '•'•■■" ¥ tl..- W..t .-i.U Pen,,le ..f S.,.ll.,n!i ,o Gnveruor D.,.lh,j and
Jehjl. — The land owned by JekyI was, it is sup- '
posed, on the Stow side of the river, in the vicinity of
Pompassiticutt Hill. John was the name of an early :
member of the family. '
Balcom. — The Balcom estate was first owned by
John and Joseph. It included land now in the pos- \
session of Asahel Balcom, Esq., and three or four
strips extending from about this place to the Vose '
farm. The Balcoms are descended from Henry, of
/ l/i.. llVit .^i.^ Pen,ile
the i!eiifrut .Iiwee//)/*/.
" The petition of iia, who are the subscribers living on ye west aide of
Sudbury great River, Humbly showelh thai whereas ye All-wise and
over.ltilliiig providence of ye great i;o*i, Lord of Heaven and Kartli,
who is tiod blesseil forever imaue, hath i-nsl our lott to fall on that side
.'f Ihe River by Iteason of the find id wutnre, wliifli for a very great
part of the yeare doth very niiicli incomode iia and idlen by evtreniity
of water and terrible winds, and a great part of the winter by ice, as it
is at this present, so that wee are shut up and cannot come forth, and
many tiiiies wee doe atempt to git over our tliid, we are forced for to
seek our gpiritnul goovl with the peril of our Lives.
'* Ueside the e:ttreme Tnvvitl that many of ua are ExjioBeU unto sum
MAYNARD.
449
3: 4 : 5 : 6; miles much more Minn a Sjilibatli day's journey, by ReftBOD
of these and many more ohjecti')ri« — (•» niauy liere toeniinierale — where-
by miiny of out i-hililreri aiicl little ones, Hiicient :in't weak fKTBont, can
%'ery Itarly allend tin- pntilir worsliiji. Tlieconcidered itrenii^^HB we truly
pray yiiui E\relleiK-y ami ye Htniotiilile ("'Hinril anil Hi)u>e of liepre-
eentatives Im (-•mttider and ciniipaiiMonale u« in our F\lreiue >ufTerinj;
ronrlilion, anil if wi* may ulitain mi nnich favur in your Eyes ilx to emnl
»- (iiiii pr"Beiit>i] n> iiiap[>iiiiii iii> a '^Hjniiiiity to si-e and eoiiiiider our cir-
runiKtanre^ and make report tliereiil to this liunorahle CourL And your
pore |ietitioners eliall ever pniy.
"Smi^iir^, .lanuarj lo"! 171111-07."
Tiiis shows that distatice did not altogether deter
the people (Voiii Sabbath observauce in the house
of worsliiji, but it indicates the denials they endured
for the sake of their faith.
It also shows the condition of things to which
the people of the district were subjected. It was by
no means a nieaningles.s paper that was tiius sent to
the Court, but every sentence had a real significance.
To be deprived of sanctuary privileges in those times
had more of hard.sbi{> than such deprivations would
have in these later years. With few books of any
description in their homes, with no issues of the peri-
odical fioni a weekly press and little intercourse with
their towiis|ieople of other parts of the sparsely-set-
tled coinniunity , absence from church on the Sabbath
meant much. Neither did the petitioners overesti-
mate the obstacles that sometimes stood in their way.
It was nut the mere matter of distance, but the perils
that were incident to il, of which they mostly com-
plained. Those brave pioneer spirits were not stopped
by a shadow. They were made of stern stuff, and it
took a siilistance to block up their way. liut the sub-
stance was there. The Sudbury Itiver was at times
utterly impassable. Vast Hoods sometimes covered
the entire meadows. < >n diHerent occjisions the in-
habitants of Sudbury sought aid from the (ieneral
I'ourt lor the betterment of the river meadows. T'he
same Hoods that covered the meadow-lands covered,
also, the causeway, and sometimes the bridge itself.
The town, in its earlier history, appointed parties '" to
stake the causeway," that when the flood was upon
them travellers might not stray from their way and
perish. Again and again were those causeways raised
to a place then above the flood, but not until com-
paratively modern times were they exempt from occa-
sional inundations.
Hut better times were to come to the people.
The petition for a division of the town of Sudbury
into an East and AVest Precinct succeeded after a
lapse of nearly a score of years. By 172ci preaching
services began to be held on the west side of the river
aiid a meeting-house was completed there by 1725.
New Sabbath day accommodations were thus aflbrded
to the inhabitants of the Northwest District, and the
distance to the meeting-house was shortened by
about three miles. No longer was the " Great River,
with its flud of watare," to keep them at home on Sun-
day. At the time that this new meeting-house was
erected, the New Lancaster Road ran, as now (with
some slight variation) from " Rocky Plain " (Sudbury
29-ii
Centre) to the vicinity of the Assabet River and the
distance over it was but about three ipiles. In those
earlier times this distance might be considered quite
short, especially would it be so considered in compar-
ison with the longer one which had hitherto been
travelled. There was no swelling flood to be crossed ;
uo high, bleak hills, with a rough, circuitous path, but
a pleasant way by the occasional farm-house and
sometimes by the sheltering woods.
The people of the town's out-districts in those days
carried their dinners with them to church, and some-
times a small foot-stove with coals. Some of the in-
habitants from the remote homesteads had a small
house near the place of worship, called a " noon-
house," whither they rejiaired at the noon inter-
mission. These " noon-houses" were provided with
a fire-place, which the owners kept supplied with
wood, and in this snug, quiet resort they could com-
fortably pass the noon hour, warm their lunch, re-
plenish their foot-stove with coals and drive off the
chill of their long morning walk or ride, and the still
greater chill occasioned by the fireless meeting-house
As late as 1772 there is on the Sudbury record the fol-
lowing, relating t<i four persons who were, it is sup-
posed, then citizens of the Northwest District, and who
were probably associated as neighbors in the work of
|)roviding a " noon-house : "
"The town gave leave to John Balcom, Joseph
Willis, -Vbijah Brigham and Jonathan Smith, to set
uj) a small Uouse on the town land near the west
meeting-house for the peo|)le to repair to on the Sab-
bath day."
In those times the people rode to meeting on horse-
back, the |)illion being used, a man riding in front and
the woman behind. The old " horse-block," until
within a few years, stood beneath a large button-wood
tree before the old meeting-house at Sudbury Centre.
To this large, flat stone — for such the " horse-block "
was — the church-goers from the Northwest District
directed the horse, that the woman might safely
alight. There they unloaded the foot-stove and basket
of lunch, and, if early, repaired perhaps to the noon-
house to deposit their food, arrange their wraps, and
start a fire that it might be in readiness for their noon-
day meal.
The people of the " New Grant " lots, after the
comjiletion of a west-side meeting-house at Sudbury,
still enjoyed the services of the Rev. Israel Loring,
who cast his lot with the West Precinct. The minis-
trations of such a man were a privilege to any people
who were religiously disposed, and their long journey
was by no means without its great spiritual benefite.
Dr. Loring continued their minister for years, dying
in 1772, in the ninetieth year of his age and the
sixty-sixth of his ministry. His successor in the
pastoral oflBce was Rev. Jacob Bigelow, who was
ordained Nov. 11, 1772, and continued their minister
for years.
The church privileges that were afforded the aet-
450
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tiers of the Maynard territory by Sudbury were, so
far as we know, all that they received until as late as
1683, when the town of Stow made a " rate " for
preaching. One of the early ministers who preached
a short time on the Stow side was Rev. Samuel Paris,
in whose family at Salem Village (now Danvers), the
Salem witchcraft delusion began. June 5, 1685, the
town of Stow made a rate to pay Mr. Paris "for his
pains amongst us." This clergyman afterwards lived
and taught school in Sudbury, where he died. The
youth of the Northwest District may have had him for
an instructor, as the records inform us that in 1717
he was to teach school " four months on the west side
the river and the rest of the year at his own house."
Mr. Paris preached but a short time for the people
of Stow. On the 24th of July, 1609, a call was ex-
tended to Rev. John Eveleth, anil in 1702 he was in-
stalled as pastor. He continued as the town's minis-
ter until 1717, when he was dismissed, and in l'}x,
Rev. Jolin Gardner became liis successor and contin-
ued such for over tifty-si.K years. For substance of
doctrine doubtles.s the preaching to which wiiich the
people who lived on either side the river listened w;is
sound and after the old forms of faith, but until tlie
commencement of Mr. Gardner's pastorate there
probably lacked on the Stow side that stability and
consecutiveness of influence that the people enjoyed
who lived on the Sudbury side, where there were but
three pastors in the long space of more than a cen-
tury and a quarter, during a large part of which time
the ministry was exceptionally good.
But after Mr. Gardner's installation there was a
long, generally peaceful and influential pastorate,
during which season over two hundred persons united
with the church.
After Rev. John Gardner's decease. Rev. Jonathan
Xewell was installed as pastor of the Stow Church.
His installation took place in 1774, and continued un-
til December 22, 1828, when the town accepted of his
resignation and voted " to hold in lusting remem-
brance and veneration the Rev. Mr. Newell . . .
for the deep interest he has ever manifested in their
welfare collectively and individually."
Schools. — Educational privileges, like those of a re-
ligious nature, were for years only to be obtained by
exposure and elTort. In Sudbury, prior to 1700, they
were very scant ; and when, a little later, a school was
established on each side the river, the children living
remote from the centres would naturally be at a dis-
advantage. But as years advanced, privileges in-
creased. By April 17, 1719, the town was
called upon " to see if it will grant the northwest
quarter of the town's petition, they desiring the
school-master some part of the time with them.''
Among the teachers who early taught in town was
John Balcom. In 1701 the town " voted and chose
John Long and John Balcom," who were to " teach
children to rede and wright and cast accounts." As
the family of Henry Balcom, of Charlestown, moved
to the northwest part of Sudbury about 1685, it
is probable that this family furnished one of the
town's early school-ma.-ters. In 1779 the town of
Sudbury voted to builil a new school-house in the
"northwest coiner of the town,'' and to appropriate
two old school-houses for the erection of a new one.
In 1800 the town granted money for building three
school -houses, which money was to be equally di-
vided between the clistricts. The Northwest was to
have for its share 5=157.50. Lieutenant Hopestill
Willis \v;uj then committee-man for the di.strict. The
northwest portion of Sudbury, now in Maynard, was,
it is suppo.sed, a school district for at least a hundred
and fifty years. The school-house stood at about the
centre of the district, by the county roadside, not far
from the Balcom place. For years there was quite a
well-known private .school for young ladies in this
district, called tlie Smith School. It wiw kept by Miss
Susan Smith at the Levi Smith place and wiis discon-
tinued about thirty years ago. On the Stow aide
school privileges were perhaps even more meagre in
the early times than on the Sudbury side, its scttle-
ineiit lieing of later ilale. The first rel'erence to schools
there is said to be in 1715, when a school-master was
cho.sen for one quarter of a year. Thu schools were
at (irst kept in private houses and the vote to build
the first school-house was in 171jl-;i2.
Cisr(>.%[.s, 3L\XNEi!.s AND Laws. — The customs,
manners and laws of Sudbury belonged to the inhabit-
ants of the Northwest District in common with all
the others. The people were of an English ancestry,
associated together in pioneer work and partook of and
were moulded by the same general influences. They
were religious in their habits, stanch and Puritanic in
their princi])les. They greatly venerated God's word.
Town-meetings were opened by prayer, and an over-
ruling Providence was recognized in life's common
affairs. For many years the [leople met for political
purposes in the meeting-house on the east side of the
river. At this place also, as a small social and com-
mercial centre, they obtained news from the other
settlements. Every tax-payer was called upon to
support the minister of the town by the payment of
"rates." These rates were levied by the invoice-
taker and gathered by the town marshal. The people
were as surely called upon to pay the minister's tax
as the King's tax.
The following records show that the town was not
careless in collecting these dues: "November, 1670,
Ordered that Jon. .Stanhope do see that the minis-
ter's rate be duly paid, aud in case any neglect or
refuse to pay their proportions to said rates when due,
he is appointed and impowered by the town to sum-
mons such persons before a magistrate, there to answer
for their neglect." In 1683-S4 it was voted, "That
whereas certain proprietors and inhabitants of the
town have neglected to pay their proportions to the
minister's rate, and added to the evil by not paying
the proportion due upon the two six months' rates
MATNARD.
451
made since, to the dishonor of God, contempt of his
worship, unriglileousiiess to their neighbors, as if
they : : slyly intended they should pay their
rates for them again, and to the disturbance in and
damage of this town, after so much patience used, and
to the end this town may not longer be battled : : :
In his majesties name you are therefore now required
forthwith to [collect] by distress upou the monies,
neat cattle, sheep or other beasts, corn, grain, hay,
goods or any other estate movable (not disallowed by
law) you can find so much of each person herein
named so greatly transirressing, the several sum or
sums set oil' against each man's name."
In the early times there were people living on the
town's border, who were designated " farmers," and
their estates were called "farms." It was probably
with reference to these that the following order was
passed in 1C77-7S: "All persons bordering upon this
town and who live and dwell near unto the precinct
thereof shall pay (not only to the ministry but also)
to all town rates, for that they belong to us, they shall
be assessed their due |)roportions, as all other inhabit-
ants of this town are, and in case of any of them re-
fusing to pay, the same shall be levied by distress."
The early settlers were accustomed to look care-
fully after the morals of the community. The town
was divided into districts and men were chosen to
visit, individually, each family and "inspect their
condition,'' and catechise the children and servants,
and render a report of their doings to the town. At
one time the selectmen were entrusted with this im-
portant matter. The stocks were a means of correc-
tion and punishment. These were placed near the
niecliug-house; and are re|ieatedly mentioned in the
records. Later, in the town's history, tithingmen
were appointed, and the service of these officials was
continued for years.
Uommercia! transactions were carried on by means
of agricultural products, money being a scarce
article, and the settlers would convey these products
to some central place for barter or for the payment of
debts. The inn was the place generally used for this
kind of exchange, and the Parmenter ordinary is
often referred to in this connection. The minister
was paid partly in money, but largely in such articles
as flax, malt, butter, pork and peas.
Rates for labor were regulated by town action.
Carpenters, thatchers and bricklayers at one time
were to have " twenty i)ence for a day's work ; and
common laborers eighteen pence a day." Yearly cov-
enanted servants were to take but five pounds for a
year's service and maid servants were to take but
" fifty shillings the year's service." Laws were made
concerning domestic animals, viz.: that cattle were
not allowed to go at large on the town's common land
except under certain restrictions ; and swine were
to be "ringed and yoked."
Bounties were ofi'ered for the capture of wild ani-
mals, as wolves and foxes, and at times also for the de-
struction of mischievous birds. The town provided
ammunition for the inhabitants, and men were as-
signed to the duty of procuring it and dividing it up.
For a time the meeting-house was used as a place of
deposit for the " town's stock of ammunition." The
town early set apart reservations of land for pasturage
and timber for the public use. There was one large
reservation on the east and one on the west side of
the river ; and these two together contained a large
share of the original grant of five miles square. The
reservation on the west side extended from the river
nearly to the eastern border of the two mile grant,
and northerly nearly to the northeastern part of the
territory now Maynard. The inhabitants were lim-
ited on the number of cattle they were allowed to
pasture in the common land by a rule based on the
number of acres of meadow-land which they pos-
sessed.
In the social life of those days great respect was
paid to merit and position. Seats in the meeting-
house were assigned in accordance \iith age, merit
and the amount paid for the support of the ministry.
Military titles were much in use; even the minor offi-
cers of the rank and file were carefully designated by
their appropriate affix. Sergeant, Corporal and En-
sign, Lieutenant and Captain are common terms on
the record. The term Goodman was applied to men
considered especially substantial and trustworthy.
Political officers were chosen in accordance with mer-
it ; and when a person was elected to a public posi-
tion, he was expected to serve, unless a good excuse
could be rendered. If he refused he was subjected
to a fine. Idleness and lack of thrift found no favor
with the early settlers of Sudbury. This class were
not allowed to enter the territory, if their coming
was known ; and if they entered by fraud or stealth
they were liable to be warned away, and any resi-
dent who knowingly encouraged the coming of such a
one was subjected to a fine and censure.
The circumstances of the people required the strict-
est economy and industry. A long succession of inter-
colonial wars oppressed them with heavy taxation ;
and the number of able bodied men was at times de-
pleted by calls to the country's service at the front.
The implements of husbandry were rude and clumsy
and mostly of home manufacture. Home-spun fab-
rics were in use, and the women and older children
needed strong and nimble hands to keep the house-
hold clothed. The first houses were small, rude
structures ; and the material of which they were
made was probably all wrought out by hand. There
is no mention of a saw-mill in town till 1677, when
permission was given to " Peter King, Thomas Read,
sen., John Goodenow, John Smith and Joseph Free-
man to build a saw-mill upon Hop Brook, above
Peter >'oyes's Mill." This mill was situated in the
second or third squadron of the New Grant. Two
of the foregoing names are of settlers in the North-
west District. Before the erection of this saw-mill,
452
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
sawn material would be scarce. Probably hewn logs
were largely used, with clay placed over the joints.
The roofs were covered with thatch. Clay and thatch
were made use of in the construction of the second
meeting-house in 1654. The records inform us that
a conrmittee was appointed " to agree with somebody
to fill the walls of the meeting-house with tempered
clay, provided they do not exceed the sum of 5
pounds 10 shillings." The following is a record of
a house and barn put up by Edward Rice in the south-
east part of Sudbury about 1650. The dwelling-
house was " 30 foote long, 10 foote high stud, 1 foot
sill from the ground, 16 foote wide, with two rooms,
both below or one above the other ; all the doores
well hanged, and staires, with convenient fasteningis
of locks or bolts, windows glazed, and well planked
under foote, and boarded sufficiently to lay corne in in
the story above head." The barn was " 50 foote long,
11 foote high in the stud, one foote above ground, the
sell 20 foote if no leantes, or 18 foote wide with
leantes on the one side, and a convenient threshing
Hoare between the doares" (Barry). In the primitive
dwellings there may have been more of warmth and
comfort than we are wont to 3U|>pose. Many of
them were built near the phelter of the forest, or on
the sunny side of some protecting upland. Within
the building was a large fire-|)lace with a broad stone
hearth. Wood was abundant and near at hand ; and
as the bright Hames flickered up on a winter's night
they afforded both light and heat.
Highways, Bridges and Giust-mii,i,. — Hiyh-
ways. — The primitive highways of this territory were
doubtless rude, being, aa in every new country, but
mere wood-paths or trails to the scattered homesteads
and meadow-lots, and, in this case, centering in a
" great road " which led to the meeting-house, tavern
and mill. As these public places lay in a southerly
direction, it is probable that one of the earliest main
highways was the " New Lancaster Road." This road
probably existed previous to 1725 ; aud its course, as
given on the Mathias Mosman map of 1794, was
from the Sudbury meeting-house northwesterly, pass-
ing south of Vose's Pond by the old Rice tavern into
Stow. The present "Great Road" from Sudbury Cen-
tre by J. H. Vose's is supposed to be a part of that
road. This is called the " New Lancaster Road " to dis-
tinguish it from the "' Old Lancaster Road," of Sud-
bury, which was laid out about 1653, and which is
designated as the " Old Lancaster Road " on the Mos-
man map.
.(Vs the "New Lancaster Road " was long since con-
sidered ancient by the inhabitants of the Northwest
District, it has been called the " Old Lancaster Road,"
and hence may have been considered by some to be
the only Lancaster road. The " Old Lancaster Road "
piissed out of Sudbury some distance south of the
new one, and is that mentioned in connection with the
laying out, apportionment and location of the "New
Grant" lota. As the " New Lancaster Road" is in-
tersected at Sudbury Centre by a way that led to the
Hop Brook grist-mill, or Noyes' mill, at South Sud-
bury, the settlers of this district would naturally go
to mill by this way before the erection of a mill nearer
by. A highway that early passed diagonally through
the Sudbury part of Mayiiard is what was known as
the " Old Marlboro' and Concord Great Road." This
was a much-travelled highway in the last quarter of
the last century. .Vt its intersection with the New
Lancaster Road stood the Old Rice Tavern ; and
along its course a little to the northerly were some of
the old estates of the district. As the Northwest Dis-
trict developed, short ways were provided for it by the
town. Between 1725 and 1750 mention is made in
the records of a way from " Honey Pot Brook through
.labez Pufl'er's land." The "Thirty-rod highway,"
going northerly, passed a little easterly of the Rice
tavern ; and it is not im|>robable that the North
road, by the Balcoais, is a part of that ancient land-
mark. It is supposed that the east " Thirty-rod
highway " reached the town's northerly boundary at or
near the powder-mills, by Acton and Concord Corner.
Bridges. — The first record of which we have any
knowledge concerning a bridge in this territory is of
date Dec. 11, 1715, when the town of Sudbury voted
that " there be a horsi' bridge built over Assabeth
River, . . . and that the selectmen do order that
)'" bridge be erected and built over Assabeth River,
between y° land of Timothy Gibson's and Thomas
Burt's laud.'' The tii-st bridge w:us probably the Lan-
caster road bridge,and known us the Dr. Wood's Bridge.
It stood on or by the site of the present bridge near
the Whitman place, not fiir from the entrance of
Assabeth Brook. The bridge ne.\t cast is the old
Fitchburg road or Kaman Smith Bridge, and was
built about seventy-five years ago. The next is the
Jewell Mill's Bridge, and was probably built to ac-
commodate the mills. The Paper Mill Bridge was
built a little more than half a century ago. It is sup-
posed that previous to its erection the river was
crossed at that point by a fordway. The road con-
nected with this bridge was laid out by the county
commissioners about the time the bridge was made.
Grisl-mUl. — The first grist-mill was near the present
Brooks place. It has had several owners, among
whom are (fibson, Jewell and Smith. A saw-mill
has been connected with it; and thither the inhabit-
ants carried their saw-logs and corn in those early
years, when " to go to mill " was quite an event to
the homestead. At the mill and the inn the inhabit-
ants of the hamlet gossiped and gathered the news, as
well as proc'ured household supplies. The bread of
those d.iys was made largely of rye and Indian meal,
wheat being but little used as late as the beginning of
the present century. This main reliance on meal
made large demands on the mill, aud from long dis-
tances the grists were brought in a rude cart or on
horse-back. Thus this mill was an important place,
and although an humble structure in comparison
MAYNARD.
453
with the large factories that stand to-day near by, it
was very essential to the comfort of man and beast.
Character of the Settlers. — Notwithstanding
this section was for a time so isolated, its influence was
felt throughout the towns to which it belonged, and
il furnished some of their best and most trustworthy
citizens. In Sudbury the name of Balcom, Rice,
Smith, Puffer, Brighara, Vose, Maynard and others
have been on the list of the town's official board ;
while in Stow, the Gibsons, Whitneys, Browns, Co-
nants, Smiths aud others have been well-known and
substantial citizens. Ou the Sudbury niuster-rolLs of
the French and Indian and Revolutionary Wars,
names long familiar in the Northwest District are
common. In a list of fourteen Sudbury men, who
were in the campaign for the capture of Louisbourg at
Cape Breton, the name of Balcom is given four times.
Four brothers enlisted in the closing campaign of the
last French War, and were in or about New York in
17G0, viz.: Joseph, .Jr., Simon, Moses and John Bal-
com. The first two served as soldiers ; ^Moses, at the
age of eighteen, was detailed for duty a.s a boatman on
the Mohawk River to forward army supplies to the
front ; John, aged sixteen, was employed as ,i teamster ;
Simon died in the aruiy of fever, at the age of thirty-
cue ; Joseph took the small-pox on returning home
and died. His father and one child took the diseiuse
from him and died also. They were buried about
the centre of the jdain, on the farm of Lewis Brig-
ham. The names of .Sudbury men in the companies
of Capts. Samuel Dakin, John Ni.iLon and Josiah
Richardson, who were in the Canada campaign of the
French and Indian War, which are as.sociated with
the Northwest Distriri are Kveleth, Puffer, Maynard,
Skinner, Wetherby, Brigham, Balcom, Rice and
Willis. These names repeatedly appear with different
Christian names, indicating how well this territory
was represented in those old wars. As the territory
of Maynard was taken from two towns in which a
patriotic sjiirit jirevailed in the Revolutionary War,
it is safe to assume that its inhabitants bore their full
share in that protracted struggle.
Sudbury had five companies, two of which were
from the West Precinct, and Stow had two in the en-
gagement with the British on their retreat from Con-
cord, April 19, 1775. On the Sudbury muster-rolls of
the west side militia and minute companies, the name
of Maynard is given five times. Rice five, Puffer five,
Brigham four, Willis four, Smith three and Balcom
two. It was stated by one who was a Sudbury citizen
and soldier in the Revolutionary period that " to the
honor of Sudbury " there was not a " Tory " to be
found in the town. In the Great Civil War Sudbury
and Stow did their full share of service. Sudburv i
furnished one hundred and sixty-eight men, which j
was over and above all demands, and appropriated
and expended on account of the war, exclusive of
State aid, $17,575. It had a population in 18G0 of
1691, and a valuation of $1,052,778.
Stow furnished for the Union Army one hundred
and forty-three men. Several soldiers from each of
these towns lost their lives in their country's service.
Not only were the former inhabitants of the Maynard
territory influential in town matters and well repre-
sented in military service, but some of them exerted
an influence which was largely felt in the formation
of the town of Grafton, in Worcester County. The
land of the Grafton township, which contains 7500
acres, was purchased of the native proprietors upon
leases obtained of the General Court, May, 1724. The
petition asking the privilege of making the purchase
was presented by a number of citizens, principally
from JIarlboro', Sudbury, Concord and Stow ; and the
petitioners sought leave " to purchase of the Hassa-
namisco Indians land at that place." In the Indian
deed concerning the territory, among other specific
declarations is the following : " To Jonathan Rice
and Richard Taylor, both of Sudbury in the County
of Middlesex aforesaid, husbandmen, each one fortieth
part thereof ... to them and their respective
heirs and assigns forever." After the purchase of the
territory and the establishment of the plantation,
those who composed the company laying claim to the
territory held proprietors' meetings, more or less of
which were at the house of Jonathan Rice in Sud-
bury. Their records and proceedings show the promi-
nent part taken by Sudbury citizens in the formation
of the township. A few specimens of these records
are as follows : "At a meeting of the Proprietors of
the common and undivided lands in Hassanamisco,
holden in the liouse of Jonathan How in Marlboro',
.\pril, 1728, Mr. Jonathan Rice was chosen clerk for
the Proprietors to enter and record all votes and
orders from time to time as shall be made and passed
in said Proprietors' meetings." " July 9, 1728. The
Proprietors held a meeting at Sudbury, at the house
of Jonathan Rice, and chose a committee to take
charge of building a meeting-house." " Jan. 6, 1730.
Xt the house of Jonathan Rice, voted to lay out 3
acres to each Proprietor 30 acres of land for the third
division ; voted to raise seven pounds of money on
each Proprietor for the finishing of the meeting-house
and school-house."
In the appointment of committees for important
business Sudbury was creditably represented. The
committee chosen " to take a survey of the plantation
of Hassanamisco, and find out and stake the centre
plot of the plantation," were Captain Brigham, of
Marlboro', John Hunt, of Concord, and Rich-
ard Taylor, of Sudbury. Jan. 16, 1734, it was
voted that Col. John Chandler, of Concord, and
Jonathan Rice, of Sudbury, should be " a committee
to make Hassanamisco a town."
In the work of securing church privileges and a
meeting-house for the inhabitants of the west side of
Sudbup.-, at the place called Rocky Plain, the indica-
tions are that the Northwest District had an important
influence. After the first petition sent to the General
I
454
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACITUSETTS.
Court, which petition has been noticed and given, a
committee was appointed at a town-meeting to pro-
test against the west side petition. After hearing
both the petition and remonstrance, the committee
returned a report, May 13, 1708, which was in sub-
stance that they considered " the thing was necessary
to be done, but their opinion is that now, by reason
of the [grievous] times, not so convenient."
But the petitioners were not to be baffled by an
answer like this. Accordingly, again they presented
their case by another petition, dated May 26, 1708-9.
This second petition sets forth the case thus:
"The Humble PetitfoD of Several of tbe Inbabitanta of the town of Sud-
bnry, on the west side of tbe River.
"To Court session assembled Uay 2e<i> 170% showetb that jour Petition -
ers lately by their Petition to the Great and General Assembly, repre-
sented tbe hardshipfl •& Difficulties they Labored when by reason of their
distance from the meeting house and the difflculty of getting over the
water aud Some times Impossibility, there being three hundred and
sixty five on that side and sometimes in the winter not one of them can
possibly go to meeting, the Kast and West sides are Equal in their pay-
ments to tbe minister and therefore praying ther might be made a Pre-
cinct and have a meeting house and minister of their side of the Uiver,
wfaeteiipon the petition was referred to a committee who upon Consider-
tion uf the premises (as your petitioner] are Infornied) have made a
Heport to this Great and General assembly that tbu tiling was necessary
to l»e done, but their opinion is that now by reason uf Troublesome
Times not so ConTenient.
"Yeur [Petitioners] thereupon humbly pray that this great anil General
assembly would please to Grant them tbe Prayer of tUeir Petition, that
they may be Empowered to build a meeting house and have a minister
settled on their side, in such time as to this Great and General Assem-
bly shall seem meet and Yu' Petitioners (and as in duty bound) shall
pray, John Brigmah, John Dalcou. In behalf of ye rest."
The parties whose names are signed to this petition
are, we infer, men from the northwest part of the town,
and the tact that they thus head the list of persistent
petitioners, leaves room for the fair conjecture that it
was from this territory to a large extent, that a very
strong influence went forth for the formation of the
West Precinct of Sudbury.
The early inhabitants of the Maynard territory de-
pended for a livelihood largely upon the products of
the soil, for which the country was fairly suited. On
the Sudbury side were extensive woodlands upon
which some of the heaviest timber in the State has
been produced. On the Stow aide were good farming
lands, and the land in the neighborhood of Pompas-
siticutt Hill was good for pasturage and tillage. But,
as in every community where pasturage and tillage
is depended upon, there was need of industry and
economy. These traits prevailed. The families in
early times were large, and as each household
gathered about the kitchen hearth they made almost
a little community of themselve-s. When a neighbor-
hood gathering was needed for the transaction of
business, a favorite place was the iun, and at the old
Rice Tavern public business has doubtless many
times been planned and discussed. Along the early
years of the eighteenth century, meetings were held
there relative to the adjustment of land matters, as
indicated by the following :
** W« the SnbflcriberB and present ownera of the New Grant lots in
Sudbury, and us we think and imagine, Proi>i'ietor:j of llie twn miles uf
land late granted to Sudbury by the General Court, called the New
Grants, «e hiuiibty petition your booui-s to i:niiit us a leirul meeting as
the law directs, to be .it the House of Jonathan Rice, in -aid »iidlniry,
inholder. To do or act wliat may be lawful and iieeilfii] when met in
oriler to defend siiid grant i-f two miles, and every other legal ad as
Proprietors,
" JuflN" Cl-AT,
'Mamf-s IIa^ne^?,
*' Ei'iiKuai Pratt.
*' .l'>ll\ Bai.! DM,
"Thumas SSIITII,
'■ JoNATH \N Kirr.,
" Alios S.MITII,
"J.tsF.I-H BuLCUU,
anil sixteen uthers.'*
For years after the settlement of the district there
was no commercial centre ; but in proccrss of time llie
water-power of the .\ssabet River beg.m to be used
for manufacturing purposes, and a hamlet or village
was commenced.
About 1821 or 1822 a part of tbe wiiter-power
formerly used by the Jewell .^(ills was employed by
James and William Rice tor tbe inaiuifaiture of
spindles and other kinds of factory m.itbinery for the
Smith Mills, at Peterborough, N. H., and the fac-
tories at Walth.tm, M;u!.s.
Near Jewell's Mills, over the river, :i saw-inill once
stood; and on a brook by the Daniel 1 'tiller bouse
was another saw-mill, which mill wa.-^ connected with
the farm. This mill, because of the small water-
power, ran very slouiy, so the pi'uple used to start
the machinery and then go to other work, and when
the saw bad run its course it would stop of itself.
In 1845 the water-power that up tn 1S22 had been
used for the grain mill, and which had also been
used for the manufacture of machinery, was sold to
.Viiiory Maynard and William H. Kniglit, who was
formerly connected with tlie Saxonville Factorv. In
July, 1846, the .\ssabet Mill Works were connnenced.
The dam was built and a canal dug, turning the water
from the original channel into a reservoir. The dam
was completed, a builtling erected, and work begun
on the mill by the spring of 1847; and carpets and
carpet yarn to tbe value of $110,000 were made the
first year. On September 10, 1SG2. the " Assabet
Manufacturing Company " w.is formed, with T. A.
Goddard, president, and T. i ^uincy Browne, treasurer.
From the very commencement of the manufacture
of woolen fabrics in Maynard the business h.i-s proved
a success. As it has developed, new buildings have
been erected, until they now cover not far from twn
acres of ground ; fire four, iive and six stories in
height, and have a floorage of nearly ten acres. From
six to seven millions of bricks were required in their
construction. There are water-wheels having a united
capacity of 800 horse-power, and four powerful en-
gines with a total capacity of 700 horse-power. The
average consumption of coal for steam purposes is,
in round numbers, 500 tons a month, or 0000 tons a
year. The consumption of wool in the grease is
15,000 pounds per day or 2347 tons a year. The num-
MAYNARD.
455
ber of employees has increased from one in 1846 to
one thousand, one-fourth of wliom are females. One-
eighth of the whole number of employees are under
sixteen years of age. Improvements in machinery
have from time to time been made, resulting in a
marked increase in the productions of the mills or .i
reduction in the number of emi)loyees. There are
now sixty-five sets of woolen machinery, embracing
three hundred and thirty fancy broad looms. The
value of the mill properly, which in 1847 and 1848
amounted to .SloO.OOO ha-s increa.sed to S!l,'>no,000.
From 1777 to 1800, Abijah Brigham had a black-
smith's shop in the easterly part of the district ; and
nearly a century ago a tavern was kept at the Levi
Smith place. One of the first establishments for the
storage of ice was in the Maynard territory. The
business was carried on by Nathaniel Wyeth. It was
established about IS'iO, and modern machinery was
used in the work. At one time there were two cider
and vinegar manufactories, but this business has
nearly ceased in the town of Alaynard. A paper-
mill was erected in the Maynard territory about 1820,
by William May. for the manufacture of pa|)er by
hand. The mill suliseqiieritly pns«ed into possession
of John lawyer, of Boston ; later, it became the prop-
erty of William Parker, and more recently, of his son.
William T. I'arker. These paper-mills have .several
times been destroyed by tire. They are at the present
time unemployed and owned by Hemenway ct Alav-
nard.
CoNGREiJ.\TiONAL CiiuitcH.— September 23, ]Sr>L',
an Orthodox Congregational Church was orL'anized,
and called the " Evangelical Knion Church.'' The
following are the names of original nieinbers: Amory
Maynard, Mrs. Amory Alaynard, Hamaii Smith, Mrs.
Haman Smith, Silas Newton, Mrs. Silas Newton,
Henry Wilder, Mrs. Henry Wilder, Sybil Smith and
Lydia Stone.
A meeting-house was erected in IS.'iP,, which in ISr..'.
was enlarged.
The following are the names of those who have
served as pastors with the date of service.
31r. Geoit-e W". Fro»t. ftit^.: supply. May. IS.i:;. t,. SIhv. isV) ; R^v
.1 K. t>c«?rini;, HCtiUi; pn-'tor, May, |v.".J. in May, 1S..(; ; J!,.v. A 51oilcin,
iu3l»llr,l M„^, is.i.-,, disiiiiMed May, It,.,',); liev. K. I'. TeuiiL-y, act[ii-
luuitor, .Viigust, IS.V, ti. IifLuiiilicr, IScKi: Ilpv.F. WKll.ice, artini; pa«lor,
Deci-lubei, IMJI. lu Ffbriinry, IS1.2; Rrv. .K. II. Kleltlier, nctinj: luistor,
.luue. isr.j, lo Jaiiimrj, Iki;4; II^v. Tlinnms Alleiider, acting |w-lor,
March, l»m, li. April, t8i;i; ; Ber. ii. Hall, acliDg pa«lor, Apiil, }»•:'..
tuJuue, ISiIT ; Rev. T. II. V. Stone, install^.l Octubei, ISI.?, liianiisiseil
Juue, ,18711; Ri\. Wel^lei Hazlew.HKl, u.tiiig iwalor, Auguat, ItiTii, to
July, 187:;; Rev Edu'anl ri. Hnutrcss, acting pustoi, Dritnibw, l!i7i,
tt, ttarcb, 1S74 : Rev. F. B. Slirire, acting pa3t.>r, Scpti-iuber, 1874. to
Apnl, ISTCi; l(,?v. s. S MallieWB, acting pastor, M.iy 1, ISTU; R^v. (.'. E.
Millikeii, January 1, IST'i, lu July 1, 1SS2; Rev. fMwin SinitL, Hei-
teuiber tj, ipSi, lo Augu-i 1, ISfi; ; Rev. Daviil II. Drewer, Octobei 15,
ldd6, to preaenl lime.
A Sunday-school was organized in 1851, with about
thirty scholars. \. Maynard was its first superin-
tendent. The following are the names of persons
who have served as deacons :
Amory Maynard, chosen 1852 ; Lorenzo Maynard, 1882 ; Jowph
Adams, 1860 ; Charles B. Stewart, 1808 ; laaac Stott, 1871 ; Williain U.
liutteridge, 1877 ; Ezra S. Tarliell, 1888.
Methodist Church.— February 2, 1867, a meet-
ing was held in the Nason Street School-bouse, at
which a committee was appoint.ed to solicit subscrip-
tions for the support of public worship after the forms
and order of the Methodist Church.
A liberal response was made to the call, and meas-
ures were taken which resulted in occasional preach-
ing in the school-house by neighboring Methodist
ministers.
A committee was appointed the following March
to lease Union Hall for the ensuing year, and June
22d a Methodist Church was organized, consisting of
seven members.
In 1870 Union Hall was purchased, and Sabbath
services have been held there since. The society has
been somewhat feeble and small, but has held on in
xpite of its small means of support. The following
are the names of those who have served as pastors :
.1. A. De Forest, L. P. Frost, John S. Day, M. A.
Evans, A. Baylies, A. C. Godfrey, G. R. Best, G. W,
Clark, B. Bigelow, W. Wignall, C. A. Merrell.
Ro.MAX Catholic Church.— There is in Maynard
a Roman Catholic Church called St. Bridget's, which
is connected with quite an extensive parish, and has
n fine house of worship.
Steps which resulted in the formation of this church
were instituted not long after the place began to de-
velop as u considerable factory village. For a time
the Roman Catholic element in the town was admin-
istered to by Reverends Alaguire and Farrell, of
Marlboro". A little later Rev. John Conlon, then a
resident of and pastor of the church in Marlboro',
commenced service among the Catholic population
of M.iynard ; and by his effort a chapel was built
there in 1804. He was succeeded by Rev. O'Reily,
whose service continued from January, 1871, to
March, 1872, when Rev. Brozuahau became his suc-
ce.ssor, and resided in the town from March, 1872,
till March, 1873, at which time he moved to Con-
cord, and St. Bridget's became an outlying mission
of this latter place, Rev. Brozuahau having charge
of both parishes until January, 1S77. The present
pastor is Rev. M. J. McCall, in connection with
whose services the present church edifice was built.
Work on the structure began as early as 1881, and
was rapidly carried forward. It was dedicated in
1884 by Archbishop John J. Williams, of Boston.
The building is quite large and commodious, and
at the time of its completion was considered one of
the finest church edifices in the vicinity, and is at
the present time the largest public building in May-
nard.
The territory of Maynard was set off, and by in-
corfioration became a new town April 19, 1871. It
was named in honor of Amory Maynard, formerly
of Marlboro', through whose energy and business ac-
456
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tivity the town has developed. The town of Stow
made no special objection to giving up a part of
the territory belonging to it for the formation of
a new town, and an agreement was made by which
Maynard was to pay into the treasury of Stow the
sum of $650U as a compensation.
The town of Sudbury opposed the separation, and,
January 23, 1871, appointed a committee of three to
nominate a committee of three to oppose any peti-
tion to the General Court to set off any part of the
territory of Sudbury. Deacon Thomas Hurlbut,
<Charles Thompson, Esq., and James Moore, Esq.,
were nominated. The town accepted the nomina-
tion and authorized the committee to use all hon-
orable means to prevent the formation of a new-
town, including any part of the territory of the
town of Sudbury.
The committee chosen Jan. 23, 1871, to oppose the in-
corporation of any portion of the territory of Sudbury
into a new town, reported April 7, 1872, that previous
to any hearing before the committee of the Legisla-
ture on the petition of Henry Fowler .and others for
an act incorporating the town of Maynard, certain
propositions were made by the petitioners as terms oi'
separation and settlement between the town of Sud-
bury and the proposed new town. These propositions
having been laid btfore the town of Sudbury, Feb.
20, 1872, the committee were given discretionary
power, provided they accept of no terms less ailvan-
(tageoua to the town of Sudbury than those contained
in the agreement. By mutual consent a bill was
agreed upou and passed by the Legislature, by which
the town of Maynard was incorporated.
Subsequently, the committee were authorized tn
settle with the authorities of the town of Maynard,
according to the provisions of their charter. They
reported tliat they had attended to that duty, also
that the proportion of the town debt, together witli
the money to be paid by the town of Maynard to the
town of Sudbury, or Maynard'a share of the stock in
the Framingham & Lowell Railroad Corporation,
owned by the town of Sudbury, with interest on tlie
same, amounted to 120,88.3.28, which sum was paid j
by them to the treasurer of the town of Sudbury. I
Oct. 6, 1871, they say "they have also attended to
establishing the line between the said towns, and
erected a atone monument at the angle in said line
near the iron works cau.seway, which will also answer
aa a guide-board, and will be kept in repair by the
town of Sudbury ; that they have also erected a stone
monument marked S. and M., at such places as said
line crosses the highway."
For years before the territory of Maynard became
an independent town, there were strong rea.sona why
it should become such. The people of Assabet ViK
lage and its near neighborhood made up a population
nearly twice as large aa that of either Sudbury or
Stow, considered apart from this locality. It was
quite a distance to the town-houses of Sudbury and
Stow, and there w.is no speedy means of conveyance
to either place on the day of town-meeting.
The journey on election days was to be made over
the rough country roads of these towns, and usually
at such seasons aa brought them into a poor condi-
tion.
For about five hundred men to make a journey of
miles to a polling-place which was several miles dis-
tant, when a large portion of this company were living
within about a half-mile of each other, was more than
could reasonably be expected. A polling-place near
by would allow them to attend to town business with-
out much interference with their regular avocation,
and save expense of travel.
Moreover, there was but a small community of in-
terests between the people of the .^.'^sabet District and
those of the other parts of the two towns. The one
element was given to agriculture, the other to manu-
factures. The one element was scattered, the other
concentrated., Assabet Vill.age required street lights
and sidewalks, a local police, and special school
privileges. They needed town regulations adapted to
their population and business.
The reasons au'ainst division wcresnuiU, as these re-
lated either to the .Vssabet territory or to the towns to
which it belonged. The strif) of territory asked for
would impoverish neither Sudbury nor 8to\v. It was
well situated for the proposed division, and that the
territory asked for liiid resources .'imply sutiicient to
warrant the |)roposed new town's easy support may be
indicated by the following " table of aggregates for
the town of .Maynard aa assessed May 1. 1871 : ''
'I'liliil luinihfi' itf I'oIIh .''-2
Tii.\ ('U I'uMo ■;1.(4(.lill
Valno uf I'ei-SMiiHl hiluli- JSb.V'.nM"!
..f I!e:il YUlalv ;ii...'ln.l»l
Viihmli.Mi l,iHiJ,llii(l.li(l
Tii.x forSlrtle, ' oiinry uiiJ Tuw n imrposts, includ-
ing lli^lnvnv T.i\ Il,:i'.ij.s4
TofiU nilliiltfl- ill ilwellinj;hi.iiist-B .121
Laud Tiixt-s - S.Ol-T sicrei
With such circumstances to favor it, it was only a
matter of time when a separate town would be made
of the territory ; and that the time had come when the
ettbrt for it was made may be indicated by the success
of the movement.
The town appropriately celebrated the event of its
incorporation, and an oration was delivered by Gen.
,Tohn L. Swift.
In 1872 the following hill was reported to the town
of expense incurred :
INCOEPOn.\TluN AND PELEBRATinN rXPF.NSE-S.
I'aidi;. A.Soniertiy S200il()
J,.hii Spalding ^W.OO
J. B. Smith, cullali.iii 90.00
Hill for engraving nmp of town 40,(Ni
Vitrhbiirg KailroHd, B.\tia tiain 75. IH)
D I'. I'riliorn, for printing 4.1H)
Tfiiin tu Sndbniy und Stow J.tX)
Town i_'lerk of .Slow, for copy of warrant 50
liuilroud tickelil 13.50
Hiiuliug • 1.50
Badges uud expeuaeB 2.65
MAYNARD.
457
Fireworks 34.13
Use of cuntioii, elc 32. to
AV. F. Woods, for entertaining lauds 3li.M*t
Use of flagB and telegrapiiing lO.IK)
B. Sniitli, transporting citiition O.UU
Three lieg» powder 13.60
Surveying proposed town lines ■ ■ . . VZ.W
.IK. liarrinmn, for labor 5.0(1
J. Valley, lor team to Concord . . ■ 4.0U
Joeepb \V. Reed, for bills ikiiJ 31.4ll
As the new town started forth on its first year of
independence, the indications are that it made gene-
rous ai)propriationa, and evinced a courage wliich
gave promise of success. The following is its pub-
lished " assessments for 1871 : "
For Support of Scbiwls IJ.iKUVnu
Kepairs of Uigbways . ...,...■ l,iml/.i»l
IncidfUlal e.\lt«nse« 4,(HKi.0i»
.\1leiat)uns and Helmiis of Scbool-bonses 2,n(m.0<'
State Tax payalde to Sudbury '■»^^ '^*
•' •' '■ ^^low . . . ■ • 52:.,no
County Tax payable to budbury ;)m..:;.".
•' " ■' Stow -^V.;.':;
Overlaying?
Ill, I it:;-:!
;;l;i,ll
Total Jll,:nl:;.^4
A disadvantage which the new town met with was
its small and defective school accommodations. The
following from reports made to the town i)y the com-
mittee for the years ISTi and 1S73 may indicate the
condition of things. In the report for the former
vear the committee slate :
"Thf, Hi(!H SiHom.. — At tlie commencement ol
last term, when the new moms in the Acton Street
School were finished, we determined to open a special
school therein, requiring an examination for ailniis-
sioii, with the h(ipe of ultiiniitely forming it into a high
school. We admitted, on examination, thirty-five
pupils, and oUtaiiied as teacher .Mr. Theodore C.
Gleason,of Westboro', a recent graduate of Harvard
College. Mr. Gleason had had three months' exper-
ience as a teacher in Bolton. He devoted himself
heartily to the work of our school, and the scholars
were generally very much improved by his instruction
— especially in reading and in grammar — two things
in which they had been previously sadly deficient.
The examination of his school, although far from
being wliat we could wish, fully convinced us that a
good work had been done. At the annual town-meet-
ing in March we brought; the matter before the town,
and with great unanimity they voted to authorize the
committee to establish a liigh school, and granted an
extra appropriation for that purpose. We feel sure
that the people will not have cause to regret the
measure, but that they will feel abundantly repaid by
the higher tone of intelligence which a high school
will, in time, give to the community.
"School Ai'com.moiiatioxs. — We are inclined to
include under this head the accommodations both of
teachers and scholars, and we regret to say that in
both we are lamentably deficient.
" We would not say, as a well-known clergyman said,
at one of our examinations, ' this is the worst town in
the Commonwealth for a teacher to come to,' both
because it is not true, and because we would not
lightly give our town such a poor recommendation.
We could name many towns in the C'ommonwealth
which are worse than ours, worse in matter of salary,
worse in accommodations, worse in the treatment they
receive. But our town is bad enough, we confess.
We are surprised that it is so difficult to find proper
boarding-places for our teachers. In most towns some
of the first families are open to receive the teachers,
but in our town, which Mr. Elias Nason would have
to be ' the model town,' a teacher can scarcely find
shelter for the night; and one of our teachers has not
succeeded to this day in finding a place, but is com-
pelled to travel twenty-five miles every evening to
pass the night in Cambridge. We hope in some way
to see this remedied.
" Our school-liouses are beginning to be too small
again, notwithstanding the enlargement of last year.
Our high school-room will doubtless next term be full,
our grammar school is full already, and all our pri-
mary schools are a great deal more than full. When
it is remembered that last term we opened two new
schools, and that the increase of school attendance i>
likely to be greater this year than it was last year, it
will be readily seen how much we are likely to be
troubled for want of room. We shall be obliged to
encage one, at least, and perhaps two extra teachers
at the beginning of next term ; and we have no room
to put them in except a small recitation room.
" Before the close of another year we shall probably
retiuire all the rooms in both the centre school-houses
for the classes of the primary schools ; and then the
irraminar and high schools will be set afloat. What
we evidently require is a building of commodious ar-
rangement, situated as nearly as it conveniently can
be in the centre of the town, in a healthy location,
and sufficient in size and in the number of its rooms
to meet the demands of our growing population, for
the use of the grammar and high schools. We hope
the people will consider this matter, for it is of the
highest importance and will soon demand attention."
Cost of iNsTRf'TloN rnn the Ve-m: E.\nis<i 31.tDCH 31, 187*J.
High Suliool. f.ir eacb pupil, $1.'', 4:'. SlHO.OH
Blaiu Street tiraiiiniHr, for ejicb pupil, JW.ti;*, 3d;t'.M0
Dlnin Street Primary, for eatb pupil, S,",.7n 34i.0(t
Aclou Street I'rinmrx, for ea«b puj.il, $6.14 342.00
Turnpike School, for cacb pupil, 115.43 U24.00
Brick S.bool, for each pupil, Ji. 11 . 210.00
Total p.iid for tuition during the year, SIT7I1.O0
For fuel and incidental e.\pense3 2.10.00
.\venige coet of tuition )ier scholar, in all the schools,
for the year, ■ . . . . 6.12
In the report of the committee for 1873 they state
thus: " The law of the State declares that no more
than fifty pupils shall be placed in charge of one
teacher. We have been constantly compelled to
break this law by giving one teacher charge of sixty,
458
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
seventy and even seventy-five pupils. Three of our
schools have now sixty or sixty-five pupils each —
fifteen more than the number allowed by law, and the
difficulties in this respect are constantly increasing.
" The committee have now no remedy,for our school-
rooms are all crowded, the last available room having
been recently fitted up for a small clais of twenty-five
— being all that could be crowded into it. It is be-
coming more and more apparent that we must soon
have a new building. We would not urge such an
expensive matter upon the town one moment sooner
than we think it becomes absolutely necessary, but it
will not do to ignore the fact that, at the beginning
of next term, or nest fall, at the farthest, we shall
doubtless be obliged to form another school, and shall
have no place in which to put it, except by the costly
arrangement of hiring and furnishing some public or
private hall.
"Perhaps the most difficult problem to be solved, in
relation to our schools, is what shall we do with the
"Factory Scholars? who throng the schools at the
commencement of every term, barely remain the full
twelve weeks required by law, and then, as they have
just begun to know their duties as scholars, and to
make some progress in knowledge and behavior, they
are taken away and their places are filled by another
fresh company, to require of the teacher the same
hard task of smoothing, polishing and civilizing as
before. It is easy to see how injurious this must be,
what an obstacle to the success of any scheme for im-
provement. This is particularly noticeable in the
Grammar school. From carefully prepared statistics
of this school, we find that it has had 133 regularly
acknowledged pupils, actually belonging to it during
the whole year, whereas, the largest number who have
attended at any one time was sixty-four, — less than
one-half. Of these 133 pupils, there are only nine-
teen who have attended more than twenty-four weeks:
only nineteen in addition have attended more than
twelve weeks, and there are ninety-five of them who
have attended only twelve weeks, or less. No one can
appreciate the difficulties of making any real, thorough
progress in that school, without crinsidering these
facts, and whoever will carefully consider them will
be inclined to wonder how the school can make any
progress at all.
" The High and the Primary scbools.also, suffer from
the same cause. It would seem that it ought not to
be so in the Primary schools, which are calculated
only for three years of the child's life, but, it isaeton-
ishing how eagerly parents press their young and
tender children into the service of the factory ; they
give the agents and overseers no rest until they admit
them, and then they are in for life. We cannot think
it absolutely necessary that these parents should
force their children into the hard struggle of the
world so very young.
" By the kind co-operation of the factory agents and
overseers, we have been enabled to inaugurate a
system of certificates, whereby we can perform our
duty, in seeing that all children, between twelve and
fifteen years of age, attend school, at least, the twelve
weeks required by law. But, the law still further
re<iuires that all those between len and twelve years
shall attend at least, eighteen weeks, and that those
under len shall not be employed in the factory at all.
We hope, with the same kind assistance, to be able to
extend our arrangements so as to include these latter
cases, and thus obey all the law, as all good citizens
ought. At that age they will generally have se-
cured a Primary school education, and Christian char-
ity should dictate that they have so much, at least, to
fit them for the struggle for life.
"These considerations should impress upon us, more
and more, the importance of more perfectly sys-
temizing and improving our Primary schools,
since they are the only ones, the benefits of which,
there is any hope that a large class of the children of
our town will ever reap."
As the years advanced improvements in the schools
went forward, and at the present time Maynard has
very good schools, consisting of the usual grades
from the High School to the Primary Department.
The total school expenditures for 18S9 were $6270.4:2.
An evening school has recently been established,
which has been well attended, having at the outset
nearly one hundred scholars. This is an importaut
institution for a manufacturing community like that
of Maynard.
The amount paid in teachers' wages for the year
1890 w.as $4820.20. This was distributed among
twelve teachers. The principal of the High School
receives a salary of SIOOO per annum ; the highest
paid to others is a little less than half this sum.
Public Library. — There is in Maynard a Public
Library containing 3120 volumes, the most of which
are in good condition. In 1889 the sum of §300 was
appropriated for its support, and §559.07 were ex-
pended for it; the excess in expenditure being made
up of the dog-tax, fines and a balance of the previous
year. The place has two hotels, various stores and
the usual accompaniments of a thriving manufactur-
ing village of New England. The population is
about 3000. It is mostly made up of Irish, English
and Scotch, the American element being in a minority.
The thrift of the town is largely dependent upon
the prosperitj' of the Assabet Manufacturing Com-
pany. A large share of the houses are the property
of it, and occupied by its employees. Many of the
homes, however, are owned by the industrious, eco-
nomical inhabitants, who, from their daily earnings,
have in process of time laid by suflScient to pur-
chase for themselves a home. The prosperity of the
place since it was set apart as a town has been grad-
ually progressive, and improvements for the public
good have from time to time been made. The popu-
lation is nearly a third more than it was twenty years
ago.
MAYNART).
459
In 1888 there were registered in town fifty deaths,
seventy-eight births and thirty marriages. Of those
who died, eight were at the time of deatli seventy years
old or upwards, the oldest being seventy-eight, while
ten were less than ten years of age. •
Cemeteries. — The town has a well-kept cemetery,
called Glenwood Cemetery. It is situated at the
junction of the .\cton and Fitchburg highways. The
first burial w.is of the body of Thomas H. Brooks in
1871, in which year the ground was laid out. At var-
ious times the place has been beautified by the plant-
ing of trees and shubbery.
Adjoining the cemetery, at the northerly corner, is
a substantial tomb owned by A. JIaynartf It is situ-
ated upon a piece of land of about one-half acre in
extent, which is surrounded with an iron fence.
A little easterly of the town's cemetery is the Cath-
olic burying-ground. It is situated on the Fitchburg
highway, and contains many substantial monuments
and stones.
The JInrlboro' Branch of the Fitchburg Railroad
passes through the town, and aflord.-i good facilitie.'^
for travelling and the conveyance of freight.
In Maynard are the following organizations: Ma-
sonic Lodge, (Jood Templars' Lodge, Grand Army
Post, I. (). O. F. Anieric.in, I. U. U. F. Manchester
Unity, Royal Society of Good Fellows, Iron Hall,
Royal Arcanum, and Royal Arc.
BlOiiR.\.PHI<Ar.. — Aiiinri/ ^fa;/nard, from whom the
town took its name, was a son of Isaac and Lydia
(Howe) Maynard, and was born in the northeasterly
part of Marlboro' Feb. 28, 1804. The education which
he obtained in the public schools was f|uite limited,
he having ceased attendance upon them at the age of
fourteen.
For a time in early life he worked on his father's
farm, but was more largely occupied in his saw-mill,
which was situated <m a stream that it is said " forms
the channel of that basin of water known as Fort
Meadow, in Marlboro', at a point where the road from
Rockbottom to said town crosses the stream.''
When Aniory was si.xteen years old his father died,
and the son took charge of the property. Instead of
selling the saw-mill, he did that which, perhaps, few
lads of his years would have undertaken, or could
have so successfully carried out, which was to take
the responsibility of conducting the business alone.
■ This he did in a way to do credit to an* older and
more experienced person. So successfully did he
manage the property that it increased in value, and
the business gradually developed. For about a quar-
ter of a century he carried on the lumber business con-
nected with the mill. During this period he became
widely known as a builder. He erected various houses
in the neighboring towns, and at one time employed
over fifty workmen.
Under his supervision were erected the New Eng-
land Carpet-Mills.
In 184(3 an act was passed by the Legislature
I authorizing the city of Boston to take water from
Long Pond in Wayland and Natick, and the act con-
ferred the right to construct a dam at the outlet. This
action prevented the further use of the waters of Long
1 Pond as an unlimited or unobstructed mill-power at
I the carpet factories of Saxonville, in the town of
Framingham, and work at these places ceased. Mr.
W. H. Knight, the owner, conveyed by deed to the
I city of Boston all his right and title to Long and Dug
Pouds, and the land about them, which he had pur-
chased of the Framingham Manufacturing Company,
' and others, which consisted, besides the water privi-
[ lege and several dwelling-houses, of three factory
I buildings, all which 'property amounted to $150,000.
Two of the factories were burned March 20, 1847.
A joint i)artnership was then formed between W.
H. Knight and Amory Maynard for carrying on the
I cari)et business at what is now Maynard. The com-
, pany w.is formed in 184G, and the same year Mr.
I Maynard went to reside in the place, and occupied
the dwelling-house of Asa Smith. A factory was
1 soon erected, which was one hundred feet long by
! fifty feet wide, and supplied with machinery for the
manufacture of carpets and carpet yarn. Success
attended the new partnership, and by the vigilance and
thrift of such ownership, the business increased and
became firmly established.
j In 18G1 and 18C2 the first brick factory was
erected, and there was commenced at the same time
the manufacture of flannel blankets of about fifty
kinds. From that time the business has steadily
developed.
I When Mr. Maynard went to the Assabet territory
there were but few houses in the locality, among
which were those of Wm. Smith, Benjamin Smith,
.Vbram Smith, Dexter Smith, Aaron Thompson, Wm.
Parker, Paul Litchfield, Ephraim Randall, Silas
Brooks and Isaac Maynard. About the time of his
arrival in the place as a permanant resident he began
! to purchase land, and from time to time added to
his purchases until he became the owner of several
hundred acres. For twenty years Mr. Maynard lived
on JIain Street, in a house opposite the main entrance
to the factory. His last residence was at the home-
stead on the hill, to which he moved in 1873. Such
is the business career of this prominent manu-
tia,cturer.
The simple story is that the business commenced
by Knight A; Maynard in 1846, on the quiet banks of
the Assabet River has in less than a half century
developed from a property value of $150,000 to a
corporation holding property to the amount of $1,500,
000. As a result of this enterprise there has arisen a
new town with thrifty commercial, social and moral
intluence, and afl'ording the means of a livelihood
to hundreds of people. A few years ago the follow-
ing statement of Mr. Amory Maynard was pub-
lished in the Boston Herald :
"ADioDg tbe guestd who regialered ut TL.iyer'B hotel, LltUetoD, N. H.,
460
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Saturday afteruoon, is tlie nauie of Amory Maynard, ^^-i the
widely known agent of the Assabct woolen mills at Maynard. The
only peculiar fact coDoected with this gentleman is that the vacation he
ia now enjoying is the second one only that he has taken for over half a
century, his first and only other one being spent in this same vicinity,
the second week in August, 1822, when he drove in a wagon, alone, from
his native town of Marlboro' the distance being sdnie two hundred
miles, and the time consumed in the journey being tour days. At the
time Mr. Maynard was eighteen years of age. Since then he has estab-
lished the largest strictly woolen mill in the country. Nearly all uf his
time has been spent in travelling in the capacity of purchasing agent
and salesman."
Mr. Maynard was not so absorbed in his mercantile
business as to be unmindful of matters of a moral and
religious concern. He and his wife were original
members of the Evangelical Union Church of May-
nard, and gave liberallj' for its support. Mr. Maynard
died at his home March 5, 1890. He retained full
possession of his faculties until his eightieth year,
when he became enfeebled by a stroke of paralysis,
from which he never wholly recovered. His death
was the result of an accident which occurred a short
time before his death, when he was found in an un-
conscious condition at the foot of a stairway. Being
left for a short time by himself, it is supposed that he
attempted to go up-stairs, when his limbs failed him
and he fell. The funeral took place March 8th, and
the following description of the event was published
in the Boston Herald of that date :
" MAVNARD IN MOURNING.
"Anieral of It$ Fotimlrr nml .^^ont Prominent CUhen.
"Mavnard, March S, IfiMO, This thriving village has to-day worn a
funeral us|>ect, und well it might, for nil that is mortal of .\mory May-
nurd, the founder of the town, us wi-U as its' must conspicuous local hg-
ure for a Iod;^ period i-f yeais, has lit-on cnusigned to nu>llier earth,
t^verywhere about the tou'li i-mlileiiis of nutiiruiug have been noticed.
Ill fiu't, the praises of .Xiiiory ^layhard arc in every une'ri mouth, ami
iiowlicru were more evideuci-s of esteem shown than among the liun-
>lrf<]sof opemtivus who have for tiiuuy years bad reason to legard tbii,
veneiublH and worthy citizen as their friend. The iiiilN of the Assabet
Manufacturing (.'ompaiiy, which were started by Mr. Maynard. and
at the bead of which concern he hail so long been placed, were closed
'luring the arternooli. .Vll the places uf business wore a Sabbath as-
pect from 1 till 4 u'l-luck, nut of ihu respect entertained for (he de-
ceased. The private service .ici-iirred at the fiuiiily residence on Beech-
iiioiit, where prayers were nffered. In the Cuiigregational I'hurch,
with which .\iuury Maynard had been identified ever since its urgauii^a
rion, the public funeral services occurred, and the structure was filled
to overrtowiiig. .\mung those who came to offer the last tribute to
their friend's memory were u great many of the employes of the
mills. Aa the funemi processiun entered the church, itev. David H.
Brewer, the I'lUigregntionalirit pii-stor of MayiianI, read passages of
scri|iture. 111 his remarks he tniced the career uf this remarkable
man from the time when he sturled, a poor boy, in the neighboring
Inwn of Marlboro', until he had obtained that degree of success in a
business way which bad .-fiable^l liiiii to fouitil one of the leading
towns uf this comnioiiwealtb. The singing was by a selected ipiartel
comlmsed of local talent. The closing selection was ' God be with us
till we meet again.' "
Old business associates from New York, Boston
and other localities were present at the funeral
services. The remains were taken for their last rest-
ing-place to the beautiful family tomb at fllenwood,
which Mr. Maynard constructed years ago.
N.iTUR-\L Features. — The scenery of Maynard is
beautiful, and perhaps unsurpassed in this part of the
State. It has a good variety of objects, each of which
adds a charm to the diversified surface, and con-
tributes something to the beauty of the landscape.
There are the streams, hills, forests and dales; while
here and there the little brooklets sparkle and flash
as they speed &n their way.
Green pastures stretch out in acres of luxuriant
grass, verging in some places to the broad, smiling
meadow-lands, and in others reaching up the hill
slopes to the very top. Upon these fields herds of
cattle find bountiful feed, and by them the town is
supplied with rich dairy products. About 100,000
cans of milk have been raised in Maynard in a single
year. A large share of this is consumed in the place ;
but within \, few years as many as -10,000 cans have
been sent to the Boston market. Not only is the
country suited for grazing, but for farming purposes
in general.
The near proximity of a central village, whose
population is so given to mill interests, affords oppor-
tunity for the market gardener to vend his prf)duce
to ready and substantial customers, and furnishes, on
the other hand, safe patrons to the Maynard shop-
keepers for the disposal of their dry-goods and groce-
ries. Maynard has thus become a small commercial
community of itself, dependent to an extent upon its
own resources for thrift ; and combines in an excel-
lent measure those substantial elements that make up
the thriving manufacturing town of New England.
The Assabet River. — A prominent feature of the
town's scenery is the Assabet River, which takes a
winding course through the territorj'. It enters May-
nard by the Dr. Wood's Bridge, and passes along
what may be termed the smaller Pompositticut Hill
to the mill (lam. At this point its waters are turned
; from their original course into an artificial channel,
and conducted to the mill pond, where they artbrd
I power for the factories.
I The pond helps make a fine village scenery. Uike
! a little lake in a park, it is alike for the benefit of rich
and poor, as they gaze on its surface on a hot summer
i day, or watch it sparkle and tiash in the sun's rays in
the early spring or late fall.
In winter it is a place of amusement for the many
merry school children as they skim over its frozen
j surface with skate or .liled. Beyond the factories, the
j waters speed on their unrestrained course to the now
unused paper-mill, and from thence pass on to be
I again turned for a mill purpose.
Perhaps few streams of its size have in so short a dis-
tance furnished power for purposes more dissimilar in
character than this. Near its entrance to the town it
turns aside for the manufacture of cloth ; and by the
aid of the highly-improved machinery of the "Assa-
bet Manufacturing Company " and the skilled work-
men who use it, some of the best woolen fabrics of
America are produced. A little easterly it once
moved the machinery of a paper-mill, which at one
time furnished the material for one of the leading
daily newspapers of New England, while Just beyond
STONEHAM.
4C1
its exit from the town it affords power for the manu-
facture of gunpowder.
PoMPOSiTTicuT Hill. — Another prominent fea-
ture of it.s scenery is Pompositticut Hill. This, like
the river along cue of whose spurs it flows, is a well-
known landmark. As before noticed, it was a promi-
nent place of rendezvous for the Indians in the early
times, and it is to-day a favorite resort for lovers of
fine views, and much frequented both by the towns-
people and others.
The hill is about 250 feet above the river, and situ-
ated westerly of the village. It is mainly used for
pasturage. <!)u one portion are a few acres which have
a young wood growth, and scattered over other parts
are still standing a few si)ecimen8of the old " pasture
oak," which may have stood there when the place
was the " town's common land,' or when possessed by
"ye ancient hereditary Indian proprietors." The
"Reservoir"' is on the summit ; and from this point
extends a magnificent view, dotted by a great variety
of objects, and in some directions uninterrupted for
several scores of miles. To the northwestward are the
far-off hills of New Ha-iipshirc. Old " Monadnock ''
towers upward with its massive rock-crowned summit
as a lone sentinel above its fellows.
In this State " Watatic," in Asliliy, and " Wachu-
set," in Princeton, stand out as familiar hill-tops,
which are first to whiten with the early snows. To
the easterly are the hills of Waylaud and Waltham,
prominent among which, in the latter place, is
'■ Prospect Hill." To the southerly, in Sudbury and
Framingham, is " Nobscot." The view of the inter-
mediate country is grand. It outstretches in places
like acres of vast intervale covered with herbage and
forest. Interspersed over the beautiful prospect are
villages, hamlets and fruitful farms, threading among
which are winding highways and streams.
Southwesterly is Marlboro', Westboro' and South-
boro" ; southeasterly, Sudbury Centre, South Sudbury
and Wayland ; while Lincoln is near by on the east ;
to the northeasterly is Concord; and to the northerly
is Acton with its Davis monument, and various vil-
lages.
Nearer, and almost at the very hill's foot, is the
smiling and busy village of Maynard.
Prominent in the place is the tall factory chimney
and factory buildings, while about them are scattered
clusters of comfortable cottages and tenement-houses,
and upon the high land adjacent is the former resi-
dence of Mr. Amory Maynard, the chief founder of
the village, and his son, Lorenzo, the present agent
of the A.ssabet Mills. These latter residences, are
beautifully situated, surrounded by a grove of
beech, oak and maple trees, while upon the grounds
are a choice variety of shrubs and flower-bearing
plants.
Pompositticut Hill has the more gradual slope to
the north and west, and upon these sides are ex-
cellent orchard and plow-lands. On the south side
is a fertile valley and many broad acres of fine i)as-
turage.
Beside the promiuent landmarks now mentioned
there are lesser objects of interest and beauty, and all
together give a pleasing variety, which makes May-
nard and the vicinity one attractive alike to the man
of business, to those seeking the retirement of a quiet
rural retreat, and to the farmer and transient trav-
eler.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
STOXEHAM.
BY WILLIAM I). STEVENS.
During the year 1020 if a white man could have
stood upon the summit of Bear Hill a graud and
lovely view would have stretched out before him.
Turning his face to the east, be would have beheld
the rays of the sun gleaming along the waves of the
Atlantic. With his back to the ocean, the murky
lines of Wachusett and Mt. Monadnock would have
traced their forms on the western horizon. Three or
lour miles to the south, upon the shores of the Mystic,
he would have seen the late habitation of Nanepas-
hemit, chief of the Pawtuckets. Beyond the Charles
was Shawmut and the dominion of the Mas.sachu-
setts. At his feet he might have noticed an Agawome
or a Naamkeek paddling his canoe over the pic-
turesque waters of Spot Pond. On the plains to the
north he might perchance have discovered fields of
Indian corn breaking the sweep of continuous forest,
and detected here and there smoke rising over the
fields and above the wigwams, but he could have dis-
cerned no trace of civilized habita'.ion. Captain
John Smith and a few navigators had sailed along
the eastern .shores of Massachusetts, but no explorer
had penetrated so far into the interior. Through the
primeval wilderness was seen only the track of the
savage. The history of all the past was buried in
oblivion, and yet for ages these hills and valleys had
been peopled by a race so primitive and barbarous
that they have left behind them hardly a trace of
their existence. As the plough turns up the earth,
the farmer occasionally discovers the head of a spear
or an arrow-head. Sometimes the rudest kind of a
stone implement is found, and just beyond the eastern
limits of the town, in Melrose, extensive heaps of
arrow chips constitute about the only memorial in the
immediate neighborhood left behind them by the war-
like aborigines.
Prior to 1632 there is no evidence that any portion
I of Stoneham had been visited by a European, but on
' February 7th of that year the following record of a
visit by Governor Winthrop has been preserved :
I "The Governor. Mr. Nowell, Mr. Elliott and otb(;rB went over Mye-
I tic Biver, at MedfurJ, and going Nortb and Cabt among the rocka about
462
HISTORY OF >IIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
two or three miles, they came to a very great pond, having in the niidat
some rstaods of about one acre, and very thick with trees of pine and
birch, and divers amall rocks standing up in it, whicii they tlierefore
called Spot Pond. They went all about it upon tlie ice, from thence
towards the Northwest about one-half mile, they came to the top of a
very high rock, beneath which, towanls the North, a goodly plain partly
open land and partly wooils, from which there is a fair prospect, but it
being then close and rainy, they could see but a small distance. The
place they called Cheese Rock, because when they went to eat somewhat
they had only cheese, because of the Governor's man forgetting for haste
to put up some bread,'*
This must have been the north part of Bear Hill.
Very generally the early towns of Mas-sachiisetts were
of large territorial extent. The original settlement
often served as a nucleus from which radiated other
settlements, the inhabitants spreading out through
the wilderness, forming separate communitie.s, and
gradually organizing into independent towns. These
communities, in many instances, were separated from
each other by long distances, with no means of com-
munication between them but by an Indian trail or
the rude path of the forest. This was true of Charles-
town, which, within a few years after its settlement,
included Woburn, Maiden, Stonehpm, Burlington,
Somerville and Melrose, a large part of Medford, and
a small part of Cambridge, Arlington and Reading.
AVoburn, including Burlington, was incorporated in
1642; >[alden, including Jlelrose, iu 1649, and Stone-
ham in 1725. Charlestown was settled in 1629 and
'30, so for almost a century she embraced within her
limits the territory comprised within this town. The
early settlement of Charlestown having been made
between the mouths of the Charles and the Mystic,
it soon became a matter of great importance to ex-
tend the boundaries and fix the limits, which was
done by negotiations with the Indians, and by grant
from the General Court. July 2, 1633, the Court
granted '• Mistick Side" to Charlestown, ordering
that " the ground lying betwixt the North (Maiden)
River, and the creek on the north side of Mr. Maver-
ick's and up into the country, shall belong to the in-
habitants of Charlestown." But this grant does not
say how far up into the country the limits of the
town shall extend, and so on March 3, 1636, another
order was more definite : " Ordered that Chnrleatown
bounds shall run eight miles into the country from
their meeting-house, if not other bounds intersect, re-
serving the propriety of farms granted to John Win-
throp, Esq., Jlr. Nowell, Mr. Cradock and Mr. Wil-
son, to the owners thereof, as also free ingress and
egress to the servants and cattle of the said gentle-
men, and common for their cattle on the back side of
Mr. Cradock's farm." May 13, 1640, on petition of
the town, an additional grant was made "of two miles
at their head line, provided it fall not within the
bounds of Lynn Village (Reading), and that they
build within two years." So it appears that as early '
as 1640 all the territory afterwards embraced within |
the limits of Stoneham formed part of Charlestown,
although it contained at this time not a single white I
inhabitant.
In 1653 an order was passed by the selectmen
' "that no inhabitant of the town or any other town
shall under any pretence whatever fell or cut down
any trees upon the Common without the neck, or the
Common beyond Mistick Pond within Charlestown
bounds, or the Common on ilistick side belonging to
Charlestown, without first acquainting the selectmen
therewith, upon the forfeit of what the selectmen
shall see meet, who are to judge according as they
are to conceive of the offence."
Prior to 1658 all the territory at Mistick side after-
wards comprised within the bounds of Stoneham was
owned by the inhabitants of Charlestown in their cor-
porate capacity ; but this year it was divided among
them in severalty. A committee had been ajjpointed
to make the division, and on the 13th of February,
1657, they made the following report :
" The returne made by those brethr.'n that were tleputed by the in-
habitants of CliHrlcstnwne for the propounding of u way for dividing their
town's land on Mi^tik .'^yde inio CuntluouiiKe, aoiilsoo, the di\ idingof the
wood and tyuilter ttiut each inhiibitiuit may lime in liin proportiun.
After some debate f.peot, iiiid tyme in llie consiileratiou h<Teoff, all the
I'omiiiittee luiauiiiiously concurring therein doe present this as their
advice unto the sayd town. Imprimis; tliut every head ntted iu the
ciiiitry rate be ^alleweil at twenty pounds. 2. That all women, tiiil-
dren and 'rf-rvunts that are not rared in Ihe cuiitry rale iu re;,T*rdsof tlieir
beads, that every twi, of them be vallewed lit the like proportion, that is
III Kiiy at twenty [Kiiinds. .). Iliat every t.100 estate brought in to be
rated to defrayecuntry charges, then that to have the like ploponion,
that is to say hxe (ynies as much iis lie that i.^ only ratable fur bid head,
and ten tymes soe much as where there is onely women itnil children ;
that is to say, ten of tiiem to tlito estate ; and ---oc where there is not
£11111 rated yet what part of a hundred pounds that is rated, then that to
liiiAe its propinlion il^ aforesayd, and soe where there is but one woman,
chihie or servant, they to have their pro]M,rlion as being halfe heads. 4.
Kfor I he de vision of the wood and lyniber weconceave the whole to lie ile-
videdinto ten equall parts, anil thedexipioiis to runn from Mistik bounds to
Redding bounds (he longest way. .'>. That the w bole according to the pi o-
poi-tious above savl '« cast up as supposing them a tliuusand parts, That
then every hundred of these to be comprised under each eiiual part of the
ten parts, the lirst devision to he made by survayours chosen out by Ihe
whole towne, the latter to be made by those whose lot shall fall to be lo-
getherin any one of the teuu parts. <i. That because some iuhabitunle in
this towne are ratable and yet not rated by nieansof bearingsome publick
office ; and being freed by Court order; as (hose alsoe that are troopers
and soe exempted by their he:kd8 in Jpoyut of cunlry rates, as alsoe some
by lueans of poverty ; yet all these to have their proportion iu this
devision, they that have estate for them to have a pro|Mjrtion according-
ly, and those that have do estates yett those of years to bo vallewed at
twenty pounds. .\nd those that are women and children and servants
that they be vallewed as aforesayed, that is two tn twenty pounds.
"Thomas Bb.*ttle in liehalf of the rest."
The division was finally made ou the 1st of March,
1658, under the following agreement:
"riiARLTow.vE, the hrst of March, or the first moneth jl^C;;;.
"1. It is .\greed that the hnit hea^l hue shall he iMeilford Karnie. that
line Lietween tlieni and our Towne, And all other head lines to rune
Parnilell with that line foiire scoree poole asunder.
" '-. The first Lott, distinguished by the figure one, shall be;:m at the
southeast corner where Mr. Nowells Fariite and 31eadford farme meet,
.\nd so succesBi\ely according to the ligures 1, 'J, ■'., t, .\c., is to the end
of the last figure or lott. .\U"l at Ihe end of the hi^t ICaiige to tiirne
back aguine in the second Bange. .\nd so to Ihe third. .Vc, successively
till each man have halfe his proportion, for the hret, .\iid then ihe
firBt to begin aguine, 1, -, 3, 4, Ac, and successively each number to
take place, in the second division, .is in the fir^t. till every man have
his other halfe of his Lott.
"3. It is .\greed that the Ponds shall not be measured.
'* 4. It IB .Agreed that he that Tarrya not la the Towne as an inhabit-
STONEHAM.
463
aot for one year next eDaiilDg the date taereoff, upon hie going out of
the Towne shall loee his whol« Proprietie, both off wo^mJ and commonfi.
" 6. It IB further Agreetl, That DO man ehall sell bis Mf>o<I or comnioliB
but to the InhabitautB of ChHi letowne, upon forft* itnre of twelve peuce
j>. load of eyther woo*] or Tylnber; And nut to dJc:poee of the cooinious
to any of any other Towne, upon forfeiture of the game, And if any
remove to inbabite in any other Towne, Ghall make no n^ of their coui-
mODB. but shall sell it or lett it to some of tbt- Towne of I'liarletown,
that the coniiuons may be reserved for ever to the use of the Inbabitantfi
of rharletowne.
" 0. It is Agreed that each Khali pay for tlie laying out of hta wixhI
lott within one monetli after it is Uyd out. u|Kin forfeiture of hip wood
and common. .And the selectmen of (.'liarletow ne fihall have hereby
power to sell it to pay the survayour.
"Tlii.-; was .\ greed unto by vote of the iubabitants of f'liarletowneat a
meeting in the nieetiug-boiis, this hrst otl March \^ll and ordered to W
Recorded in the Towne BooLe."'
Itappeare by the foregoiog order that, commeocing
at what was then the line of Medford Farm, about one
mile and a fourth .south of the present Stoneham
boundary, range lines were run in an easterly and
westerly direction a c|uarter of a mile apart, there
being two divisions, and .seven and n half ranges in
each division. These ranges exteuded north to near
where Captain Rufus Richardson's Lane, so called,
connects with Main Street. The territory north of
this and westerly of High !?treet was retained by the
town in its corporate capacity, and constituted what
was afterwards known as the Charlestowo Farms.
There was also e.vcepted from this allotment Spot
Pond Meadows. Nearly all the long stretches of
wall running easterly and westerly mark these an-
cient range lines. The land was drawn by lot and
set oH' to the several inhabitants in pro])ortion as they
were rated, one-half of the share of each lying in the
first division, and one-half in the second division,
probably for the purpose of equalizing, so far as pos-
sible, the value of the land. This allotment is of
great interest, because it lies at the foundation of
nearly all our titles, which can be traced back directly
to it, where the deeds have been recorded. Could
one go back to the year 1658, and accompany a sur-
veyor of that time, as he came up from the Market
Place (now Charlestown Square) with compass and
chain to Mistick side, he would leave the road near
the river and strike into the primeval forest by a trail
or possibly a path over which had been hauled timber
and cedar from the swamp near Spot Pond. No break
or clearing would meet his eye, except reaches of
water and meadow, till his arrival at Doleful Plain,
where part of the land was open and had been used,
as we suppose, for fields of Indian corn. He would
roam through an almost trackle.ss wilderness and
could probably discover no human habitation unless
possibly a few Indian lodges. No public road had
penetrated the recesses of the forest, and there was
hardly a landmark to indicate the presence of civil-
ized man. A few years prior to this time, in 1642,
Charlestown Village, incorporated as Woburn, had
been settled three miles to the west of us, and three
years earlier, 1630, just over the line to our east,
Lynn Village (afterwards Redding) had been planted.
There were forest paths connecting these two settle-
ments, by means of which the adjacent colonists vis-
ited their neighbors, but no highway was built for
many years subsequent. The chain-bearer, the blaz-
ed lines and the allotment of 1658 paved the way
for the early settlement of what was afterwards known
as Charlestown End.
There was an individual proprietorship in the land
which stimulated its occupancy and improvement.
The first settlers seem to have been attracted to the
northea.st part of the town, probably on account of its
nearness to Reading (now Wakefield). It was many
miles to the meeting-house in Charlestown, and but a
short distance to the meeting-house in Read'Dg; and
then our ancestors in this section of the town could
derive all the advantages and protection to be ob-
tained from the neighborhood of an established com-
munity. In case of an Indian raid they could flee to
the block-house of their neighbors. There was no
organized movement and general settlement, as in
most of the New England towns. The axe of the
solitarv- pioneer first rung out and broke the stillness
of a hundred centuries. Little clearings were made
here and there and the first farms started. The first
toilers were hardy men, with an education insufficient
in some cases even to wiite their own names. The
foundations of Stoneham were laid, not by men of
culture and wealth, but by the brawn and courage of
laborious yeomen. It is impossible to state with ab-
solute certainty the name of the earliest inhabitant or
the exact year of his settlement, but in March, 1678,
the inhabitants were Thomas Gery, John Gould, Sr.,
John Gould, Jr., William Rogers, Thomas Cutler and
Matthew Smith. These were the fathers of the town.
But little is known of them. The monuments which
survived them were the fields they cleared, the walls
they built and the families they reared. The records
have saved a little and tradition something more.
Thomas Gery, probably of Irish ancestry, was born
about 1638, is supposed for a time to have lived in
Reading, where he owned land, and in 1668 or 1669
moved to Charlestown End. He made a clearing
and built a house or cabin just beyond the northern
slope of Farm Hill, on or near the present High
Street, and had his home there during King Philip's
War. In 1668 he was complained of for cutting an
acre of grass in the meadow of Charlestown. He was
at the same time a cunning and a courageotis man.
It is said that on a certain occasion, having risen early
in the morning, his attention was attracted by the
suspicious movements of an Indian lying concealed
behind a log, and having reason to believe that he
was lying in wait for him, and not caring himself to
unnecessarily expose his person, he extended through
the partly open door his coat and hat in such a man-
ner as to draw the arrow of the unwary savage, and
1 the next instant the ball had whizzed from his uner-
i ring musket with fatal eflect. Fearing the vengeance
' of the tribe should they discover the dead body, he
464
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
buried it in his own cellar. On another occasion, as
the story goes, he had been away from home one
winter's day cutting wood, and on his return, just after
dark, stopped at the house of his neighbor, Thomas
Cutler. Mr. Cutler invited him to remain and spend
the night, urging upon him the danger of his pro-
ceeding, as a pack of wolves had been heard in the
neighborhood. Mr. Gery, thinking of his family and
their anxiety should he stay away, declined the in-
vitation, and shouldering his axe, started on. He had
proceeded but a short distance before he was greeted
by the Bowls of the wild beasts. On they came, we
can imagine with gleaming eyes and lolling tongues,
thirsting for human blood. A weak man, a cowardly
man might well have been deraoraliz'^d and lost ; not
so the hardy woodsman. Backing himself against a
tree and swinging his axe to the right and left, he
soon cleared a space and drove away the brutes. The
next morning, on returning to the spot, he found the
carcasses of four dead woves. By family tradition it
has been handed down that this man died as a soldier
in l(j90, when returning home from Canada in the
expedition of tjir William Phipps. From then till
now his name lia;i been borne by numerous descenil-
ants, many of whom have been among the chief men
of the town of which he was one of the first settlers.
Of the colony of H>7S the oldest inhabitant was John
Gi»uld, Sr., and very probably he was the first pioneer
who established himself at ( 'harlestown End. At
this time he wa.s sixty-eight years of age, and came
here some time prior to l(Jtj8. He was au extensive
land-holder, and his farm was in the extreme north-
eastern section of the town, most of it being embraced
in what is now Wakefield, and, including the land of
his son John, extended as far west as land of Thomas
Cutler (now of Mrs. Doylf). He is supposed to have
come from Towcester, in Northamptonshire, and to
have embarked for America in the " Defence," from
London, July 7, 1635. Originally he was described as
a carpenter, and later in life as a planter. It would
seem that he was oue of the most substantial men of
the town, for in the allotment of llioS there were only
nineteen who were rated iis high or higiier than he,
while there were one hundred and eighty-two rated
lower. For many years he lived in Charlestown be-
fore he moved to the north end of the town. He
joined the church in lii38, but later in life seems to
have been subjected to church di.scipline. probably
because he lived so remote from the house of public
worship. Under date of April 2.8, 16C7, we find the
church records contain the lollowing:
"The ivcknawlwlgmenl :ind lunrrasiun ..f Hrutlior John CouW, who
had been funnerly :uiuiuDJilied io order tu liis jiLct^pmuce to l.'otiiiiiim-
ioD again, vizt. i;od liiith htdpt-d mil- ti) nee iiiany tlinigrt wlivrein I li.tve
fomierlj- eiven ofTeiicu lo his people liolh of llusi hiinli and of Itt'ldint',
for which I have Iwen admonished .ind I do uot nor would justify myself
therein hut rather I doe justify the church ill their proceedings with nie
looking it to have l«eu the duty of the churfh to deal with uie for what
waaoffeDBlve. Go<l bath done me much ^o<h1 thereby and [ desire that
the Cborch would forgive nie and ncccept of me to their communion
which formerly before my admonition I diil enjoy. This was read to the
hrethrpti liberty given to theni who had anything of weight to object
but none did objett against it but it was accepted of as satisfactory. He
nne (tlie brethren consenting) received to thathtate of communion which
he liad before his admonition and by thesentence of the church declared
to be restored."
I On the 25th of September of the same year,
I "John Gould appearing before the select men being demanded whether
he would pay anything to the maintaining of ordinances for the time
past answered plainly that be was not willing to pay anything for the
time pust."
1
! The military service in the early days must have
been very exacting, for it appears that he was ex-
cused from training in 1682, when he was seventy-
; three years old. He conveyed his house and about
ninety acres of land to his son Daniel in 1687, and
this farm remained in the family of Daniel Gould till
a few years since, when it was owned by the late Dr.
Daniel Gould, of Maiden, who was the son of Daniel
Gould, Esquire, or " .Square Gould," ;i8 he was called.
I The name Daniel seems to have been attached to the
land for two hundred years, having descended from
: lather to son. In 1690 John Gould conveyed to his
■irandscn Thom.os a tract of land bounded on the
east by .Smith's Pond. Dying in 1691, he left a num-
erous otlspring. This family for one hundred and
fifty years was perhaps the most influential one of the
town. The names of Deacon Daniel <iould. Lieuten-
ant Daniel Gould, Captain .Abraham Gould, Square
(4ould and Colonel J. Parjer Gould, from generation
to generation, have represented men of the best type
that Stoiieham has ever produced. The name has
almost disappeared from our midst, but in the female
line the blood of old John Gould still circulates
amongst us in many households. Next westerly or
southwesterly from his father, was the house and farm
of John Gould, Junior, who probably lived on the
I west side of the old road to Wakefield. Adjoining
the land of John Gould, Junior, and westerly there-
[ from the clearing of Thomas Cutler would next have
appeared. Thomas Cutler lived on what was after-
wards known ;is the "old poor farm,'' which remained
; in the family till the death of .the widow Elizabeth
Cutler in 1825, after which it was sold to the town, no
male representative remaining here who bore the
j name. Thomas Cutler must have had an eye for
I beautiful and extensive scenery, his home command-
ing incomparably the finest view of any among the
first inhabitants. He died in 1683, at the age of forty-
eight. About one-third or one-haif mile southwesterly
from the house of John Gould, Senior, lived William
Rogers, who occupied the farm lately owned by
Captain Buck. In 1669 he married Abigail, the
(laughter of Mr. Gould, and at that time was a resi-
dent here. His house probably stood on or near the
spot where Mr. Currier now resides. But little is
known of him. He died prior to 1688, for on Febru-
ary 7th of that year his widow married John Rogers,
of Billerica. He was succeeded by his son William,
.lohn Cutler conveyed to him in 1690 twelveand one-
half acres, " reserving highway two poles wide for use
STONEHAM.
465
of the town." The son remained here till 1728, when
he sold his farm of thirtj- acres to Deacon Daniel
Grould, and from that time nothing is known of the
family. They made no lasting impression upon the
town and none of their descendants appear to have
remained. The last one of the first inhabitants
whose shades we invoke is Matthew Smith. In the
early history of Charlestown, there were three gener-
ations of Matthew Smith, and it is not quite certain
whether it was Matthew first or second who planted
himself at Charlestown End. In 1678 Matthew re- '
sided here, and ten years later Matthew Smith, Senior
and Junior, were residents. It would rather seem that
the first one of the name remained in the old town,
although it is by no means certain, and probably was
the .same one who embarked at Sandwich, County
Kent, with wife Jane and four children in 1635. He
was a shoemaker; inhabitant 1637; with son Mat- i
thew, herdsman, 1649 and 1655; town crier, 1657;
aged about seventy-two in 1682. He was town mes-
senger at thirty shillings a year in 1637. In the divi-
sion of 165S he was allotted eleven acres, five and one-
half in the second division, which probably included
the land where D. H. Tilton now resides. One of the
name, either the father or son, died in 1690, who had
married, about 1684, Mary Cutler, probably the widow
of Thomas Cutler. He must have been a man of '
some substance, for in his inventory are found two
oxen, one horse, four cows, three yearlings, nine sheep
and four swine, and he carried on a farm which he i
leased of Charlestown. This farm is described as
bounded on the north and east by Thomas Gery, and i
on the south and west by the town, consisting of forty
acre.s, " with as much meadow as he can get out of Par-
ley's swamp, aud out of town land nigh Redding, not
exceeding twenty acres for twenty-five years; rent after
twelve years, four pounds per annum ; he to plant and
build a house eighteen by twenty-two, and barn, to
be left the town." The house in which he lived
stood on the north side of North Street, near where
Mr. Pierce now resides, or possibly it was the house
of the late Deacon Dunlap. This completes the list
of the first settlers. It requires but little stretch of
the imagination to go back two hundred years, recall
to life our early forefathers, look in upon them as they
lived in their first rude cabins made of logs, and be-
hold the fields which they cleared amidst the forest,
the corn and grain just starting up between the charred
and blackened stumps. In those days the streams
were dammed by beavers, the sheep were a prey to
wolves, the bear roamed through the woods, and uow
and then the hunter brought down a deer. During
these years our pious ancestors, not numerous enough
to support a minister themselves, traveled on Sunday
to the meeting-house in Reading. Their habits were
simple and iheir wants were few. It was a hard con-
test with a rigorous climate and a barren soil for the
bare necessaries of existence, but it produced a strong
and manly character. They^ may have been rough,
30-ii'
and uncouth, and uneducated, but they possessed the
best traits of English yeomanry. Some of the abor-
igines lingered about their old haunts. The Indian
wars and the wild beasts made them familiar with the
use of firearms. In 1675 John Gould and Thomas
Gery were troopers in Captain Hutchinson's company,
and were impressed as soldiers from the "Three
County Troopers," and served in King Philip's War.
There were liquor laws in those days as well as now.
In 1682 " John Gould appears before the Court, and
convicted of selling strong liquors to the Indians is
fined ten shillings money and pay the costs." The
means of communication was at first by forest paths
and private ways from farm to farm. No public high-
way existed till about 1685, when one was laid out from
Reading to Wobum as follows : " Beginning at ye
Country road near Sergt. Parker's house and so along
by the meadow, called Hoopper's Meddow, and by the
foot of ye hill, which is above ye leest of three ponds,
from thence to the way marked out by Sergt. Parker,
throwe Charlestown land to Wobum River, neer John
Richardson's house." Another highway was also laid
out the same year from Reading to Charlestown (now
Stoneham). These two roads were the old road over
Farm Hill and the present North Street, or possibly
one of them was Green Street. The latter road, be-
ginning at the easterly foot of Cowdrey's Hill, came in
a southwesterly direction by the houses of the Goulds,
passed William Rogers, near the end of Thomas
Cutler's land, and so on to Charlestown, a more par-
ticular description of which will be given hereafter.
The road over Farm Hill accommodated Thomas
Gery, and the road from Reading to Woburn (North
.Street), Matthew Smith. Tradition says there was an
old road over the southest corner of Bear Hill, and so
on through Spring Pasture to Medford. " In 1673 a
large trade was carried on in cedar posts, shingles and
clapboards. The select men granted many of the in-
habitants permission to cut the trees in Cedar Swamp
near Spot Pond, and John Mousal was charged with
the duty of inspecting the number and bigness of the
trees cut down." There were but few additions to the
inhabitants for many years. In 1688 Thomas Cutler
bad died, and was succeeded by his son Thomas.
Daniel Gould, the son of John, had come of age, and
Samuel Cowdrey, Michael Smith and Andrew Philips
were added to the settlement of 1678. The history of
the town during these years is little more than the
bare mention of the names of the people who lived
here, and the location of their farms. Measured by
the progress and attainments of the nineteenth cen-
tury, their lives must have been barren indeed. The
tomahawk and the war-whoop of the red man at
times varied the monotony of their existence, but the
great and vital question which, more than any other,
seems to have absorbed the attention of our ancestors
was religion. About the most important business
which came before the town was the building of the
meeting-house, and the support of the minister. At-
466
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tending church as they did at Reading, it was a source
of grievance to the people of that town that they
should contribute nothing towards the support of the
Gospel, being taxed aa they were in Charlestown, and
so the following petition was presented to the General
Court :
"The humble petiftion of the InhabitftDts of the towoe of Redding,
Humbly Showeth — That wbereu our case, being aa yoDr pettiflaioers
humbly cooBeive, soe sircumstanced, aa wee Know not the like id all
Respects — and not KnowinK which wave to helpe oureelvee — But Uy
hambly acc<iuaintiDg yor huanera with our state — your honners beeing
the Fathers of the Ooninionwealth to which wee doe belonge ;— aud
yor petisaineni humbly hoping tbat yor honners will helpe soe far as
may bee to the Relieving of ns in our case ; — It t>eing soe with us that
wee ana but a poore place, very few above sixty families, Abell to pay u<
tlie Ministry, and sevenill of them have more need to Receive than to
paye,— if we were a place of altility aa many others bee ; and to us there
is Adjacent farmers, which bee constant hearers of the word, with us.
which goes not at alt to their owne towne. But transiently aaotherwdoe :
Neither came they one [he Sabbath daye butt bee hreakera of the Lawe
of god and of this commonwealth aa we rnnseive. Aud to many of them
Itt would be soe intolerable a burthen, that nianyef tbem must necessarilv
refrains from the public worship of god, established amongst up, for
prevention o( which they 'loe heare with us, which seems lo he ver}
hard for us to rnaiutayne Ministry and Meetinghouse conveniently for
them, and others t(. force them to pay their hole Hatea to their one
townes, aa others do ; or if wonie of them bee Better-minded, their bise-
nes lyeth M} att the present that wee have nothing from them all or
next to nothing.
" .Vnother thing that your humble petiaioners desire to rleclare
to your honners la thatt vvee have now not roume enough in our
Meeting-liouae for ourselves, but the Adjasent farmers t)eing one third or
very neare one third as iiitich aa wee, wee musts build anew befoie it
bee Longe, for the house will be loo little for them and u», which we
hope your bonnets will consider bow the case is like to bee with us, if
iiotlnng t>ee considered. Rutt as wee hope itt is the waye, that god
would have us to take to leave the ca^e to your honners, we desire
humbly sue lo doe, and ■piietly to reste to thia honoure"! t'oiirte's good
pleaaure aa to what hath been declared.
*' .\nd ahall ever pray — In the name & by the consent of the re^te of
the inhabitants (tf the towne. Win. Towdrey, Robery Burnap, .loiia.
Poole, Thomas Parker^ .lereiuy Swaine."
When subscriptions were raised for the purpose of
building a new meeting-house in Reading in 1688 the
following subscriptions were raised from persons liv-
ing at Charlestown End and the list substantially
conprises those living here at that time
£ >. d.
John Gould 4 18 4
Daniel Gould 3 0 0
Thomaa (Jery 3 00
Matthew Smith :<en 0 10 0
Matthew Smith Jun 2 10 n
Michael Smith 0 10 0
Thomas Cutler 1 00
Samuel Cowdrey 1 0 0
Andrew Philips 1 Qo
Samuel Cowdrey came from Reading, and probably
lived not far from where Mr. Tilton now resides.
Michael Smith was advanced in years, and his
daughter Sarah was the wife of Andrew Philips.
Domestic infelicities e.xisted then as well as now.
" At a Court held at Charlestown, June 17, 1679,
Michael Smith and wife, of Charlestown, for disor-
derly living apart from one another were admonished
and to pay the costs of Court." Andrew Philips set-
tled here somewhere about 1686, living, perhaps, at
first in the easterly part of the town near the house of
Mr. Outram, but at the time of his death he re.^ided
on Cobble Hill, iu a dwelling formerly owned and oc-
cupied, and probably built by Nathaniel Dunton, of
Reading. His homestead was afterwards conveyed
to Rev. James Osgood, the first minister of .Stone-
ham. All the old residents will remember the par-
sonage of Parson Osgood. It stood on the corner of
Green Street, about opposite the house of the late
Reuben Locke, and wtts the best specimen of archi-
tectural style among us, which antedated the Revolu-
tion. Prior to the latter part of the seventeenth cen-
tury the population increased very slowly. The
settlers had generally located in the northeasterly
part of the town, but after this they spread out in all
directions. Iu lilSo Eleaz.er Bateman came from
Woburu ami located in the extreme we.sterly part of
the town, just north of Marble Street. The old cellar-
hole where his house stood was to be seen till within
a short time. That [lart of the town including the
level land extending all the way to Summer ."^treet,
was then known as Doleful Plain. When Bateman
purcha.*ed his land in li'iS-i. there was a cellar dug
and itoned ujion it, and the frame of a house twenty-
two by eighteen feet, which siems to have been the
regulation size that then prevailed. .Mr. Bateman
was a carpenter ;tnd owned one or two houses in the
neighborhood besides the one in which he lived. One
of these probably ^tood a little north of the house
where Mrs. Lot .Sweetser resides. He lived here till
17n and then sold his place to .Totei>h Underwood.
He Wits a man of .so tiiucli repute that on several oc-
casions he was appointed by the town on a committee
to lease the Charlestown Farms. In 1688, Patrick,
otherwise called Peter Hay, then described as of Red-
ding, commenced to buy land at Mystic .Side, so
called, and afterwards became one of the largest land
owners and most prosperous settlers in the neighbor-
hood. Hay was a Scotchman, lived for a while at
Lynn, (Lynntield) and removed to Charlestown End
in 1692 or 1693. He must have been a man of great
force of character, buying as he did, numerous tracts
of land, clearing farms and erecting dwellings. Al-
though his possessions extended in all directions, he
himself located in the northerly part of the town,
building first a loj; cabin, which tradition says stood
i near the bead of Tromont Street, and afterwards the
! house where he lived and died, on or near the spot
where Luther White now lives. This dwelling was
: occupied by his descendants till about 1846 or 1847,
; when it was burned. To his son James, who was a
. shop-keeper in Charlestown, he gave a farm of sixty-
I three acres, with house and barn iu the easterly part
of the town. The house stood ou the westerly side of
I Pleasant Street, about opposite the residence of Amos
Hill, Esq., and was owned by the Hays till it passed
out of the family to Thomas Gould in 1799. Another
j son of Patrick Hay, Capt. Peter Hay, who was one of
the most infiuential men in Stoneham of his time,
settled near his father, living for a while in the build-
STONEHAM.
467
ing known a few years since as the Old Office, and
afterwards in the Hay Tavern which descended in
turn to Capt. David Hay. For generations the race
was a thrifty and prolific one, exercising a very large
influence. A third son, John, a young man of great
promise, died in his thirty-first year. Peter Hay was
not only the owner of houses and land and men-ser-
vants and maid-servants, but he had a multitude of
wives, no less than four. He was one of the first se-
lectmen when the town was organized. After having
lived the life of a patriarch, so far as such a life was
possible in the eighteenth century, and in Puritan
New England, he died at the age of ninety in 1748.
As Peter Hay owned a large part of the Northern so
.John Vinton owned a large part of the Southern sec-
tion of Sloneham. He was n weaver, afterwards a
farmer, born in Maiden about 1678 ; came from Wo-
burn about 1710. His house probably stood upon a
slight elevation which is to be seen between the resi-
dence of Warren Wilson and South Street. An old
house once stood on this spot near which has been
dug up old pottery and curious relics. This was
upon his farm and he appears to have been the origi-
nal settler of the territory, so it would seem that this
was probably his residence, though possibly he occu-
pied and built the old John fiuckman house which
was torn down a few years ago. The author of " Vin-
ton Memorial '' locate." him as near the outlet of Spot
Pond, but although he and Stephen Richardson
bought the lot on which stood the mill in 1715, there
is no reason to suppose he lived there unless for a
short time. The above author says " John Vinton,
Esq. was a man of great ability, energy and activity,
and became a leader in every place where his lot was
cast." When Stonehum was incorporated the usual
order from the General Court was addressed to John
Vinton as the principal inhabitant, directing him to
issue a warrant for the first town-meeting. He ad-
vanced more money and jvrobably did more than any
other man to obtain an act of incorporation for the
town.
.Tohn Vinton was one of the first board of selectmen
and served in that responsible office six years, viz. :
1726, 1727, 1731, 1732, 1734, 1735. He was commonly
called to preside at town-meetings as moderator. He
was very often employed on public business. He was
placed by his townsmen on almost all important com-
mittees. At one town-meeting he was placed on four
committees. One of the first measures of the town
was the erection of a meeting-house, and Capt. John
Vinton was one of the committee of three to select a
site, procure materials, put up and finish the build-
ing. He was also one of the committee to employ a
minister. He seems in an eminent degree to have
enjoyed the confidence of his fellow-citizens. He
was a representative of the town in the Legislature in
1734. Capt. Vinton paid the highest tax of any man
in town. He was a lieutenant in the train band
in 1720, captain in 1723, a very energetic, enterpris-
ing prosperous man. He received a commission as
Justice of the Peace in 1734.
In 1736 he sold .his farm of 270 acres to James
Allen, of Boston, for which he received £2560 and
removed to Dudley where he died in 1760. Borne of
his descendants remained in Stoneham, and settled in
that part of the town which has since been annexed
to Melrose. Another large land owner was Timothy
Wright who was born in Wobum, was originally a
carpenter, and came here about 1700, settling in the
westerly part of the town, his house being located
near the corner of Wright and Hancock Streets. A
large portion of the original farm with additions made
to it by big descendants remained in the family for
about 175 years. The venerable form of Capt. John
H. Wright is still fresh in the memory of the present .
generation. The possessions of the Wrights em-
braced most of the territory westerly from Main, and
Warren Streets to Woburn line, and from Marble
Street on the south to the lands of the Hays, north-
erly from Montvale Avenue. The progenitor of the
Bucknams was Edward who came from Maiden in
1716, and bought twenty-six acres of Philip Alex-
ander with a house and barn which stood near the
corner of Warren and Lynden Streets, on the easterly
side of the road. With the usual thrift of the early
settlers he made considerable additions to his original
purchase, and died in Stoneham in 1773, aged eighty-
two years. Next easterly from Edward Bucknam
lived Richard Belcher, who is described of Charles-
town {IS early as 1708, when he bought a house and
twenty-one acres of land of Joseph Wright, Jr., of
Woburn. He very probably occupied the old Mars
ton or Ebenezer Bucknam house, on the north side
of Summer Street. He was a mason, taught school
at Charlestown End, and died in 1720, leaving a large
family of children. In 1695, Deacon Nathaniel Law-
rence came from Groton, bought seventy one and a half
acres of Joseph Lynde, and built the house recently
torn down on the southerly side of Hancock Street,
known as the Old Zac Gerry house. A lane formerly
led from the house to the old road (now Summer
Street). A brick was taken out of the chimney bear-
ing the mark 1708 from which it is possible to fix the
probable date of its erection. For those times it must
have been a roomy and substantial residence. The
character of this building as of the Ebenezer Buck-
nam house, the Old OflSce, the Jonathan Green house
in Green Lane, and of several others which have dis-
appeared within the past fifty years, many of them
similar, and built about the same period, indicate the
thrift and prosperity of the men who were the founders -
of Stoneham. These ancient relics of the pastare gra-
dually fading away, and the time may soon come when
not a single monument built by human hands wUl
carry us back.fb the days of Charlestown End. Even
the names of most of those who laid the foundation of
the town, have been long forgotten. Deacon Lawrence
very likely may have built and first lived in the house
468
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACnUSETTS.
which was the home of Deacon Jabez Lvude on the
east side of Summer Street, and now owned by Miss
Sarah A. Lynda. He was past middle life wlien he
came here from Grot<5n, and died in 172-1. He had
been a leading man in Groton, was an ensign in the
militia, a deacon in the church, and one of tlie lirat
representatives of that town under the charter of
William and Mury in 1()93. The ne-^Et year after his
death, his farm was sold by his children to Thomas
Geary. Another citizen of Groton who settled here
was Samuel Holden, who lived for a time iUiWoburn,
and bought a tract of forty-five acres in the westerly
part of the town south of Marble Street in 1600. The
Holdens owned an extensive territory in the south-
westerly part of Stoneham, and easterly of f5ear Hill.
[t is impossible to say with certainty where Samuel
tirst located, but probably on the laud which he origi-
nally purchased near Marble Street, although sub.-e-
quently some of his descendants live<l in two houses
westerly and s(<uthwesterly from the last residence of
the late John Bucknam. In an ancient paper now iu
the possession of one of the family is the following
reference to him while in (proton : " Samuel Hnjijeu.
second son to Richard ilulden, lived iu Groton until
the Indian War (which probably w;is the war wiih
Philip, but whether it wa>i or not, I shall not deter-
mine, the war with Philip, I think) was about the year
1()7.5, at which time Mrs. R wjis taken Ciijitive.'
"The town in the uightwas beset with Indians; tlie
Indians came to his house in the night and broke it
open and came in. His wife made her escape out of
a door with two HmM children in her arms and went
into a corn-field. -Mr. Hohlen stood behind a door
with a gun in his hand, intending to kill some ol
them, but it being so ilark he could nr)t see them. .
He also made his escape out of the house and went I
to a garrison house. The Indians, after plunderiug
the house, went oti". Soon after this ."Samuel Holden
moved to Stoneham (then Charlestown) for fear of
the Indians. He died on or about the year 1739,
aged eighty-eight years ! " As the observaut pedes-
trian tramps over the pastures between the Xathan '
Bucknam house and Bear Hill, he notices three de- ,
pressions in the ground where once stood human
habitations which long since have disappeared. Two
of them were occupied by Holdens, and the one far-
thest south by Isaac Howe, who purchased there a
house and barn and eighty-two acres of land, in 171o. '
William Richardson, the brother-in-law of John Vin-
ton, probably built the house and for a time lived in
it. Isaac Howe came from Ro.tbury at the age of
fifty-nine or sixty, and lived but two or three years
after his settlement. He left, however, several sons
and a daughter, Naomi, who married Joseph Holden.
To the lover of antiquity, in this new country where
there are but few antiquities, there is nothing more
fascinating than roaming through the woods and I
over the fields, placing the old range lines, discover-
ing here and there an ancient cellar-hole, and re-
peopling in imagination once more the territory with
the early inhabitants wlio dwelt here one hundred
and fifty and two hundred years ago. To a person
familiar with the transfer of their lands, the dates of
their birth, times of their death, the names of the
girls they married and the children they left, these
forefathers of ours seem like old and near friends.
Going now to the northwestern part of the town,
north of William Street, to the farms of Micah
Williams and Sumner Richankon, let us rebuild
again the houses of Timothy Baldwin, Sr., and Tim-
othy Baldwin, Jr. The former came from Woburn
as early as 1700, perhaps earlier, hired of Charles-
town eighty-six acres, bought land of his own and
lived a few rods northeasterly from the house of Mr.
Williams. Deacon Dean, in his history of .'^toneham,
tells this story of Baldwin'.^ house, which is a tradi-
tion. "The buililing for a considerable length of
time was supposed to be h.iunted. \ family lived
there at that time. At ihe sea.soii of harvesting a
quantity of pumpkins were carried into the garret ;
one evening while the father uas :ibsent, and the
iiiiithcr with tlie children and other members of the
family sat by the fireside, a noise was heard; some-
thing appeareil to be coming down stairs. It came
>tam|>, stamp, down the garret stair.-.; it then came to
the entry stairs, which led to a lower door, and with
increased lorce came pound, pound into the entry be-
low. Then the noise ceased. The afi'righted family
waited with great anxiety for the return of the hus-
l^aiid and father. When he returned the news was
communicated to him. He repaired to the entry,
when, on opening the door, a irood, lusty pumpkin
w;is rejiosing on the floor." .Mr. Baldwin was a per-
son of good education for those times, a man of inHu-
ence, and one of the first board of selectmen. With
.lohn (iould, James Hill and Peter Hay he built u
grist-mill near Mill .Street. Timothy Baldwin, Jr.,
lived west from his lather, a tew rods northeast of the
iiouse of Sumner Richardson. In 171.'; he bought
the house an<l barn and thirty-seven acres of land of
-V^ndrew Beard ; the latter probably having cleared
the land and built the house, for we find Beard buy-
ing lots of woodlaml, which made up the farm of the
first proprietors or their heirs, as early as 1700. Han-
nah, the widow of Timothy Baldwin, Jr., and her
second husband, John Vinton, in 176o, sell to Oliver
Richardson, in whose family most of the land has
since remained. During the first century of the
town hardly any family exerted a wider influence or
furnished more leading citizens than the Greens, two
or three branches of whom located in the easterly
and southeasterly parts of the town. Henry, or El-
der Green, was a weaver; came from Maiden; com-
menced to purchase land in the latter part of the
seventeenth century; is described as of Maiden, in
161)5, and of Charlestown, in 1709, and died here in
1717, aged seventy-eight. He was the father of Dea-
con Daniel Green ; probably built his house on the
STONEHAM.
469
nonh side of East Street, near the spot where Dauiel
G. Sturtevant now lives, who is a lineal descendant,
a portion of the property having remained in the
family for two hundred years.
His possessions lay chiefly north and south of
Spring and East Streets. Captain Nathaniel Green
was also a resident of Charlestown End in 1716, but
in a few years moved to Leicester. Another one of
the Greens who settled at Green Lane was Jonathan,
who came from JIalden in the early part of the
eighteenth century. From then till now the old
homestead, which is said to have been built early in
the eighteenth century, has been occupied in each
generation by a Jonathan Green. The Green farm
was very extensive, embracing a large portion of the
territory from the Melrose line southwest to Pond
Street. Captain Jonathan Green, son of the tirst
Jonathan, became a leading citizen, and filled a large
space in our history during his life, but it belong*
to a later period than the one of which we are now
speaking. Supposing it now to he the year 1710, we
will return to the abode of Patrick Hav, and travel-
ing easterly, towards the form of William Rogers, we
shall notice the house of Samuel Smith, on the north
of where now is Elm Street, about opposite the
residence of Captain Snow. Tiiis year he sold his
tarmof thirty-fouracres with aLouse,barn andorchard,
to Ebenezer Damon. Damon came from Reading :
was a blacksmith; in 1711 was a soldier against the
French and Indians in Canada, and lived here but a
few years. One of the oldest ilwellings in Stonehani
is on Green Street, owned and occupied by Oakes
Green. Its history gnes back aluKist two centuries,
through the families of the Greens, the Bryants and
the Southers, to Thomas Millard, who is supposed
to have built it and lived there till 172-'i.when he sold
to John Souther. Miliani cauie from Reading. North
of Thomas Millard lived Joseph Bryant, the father
of Col. Jo.seph Bryant. To a person tramping tlirough
the Felis west of Bear Hill and so down to S|)ring
Pasture, the territory appearing, till within a few
years, like a solitary wilderness, away from roads and
human h.ibiiations, it seems almost impossible to real-
ize that he is passing over what was once cultivated
farms, and yet, in this immediate neighborhood, long
before the memory of living man, there were three
diflerent houses. As one peered into the well, looked
down into the cellar-hole and traced the nuraerou?
walls about the Parker place, he felt almost the weird
sensation of looking back on a pre-historic past, that
the traveler experiences in gazing upon the ruins of
Palenque and U\mal. These old landmarks have af-
forded, how many hours of happy revery, but alas!
they are now all swept away, the walls are gone, and
not a trace remains to locate the home of Ebeuezer
Parker, who lived here l.jil years and more ago. His
nearest neighbors to the south lived, one of them
where now is the east end of Winchester Reservoir,
and the other a little farther south, in Spring
Pasture. As there was no highway in this neighbor-
hood, the people probably used the road over Bear
Hill, which extended down through the woods to
Medford. When the division of land among the in-
habitants of Charlestown was made, in 1658, the
northwestern section of the town was not included ;
that is to say, the territory between High Street and
Woburn line, and north from about Captain Rufus
Richardson's Lane. This was subsequently known as
the Charlestown Farms, and, in the early part of the
eighteenth century, was leased to different individ-
uals. The two hundred acres in the extreme north-
western section were leased, in 1705, to Stephen Wil-
liams, of Woburn, for twenty-one years, and were
bounded on the south by the old road from Reading
to Woburn. There was a provision in the lease that
the lessee should " build and finish upon said Land A
Dwelling house wich shall be Twenty Two foot Long
and Eighteen foot wide, nine foot studd between
joists, and a Leauto at the end of said house. Twelve
foot Long, the bredth of the house six foot stud, and
shall Dig and sufficiently stone A Convenient Seller
under said House, and shall build and cary up a
Double stack of Brick Chimneys to A Convenient
height above the house, and shall Lay two floors in
said house, and Leanto and fill the Walles Betweene
the Studs and Ceile them with Plained boards or Lime
morter on the inside, and shall make Convenient
Stairs, and shall board or Claboard the outside of said
house, and board and Shingle the Roofe, to make it
every Where Thite, and make Convenient Lights in
said house, and Glaze the same; And shall also erect
and build .\ barn upon said Land Thirty foot Long
and Twenty foot wide, and Cover the same on the
Sides, Ends and lloofe, to make it thite ; and at his
own proper Cost and charges suport, maintaine. Re-
pair and Amend the said house and barn with all
needful Repairntions and Amendments during said
Term, And shall also plant Two acres of said Land
with Good fruit Trees, for an Orchard, the Trees to be
planted thirty Two foot asunder, and Fence said or-
chard intire With A Good sufficient fence aboute the
same, and make and maintaine A Good sufficient
fence, stone Wall, or posts and Railes about What
Land he Improves ; And the said Land, medow, house,
barn and fences erected and sett up on said Land as
above said, so well and sufficiently repaired and
Amended ; with the orchard sufficiently fenced intire,
and as above expressed, all the improved Land so
fenced ; as above said at the end of said Term of
Twenty one years shall and will Leave, etc."
Eighty acres were to be reserved for woodland. For
rent he was to pay during the first ten years twelve
|)ence per year, and for the other eleven years the
sum of five pounds and ten shillings per year. How
long he remained is uncertain, though twenty years
later there was a Stephen Williams, Jr., here, proba-
bly the same man. The house which he built was
one story high, and probably stood on the north side
470
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of the old road a little easterly from the Woburn line,
though possibly the original dwelling was located
near the spot where the late Caleb Wiley lived. The
latter spot is said to have been the scene of an Indian
butchery. The tradition is, that after the murder
the neighbors assembled and pursued the savages.
Near a large rock, which may be seen to this day
about a third of u mile west of the house, one of them
was seen and shot. Also seven packs were found on
the rock, from which it appeared that six others were
in his company and had escaped. The farm east of
that of Williams, consisting of one hundred and six-
teen acres, with a house, barn and orchard, just such
as has been described, was leased to John Wesson, of
Reading, and extended to the Geary land near the
present High Street. The house was probably located
in the vicinity of where the late James Pierce lived.
Wesson also in 1705 leased ninety-one acres south of
his other farm, with the same provisions in the lease
.IS to house, barn and orchard as in that of Williams.
The latter extended from near Oak Street to High
Street. The buildings were located a few rods east
of the old house of John B. Tidd south of the road,
and were still standing in the early part of the pres-
ent century. Some years later this farm was occu-
pied for many years by James Hill, the founder of the
family of that name. The next and last farm to the
south was one, of one hundred and ten acres, let to
Thomas and Daniel Gould, with the same conditions
as in the other leases, and extended from near Oak
Street on the west to land of Kendall Parker on the
east, extending a little easterly of High Street, and
embraced a large portion of Farm Hill. Two ancient
homesteads stood on this territory, and it is not quite
certain which was the original farm house, but prob-
ably it was one built on the east side of the road,
nearly opposite the house of John Paine, and just
south of land now owned by the town. It was here
that Grover Scollay was afterwards said to have lived,
though for a. time he hired one of the Charlestown
farms formerly occupied by Wesson. When Stone-
ham was set otr, the Grould farm was conveyed to the
town towards the support of the ministiy. West of
the Gould and Wesson farms, and south of the old
road, was a farm let to Timothy Baldwin, of eighty-six
acres. There were no buildings upon this farm, and
in 1787 it was conveyed by Charlestown to Thaddeus,
Oliver, Caleb and Elijah Richardson, and afterwards
divided between them. It is believed that the names
and, so far as possible, the location of almost every
inhabitant who founded a family here, prior to 1725,
have been given in the preceding pages. It may have
seemed tedious to the reader, but it is a duty we owe
their memory that their names should be preserved.
No one of them is known to have acquired a distinc-
tion beyond his immediate neighborhood. None
among them could boast of Harvard as his alma mater.
Neither of the so-called learned professions had had
a representative at Charlestown End ; probably no
town within a radius of ten miles from Boston had an
humbler origin than ours.
It may be interesting to know soraetning of the
domestic life of the earliest settlers, and nothing indi-
cates this more certainly than the inventories of their
estates as they were made at their decease. Let us
for a moment consider a few of them. The first one
who died was Thomas Cutler, whose decease occurred
in 1683. He left twenty-five acres of land and a
house valued at £40 ; "3 cows, 4 young cattle, £18;
1 mare to colts, three pounds; 10 swine, 40 bushels
Indian corn and some rye and oats and barley, 9
pounds and 10 shillings ; 1 plough and ax and imple-
ments for husbandman's work ; 2 beds with bedding;
3 pair sheets with other liten, woolen and Has, 2
pounds, 4 shillings; 5 yards home-made cloth, and
some yarn, 2 iron pots with iron things and pewter
and brass, 2 pounds 5 shillings ; chests and boxes
with other usable things in house, 1 pound 10 shill-
ings ; wearing clothes, 2 pounds ; gun and sword, 1
pound." The inventory of John (ioiild, filed March
27, 1691, is as follows: "One feather bed, bolster,
blanket, bedstead, etc., £5 ; pewter and brass, £2;
Ironware, £1 l.js. ; household linen, £G 10a.; table,
chests, boxes and chaires, £2 lo«.; 2 oxen, £4; 2
cows, £4 ; 12 sheep, £3 12/.; Dairy vessels, il 13s."
Matthew Smith's valuation, dated December ITi, 1691,
shows that he left "Two oxen valued, £9 ; 4 cows, £13;
3 yerlings, £4 ; 1 horse, £4 10s.; 9 sheep, £4 ; 4 swine,
£3 ; Iron and Ring and plough irons, etc., £2 ; Iron and
two axes, etc., £1 18s.; .'i whit'altree, chains and cart
Ropes, Iron and tongs, Iron bolts, shave, Some other
eage tools and ax, £2 9«.; Indian corn and Inglish
corne, Hax, and woolen yarns and linen yarns and
linen cloath and hemp, £3 ISs. ; beds and cording, £5;
tobacco, l.'(s.; hops, 10s.; chests and bo.xes and pailes,
trays and dishes, with other wooden things visabal in
the house, tl 15'<.; 1 baril and a half of pork, £4 10s.;
sadell and bridell, £1 ; Iron arms and amunition, £2
10.'.; Cloathing, woolen and linen, £3 5s.; books, is.;
a broad axe, a book, a pair of shoes, £3 lOs." Coming
down to the early part of the next century, and to the
second generation, when wealth had somewhat ac-
cumulated and luxuries increased, John Gould, the
second of that name, who died in 1712, left a much
larger personal property, which was described as fol-
lows : " Wareing close, the best feather bed, one
bolster, 2 pillows, £G 5s. (it/.; a straw bed, a coverlaid,
£6 lis. 1 blanket, 2 sheets, cord and bedstead, £4
8s. 6(i.; another feather bed, bolster, coverlaid
9d. ; another feather— bed, 1 bolster. 1 cover-
laid, 2 blankets, 2 sheets, £4 23. tjd.; 6 napkins, 1 ta-
ble cloth, 1 bed blanket, £1 3s.; pillows, 4s.; 3 pewter
platters, one basoa and other puter and tinn, £1 7s.
lid.; brass cettle, 15s.; worming pan, (is.; a scollet and
oyru pot, 4s.; friing pan, 6s.; an oyrn cettle, 7s.; an
oyrn scelet, 4s.; fire shovel, tongs, 7s.; box oryn and
pot hook, 1 gun, 15s.; a pare of pistils and holster,
18s.; a cutlash, 4s.; 2 chests, 2 boxes, 19s. 6d.; 2 aad-
STONEHAM.
471
dies and pilian, Is.; lU books, Vis.; 5 barils and a
pipe, 16s. 6<f.; lumber, 6».; a loome, 2 slays, £1 10s.;
carpenters tools, £1 14s.; 2 sickles and wedge and
old oyrn, 17s. 6rf.; and tackling, los.; axes, 14s.; forks
and 2 chains, 16*.; 1 plough and oyrns, 8s.; boe, yoke
and rings and staples, 12s.; 1 shovel and grindstone,
7s. 8rf.; 1 cart and wheels, £4 10s.; sled and tumbril,
IDs.; a flax comb, 9s.; stone cart, 8s.; 20 bushels ry,
10s.; 0 bushals wheat, £1 2s. 6rf.; 16 bushals of molt,
1 B >! barly, £2 12s. 6(f.; Indian corn, 55 bushals at
2s. 3rf. per B, £6 17s. iid.; 8 pounds of wool, 5s.; a
cross-cut saw, 5s.; 5 swine, £2 ; 2 pair of oxen, £15
15s.; 1 horse, £4 10s.; one mare, £4 10s.; 6 cows, £17
15s.; 2 yearlings, £1 18s.; 23 sheep, £8 Is.; timber
hieved for a barn, 3s.; flax, 10s.; a paire of new shoos,
58.; 2 sacks, 3s.; 2 baskets, 3s. 9(f.; 300 bords, 12s.; 1
baril and half of pork, £4 10s.; sword, small things,
10s. 6(f." By an examination of these lists it will be
observed there, were no carriages, no crockery or
glass-ware or hardly any furniture except bedsteads,
chairs and boxea. The only fire was that of the fire
place. Carpets or ruga had not come into use. No
curtains were required to shield the inmates from the
curiosity of passers-by. There were no watches or
clocks to indicate the time. No metal more precious
than iron and brass and pewter and tin filled their
cupboards, or covered their tables. Potatoes had not
come into general use. The staple articles of food
were Indian com, wheat, rye, barley and pork, with
mutton and beef at intervals, and doubtless veal and
lamb now and then. Coffee and tea were luxuries of
the future, and probably sugar was very little in use.
Flour as we have it was unknown. Garden vegetables
were cultivated to no great extent. Milk and butter
and cheese they possessed iit an early day in abun-
dance. Wild game was plenty. The cloth was for
the most part home-spun. To a very large de-
gree their purchases were exchanges, grain taking the
place of money as a medium of exchange. Fruit
trees were set out at an early day, orchards started,
and afterwards great quantities of cider were made
and consumed, but the first John Gould and Thoma"*
Cutler hardly lived to reach that blissful day. It is
.safe to assume that during the first years of the set-
tlement, wagons were not in common use.
As the years went on comforts gradually increased.
As appears in the inventory of'John Gould, who died
in 1712, pillions were used, and we can imagine our
great-great-grandfathers on horseback in front, and
our great-great-grandmothers on pillions behind.
Every household contained a gun, and from necessity
all the men, and many of the women were familiar
with the use of firearms. This was not a border town,
but still the Indians in small numbers made occa-
sional incursions. John Gould and Thomas Geary, as
already stated, were soldiers in King Philip's War
and later Ebenezer Damon and Joseph Arnold in the
war against Canada. Perhaps there were no slaves
here in the seventeenth century, but there were sev-
eral in the eighteenth. Timothy Baldwin in 1708
made his will, giving to his wife his " beat feather bed
with the furniture thereunto belonging, and six pairs
of sheets, one paire of them being cotton aad lining,
and ten pounds in money, the chamber which is in
the east end of the House, with the Improvement of
a third part of my seller Roome, well and oven, and
my Brass Kettle skilet. Iron Pots and Kettels, and all
my Pewter During the Terme of her widowhood.
Also the use of a good cow and horse, half a hundred
weight of good Pork annually, fifteen bushels of In-
dian corn, five bushels of malt, two bushels of ry,
and two Barrils of aider, ten cords of firewood, liberty
of raising one swine and of gathering six bushels of
apples." Gould's saw-mill was in existence certainly
as early as 1708 and quite probably much earlier,
being located south of Mill Street, on or near the spot
where stood the saw-mill of the late David H. Burn-
ham. A grist-mill was built here by John Gould,
Peter Hay, Timothy Baldwin and James Hill in 1737
or 1738. There was also a mill in the early part of
the century near the outlet of Spot Pond. The only
public building was the school-house in the easterly
part of the town near where Charles Buck resides.
The appropriations for the school, however, could not
have been very munificent if the usual amount was
spent in 1713. That year four pounds were voted " to
pay for teaching children to write among our inhab-
itants near Reading." No record is known to exist of
a public house prior to the year 1725, but there is a
tradition that one was kept at an early day,^ located a
few rods north of South Street, on the Wiiison farm.
Numerous relics have been ploughed up at this
place, one of the most interesting of which was a
large mug in an almost perfect state of preservation,
similar to what is now known as Flemish ware. In
1725 the population of Charlestown End had been
gradually increasing till the number of male inhab-
itants who were taxed was sixty-five. They were so
far from Charlestown that they derived none of the
advantages of a connection with the parent town,
and suflered all the inconveniences attending a com-
munity separated from the church and the school by
miles of wilderness. The time had come when they
had outgrown the dependence of a distant settlement
and aspired to become a separate town. So this year
Captain Benjamin Geary and fifty-three others peti-
tioned to be set ofl", but the town voted not to grant
the petition. The General Court, however, in Decem-
ber, 1725, passed the following act:
"Whereas the Nortberlj part of the Town of Charleetowo withtD the
(JuuDty uf filiddlesex ia cotDpeteDtlj filled with InbabitaDta who lat)our
ODder great I>ifficultiefl by their R«inot«DeaB froiD the place of pcblic
worship, and have thereupoo made their applicatioo to the njd Towd of
Charleatowu, aod have iiliewise uddrcaaed the Court that they may be
Mt ofT a DiBlinct aod Separate Towd, aud be vested with all the powem
and privileges of a Towd, and the InhabitaDta of CbarleatowD b.v their
ageDts baviug cooaeDted to tLeir being set off accordingly, aod a coed-
mittee of this court baviug viewed the Northerly part of the aaid Towd
of Cfaarlestowu, and reported io favor of the Petitiooers. Be it there-
fore Eoacted by the Lieuteoaut-Goveroor, CoDDcil, abd Kepreaentatives
472
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, iMASSACHUSETTS.
Id General Conrt anembled and by the aotbohty of the same. Tbat the
Northerly part of the said Town of Charlejtown, that ii to eay all the
Land on the East side of Woburn, the South side of Reading, the West
side of Maiden and the North side of the Fifth Range of the First Divi-
sion of Charlefltown Wood Lota be and hereby is set off and constituted
a separate Township by the name of Stoneham. And the Bounds and
the Limit! of the said Town of Stoneham be according to the agreement
made in Noremberone Thousand seven hundred and twenty-five by and
between the committee or Agents for and in behalf of the said Town of
Charlestown, and the petitioners of the Northerly part thereof, wherein
It was consented and agreed, tbat the five ranges or remaining part of
the said first Division do remain to the Town ot Charlestown, agreeable
to a former grant of the Town made in the year 1657-58, and that the
Inhabitants of the Northerly half of Cbarlestown should have and
enjoy tbat Tract of Land lying in the bounds aforesaid, communly called
and known by the name of Goulds' Fanii, now under lease to Messrs.
Thomas and Daniel Gould, containing una hundred and ten acres, ur
thereabouts ; also one-half of all the Tun-n's Meadow (and uplands) lying
on Spot Pond, both for quantity and quality containing 9eventy-iiine
acres (by Captain Burnapp's platt) an estate in Fee with an equal share
in Spot Pond, the said Land or the value thereof t^) be improved for eet'
tling and maintaining an Orthodox minister to dispense the word and
ordinances among them. The Inhabitants of the Kiid Northerly half uf
Charlestown being by virtue uf the said agreement to be debarred from
any claim or demand of and to any Land money, Rents or income of
what kind soever, which now are or Bliall belong to the Town of Cbarles-
town us well those several Farms and Land lying within the Boundn
above said, as all other Estate or Income either Keal or Pei-sonal, and
from all demands for Hif;h Ways ; that so the Town of Charlestown may
quietly ami peaceably enjoy the same. .\nd further It is to be under-
stood that none of the Land contained in the Two Ranges and Half be-
longing to the first Division shall on any pretence whatsoever be as-
sessed or taxed by the said Town of Stoneham, exce|)t those Landn that
shall be put under Improvement, such as mowing, ploughing and pas
tiiring. And be it further enacted by the authority aforesaid, that (he
Tnbabitanta of the Northerly half of Charlestown living within the
Bounds aforesaid be and hereby are erected with the Powers, Privileijcs
and Immunities that the Inhabitants of any of the Towns of the Prov-
ince by Law are or ought to be vested with ; that the inlrabitants of the
said Town of Stoneham do within the space of two years from the Pub-
licaliciM of this Act, Krect and finish a suitable House for the public wor-
ship of God, and flo soon as may be procure and settle a Learned and
Orthoilux minister, of good conversation and make provision for his com-
fortable and honorable support ; and likewise provide a school-master to
iustmct their youth in Writing and Reading, and that thereupon they
be diricharged from any payment for the maintenance uf the ministry
and school in the Town of Charlestown, Provided that the Inhabitants
of Stoneham nevertheless, are to pay their respective proportions to Two
several assessments already made by the Assessors of Charlestown for
(.'oiinly and Town charges, and David Gould, one of the present consta-
bles of Charlestown, is required to collect and pay in such parts and pro-
portions of each of said assessments as are [lermitled to him by the said
Assessors of Charlestown according to the powers and directions in the
warrant duly made and delivered ; anything in this Act to the contrary
notwithstanding. December 17, 1725, This Bill having been Bead three
several times in the House of Representatives passed to be enacted. Wil-
liam Dudley Speaker."
The first town meeting was held December 24, 1725.
Timothy Baldwin Sen. was chosen moderator and
Daniel (xould Jr., town clerk. The select men the
first year were Captain Benjamin Geary, Captain John
Vinton, Mr. Peter Hay Sr., Mr. Timothy Baldwin
Sr,. and Lieut. Timothy Wright. The following is
the list of the remaining male inhabtants who were
residents this year and paid a tax.
John Gould Sr, Daniel Gould Sr, Daniel Gould Jr., Daniel Green,
Abraham Gould, William Rogers, Thos Cutler Sr., Benjamin Geary Jr.
William Lewis, Benjamin Wesson, Benjamin Gould. John Hay, Ebene-
zer Phillips, Samuel Williams, Jonathan Green, David Greeu, Jobu
Oreen, John Cowdrey, David Gould, Thomas Geary .Sr. Joseph Arnold,
Ehenezer Knight, Edward Bucknam, Stephen Parker, Ebeuezer Parker,
Samuel Williams Jr., John Vinton Jr., Stephen Williams Jr., Timothy
Wfjght Jr., John Dexter, Peter Uay Jr., Ebeuezer Damon, Tbumaa
Glover Sr, John iouthL-r, Nathaniel SoiitliL-r, Tlioliias (ieuiy Jr., John
Geary, Thomas Geary, Jonathan Griffin,. lohn Howe, .Siimeul Uolden Jr.,
Joseph Holden, Jacob Howe, Anthony Hadley, Ephniini Larabee, Sam-
uel .'^pnigue, Richard Belcher, John -May, James T.iylor, Samuel Wesson,
Jeremiah Belcher, Ebeuezer Cutler, James Hill, Joseph Bryant, Grover
Scollay and Thomas Williams.
The first business of importance which came before
the town was the election of committees to provide
preaching and to take preliminary steps for the erec-
tion of a meeting-houae, which was raised the next
year. It was located in the easterly part of the town,
a few feet southerly from the residence of Charles
Buck, and was a plain building thirty-six by forty
feet, with galleries on three sides and posts twenty
feet high. There were three doors, one on the east,
south and west. It could make no pretensions to
architectural beauty ; at first, was destitute of paini,
and for years its bare walls looked down upon a con-
gregation who did not enjoy the luxury of pews. It
was spiiken of by a person who remembered it in her
girlhood, as having no belfry or tower, and no entry,
and was situated on the easterly side of the roail. The
pulpit stood at the north end. It wa.s voted " that the
meeting-house shall stand between the black oak tree
and the red oak tree, upon the hill near the east end of
the school-house." Stones for the foundation were laid
by Ehenezer Pliillips, and the building was framed
by Lieut. Timothy Wright. Our ancestors were men
of strong religious convictions and in the main were
severe and exemplary in their morals, liut in some
respects they were more convivial than their de-
scendants.
On the day when the inhabitants assembled to
raise the frame of the meeting-house it must have
been an occasion of great hilarity and festivity.
Refreshments were served, and it rec|uires no Hight
of the imagination to suppose that the pious enthu-
siasm of the earnest workers as they erected the great
posts and lifted up the heavy beams may have been
somewhat stimulated by liberal potations ; for besides
a quantity of cider they consumed five gallons of rum.
For many years there were no pews, the people sit-
ting upon benches, the men on the west side, and in
the west gallery, and the women on the east side and
in the east gallery, the negro men occupying the rear
seat of the men's gallery and the negro women occu-
pying the rear seat of the women's gallery. Numer-
ous town meetings were called, many appropriations
made, and a considerable time elap.sed before the
edifice was completed. Four years after its erection
a minister's pew was built and .at the same time the
doors and window-sashes were painted, also the eave
troughs, weather-boards and end-boards. It appears
upon the records that the womcu of Stoneham con-
tributed towards the completion of the house, £5 lis.
9rf., to which additions were made by the gentlewomen
of Maiden, Woburn and Reading. The first town-
meeting was held in the school-house, and those per-
sons only were allowed to vote who were freeholders,
having an estate of freehold in lands withiu the Prov-
STONEHAM.
473
ince of forty Rhillings per annum, or other estate to
the value of forty pounds sterling.
About an acre of land was purchased of James
Hay on which to locate the meeting-house, and at
the same time a quarter of an acre for a burial place,
it being the northerly part of the old graveyard south
of Pleasant Street. Town meetings were called and
conducted almost identically the same as those of to-
day. By means of them the people learned to govern
themselves. They were the very foundation of our
republican institutions. De Tocqueville says, " Town
meetings are to liberty what primary schools are to
science ; they bring it within the people's reach ;
teach them how to use and how to enjoy it." About
ten or twelve years after the completion of the meet-
ing-house a vote was passed that family pews might
be built which should be " lotted out to such men as
appeared to be the highest in rate and right ; " and by
the subsequent distribution, it would appear that the
men of the most consideration were the flays, the
Goulds and the Greens. It may be interesting to
pause for a moment and consider the appearance of
Stoneham at this period. There were probably about
fifty houses in the town, but not the remotest sem-
blance of a village. Almost every man was a farmer,
some of them combining with agriculture the occu-
pations of cordwainer, weaver, carpenter or black-
smith. Stoneham was inferior to most of its neigh-
bors in territory, population and wealth. We may
suppose its population to have been between two
hundred and fifty and three hundred. Although nu-
merous clearings had been made, and many farms
were under cultivation, a large portion of the terri-
tory must have been covered with forest. Let us start
from the meeting-house as a centre, perambulate the
town and make as perfect a picture of it as we may.
There were but three or four highways, none of them
straight, but crooked country roads. In explanation
of the circuitous course of the old road over Farm
Hill, as it existed forty years ago, it used to be said
it was laid out by a drunken man. A large portion
of the houses were scattered about on lanes and pri-
vate ways. The buildings in a country town a cen-
tury and a half ago did not present the neat and
thrifty appearance which characterizes a New Eng-
land village to-day. The dwelling-bouses were gene-
rally dark and weather-stained. It was the day of
things useful and not ornamental. The meeting-
house stood on one of the few highways facing to the
south, on an elevation overlooking the site of the
future town. Proceeding northerly, the first house
a little beyond the church, and on the west side
of the road, was owned by James Hay, although
he himself did not live in it, being a shopkeeper in
Charlestown. The next one, not far distant on the
right of the road, was probably where Andrew Phil-
lips had lived, the one which Nathaniel Dunton
built. Keeping on until we come to Spring Street,
somewhere hereabouts a private way led to the east.
on which lived Daniel Green, Ebenezer Phillips and,
a little later, Thomas Knight and Ephraim Brown.
Winding our way up through Bow Street, by the
stand-pipe, the next old-time citizen we know of on
the left, was John Souther (the Oakes Green place).
It was here the church was organized. Souther's next
neighbor on the north, and on the same side of the
street, was Joseph Bryant. From Bryant's the road
followed the present course of Green Street till its
intersection with Elm, and then easterly by the lat-
ter to its junction with the old road to Wakefield,
and by the last-named old road till it reaches the foot
of Cowdrey's Hill. This was one of the very earliest
highways of Charlestown End, and on it lived, in
1725, William Rogers, Daniel Gould, Sr., Daniel
Gould, Jr., and Abraham Gould. As before stated,
William Rogers was located on the Captain Buck
farm. Daniel Gould, Sr., afterwards Deacon Daniel,
a short distance beyond Rogers', on the opposite side
of the way. On beyond Daniel Sr., was Abraham,
and still farther on, Daniel, Jr., otherwise called
Lieutenant Daniel, who had inherited the home farm
of the original John Gould. All of the Goulds were
on the left-hand side of the road as we go towards
Wakefield. A lane, we suppose, led from the road near
Rogers' house to Thomas Cutler's (the Doyle place).
Retracing our steps once more to the meeting-house
and proceeding south by the general course of the
present Summer Street, we pass between the house
of John May on the left and his blacksmith shop on
the right. May lived in the old house now owned by
Miss Lynde, which is a building of some historic in-
terest, and will be referred to at a later period. Al-
most opposite the May house a lane from the road on
the west approached the homestead of Thomas Geary,
(the Zac Geary house) which had been sold to him
by the children of Deacon Nathaniel Lawrence. Fol-
lowing the circuitous course of the highway in the
direction towards Wobum, (now Winchester), our
attention is first attracted to a house on the north side
of the road, where it is supposed Richard Belcher
lived at the time of his death in 1720. It was prob-
ably occupied at this time by his children and widow.
Here lived a century later Ebenezer Bucknam, and
within a few years wa.s owned and torn down by Hi-
ram Marston. On the south side of the way between
Belcher's and Wobum line, were one and perhaps two
houses occupied by Joseph and possibly Samuel
Holden. On the north side there was a bouse a few
rods east of Woburn line owned at that time by Joseph
Underwood, and occupied perhaps then, at all events
a few years later, by Stephen Parker. This was where
Eleazer Bateman had established himself forty years
earlier. Turning to the present Warren Street
where it connects with Marble Street, if we wish
to trace the old road we shall follow Warren Street to
Central Square, cross the Square to Central, down
Central to Elm, up Elm to Waverly over Farm Hill
by the way of High Street. Of course these modern
474
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUxVTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
streets have been widened and straightened but this
was one of the old country roads from Reading to
Woburn a century and a half ago. When the town
was organized, Edward Bucknam, Timothy Wright
and Peter Hay owned houses on or near it, the loca-
tions of which have already been given. I*, passed by
the doors of Grover Scollay and Captain Benjamin
Geary, on and over Farm Hill. The central part of
the village was then largely a forest. East of the
road a path led down to the mill near which John
Gould is supposed to have lived. Near the junction of
Central and Elm Streets a private way ran towards
the Woburn road by the houses of Timothy Baldwin,
Sr. and Jr. From near the house of Peter Hay, Sen.,
a bridle way led easterly towards Reading by the
house of Ebenezer Damon. The present North Street
ran from Reading to Woburn through the Charles-
town Farms. Pond Street was an old road extend-
ing towards Maiden, passing near the houses ol
Captain Vinton, David Gould and perhaps Anthony
Hadley. From near the meeting-house a private way
led to Green Lane and Melrose Highlands. Town
government and town offices have changed but little
since then, but some of the customs which prevailed
at that time seem quaint. It carries us back a long
time svhen we read from the records the vote " that
Ebenezer Parker shall be tytiiing man, that bogs shall
go at large and that no shepherd shall keep sheep in
the town of Stoneham, that Deacon Daniel Green shall
set the paalm for the Sabbath day, that five pounds
be raised to provide the town with a pair of stocks,
and five pounds more for renewing the town's supply of
ammunition." The town well organized and a meeting
house built measures were taken to secure a settled
minister, and procure the services of a school-master.
The former was considered a question of such vital
importance to the welfare of the people, that it was
voted in town meeting assembled to set apart a day
for prayer to ask God's direction in the choice of a
minister, and so strong was their religious faith, that
they doubted not their prayers had been answered
when in the following month they elected the Rev.
James Osgood. In their selection of a person to fill
the pastoral office, they seem to have been as diffi-
cult to satisfy as their descendants. Several were
heard on trial, before one was chosen. The first
preacher who was hired for some months was Rev.
Joseph Champney. Mr. Osgood, who came from Salem
WHS called in October, 1728, accepted in April, 1729,
and was ordained on September 10th. The ministers
.assisting at the ordination were Rev. Richard Brown,
of Reading, Rev. Samuel Fiske, of Salem, Rev. Hull
.4bbot, of Charlestown, Rev. Benj. Prescot, of Salem,
Rev. Jo.ieph Emerson, oI'Malden, and Rev. Daniel Put-
nam, of Reading. The town had voted him a salary of
£110 per anum, £172 for a settlement, and a few years
later purchased a wood lot and agreed to furnish him
with ten cords of wood each year. Mr. Osgood pur- i
chased land and built him a house which was a fine
one for those times, and he remained here till his
death in 1746. The members of the church who were
dismissed from the First Church, of Reading to form
the church at Stoneham were Daniel Gould, Daniel
Goold, Jr., Ebenezer Knight, David Gookl, Ebenezer
Parker, Abraham Goold, Edward Bucknam, Thomas
Cutler, Joseph Bryant and Jonathan Griffin. These
with Ephraim Larrabee, Jacob Howard and Samuel
Sprague on July 2, 1729, signed the church covenant.
The women who severed their connection with the
Reading church, some months later to join the Stone-
ham church, were Anna, wife of Samuel Holdeu ;
Naomi, wife of Joseph Holden ; Eliza, wife of Benj.
Gary, Jr.; Hannah, wife of Thomas Gary, Sr.; Abi-
gail, wife of James Taylor; Mary, wife of John
Souter; Hannah, wife of Peter Hay, Jr.; .Sarah, wife
of John Gould ; Judith, wife of John Gould, Jr.;
Eliza, wife of John Gary, and Eliza, wife of Benjamin
Gould. From the church at Maiden came Judith
Lynde, Mary Green, John Green, Isaac Green, Joseph
Green, John Dexter, and the wives of the three latter.
From the church in %)ston came Elizabeth Holden.
Some of those who were dismissed from the church at
.Maiden lived in what is now known as Melrose High-
lands, a territory which a few years subsequently was
annexed to Stoneham, and remained a part of this
town till it annexed to Melrose in 1853.
Two of the best sources of information from which
to obtain materials for a town hi.story are the records
kept by the church and the town clerk. They are pic-
tures of the times, skeletons upon which it requires
but little imagination to construct a complete image,
representing the customs and habits of life and im-
portant events which prevailed in a New England town
one and two centuries ago. A most interesting little
book is the one in which appears the transcript of the
proceedings at church meetings kept for years in the
neat and distinct handwriting of Mr. Osgood. For
instance, take the occasion when the first deacons
were chosen and read Mr. Osgood's record of it. "Att
X Chh. Meeting in Stoneham Called by the Rev'"*.
Pastor of sd Chh on Novemb' 27th, 1730 at the meet-
ing House in sd Town. The Pastor opened the meet-
ing with Prayer Imploring a Blessing upon their Chh
and for Direction & Aid in the work that was before
them Viz. in the election of 2 of the brethr" that
might be Best Qualified to Sustain the office of Dea-
cons to the Chh. Then the Brethr" at the request of
the Pastor bro' in ther written vote on Papers. The
1" vote for the 1" Deacon by the Breth" of this Chh
that were present came out upon Broth' Dan' Gould
Sen who accordingly accepted of said election. The
2'"' vote on written Papers for the 2°'' Deacon to this
Chh. fell upon Broth' Dan' Green, who accordingly
stands elected & has accepted of sd election. Noth-
ing further being agitated or'acted upon. The Pastor
again Prayed with them & Gave thanks to God for
his assistance & Recommended the Persons Elected
to the office of Deacons to the Grace of Gd that they
STONEHAM.
475
might be made Blessings to the Chh & Ans'' the
Charsct' of Deacons & be Enabled to fulfill all parts
of ye office. So the Breth" were Dismist by the
Pastor.
"As attests James Osgood Clerk of s" Chh."
" The second day of March, 1746, Eey. Mr. James
Osgood died and was Interred the fifth when his
Corpse was carried to ye Meeting-House and there
attended to the grave by several ministers and a great
Concourse of People." In 1729 the town voted to
raise £9 for a school ; and for the first time chose a
committee to procure a school-master. In 1731 the
selectmen laid out a road on the easterly side of Spot
Pond to Charlestowu (now Medford) line. Previous
to this there had been a private way over which peo-
ple had been accustomed to travel, but it was neces-
sary to take down bars and open gates and the lime
had come when public convenience required a high-
way. The exact course which the way should run
seems to have caused a good deal of contention
between the town and some of the land owners,
especially Timothy Sprague of Maiden, who owned
the land at the outlet of Spot Pond. Litigation fol-
lowed, and Sprague obtained judgment and execu-
tion against the town. The country road then run
to Maiden, and the new road connected with it near
the northeast comer of the pond running south.
Finally in 1734 an agreement was made with Sprague
by which the course of the road was fixed and a
watering-place secured. Also in 1731 the "selectmen
laid out an open Highway over the land of Stephen
Parker from the Country Road between said Parker's
house and barn " to Woburn. " Said way is to lie
open to all people to pass as long as there is free
liberty to pass from said way over Richardson's land
and the other Woburn land to the Country Road near
to Samuel Williams in Woburn ; and in case any of
the owners of Woburn land do stop or hinder the free
passing from said way to the Road by Samuel Wil-
liam's in Woburn as aforesaid, then the way over Par-
ker'* land shall no longer be a way." Stephen Par-
ker, it will be remembered lived north of Marble
Street, and this was probably the road from Marble
Street towards Montvale. It may be interesting to
the public-spirited citizens of today to know what
our fathers raised and appropriated for town expenses.
The annual meeting for the election of officers during
the first few years was held in March and the meet-
ing for raising money in May. In 1731 they voted
to raise £9 for a school for " Reding and Righting,
£2 for the Poor and for sweeping the meeting-house
and for looking after the meeting house and £40 for
the Highways." This was exclusive of the minister's
salary, the larger part of which was paid with interest
derived from the sale of the Gould farm. John Vin-
ton, Eiq., was sent a representative to the General
Court in 1734,— the only instance prior to the nine-
teenth century that the town was represented, except
in 1775, when Col. Jos. Bryant was sent a representa-
tive to the General Court, and Capt. Samuel Sprague
to tie Provincial Congress.
Our ancestors loved office and distinction, were
punctilious of all titles from ensign to colonel and
deacon, but chose to do without a representative be-
cause it involved expense for his service. But little
of the highway tax was raised in actual money, most
of it being worked out on the roads, a custom which
prevailed till a comparatively recent time. Great
care was taken that no one should obtain a settlement
if it could be prevented, lest such one might become
a public charge, and so notices were served upon peo-
ple coming into town, of which the following is a
sample:
" Middlesex ss. To Mr. Ebeneser ,PbiIlips, constable for tbe towD of
Stonebam and to you greeting; You are in bis Magesty'a name required
fortbwlth to warn out of tbe town of Stonebam Martba Tidd and ber
child, late of Woburn, wbo are at the bouee of John Vinton, Eeq., of
Stonebam, and that tbey depart tbe laid town of Stonebam speedily,
they and their children, or else they may expect further trouble.
Hereof fail not and make a return of your doingB to myself at or before
the 19tb day of May. Dated at Stonebam, tbe seventeenth day of May
Anno Domini 1736, and tbe ninth year of our eoTengn Lord King
George tbe Second OTer Great Britain. By order of tbe select iDen.
Daniel Gould, Jr., Town Clerk."
One of the great evils with which our forefathers
had to contend during the last century was the tiuc-
tuaiion in the value of money on account of the large
emission of bills of credit and the consequent infia-
tion of the currency. Prior to 1745, when Louisbourg
was captured, specie had almost been driven from the
country, and it was flooded with a depreciated cur-
rency. Consequently many contracts were made pay-
able in the staple products, such as corn and pork.
The purchasing value of the pound was constantly
falling. No men suffered from this condition of af-
fairs more than the ministers, and for this' reason
there was a constant friction between the successive
pastors and the people about their salar,', which is
illustrated by the following letter from Mr. Osgood:
"To tbe select men of Stonebam To b« Communicated to tbe Inhabit,
auto of said Town at tbeir Town Meeting in Slay, 1T3T. Gentlemeu.
T gale my answer to settle among you In tbe work of tbe gospel uiiuis*
try, April, 1729, and in my answer 1 then Declared my acceptance of
what you then voted me for my settlement, and my yearly aabiry. But
in my further answer I further inserted this : (That 1 do expect that you
will Readily k Cheerfully come into those Further allowances which iti
tbe course of my ministry I shall stand in need of for my Comfortable Sup.
port. 1 am coming to a Family Itelation among you & By Reason of tbe
Bills of Credit Being so much sunk in their value In Exchange Between
Silver & ye Paper Currency ; for Silver money has risen from 18 shillings
to 27 shillings an ounce in Paper Bilbi ; so that the Paper Bills sinking
so much in tbeir Credit, Cloatbiiig, Provisions and Fire wood Have Rise
in tbeir price there updn, that with the one Hundred and Ten Pounds
which you voted me for my annual Support I cannot Purchase near
equal to tbe value now in tbe articles with the said one Hundred and Ten
Pounds now as I could when 1 first settled among you. Therefore 1 wd
Request of you to allow ine a valuable consideration for tbe sinking of
Bills of Credit whereof I may be Enabled to comfortably eoUust and
Live amongst you. 1 do spend tbe Produce of my own Place among
you. James lisgood, Clerk. Stonebam, May 5, 1737.*'
In 1739 David Gould and Ebenezer Knight were
chosen "to see to the preservation of the Deer," and
after that time deer-reeves were annually chosen.
The town having buried their firet pastor, they sought
476
HISTORY OF m'IDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
a successor and secured the Rev. John Carnes, who
was ordained December 17, 1746. Mr. Carnes wken
he came here was a young man twenty-two years of
age and a graduate of Harvard College. He re-
mained till 1757, was afterwards installed at Reho-
both, was subsequently a chaplain in the Revolution-
ary Army from ma till the close of the war, and
died at Lynn, October 20, 1802. It was during the
pastorate of Mr. Carnes that the old par.<(ODage on
C'entrai Street was erected in 1747. Mr. Carnes ap-
pears to have had more trouble about his salary even
than Mr. Osgood, and indulged in some rather pointed
correspondence with the town. On May 17, 1750.
which was the day of the town-meeting, he sent them
the following letter:
"To the iababifanta of the town of Stoliebant, Ijeiitlenieli : — I Imve
year .ifter year desired vdii to consider nie witti rng.ird to tiiy Siiliiiy,
but notuitU3tuiidinp:lU)s, and uotwithstandin); I hiivesuok by ye full s.-v-
erul Hundred Pountls, I biive never bad since tuy urdinntion bill a p'ti>r
pitiful consideration iif iiSti itid tenor, \\hutever you tbink of it, geii-
ileinen, you have been guilty of gieat Injustice .t oppreftsion and ba\e
witlifcid from your niiuibter more tban is meet, not consiilering wbai
you rend, I'rov. 11,21, Jo, wbicb Verses run tbuH. There is that scat
lerelii uud yet increasetb, and there is y* witboldeth more than is meet
but it tendetb to ptneity. The liberal soul shall be made fat ; and be >'
watereth shall be Miitered also himself V"U hnKti never made go"<l
your contract with yonr minister, and wa.s it not' for some of bis good
Friends in this Town and other IMaces. he must have snrtered. Time
b.is been wlieu 1 have batl no corn imr meal In my House .V when I
have wanted many other necessaries and haveni had one Forty ■:hillint:^
in ye \\'orld. nor yet Thirty sbilllnjis, and w hen I have been obliged t'-
live by borrowing ; and this is ye case now. Itut 1 shall say no more
about my circumstances and your Injustice and oppression. What I de-
sire of you now is that you would at this meeting ad like honest men
aud make good your contract that you would make such an addition to
my Sidaiy for the present year ;ui that I nuiy be able to subsist. I de-
sire Dotbim: that is utlleasonable, uuike ;;oi^l w lial you first \oIed me
aud 1 shall be easy. I I'eiuain your friend and servant, .Kthn fames,
r .S. Hentlemen — IMease to send me word before your meeting is ov.-r
what you lia\e done, y" I uuiv sentl you a Line or two in onb-r to let
you know I iim easy with what you done oi- not ; for if I cant get a .'sup-
port by the ministry I must pursue something else, must betake mysell
to some other business and will immediately do it."
The civil and religious duties of those days must at
times have been pursued at a disadvantage. Tlie
people sat through the long service in a culd and
comfortless church, with no means of artificial heat.
At the annual town-meetings in March they fulfilled
the letter of the law by a-s-iembling at the meeting-
house, acting upon a part of the warrant and then
adjourning, often across the way to the hospitable inn
of Lieut. James Hay, where, do;ibtless amid the fra-
grant fuuiL-s of steaming punch aud hot flip, they
yielded to the seductive influence of good lellowship,
and finished the town's business with great unanimity
aud satisfaction. Competent men were kept in ottice
for long periods. Lieut. Dan'l Gould was town clerk
and town treasurer almost continuously from 1725 to
1748, and Capt. Jonathan Green held the sameoHice,
with the exception of oneyair, from 1748 to 17()9. As
has been .said, the women sat on the east side of the
meeting-house and in the east gallery, and the men
on the west side and in the west gallery, although
after a few years those of the moat coDsideration were
allowed to biiilil f^r them.selves pews. The colored
people, though in a state of slavery, were admitteil
as brethren and sisters to the ohuich. Mr. Carnes.
after a good deal of contention and di.ssatisfaction
about his salary, preacheil his farewell sermon July
31, 1757, went away with a bitter feeling and appar-
ently rpflected upon the conduct of the town in the
papers, for it was voted "that the town will make an
answer to what the Rev. John Carnes hath put into
the public print." Mr. Carnes was succeeded by
Rev. John Searl in January, 1759. He had been
previously settled in Sharon, Conn.,, and w.as a gradu-
ate of Yale College. During the first fifty years of
(he town's history she had been calleil upon to fur-
nish her quotas to the French and Indian ^Vars.
-Vfter the French were driven from .Acadia many of
them were billeted upon the various towns of Massa-
chusetts. .V number were assigned to Stoneham and
:ipproprifltions voted for thi^ir support. \n occa-
sional house or barn-raising broke in iifion the irk-
soiiieness of everyday life, far it was usually made an
occasion iif great hilarity to which came men and
lioys from far and near. 'I'he items of expense which
were ini tirreil at the r;ii.sing of the barn of Daniel
(vreen, .Ir.. in 17(I.'j. indicate how these occasions
must have been ctlphrnted : " Knglish cheese for
Raisin?, I'lx. 2d. ; 0 (JtiarLs of Rhiim, 4s. ; New F-ng-
land cheese, l.«. Sr/. : Bisket for Raising. 2«. ; brown
bread for Raising, l-*. -'''/.; sugar I'tir Raising, 1«. 2'/.;
l)utter for R:\ising, Srf. ; malt to m.nke beer for Rais-
ing, 1(/." The training of the military company was
iilso a feature (if colonial times, and it is rather a sug-
gestive fact that ihey were almost tdways summoned
to meet at the tavern of James Hay. There was but
one school, a schoolmaster being employed in winter
nnd sometimes a schoolmistress in summer. Reading,
writing and a little arithmetic were taught, although
during the first years the girls did not generally learu
to even writ.-», it being considered an accomplishment
not necessary for female usefulness. Among the
teachers were Captain William Toler, Lieut. Joseph
Bryant, Hannah Willy and .Toanna Burditt. W'e
may form some idea of the educational attainments
required, when we remember that Joanna Burditt, in
signing her name, made her mark. Captain Toler
was engaeed in various occupations, for besides teach-
ing school, he kept tavern and carried on a store in
the house heretofore referred to as now owned by Miss
Lynde. It was said to have been his custom to send
a scholar at eleven o'clock to the tavern across the
road from the school to bring him his grog. Stone-
ham was one of the poorest towns of the county. Her
comparative valuation appears from the Province tax
assessed upon the diff'erent towns in 1754, which was
as follows :
I'aubridge, £l.*o 14». ; iTiarleBlown. £102 l;!j. ; Watertown, CCS 13«.
6,;.; Woborn, Jir.7 ; C<incord, £71 lis. liJ. ; Newton, illT ; Sudbury,
£126 10j. fid. ; Marlborough, £126 ; Billerica, £7.1 lo. ; Framingham,
£96 6t. ; Lexington, £55 18». ; Chelmsford, £72 ; Sberburne, £49 14*. 6d. ;
STONEHAM.
477
Reading, £118 1C<. ; Maiden, £94 ICi. ; Weston, £74 7t. id. ; Medford.
£93 4<. M. ; Littleton, £S011i. ; Hopkinton, £44 2« : Weatfnrd, £48 12. ;
Dintrict of Shirley, £12 7«. M. ; Waltham. £fi2 5». ; ToiruBend, £27 Kn
6<i. ; Stow, £44 2i. ; Stonehani, £31 lit. 6rf, ; IJrotou, £8« 17i. ; Wll.
nsiogton, £36 ; Nalick, £2o 1« ; Dracnt, £.!■'' ««. , Bedford, £41 ««. (id. ,
HoUiatoQ. £40 2j. firf. : Te»kBbiir>, £Vi x«. ; Acinu, £2i. 2«. ; DiinstAlile,
£33 lis, 6d. ; Dietncl of Pepperell, £28 ,i«. ; Lincoln, fM 4s. 2ii. ; Car-
lisle, £34 Itil.
The inventory of many of the inhabitants in
1761 has been preserved, signed by each individ-
ual, find is valuable as it affords us a view of the ma-
terial prosperity that then prevailed. Captain Jona-
than Green, who, at that time, was one of the most
substantial, prosperous and intelligent citizens of the
town, owned 1 dwelling-house, " servants for life, 3
horses, 6 oxen, 9 cows, 20 sheep, 10 bushels of Indian
corn, 14 bushels of rye, 1 7 busliels of barley , 30 bushelsol
oats, 30 barrels of cider, 108 acres of pasturage, 12
acres of tillage, 2 acres of orcharding and 33 acres of
mowing land. Timothy Taylor, who owned the John
Bucknam farm, returned 1 dwelling-house, 2 horses,
4 oxen. 3 cows, 3 swine, 70 acres of pasturage capa-
ble of pasturing 20 cows, 8 acres of tillage land (the
ordinary produce of which is 100 bushels of Indian
corn, 32 bushels of rye and 34 bushels of oats), 2 acres
of orcharding (the produce was 24 barrels ol cider), 18
acres of mowing land, 14 tons of English hay and H
tons of meadow hay.
Joseph Hill, the father of James and the grand-
father of John and Luther Hill, was at that time a
young man, and was taxed for 1 horse, 2 cows, 4 acres
of pasture land, 3 acres of tillage, 1 acre of orchard-
ing and £G money at interest. In 1707 there were
78 ratable polls, ^'lO dwelling-bouses, 1 mill, 10 serv-
ants for life, ii27 i'ts. 8d. trading stock, £1100 Gfl. 8d.
money at interest, 42 horses, 41 oxen, 222 cows, 311
sheeji, 33 swine, 2340 bushels of grain, 32ii barrels ol'
cider, 102 tons of Engli.-h hay and 20o tons of mead-
ow hay.
Captain Peter Hay, son of the original Patrick, or
Peter Hay, was one of the leading inhabitants during
the middle of the century, a |)rominenl man in public
affairs, holding many offices and possessing a consid-
erable estate. His liomeslead was near the Farm
Hill .Station, the house afterwards known as the Hay
Tavern. Through the ytird between the house and
barn led a private way northerly to the Captain
Rufus Richardson Lane, and so on by the houses of
Caleb, Elijah, Oliver and Thaddeus Richardson, west-
erly to the Woburn road. When he made his will,
in 1768, the original pioneers were all dead, and a
second and third generation liad taken their places.
Some of the changes which had occurred during the
first century are indicated by Captain Hay's will.
After commending his soul to God, committing hi.s
body to the earth and expressing his faith in the res-
urrection of the body, he gives to his wife, Isabelle
Hay, indoor movables, etc., 2 cows, 2 sheep, top-
chaise and use of horse, the use of one-half of dwell-
ing-house, 10 bushels of Indian corn and meal, 3
bushels of rye, 1 bushel of malt, 150 pounds of pork,
2 barrels of cider, 50 pounds.of beef, 8 bushels of po-
tatoes, i bushel of beans, 8 cords of wood, etc., per
annum.
About 1734 Reuben Richardson came from Woburn
and settled on what is now known as the Thaddeus
Richardson Farm, which was retained by his de-
scendants for more than 150 years. His nephew, Ol-
iver, and sons, Elijah and Caleb, occupied farms be-
tween his and that of Captain Hay.
From the incorporation of the town to the outbreak
of the Revolution but few events of a public nature
transpired to vary the monotony which usually pre-
vailed in a thinly-settled community.
From time to time, as expeditions were planned
against the French in Canada, volunteers were called
for, and soldiers impressed. Many a Stoneham
boy, as he returned from Louisbourg, Fort William
Henry and Crown Point, must have been a welcome
guest, sitting before the blazing fire and recounting
the thrilling tales of Rogers' Rangers, and Indian war-
fare. During the middle of the century the long-
coniinued peace which had blessed the people for
over a generation was broken, and for a period of
years savage war poured forth destruction along the
northern and eastern frontiers. Stoneham was called
upon to contribute her quotas, and she responded
with the same alacrity that has distinguished her in
later times. Among her sons engaged in the wars,
Thomas Gould and Titus Potamia in 1746 were sta-
tioned at Fort Richmond, on the Kennebec. In the
Crown Point expedition of 1756, in Captain William
I'eabody's company of Colonel Plaisted's regiment,
Peter Hay was lieutenant, Thomas Hadley and
Thomas Johnson were corporals. Among the privates
were John Cade.s, Jonathan Gritfin, Timothy Holden,
Nathan Holden, John Carter, Titus Potamia, Jona-
than Eaton and Philip Gross. Two oi three of these
were born in Stoneham and went from other towns.
These men were stationed at Fort William Henry, at
the head of Lake George, from early in the spring till
late ill the fall. Nathan Holden died there. The
list of soldiers in the French and Indian Wars also
includes the names of John Hill, Thomas Larrabee,
.lohn Converse, Ephraim Brown, Thomas Sprague,
Timothy Wright, Aaron Brown, Daniel Connery,
Abial Brown, John Geary, Daniel Knight, Michael
Newell, Simeon Wyman, Francis Phillips, Oliver
Gross and Jonathan Morrison. A few of these were
hired from other towns to fill our quota. John Hill
was a sergeant in the company of Ebenezer Nichols,
of Reading, and was in the expedition of 1757-58.
Four Stoneham men were also in the famous Rogers'
Rangers, whose exploits about Lake George and along
Lake Chaniplain, in the campaigns of 1757-58, fill
some of the most thrilling chapters in savage warfare.
The French and Indian War, which fell like a thunder-
bolt upon the colonists, came as a blessing in diiguise,
for it prepared them for the greater conflict which so
478
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
soon was to loom up in the future. Greater events
were casting their shadows before. Three millions of
people are girding themselves for a struggle with the
mightiest power on the face of the globe. The ad-
ministration of Chatham had covered the British
name with imperishable glory, but the government is
now fallen into the weak hands of Lord North, whose
ministry is assailing the rights we have enjoyed for
five generations. The Stamp Act, the Tea Tax, the
Boston Port Bill, the Military and Restraining Acts
had aroused and incensed the Colonies. The Recon-
struction AQts were intended to effect a complete rev-
olution of the government, transferring the powers of
the people lo the creatures of the Crown. The jurors
were to be appointed by the sheriff; the judiciary was
to be controlled by the King ; certain classes of crimi-
nals could be transferred for trial to a distant colony
of the mother country ! the matters considered in
town-meetings were to be under the direction of the
Royal Governor I the people were alarmed, their lib-
erties were being threatened ; they elected delegates
and organized Provincial Congresses. Entreaty and
expostulation were followed by resistance. Military
Htores were being collected, companies of minute-men
raided, and ihe genius of Sam Adams and his com-
patriots was organizing revolt. The towns unanimous,
war meetings held, resolves passed, men furnished,
supplies voted, the first volley fired, and the conflict
commenced. Stonehara in the mean time had not been
idle. The walls of the old meeting-house resounded
with the patriotism of our great-grandfathers. It was
there that they met and gave utterance to the senti-
ments thatswept like a whirlwind over the Province of
Massachusetts Bay and extended to the other English
provinces in North .Vmerica. There were held the
war meetings of the Revolution, the Committee of
Correspondence chosen, and the resolutions adopted
which declared the rights of the colonists, and pledged
lo the common cause the lives and property of the
freeholders and inhabitants in town-meeting assem-
bled. Meeting after meeting was called to consider
the questions which were agitating the country.
In January, 1773, a long communication was adopt-
ed in town-meeting, and dispatched to Boston, which
deserves attention, for it is a full description of the
political questions of the day, and was probably writ-
ten either by the minister, John Searle, or else was
framed in accordance with a general form adopted
by the other towns. It contains these passages : " We
fully join in sentiment with you, that the natural
liberty of man is to'be free from any superior power
on earth, unless justly forfeited by some injurious
abuse of it. The right of freedom being the gift of
God Almighty, it is not in the power of man to alien-
ate this gift." " It is a point of undoubted evidence
with us that the Commons of Great Britain have no
right to seize upon the properties of the colonists ;
that the colonists are well entitled to all the essential |
rights, liberties and privileges of men and freemen
born in Britain. In special, we are deeply affected
with some late threatening innovations upon our
Constitution ; that the Governor of this province is
made independent of the general assembly for his
support, whereby the ancient connection between
him and this people is weakened, the confidence of
the Governor lessened, the equilibrium destroyed,
and our happy Constitution essentially altered.''
.\gain, in August, 1774, was passed the following
covenant :
'* Wf, theinhahttantsof the towoof .Stoneham, bcingle^llyaasemhled,
aincerely acknowledge our strict attachment totbeConstttutioD of onr na-
tion, and our unfeigned loyalty to our rigbtftil lord and sovereign. King
George the Third. Ardently wishing that we might ever live in the ut-
uiost harniuny with Great Britain. Yet we are driven to the disagree-
nble necebsity to pay that, having taken into serious consideration the
precirious state of the lil)ertie3 of North .America, and more especially
the present depres.se<i condition of this insulted province, embarrassed as
it is by several acts of the British Parliament, tending, aa we apprehend,
to the entire subversion of our natural and charter rights, among which
is the act of blocking up the harbor of IViston. Therefore, we do sol-
emnly covenant and agree with each other
I. That henceforth we will suspend all commercial intercourse with
(treat Britain until they shall alTonI us relief. '2. That we will not buy,
purchase or consume any goods or merchandise which shall arrive in
.\nierica from iireaf Britain from anil after ihe last day of September
ne.\t ensuing. These things we soleninly promise lo observe, provided
no better scheme ?hall be ilevised, to answer the same end, by the L'un-
gress who are to meet (be up\t month at Philadelphia to consult the
general political interests of .\nierica, and provided a majority of the
Inhubituuts of (he English (iovernment of North .\merica bind them-
eeWes by Ihe covenant above-mentioned, or one essentially similar to it ;
further provided, that we hereafter shall (hiuk of no further method
that shall be more worthy of our choice."
The population was small, but a common enthusi-
asm i)osses.sed the hearts of the whole community,
and a company of minute-men was organized, which
comprised nearly all the inhabitants capable of bear-
ing arms. Tradition says the place of rendezvous
was in front of the house of Deacon Edward Buck-
nam, and that it was arranged they should be called
together by firing of alarm-guns in front of the meet-
ing-houso. During the winter and early spring of
1775 they drilled and held themselves ready for ser-
vice at the shortest notice. Rev. Caleb Prentiss, of
Reading, under date of February 27th, in his diary,
makes the following entry :
" At about 3 o'clock a.m. an alarm was made, the dniins beat to arms,
the bell waa rung and alarm guns were fired in ihe Parish. The report
was that a regiment of the Cambridge troope had landed at Marblehead
and marched to Salem to lake (tome cannou there, and that the people
were defending the cannon, and wanted aasistauce. The people were
mustered, anil before daylight were upon the march towards Salem.
Having marched about five miles we were informed by the Lynn End
company, who were returning, that the Regulars were retreated with-
out the caunon, embarked and set sail, upon which we returned. On
our return we met the West Parish company and the Slonebam com-
pany, all which joined together, returned in order to this Parish, and
went ihrough the military exercise. The whole were more than two
hundred. "
** It was twelve by the village chtck
When he crossed Ihe bridge into .^ledford town."
We may suppose an hour or two later, on the morn-
ing of the eventful 19th of April, 1775, a messenger
knocked at the door of Captain Sprague and an-
nounced that the British troops were on the march to
capture or destroy the military stores at Concord. At
STONEHAM.
479
all eveuta, the alarm waa given, the company asBem-
bled and they marched to Lexington, reaching there
in time to intercept and pursue the British on their
retreat from Concord. Before reaching Lexington it
is said the company separated and scattered them-
selves about in small groups. Ebenezer Bucknam,
Timothy Matthews and James Willy were together.
A bullet passed close to the head of Bucknam and
through the hats of both AVilly and Matthews.
Another member of the company was Josiah Richard-
son, of whom Mr. Dean, in his history, says, " Asahel
Porter, on the morning of the nineteenth of April,
wa.s desired by a neighbor, Josiah Richardson, to pro-
ceed with him towards Lexington about three o'clock
A. M. Somewhere on the way they discovered some
British Regulars. Porter and Richardson were also
seen by the Regulars and were taken by them. Rich-
ardson requested permission to return and was told
by the individual to go to another person who would
no doubt give him a release, but in case the second
person he went lo, told him to run, he was by the first
ordered not to run ; being informed that if he did run
he would be shot. Richardson did as he was told to
do ; and though he was told to run, he walked away
and was not injured. The reason why he was ordered
to run was this ! That the guard might think him a
deserter and thereby in the discharge of their duty,
shoot him. Mr. Porter not being apprised of their
artifice in telling him to run, got permission in the
same way as Richardson. Having liberty to go, he
set out upon the run. On getting over a wall, a short
distance off, he was fired upon and received his death
wound." His bones now lie in Lexington with the
seven who fell on that morning while defending their
rights as freemen. Samuel Sprague was captain of
the company, Joseph Bryant lieutenant, Abraham
Gould enaipii, John Bucknam and Daniel Bryant
sergeants, David Geary and Joseph Geary drummers,
and the men were Caleb Richardson, Josiah Richard-
son, Charle8Richardson,Ephraimand Samuel Brown,
Jacob Gould, Amos Knight, James Steele, Benjamin
and David Blodgett, Jacob Gould, Jr.. Ebenezer
Bucknam, David Geary, Thomas Geary, John Hol-
den, James Willy, Thomas Sweetser, Joseph Atwell,
Eiias and Ebenezer Bryant, Timothy and Ezra Vin-
ton, Oliver Richardson, Moses Hadley, Thomas and
John Knight, Jonathan, Daniel and Daniel Green, Jr.,
John Crocker, Benjamin Taylor, Nathan Willy,
Jamp.s Hay, Jr., Timothy Wright, Jr., Daniel Hay,
Peter Hay, Jr., David and William Hay, John Wright,
Daniel Gould, Jr., Samuel Ingalls, John Green, David
Gould, John Benjamin, William Person, Joseph Mat-
thews, William Connery, Aaron Putnam, Eben Law-
rence, Thomas Vinton, Jacob Cutler, John Geary
aud Thomas Watson. The British, after retreating
to Boston, were besieged by the Provincial troops and
Captain Sprague's company was probably engaged for
some time in the siege, for it appears by their muster
roll that manv of them were in the service at that
time during a period varying from a few days to two
or three weeks. The first shot over, the war fairly
commenced, and the history of Stoneham was like
that of almost every other Massachusetta town. She
sent Captain Sprague and Major Joseph Bryant to
represent her in the Provincial Congress and General
Court.
Her sons were with Montgomery of Quebec. They
witnessed the surrender of Burgoyne at Saratoga;
were at Rhode Island ; in camp on Winter Hill ; and
formed part of the Continental Rrmy on the Hudson .
William Connery was probably in the battle of Bun-
ker Hill, William Deadman was taken prisoner at
Fort Washington. Among the soldiers in the subse-
quent years of the Revolution were Joseph Bryant,
William Deadman, Samuel Brown, John Boyd, Will.
j iam Connery, Reuben Geary, Henry Hawks, John
I Hill, Daniel Holden, Samuel Ingalls, John Knight,
\ John Noyes, David Blodgett, David Geary, Aaron
j Putnam, Joseph Geary, Joseph Bryant, third, John
■ Bryant, Samuel Call, Elias Bryant, Daniel Bryant,
Aaron Parker, Benjamin Taylor, John Thayer, Ben-
; jamin Eaton, Jonathan Farley, Thomas Hay, Eli
■ Mclntire, Joseph jMatthews, Jacob and George Brown,
Peter Hay, Thomas Hadley, Ralph Doyle, John Hol-
1 den, Daniel Hay, Joseph Holden, Ephraim Wood-
I ward, Ebenezer Bryant, Samuel Clapp, John Wright,
I Jabez Upton, David Gould, John Bucknam, Richard
Holden, Samuel Howland, James Weston, Joshua
Geary, Job, John and Titus Potamia, Isaiah Barjona,
Cato and Sharper Freeman, and Cato and Pomp
Green, of whom the last eight were negroes, and some
of them obtained their liberty by enlisting in the
army. Some of these men probably were not citizens
of Stoneham, but were hired by the town. Among
her military officers were Major (afterwards Colonel)
Joseph Bryant, Captain Abraham Gould, Lieutenant
John Bucknam, Lieutenant (afterwards Colonel)
Joshua Burnham, Lieutenant Daniel Bryant, Captain
Josiah Green and Lieutenant John Holden. No
likenesses are known to exist of any of these men,
so it is interesting to read the description of some
of them and imagine, so far as we may, what was
their personal appearance. In 1780 Reuben Geary
was nineteen years old, five feet six inches high,
light complexion.
"Joseph Matthews, 31 years old, f> feet high, light complexion ;
George Brown, 17 yeaia old, n feet. 3 inches high, light complexion ;
Joeepb Holden, 17 years old, 5 feet, 7 inches, light complexion ; John
Holden, 19 yeatv old, landj complexion ; Daniel Bryant, 20 yearB old,
dark complexion ; Daniel Hay, 38 years old, dark complexion. In 1778
— John Hill, 16 yeare old, 6 feet, 1 inch ; Jacob Brown, 28 yean old, 6
feet."
John Noyes and William Connery went forth from
their homes never to return. Ephraim and George
Brown and John Noble were prisoners of war. The
names of ninety-eight different Stoneham men appear
upon the Revolutionari- muster rolls. During these
years, the town was constantly purchasing stocks of
ammunition, furnishing supplies to the army, raising
480
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, ."MASSACHUSETTS.
bounties with which to pay soldiers, aud with an un-
flagging zeal supporting the common cause. In
town-meeting December :22, 1773, it was resolved,
" first, that it is the opinion of this town that Great
Britain has no right to lay a tax on Tea or any other
article imported from Great Britain to raise a revenue
payable in America, without our consent. 2. Re-
solved that the late measures of the East India Com-
pany in sending Tea to the colonies loaded with duty
to raise a revenue from America, are to all intents
and purposes, so many attempts in them and all em-
ployed by them to tax the Americans. Therefore,
3, Resolved, that the proceedings of the inhabitants
of Boston and other towns in the Province for oppos-
ing the landing of this Tea are rational ; and they are
highly honored and respected by this town for their
tiruiness in support of American liberty and that we
are ready with our lives and interest to assist them in
opposing tbes2 and all other measures to enslave our
countrv. 4. Resolved, that we the inhabitants of
this town, will purchase no Tea imported from Great
Britain so long as it is subject to a duty payable in
North America for raising a revenue. Voted that
the committee of correspondence of this town be de-
sired to obtain I'rom the town clerk's office an attested
copy of this day's resolves and forward the same to
the committee of correspondence at Boston." The
emoluments of public men during the early days of
the Revolution could not have have been very tempt-
ing if we may judge from the amount voted to Cap-
tain Samuel Sprague who had been a delegate to the
Provincial Congress. He was allowed four pounds
fourteen shillings and four pence lawful money for
his time aud expenses during twenty-seven and one-
half days, or the munificent sum of about fifty-seven
cents a day.
Under date of September 6, 1775, the town voted
" to choose a committee to take care, to get the wood
carried to the army which the General Court has
ordered the town of Stoneham to furnish." Again in
July, 177G, the town voted " to give something in ad-
dition to what the General Court had provided to en-
couraire men to enlist to go to Canada. In the expe-
dition against Canada, Stoneham was required to fur-
nish twelve men.
In 1777 Captain Abraham Gould, Lieuteuant John
Bucknam and Lieutenant Daniel Bryant were chosen
a committee " to hire men for the war in time to come
if men are needed."
On June 29, 1778, two hundred and twenty pounds
were raised " to pay those men belonging to the town
who have been hired by other towns to go into the
army if we hold them and it is needed." At another
meeting later in the same year, eleven hundred
pounds were raised to pay soldiers. It must be re-
membered these large figures represent a currency
which had become greatly inflated, and was of a con-
stantly diminishing value as resting upon a specie
Uasis. As the war progressed, the country became
depleted in men and resources,and provisions became
scarce, requiring great economy, as appears from action
of the town in .^pril, 1779, when they voted to choose
a committee " to make search in the town of Stoneham
to see if there be any quantity of grain belonging to any
person more than need for his own use." In the same
year eighteen hundred dollars were raised to defray
the charges of the war already incurred." The people
were compelled to exercise continual vigilance, there
being times when it was feared the enemy might make
an attack as is shown by a vote passed in 1778, " that
when any of the inhabitants of the town of Stoneham
draw ammunition from the town stock upon an alarm.
Deacon Edward Bucknam shall fixthe price thereof ;
and if the price be not satisfactory to the receivers,
they may after the alarm receive this money again,
on their returning as much ammunition as they had
taken out if equally goodr' In 1780 five hundred
and fifteen pounds were raised to pay the money that
had already been expended to hire men for the war.
October 9, 1780, it was voted " to raise three thousand
seven Imndred pounds for beef for the army." Deacon
Daniel Green was authorized to hire money to pay sol-
diers that may be needed for the war. In 1781 it was
voted " to raise thirty-seven thousand five hundred
dollars of the old emission to pay in part the soldiers
that are now called to serve for this year." And so
one may go through the town records from 1775 to the
close of the Revolutionary War and he will find them
filled with the patriotic action of our forefathers.
However much they may have been divided upon
other i|ue8tions, they were unanimous in the support
of the government. It was the proudest heritage that
could be handed down to their descendants. Some-
thing of the condition of the town in 1778 may be re-
alized when it is remembered that there were then
eighty-seven ratable polls, seventy-five dwelling-
houses, six hundred and fifty-six acres of up-land
mowing, orcharding and tillage, fifteen hundred and
seventy-four acres of meadow, twenty-one hundred
and oue acres of pasture land, three hundred and forty -
eight acres of woodland, ninety-one ounces of plate,
fifty-five horses, ninety-six oxen, two hundred and
fifty-nine cows, one hundred and fifteen steers and
other horned cattle, nine hundred and eighty-
nine sheep, one hundred and twenty-eight swine, four
chaises, five hundred and twelve bushels of grain,
three thousand aud eleven bushels of corn and one
hundred and seventy-three barrels of cider. The in-
habitants of 1784 and their comparative wealth ap-
pears from the taxes of that year.
Pulla.
'* Deacon Edward Bucknaui . . 2
Lt. John Bucknam 2
Ebeuezer Bucknam 1
Jonathan Green 2
Captain Josiah Green 2
Jacob Gould 2
Nathan Willey 1
Anthony Uadley 2
Real Estate.
Tersoual Estate
£. I. <t.
i. ^. d.
14
1 11
64 10
2 3 4
12 13
8
1 2 .■)
19 9
4
I 14 10
29 7
4
4 0 7
12 0
0
0 15 0
7 0
0
0 5 8
STONEHAM.
481
Polli. Keal Estate. PeraoDtl Eiitat«.
Lt. John Holden ....
Sajnuel UoldeD
Elisha Knight
Ebenezer Lawrenee . . .
John Gre«n
Samuel Ingalla
Captain Samuel Spra^e .
Tbomas Tinton
Jacoti Gould, Jr
David Gould
John Knight
Timothy Matthews . . .
David Gearj*, Jr
Psleg Taylor
Timothy Vinton ....
Ezra Vinton
Ensign Timothy Wright .
Lt. Timothy Wright . . .
Samuel Call
John Mitchell
Benjamin Richardaon . .
Thomas Green
John Geary
Jacob Cutler
Captain Abniham Gould .
Lt. John Geary
David Geary
Daniel Gould, Jr
Deacon Daniel Green . ,
Captain Peter Hay ....
Robert Converse
Ebenezer Nichols ....
Captain David Hay . . .
Captiiin I'eler Hay, Jr. .
Peter Hay, Third ....
Caleb Richardson ....
Oliver Richardson ....
Elijah RichanJBUu ....
Thaddeus Richardson . .
John Wright
Charles Richardson . , .
Ellas Bryant
Calvin Dike
Col. Joseph Bryant . , .
Ephraim Brown ....
Joseph Bryant, Jr. ...
William Eaton
Ebenezer Bryant ....
Nathaniel Wesson ....
Peter Gould, freeman . .
Daniel Green, Jr
Timothy Hadley ....
Cato Eaton, freeman . .
John Hill
Joseph Matthews ....
Daniel Hay
Jonas Parker
Silas Simons
Ephraim Pierce
Jaiues Edmunds ....
Thomas Gould
Samuel Brown
David Gould, Jr
John Hadley
£. •. d.
IS 0 0
8 6 8
13 10
18 15
6 0
9 3
23 6
11 13
11 5 0
2 18 4
6 13 4
1 2 8
17 0 0
11 13 10
18 13 2
16 4 0
24 13 6
10 0
5 0 0
14 10 0
17 10 8
2S C 8
17 14 8
40 0 0
23 5 8
18 9 10
46 16 8
19 3 4
31 3 4
12 10 0
12 10 0
12 6 0
9 G 2
19 2 8
9 6 2
11 13 2
18 11 3
17 19 8
18 11 3
11 13 1
15 0
12 9 9
13 18 4
£. : d.
1 6 10
0 16 4
0 12 4
6 18 8
1 12 10
0 8 10
0 18 II
1 1 0
114
0 11 6
1 15 0
0 8 7
4 19 6
13 8
2 0 8
0 6 3
13 4
2 13 5
16 9
1 2 10
1 2 10
1 17 G
5 IG 0
1 16 0
17 3
18 8
2 4
9 11
7 1
9 6
C 8
15 0
0 12 10
0 19 4
16 5
0 14 5
0 11 1
14 0
0 5 9
0 12 2
0 13 9
36 8 0
1 7
11
37 10 0
1 3
3
16 0 0
0 16
2
0 3
1
" Ellsha Knight,
Timothy Wright,
Jr.,
Ephraim Brown,
David Hay,
John Hadley.
'MsjfMors.
'
In 1776 the minister John Searl was dismissed and
succeeded in 1785 by Rev. John Cleaveland, there
being no ordained preacher during the war after the
31-ii
departure of Mr. Searl. As late as 1786 no new hif;h-
ways had been built, in addition to those already
described except a road from the meeting-house to
Maiden (now Melrose), along the general course of
Franklin Street, east of Noble's Corner, which wa«
laid out and accepted in 1781 as a particular or pri-
vate way, and a cross road from the meeting-house
to the road near the parsonage (now a portion of
Pleasant Street). As has been said, there were many
private ways, one extending from Maiden (Melrose)
line to Woburu line by the house of Captain Peter
afterwards of Captain David Hay. In 1786 it was
voted "to divide the town into 4 districts as respects
highways, as follows: Captain Samuel Sprague is to
mend the road from Medford line and Maiden line
till it reaches the road from Woburn which passes by
Deacon Edward Bucknam's. Captain Abraham
Gould is to mend the road from Beading line by Col.
Joseph Bryant's house till it comes to Stoneham
Meeting House, also the cross-road by the Burying
Ground. Ezra Vinton is to mend the road from Mai-
den line near Mr. Cook's house to Stoneham Meeting
House, and from thence till it comes to the road that
comes down by Lt. John Bucknaim's house. Mr.
Caleb Bichardson is to meud the road from Woburn
line near Lt. John Holden's till it comes to Beading
line near Lt. John Geary's, and thence till it cornea to
Woburn line near Mr. Leathes."
Our ancestors in many respects were men of great
virtue and were stern in their religious convictions, but
in the amenities of life, Christian graces and gentle-
ness of manners, great changes have taken place ia.
one hundred years. Nothing illustrates this more
aptly than the treatment accorded to the minister^
John Cleaveland. He was a man of talent. No in-
sinuations were made against his moral character.
From the correspondence he appears to have been a
person of great self-possession, forbearance and dig-
nity of character, and yet after the death of his wife,
because he married a girl who had been a member,
perhaps a domestic in his family, he was treated by
the town like a thief and a pick-pocket. At one time
they nailed up the door of the minister's pew, at an-
other, covered the seat and chairs and the seat of the
pulpit with tar. Not content with these indignities
against the pastor, some one vented the general spite
by inflicting an injury upon his horse, probably by
cutting off his tail. The church stood by him, but
the town voted to lock and fasten up the meeting-
house against him, bo that for a time public worship
was held at the house of Deacon Edward Bucknam.
They refused to raise his salary, requested him to re-
linquish his ministry and leave the town, declined to
furnish any reason, and rejected his proposition to
call a council ; but one was finally convened at the
parsonage on the 30th of September, 1794, and they
found:
" 1. That Mr. Cleaveland's influence among this people Is lost, and
irrecoverably lost and that It has become neccmary that bu ministerial
482
HISTORY OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
connectfoD with them be liieeolved, and it is the advice of this council
that be oek a dismiesiua from his pHbtoral relntioDs tn them. 2. It ap-
pears from Ihe fullest and they trust from tJie niott impartial e.Namina-
tiuo of the subject of which they are cnpahle, ttiat Mr. Cleavelaod lias
given DO just cause for that aversion and upposition to him which in Bo
Tiulent, and very unprecedented a manner they have displayed. 3. It
appeara to this council that Mr. Cleaveland's moml, Christian and min-
ibterial character stands fairly and fiinily supported, and they cordially
recommend hitn to the church and people of God wherever in the Provi-
dence of God he may be cast. 4. As Mr. Cleaveland has pven to this
people no just cause for that opposition to him which they discover, and
which rendera his removal from them necessary, and as his removal must
be attended by ffreat inconvenience and expense to him, it is the opinion
of this council that he ought to receive a compensation, and they recom-
mend it to the parties concerned to chooee mutually three judicious,
impartial characters from some of the neighboring towns to eelimate
the damage to which Mr. Cleaveland is subjected by his removal. .').
That the select men of the town be seaaonabiy fumiBhcd with an at-
tested copy of this resiilt. Finally the cotmcil deeply impressed with
the singular saciitice which Mr. Cleavelaud's frieuds make in parting
with their valuable and beloved pastor beg leave to e.xhort them to
acknowledge the hand of Gud in this atflicting Providence iis becomes
Christians ; to uiaintaJn the order of Christ's house, and with unre-
mitting ardor promote the interest of His kingdom. .\nd now brethren
we recommend you to God ami to tlio word of His grace, who is able
to build you up and to give yon an inheritance among them that are
sanctified. Voted unanimously.
" Elijah Pabish, Scribe.
" Stonebam, 30th September, 1T94."
!Mr. Cleavelanti Tras afterward settled in Rehobnth,
and finally in Dunbarton, New Hampshire, where he
died. At this council, it was necessary for the church
to raise funds with which to furnish a suitable enter-
tainment, and it is rather amusing to read that they
pledged two silver comjiunion cups "to Deacon Ed-
ward Bucknam, and brother Abraham Gould,'' as se-
curity for the money which they advanced for this
purpose. Mr. Cleaveland was succeeded by Rev. John
H. Stevens, who came from Methuen to Stoneham,
and was installed November 11, 1705. The council
met at Captain David Hay's tavern, and afterwards
proceeded to the meeting-hou;e, where the exercises
took place. Rev. Mr. Prentiss, of the First Church of
Reading, delivered the charge. Rev. Mr. Bradford,
of the First Church of Rowley, preached the sermon.
Rev. Mr. Litchfield, pastor of the church at Carlisle,
made the consecrating prayer. Rev. Mr. Spalding,
of the Tabernacle Church, Salem, made the introduc-
tory prayer. Mr. Green gave the right hand of fel-
lowship, and Rev. Mr. Aiken, of Dracut, made the
concluding prayer.
Mr. Stevens was born in Canterbury, Conn., in
1766, and remembered when he was a boy nine years
old seeing his brother, Darius, join the Connecticut
troops as they were about marching to Massachusetts
in the early season of 1775. This Darius Stevens
was killed at the battle of Bunker Hill. Tradition
says he was wounded and shot so that he could not
stand, but kept firing at the British till he was finally
despatched. Mr. Stevens filled the longest pastorate
of any minibter who was ever settled in Stoneham,
having had charge of the church here for thirty-two
years, after which he preached a few years at the
East Parish, Haverhill, and then returned, purchased
the parsonage, and spent the last years of his life in
the home he loved so well, dying in ISol, at the age
of eighty-five. Some of the pleasantest recollectioi/s
of the writer's early boyhood are the limes when be
used to call with his father at the old hoii>e in the
evening, hitch the horse and pass in through the shed
and back hall to the sitting-room where his grand-
father and grandmother were generally seated in front
of an open fire, presenting an ideal picture of beauti-
ful old 8ge. He was settled on a salary of two hun-
dred and sixty-six dollars, with fifteen cords of wood
and the use of the parsonage, and must have been a
wonderfully good manager, when it is remembered
that on his meagre salary he reared a large family of
children, lived well for those days, accumulated a
competency sufficient to support him in the last years
of his life, and left at the end quite a little property
to his children. He was tall, had a fine and dignified
presence, was a man of quick feelings, and at times
preached with marked eloquence. Some of his ser-
mons were printed and obtained a wide circulation.
In the war of 1812 he was an ardent republican and
preached a vigorous and patriotic sermon which form-
ed part of the war literature of the time. It was de-
livered on Fast Day, 1813, and thete.\t was Judges 5:
23. " Curse ye Meroz," said the angel of the Lord,
' curse ye bittterly the inhabitants thereof; because
they came not to the help of the Lord ; to the help
of the Lord against the mighty."
Stoneham has to-day a splendid .«ystem of public
schools in which every citizen may jusiiy be proud,
but the educational facilities during the first hundred
years were very limited, and the people could make
no pretensions to literary attainments. Indeed, till
the middle of the present century, the only college
graduates outside of the ministers were David and
Samuel Green. One of the most distinguished off-
spring of the old stock was Judge Fletcher, of the
Supreme Cuurt, who was not born here, but, on his
mother's side, was descended from Jonathan Green.
In 1702 an organization was formed, whichdeserves
to be remembered, and which flourished for about
seventy years. It was known as the Stoneham Cir-
culating Library, and was finally merged into the
Stoneham Public Library. The first librarian was
the Rev. Mr. Cleaveland, and for many years the
books were kept at the parsonage. There were some
histories, a very few novels, books of a miscellaneous
character and several theological works, which seem
to have been the kind of literature best adapted to
the serious minds of our pious forefather.^. There was
Brown's Christian Journal, Doddridge's Sermons,
Whitefield's Sermons, Hand of Providence, Remedies
against the Fears of Death, The Death of Abel,
Henry on Prayer, etc. Coming down now to the
late years of the eighteenth and to the early years of
the nineteenth century, we are reaching compara-
tively receut times. The early settlers and the sol-
diers of King Philip's War are almost forgotten. The
heroes of the French and Indian Wars are either old
STONEHAM.
483
men or else repose in the silence of the grave. The pa-
triots of the Revolution are still the active men of the
town. The heroic age in America is a memory of the
past, destined, however, to be revived again by the
bugle blast of union and freedom in 18G1.
The independence of the nation had been achieved,
but the long and exhausting struggle of the Revolu-
tion had drained the country of its resources and
left the people little better than bankrupts. The
continental money had become so inflated that it
was finally redeemed one dollar for a hundred. The
towns and individuals were overwhelmed with debt.
General dissatisfaction prevailed. Attempts were
made to obstruct the proceedings of the courts. The
government was blamed and civil war threatened,
which culminated in Shays' Rebellion. Conventions
were held in the summer and autumn of 1786 under
the pretence of setting forth the grievances of the
people, and mobs gathered at the county ceats from
the various towns. One of these conventions was
held at Concord en the Uth of September ut which
Captain Jonathan Green was sent as a delegate from
Stoneham, having been instructed, however, that he
should do nothing contrary to the Con.stitution.
Durin» the autumn and winter of 178G and '87 an
insurrection was threatened and the town was called
upon agviin to furnish soldiers to protect the law and
defend the State government. The insurgents were
led by Luke Day of West Springfield and Daniel
Shays of Pelham. Governor Bowdoin ordered Mid-
dlesex to raise eight hundred men, out of forty-four
liundred from the State, to protect the courts and
suppress the insurrection, under the command of Major-
General Benjamin Lincoln. " On the 25th of January,
Shays, at the head of one thousand men, made an at-
tempt to seize the arsenal at Springfield, but upon a
discharge of cannon from the State troops under the
command of Gen. Shepard, which killed four of the
insurgents, the assailants fled in great haste and con-
fusion and the rebellion was not long after completely
suppressed." Stoneham with her accustomed public
spirit in times of threatened war, voted to pay the
men of her quota three shillings per day during the
time of their eervice. The military company in
Stoneham at that time was commanded by Captain
David Hay. The first men went under charge of
Lieutenant David Geary, followed on the 30th of
January by another squad, and a few days later, it
would appear, the town was called upon to furnish six
additional men and a sergeant.
This company did not go as an organization, though
they furnished men for the quota. At least during a
portion of the time while the trouble existed one of
the regiments was commanded by Colonel Joseph
Bryant. At that time Colonel Bryant was the chief
military personage of the town, and it may be inter-
esting here to refer to one or two stories that are told
of him, though the writer is unable to vouch for their
truth ; but they were related to him in his youth. He
waa grandson of Deacon Daniel Gould, who gave to
him the Captain Buck farm. He was a man of con-
siderable influence, was interested in military matters,
and doubtless was an ardent patriot. A short time
prior to the outbreak of the Revolution he had occa-
sion to go to the marsh, as was customary in those
days, for a load of salt hay. On his return he met
some of the king's officers on horseback, who ordered
him to turn out of the road and make room for them.
Twisting the whip lash about his hand, straightening
himself to his full height, and menacing defiance in
his attitude, he thundered out to them be should
neither turn out for them nor all the king's army.
Another story is, that on a certain occasion, the
governor called to the house to see him. He was
at work in the field and his good wife somewhat awed
by the presence of official greatness, and desirous that
her husband should appear to good advantage, took
his Sunday clothes and ran out to him with them ; but
the doughty colonel possessed of good sense, and
scouting false appearances, marched up to the gover-
nor with his working clothes on his back and as we may
suppose his Sunday clothes over his arm. In 1788
Captain Jonathan Green was sent as a delegate to the
convention in Boston, which was called to ratify the
constitution. This same year " Jonathan Green and
others petitioned the selectmen to lay out a town-way
from Ezra Vinton's barn to the southeast corner of
the town, needed by them for the purpose of going to
market and to mill," stating that for more than sev-
enty years they and their predecessors had maintained
such road at their own expense. The road was laid out
and accepted the next year. It is the old road now in
Melrose Highlands leading from Franklin Street near
the Perkins' place, southerly towards the centre of
the town, and into it ran a private way from Green
Lane. In 1793 the school-house which had probably
grown old and dilapidated, was sold, and the town,
either in this or the succeeding year, built a new one
twenty feet square and located it a little north of the
meeting-house and east of the road. On the 25th of
August, 1795, died Captain Jonathan Green, who for
fifty years had been the most active man of the town
in public afiairs. He was the son of Jonathan and
the grandson of Samuel Green, of Maiden. He was
born in Maiden, November 23, 1719, and when a
young boy removed with his father to Stoneham
where he lived the rest of his li.'e, except from 1769 to
1786 when he resided in Chelsea. With the exception
of one year he was town clerk and town treasurer
from 174S to 1769, also from March 1789 till his
death, except two years ; twenty-five years in all. In
these days there was no alms-house, and the custom
prevailed at the annual town-meeting in March of
putting up the paupers at public auction, and striking
them off for board to the lowest bidder, a practice
perhaps, insuring economy to the town, but not al-
ways cheering to the victim. William Street was laid
out in 1798 but not built till 1805. During the first
484
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
seventy-five years of the town's history, the growth
was small, and it must have presented very much the
same appearance in 1800 as in 1725. Going back to
the first years of the present century, let us look upon
the town as it then appeared, the picture perhaps not
perfectly accurate in all its details, but nevertheless,
substantially correct. It must be remembered that
it was long subsequent to this period, when Stoneham
became a manufacturing town. If one of our ances-
tors who was alive at that time should return to-day,
and mingle with us, hardly a familiar object would be
presented to his view. Imagine him, in the first place,
turning his footsteps towards the old meeting-house,
and picture the amazement with which he would be
overcome. Astonished and bewildered, he would
wander about in search of the pound, the James Hay
house, the school-house and the- church, for in those
days all these objects were taken in at a single glance.
They have long since disappeared from human sight.
Turning his face to the west, he would see that a
magic power had felled the trees of the forest and
reared in its place a large and prosperous town, pre-
senting an appearance of wealth and prosperity al-
most beyond the conception of one accustomed to the
simplicity of colonial days. On every side the farms
which he remembers scattered here and there are cov-
ered with houses and factories and chimneys. The
quiet rest of country life has given place to the buzz
of machinery and the whistle of the engine. Broad
and numerous avenues replace the crooked country
roads, and the old houses are almost gone. Com-
mencing at North Street and going from Reading
(now Wakefield) towards Woburn, the first house on
the north side of the street was the one recently
known as the Deacon Dunlap house, where formerly
lived oue Simondswho kept a store. There lived Eph-
raim Pierce the younger.
A little further on, lived Ephraim Pierce the father,
on the spot where Jas. H. Pierce lately resided. The
next was a small one story house occupied by Captain
Nathaniel Cowdrey, and stood on the south side of
the road, a little east of the present farm house of
John B. Tidd. The next house was on the right, oc-
cupied by Phineas Wiley, and stood where Caleb
Wiley lived at the time of his death. Coming from.
North Street south onto High Street the first building
was an old one on the east side of the street occupied
by John Geary. South of him was Benjamin Geary
where Mr. Sargeant now resides. Near the top of
Farm Hill also on the east side of the road, Stephen
Lynde lived in a house owned by Mrs. Reuben Geary.
In theold office lived Jas. Willy. Thirty or forty rods
south was the residence of Captain Peter Hay. Next
came the Hay Tavern, occupied by Captain Peter Hay,
on the westsideofthestreet, then the Aaron H.iy house
and afterwards the parsonage. Where Wm. H. Rich-
ardson now lives stood the house of Captain David
Geary. Going south on what is now Warren Street
was the house of Mr. Wright, father of Captain
John H. Wright, which stood on a lane running west-
erly from the road. This lane followed about the
course of Hancock Street. A little further south on
the east side was the residence of James Hiil. The
Lot Sweetser house on the north side of Marble Street
was them owned by James Hill, called James Hill, Jr.
The last house in Stoneham which stood partly in
Woburn was the Jesse Dike house then occupied by
William Holden. Returning east over Summer Street,
the first house on the north was that of Ebenezer
Bucknam. Then came the dwelling of the late Zac.
Geary which was torn down a short time since. A
little further north on the east side was Deacon Jabez
Lynde. No other building intervened till the meet-
ing-house was reached. A few rods north of the
meeting-house and westerly from the highway was
Thomas Gould, who had bought the James Hay farm.
In the Osgood house lived Mrs. Dalton, a daughter
of Rev. James Osgood. In the Oakes Green house
lived Eben Bryant and north of him Elias Bryant.
Daniel Hay lived where Horace Tilton now resides.
On the Captain Buck place was the house of Col.
Bryant. Col. Bryant's next neighbor was John Noble
where Aaron Paine afterwards lived. On the Jenkins
place lived Captain Abraham Gould, and further on
Daniel Gould, Esq. The. four latter houses were si-
tuated on territory which has been annexed to Wake-
field. Returning to Spring Street and going east over
what was then a private way there was an old house
on the south where lived William A. Rove. Where
the Chapman house now stands lived Ephraim Brown,
and in the Sturtevant house Captain Daniel Green.
Continuing on towards ISIelrose Highlands near the
town line and just beyond it standing back from the
street on the north side in a lot owned by the town
was a small house or hut occupied by Clamrod, a
Prussian, whose wife was a mulatto. The first house
on Franklin Street, now owned by Mr. Outram, was
that of Thomas Green. He was father of Rev. Sam'l
Green, bom in Stoneham in 1792, afterwards pastor
of the Essex Street church, Boston, and although he
died in comparatively early life, in his forty third
year, he was a man of marked distinction and great
promise. Rev. David Green, a brother of Samuel,
was bom in 1797, and for twenty years was secretary
of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign
Missions. In the next house on the north side of the
street at present occupied by Mr. Walsh lived Cap-
tain Josiah Green. Jonathan and Peter Green resided
on Green Lane: near the foot of Vinton's Hill now
in Melrose Highlands was the house of Ezra Vinton.
Between Ezra Vinton's and the Reading road on the
south side lived his two brothers, Thomas and Tim-
othy, and on the north side, the last house in Stone-
ham was thatof John, nicknamed Sopus, Green. Going
from Summer Street down the present Pond Street to-
wards SpotPoud, Nathan Bucknam lived in the James
Hadley house and John Bucknam in an old house
on the south side of the street torn down some years
STONEHAM.
485
ago. On the Dyer farm lived Jesse Green. Where
the Ames house now stands there was a building
then owned and occupied by Jacob and David Gould, ,
the former of whom was murdered in 1819. On the j
opposite side of the street and a little further south
lived a second David Gould, commonly called Pepe
Gould. At the northeast corner of the Pond lived
Matthew Whipple Sprague. Further down towards
the Red Mills were the houses of Ebenezer Bucknam
and Jabez Kendall. Returning and taking the road
to the south on the east side of the Pond, Daniel
Bryant's house was located where Charles Copeland
afterwards lived. On the east side of the road, on or
near the location of the Butterfield house, lived Mr.
Willy.
The last house in Stoneham on the west side of the
road was that of Captain Samuel Sprague. Retrac-
ing our way to the Hay Tavern in the north part of
the town, and going thirty or forty rods a little north
of west, we should have come to the Fosdick house,
in which Captain Caleb Richardson lived. In the
northwest part of the town on the private way lead-
in" from the Hav Tavern to Woburn, were the houses
of Captain Rufus, Elijah, Oliver and Thaddeus Rich-
ardson. At the old Poor Farm lived the widow
Elizabeth Cutler, the last survivor of that family.
Hclden lived east of Bear Hill. A few other build-
ings there were, but these were substantially all the
dwelling-houses of the town, with one church and
one school-house. The principal change that had
taken place during the last three-quarters of the
eighteenth century had been a mere succession of gen-
erations, even the same names being very generally
preserved. In 1802 the town voted to build a new |
meeting-house, and chose Mr. Daniel Gould, CapUin
Daniel Green and Captain David Geary a committee
for that purpose. It was also voted to ' build the
new meeting-house on the slope of the hill that is
east of the Burying Hill Brook on the north side of
the road." The committee were instructed to make
all necessarv provision for the entertainment and re-
freshment of the men to be employed, and a general
invitation was extended to the inhabitants to be pres-
ent at the raising, which occupied Wednesday, the
'>9th and Thursday, the 30th days of June, 1803, and
U was dedicated on the 14th day of December, the
same year. This was the second house of public wor-
ship erected in the town. This second house re-
mained till the first Sabbath in January, 1840, when
it was destroyed by fire which accidentally caught
from a stove during morning service. The older resi-
dents will remember this edifice with the common
about it, about one acre and a quarter on the north
side of the road and three-quarters of an acre on the
south side, which was used as the training field. The
following description of the church has been left by
Mr. Stevens :
••AD 1803 The inhnbitants of Ihe town of Stoneham built this
De»- Meeiing-Uotuie. Captaiu David Geary, Captain Daniel Green, Mr.
Daniel Gould were the committee to build the meelinghonse. They
agreed with carpenteni to do all the work for seventeen hundrwi and
eighty.one dollar.. The hoane waa raised the two laat daya in Jane.
18U3 and finished about the middle of November following. It l« forty-
six feet by flflv.aix. The entry iB ten feet maklDg the body of the
house square, it coet about 5600 dollar., inclnding the common which
est about 120 dollars. The pewa sold for sevenil hundred dollars more
than enough to pay for the houae. The highest pew sold for 172 dol-
lar.. On the 14th of December, we assembled In the new MeeUng
House to dedicate it to God. There was a vaat conconrw of people.
Bav. Mr. Sanborn, Rev. Mr. Reynolds. Eev. Mr. Nelson and Mr. M
attended with myaelf. Mr. Reynolds road and made the Smt prayer.
Mr. Sanborn made the consecrating prayer. I preached on Haggai. 2,
7 'I will fill this house with glory,' and made the concluding prayer.
The choir concluded with a dedicating anthem. Gr«at order and io-
lemnity marked all the proceedings. On the Sabbath before I pr«ch»»
a farewell sermon at the Old Meeting House, and the day after dedica-
tion the people took It down. I have written this that after genera-
tions might know about It, eepeclally my succeasors In the mlnlitry.
(Signed), JOH.N H. 8TEVE1I8.
In 1803 it was " voted to request the select men to
lay out a new road from the road south of the Old
Meeting House by the corner of Deacon Jabez
Lynde'fl house straight to the New Meeting House."
In 1805 William Street was built, and the Medford
and Andover Turnpike the next year. In 1806, also,
Daniel Gould was elected to represent the town in
the General Court.
In 1810 Spring Street was also laid out and was
known as Captain Daniel Green's road. This year
for the first time a bell was placed on the meeting-
house, having been purchased by subscription, the
committee to purchase it consisting of Thaddeus
Richardson, Benjamin Geary and Lieut. John Buck-
nam. In the early days Stoneham and its people
seemed to be rather fond of indulging in law-suits.
In building William Street the road passed through
the land and near or over the upper dam of Captain
David Hay. They could not agree upon the damages,
so the Captain sued the town, recovered judgment and
obtained execution. The Richardsons also had a
good deal of trouble about their damages, and
finally the town was indicted for not opening that
part of the road lying between the meeting-house
and the houses of Aaron and Peter Hay through the
land of Lieut. John Bucknam, now from Pleasant to
Central Street.
On the 18th day of June, 1812, war was declared by
the Congress of the United States against Great
Britain. This war was generally unpopular in New
England, though there was a minority strongly in
favor of it. The people of the town supported the
government, and cheerfully met the demands that
were made upon them. At the May meeting they
voted " to make up the pay of the soldiers who have
volunteered or shall volunteer their services, or who
shall be drafted out of the militia in Stoneham in
pursuance of the recent general orders of the Gover-
nor for raising ten thousand men out of the militia
of the Commonwealth, to the sum of fifteen dollars
the month, including the United States pay, when
they shall be called into the actual service." Again,
1 in August Captain Caleb Richardson, Lieut. John
486
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Bucknam, Deacon Jabez Lynde, Captain Nathaniel
Cowdrey and Mr. James Hili were chosen a commit-
tee to draw up resolutions upon the national affairs.
About this time a famous compaoy of riflemen was
organized, known aa the Washington Rifle Greens. '
Most of the men came from Stoneham and South j
Reading, though the first commissioned otiicers were
all from Stoneham. It was for a long time the
crack company of the vicinity, and was called out j
in 1814 from Sept'^mber 22d to October 3Ist, and I
stationed on Dorchester Heights. Its first commau- I
der, Captain Jonathan Hay, is said to have been a
very efficient officer. Several of the old-time cap- |
tains whose names were familiar thirty or forty years
ago, such aa Captain Wright, Captain William Rich-
ardson and Captain Steele graduated Irom this com- !
pany. The following is a roll of the company while
in camp on Dorchester Heights : " Inspection and
muster roll of Captain Jonathan Hay's company of
riflemen, of Maj. William Ward's battalion in Gen.
Maltby's brigade, of the detached corps under M«j.-
Gen. Whiton (October 25, 1S14.) Jonathan Hay, ^
Captain; John H. Wright, Lieutenant; William
Richardson, Ensign ; Sergeants — William De.idman,
Benjamin Geary, Jr., Samuel Richardson, William
Bryant. Corporals — Abraham Marshall, Ephraim
Pierce, Samnel Wiley, Jesse Converse. Musicians —
Jedde Brown, William Holden, Joseph Matthews, ,
Thomas Parker, Nathaniel Richardson. Privates — '
James Brown, Jeremiah Converse, Samuel Evans,
James Emerson, Joseph Eaton, Benjamin Flint, Sam-
uel Geary, Amos Howard, Pierpont Hay, Simon
Jones, Henry Knight, Charles Lewis, Jas. Lathe,
Aaahel Porter, Timothy Pierce, Alpha Richardson,
Jonas M. Rowe, Frederick Slocumb and Samuel
Sweetser. One of the curious relies of bygone days
was the office of tythingmau, a part of whose duty it
was to preserve order in the church. The sense of ,
propriety and decency which exists among the young
people of to-day must be greater than that which
prevailed seventy-five years ago. In 1816 it was ne- \
cessary to instruct the tythingmen to " clear the I
stairway of the meeting-house so that the people can 1
have a free passage into the gallery, and the people
when they leave the house will turn to the right band [
or the left hand as soon as they get out of dgors, so i
that others may have a free passage t hrough the porch |
and to keep the boys and girls from whispering and '
laughing in the gallery. The tythingmen will post
up these instructions at the Meeting-House." In ;
passing from Stoneham towards Spot Pond over Pond ■
Street, the traveler notices on the right about one-
fourth of a mile below the junction of South Street, '
the well-kept buildings of what was formerly known
aa the Tom Gould Farm.
For generations it had been the home of a branch
of this old family. David, a grandson of the origi-
nal settler, John Gould, had bought it in 1714.
The |>re3ent dwelling occupies the site of the old
bouse. On this spot, and during the night of Nov.
2.1, 1819, occurred the brutal murder of Jacob Gould,
which produced a proi'ounder sensation in the town
than any other local event in ils history. The tamily
at that time consisted of two brothers, David and
Jacob, and a maiden sister, Polly Gould, together
with one Mrs. Winship, who was hired to help do the
work. David and Polly were supposed, for those
times, to have considerable money. On the evening
of the 25th, between eight and nine o'clock, they
were sitting in the kitchen, when three men rushed
in with disguised faces, armed with dirks, and de-
manded of Jacob his money. He attempted to de-
fend himself with a chair, but was overcome, and lell
pierced with several wounds, one of which, in the
region of the heart, proved fatal. David also received
two wounds. The hands of David and Polly were
then bouod, and each one of the three was in turn
taken up stairs to produce the money. From Jacob
was obtained five dollars, from David two liuudred
dollars, and from Polly s-is hundred dollars, hers
being deposited, in six deer-skin bags, in Jacob's
chest. In going up-stairs the light went out. In the
scuffle that ensued Polly's hands were badly cut and
a finger of one of the robbers. Daniels whs afterwards
detected partly by means of this wound. A fourth
man stood at the door to keep watch, supposed by
some to have been one Clifton, who had formerly
resided in the town. After the robbery the mem-
bers of the family were all put down cellar, a feather-
bed thrown down for them to lie upon, a table placed
against the door and warning given that one of the
robbers would be left to guard them for two hours.
About eleven o'clock, however, David was impelled
by the dying groans of his brother to venture up-stairs
and give the alarm to their next-door neighbor, ."Ste-
phen Lynde.
By daylight the whole town was aroused, and scour-
ing the country far and near. Jacob died at three
o'clock on the morning of the 2Gth. A reward of
five hundred dollars was offered by David for the
detection of the murdererp, and five hundred more by
the Governor of the Commonwealth. Several men
were arrested, but no one was convicted, though Dan-
iels was probably one of the guilty parties. He hung
himself while in jail before the trial.
From the early settlement of the town the school-
house had been located near the spot where the first
meeting-house was built. This was about the geo-
graphical centre of the inhabitants. During the
period of a century and more, one building (bllowed
another. The town-meetings were sometimes held
in the meeting-house, and sometimes in the school-
house.
In 1820 the town "voted to build a school-house
on or near the spot where the old meeting-house
stood, large enough to be convenient for the whole
town for school and town meetings, by excluding
small children under a certain age." But it was not
STONEHAM.
487
built till 182G. The first story was used for a school,
aud the second for a town hall.
The dtructure which was erected in accordance
with this vote remained where it was built until
1833, when it was moved to the corner of Pleasant
and Central Streets, where it now stands, known as
the Old Town House. As has been said, the prac-
tice prevailed for many years of putting up the town's
paupers, for support, at public auction, an occasion
attended, very likely, at times, with some festivity,
judging from the fact that the meeting adjourned for
tlie sale, sometimes to the tavern, and sometimes to
Alpheus Richardson's Hall, neither of which places
in those days was surrounded by an atmosphere of
total abstinence. The last auction of this character
occurred in 1825, when Benjamin Blodgett was struck
off to Col. Eldridge Geary at seven shillings per
week ; Pbineas Blodgett to the same person at fifty-
three cents per week ; Thomas L. Knight to Captain
Daniel Green at one dollar and twelve cents per
week; Daniel G. Brown to Col. Geary at forty cents
per week ; Chloe aud Nancy Freeman (colored) to Dan-
iel Gould, Esq., at one dollar and ninety-eight cents
for both ; John Crocker tn Joseph W. Noble at
eighteen cents per week, and John Green to Benja-
min Geary at one dollar per week.
In 1826 the town bought the old Poor Farm, and
this cheerful and economical custom has become a
relic of by-gone times. It is a pleasant reflection
that the number of paupers is much less at the pres-
ent time, in proportion to the population, than it was
seventy years ago. With the progress and develop-
ment of the nineteenth century poverty is greatly
diminished. The laboring man of to-day enjoys
comforts and luxuries almost beyond the conception
of our grandfathers.
During the first century of our history one of the
principal burdens imposed upon the lowii had been
the supporr of the minister. The last appropriation
for this purpose was made in 1826, when three hun-
dred and forty-six dollars was raised for the minis-
ter's salary and wood. After this a parish was or-
ganized, and the town in its corporate capacity
exercised no further control in ecclesiastical matters.
The rigor of the laws had been gradually modified in
the interest of dissenters, so that every man was al-
lowed the privilege of withdrawing from one relig-
ious society provided he connected himself with some
other, so that he could be taxed somewhere for the
support of preaching. It has been only since 1834
that the support of public worship has been entirely
voluntary.
From dissati-sfaction with the minister, with the
creed aud from a variety of causes, many withdrew
from the meeting in Stoneham, and joined socielies
in other towns. A Universalist Society was organ-
ized, embracing some of the most substantial citi- '
zens ; but did not meet, it would seem, at first, with |
great popular favor; for in 1S2G we find the town
voting "not to allow the Universalist Society the
privilege of holding meetings for preaching in the
hall or in the school-house."
Stoneham's record as a temperance town in recent
years is consistent with the opinions entertained by
our fathers, who chose, in 1832, the selectmen, "Levi
Hill and Charles E. Walker, a committee to see that
the law fur regulating licensed houses is regarded in
this town." And they furthermore voted that the
" selectmen use all lawful measures to prevent any
person or persons procuring license to retail ardent
spirits."
Prior to 1833 the town-meetings bad been belJ
either in the meeting-house or the school-house, but
after the town-house was built, the bulk of the popu-
lation gradually settled near the present centre of the
village, leaving the public buildings on the outskirts ;
so it was desired that the town-house should be
moved to a location that would better accommodate
the population. Opinion was divided, but at the
annual raeetiuT in March, 1833, the friends of the
movement rallied in force and voted " to move the
Town House to some convenient place near the And-
over and Medford turnpike, and chose Charles E.
Walker, Benjamin F. Richardson and Alpha Rich-
ardson a committee to purchase a suitable piece of
land, and superintended the moving of the build-
ing." This was the 4th of March. The movers had
been victorious, but the contest was not yet end-
ed. On the next day the anti-movers bad out a war-
rant for another town-meeting called for the 12th,
the earliest possible day, hoping to reverse the action
of the town. And now the committee proved them-
selves equal to the emergency. Only seven days re-
mained in which to purchase the land and make the
removal. A lot was bought, the country was scoured
for oxen, and forty or fifty yoke were collected
together for the important occasion. The ground was
frozen and covered with snow and ice. The build-
ing was put on runners. A great concourse of people
had assembled. Rum was distributed from the inter-
ior of the building to stimulate the zeal of the excited
crowd. The chains were secured and the oxen at-
tached. The apple-trees of Thomas Gould had been
cut so as to make a bee line, near as possible over the
meadow to the new location. The signal was given,
the great team started, but after a while the chains
broke. Delay followed. The broken links were
again replaced, or new ones substituted. Time was
precious. The loss of a single day accompanied by a
thaw might leave the edifice a helpless wreck, anchor-
ed in meadow mud; but steam was up, and with a
yell of triumph they again started and this time no
halt was made till the house was landed near the
spot that had been purchased for its location. The
victory was won and the anti's were whipped. On the
meeting of the 12i,h there was nothing for them to do
but meet and dissolve. Boys who stood about and
sat on steps enjoying the fun, are now old men and
488
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
love to look back and recall the events of that excit-
ing day. In 1834 the first fire-engine was bought,
known as the " Phoenix."
In 1836 the town was divided in six school districts.
The school-house, district number one, was located
at the corner of Main Street and Captain Rufus Rich-
ardson's Lane : in number two on Cobble Hill, not
far from the present standpipe ; in number three on
Vinton'sHill; in numberfouronPondStreet; in num-
ber five on Warren Street ; and in number six at the
centre, near the corner of Pine and Pleasant Streets.
In 1833 the county commissioners laid out the high-
way now known as Elm Street from the old road
towards South Reading. Old people look back to
the period between 1830 and '40 as one of great pub-
lic interest and excitement. Moral and political
questions which were destined to agitate the country
during the coming years were then beginning to crys-
tallize. Public opinion was divided ; one element was
aggressive, and the other intolerant. The question
of African slavery was cleaving asunder the cora-
munity. Political fervor was red hot. Some opinion
may be formed of the temper of the town in 1837 when
it is remembered that Captain Rufus Richardson,
Joseph W. Noble, John Hill and Darius Stevens
were added as a committee to the selectmen to take
charge of the town-house, and were instructed not to
let any meeting be held there " which they shall have
reason to think will produce a disturbance or endan-
ger the house." On May 9th it was voted sixty-two
in the aflBrmative and thirty-three in the negative
" that the town will not allow anti-slavery lectures,
and discussions to be held in the town-house." It is
difficult to realize to what an extreme limit some of the
good men of that time allowed their zeal to carry
them in opposition to anti-slavery agitation. Meet-
ings were held, others were broken up, and finally the
excitement culminating in mob violence, concluded
with the homicide of Timothy Wheeler. Some of the
doggerel verse and sarcastic rhyme in which hard
epithets were hurled by one side against the other,
and received back in turn, now lie hidden away in
old houses and attest the violent birth-throes of the
great reform, which in a little more than a quarter of
century from that time was destined to shake a con-
tinent to its foundations and crown a race with
human freedom. Reference has been made to the
laying out or building of most of the early roads.
Only a few others will be mentioned, as the limit of
this article forbids it.
In 1837 the county commissioners laid out a con-
tinuation of Elm Street from near the house of the
late John Paine to the centre ot what is now Wake-
field, making this the direct and usual thoroughfare
between the two towns. The population this year was
a little over 900. During the year ending .\pril 1,
1837, there were manufactured 380,100 pairs of
shoes, valued at $184,717. Montvale Avenue was laid
out by the county commissioners in 1840. After a life
of 115 years, Stoneham had made but little material
progress. lu fact, during the first century the growth
had been hardly perceptible and the changes slight.
Outside of agriculture, the principal occupation was
the manufacture of shoes, though carried on in a
small way, in comparison with the expensive plants
and large capital invested in this business during the
last thirty years. The country was dotted here
and there with little shoemaker's shops, where most of
the work was done. The manufacturers themselves
required no large amount of room, only a sufficient
space to hold the goods, cut up the stock, and deliver
it to the men who made the shoes. The largest man-
ufacturers usually kept a general store in connection
with their business, which enabled them to pay their
workmen partially in supplies, and thus secure to
themselves a double profit. In those daysshoemaking
was a trade ; one shoemaker could make the entire
shoe, and labor was not sub-divided as at present, giv-
ing to each man a specific part, and having a ten-
dency to make of him a mere machine. Then, man-
ufacturing was the slow and simple process of hand
labor, now the magic product of complicated machin-
ery. Something may be said in favor of each process.
Those of us who can look back to the little shop
where the workmen labored inside in winter, and out-
side in summer, the proprietors of their own estates, an-
chored to the soil by a sense of ownership, each one
personally interested in the welfare of the town, no
large fortunes and no expensive living, we are iu-
clinad to think the common citizen leveled up to a
rather higher standard than now. On the other hand,
with the introduction of machinery, modern inven-
tions, the results of recent scientific research,
material prosperity has rapidly increased, for-
tunes have multiplied, and what were luxuries
to our fathers are necessities to us. During the
twenty-five years succeeding 1840 great changes
took place, new roads were built, great factories
sprung up, and a few scattered houses grew into a
compact and thrifty town. New business methods
prevailed, and the workmen of a single concern, in-
stead of being scattered over the whole town, were
collected together under one. In 1844 Franklin
Street from Main Street to Noble's Corner was
built. The present town-house was originally built
in 1847, though it was subsequently enlarged. The
committee who built it were Benjamin F.Richardson,
Reuben Locke, Jr., Luther Hill, Daniel Hill and El-
bridge Gerry, and the expense of the building exclu-
sive of land was between S5000 and $6000. The lower
story was used for the accommodation of the High
School, till a short time before the erection of the
present high and grammar school-house, and here
it may be well to refer briefly to the history of our
public-scnool system. An allusion has already been
made to the single school kept near the meeting-house
and to the six district school-houses that were subse-
quently erected in the different localities of the town.
STONEHAM.
489
The High School was firet thoroughly organized with
a regular course of study and a system of graduation
in 1856, although nominally eathblished in 1854, and
was the heritage of the Centre Union School, kept by
Caleb Oliver in the winter of 1846-47. Let us go
back for a moment to the school of Master Oliver,
which was taught in the old red school-house, located
on Pine near Pleasant Street, and commenced No-
vember 30, 1846, and closed February 27, 1847.
George W. Dike, Silas Dean and Ira Gerry were
committee, and George W. and Solon Dike, pru-
dential committee. The list of books prescribed
were the Bible, Porter's Rhetorical Reader, Emerson's
Second and Third Class Readers, Webster's Diction-
ary, New National Spelling Book, Worcester's
Primer, Emerson's Arithmetic, Leonard's Arithmetic,
Brown's Grammar, Smith's Anatomy, Oliver's Geog-
raphy, Burrit's Geography of the Heavens, Willard's
History of the United States, Towoe's Gradual Reader,
Thompson's Seasons, Sherwin's Algebra and Com-
stock's Philosophy, Chemistry and Physiology. The
whole number of scholars was seventy. The teacher was
paid thirty-five dollars per month and his board was
valued at eight dollars per month. In age the schol-
ars ranged from twelve to twenty. Afterwards the
school was kept winters in the old town-house till
the new one was built. In 1850 the number of schol-
ars between four and sixteen was 377. Prior to 1851
the prevailing st^le of school architecture in Stone-
ham had been that of the old red school -house, which
was so common in New England fifty years ago, but
this year the town expended about S16,000 in
the erection of three large, fine grammar school
houses and two smaller mixed ones, one of them at
Spot Pond and one of them at what is now Melrose
Highlands. These were among the finest and best
appointed of any in the neighboring towns, and they
at once placed Stoneham in the front rank, at least as
a supporter of the public schools. In 1859 the public
library was established, a nucleus having been
formed from the old Social Librarj-, the Young Ladies'
Library and the High School Library. The present
Congregational meeting-house was built in 1840,
the second one having been burned, as previously
stated. The same year the Universalist meeting-
House was also erected, which was subsequently sold
to the Catholics in 1868, at the time of the erection of
the Christian Union, now the Unitarian Church. The
pastors of the Congregational Society of the First Par-
ish subsequent to Jos. Searle, who preached from
1828 to 1832 were Rev. Jonas Colburn, from 1832 to
1837 ; Rev. John Le Bosquett, from 1837 to 1838 ;
Rev. John A. Vinton, 1839; Rev. Edward Cleave-
land, from 1839 to 1840; Rev. John Haven, from
1841 to 1849; Rev. Wm. C. Whitcomb, from 1850 to
1855; Rev. Chas. P. Grosvenor, from 1856 to 1858;
Rev. J. E. Swallow, from 1858 to 1859; Rev. W. J.
Bitt, from 1859 to 1861, and again from 1875 to 1885 ;
Rev. Swift Byington, from 1864 to 1871 ; Rev. Web-
ster Hazlewood, from 1872 to 1874; Rev. D. Augus-
tine Newton, from 1885 to 1889, and at present the
Rev W. W. Sleeper. Of these, Mr. Le Bosquett, Mr.
Vinton, Mr. Cleaveland, Mr. Grosvenor, Mr. Swallow
and Mr. Hazlewood were not settled. The Univer-
salist Society remained an independent organization
till it united with the Unitarian Society and became
the Christian Union Church.
Its first minister was Rev. J. P. Atkinson, followed by
Rev. A. G. Fay, 1840-41 ; Rev. Woodbury M. Fem-
ald, from 1842 to 1845; James M. Usher, 1845; Rev.
Mr. Marvin, Rev. Henry Jewel, from 1852 to 1855;
Rev. S. W. Squires, from 1859 to 1862 and Edward
Eaton, in 1863.
The Unitarian Society was organized in 1858, and
employed Rev. Fiske Barrett, who remained with them
till 1861. Mr. Barret was followed by Rev. Geo. M.
Skinner, who resigned September 1, 1867. During
the pastorate of Mr. Skinner the Universalist and
Unitarian Societies united under the name of " The
Christian Union Church," and for a time worshipped
in the Universalist meeting-house. The Universal-
ist meeting-house was sold to the Catholics in 1868,
and the Christian Union Church was erected and
dedicated on January 1, 1869. Mr. Skinner was suc-
ceeded by Rev. E. B. Fairchild, who came in Novem-
ber, 1867, and remained the pastor of the church till
January, 1876. The clergymen connected with this
society subsequent to Mr. Fairchild have been Rev.
D. M. Wilson, from May, 1876, to December, 1878;
Rev. Daniel Rowen, from April, 1879, to April, 1883;
Rev. C. J. Staples, from May, 1884, to June, 1887,
and J. H. Whitmore, from January, 1888. In 1889
the Christian Union Church reorganized as the First
Unitarian Society.
The Methodist Society was first organized in 1856,
the first pastor having been Rev. J. W. F. Barnes, at
present chaplain of the Massachiisetts State Prison.
Its ministers have been Mr. Barnes, 1857, and a part
of 1858; Mr. Little, a part of 1858; Henry V. De-
gen, a part of 1859 ; Linus Fish, 1860 ; H. P. An-
drews, 1861 ; L. Frost (local), 1862; Mr. Wheeler,
(local), 1863 and 1864 ; B. W. Gorham, 1865 ; Steven
A. Cashing, 1866 ; A. D. Sargent, 1867 and 1868 ; M.
M. Parkhurst, 1869 and 1870 ; W. F. Crafts, 1871 and
1872 ; Geo. L. Collier, 1873-4-5 ; L. O. Knowls, 1876-7 ;
Chas. W. Wilder, 1878-9 ; John M. Short, 1880-1-2 ;
Henry Lummis, 1883-4-5; Charles T. Johnson, 1886-
7 ; J. Weare Dearborn, 1888-9 ; W. H. Meredith, 1890.
The corner-stone of their present church edifice was
Inid June, 1868, the vestry dedicated in October of
the same year, and the main audience-room dedicat-
ed December 5, 1870, during the pastorate of Mr.
Parkhurst, a man who possessed the force and push
requisite to accomplish a great undertaking in the
face of obstacles apparently almost insurmountable.
The Baptist, which is the youngest of the religious
societies, was organized in 1870, and built the chapel
which they now occupy the same year. Their pas-
490
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tors have been Rev. T. P. Briggs, who was ordained
July 16, 1871, and resigned July 14, 1872; Arthur J.
Hovey, ordained September 25, 1872, resigned (Octo-
ber 28, 1887 ; and J. W. MuGreggor, ordained May
31, 1888. It is expected the Baptists will soon build
a fine new stone church in the southerly part of the
town, upon the estate of the late Luther Hill.
The Catholics bought the old Universalist meeting-
house, moved it on to Pomeworih Street in 1868, and
occupied it till the completion of their present house
of worship, which was completed in 1888. The Cath-
olic pastors residing in Stoneham have been Rev. \V.
H. Fitzpatrick, from 1868 to 1875 ; and Rev. Dennis
J. O'Farrell, from 1875 to the present time.
Twenty-live years have passed since the close of the
greatRebellion. itseems hard to realizethatto a large
part of the people now living the events of the war are
known only as matters of history or tradition; that al-
most one generation has come and another gone since
the opening events of 1861. Those were stirring
times in Stoneham, and all who love the old town are
proud to dwell upon her record. No town was more
patriotic, none more prompt in hurrying to the
front, or furnished more men in proportion to her
population. Stoneham's company of minute-men hav-
ing been engaged in the first battle of the Revo-
lution, it was a remarkable coincidence that Captain
John H. Dike's company, from the same town, on the
same day of the same mouth, should have participat-
ed in the first skirmish of the Rebellion. At Lexing-
ton she was in the vanguard of the army which
founded the Republic. At Baltimore and Washing-
ton she led the hosts that saved the Union. The
conduct of Captain Dike and his men in a great
emergency deserves more than a passing notice. The
part they acted in the march through Baltimore has
made the name of the Stoneham company historic.
The Stoneham Light Infantry had betn the military
organization of the town for many years, and was
Company C of the Seventh Regiment. The first
proclamation had been issued by President Lincoln
calling for seventy-five thousand volunteers. On
Tuesday, April 16th, Captain Dike goes to Boston, pje-
sents himself at the State-House, and begs the privi-
lege of calling out his company in obedience to the
President's call. On his return home the nieu are
notified to meet in the armory in the East School-
house, wheretheyassembleatS P.M., and unanimously
vote that they are ready to start at a moment's notice.
The night was dark and stormy, and Wednesday
morning broke with a cold and hazy atmosphere, but
the town was alive with excitement. Men were hur-
rying to and fro, and preparations being made for im-
mediate departure. A messenger had been despatch-
ed from the Governor, who reached Captain Dike's at
half-past two in the morning, notifying him to muiter
his men and report in Boston forthwith. These men
were again summoned to meet in the armory at 6 a..m.
New names were added to the roll, and the members
': dismissed to make the last arrangements, and bid their
final adieus. Those who witnessed thecompany'sde-
parture on that morning of the 17lh of April can never
forget it. The company met at the Town Hall, where
prayers were offered, and a little before ten, in military
array, they reached Central Square.
The people had assembled in a great multitude,
wild with patriotic enthusiasm. It was an occasion
such as Stoneham had never witnessed. The com-
; pany departed from the square amid the ringing of
j bells, waving of handkerchiefs and tumultuous
: cheers. After reaching Boston, they marched to the
I State-House, where they received over-coats and other
articles. A. V. Lynde, Esq., presented to each one of
the commissioned officers a revolver. The company
was assigned to the Sixth Regiment, commanded by
Col. Jones, ^nd the same afternoon they were en route
I for Washington. The commissioned officers of the
company were : Captain, John H. Dike, First Lieut.
Leander F. Lynde; Second Lieutenant, Darius N.
Stevens;Tbird Lieutenant, James F. Rowe, and Fourth
Lieutenant, W. B. Blaisdell. In addition to the offi-
cers there was one musician and a full complement of
sixty men. No language of the writer could give so
J vivid a description of what occurred during the next
' few days as the following letter, written by one of the
chief actors, Lieut. Lyude, who was in command of
the company after Captain Dike was wounded in
Baltimore :
" Head Quartebs Sixth Regiment op I. 51. V. M.
I •' Senate Clianiber, .\pril 20. 12 31., '61.
" Me C. C. UlKE :
Dc^ir sir : — Yours was received this a. m. For tlie fii-st time we have got
direct uew.H tioin humc, iilid 1 assure yon tlit-y Mere gladly received. LitsC
iii|;:ht at 7 !■ M. the Ttli Rept. N'. Y. arrived and were unurtered at the
House of Kepresentatived. That cheered us up constdenildy, but tn-day,
< when the gallant 5th, 7th and Sth Massachusetts and Ihe 1st Khude
Island arrived, the wildest euthusiiicin pre\ttiled, for it was refreshing to
see laniiliar faces fr.irn the uld Bay State. PreMuMs to Iliia we h.id been
worked very hard for green soldierf, sleeping with, and at all times hav-
ing with us, ourequipnieuts, but thenten have done well, and liavestood
by each ulher like brutheiy. Now lor our journey litre. The papers
give an accO'int uf nur route to Philadelphia. From there I will try and
! give the partiruhii's. Our muskets were loaded and crpped heforo
I w-egot to Philadelphia. We left there at 2 in the morning, arriving at
Baltimore about 12 M. Our company were in two covered bagage cars.
j We had otopped for about tifleeu minutes, and a crowd was gathering
fast, when we discovered that the Colonel and Staff, titgerhor with seven
j coDipnnies, had left in their cars, and gone across the city. The nieu
I whose duty it was to draw w ith horses our cars across, were driven off
I and could not, and we proceeded to get out, fall in, four companies in
all, to march across, we having the colors in une of th" companies. Tho
com]>anies were C, of Lowell on the right : Co. B, of Lowell, with the
colors; then came Co. C. of our town, Captain Dike, followed by Co. I,
of Liiwrence. Before we pot fon:jed we were taunted and spit upon and
iliaiilted in every way possible. After marching about ten roiis, stones
and brick-bats flew merrily, and the onler wiis tln-n given by Captaiu
Follansbee, who commanded the regiment, to double quick march. We
had not gone more Ihan ten rods bel'oie 1 eaw a man discharge a revolver
at us from the second story of a building, and at Ihe same lime, a great
many were fired from the street. We got scattered a little, and I gave
j the order to close up in close order, solid coliiinn. Just then. Captain
' Dike being ahead, two uf our men fell, one by a bullet Iruni a pistid, anil
one by a brick baL I then ordered my men to lire, which they did, and
I then gave the order to load and hre as we went. We got partly through
the city, when we found them tearing up a britlge, and Ihe street hb»ck-
ed up with stone and laigc anchors, but we ^aled them and kept up our
STONEHAM.
491
couragfl. I kepi around tbe culors atid stuud by theui till they wprv at
tbe depot, tlieu lielped put ttieui ID tlie caw. \Ve were acatlervd very
much, all trying to get into tbe caiB. About ten rods from tbe depot I
Miw Cjtptuin Dike. Tbat was tbe last time I saM- liini. He being aonie
H-ay abead, 1 Btipf)Osed he bad got into tbe for^vard cars. A great many
of the curs v\ere lot-kefl, and tbe windows closed, but the buls of tbe
guns Hoou made a passage into tbein. Kvery gun was then pointed out
of tbe window, and tbe rebels be^an to leave. ^Vbile we were getting
into tbe cars, we wel^ showered upon with pistol balls, and they were
uusliHCkling the rat^ so us to leave eoliie ut us, but when we got right
we soon stopped that by stationing men on tbe platfoim, and muzzles
out of tbe windows. After helping put in the colors in company with
the cnloi-bearer, I got into tbe earn and they t>egan to move very slow,
for the rebs had gone abead and torn uj) tbe track. The {Kjtice went
ahead and we fixed the truck and finally moved on to Washiugtoli. One
word in regard to tbe police. Some of them weie loyal, but what could
they do w heii we were in tbe thickest of the figbt. As soon as we got
started I looked Ihrongb the train to see who were hurt and who were
missing, fur we were awfully mixed up. I found u}K>D examination that
our Captain, James Keenan, Horace liunforth, Andrew Kobbins and
Victor Lorendo were left behind. The band did not get out of car^ on
the Dortli side of Baltimore, and we did not know what bad become of
tbem till this morning when we learned tbat part of them had gone home,
and a part ot tbem were in New York. As soon as possible after get'
ting to Washington I took means to fiud out in regard to those left behind,
and found that Cuptain Dike was shot in the thigh and was in good
bands, but was told that they conid not tell the names of tbe parlies with
w linii) he was stopping. James Keenan whs shot in the leg, and .\iidrew-
Itobbiiis was shot and hit with a stone, hurt very bad. Horace Danfuith
was hit with a stone and injured very aevcrelv, but all were in good
bands, and well cared for. Communication by letter being cut off from
Baltimore, I have not received news from there as well as I should had
there been a mail, but have heard several times by men coming from
there tbat they were cored for and doing well, but rumor said yesterday
that A. Ilobbins and U. Danforth were dead. I cannot tell, fur it is
impossible to write and nobody goes tliere. 1 shall dn tbe best 1 can to
bcHT from them and help tbem in every way We got to Mashington
at daik, went directly to tbe Capitol, and were quartered in the Senate
Chamber. The Pennsylvania Kegimenc wiu) quartered in the southern
wing, ^50 men. Monday we took the oath of allegiance to the United
States. It was administered by Alaj. McDowell. We bave march-
ed up to tbe President's bouse, passing in review befure President Lin-
coln, Gen. .Scott, Wm. II. Seward and Simon Cauieron. To-4liiy at 12
51. the Jtli and 7th Massachusetts Regiments arrived and matched to
the Patent Office, where they are quartered. The 8tli Massuchnsetts are
in the Tlotiinda and old Senate Chamber, very Diucb used up with
inatdiing, and going without sleep and provisions, but our men are
doing all in our powei' for tbem. Say to all our Stoneham friends that
the men behaved like men as well as soldiers, and attend to their duties
cheerfully, and are ready if needs be to rally at a mumeut's warning
around the culors of Gth Regiment, and under the stars and stripes there
to protect our glorious Union against any odds and at all baziirds. We
all unite in sending good news to all iiiquiling friends, and will en.
deiivor so to act tliat none of them shall ever be anbumed to own tbat
they had friends iu tbe time of need in the Stoneham Light In-
fantry. 'Vours truly,
*' L. F. LyspE, Lieut. Commanding/^
The town was full of patriotic ardor. The first
company having departed for Washington, fifteen ad-
ditional Stoneham men joined Company F of the
Fifth Regiment, under command of Captain David K.
Ward well, and at once another company was organ-
ized by Captain, (allerwardsColonel,) J. Parker Gould,
known as the " Grey Eagles." This last company
comprised, besides the officers, seventy-seven men
from Stoneham, and became Company G of the Thir-
teenth Massachusetts Regiment, were attached to the
Army of the Potomac and served for three years,
sharing in the reverses and victories of tbat grand
array. They were at the Second Battle of Bull Run, j
at Antietam, at Thoroughfare Gap, Chantilly, South
Mountain, Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, at Get-
tysburg and the Wilderness. Before leaving for the
seat of war they earned a high reputation as a well-
drilled and splendid body of men, a reputation which
tbey afterwards fully sustained on a score of battle-
fields. Here it may be well to pause for a moment
and briefly recall the life and services of Colonel
Gould, for he stands out in clear relief as the repre-
sentative of almost an ideal soldier. Descended from
John Gould, who has been described as one of the
first settlers of Charlestown End, and bearing a name
which for two hundred years was one of the most
reputable in the town, he was born on the 15th of
May, 1822, the son of Jacob and Phoebe Catherine
(Parker) Gould. His early advantages were not of
the best. Attending in his boyhood the local schools,
he learned the tradeof a shoemaker and saved money,
with which he obtained an education at the Military
University of Norwich, Vermont, where he graduated
with honor and was employed for some time after his
graduation as an instructor. Teaching at times in
Stoneham and Wilmington, he acquired and puisued
the profesiion of a civil engineer, following his avo-
cation in Vermont, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania
and Massachusetts, but always keeping his rtsidence
at the old home in Stoneham. He had been repeat-
edly honored by his native town, filling many posi-
tions of reeponsibility and trust, having twice repre-
sented her in the General Court, and having earned
for himself the reputation of a high-minded Christian
gentleman. So, when tbe war came on, he seemed
peculiarly fitted by education and character to fill the
position in which he was placed. Raising and
drilling the company of "Grey Eagles," sn-called, iu
the spring and early summerof 18G1, and joining with
his company the Fourth Battalion at Fort Indepen-
dence, which was the nucleus of the Thirteenth
P^egiment, he was promoted to a majority before
leaving for the front. His appointment was said, at
first, to have been resented by the members of the
Fourth Battalion, who looked upon themselves as a
crack organization, and felt that it was rather an in-
trusion upon their rights to place over them a major
from another company ; but as time went on, and the
men were called into action, they learned to know his
soldierly qualities and noble traits, and he soon had
earned for himself the sobriquet of the " fighting
major." It was a saying among the men on the eve
of a battle, " We know who is to be our commander
now, and he commands no man to go where he is not
willing to go himself." After having been engnged in
seventeen or eighteen skirmishes and battles he was
ordered home to recruit a new regiment, the Fifty-
ninth Massachusetts, of which he was appointed
colonel. A second time he left for the seat of war, at
the head of over a thousand men ; in April, 1864,
joined the army of General Grant, and participated in
the battles of the Wilderness. Some idea may be
formed of the campaign when it is remembered that
492
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNXr, MASSACHUSETTS.
the Fifty-ninth, on arriving at Petersburg, had become
reduced to about one hundred officers and men, all
told, and Colonel Gould was left in charge of the
brigade. His health at this time had become very
much impaired on account of his privations and
labors; still he retained command of the brigade until
the evening before the explosion of the mine at Peters-
burg, when he was relieved by General Bartlett.
Although relieved of his command on the 29lh of
July, on the next day he took the field in the fatal
advance on Petersburg, commanding the left of the
brigade, and while standing on the brink of the mine
was struck by a ball in the leg and carried from the
field. His leg was amputated, and, contrary to his
desire, he was removed within less than three weeks
from City Point to Philadelphia, where he died the
morning after his arrival, on the 22d of August, 1864.
His name is now borne in this town by Post 75 of the
Grand Army of the Republic, and he has left a record
filled with the gratitude, the pride and the affection
of his townsmen, and a name which deserves to be
cherished by those who shall come after us for gener-
ations to come.
The men, as they shouldered their muskets and left
behind them their wives and children, must have felt
that they were consigned to the patriotic care of the
mother town ; that responsibility was to be shared by
those who went and those who remained ; and recog-
nizing their responsibility, the town voted in 18C1
"that the selectmen be instructed to furnish all nec-
essary supplies for supporting the families of members
of the military formed and forming in this town, with
the understanding that no person thus assisted shall
be taken to the almshouse." "That the members of
the military company recently formed be allowed the
sum of twenty dollars each per month till the 4th day
of July next, unless they should be called into active
service before that time." Again on June 3d, the
town voted "that the select men be instructed to
make all necessary provisions for the families of all
persons belonging in town who have enlisted for mil-
itary service." The patriotic ardor of the citizens
which prompted them to fill the various quotas of the
t3wn continued till the end of the war, and the town
itself was no less patriotic in encouraging and sup-
porting the men who went to the front. The reverse
of 1861 at Bull Run, and the small progress made by
the Union cause during that year, made it necessary
for the Government to call out the reserve power of
the whole North to meet the exigencies which faced
the country in 1862. To a people less courageous
and determined, the prospect was indeed a gloomy
one. No substantial impression had been made upon
the successful progress of the Rebellion, and to the
faint-hearted it almost seemed as if the fate of the
nation was sealed. As the historian of future years
studies the history of the war, and grasps the motives
and purposes, and disserns the springs of action
which furnished ultimate success and victory, he need
hardly go beyond the annals of a single New Eng-
land town, and no better representative of the class
exists than Stoneham. There was no abatement of
the demand made upon her resources and no faltering
in the spirit to meet the demand. On August 26,
1862, it was voted "to appropriate and pay to the
Stoneham Infantry Company the sum of forty hun-
dred dollars as a bounty to said Company, provided
said Company of not less than forty men enlist into
the service of the United States as the town's quota,
under the call of the President of the United States,
for three hundred thousand militia to serve nine
months, and accepted and sworn into said service, said
sum to be paid by the selectmen as soon as they are
sworn in." This was the same organization that had
joined the Sixth Regiment and marched through Bal-
timore, though most of the members were new men.
The company was officered by Captain Darius N.
Stevens, First Lieutenant Samuel C. Trull, of Stone-
ham, and Second Lieutenant Frederick Cochran, of
Methuen. Forty of the members were from Stone-
ham, and most of the others from Lawrence and
Methuen. They became Company C, of the Fiftieth
Regiment, Colonel Carlos P. Messer. Perhaps in no
company from Stoneham were so many old residents
represented as in this. The beautiful autumn days
spent in camp at Boxford, linger as delightful mem-
ories in the minds of many who were then full of the
hopes and enthusiasm of youth. The day when they
shouldered knapsacks and muskets, marched to the
train, sped on to Boston, formed in the streets, bade
adieu to their friends and left the old Boston and
Worcester depot for Allen's Point in New York by
way of the Sound, is one never to be forgotten. And
their arrival at the great metropolis on a cold and
dismal morning, breakfast at the barracks, camp on
Long Island, running of the guard, the evenings in
the city, the embarking on the steamer "Niagara "
from Brooklyn, which sprung a leak and caught fire
off Delaware-breakwater, the trip up the river to
Philadelphia, its kindnesses and hospitalities, the re-
embarking on the "Jennie Lind," and the voyage
down the Atlantic by way of Fortress Monroe and the
Gulf of Mexico to the Southwest Pass of the Missis-
sippi, and the sail up to New Orleans and Baton
Rouge — all these, after a lapse of nearly thirty years,
seem like a romance of adventure. The Fiftieth
Regiment was in the command of General Banks, par-
ticipated in the sieee of Port Hudson and formed part
of the army, which, in conjunction with General
Grant at Vicksburg, opened the Mississippi. Vicks-
burg surrendered on the 4th of July, 1863, and Port
Hudson a few days later. Although Company C en-
listed for nine months, they were in the service nearly
a year, arriving home in August, their return being
like a triumphal progress from Cairo through the
West, upon whom were showered the hospitality of an
enthusiastic and generous people all along the route.
About the same time that Company C, of the Fif-
STONEHAM.
493
tieth, was being organized, forty-two Stoneham men
joined the Thirty-third Massachusetts Regiment, Ck>\.
Maggi. The officers were, Captain Jan'es F. Rowe,
Captain Hiram P. Marslon, Lieut. Archeleus Welch,
I>ieut. Sidney L. Colley und Lieut. Charles H. Barry.
These men experienced much hard fighting. After
being engaged in the battle of Gettysburg they were
ordered to the Southwest, participated in the battle
of Lookout Mountain and joined the army of Gen.
Sherman in his march to the sea. In 1864 Captain
Francis M. Sweetser raised a company for 100 days,
represented by sixty -six Stoneham men. They per-
formed garrison duty most of the time in and about
Baltimore. Marshall P. Sweetser was first lieutenant
and Mo5es Downs, Jr., second lieutenant. In Feb-
ruary of the same year twenty-nine other sons of
Stoneham joined Col. Gould's Fifty-ninth Regiment,
passed through the terrible campaign of the Wilder-
ness and the closing year of the Rebellion. There also
appear 189 Stoneham names upon the muster-rolls
of the various regiments, battalions and ba'teries of
the State in addition to those already mentioned.
Between 400 and 500 soldiers from the town served
during the war, although she was credited with more
than 500, from the fact that several of them enlisted
more than once. Some idea may be formed of the
alacrity with which men enlisted when it is remem-
bered in the latter part of 1862 Stoneham had al-
ready furnished 269 men, about sixty more than were
required of her at that time. The following list of
those who were killed and died in the service, while
not, perhaps, complete, is believed to be substantially
correct :
KiUeJ. •
■William H. Kichardson, 6th Mass. Regt., Co. F (throe montbe), acci-
dentally shot ; died .liily 7, 18111,
George O. Berrv aud JohD E. Le Qair, 13th Begt., Co. G, Antietam,
Septcuiber IT, 1802.
Joseph H. Wheeler, Ist Regt. HeaTj- Artillerj', Petersbnrg, Va., June
18, ISM.
Cliarles H. Carr. 22d Regt., Co. E, Gaines' Mill. Jane 27, 1862.
Philip 0. Buxton, 33d Regt., Co. D, Lookout Mountain, Tenn , Octo-
ber 29, 18G3.
Wm. Jlahan, 33d Regt.. Co. D, Gettysburg, July 2, 18C3.
John Nolan, 33d Regt., Co. D, Diilton, Ga.. May 25, 18M.
Leonard S, Whittier, 60th Regt., Co. A, Spottsylvania Court-IIouse,
May 12. 18G4.
Jeremiah Murphy, 09th Regt., Co. E, Spottsylvania Court-Houae, May
12, 1804.
Died in the Service.
William B. Smith, 8tb Light Battery, September 11, 1862.
John L. Hovey, 3d Regt., Heavy Artillery, June 11, 1865.
Henry Burt, 2d Regt., Mass Cavalry, June 3, 1860.
William H. Heath, aurgeou 2d InJantry ; died at Chattanooga Augnst
23, 18r4.
Charles A. Whittier, 1.3th Regt., Co. G, wonnded at Antietam ; died
at Chambersbnrg, Pa., September 27, 1862.
Otis W. Pinkham. 33d Regt., Co. D, Brook Station, Va., May 16, 1863.
Nathan Starbird, 33d RegL, Co. D, Washington, D. C , January 12,
1803.
Walter B. G. Gray, S-ld Regt., Co. D, at Stoneham, August 23, 18G4.
Aaron A. Green, 3:id Kegt., C<j. D, at Ilevcrly Ford, Vu , June I'.. It03.
Joseph Le Clair, 3:id Re-t.fo. 1>, Ri-sacii, (ia., Ma.v 1."., ISGI.
Warren V. B. Tibbelts, 33d Regt., Co. D, Fairfax Court-House, March
15, ISKt.
Oliver Wheeler, Jr., 33d Regt., Co. D, A'eiandria, Va , Nov. 10, 1802.
Hiram George, 69th Regt, Co. F, Danville, Va., Auguit 20, 1864.
Peter McClusky, 69lh Regt., Co. G, Alexandria, Vu , October 10, 1864.
John O'Brien, 6'Jtli Regt, Co. G, steamer " B«ltlc," October 16,1864.
Charles Peterson, 69th Regt,, Co. G, UeadvlUe, Maas., Oct. 2.1, IBM.
Clement Pocket, 69th Regt , Co G, City Point, Vu., August 21, 1864.
Samuel I. Dodge, let Co. Sbarpahooters, Oct. 19, 1802,
Isaac B. Condrey, 2d Co. Sharpshooters, Torktown, V»., April 30,
1862,
George W. Yoong, 2d Co. Bharpehooten, Tork, Pa,, October 8, 1802.
When men sacrificed their all in sacrificing their
lives, it setms almost invidious to select a few for
words of eulogy, unless they occupied exceptional
positions ; but there were some cases that 8°emed pe-
culiarly distressing. Those who knew Willie Rich-
ardson, a bright, active, joyous boy, full of life and
spirits, the pet of his family and friends, who was the
first victim shot by the accidental discharge of a re-
volver, will remember what a Bh.d shock was felt by
the entire community when the report came of his
wound and his death, and with what regret and tears
he was followed to the grave. And then the Whittier
brothers,— Charles dying from wounds received at
Antietam in 1862, and Leonard, killed atSpott^ylva-
nia Court-House almost two years later, — lurnish an
illustraiion of what grievous sorrow the war imposed
upon some households. Both of them upright, prom-
ising young men, the two oldest sons, who made a
record which deserves to be gratefully cherished by
their townsmen for all time to come, as they shall
read of the part taken by their town in the great
events from 1801 to 1865.' The illustrious names of
great leaders live on the pages of history, but pat-
riotism and heroism no less worthy of remembrance
filled the ranks of the army. Dr. Heath, who was
surgeon of the Second Massachusetts Infantry, and
who died at Chattanooga, deserves a lasting memory.
Born in Sandwich, New Hampshire, he had been lo-
cated in Stoneham for several years, was the first
treasurer of the Stoneham Five Cent Savings Bank,
had been actively interested as a member of the
School Committee in the public schools, and was a
most useful and public-spirited citizen. Those who
knew him and recall his kindly smile and genial
courtesy must always regret that so promising a life
should have been cut off in early manhood. Return-
ing to 1860 and 1861, two important events occurred
which materially affected the development of the
town.
Prior to the construction of the Boston and Lowell
and Boston and Maine Railroads, the public means of
communication with Boston had been by stage-coach
over the Medford and Andover Turnpike. After the
completion of the Boston and Maine Road, which
passed through what was then the extreme eastern
section of the town, Mr. Padilla Beard connected
by coaches with the road at the station, now known
as Melro=e Highlands, which was the usual way of go-
ing to the city, till the Stoneham Street Railroad was
built in 1860, it being opened in the fall of that year.
The Stoneham Branch Railroad, connecting with the
494
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, .MASSACHUSETTS.
Boston and Lowell at East Woburn (now Montvale),
was opened in 1861, as far as Farm Hill and completed
to Franklin Street, the present terminus of the road
two years later.
During the war the vast consumption of the Gov-
ernment had stimulated great activity in manufactur-
ing, and the impetus carried along a seemingly pros-
perous business in almost all industries till 1871 and
'72, when the evil effects of a depreciated currency
were experienced and a reaction set in. These were
very successful years in the material development of
Stoneham. For a time the ratio of increase in popu-
lation was greater than that of any other city or town
in the county except Cambridge and Somerville.
The men returned home from the war, the factories
were filled, business increased, and it was an era of
unabated prosperity. The principal industries were
the manufacture of shoes and the tanning of hides
and currying of leather. The old-time manufactur-
ers, the fathers of the shoe business, such as George
W. Dike & Co., Allen Rowe & Co., Warren .Sweetser,
Alpha Richard.son, Darius Stevens and Ira Gerry,
had most of them either retired from business, or
ceased to occupy the foremost rank. The old methods
were passing away, and with them the old concern'.
From ISe.") to 1870 about the only leading establish-
ments with an existence of twenty years behind them
were John Hill & Co. and William Tidd & Co, It is
not designed to give any detailed account of the shoe
bu^ine-s or of the manufacturers engaged in it; es-
pecially there will be no allusion to living men.
As a general rule, the faults aud virtues of the dead
can only be cast up and a correct balance struck, but
no complete history of the town during the last fifty
years could be written without some refereuce to the
men who were active in it, for it was their lives which
largely traced the course of local events. In all
frankness lei it be said we were not a people gener-
ally of considerable education, or of high intellectual
and social culture, nor were there many citizens of
large means. There was an absence of what are fre-
quently termed " old families," which gave character
to many of the most respectable New England towns.
On the other hand there was general thrift and pros-
perity, and that ceaseless, active energy which in the
history of communities so often precedes gentle man-
ners and refinements of life.
We were a typical New England manufacturing
town, just emerging from the country life of our
grandfathers, commencing in a small way, and laying
the foundations for a larger future. One of the patri-
archs of the shoe business was Alpha Richardson,
commonly known as the Commodore, who originally
located at the north end of the town, in the Wiley
house, at the intersection of Maine, Central and Wil-
liams Streets. Here he kept a grocery and variety
store in the first story, and had a hall in the second
story, which was the scene of old-time dances and
social festivities. Had there been a chronicler in
those days to have preserved the reminiscences and
stories, told by the neighbors collected about the
stove in Mr. Richardson's store, he would have left a
most interesting picture of the time's. We can readily
imagine the old residents coming in on a winter'.s
evening, drawing about the fire and indulging in a
vein of jovial w!t stimulated by occasional potations
of East India rum. It is almost impossible to realize
that this was about the business centre of the town
at one time. Opposite the store lived Dr. Stevens.
On the corner where W. B. Stevens now resides was
the blacksmith-shop. Near by lived Aaron and
Squire Peter Hay. At the corner of Central and Elm
Streets was the Burn ham Tavern, and not far away
the Parsonage.
Speaking of the Burnham, formerly the Hay Tav-
ern, it was a hostelry, patronized very largely by
drovers and teamsters before the days of railroads,
for there was a large amount of travel from New
Hamp-hire and the North over the turnpike to Bos-
ton, which found this a convenient stopping-place.
The yard in front of the great barns is .said at times
to have been white with the canv;is tops of wagons.
Severer notions prevailed in tlie church then than
now, in reference to dancing and other social amuse-
ments, which, at the present time, are regarded as
quite innocent. Mr. Richardson was a member of the
church, and was taken to task for the use to which
his hall was appropriated, as appears by the following
transcript from the church record:
" Bretlireu : Having li;ij it reported witlt appnrent truth that Brother
.Xlphii Kichiinlson hii.^ encoiiiiigeij vuin aitinseinentt,, and feelliif; .'-iicli
cuiniiict to he 11 c;uise of prief to myself jis well us to other'', I vi.-itetl liim
tile l."»lli iliiy of February to he iissured of facts, mdcI to epeak to hini in
n Cliriatian iimliiier «b ilisclosurea nii^lil jiisrlify me. Not liavini; oli-
iaincd satisfaction hy teeing him alone. I took with me Brother I'eter
j Green ami vi&ited him afrain on the '.Mth day of June, and hy converra-
I tion obtained as little satisfaction as at any previons interview, llaving
I tbna taken snbstiinlially the step laid down in the Gospel, to deal with an
I ofTendilig brother withont gaining him, I now, as a brother olTelided,
' tell it to the clinrch for tliem to examine and jndge abont as God may
! direct them. First, it is ascertained that Bro. Richardsdi has enconn
I aged vain nmnsenients by providing a room for a dancing partv. Sec-
I ondly, lie jiiHlihes himself in doing it and for reasons which are entirely
I different from those which ought to intlnence Christians.
I (signed) " J.idez Ltnde.
I "Stonehnm, July yo 6th, 1S30."
" On the foregoing communication the church voted
to send a citation to Bro. Alpha Richardson for him
to appear before the church at their adjourned meet-
ing and exonerate himself from the charges brought
against him." A report is made that " Bro. Alpha
Richardson says he bus not any thing to do with the
church nor the church with him respecting his con-
ducting his business." On July 20th "Bro. Alpha
Richardson came before the church and appeared to
justify himself in opening his house for balls and
dancing parties." Manifesting no repentance, his
connection with the church was severed, though he
continued ever afterwards to remain a member of the
parish and support the society. Mr. Richardson
afterwards removed his business to the building oa
STONEHAM.
495
Main Street, now occupied hy Patrick Cogan & Son,
where he kept a store and manufactured shoes, resid-
ing ju-t north of the factory till his death, which oc-
curred in 1868. He was a man of kind feelings and
genial disposition, and for many years was an active
and enterprising citizen. At the other end of Main
Street, at the corner of Marble, was Allen Rowe, who
for many years manufactured shoes in a part of his
house, and subsequently, with his son Allen, Jr., built
quite a larje factory and store on the spot where Hon.
Onslow Giimore now resides. During middle life he
was a thrifty and prosperous manufacturer and mer-
chant, though he took no very active part in public
affairs. Filty or sixty years ago one of the leading
citizens and principal business men was Darius
Stevens, who was repeatedly entrusted with almost
every office within the gift of the town, serving con-
tinually on important committees and exercising a
very great influence in the management of public
affairs. Like many of his contemporaries, he both
manufactured shoes and kept a store. After his death
a i^hort obituary of him appeared in one of the local
papers, and it was so just and discriminating in repre-
senting his character that perhaps no better account
can be given of him.
" Another old resident of the town, Mr. Darius
Stevens, passed away at the ripe old age of eighty-
six, yesterday morning, after a life of great useful-
ness. The second son of Eev. John H. Stevens, he
was reared in the stern virtues of early Kew England
industry, economy and strict honesty. Later in life,
when a prominent manufacturer, which he continued
to be for a generation, these virtues stood him in good
stead, winning the re^'pect and confidence of all with
whom he came in contact. His fellow-townsmen
honored him with the important offices of selectman,
collector and representative to the State Legislature,
which duties he discharged with uniform care and
fidelity. Mr. Stevens look a deep pride in the wel-
fare of his native place, and was active in promoting
any needed improvement or reform. He lived to see
the town grow from a small village of five hundred
inliabitanti" to its present size, a growth which he
largely aided, by erecting a number of stores, dwell-
ing-houses, etc. Even to thelast was his strong men-
tal power and keen reasoning manifest. A close
reader of the leading daily and weekly journals, all
the doings of the nation and the State were thoroughly
familiar to him, and his upright views concerning
men and their duties refreshing in these days of cor-
ruption and deceit. Not only was he successful in his
public character, but unusually happy in his domes-
tic relations; strongly interested in the Orthodox
church where his family worshipped, his liberality and
earnest efforts proved greatly instrumental in com-
pleting the present edifice. Kind and genial, firm in
his convictions, yet with a broad charity for the faults
of every one, Mr. Stevens gained the esteem of all.
For over three-score years he and his aged wife have
enjoyed a life of quiet content, seeing their children
and grandchildren grow up around them. Thus full
of years and good report, he has closed a well-spent
life and entered into his rest, leaving a wide circle of
descendants to revere his memory." (1878.)
Looking back thirty-five or forty years, one of the
most familiar figures on our streets was Warren
Sweetser. He, with four of his brothers, had come
from South Reading when young men and settled in
Stoneham, where they all passed their lives, and be-
came respected citizens. Mr. Sweetser's factory occu-
pied the present site of Chase's Block. Those who
remember him in his prime, and in town-meeting
when answering an opponent, or debating a question,
will recall the cool, keen, sarcastic style which so
often characterized him and made him a dangerous
antagonist. He was born in the year 1799 and lived
till the age of ninety, retaining complete possession of
his faculties to extreme old age. Originally he took
a radical stand in opposition to the anti-slavery agi-
tation, but became an early Republican and an ardent
supporter of Fremont in 1856. A msn of well-
poised mihd and good judgment, though of strong
prejudices, possessing the old-fashioned New England
integrity, during the years of his prosperity he earned
for himself the respect of his townsmen, which fol-
lowed him to the close of life. For many years no two
families exercised so wide a local influence as the
Hills and the Dikes. Each family, consisting of rev-
eral brothers who ordinarily stood by each other, was
a power in itself; and then each family, in certain
ways, seemed to be at times at the head of rival fac-
tions. The Hills were generally Whigs and the Dikes
generally Democrats. When a Democratic adminis-
tration was in power, George W. Dike was its local
representative and postmaster, and when a Whig ad-
ministration came in, the same position was occupied by
John Hill. They largely represented the vigor and
strength of the town, and were living illustrations of one
of the advantages of large families. Hon. George W.
Dike, son of Je'se Dike, was descended from Samuel
Holden, an early settler, and was born April 14, 1807.
With si ightopponunities in his boy hood, he commenced
life in a small way, beginning to manufacture shoes at
the age of nineteen, walking to Boston, carrying his
goods on his back, and returning with stock in the
same way. Gradually increasing his business, after
some years he bought out the store of Ira Gerry and
formed a co-partnership with John Howard, which
continued to the death of Mr. Howard, after which he
carried on the business of manufacturing shoes and
keeping a country store till 18-18, when he formed a
co-partnership with his brother, Lyman Dike, under
the firm-name of Lyman Dike & Company, the two
brothers remaining together till 1855, when they dis-
solved. During these years they did a very large bus-
iness manufacturing goods mostly for the Southern
and Western trade. They built and occupied the shop
that was afterwards owned by H. H. Mawhinney &
496
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Company, on Central Square, at the time it was built,
the finest and most complete factory in town. Alter
the dissolution of Lyman Dike & Company he asso-
ciated with himself two of his sons and two of his
sons-in-law, and till 1861 carried on business under the
style George W. Dike & Sons. Mr. Dike from the
time he became a voter took a great interest in public
affairs, local, state and national. He was elected by
his fellow-citizens selectman, assessor, overseer of
the poor, highvfay surveyor, town treasurer, trustee
of Public Library, of Lindenwood Cemetery, auditor,
etc. He was greatly interested in the public schools,
having served on the school committee twenty-eighj
years, and was largely instrumental in changing the
schools from mixed to graded ones. He was a mem-
ber of Governor Boutwell's council in 1851, and atone
time the democratic candidate for congress. He was
the leading democra*;, and always remained true to
his political faith, although he furnished two sons in
the late war, one of whom was Captain John H.
Dike. After a long life, having enjoyed the pros-
perity of success and suffered the disappointment of
reverses he died July 4, 1883, at the age of seventy-
six. A generation has now passed away since the
death of John Hill, but his name is still respected as
one of the best citizens who ever lived in Stoneham.
He is usually spoken of as old John Hill, to dis-
tinguish him from his son, John Hill, Jr. Mr. Hill
was born in Reading in 1794, the son of James Hill
and Mary Holden. Although not born in Stoneham,
his ancestors on both sides were old Stoneham stock,
his paternal ancestors having lived in the north part
of the town. He was descended on his father's side
from that James Hill who lived 150 years ago on one
of the Charleatown farms. John came here with his
father when a small child, and lived during his youth
at the old homestead on Marble Street which his
father built, where the Hill family were reared. The
house is the one owned and occupied by the late Lot
Sweetser. On arriving at manhood Mr. Hill settled
in the south part of the town and built the house op-
posite the end of Wilson's Lane, the one owned by
the late Jesse Green. Here he commenced business
in an humble way. It is said of him when he went to
Boston to sell his shoes and buy his stock that he used
to hire John Bucknam'd horse, leave it at Charlestown,
and, to save expense, shoulder his goods and take them
on his back over the ferry to the city. Some years
later he moved to what is now Central Square and
bought of Reuben Geary the building that afterwards
was enlarged into the Central House. At that time
Mr. Geary kept a store there. The frame of the struc-
ture had originally been gotten out by Captain David
Geary, the father of Reuben, who intended to use it
for a tavern, and this was the use to which Mr. Hill
subsequently put it, opening there a public-house on
December 31, 1829. He kept it for a few years and
then sold out to Benjamin Goldsmith, erecwng a short
time afterwards the house where he subsequently lived
and died. At first a part of his house was used for
business purposes where the stock was cut up, but in
1840 the building waj erected on the corner of Main
and Franklin Streets which, with the additions after-
wards made to it, became the extensive factory of John
Hill & Co. In 1832 he formed a co-paitnership with
his brother Luther, and in 1844 they took into the
firm John Hill, Jr. Mr. Hill had also quite large in-
terests for several years in pork-packing at Meredocia,
Illinois. Some years prior to his death he retired
from active businers and passed the remainder of his
life in the care of his property and the enjoyment of
his family and friends. Although he himself retired
from business, the old firm-name survived under the
management of his son and brother, and for many
years during and subsequent to the war the new fac-
tory of John Hill & Co. was the principal establish-
ment of the town. While Mr. Hill did not seek or
fill public otfice so often as many others, still he was
one of the leading men of his time and perhaps the
most prominent leader in the Whig party. Univer-
sally loved and respected, he died in 1858 in his sixty-
fourth year. Those who remember him recall a dig-
nified, courteous, old-school gentleman, just such as
leavei on boys an impression of good manners and a
kind heart. Of the manufacturers before the war
but few survive.
Perhaps George Cow^drey should be an exception
to the rule laid down, that no account shall be given
of living men, merely for the purpose of preserving a
single fact. Mr. Cowdrey h«s represented Stoneham
in the General Court eight times and was a member
of the Houseof Representatives when Charles Sumner
was first elected toj:he United States Senate. It will
be remembered Mr. Sumner was supported by a com-
bination of the democrats and free-soilers. Upon
Mr. Cowdrey, who was a democrat, fell the task of
leading the fuaionists, which he did with marked abil-
ity and secured the victory, so to him and his town is
due the credit of having elected the great champion
of human freedom.
The oldest coucern now in existence in Stoneham,
which for fifty years has been intimately associated
with the industries of the town, is the tannery and
currying shop of William Tidd & Co. This estab-
lishment, with its well-arranged and extensive plant,
employs from 125 to 150 men, and has a capacity of
tanning 800 and of currying 4000 sides of leather per
week. The manufacturing interests of Stoneham at
the present time are chiefly represented by twenty-one
concerns engaged in the manufacture of boots and
shoes, three in the manufacture of shoe stock, two in
leather, one in lasts, two in boxes and one in the
manufacture of drugs and medicines, and these estab-
lishments turn out goods to the amount of from
$3,000,000 to $5,000,000 per annum, employing from
1200 to 1500 hands, with an invested capital of be-
tween $1,000,000 and $2,000,000.
The Stoneham Five Cent Savings Bank, with a de-
STONEHAM.
• 497
posit of between $500,000 and $600,000, is the oldest
financial institution. It was established in 1855,
with Dr. Wm. H. Heath its first treasurer. Dr.
Heath was followed by Ira Gerry, the treasurer from
1862 to 1873. Mr. Gerry was a very able and conser-
vative financier, and laid the foundation of a strong
institution which has always enjoyed the absolute
confidence of the entire community. In 1873 Mr.
Gerry was succeeded by Hon. Onslow Gilmore, who
from that time has been so completely identified with
the bank that one seems almost the complement of
the other. The Stoneham Co-Operative Bank, estab-
lished in 1887, has also met with very substantial suc-
cess. The Stoneham National Bank, with a capital of
$50,000, and under the presidency of Charles W.
Tidd, was opened in March, 1890, and thus far has
met with success. The present population of Stone-
ham is a little upwards of 6000.
It is one of the healthiest towns of the State, with
a perfect natural drainage and high elevation, is
lighted by electricity and gas, supplied with water
from Crystal Lake ; directly connected with Boston
by way of the Stoneham Branch and Boston & Low-
ell Ruilroad, now leased by the Boston & Maine Rail-
road, and connects with the last road at Melrose
Highlands by means of the East Middlesex Horse
Railroad. The natural advantages in building loca-
tions is surpassed by no town in the neighborhood
and by few in the county. An effort is being made
to shorten the distance to Boston by extending the
Stoneham Branch to the Fells Station on the Boston
& Maine. If the project succeeds, the distance-to
Boston will be nine miles, and it is believed almost
every inducement will exist to attract a large siAurb-
an population. The finest section of Middlesex Felh,
embraciug Bear Hill and Spot Pond, is contained
within the limits of the town. The picturesque
beauties of this sheet of water are not surpassed and
hardly equaled by any in Eastern Massachusetts.
Those who cherish and love the old town, remember-
ing its humble origin amid the rocks and forests of
Charlestown End and recalling the little settlement
planted far away from the mother town, look forward
with confidence to a prosperous future.
Seiectmes.— 172C-27, Captain Benjamin Gear\', Captain John Vin-
ton, Mr. Peter Hay, Sir, Timothy Baldwin, Lieut, Tiniotby Wright ;
1728, John Gould, Daniel Green, Ensign Daniel Gould, Jonathan Green,
Daniel Gould, Jr.; 172rt, Dan'l Gr«en, John Gould, Sr.. Lieut. Dan'l
Gould, Euaipu Jonathan Green, Dan'l Gould, Jr.; 1730, Daniel Green,
John Gould, Sr., Dan'l Gould, Sr, Jonathan Green, Dan'l Gould, Jr.;
1731. Daniel Green, Capt. John Vinton, Lient. Daniel Gould, Daniel
Gould, Jr., Ensign Jonathan Green ; 1732, Capt. John Vinton, John
Gould, Sr, Deacon Dan'l Gould, Dan'l Gould, Jr., Peter Hay, Jr.; 1733,
Deacon Dan'l Green, Dan'l Gould, Jr., Ensign Jonathan Green, Peter
Hay, Jr., Timothy Baldwin, Jr; 1734, Capt. John Vinton, Deacon Dan'l
Gould, Dan'l Gould, Jr., Deacon Dan'l Green, Peter Hay, Jr.; 1735,
John Vinton, E<q., Deacon Dan'l Green, Dan'l Gould, Jr., John Green,
Peter Hay, Jr.; 1736, Dan'l Gould, Jr , Dan'l Gould, Jon^ttban Green,
Peter Hay, Jr., Samuel Sprague ; 1737-38-39, Deacon Dan'l Gould, En-
6ign Jonathan Green, Dan'l Gould, Jr., Peter Hay, Jr., Sam'l Sprague ;
1740. Daniel Gould, Jr., Ensign Jonathan Green, Darid Gould, Edward
Bucknam, Thomas Cutler ; 1741, Deacon Dan'l Gould, Dan'l Gould, Jr.,
Ensign Jonathan Green, Edward Bucknam, Samuel Spmgne ; 1742,
Dan'l Gonld, Jr., Jonathan Green, Dan'l Gould, 8r., Tbomu Ctitler,
Timothy Wright ; 1743, Ensign Jonathan Green, Deacon Dan'l Gould,
Dan'l Gould, Jr., Thomas Cutler, Timothy Wright ; 1744, Enaign Jona-
than Green, Daniel Gould, Jr., Deacon Daniel ^onld, Samuel Sprague,
David Gould ; 174i, Dan'l Gonld, Jr., Thomas Cutler, Timothy Wright,
John Geary ; 1746, Capt. Peter Hay, Deacon Dan'l Green, D<iacon Dan'l
Gould, Thomas Cutler, Ensign Timothy Wright ; 1747, Capt. Peter Bay,
Ensign Timothy Wright, Lieut. Jos. Green, Sam'l Sprague, Ebeneur
Parker; 174«, Ensign Timothy Wright, Edward Bucknam, Ttaoniaa
Cutler, Capt. Peter Hay, Ephralm Brown ; 1749, Capt. Peter Hay, Deacon
Dan'l Gould, Elder Dan'l Green, Lient. Dan'l Gould, Deacon Joe. Green ;
1760, Capt. Peter Bay, Elder Samuel Sprague, Ensign Timothy Wright,
David Gonld, Joeiah Green ; 1751, Capt. Peter Hay, Enaign Timothy
I Wright, Josiah Qreen, James Hay, Ephraim Browo ; 176'2, Capt. Peter
liay. Ensign Timothy Wright, Josiah Green, James Hay, Jonathan
Green ; 1753, CapL Peter Hay, Joeiah Green, Jonathan Green, James
Hay, laaac Green; 17>4-55, Capt. Peter Hay, Deacon Dan'l Gould,
Ensign Timothy Wright, Deacon Joe. Green, Jonathan Green ; 1766,
Lieut. Dan'l Gould, Jr., Capt. PeUr Hay, John Geary, Joaiah Green,
Peter Hay, Jr.; 1767, CapL Peter Hay, Jonathan Lawrence, Enaign
Timothy Wright, Jonathan Green, Benben Richardson ; 1758. Jonathan
Green, Jas. Hay, Deacon Jos. Green, Isaac Green, CapL Peter Hay ;
1759, Ensign Timothy Wright, CapL Jonathan Given, Joeiah Green,
Lieut. Jas. Hay, Abraham Gould ; 1760, Ensign Timothy Wright, CapL
Jonathan Green, Edward Bucknam, Ensign Sam'l Spt^ne, LieuL Joe.
Bryant ; 17C1, Ensign Timothy Wright, CapL Jonathan Green, Lieut.
Jus. Brya:;t, Edward Bocknam, Jr., Ensign Sam'l Sprague ; 17G2, CapL
Peter Hay, Ensign Timothy Wright, Capt Jonathan Green, LieuL Joa.
Bryant, Jos. Knight ; 1763-64, Capt. Peter Hay, Ensign Timothy
Wright, Capt. Jonathan Green, Lieut. Jas. Hay, Joeiah Green ; 17ti5-.66,
CapL Peter Hay, Ensign Timothy Wright, CapL Jonathan Green, Ideal.
Samuel Sprague, Lieut. Jas. Hay ; 1767, Capt. Peter Hay, Ensign Timo-
thy Wright, Timothy Taylor; 1768, Ensign Timothy Wright, CapL
Jonathan Green, Timothy Taylor, Lieut. Sam'l Sprsgne, Joe. Bryant,
Jr.; 1769, Ensign Timothy Wright, LieuL Sam'l Sprague, Dan'l Gould,
Jr., Dan'l Green, Edward Bucknam, Jr.; 1770, Capt. Peter Hay, Ensign
Timothy Wright, LieuL Jas. Hay, Peter Hay, Jr., Timothy Taylor;
1771, Timothy Taylor, CapL Sam'l Sprague, Edward Bucknam, Jr.,
Abraham Gould, Elisha Knigbt; 1772, Enaign Timothy Wright, CapL
Peter Hay, Joeiah Green, Beuben BicbarUson, Abraham Gould ; 1773,
Timothy Taylor, Ensign Joseph Bryant, Dan'l Gould, Jr., Dan'l Green,
John Bucknam ; 1774, Timothy Taylor, CapL Sam'l Sprugue, LieuL Jas.
Hay, Jas. Bill, LieuL John Geary ; 1775, Lieut. Joe. Bryant, Abraham
Gould, Jr., John Bucknam, Deacon Dan'l Green, Timothy Wright, Jr.;
1770, Sam'l Taylor, Capt. Sam'l Sprague, Timothy Wright, Jr., Daniel
Gould, Jr , Peter Hay, Jr.; 1777, Capt. Sam'l Sprague, Deacon Daniel
Green, Lieut. John Bucknam, Timothy Wright, Jr , Caleb Bichardson ;
1779, Capt. Samuel Sprague, Deacon Dan'l Green, LieuL John Geary,
Lieut. John Bucknam, Et>onezer Lawrence ; 1780, CapL Sam'l Sprague,
Timothy Wright. Jr., Oliver Bichardson, Peter Hay, Jr., David Hay ;
1781, CapL Sam'l Sprague, Deacon Edward Buckuam, Deacon Daniel
Green, CapL Joeiah Green, Lieut. John Holden ; 1762, Capt. Samuel
Sprague, Deacon Dan'l Green, Deacon Edw. Bucknam, Capt. Peter Hay,
Jr., Oliver Richardson ; 1783-&4, Elisha Knight, Ephraim Brown, Lieut.
Timothy Wright, David Hay, Elijah Rirhardson ; 1785, CapL Samuel
Sprugue, Deacon Edward Bucknam, Capt. Peter Hay, Jr.; 17S6, CapL
Samuel Sprague, Deacon Edward Bucknam, Capt. Joeiah Green, LieuL
Timothy Wright, Ephraim Brown ; 1787, Lieut. John Bucknam, Eph-
ralm Brown, Capt. Peter Hay, Jr., Capt. Joeiah Green, CapL Samuel
Sprague ; 1768-89, Capt. Jonathan Green, CapL Abraham Gould, CapL
Sam'l Sprague, Capt. David Hay, Thuddeus Richardaon ; 1790, Capt.
Jonathan Green, Capt. Peter Hay, Jr., Col. Jos. Bryant, LienL John
Bucknam. CapL David Geary ; 1791, Joe. Bryant, Esq., CapL Jonathan
Green, Capt. Joeiab Green, Capt. David Hay, CapL David Geary ; 1792,
Col. Jos. Bryant, Jas. Hill, Capt. Peter, Hay, Ephraim Browo, Caleb
Bichardson ; 1793, Jos. Bryant, Esq., CapL Peter Hay, Ephraim Brown,
Capt. David Hay, Thaddeus Richardaon ; 1794, CapL Jonattun Qreen,
Capt. PeUr Hay, Capt. David Geary, LienL John Geary, Jas. Hill, Jr.;
1795, Captain Jonathan Green, Captain Peter Hay, Olivar Richardaon,
CapL Daviil Hay, CapL David Geary ; 1796, Ephmim Brown, CapL Peter
Hay, Jus.HIU, Cspt. Dan'l Green, Ephraim Pierce ; 1797, Jaa. Hill, CapL
David Geary, Jas. lliil, Jr., Ensign ThomusGreen, Dan'lGonld, Jr.; 1798,
Jas. HitI, Lieut. John Bucknam, Dan'l Gould, Caleb Richart^n, Jr.,
Timothy Matthews, Jr. ; 1790, Jaa. Hill, Ezra Vintop, Timothy Mat-
thews. Jr , Caleb Richardson, Jr., Peter Hay (3d); 1800, Jas. Hill,
Timothy Matthews, Capt. David Geary, Peter Hay, Jr., CapL Dmn'l
Green , ISOI, Jas. Hill, Capt. Darid Geary, CapL Dan'l Sreen, David
498
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Getry, Jr., Fblneas Wiley ; 1802, Jaa. Hill, Deacon Jabez Lvnde, Capt.
Dan'l Green, Ezra Vinton, Lieut .lohn Bncknam, Jr. ; 1803, Jas. Hill,
Capt. Peter Hay, Enaigii Tboniaa Green, Ezra Vinton, Lient. John
Bncknam, Jr. ; 1804. 4aa. Hill, Dan'l Gould, Ezra Vinton, Lieut. John
Bncknam, Jr.. Peler Hoy, Jr. ; 1805, Capt. David Geary, Daniel Gould,
Lient. Jobn Bncknam, Jr., Capt. Dan'l Green, Capt. Caleb Ricbardaon,
Jr. ; 1606, Capt. Peter Bay, Dan'l Gould, Ezra Vinton, Jaa. Hill, Jr.,
Elijah BichardMn, Jr. ; 1807, Capt. Peler Hay, Dan'l Gould, Ezra Vin-
ton, OliTer Blcbardsoo, Jr., Benjamin Geary; 1808, Dan'l Gonld, Ezra
Vinton, Banjamin Geary, Oliver Bicbardaon, Jr., John Hay Wright ;
1809, Daniel Gonld, Ezra Vinton, Benjamin Gear?, Jobn H. Wright,
Lient. Eli Starr ; 1810, Enaign Thoa. Green, Entign Peler Hay, Oliver
Bichardeon, Jr., John Buy Wright, Lient. Abraham Hart; 1811, Dan'l
Gould, Eaq., Be njamin Geary, Capt. Dan'l Green, Lieut. Abraham
Hart, Epbralm Pierce; 1812-13, Dan'l Gould, Ecq., Peter Hay (2d),
Captain, Daniel Green, Epbralm Pierce, Peter Green ; 1814, Dan'l
Gould, Esq., Captain, Dan'l Gieen, Lientenant, Jobn H. Wright, Cup-
tain, Jonathan Hay, Enaign Wm. Ricbardaon, 1815, Captain, Daniel
Green, John H. Wright, Lieutenant, William Ricbardaon, Deacon
David Geary, Jn«. Steele ; 1816, 1817 and 1818, Jobn H. Wright, Dea-
con David Geary, Reuben Ricbardaon, John Howard, Jesse Green;
1819, Oapt. Daniel Green, Capt. Nathaniel Cowdrey, Thos. Gould, Jr.,
Peter Green, Dariua Stevens ; 1820, Capt. Daniel Green, Capt. John H.
Wright, Capt Bufua Richardson, Darius Stevens, Reuben Geary ; 1821,
Capt. John H. Wnght, Reuben Ricbardaon, Reuben Geary ; 1822, Reu-
ben Ricbardaon, Thos. Gould, Jr., Deacon David Geary ; 1823, Thomaa
Gould, Jr., Deacon David Gear^', Jobn Howard ; 1824, Peter Hay, Esq.,
John H. Wright, Deacon David Geary ; 1825, John H. Wright,
Deacon David Geary, Alpha Richardson; 1826, John H. Wnght,
Thomas Gould, Jr., Epbralm Pierce ; 1827, Thomaa Gonld, Jr.,
Epbraim Pierce, Reuben Richardson ; 1828, John H. Wright, Thos.
Gould, Jr., Epbraim Pierce ; 1829, John H. Wright, Epbraim Pierce,
Darius Stevens; 1830, 1831 and 1832, Peler Hay, Esq., Darius Stevens,
Capt. John H. Wright ; 1833, Tboa. Gould, Jr., Vincent Howe, Chaa. E.
Walker; 1834, Dariua Stevens, Reuben Richardson, Jr , Ira Gerry;
163."^, Peler Hay, Esq., Joa Buck. Ira Gerry ; 1836, Ira Gerry, Benj. F.
Blcbardsoo, John Wheeler; 1837, Benj. F. Richardson, Levi Smith,
Edw. Buckuam ; 1838, John H. Wright, Geo, W. Dike, Edw. Bncknam ;
1839, Ira Gerry, Amaaa Farrier, Jas. H. Gould ; 1840, Ira Gerry, Benj.
r. Bichardeon, Lot Sweetser ; 1841, Benj. F. Richardson, Luther Hill,
Marcua Wcod»ard; 1842 and 1843, Ira Gerrj-, Benj, F. Ricbardaon,
Luther Hill ; 1844, Warren Sweetaer, Luther Hill, Jos. Buck ; 1845, Ira
Gerry, B. F. Richardson, Marcus Woodward ; 1846, Beuj. F. Richard-
son, Ira Hay, Jaa. Pierce ; 1847, Ira Gerry. Jus. Pierce, Geo. Cowdrey ;
1648, Benj. F. Ricbardaon, Warren Sweetser, Francis Hay ; 1849.Dariu8
Stevens, Joseph Buck, Benj. F. Richardson (resigned during the year),
Amaaa Farrier; 1850, Araasa Farrier, John Hill, Jr., Geo. W. Dike ;
1851, Ira Gerry, Amaaa Farrier. Enoch Fuller ; 1852, Allen Rowc, Jr.,
Luther Hill, Ira Gerry ; 1853, Ira Gerry, Amasa Farrier, Lyman Dike ;
1854, Luther Hill, Snml. Cloon, Danl. L. Sprague ; 1855, J. C. Slayton,
J. W. Noble, Sanil. Pierce ; 1866, Amasa Farrier, Jeaae Curtis, Jos. B.
Eitlredge ; 1857, Amasa Farrier, Benj. F. Richardson, Jesae Curiis ;
1858, Ira Gerry, Benj. F. Bicbardson, Jesse Cnrtia, Lcander F. Lynde, J.
W. Trowbridge ; 1859, Thoe. J. Melbourne, Benj. F. Richardson, Geo.
W. Dike ; 1860, Benj. F. Ricbardaon, Franklin Harriman, Lorenzo D.
Hawkina; 1861, Jcoe Curtis, Franklin Harriman, Albert R. Green ;
1862, Benj. F. Ricbardaon, Jesae Curtis, Henry H. French ; 1863, John
Hill, L. F. Lynde, Onelow Gilmore ; 1864, John Hill, L. F. Lynde, M.
L. Morae, Geo. P. French, E. T. Whittier, Albert R. Green, Reuben
Bichardeon ; 1865, John Hill, L. F. Lynde, Onalow Gilmore ; 1866 and
1867, Onalow Gilmore, David B. Gerry, Benj. F. Richardson, Jr.; 1868,
Jesae Curtis, Benj. F. Richardson, Jr., Amoo Hill (2d); 1869, Amasa
Farrier, J. B. Weeka, Joe. \V. Osgood ; 1870, Amos Hill, J. W. Osgood,
Myron J. Ferren ; 1871, Amos Hill, Job. W. Osgood, Myron J. Ferrin :
1872, 18T3 and 1 874, Amos Hill, Myron J. Ferrin, J. B. Sanborn ; 1875,
Amos Hill, Benj. F. BIcbardaon, T. P. Smith : 1876, Jesse Curtia, Jos.
W. Osgood, Sumner Ricbardaon (2d); 1877, J. C. Chase, Sumner Richard-
Bon (2d), Geo. A. Cowdrey ; 1878, Jesse Curtis, Amos Hill, Sumner Bicb-
ardson (2d); 1879, Amoa Hill, Wm. F. Cowdrey, Jos. W.Osgood ; 1880,
Amoa Hill, Wm. F. Cowdrey, Sumner Richardson (2d); 1881 and 1882,
Amos Hill, Lyman Dike, Sumner Bicbardaon (2di ; 1883 and 1884, Amoa
Hill, Sumner Bicbardson (2d), Lewis Peny ; 1885, Lewis Perrj-, Sum-
ner Richardson Hi), Chaa. Buck ; 1886, Lewis Perry, Lynmn Dike. Jaa.
H. Murphy; 1887, Wm. H. Sprague, Jas. H. .Murphy, Leonard P. Ben-
ton ; 1888, Jas. E. Whitcher, Wm. D. Byron, Wm. H. Sprague ; 1889
and 1890, Wm. H. Sprague, Geo. F. Butterfleld, Walter S. Keene.
Town CuaKS.-From 1726 to 1747, inclusive, Dan'l Gould, Jr. ;
from 1748 to 1758, incluaive, Jonathan Green; 1759, Peter Hay, Jr.;
from 1760 to 1769, inclusive, Capt. Jonathan Green ; from 1770 to 1786,
inclusive, Edw. Buckuam ; 1787 and 1788, Captain Peter Hay, Jr. ; 1789
to 1791, inclusive, Capt. Jonathan Green ; 1792, Col. Jos. Bryant; 1793,
Joa Bryant, Esq. ; 1T94 and 1795, Capt. Jonathan Green ; 1797, Peter
Hay (2d) ; 1798 and 1799, Caleb Richardson, Jr. ; 1800, Peter Hay,
Jr. ; 1801 and 1802, David Gerry, Jr. ; 1803, Reuben Richardson ; 1804,
Peter Hay, Jr. ; 1805, Capt. Caleb Bicbardson, Jr. ; 1806, Elijah Bicb-
ardson, Jr. ; 1S07, Elijah Hosmer; 1808 to 1811, inclusive, Oliver Rich-
ardson, Jr. ; 1812 and 1813, Peter Bay (2d) ; 1814 to 1828, inclusive,
John H. Wright; 1829 to 1833, inclusive, Joseph Buck; 1834-36, War-
ren Sweetser ; 1837-39, Amasa Farrier; 1840 and 1841, Solon Dike ; 1842
and 1843, Alfred J. Bhoades ; 1844, Amassa Farrier ; 1845, Alonzo N.
Lynde ; 1846 and 1E47, Solon Dike ; 1848, ( yrus Bay ; 1H9 to 1852, in-
clusive, Silas Dean ; 1853, John Hill, Jr. ; li!54, Chas. Brown; 1855 and
18.56, S. N. Richardson ; 1857 to 1890, inclusive, Silas Dean.
KKPBEa£KTATIT£S TO THE GENERAL CouHT. — 1734, Capt. John Vin-
ton ; 1775, Lient. Joseph Bryant ; 1806, Dan'l Gould ; 1809, '10 and '12,
Rev. Jobn H. Stevena ; 1811 and 1830, Jabez Lynde ; 1810-17, '31, John
H. Wright: 1823-24, '3-2-33, Peter Hay ; 1825, Wm. Richardson ; 18'28-
29, Dariua Stevens; 18.34, Chaa. E. Walker; 1836, Ira Gerry; 1837,
Benj. F. Richardson; 1840, Wm. G. Fuller; 1841, Solon Dike; 1842,
Wm. Bryant:1843, Sam'l I.Bryant; 1844-50,'5I, '52, '83, '84, '85, '86,
Geo. Cowdrey ; 1846, J. Pierce ; 1854, A. V. Lynde ; 1855-59, J. Parker
Gould ; 1856, S. Tidd ; 1857, J Dike ; 1860, Lyman Dike ; 1861, W. H.
Pierce ; 1862, John H. Dike ; 1863-65, Leander F. Linde ; 1806, John
Kingnan ; 1867, John Botume, Jr. ; 1869, Sam'l aooni ; 1870, Sam'l 0.
Trull ; 1872-73, Amos Hill ; 1875, Jobn Best ; 1870-77, Onslow Gilmore ;
1878, Geo. A. Cowdrey; 1S79-80, John F. Berry; 1881, Chaa. L. Gill;
1882, Jobn W. Spencer; 1887-88, Jas. E. Whitcher ; 1889-90, Myron F.
Ferrin.
Se.\atoes.— 1852, Sam'l E. Sewell ; 1665-66, Jobn Bill ; 1883-85,
Onalow Gilmore.
Special Codntt Coumissio.ners. — 1838 to 1841, Darius Stevens ;
1841 to 1844, Geo. W. Dike ; 1890, about twenty years in all, Lyman
Dike.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
IRA GEREY.
Ira GeriT^, the youngest son of Captain David
and Sarah Richardson Gerry, was born in Slone-
ham June 29, 1806, and was a descendant in the
fifth generation from the original settler, Thomas
Gerry. Captain Gerry was a leading man and kept
a public-house on the corner of Central and Winter
Streets, the old farm comprising a large part of
what is now the most thickly-settled section of the
town. Losing his father when he was nine months
old, he had the good fortune to grow up under the
influence of a strong-minded and affectionate mother.
His early advantages were limited, and he obtained
only the meagre education afforded by the schools of
his native town, and yet in after-life he became a
man of large information, sound judgment, and pos-
sessed a well-trained mind. He had barely reached
the age of majority when, in company with his bro-
ther Arad. he opened a slore and commenced the
manufacture of children's shoes, remaining with him,
however, only a few years on account of his brother's
failing health ; after which he contiiiued for some
years alone, till 1844, when his own physical weak-
ness compelled him to close up his business and en-
gage in pursuits which required less confinement and
application. About this time " Square " Peter Hay,
as he was called, died. Mr. Hay for many years had
"ohcu VWu/,
%
-"\_,
l^^/^ ^Si-T-/ t ^-^ J /^ji^^^ ,i>-/
-<7
STONEHAM.
499
beeQ the priacipal conveyancer of the town, and
after his death Mr. Gerry took his place, and gradu-
ally absorbed almost all the business of this charac-
ter. The deeds and wills and contracts which he
wrote during the remainder of his life would have
afforded a lucrative office practice to a well-estab-
lished lawyer. In addition to his occupation of con-
veyancer and a considerable probate business, he
engaged in fire insurance, and became a sound and
prosperous financier. He was repeatedly called to
fill almost all offices within the gift of the town ; and
at the age of thirty was elected a Representative to
the General Court.
When the Stoneham Five Cent Savings Bank was
organized he became its first president, and. in 1862,
its treasurer, which office he beld for about eleven years,
and under his able and conservative management the
deposits increased from nine thousand to a quarter of
a million.
In financial matters and business affairs Mr. Gerry
was a man of rare judgment and sound sense. He
was a safe counsellor and trusty friend. But few
men in any community ever enjoyed a more univer-
sal confidence of his townsmen, which prompted them
to constantly seek his advice and entrust to him the
settlement of their estates. While not inclined to
large public benefactions, or to much display, he was
a man of scrupulous honesty and a lover of justice.
In politics he Avas a democrat, though a firm believer
in equal rights. In the bitter anti-slavery agitation
of 1837, notwithstanding his politics, he demanded
for all parties the right of free speech. He was a
large owner and dealer in real estate, inheriting from
his father land which afterwards became some of the
most valuable of the town. Like his brother. Col.
Elbridge Gerry, he was an ardent sportsman, and
from his gun and dog derived through life the greater
part of his recreation. Such was Mr. Gerry's public
character which he bore to his townsmen. Another
and a gentler side was that which characterized the
relations to his family. Marrying, at the age of
twenty-six, Paulina, the daughter of Robert Gerry,
he lived with her forty-four years, and at his death
left to her a memory made beautiful by the afl'eclion-
aie and indulgent devotion of a lifetime.
Thoroughly conscientious, he combined great natu-
ral courage with gentleness, and possessed feelings
sensitive as those of a woman. He was reared a Cjn-
gregationalist, but in mature life became liberal in
his views, tolerant of the opinions of others and prone
to examine all sides of a question impartially him-
self.
When first engaging in business, like most of their
contemporaric'', he and his brother kept a stock of
liquor among their goods; but becoming convinced of
the evils of intemperance, and the dangers attending
the sale of intoxicating liquors, they closed them out
and determined to have no further connection with
such traffic.
Mr. Gerry never had any children, and after a long
and distressing illness he died November 23, 1875, in
hie seventieth year, leaving behind him the reputa-
tion of an able, successful and upright man.
DE. WILLIAM F. STEVENS.
Dr. William F. Stevens, the son of Rev. John H.
Stevens, was born at the parsonage in Stoneham, Jan-
uary 17, 1807. He was the youngest son of twelve
children, which consisted of four boys and eight girls.
His early days were spent at home, and he obtained
the rudiments of an education in the public schools
of his native town. Losing his mother at the age of
ten, two years later he was placed by his father in
the dry-goods store of a Mr. Fosdick, in Charlestown,
where he remained two years. A delicate, sensitive
boy, with a constitution apparently fragile, he then
began the struggle of life from which there was no
cessation till its close. Thrown upon his own re-
sources at this tender age, he learned habits of indus-
try and close application. Remaining in Charlestown
about two years, when he was fifteen he went into
the drug-store of Dr. Plympton, at Old Cambr'dge, a
more congenial occupation, continuing there four
years, studying the nature of medicine during his
leisure time, and preparing himself for entering col-
lege. The condition of his health was such that he
gave up the idea of a college education at Harvard,
and in 1826 entered the Medical School connected
with Dartmouth College, spending his time, when not
at Hanover, as a student of Dr. Daniel Gould, who
then lived in Reading. Obtaining his medical di-
ploma, he commenced the practice of medicine in
Stoneham, before he had quite reached the age of
twenty-one, where he continued to reside, and for
over fifty years was the good and beloved physician.
Devotedly attached to his profession, it absorbed the
restless energy of body and mind for a lifetime. Law
is said to be a jealous mistress. This is equally true
of medicine, and she rarely bestows great success up-
on her disciples unless they serve her with absolute
devotion. A more faithful servant never pursued a
calling than Dr. Stevens. Of a reserved and retiring
disposition, he filled but few positions of public trust,
nor often did he take an active part in public affairs.
His profession demanded all his time and attention.
He never would consent to have his name used as a
candidate for offices of emolument ; and yet he was
greatly interested in public improvements, as ap-
peared when he became a director of the Stoneham
Branch Railroad, and by his influence and exertion
contributed so largely to its completion. After his
death, a brother physician spoke of him among other
things, as follows: "His was one of those rare natures
which enjoy work for the very love of it. He did not
seem to need a holiday, for every day with him was a
holy day consecrated to duty. He was one of the
most conscientious men I ever knew ; manifesting no
500
HISTORY OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
faToritism for either rich or poor, he did the very
best he could for all, with a devotion which never
swerved and a zeal which never tired. His skill in
diagnosis was extraordinary. Within the last six
months, three cases came to my knowledge, where
professional experts gave one opinion, and he gave a
different one, modestly, but clearly, and in all these
he proved ultimately to be correct. The solution of
one of them occurred on the very day of his death ;
the other two 1 was privileged to apprise him of. In
nothing was his true merit more marked than in the
genuine humility which adorned his character. Many
a time I have been astonished at the depth of this
trait ; for he was just as ready to follow the advice of
a young physician commencing practice, as that of
one of the magnates of our profession, if convinced
he was in the right. More than any man I ever knew,
he was guided by our fundamental principle of ethics
— the welfare of the patient. All else was thrown
aside, apparently without an effort — pecuniary inter-
est and reputation — and he was ready to brave oblo-
quy aod misconception, if the true welfare of the pa-
tient required the sacrifice. This was partly the se-
cret of the unbounded confidence reposed in him by
all who knew him well enough. He was so upright
that he almost leaned backward in all cases where
his own interests seemed to conflict with those of the
patient. I never met a mau possessed of more in-
domitable courage. Time without number, I have
known him go to see patients when any other man
would have been in bed, and some of them were not
half as sick as he himself was. As a man, his man-
ners were refined and courteous, more like a gentle-
man of the old school than we often meet with nowa-
days. Those who did not know him intimately sometimes
fell into the error of supposing him cold and distant, a
very great mistake. Under the outside crust ran a
vein of quiet humor, and warm human sympathy.
He was deeply affectionate. He loved little children
with an intensity which few were aware of, for he did
not like to make a parade of his feelings. As a citi-
zen Dr. Stevens was both public-spirited and liberal."
By nature he was a perfect gentleman, of absolute
integrity, a lover of justice and virtue, and possessed
a delicate refinement of feelings which prompted him
to treat others with consideration and respect. In
his character natural humility was combined with
great dignity. While his appearance was always
modest and unassuming, there was something about
bis bearing that would have repelled any offensive
familiarity. Pitying and sympathizing with the poor
and unfortunate, a large portion of his life was spent
in their service. But few men in his profession ever
exemplified more of the spirit of the Great Master.
He seemed to fill the place for which nature designed
him. People who came into his atmosphere instinc-
tively recognized theskillful physician, the wise coun-
selor and true friend. Beginning his life at a time
when there was no other physician in the town, his
practice gradually extended to the neighboring towns,
till it became as large and probably larger than that
of any othtr country doctor in Middlesex County.
He was a most indefatigable worker, and hardly knew
what rest was till the last years of his life, when his
constitution had become undermined and his body
enfeebled by the exhausting labors of half a century.
After an illness protracted through many mcnths, he
died on February 16, 1879, in the seventy-third year
of his age, leaving a memory cherished in many com-
munities and numerous households with mingled love
and respect. After his death the following poem was
written of him by Francis Durivage, of New York :
** No UDexpected nevs, and yet it fell
With mournful resonance — a funeral knell I
So good, so true, bo gentle nnd bo wise,
I cannot write of him with tenrlefs eyea.
Memory recalls his venerable form,
LeBB often seen in Bunshine than in storm,
Ab it appeared beneath the sky's black pall,
Through the w ild snow and the min'B drenching fall,
Hnstening responsive to our urgent cull.
Over my loved one's bed of pain to bend.
More than the man of skill — physician, friend I
AVell did he win a pure and spotless name,
"Who might have won — tut ho disdained it — FA3IE I
For he waa master of his sacred art,
In its full scope and its niinulest part.
But to Ambition's voice he would not yield,
The humble hero of Life's battle-field.
"What is fame worth to him who can secure
The blessings of the suffering and the poor?
What academic laurels have the power
To arch with rainbow hues the parting hour?
He chose the better part and sank to rest
Conscious of duty done and truly blest."
LUTHER HILL.
Luther Hill, son of James and Mary (Holden) Hill,
was born in Stoneham, Massachusetts, February 3,
1808. His ancestors were among the early settlers of
New England. Mr. Hill obtained his education in
the public schools of his native town and at the South
Rer.ding (now Wakefield) Academy, then in a flour-
ishing condition, with Professor Heath as principal.
After completing his studies there he taught school
for a short time in Stoneham and Danvers, Massachu-
setts, but early devoted his attention to business, com-
mencing the manufacture of shoes at eighteen years
of age, with a capital of twenty dollars. From this
small beginning his business grew to be one of the
largest in the State. In 1832 he formed a partner-
ship with his brother, under the firm-name of " John
Hill k Co.," John Hill, Jr., entering the firm in May,
1844. This firm was the first to employ power in the
manufacture of shoes, using horse-power, then steam,
for that purpose. Mr. Hill was also the first to apply
power to a labor-saving machine or tool in manufac-
turing shoes, being the inventor of a die for stamping
out lappets or tongues, a great improvement upon the
slow process of cutting them out with a knife. He
then made dies to stamp out vamps, quarters and
soles. In 1858 his firm erected a large factory, intro-
S?j^: ^- ¥-
^^
GROTON.
SOI
duciDg Bteam as a power. This application of steam-
power was the first of a series of wonderful changes in
the shoe industry. Mr. Hill's brain teemed with posi-
tive and original conceptions, the result of which was
the invention of many machines used in the manufac-
ture of shoes. Among them the first sole-cutter and
counter-skiver machine, upon both of which he ob-
tained patents. In 1857 Mr. Hill became interested
in, and put in practical operation, the first pegging-
machine used ill this country. In 18(52 he placed in
his factory the first heeling-machine ever used, devel-
oping it with improvements on which he obtained
several valuable patents, and he successfully operated
it until, with Gordan McKay and others, he formed a
stock company, known as the McKay Heeling-Ma-
chine Association. This machine, with additional
patents, is in general me to-day. Mr. Hill was the
first to apply the sewins-maihine to the fitting of
shoes, and later connected it with steam-power.
Many of the best and most complicated machines
used in the manufacture of shoes to-day have sprung
from these inventions of Mr. Hill.
He retired from the firm Nov. 10, 1866, after a suc-
cessful business careerof forty years, bearing with him
the love and esteem of all with whom he had been
associated. Throughout his entire life Mr. Hill had
the welfare and progress of his native town warmly at
heart, and was prominently identified with all meas-
ures for its advancement.
He was largely interested in real estate, helped to
introduce street lighting by gas, and with six others
planned and pushed to completion the Stoneham
Street Eailroad. His good judgment, progressive
views and dispassionate manner in debate gave him
influence as a citizen. His townsmen's appreciation
of these qualities was shown by his election to the
oflice of selectman, School Committee, overseer of the
poor and assessor. He discharged these duties with
the same fidelity, honesty and integrity that distin-
guished his conduct in every relation of life. Strong
in hie sense of justice and the principle of universal
right, be was a warm supporter of George Thompson
and William Lloyd Garrison, and was among the first
to join the anti-slavery movement in the days when to
avow and maintain iti principles meant almost social
ostracism. He was one of the founders of the Uni-
tarian Church in Stoneham, and showed the sincerity
of his religious faith by the purity of his daily life-
In June, 1840, Mr. Hill was married to Sarah Atwell
Stevens, of Stoneham, daughter of Darius Stevens,
and granddaughter of the Rev. John H. Stevens, who
officiated at the marriage ceremony. This marriage
was in all respects a most fortunate and happy one,
and in his home the utmost harmony and confidence
prevailed. Mr. Hill was a strong advocate of woman's
suffrage. His daughters shared equally with his sons
bis thoughts and wise counsels, and to all he gave the
same opportunities for education and usefulness. Mr.
Hill was a self-made man in every sense of the word ;
whatever he achieved in life was due to his own
efforts. While he was sincere and firm in his convic-
tions, his nature was kindly, his impulses generous,
and his judgment of others most charitable. He died
at his home in Stoneham, Oct. 31, 1877, leaving his
wife, four sons and four daughters.
CHAPTER XL.
GHOTOy.
BY HON. SAMUEL A. GREEN.
The town of Groton lies in the northwestf^rn part
of Middlesex County, Massachusetts, and is bonnded
on the north by Pepperell and Dunstable ; on the east
by Tyngsborough and Westford; on the south by Lit-
tleton and Aver; and on the west by Shirley and
Townsend. The First Parish meeting-house — or " the
tall-spired church" — is situated in latitude 42° 36'
21.4" north, longitude 71° 34' 4" west of Greenwich,
according to the latest observations of the United
States Coast Survey. It is distant nearly thirty -one
miles in a straight line from the State House at Bos-
ton, but by the traveled road it is about thirty-four
miles. The village of Groton is situated principally
on one long street, known as Main Street, a section
of the Great Road, which was formerly one of the
principal thoroughfares between Eastern Massachu-
setts and parts of New Hampshire and Vermont.
The Worcester, Nashua and Rochester Railroad passes
through it, and traverses the township at nearly its
greatest length, running six miles or more within its
limits. It is reached from Boston by trains on the
Fitchburg Railroad, connecting with the Worcester,
Nashua and Rochester road at Ayer, three miles dis-
tant from the village.
The original grant of the township was made in the
spring of 1655, and gave to the proprietors a tract of
land eight miles square; though subsequently this
was changed by the General Court, so that its shape
varied somewhat from the first plan. It comprised all
of what is now Groton and Ayer, nearly all of Pepperell
and Shirley, large parts of Dunstable and Littleton,
and smaller parts of Harvard and Westford, in Mas-
sachusetts, and small portions of HoUis and Nashua,
in New Hampshire. The present shape of the town
is very irregular, and all the original boundary lines
have been changed except where they touch Town-
send and Tyngsborough.
The earliest reference to the town on any map is
found in the Reverend William Hubbard's "Narra-
tive of the Troubles with the Indians in New-Eng-
land," a work published at Boston in the early spring
of 1677, and in London during tbe ensuing summer
under a different title. The map was the first one cut
in New England, and of course done in a crude man-
502
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ner. It was engraved probably by John Foster, the
earliest Boston printer. The towns assaulted by the
Indians in Philip's War are indicated on the map by
figures; and at that period these places were attract-
ing some attention both here and in tlie mother
country.
There were two petitions for the plantation of
Groton, of which one was headed by Mr. Deane
Winthrop, and the other by Lieutenant William
Martin. The first one is not known to be in exist-
ence, but a contemporaneous copy of the second is in
the possession of the New England Historic Genea-
logical Society. The signatures vary in the style of
handwriting, but they do not appear to be autographs,
and may have been written by the same person. The
answer to the petition is given on the third page of
the paper, and signed by Edward Rawson, secretary
of the Colony, which fact renders it probable that this
is the petition actually presented to the General Court
as the original one, after it had been copied by a
skillful penman. It was found many years ago among
the papers of Captain Samuel Shepley, by the late
Charles Woolley, then of Groton, but who subse-
quently lived at Waltham; and by him given to the
New England Historic Genealogical Society. The
petition is written on the first page of a folio sheet,
and the answer by the General Court appears on the
third page of the paper. Near the top of the sheet
are the marks of stitches, indicating that another
paper at one time had been fastened to it. Perhaps
the petition headed by Deane Winthrop was attached
when the secretary wrote the action of the General
Court, beginning, "In Ans' to both theise pelicons."
The grant of the plantation was made by the Court
of Assistants on May 25, 165.i — as appears by this
document — though subject to the consent of the
House of Deputies, which was given, in all proba-
bility, on the same day. In the absence of other evi-
dence, this may be considered the date of the incor-
poration, which is not found mentioned elsewhere.
In the early history of the Colony the proceedings
of the General Court, as a rule, were not dated day
by day — though there are many exceptions — but the
beginning of the session is always given, and occa-
sionally the days of the month are recorded. These
dates in the printed edition of the records are fre-
quently carried along without authority, sometimes
covering a period of several days or even a week ;
and for this reason it is often impossible to learn the
exact date of any particular legislation, when there
are no contemporaneous papers bearing on the subject.
The petition and endorsement are as follows :
" To the honored GeDemll Courte assembled at Boston the bumble pe-
tion of va wboee naaiea ar here voder written bumbly shoetb
"That where as youre petioners by a proaidence of ffod hauo beene
bronKbt oner into this wildernesand liued lor.ge herein: and being
eomthing straigbtued for that where by subsistance in an ordinarie
WRie of gods prouidence is lo be liad, and Conaiddering the a lowance
that god giues to the sunoa of men for euch an ende : youre petlouera
re<iue8t there fore is that you would be pleased to grant vs a place for a
I plantntioD vpnn the Riuer that runes from Xaehnn^ay in tDnieriDiake nt
: a place or a lionte a place Caled pctaupauketl and waubanecoDCctt and
I youre petioners shall pray for youre happy prosedings
*' WiLLI'M 5I\RTI»
Ririr van Bt.oon
.loHN Witt
WltLl'M LaKIIV
Richard Uauen
Timothy Cooper
John Lakin
John Bluod
MaTHU FARnlNGTOIf
Robert Blood
"In Ads' to both theise peticona The Court Judgcth it meete to
graunt the peticonefs eight miles square in the place desired lo make a
Comfortable plantn(;on wch henceforth shall be Called Croaten forme'ly
knowne by the name of Petapawage : that M' Damforlh of Cambridge
u'h auch aa he shall Aaossiate lo him shall and hereby is desired to lay
it out wi'h all Convenjent- speede that so no Incuuragement may be
wanting to the Peticone'a for a speedy procuring of a godly minister
amoncst lliem. Provided lliat none shall enj'iy any part or porf;an of
that laud by guift from the <»eleclmen of that place but such who sliall
build liowses on theire lolls so given them once w'bin eighteene months
from Ihe tjme uf the eayd Towncs laying out or Townes graunt lo such
penK»na: and for the p'f»ent ^U Deane Winthrop 31' Jn^ Tinker M'Tho ;
Hinckly Dolor liavis. W^. Martin Maihew fTurinpton John Wilt and
Timothy trouper are .\ppoinled the telectmen for the sa\d Towne of
Grujiten for <'ne two yeares from the tjme it ia layd out, to lay out
and dispose cf particular lolls not exceeding txveniy acres to each howse
lott, Alid 10 Order the prndeiitiatl aftiiira of the place at the end of which
tjme other selectmen hh.nll be chosen and Apjioinled in theire roomea :
the selectmen of Uroaton giving M' Danfonh such sattUifaclion for liia
service A: panics as lliey .s; he shall A^ree ;
" The magist* haue passed this w'.h reference to the Consent of Iheire
bretheren the depu<s hereto
'* Epward RawsoX, Secrety
'* 25 of May 1605.
"The Deputies Consent hereto
" William Torsev deric."
The entry made by Secretary Rawson in the Gen-
eral Court Records, at the time of the grant, is sub-
stantially the same as his indorsement on Martin's
petition, though it distinguishes between some of the
names signed to each petition. It is evident that the
one headed by Deane Winthrop was also signed by
John Tinker and Thomas Hinckley; and probably
by Dolor Davis, Richard Smith and Amos Richard-
son, as is inferred from a petition dated May IG,
16.56, and given later in this account of the town.
The Roman letters and Arabic figures within paren-
the>es refer to the volume and page of the General
Courc Records at the State-House. The entry is as
follows :
" In Ana' to the peticon of M' Deane Winthrop M' Jn° Tincker Mr
Tho: Hiiickly 4c i of Lieu Win Martin Timothy Cooper ic The Court
Judgeth it meete lo Graunt etc." (IV. 204).
Charles Hastings Gerrish, of Groton, has a contem-
poraneous copy of this record made by Secretary
Rawson, which was perhaps sent originally to the
selectmen of the town. It was found among the pa-
pers of the late Hon. John Boynton, at one time town
clerk.
The record of the House of Deputies is also prac-
tically the same, though there aj-e a few verbal vari-
ations. It begins :
"There beinge a pet. p'ferd by M' Dean Winthrop M' Tho: Hinck-
ley .t divers olhersfor a plantation vpon the riuer that Ruiia from N'ash-
away into Merimacke called petapawage & ao other from some of the
GROTON.
503
lobabitants of Coocord for a plantatioD in the same place to both which
the Coart returoed this answer that the Court Thiokee meet to graunt
etc," (ril. 4C2).
The following letter from the Hon. J. Hammond
Trumbull, whose authority in such matters is unques-
tioned, gives the meaning and derivation of the In-
dian name of the town :
•• Hartford, Dec. 22, 1877.
" My dear Da. Green, — Petaupcmket and Pttapawage are two forms
of the same name, the former having the locative poetpoeitinn (-«/},
meauiog *at ' or ' on ' a place ; and both are corruptions of one or the
other of two Indian names found at several localities in New England.
From which of the two yoar Groton name came I cannot decide without
some knowledge of the place itself. I leave yon the choice, confident
that one or the other is the true name.
" ^ Pootvppog^' used by Eliot for ' bay,' in Joshua xv. 2, 5, literally
means * spreading' or ^bulging water,' and was employed to designate
either a local widening of a river making still water, or an inlet from a
river expanding Into something like a pond or lake. Hence the name
of a part of (old) Saybrook, now Essex, Conn., which was variously writ-
ten Pautapaug, Poattapoge, Potabauge, and, later, Pellipaug, >&c., so des-
ig:nated from a spreading cove or inlet from Connecticut River. PoUO'
poug Pood, in Dana, Mass., with an outlet to. or rather an inlet from
Chicopee River, is probably a form of the same name. So is ' Port To-
bacco,' Charles County, Aid. (tbt* *Pot/}paco ' of John Smith's map), on
the Potomac.
"But there is another Algonkin name from which Petnupauk and
some simiUr forms maij have come, which denotes a swamp, bog, or
quagmire, — literally, a place into tchUk Uie foot »inict; represented by the
CUi'p'pevia.y petobea, a bog or soft marsh, and the Abnaki polepaug. There
is a Pautipattg [otberw^se Pootapaug, Portipaug, PMapogue, etc.) in the
town of Sprague, Conn., on or near the Shetucket River, which seems
to have this denvation.
"If there was in (ancient) Groton a pond or spreading cove, connected
with the Nashua, Squanoacook, Nissitisset, or other stream, or a pond-
like enlargement or ' bulge ' of a stream, this may, without much doubt,
be accepted as the origin of the name. If there is none such, the name
pr>jbably came from some ' watery swamp,' like those into which (aa the
• Wonder-working Providence' relates; the first explorers of Coocord
' Munke, into an uncertaine bottome in water, and waded up to their
knees.'
" Yours truly,
" J. Hammond Trumbull.''
The last suggestion, that the name came from an
Algonkin word signifying "swamp" or "bog," ap-
pears to be the correct one. There are many bog
meadows, of greater or less extent, in different parts
of the town. Two of the largest — one situated on
the easterly side of the village, and known as Half-
Moon Meadow, and the other on the westerly side,
and known as Broad Meadow, each containing per-
haps a hundred acres of land — are now in a state of
successful cultivation. Before they were drained and
improved they would have been best described as
swamps or bogs.
It is to be regretted that fio many of the Indian
words, which have a local significance and smack of
the region, should have been crowded out of the list
of geographical names in Massachusetts. However
much such words may have been twisted and distort-
ed by English pronunciation and misapplication,
they furnish now one of the few links that connect
the present period with prehistoric times in America.
*' Nashaway," mentioned in the petition, is the old
name of Lancaster, though spelled in different ways.
Mr. Trumbull has given some interesting facts in re-
gard to this Indian word, which I copy from a paper
by him in the second volume of the " CoUectionB of
the Connecticut Historical Society : "
" Nashaue (Cbip[pewa], iiusiiatoatt and tuJtawiwi), * mid-way,* OT
' between,' and with okkt or auk added, the * land between ' or *tfae
half-way place,' — was the name of aeveral localities. The tract on
which Lancaster, in Worcester county (Slaas.) was settled, was 'be-
tween' the bnnches of the river, and bo it was called ' A'oiTiuuxij/ '
or ' NoAhawake ' (maahaui-ohie) ; and this name was afterwards trans-
ferred from the territory to the river itself. There was another Naaha-
toay in Connecticut, between Quinehang and Five-Mile Rivers in
Windham county, and here, too, the mutilated name of the nashoMe-ohke
was transferred, as Athawog or A$tatrog, to the Five-Mile Blver. Nai-
chaug, in the eami^ county, the name of the eastern branch of Shetuck-
et river, belonged originally to the tract 'between' the eastern and
western branches; and the Shetucket itaelf borrows a name (luuhaue-'
tuk-td) from Its place * between ' Tanttc and Quinetung rivers
(page 33)."
The town is indebted for its name to Deane Win-
throp, a son of Governor John Winthrop and one of
the petitioners for the grant. He was born at Gro-
ton, in the county of Suffolk, England, on March 16,
1622-23; and the love of his native place prompted
him to perpetuate its name in New England. He
stands at the head of the first list of selectmen ap-
pointed by the General Court, and for a short time
was probably a resident of the town. At the age of
exactly eighty-one years he died, on March 16, 1703-04,
at PuUen Point, now within the limits of Winthrop,
Massachusetts.
The following letter, written by a distinguished
representative of the family, will be read with in-
terest :
••Boston, 27 February, 1878.
*' Mt deae De. Gheen, — It would give me real pleasure to aid you in
establishing the relations of Dean" Winthrop to the town of Gro-
ton in Massachusetts. But there are only three or four letters of
Deane't among the family papers in my posseaslin, and not one of
them is dated Groton. Nor can I find In any ol the family papers a
distinct reference to his residence there.
"There are, however, two brief notes of his, both dated 'the 16 of
December, 16G2,' which I cannot help thinking may have been writ-
ten at Groton. One of them is addressed to his brother John, the Qov-
enior of Connecticut, who was then in London, on business connected
with the Charter of Connecticut. In this note, Deane says as fol-
lows:
" * I have some thoughts of removing from the place that I now lire
in, into your Colony, If I could lit of a convenient place. The place
that I now live in is too little for me, my children now growing np."
"We know that Deane Winthrop was at the head of the first Board of
Selectmen at GrotoD a few years earlier, and that be went to reside of
Pullen Point, now called Winthrop, not many years after.
*- 1 am strongly inclined to think with yon that this note of December,
1662, was written at Groton.
' Tours very truly,
" RoBEET C. "WnrrHEOP.
' Samuel A. Gbees, M.D.'
A few years before the incorporation of the town,
Emanuel Downing, of Salem, who married Lucy, a
sister of Governor John Winthrop, had a very large
farm which he called Groton. It was situated in
what was afterward South Danvera, but now Peabody,
on the old road leading from Lynn to Ipswich, and
thus nafned, says Upham, in his "Salem Witchcraft,"
*' in dear remembrance of his wife's ancestral home in
* the old country'" (I. 43). Downing subsequently
sold it to his nephews, John Winthrop, Jr., and Adam
Winthrop, on July 23, 1644, when he speaka of it a«
504
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUxNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
" his farme of Groton." The sale is duly recorded in
the Suffolk Kegistry of Deeds (I. 57).
Groton in Conueclicut — younger than this town by
just half a century, and during the Revolution the
scene of the heroic Ledyard's death — was named in
the year 1705, during the Governorship of Fitz-John
Winthrop, out of respect to the Suffolk home of the
family.
New Hampshire has a Groton, in Grafton County,
which was called Cockermouth when first settled in
the year 1766. Subsequently, however, the name was
changed by an act of the Legislature, in accordance
with the unanimous wish of the inhabitants who ap-
proved it, on December 7, 1796. Some of its early
settlers were from HoUis, New Hampshire, and others
from this town.
Vermont, also, has a Groton, in Caledonia County,
which received its charter on October 20, 1789, though
it was settled a short time before. A history of the
town, written by General Albert Harleigh Hill, ap-
peared in Miss Abby Maria Hemenway's "Vermont
Historical Gazeteer" (IV. 1145-1168). Taken bodily
from this work, a pamphlet edition was also pub-
lished, with some slight variations, but with the same
paging. The author says :
'"It received tbe name of Groton through the influence of its earliest
settlers, who were born in Groton, Mass. These sterjinp old pittrlots
who, mid all the stiirlng activity ot those days, forgot nut The old
birthtowD, but hallowed its memory by giving its name to their new
settlement and town in the wilderness" (page 1143).
New York, too, has a town called Groton, situated
in Tompkins County ; and Professor Marvin Morse
Baldwin, in an historical sketch of the place, pub-
lished in the year 1858, gives the reason for so nam-
ing it. He says :
" At first, the part of Lonke thus set off wan called Division ; but tbe
next year [1818] it waa changed to Groton, on the petition uf the in-
habitants of the town, some of whom had moved from Groton, 3Iass.,
and some from Groton, Ct., though a few desired the name of York"
(page 8).
There is also a Groton in Erie County, Ohio. It i« sit-
uated in that partof the State known as the fire lands,
and so called after the Connecticut town. The name
waa originally Wheatsborough, and its first settlement
was made in the year 1809.
The latest place aspiring to the honor of the name
is in Brown County, South Dakota, which was laid
out six or eight years ago on land owned by the Chi-
cago, Milwaukee and St. Paul Railway Company. I
am informed that various New England names were
selected by the company and given to different town-
ships, not for personal or individual reasons, but be-
cause they were short and well sounding, and unlike
any others in that State.
In the middle of the last century — according to the
New England Historical and Genealogical Register
(XXIV. 56 note, and 60) for January, 1870— there
was a place in Roxbury sometimes called Groton.
It waj a corruption of Greaton, the name of the man
who kept the " Grey Hound " tavern in that neigh-
borhood.
Groton, in England, is an ancient place; it is the
same as the Grotena of Domesday Book, in which
there is a record of the population and wealth of the
town, in some detail, at the time of William the Con-
queror, and also before him, under the Anglo Saxon
King, Edward the Confessor. X literal translation of
this census-return of the year 1086 is as follows :
"In the time of King Edward [the Abbot of] Saint Edmund held Gro-
ton for a manor, there being one carucate and a half of land. Always
[there have l*een] eight villeins and tive bordarii [a rather higher sort
of serfs ; colters]. Always [ihere has been j one plouugh in demesne. Al-
ways two ploughs belonging to homagers [Iciiants], and one acre of mead-
ow. Woodland for ten hogs. A mill serviceable in winter, .\lwaje
one work-horse, si.i cattle, and sixteen hogs, and thirty sheep. Two free
men of half a airucale of land, and they could give away and sell their
land. Six bordarii- .Mwavs one plough, and one acre of meadow [belong-
ing to these bordai ti]. It was then |i. e., under King Edwurd] worth
thirty shillings, and now valued at forty. It is seven furlongs in length
and four in breadth. In the sanre, twelve free men, and Ihey have one
carucute ; it is worth twenty shillings. These men could give away and
sell their land in the lime of the reign of King Edward. [Tlie AblK)t
of] Saint Edotund has the soc, protection and servitude. Itsgelt is
seven pence, but others hold there."
This extract is taken from the fac-simile repro-
duction of the part of Domesday Book relating to
Suffolk (page cLViii), which was published at the
Ordnance Survey Office, Southampton, in the year
1863. The text is in Latin, and the words are much
abbreviated. The writing is peculiar and hard to de-
cipher. The same entry is found, in printed char-
acters, in the second volume of Domesday Book
(page 359. b.), published in the year 1783.
Some idea of the condensed character of the record
may be gathered from the following copy of the
beginning of the description of Groton, in which the
matter within the brackets is what the Norman
scrivener omitted : " Grotena. [m] t.[empore] r.[egis]
e.[dvardi] ten[uit] S.[anctus] e.[dmundus] p[ro]
man.[erio] ' etc. A carucate was " a plough land,"
or a farm that could be kept under tillage with one
plough. It is variously estimated at from twelve
acres to a hundred.
It is curious to note the different ways which the
early settlers had of spelling the name; and the same
persons took little or no care to write it uniformly.
Among the documents and papers that I have ex-
amined in collecting material for a history of the
town, I find it spelled in twenty-one different ways,
viz : Groton, Grotton, Groten, Grotten, Grotin, Groa-
ten, Groatne, Groaton, Groaiton, Grooton, Grorton,
Grouten, Grouton, Groughton, Growton, Growtin,
Groyton, Gfauton, Grawten, Grawton and Croaton.
From the old spelling of the word, it may be inferred
that the pronunciation varied ; but at the present
time natives of the town and those " to the manner
born " pronounce it Grdw-ion. This method appears
to hold good in England, as the Reverend John W.
Wayman, rector of the parent town, writes me, under
date of August 13, 1879, "That the local pro-
nunciation is decidedly Grawton. The name of the
GROTON.
505
parish is described in old records as Grotton, or
Growton." I learn from trustworthy correspondents
in all the American towns of the name, that the
common pronunciation of the word in each one of
them is Grdw-Um. With the exception of the town
in South Dakota, I have visited all these places, in-
cluding the one in England, and my observation con-
firms the statement.
The following paragraph is taken from the Gi'o-
ton Mercury, of June, 1851, a monthly newspaper
edited by the late George Henry Brown, postmaster
at that time :
*' We have noticed amongBt tlie niiu9 of letters received at our Port
Office, tlie word Ghoton epelled in tbe following different WHys : Grot-
ton, Gmwtou, Graton, Grotouo, Groiitowo, Growtown, Growtan, Grow-
teu, GrowtoD, Grauu, Gtsttan, Grewton, Grotliao, Gi-aten, GroteD,
Crouton."
The daily life of the founders of Massachusetts
would be to us now full of interest, but unfortunately
little is known in regard to it. The early settlers were
pious folk, and believed in the literal interpretation
of the Scriptures. They worked hard during six days
of the week, and kept Sunday with rigid exactness.'
The clearing of forests and the breaking up of land
left little leisure for the use of pen and paper; and
letter-writing, as we understand it, was not generally
practiced. They lived at a time when printing was
not common and post-offices were unknown. Their
lives were one ceaseless struggle for existence; and
there was no time or opportunity to cultivate those
graces now considered so esstntial. Keligion was
with them a living, ever-present power ; and in that
channel went out all those energies which with us
find outlet in many different directions. These con-
siderations should modify the opinions commonly held
in regard to the Puri^n fathers.
The sources of information relating to the early
history of Groton are few and scanty. It is only here
and there in contemporaneous papers that we find
any allusions to the plantation ; and from these we
obtain but glimpses of the new settlement. The
earliest document connected with the town after its
incorporation is a petition now among the Shattuck
Manuscripts, in the possession of the New England
Historic Genealogical Society, which contains some
interesting facts not elsewhere given. All the signa-
tures are in the same handwriting as the body of the
document ; but those of the committee signing there-
port on the back of the petition are autographs. The
report itself is in the hand of Joseph Hills. The doc-
ument is as follows :
" Best' : 16 : 3 ni« : 165G
"To the Right Wo^" tbe Gou'do' the wo,'" Beput Go'no' and Blagie-
trates willi tlie Wortliy Deputie3 of tbid Hono"i Court
" The humble Peticon of Certeiu the iateoded luhatiitants of Groten,
" Humbly Sbeweth
"Tbatyo' Peticon" haning obteined theire Kcfiueet of a PlantacoQ
from this honored Court, they haue made Eotrauc thervppon, and do
Heaohie by the Gracious Assistanta of the Lord to proceed in the Bame
(though the greatest Number of Peticon" for the Grant haue declyned
the work) j-et because of the Iteiuoteoees of the phice, i Coaaidering
how heavy and alowe It Is like to bo Carried an end and with what
Charge and difficultie it will be Attended yo^ Peticun'' hombleBeqoaati
ar»
" I That thej be Dot nominated or tnclnded in tbe Country taxef
vnUI the full end of three years from these p.mtB : (in which time they
Account theire expenc will he ffreat to the building a house, procureiog
and maintaining of a minester Ac, with all other oeaseasary Town
Charges; they being but few at present left to Carry on tbe whole
worke) and at the end of the term, shall be redy by gods help to yeald
thei' Hates according to tfaei' Number t abillitie i. what shall be Im-
posed, vppon them
"2 That they may baue libertie to make Choyce of an other then H'
Danford for the Laying out their town bounds because of his desire to
be excused by reason of bis vrgent ocations otherwise, <& that they be
not strictly tyed to a square forme io their Line Laying out
"So shall yo' Peticou." be incoridged in this ^reat work, and shall as,
duty blndes pray for yo' happiness and thankfully Rest
yo* bumble Serrants
"Dean Winthropp
DOLOB liAVIB
Will. Uabtih
is". TiSkee
RtcHABD Smith
Robert Blood
Jn«. Lakin'
AhoBE KlCHENBON
"In Ans. to tbie Peticon wee Conceiue it needfull that the Town of
Groton be freed from Uates for three yeara from tbe time of their Grant
as is deBired.
" 2'* That they may Imploy any other known Artist In the room of
M' Daufort as need shall be.
" S'l That the foniie of the Towne Duiy A little varie from A due
Square According to the discrecon of the Comitte.
"21. Si" m". (50) "Daniel GooKui
Joseph Hills
John Wiswall
" The Deputyes approue of the returne of the Comittee in answer
to this petitio k deaire the Consent of o' bone"* magists. hereto
•* WlLLIAU TOBEEV Clerkt
" Consented to by the magists
"Edwaed ItAWSON Becrtt
*<[lDdorBed for filing :] Grotens Peticon | Eutrd & x' secured p^ 6 j
105G"
The next document, in point of time, connected
with the history of Groton is a petition to the Gen-
eral Court from John Tinker, one of the original se-
lectmen of the town. It is dated October, 1659, and
preserved among the Massachusetts Archives (CXII.
120) at the State-House. In thi-j petition Tinker
makes some indirect charges against his townsmen,
of which the real nature can now be learned only by
inference. It would seem that they had taken land
in an unauthorized manner, and their proceedings in
other respects had obstructed the planting of the
town ; and that he felt aggrieved in consequence of
such action. Evidently the new plantation did not
prosper during the first few years of ita settlement.
The petition reads thus :
*' Boston To the Huno'' Gen'" Court Assembled at Boston
8 m" The humble Petition of Jn° Tinker
1639 HuDibly Shewith that
"With Tnfaioed Uespect to the good and welfare of Church and Com-
monwealth yu' Petitiuuer bath oodeauored to answer the expectation
and desires of this honorii Court and the whole Countrvy In erecting set-
ling and Carying an End the Afaires of Groaton, Granted and intended
by this hono'>* Court for a plautation, which notwithstanding (all in
vaine) it Cuntinueth vnpeopled and soe Like to remaine vnless by this
liono'^ Court some wise and Juditioua Comitte t>e impowered to order
and dispose of all things there about, after which no doubt It will goeou
and prosper, which is tbe humble desire and Request of yo.' Petltjuuer
that soe it may he, and that yo' Petitioner be admitted and appoynted
506
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
faithfully to declare Tnto and informe the said Coniitte, 1 what bath
• llredy bin done, 2 what are the Grounds and Reaftona wherefore it Re-
mainetbat the atay It doetb. being bo much desired by so many and aucb
Considerable persons as it is, and 3 what bee Conceuith needfiill to the
further ContinuiDg what is done according to Right to every pereon &
Cause, and the setleing snch doe order as may incoridg the Carying on
of all tbinga to a prosperoos effect, vnto which yo^ Petitionershall redylj
adreaa bimsetfe, as willing to aobmJtt to the good pleasure of this hon^
Court & aucb Authorized by them for such due satisfacoo for alt bis
Care time cost & painea in and about the said plantation as ahall be
thought meete and humbly begging the good fAUO^ of god to Rest vppon
you ahall ever Bemaine to the hono»^ Court and Country
'• Yo' humble Serv* Jn<». Tinker
" The comictee baveiog prsed this peticcon, do Jndge y* it wilbe Tery
convenient that a Comittee of 3 : or more meet persona be nominated
& impowred ^to Examine the ptlculars therein mencconed. and make
returne of w' they find to the Court of Eleccon.
"Thomas Danforth
Anthony Stoddard
RooEH Clap
"21. (8) 59. The Depu* approne of the ret. of y< Comitee in anew :
hereto & haue Nominated M' Danforth M' Ephraim Child Cap'. Edw :
Johnson to be their Committee desireing o^ Honom magista [con.sent]
hereto
"William Torrey Cleric.
" Ciinaented to by y* magiats Edw Rawson Seaetv "
It appears from the writing on it that Tinker's peti-
tion was referred to a special committee, who recom-
mended that the whole matter be considered by
another committee with larger powers, who should
report to the Court of Election. In accordance with
this recommendation, Mr. Thomas Danforth, Captain
Edward Johnson and Ephraim Child were appointed
such a committee. I have here given their names
in the order in which they are mentioned in the
General Court Records (IV. 324), and not as they
appear in the approval of the committee's return on
the petition. The original report, made eighteen
months afterwards and duly signed by them, is
now among the Shattuck Manuscripts of the New
England Historic Genealogical Society. It is dated
May 23, 1661 ("23 (3) 1661"), and bears the official
action of the Hou^e of Deputies and of the magis-
trates. Edward Rawson, the secretary, made his
entry on the paper May 29, 1661. In copying the
document I have followed the General Court Records,
as this version of the petition contains fewer abbre-
viations and contractions. The record-book has been
paged differently at three separate times; and the
paging marked in red ink has been taken in this
copy. The " Committees Returne ab' Groaten &
Courts ordr " are as follows :
"Wee whose names are subscribed being Appointed & impowrd by
the Generall Court in octobe' 1659 for the examination of the prpceed-
ingsaboQt Groten plantation A the Intanglementa that haue obstructed
the planting thereof hitherto=-hauing taking pajnea to travajle vnto the
sajd place & eromino the Records of forme' proceedings in that plase as
also the Capacity of the s** place for the enterteining of a meet noumber
of perBona that may Carry on the affairs •f a Tonne, doe App'hend (ac-
cording to wt Information we haue had) that the place will .^ffoord a
comfortable accommodation for sixtj* familjee at least that may subsist in a
way of hu8bandry=And for aucb fnmilyes as be there already planted wch
are not aboue four or five acresi wee doe not finde theire Interest in mich
J The word "acres" occurs at the end of aline in the manuscript
records, and appears to be an interpolation. The sense Uoea not require
it, and the original copy in the library of the ffeW'England Historic,
I
lands as they claime ia legall & Jnst nor yet consistant W^ the Courts
ends in their graunt of the sajd plnntatiou.
*' And for the further encour.igement of such as haue now a desire
&.C doe present (hemselTs as willing to plant themselves in that
place,
** Wee craue leaue humbly to leaue our poore appfhentlons w^ this
Honored Court as followeth
" 1 That the old planters A their Asaigoes whose names are John
Tincker Rich : Smith. Wm ilartju. Ri : blood Rob' Blood &. Ju° Lakin
that they reteiue A keep as theire propriety, (of such lands as they now
clajme an Interest in) each of them only twenty acres of meadow twenty
acres for the house lott ten acres Intervale land & tenn ficrea of other
vplanda & that the same be sett out by a Comittee so as may not vn-
equally prejudice such aa are or may bo their Neighbo"
" 2 That the neere lands &. meadows, be so diuided as may accomodate
at leaat sixty familjea & fur that end That the first diuision of lands be
mode in manner following viz^ such as bane one hundred & fifty pounds
estate be ullowed equall w(b the old planters aboue &. that uone exceed
&. that none liaue lease then tenn acres for theire houaelott i fiveacres of
meadow two &, a halfe acres of Interrale S: two & a half of other tanda
for planting lotta in their first div ission x that none be admitted to haue
graunta of lotts there but on Condition* following Tiz«
"1 That they Qoe vp, w^ theire familjea w't>in 2 years after theire
graunta, on penalty of forfeiting theire gruunts againe to the Towne &
eo many tenn shillinjrs as they had acres Graunted them for their©
bouselotts A that the like Injunction be putt vpon those aboue named
as old planters.
"2 That all towne charges both Civil &. Eccleasiaaticall be levyod ac-
cording to each niaus Gmunt in this firbt divition of lands for seuen
years next Eusuing Excepting only such whose stocks of Catle shall
exceed one hundred A fifty pounds estates.
'*3 That the power of Admission of Inhabitants & Regulating the af-
faires of the SHJd place be referred to a Comittee of meete persons Im-
powred by this Court thereto, Vntil the plantation be in aome good meas-
ure (at least) filled w"> Inhabiunls A .be enabled regularly A peaceably
to Carry on y* same theniselvea
"4 That this honoured Court be pleased to grannt them Imunitjes
[from] all Comon & Ordinary Countrj' charges not exceeding a single
rate or a Rate & a half p Annu for three years next ensuing.
*'5 That in Graunting of lotts children haue tlieire due Consideration
w** estates theire paren" giving becuritje to defray y charges of the
place aa is before p''uiiaed.
*'Tho Danforth
Edwabd Johssok
Ephu. Child
** The Conrt Approoves of «t doe CoufirA the retnrne of the Comittee
& doe liereby further orde' i Iropowcr the aforesajd Comittee for the
ends aboue mentioned vntlU meete men shall be found amongst such ua
shall Inhabit there i be approoved of by a County Court "
(General Court Records, IV. 371.)
The next document, in point of time, found among
the Archives (I. 21) at the State House and relating
to Groton, is the following request for a brandmark,
which was wanted probably for marking cattle
"The Hnrabie Request of Joseph Parker to the Honoured Govemo'
the Honourd magistrates & deputyes, Humbly Requests in behalfe of
the towne of Grawton that the letter Gr may bee Recorded aa tbe brand
mark belonging to tbe towno I being chosen Counstible this year make
bolde to present this, to tho Honoured Court it being but my duty, in the
townes behalfe thus Hopeing the Honored Court will grant my request
I rest yo' Humble Servant ;
"Joseph Pabrek
"Boston : 31»*» : may : 1666
*' In answer to thia motion the Depntiea approue of the letters : Ge
to be y« brand murke of groaten
" William Toebey Cleric.
" of Hono f^ magiata consentinge hereto
"Consented by the magista
" Eow : Rawso\ Secreti/*
Joseph Parker, before coming to Groton, had lived
at Chelmsford, where his children were born. He
Genealogical Society doea not contain it, though the printed edition of
the General Court Recorda gives it.
GROTON.
507
was a brother of James, another of the early settlers
of ihe town.
During this period the town was paying some at-
teation to the question of marks for trees as well as
for cattle. At a general meeting held on March 5,
1665-66. it was voted that "there should be trees
marked for shade for cattell in all common by wayes : "
and furthermore that " the marke should be a
great T." From various expressions found in the
early town records, it would seem that the country
in the neighborhood was not densely wooded when
the settlement was first made. Ai a meeting of the
selectmen held in the winter of 1669, an order was
passed for the preservation of trees, but the writing
is so torn that it is impossible to copy it. At another
meeting held on January 13, 1673-74, it was voted
that all trees of more than six inches in diameter at
the butt, excepting walnut and pine, growing by the
wayside, should be reserved for public works, and
that the penalty for cutting them down, without
authority, should be ten shillings a tree.
At a general town-meeting on December 21, 1674.
leave was granted to William Longley, Jr., to cut
down three or four trees standing in the road near his
farm and shading his corn, on condition that he give
to the town the same number of trees for mending the
highways.
The early settlers of Groton encountered many
trials and privations in pianling the town. The men
worked hard in felling trees and breaking ground,
and the women toiled faithfully in their rude houses.
They were used to hardships, and they took them
with Chriscian resignation. Their daily life taught
them the true principles of philosophy. They lived
on the rough edge of civilization, and nothing stood
between them and an unbroken wilderness. These
pioneers were a devout people; and the strength of
their rel'gious belief i* shown in no way so clearly as
in the fortitude with which they met their lot in life.
The prowling Indians were their neighbors, whose
constant movements required careful watching. There
were families of savages scattered along the interval
land of the Nashua valiey, from Lancaster to the
Merrimack Eiver, who at times annoyed the settlers
by killing pigsandstealingchickens. Judgingfrom the
number of stone implements found in the neighborhood,
there was an Indian village just above the Red Bridge,
on the west side of the Nashua River. It probably
consisted of a few families only, belonging to the
Nashua tribe, a.s they were called by the English.
Like all their race, these Indians were a shiftless peo-
ple, and often changed their abodes, going hither and
thither as they found good hunting-grounds or fish-
ing-places. They bartered skins and furs with the
planters ; and so much business was carried on in this
way, that the government sold to indiviiiuals the
right to trade with them. As early as July, 1657,
John Tinker, one of the original selectmen of the
town, appointed by the General Court, paid eight
pounds for the privilege of trafficking with them at
Lancaster and Groton. A few of these natives knew
a little English, which they had picked up from con-
tact with the whites. Gookin refers to them in his
" History of the Christian Indians," when he speaks of
" some skulking Indians of the enemy, that formerly
lived about Groton, the principal whereof was named
Nathaniel, he and his party did this and other mis-
chief afterward, in bumingseveral houses at Chelms-
ford." ' This Nathaniel was taken subsequently at
Cocheco (now Dover), New Hampshire, and hanged in
Boston. 8ome of these vagrants took an active part
in the burning of Groton during Philip's War. The
leader of the savages at this assault was John
Monaco or Monoco, nicknamed " One-eyed John,"
from the loss of an eye. After he had taken by strat-
agem a garrison -house, he entered into a long conver-
sation with Captain Parker, who was stationed in
another house nearby, and called him his old neigh-
bor. From this fact I infer that " One-eyed John "
knew Captain Parker, and had previously lived in the
vicinity. Warfare among the aborigines did not
require generalship so much as knowledge of places ;
and the head of an assaulting party was one familiar
with the clearings and the lay of the land in the
threatened territory. During the ensuing autumn
this leader was brought to the gallows in Boston,
where he suffered the extreme penalty of the law.
The Indians soon acquired from the English the
love of strong drink, which is sure to lead to disputes
and quarrels. The earliest documents at the State
House, relating to Groton and the savages, give an
account of a drunken brawl which ended in murder.
The affair took place in the Merrimack Valley, and
several men of this town were summoned to appear
as witnesses at the investigation before the General
Court in Boston. In the spring of 1668 Captain
Richard Waldron built a trucking or trading-house
at Pcnacock (now Concord), New Hampshire, where a
few weeks later one Thomas Dickinson was murdered
by an Indian while under the influence of liquor.
The homicide created great excitement, and it has
been supposed to have delayed the permanent settle-
ment of the place for many years. A warraut was
issued directing the constable of Groton to summon
John Page, Thomas Tarbell, Jr., Joseph Blood and
Robert Parish, all of this town, before the General
Court in order to give their testimony, which they
did under oath. It appeared by the evidence that
there had been a drunken row, and that Dickinson
was killed by an Indian, who acknowledged the crime
and expressed great sorrow for it, but pleaded drunken-
ness in extenuation of the deed. The culprit was
tried at once by a counril of the Indians, who sen-
tenced him to be shot, which was done the next day.
It is interesting now to note the high temperance
stand taken, more than two hundred years ago, by the
1 Arcbeeologia Americana, II. 471.
508
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Chief Tohaunto, which places him abreast of the most
earnest opposere of the rum traffic at the present
time.
During a series of years before Philip's War the
Indians had been supplied with arms and ammuni-
tion, though this was contrary to the laws of the Colo-
nies. The French in Canada and the Dutch in New
York had carried on considerable traffic with the na-
tives in these contraband articles ; and occasionally
some avaricious settler would barter with them, giv-
ing powder and shot in exchange. The possession of
firearms made the Indians bold and insolent, and the
tendency of events was toward open hostilities.
This tendency was strengthened by a feeling of suspi-
cion on the part of the colonists, and by one of
jealousy on the part of the savages. Distrust alw.ays
grows out of suspicion, and the fears of the settlers
began to be excited when they thought of their ex-
posed situation. Under these circumstances, it was
wise to prepare for all emergencies ; and at an early
day a military company was organized in this town.
The following entry is made in the manuscript records
of the General Court during the session beginning
May 6, 1673:
" James Parker of (iroaten hanlng liad the care of the military Com-
pany there for seiierall yeares. ia Appointed i ordered to bo their leilten-
nant i W» Larliin to t>e eoaigne to the siyd Company there. " '
The two officers of this organization were each pro-
moted one grade during the next autumn, which
would indicate that the company was filling up in
numbers. At the session of the General Court begin-
ning October 15, 1673, the record reads :
" The military Company of Groaten being destitut of military ofcer«
The Court Judgeth itnieet to choose A Appoint James Parker to be their
captane W" Lakin to b« loiftonnant 4 Nathaniel Lawrence to be their
enaigne.2
Before this time there had been in Middlesex
County a company of troopers, or cavalry, made up
of men living in the frontier towns, of which Groton
was one— as mentioned in the General Court Records
of October, 1669.
One of the prominent men in the history of the
Colony at this period was Major Simon Willard. A
native of England, he came to Massachusetts in the
year 1634. He had lived at Concord, Lancaster and
Groton, and in all these places exerted a wide influ-
ence. He had filled various civil offices, and in his
day was a noted military man. His farm was sit-
uated at Nonacoicus, now included within the limits
of Ayer ; and his dwelling-house was the fir.it build-
ing burned at the attack on Groton, March 13, 1676.
During several months previously he had been en-
gaged with his men in scouting along the line of
frontier settlements and protecting the inhabitants.
At this assault Major Willard came with a company
of cavalry to the relief of the town, though he did not
' (General Court Records, IV. 718.)
' (Genoiul Court Records, IV. 726.)
reach the place in time to be of service in its defence.
He died at Charlestown, on April 24, 1676, a very
few weeks after this town was abandoned. Benjamin
Thompson, the earliest native American poet, pays
the following tribute to his character, in a little
pamphlet published during Philip's War, and entitled
" New England's Tears." It is certainly rude in ex-
pression, and probably just in its conception, but not
accurate aa to the date of his death :
"About this Time Died Major Willurd Esq.; who had continued one
of our Senators many years, and ilead of tbe JIitsMacIiitBtt Bands. In
23 April 1670.
"EPITAPHIU5I.
'• Great. Good, and Jtut, Valian', nnd Wise,
New Eoglands Common Sacrijici :
The Prince of War, the Bond of Love,
A True Heroick Martial Dove :
Pardon I croud ftLi Parte eo cfoie
Which all the World in meaeure titvtica.
We envy Deatlt, and icell tee laaij,
Wlio keept him under Lock and Keij.^*
Nearly one-and-twenty years had passed since the
little settlement in the wilderness was begun, and
Groton was fast approaching its majority. The new
town had enjoyed a moderate share of prosperity, and
was slowly working out its destiny. The founders
were poor in this world's goods, but rich in faith and
courage. They had now tasted the hardships of
frontier life, but not as yet felt the horrors of savage
warfare. The distant thunders of a threatening
storm were beginning to be heard, and the occasional
flashes put the early settlers on their guard. Philip'.s
War had broken out during the summer of 1675, and
the outlyingsettlements were exposed to new dangers.
The inhabitants of this town took such precautions
as seemed needful, and trusted in Providence for the
rest. They were just beginning to prepare for the
work of another season, when a small band of prowl-
ing Indians alarmed the town by pillaging eight or
nine houses and driving off" some cattle. This oc-
curred on March 2, 1676, and was a sufficient warn-
ing, probably, to .send the inhabitants to the garrison-
houses, whither they were wont to flee in tiftie of
dauger. These places of refuge were usually houses
surrounded by a strong wall of stone or limber, built
up as high as the eaves, with a gateway, and port-
holes for the use of musketry.
In Groton there were five such garrison-houses,
and under their protection many a sleepless, anxious
night was passed by the inmates. Four of these
houses were very near each other, and the fifth was
nearly a mile away. The sites of some of them are
well known. One was Mr. Willard's house, which
stood near the High School ; another was Captain
Parker's house, which stood just north of the Town
Hall ; and a third was John Nutting's house, on the
other side of James's Brook. The fourth was proba-
bly north of John Nutting's, but perhaps south of
Mr. Willard's. There is a tradition that one stood
near the bouse formerly owned and occupied by the
late Eber Woods, which would make the fifth
GROTON.
609
garrison-house " near a mile distant from the rest."
Kichard Sawtell, the first town-clerk, was living on
this site at that time, and his house would have been
a convenient rallying-point for his neighbors. With-
out doubt he was the Richard Sawtell who served in
Major Appleton'e company during Philip's War.
It is recorded in the inventory of his estate, on file
in the Middlesex Probate OflRce at East Cambridge,
that Timothy Cooper, of Groton, was "Sleine by the
Indeins the Second day of march, 1675-6." Cooper
was an Englishman by birth, and lived, probably,
somewhere between the Baptist meeting-house and
the beginning of Farmers' Row. It is not known that
there was other loss of life at this time, but the affair
was serious enough to alarm the inhabitants. They
sought refuge immediately in the garrison-houses, as
the Inaians were lurking in the vicinity. t)n March
9th the savages again threatened the beleaguered
town, and by a cunningly contrived ambush, man-
aged to entrap four men at work, of whom one was
killed and one captured, while the other two escaped.
This second assault must have produced great alarm
and consternation among the people of the town.
The final and main attack, however, came on the
13th, when the enemy appeared in full body, — thought
to be not less than four hundred in number. The
inhabitanls at this lime all were gathered into the
several garrisons for protection. During the previous
uight the savages scattered throughout the neighbor-
hood, and the first volley of shot on the morning of
the 13lh was a signal for the general burning of the
town ; and in this conflagration the first meeting-
house of Groton was destroyed, together with about
forty dwelling-house?. This building, erected at the
cost of many and great privations, was the pride of
the inhabitants. With its thatched roof, it must have
burned quickly ; and in a verj' short time nothing was
left but a heap of smoking embers. Althousrh it had
never been formally dedicated to religious worship,
it had been consecrated in spirit to the service of God
by the prayers of the minister and the devotion of the
congregation. In this assault John Nutting's garri-
son was taken by stratagem. The men defending it
had been drawn out by two Indians, apparently
alone, when the savages in ambush arose and killed
one of the men, probably John Nutting himself, and
wounded three others. At the same time the garrison-
house, now defenceless, was attacked in the rear and
the palisades pulled down, allowing the enemy to
take possession. The women and children, compris-
ing those of five families, escaped to Captain Parker's
house, situated between James's Brook and the site of
the Town-House.
There is a family tradition, worthy of credence, that
John Nutting was killed while defending his log-
house fort during Philip's War. His wife's name
appears a few months later in the Woburn town-
records as " Widow Nutting," which is confirmatory
of the tradition.
Several printed accounts of Philip's War appeared
very soon after it was ended, and these furnish all
that is known in regard to it. At that time there was
no special correspondent on the spot to get the news;
and, as the means for communication were limited,
these narratives differ somewhat in the details, but
they agree substantially in their general statements.
With the exception of Hubbard's Narrative, the
contemporary accounts of this assault on the town
are all short; and I give them in the words of the
writers, for what they are worth. The first is from
" A Brief History of the Warr with the Indians in
Newe England," by IncreaseMather, published in the
year 1676. This account, one of the earliest in print,
is as follows :
" Harcb the Klh. Miscbief was done, and several liTet cut off by the
Indiana IhlB dRy , at GroUm aDd at SudbuTjf. Ac bumbling Providence,
ioasmucb aamany Churches were this day Fasting and Praying. (Page
23.)
"3farc/il3. The Indians assaulted Groton, nod left but few boasea
standing. iBo that this day also another Candlestick was removed out of
it^ place. One of the first houses that the eneniy destroyed In ihia
place, was the Houte of God, h. e. which was built, and set apart for tbe
celebration of the piiblick "Worehip of God.
*' When (bey bad done that, thry scoffed and blasphemed, and came
to Sir. WtUord (tbe worthy Pastor of tbe Church there) his bouse (which
being Fortified, they attempted not to destroy it) and tauntingly, said,
What icdl you do for a hovae to pray in fioif ire have burnt your Meeting-
house? Thus hath the enemy done wickedly in the Sanctuary, they
have burnt up the Synsgogues of God In the Lund ; they have cast fire
into tbe Sanctuary ; they have cant down the dwelling place of his name
to tbeGround. 0 God, liOv> long aboil the Adceraary approach f ahall Ou
Enemy Blaspheme Uiy Same for ever f icluj tcUhdraweri thou thtne hand, even
thy riyU handf pluck it out of thy boKme." (Page 21.)
Several accounts of the war appeared in London
in 1676, only a few months after the destruction of
this town. They were written in New England, and
sent ;o Old England, where they were at once
published in thin pamplets. The authors of them
are now unknown, but undoubtedly they gathered
their materials from hearsay. At that time Indian
affairs in New England attiacted a good deal of at-
tention in the mother country. One of these pamphlets
is entitled : " A True Account of the most Consider-
able Occurrences that have hapned in the Warre
between the English and the Indians in New Eng-
land, ... as it hath been communicated by
Letters to a Friend in London." This narrative
says :
'* On the 13th of March, before our Forces could return towards our
Pans, the /rufwna sentastrong party, and a«aulted tbe Townof Growtoa,
about forty miles Nortb-weat from Boaion, and burn'd all the deserted
Houses ; the Garrlsoo'd Bouses, which were about ten, all escaped but
one, which tbey c&rryed, bat not tbe Englith in it ; for there was but
one slain and two wouuded." (Page 2.)
Another account, entitled : " A New and Further
Narration of the State of New England, being a con-
tinued account of the Bloudy Indian-war," gives the
following version :
" The 14tli of March the savage Enemy set opon a Considerable Town
called (;rou(7/((i»ii, and burnt Major WUberda Bouse first (who with bis
family removed to Charii Town) and afterwards destroyed sixty Five
dwelling-bouses more there, leaving but six bouses standing in the
whole Town, which they likewise fuiiously attempted to set on tire;
510
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUxVTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Bnt being fortiSed with Anna and Men aa Gariaons, they with their
abot, killed several of the Enemy, and prevented so much of their
deeif^e ; Nor do we hear that any person on our aide was here ei.t>ier
aUln or taken captive." (Page 4.)
A few pag?8 further on it says : " Grantham and
Nathaway all ruined but one house or two." (Page
14.) Few persons would recognize this town under
the disguise of Grantham.
A third one of these London pamphlets, bearing
the title of " News from New England," says :
"The 7(/i of aforci following these bloody indiaru march't to a con-
siderable Town called CnxUon where they flrat aet fire to Major n'illardA
house, and afterwards burnt 65 more, there being Seaventy two houses
at fliat so that there was left standing but six honsesof the whole Town."
(Page 4.)
The details of the burning of the town are found
in " A Narrative of the Troubles with the Indians in
New England," written by the Reverend William
Hubbard, and printed in the year 1677. It is the
fullest history of the events relating to Groton ap-
pearing near the time; and very likely many of the
facts were obtained from the Reverend Mr. Willard.
The account is not as clear as might be desired, and
contains some glaring discrepancies, but it is too long
to be quoted here.
The Indians were a cowardly set and never at-
tacked in open field. They never charged on works
in regular column, but depended rather on craft or
cunning to defeat their adversary. The red hell-
hounds— as they were sometimes called by our pious
forefathers — were always ready to attack women and
children, but afraid to meet men. The main body of
the savages passed the night following the final at-
tack in "an adjacent valley," which cannot uow be
easily identified, but some of them lodged in the gar-
rison-house, which they had taken ; and the next
morning, after firing two or three volleys at Captain
Parker s house, they departed. They carried otf a
prisoner, — John Morse, the town clerk, — who was
rantomed a short time afterward. The following
reference to him in an undated letter, written by the
Rev. Thomas Gobbet to the Rev. Increase Mather,
shows very nearly the time of his release :
•' May y« 12th [1676] Good wife Diuens [Divoll] and Good wife Ketle
Tpon raosom paid, came iuto conrord. i vjion like runsom presently
[ajrter John Moas of Groton i liefteuiint Carlors [Kerley'a] Daughter of
Lancaster were set at liberty ,t 9 more w^oiit ransom." (Mather
Mannscrlpts in the Prince Collection, at the Boston Public Library,
I. 76.)
The ransom for John Morse was paid by John
Hubbard, of Boston, and amounted to "about five
pounds." Morse's petition to the Gouncil, to have
Hubbard reimbursed, is found among the Massachu-
setts Archives (LXIX. 48).
Fortunately the lots of life or limb on the part of
the inhabitants of the town was small, and it is not
known that more ihan three persons were killed —
of whom one was Tim>thy Cooper, and another, with-
out doubt, John Nutting — and three wounded ; two
were made prisoners, of whom one escaped from the
savages and reached Lancaster, and the other, John
Morse, was ransomed.
The lot of these early settlers was indeed hard and
bitter; they had seen their houses destroyed and their
cattle killed, leaving them nothing to live on. Their
alternative now was to abandon the plantation, which
they did with much sadness and sorrow. The settle-
ment was broken up, and the inhabitants scattered in
different directions among their friends and kindred.
In the spring of 1678, after an absence of two years,
they returned and established anew the little town on
the frontier.
In the autumn of 1879 the town of Groton erected
a monument to commemorate the site of the meeting-
house which was burned during this assault. It bears
the following inscription :
" NEAR THIS SPOT
STOOD THE FIRST 3IEETING HOOSE OF GROTON
BOILT IN ir.66
AND BUaST BY THE INDIANS
13 -March 1G70"
The monument, in connection with two others
relating to the history of the town, was dedicated
with appropriate exercises in the Town Hall on Feb.
20, 1880, when an address was delivered by Dr. Sam-
uel A. Green, which was subsequently printed.
After Philip's War the colonists were at peace
with the Indians, but it was a suspicious kind of
peace. It required watching and a show of strength
to keep it; there was no good-will between the na-
tive race and the white intruders. The savages at
best made bad neighbors ; they were treacherous and
addicted to drink. The following entries in the town
records show that they were a shiftless and drunken
set :
" Jnneuary 31 1081 It [was] ajred upon liy the select men That the
Indanes shall be warned out of the Toune forth with and if the shall
neiglect the warning and if any of iheni be taken drounke or in driuke
or with drinke Then these parsons ar to be sezed and brout be fuure
the select men either by constiiltte or by any other parson and be poun-
esed accordin as the law doth direct and the Inforniar shall be sattised
for his paines"
" March 28 ICS^ two Indian squaws being apprehended In drinke ,t
with drinke brought to j« select men one squaw Xehatchechin swaw
being ilronncke was seutanced to received did receive ten atnpes the
other John Nnsquuns sway was sentanced to pay 3» 4d ,;ii3h and loose
her two quart bottle and the Liquourin it awarded to Sarg°' Lakea who
seized I hem."
During this period the Indians began again to be
troublesome, and for the next fifteen or twenty
years continued their occasional depredations by
murdering the inhabitantf", burning their houses,
destroying their crops or killing their cattle. Into
these garrison-houses the neighboring families gath-
ered at night, where they were guarded by armed
men who warned the inmates of any approach of
danger.
At times troops were stationed here by the Colonial
authorities for the protection of the town ; and the
orders and counter orders to the small garrison show
too well that danger was threatening. In the mean-
while King William's War was going on ; and the
GROTON.
511
enemy had material and sympathetic aid from the
French in Canada. The second attack on the town
came in the summer of 1694, and the accounts of it I
prefer to give in the words of contemporary writers.
Sometimes there are discrepancies, but, in the main,
Buch narratives are trustworthy.
The attaclc was made on Friday, July 27th, and Cot-
ton Mather, in his " Magnalia," thus refers to it :
" Nor did the Slorm go over bo ; Some Drope of it fell opon the Town
of GroloH, a Town that lay, one would think, far enough off the Place
where was the last £cfnf of the TVagedy.
" On July 27. [1G94,] about break of Day Groton felt Bome Burprislng
Blows from the Indian Haldteli. They began their Altacka at the
House of one Lieutenant LaHn, in the Oot-skirtB of the Ibtni ; but met
with a Repulse there, and lost one of their Crew. NeverlhtleBS, in
other Pans of that Plantation (when the good People had been bo tired
out aa to lay down their MUUarTj Walch) there were more than Twenty
PerBons killed, and more than a Dozen carried away. Mr. Genhom Ho-
hart, the MiniBter of the Place, with part of his Family, was Bemark-
«bly pr^Bened from falling into their Bands, when they made them-
selves the MaBtem of his House ; though tbey Took Two of hie Chil-
dren, whereof the one was Killed, and the other §ome time after hap-
pily Bescued out of bis Captivity." (Book VII. page ec.)
Governor Hutchinson, in his " Historj* of the
Province of Massachusetts Bay," published during
the following century, writes :
" Having crossed Merrimack, on the 2"th of July [1694] they fell upon
GrotoD, about 40 miles from Boston. They were repulsed at Lakiu's
garrison house, but fell upon other houses, where the people were off
their guard, and killed and carrie-1 away from the vicinity alwut tony
peraons. To-xus's two nephews were killed by his side, aud he had a
dozen buUetsthrough his blanket, according to Charlevoix, who adds
that he carried the fort or garrison and then went to make spoil at the
gates of Boston ; in both which facts the preach account is erroneous."
(II. 8:;.)
In the assault of July, 1694, the loss on the part of
the inhabitants was considerably greater than when
the town was destroyed in the attack of 1676. It is
said that the scalps of the unfortunate victims were
given to the Count de Frontenac, Governor of Can-
ada. A larg^ majority, and perhaps all, of the pris-
oners taken at this lime were children. The Indians
had learned that captives had a market value; and
children, when carried off, could be more easily
guarded than adults. It was more profitable for the
savages to exchange prisoners for a ransom, or sell
them to the French, than it was to kill them. It is
now too late to give the names of all the sufferers,
but a few facts in regard to them may be gathered
from fragmentary sources. The families that suffered
■ the severest lived, for the most part, in the same gen-
eral neighborhood, which was nearthe siteof the first
meeting-house. Lieut. William Lakin's house,
where the fight began, was situated in the vicinity of
Chicopee Row.
The following list of casualties, necessarily incom-
plete and in part conjectural, is given as an approxi-
mation to the loss sustained by the town :
Killed. Captured.
John Longley's family " 3
Kev. Mr. Hobart's " 1 1
John Shepley's " 4? 1
JamesParker.Jr.'s " 2 3?
Alexander Bouse'B ** 2 1
Mr. Gershom Hobart, the minister, whose house was
captured in this assault, lived where the Baptist ,
meeting-house now stands. One of his boys was
killed, and another, Gershom, Jr., was carried off.
There is a tradition extant that a third child was con-
cealed under a tub in the cellar, and thus saved from
the fury of the savages. Judge Bewail writes in his
diary, under the date of May 1, 1695 :
*' Mr. Hobarta aon Gershom ifl well at a new Fort a days Journey
above Keriguwag [Norridgewock], Masters name ifl Naaaacomb^wit, a
good Master, and Uistrets. Maater is chief Captain, now Biuub&z«en ia
absent."
(" MaaaachuaettB Historical Collections," V. Fifth seriea, 403, 404.)
According to a letter written by the Reverend
John Cotton to his wife at Plymouth, and dated
" Election-night, Boston " (May 29, 1695), he was res-
cued from captivity during that month. The inscrip-
tion on the Shepley monument says that "the Indi-
ans massacred all the Sheples in Groton save a John
Sheple 16 years old who the[y] carried captive to
Canada and kept him 4 years, after which he returned
to Groton and from him descended all the Sheples
or Sbepleys in this "Vicinity ;"' but there is no record
to show how many there were in this family. Mr.
Butler, in his History (page 97), makes substantially
the same statement, but does not mention any num-
ber. In my list it is placed at five, which is conjec-
tural ; of this number probably four were slain.
Shepley lived near where the Martin's Pond Road
starts off from the North Common. The knowledge
which the boy John obtained of their language and
customs, while a prisoner among the Indians, was of
much use to him in after-life. Tradition says that,
when buying furs and skins of them, he used to put
his foot in one scale of the balance instead of a pound
weight. In the summer of 1704, while he and thir-
teen other men were reaping in afield at Groton, they
were attacked by a party of about twenty Indians.
After much skirmishing Shepley and one of his com-
rades, Butterfield by name, succeeded in killing one
of the assailants, for which act they were each granted
four pounds by the Provincial authorities. He was
the direct ancestor of the late Honorable Ether
Shepley, of Portland, formerly chief justice of the
Supreme Judicial Court of the State of Maine,
and his son, the late Gen. George Foster Shep-
ley, formerly a justice of the Circuit Court
of the First Circuit of the United States.
John's petition to the General Court, asking
that an allowance be made for this service,. and giv-
ing the particulars of the attack, is found among the
Massachusetts Archives (XXX, 496, 497) at the State-
House.
Among the " Nams of thos Remaining Still in
hands of the french at Canada," foucd in a document
dated October, 1695, are those of " Lidey Langly
gerl" and " Jn° Shiply boy." In this list the resi-
dences of both these children are incorrectly written,
Lydia'ii being given as Dover, New Hampshire, and
5U
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
John's aa Oyater River. They both belonged in this
town, and were taken at the assault of July 27, 1694,
The name of Thomas Drew appears in the same list
as of Groton, which is a mistake, as he was of Oyster
River. (Archives, XXXVIII. A 2.)
This expedition against Groton was planned in
part by the Indian? at a fort called Amsaquonte above
Norridgewock, in Maine. It was arranged also in the
plan of operations that Oyster River — now Durham,
New Hampshire — should be attacked on the way ; and
the assault on that town was made Joly 18th nine days
before the one on Groton. At Oyster River more
than ninety persons were either killed or captured;
the prisoners from the two towns appear to have been
taken to Maine, where they were brought frequently
together during their captivity. On January 21, 1695,
Lieutenant-Governor William Stoughton issued a
proclamation, in which he refers to the " tragical out-
rages and barberous murders" at Oyster River and
Groton. He says that several of the prisoners taken
at these places "are now detained by the said Indians
at Amarascoggin and other adjoining places."
Hezekiah Miles, alias Hector, a friendly Indian, at
one time a captive in the enemy's hands, made a
deposition before the Lieutenant-Governor and Coun-
cil, at Boston, May 31, 1695, which gives some details
of the preparation for the attack ; and Ann Jenkins,
in a deposition on June 11, 1695, adds other particu-
lars. These papers may be found among the Massa-
chusetts Archives (VIII. 39, 40).
The story of William and Deliverance Longley's
family is a sad one to relate. They were living, with
their eight children, on a email farm, perhaps a mile
and a quarter from the village, on the east side of the
Hollis road. Their house was built of hewn logs, and
was standing at the beginning of the present century.
The old cellar, with its well-laid walls, was distinctly
visible forf.y years ago, and traces of it could be seeu
even to very modern times. The site of this house
has recently been marked by a monument bearing the
following inscription ; —
HEBK DWELT
WILLIAM AND DELIVERANCE LONOLET
with their eloht chilurek.
On the 27tu of Jvly 1604
the utdiakh killed the father and mother
AND Five OF THE CHILDREN
AND CAURIED INTO CAPTIVITT
THE OTHER THREE.
The monument was erected in the autumn of 1879,
at the expense of the town, on land generously given
for the purpose by Mr. Zechariah Fitch, the present
owner of the farm ; and it was dedicated with appro-
priate exercises on February 20, 1880.
On the fatal morning of July 27, 1694, the massa-
cre of this family took place. The savages appeared
suddenly, coming from the other side of the Merri-
mack River, and began the attack at Lieutenant
William Lakin's house, where 'hey were repulsed
with the loss of one of their number. They followed
it up by assaulting other houses in the same neigh-
borhood. They made quick work of it, and left ihe
town as speedily as they came. With the exception
of John Shepley's house, it is not known that they
destroyed any of the buildings; but they pillaged
them before they departed. They carried off" thirteen
prisoners, mostly children, — and perhaps all, — who
must have retarded their march. There is a tradition
that, early in the morning of the attack, the Indians
turned Longley's cattle out of the barnyard into the
cornfield and then lay in ambush. The stratagem
had the desired effect. Loogley rushed out of the
house unarmed, in order to drive the cattle back,
when he was murdered and a'.l his family either killed
or captured. The bodies of the slain were buried in
one grave, a few rods northwest of the house. A
small apple-tree growing over the spot and a stone
lying even with the ground, for many years furnished
the only clue to the final resting-place of this unfor-
tunate family, but these have now disappeared.
William Loagley wr.s town clerk in the year 1687,
and also from 1692 till his death, in 1694; and only
one week before he was killed he had made entries
in the town records. His father, William Longley,
Sr., also had been town clerk during the years 1666
and 1667, and died November 29, 1680. The father
was one of the earliest settlers of the town, as well as
the owner of a thirty-acre right in the original Groton
plantation. Lydia, John and Betty were the names
of the three children carried off by the savages, and
taken to Canada. Lydia was fold to the French and
placed in the Congregation of Xotre Dame, a convent
m Monireai, where she embraced the Roman Catho-
lic faith, and died July 20, 1758, at the advanced age
of eighty-four years. Betty perished soon after her
capture from hunger and exposure ; and John, the
third child, remained with the savages for more than
four years, when he was ransomed and brought away
much against his own will. At ote time during his
captivity he was on the verge of starving, when an
Indian kindly gave him a dog's foot to gnaw, which
for the time appeased his hunger. He was known
among his captota as John Augary. After he came
home his sister Lydia wrote from Canada urging him
to abjure the Protestant religion ; but he remained
true to the faith of his early instruction.
Their grandmother, the widow of Benjamin Crispe,
made her will April 13, 1698, which was admitted to
probate in Middlesex County on the 28th of the fol-
lowing December; and in it she remembered these
absent children as follows:
"I give aDd bequeath Vnto my three Grand-Children y' are in Cap-
tivity if they returue Vizdt these bool^a one of y™ a bible another a Ser-
mon booke treating of faith and the other a psalnie bool£."
The old lady herself, doubtless, had read the "Ser-
mon booke treating of faith ; " and it must have
strengthened her belief in Divine wisdom, and been a
GROTON.
513
great consolation in her trials. She did not know at
this time that her granddaughter was already a con-
vert to the Roman Catholic religion. The knowledge
of this fact would have been to her an affliction
Bcarcely Icjs than the massacre of her daughter's
family.
John Longley returned about the time when the
grandmother died ; and subsequently he filled many
important offices both in the church and the town.
Like his father and grandfather, he was the town
clerk during several years. Among the papers (Knox
Manuscripts, Waldo Papers, L. 13) in the possession
of the New England Historic Genealogical Society is
a deposition made by Longley, giving a short account
of his captivity among the Indians.
In the month of July, 1877, I was in Montreal,
where I procured, through the kindness of the Mother
Superior at the Congregation of Nfitre Dame, a copy
of the French record of Lydia's baptism, of which the
following is a translation :
" On Taeeday, April 24, lfi9C, the ceremony of baptism waa performed
on aa KagUsh girl, Darned Lydia Looglej, who was born April 14, 1074,
at Grotoii, a few miles from Boston in New England. She was tlie
'daughter of William Longley and Deliverance Cnap, both Protesunts.
She was captured in the month of July, lt)94, by the Abeuaqui Indians,
and has lived for the past month in the house of the Sisters of the Con
gregation of Notre Dame. The godfather was ]M. Jacques Leber, mer-
chant ; the godmother was Madame Marie Madeleine Dupont, wife of
W. de Maricourt, Ecuyer. Captain of a company of Marines: she named
this English girl Lydia Madeleine.
Signed **Ltdia Madkleine Longley,
" Madf.leine Dui'ont,
*' Lebeh, I
*'M. Caille, acting curaU."
After this attack of July 27th the town was left in
straitened circumstances, and the inhabitants found it
difficult to meet the demands made on them. In
this emergency they petitioned the General Court for
relief, which was duly granted.
Cotton Mather says that one man was killed at Gro-
ton in the year 1697, and another, with two children,
carried into captivity. (Mognalia, Book VII. page
91.) He does not give the date clearly, but inferen-
tially it is June. The prisoner was Stephen Holden,
who was captured, with his two oldest sons, John and
Stephen, Jr. John was released in January, 1699, at
which time the father and the other boy were yet
remaining in the hands of the savages. It was not
long, however, before they too were freed ; for, in the
following June, the House of Representatives voted
three pounds and twelve shillings for the expenses
that had been incurred in bringing them back.
Queen Anne's War, as it is commonly called in
America, broke out in the year 1702, when England
declared war against France and Spain ; and the
American Colonies were drawn into the contest. The
Indians in New England were in sympathy with the
French ; and they kept the frontier settlements con-
tinually on the alert. Strict vigilance, on the part of
the colonists was the price of their safety. Military
companies were still held under discipline and drill,
o3-ii
acd from lime to time were reviewed by the proper
officers. In the year 1702, Chief Justice Samuel Sewall
accompanied Governor Joseph Dudley through Mid-
dlesex Cjunty on a tour of inspection; and in hia
Diary, under date of October 28th, he writes:
" Went to GrotOD. saw Captain Preacot and hia company in Anns. (Gov
bad sent to them from Dunjtable tbut would visit them). Lancaster *ls
about 12 Miles Southward from Groton. Concord i£ lu Miles ^ and
Ten-Hod from Groton."
(Massachusetts Historical Collectiooa, VL fifth aorlea, fi7.)
After these alarms there was a short respite, which
continued till 1704, when the frontier towns were
again exposed to savage warfare, and this town Buf-
fered with the others.
Samuel Penhallow, in "The History of the Wars
oi New England" (Boston, 1726), thus refers to the
attack on this place in August, 1704 : The Indians —
'* afterwards fell on Lancojiirr, and (7ron/o«, where they did some dpod,
but not what they expected, for that these Towns were eeasooably
strengthened. . . .
" And yet a little while after they fell on QnaUm^ and Naihmoay [Lan-
caster], where they kill'd Lieut. WyUr fWilder], and several more.
(Pages 24, 25.)
In the library of the Massachusetts Historical So-
ciety is a manuscript diary of John Marshall, of
Braintree, which has the following entry :
The beginlng of this month of august [1701] the Indians did mischief
at Lancaster Killed 3 or 4 persons burnt their meeting house : and did
some harm allso at Groton. the same week. Killed one or more : about
2()l> men wentoitt after them who weer gone 20 days under major Taylor,
but Returned Without doing auy spoill on them."
The attack on Lancaster was on July 31st, and
that on Groton probably within a day or two of the
same time.
It was during this assault that Matthias Farns-
worth, Jr., was captured and taken to Canada, where
he remained permanently. He was afterward mar-
ried to a French wife, and his numerous posterity are
still living in Canada. The name is found written
now Farnet, Famef and Phaneuf.
A party of Indians, numbering about thirty, made
their appearance in town, and killed a man on the
night of October 25, 1704. Pursuit was at once made
for them, but it was unsuccessful. The Boston Neios-
Letter, October 30, 1704, gives the following account
of the affair:
" On Wednetdny night [October 2^S] an English man was killM In tfa*
woods at Groton by the Indians which were afterwards deacryed in the
night by the Light of their Fires, by a Perfton Travailing from Groom
to Laucaatef, and judged they might be about Thirty in uumtier ; pur-
suit was made after them, but none could he found."
From "Marshall's Diary'' we learn the name of
the man who was slain. It ■& there recorded :
"on the 25 day [October, 1704], nir Brock was ordained at marlbor-
roiigb. the next day a man was killed and scalped by the Indians he
belonged to the town of Groton his name was davis ; a very useful nuin
and much Lamented."
It has been a tradition that John Davis was killed
by the Indians, but the date of his death was un-
known ; this entry, however, seems to fix it. It is
said to have happened in the early part of the even-
514
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUxNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
iDg, while he was taking in some clothes which had
been washed and hung out to dry. He lived near the
Groton School, where W. Dickson resided when the
map in Mr. Butler's History was made ; and Davis's
Fordway, in the r'ver near by, named after him, is
still remembered by the older people of that neigh-
borhood.
It is not surprisipg that the inhabitants, upon the
renewal of hostilities, were obliged to ask for help
from the General Court. They had already suffered
much in life and property, and w^ere little able to
bear new burdens. They represented to the Gover-
nor that they had been greatly impoverished by their
loss of horses and cattle, of corn and hay, and that
they were scarcely able to hold out much longer ;
but the crowning calamity of all was the illness ot the
minister, Mr. Hobart, which prevented him from
preaching. Their means were so limited that they
could not support him and supply his place besides.
They were obligtd to earn their living at the peril of
their lives; and some were thinking to leave the
town. They spent so much time in watching and
guarding that they seemed to be soldiers rather than
farmers. Under these discouraging circumstances
they asked for help from the Province, and were al-
lowed out of the public treasury twenty pounds to
assist them in procuring another minister, besides ten
pounds to be divided among those who had been the
greatest sufferers in the late attack upon them.
Two years later another assault was made on the
town, though with little damage. I again quote from
Penhallow's History of the Wars of New England :
'• [July 21, 17(16], Several Stroke? were aflorwards mnde on Ctielms-
/ord, Sudbury and Groton, Mhere ihree Soldiers lb tbev were going to
publick Worship, were way-laid by a small Party, wlio kiU'd t^Yo, and
made the other a Prisoner." (Page 36.)
A few additional particulars of these " Strokes"
are found in the Rev. John Pike's Journal, printed
in the Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical
Society for September, 1875 :
"July 21, 1706. Sab: 2 suuldiers slain & one carried away by the
euemyat Groton. They were all new-Cambndpe [Newton] men i were
returned to their Post from one Bloods house, who had invited yo to
Dinner." (XIV. 143.)
Marshall, in his Diary, briefly alludes to this aflair,
thus :
" on the 21 [July] they Killed 2 and took one captive at groton.
The Rev. Jonathan Homer, in his History of
Newton, as published in the ilassachusetts Histori-
cal Collections, V. 273, gives the names of these men
as John Myrick, Nathaniel Healy and Ebenezer Se-
ger, and says they were all three killed by the Indians.
This statement, however, is inaccurate, as John My-
rick was not one of the three soldiers, and, further-
more, was alive after this date. It is sufficiently
clear from contemporaneous petitions among the
Massachusetts Archives (LXXI. 345,419), that two
of these men were brothers, by the name of Seeer
and the third one was Nathaniel Healey. It was
E benezer Seger who was killed, and, probably, Henry,
Jr., who was taken prisoner.
I At various times in its early history, Ihe town was
I threatened by bands of roving Indians, who did what-
ever damage lay in their power to do. Such incur-
sions kept the inhabitants on the alert, and from time
to time companies were organized for the purpose of
scouring the neighborhood.
On March 12, 1694-95, an Act was passed by the
General Court, which prohibited the desertion of fron-
tier towns by the inhabitants unless permission was
first granted by the Governor and Council. There were
elt-ven such towns, and Groton was one of thtm. The
law required the inhabitants of these out-towns, who
owned land or houses, to take out a special license,
on pain of forfeiring their property, before they could
quit their homes and live elsewhere. It was thought
that ihe interest of the Crown would be prejudiced,
and encouragement given to the enemy, if any of
these posts were deserted, or exposed by lessening
their strength. Many towns were threatened by the
Indians about this time, and a few were attacked. It
is recorded that some of the settlers here lelt the.
town, and there was probably a movement among the
inhabitants in other places to do the same. This
fact undoubtedly occasioned the enactment, which was
to remain in force " unto the end of the session of the
general assembly to convene in May, one thousand
six hundred ninety-six (if the present war so long
last), aud no longer, nor afterwards."
A similar Act was again passed on JIarch 22, 1699-
1700, which embraced fourteen irontier towns, of
which Grotou was oue, aud seven other towns that
" lye more open than many others to an attack of an
enemy." This enactment had a limitation in pt^nt of
time similar to the preceding one. Subsequently this
Act was revived on June 8, 1702, with the limitation,
though no towns are specified by name ; again on
June 28, 1706, it was re-enacted, to remain in force
until June 29, 1707 ; and still later, but not for the
last time, it was passed on June 10, 1707. This con-
tinuous legislation to prevent the desertion of the
frontiers shows clearly the unsettled condition of the
outlying towns during Queen Anne's War, and Groton
was no exception. The inhabitants were now living
in constant dread of the savages. Sometimes an ex-
posed farm-house was attacked and burned, sume of
the inmates killed and others carried away in captiv-
ity ; sometimes the farmer was shot down while at
work in the field, or while going or coming. This
was the fate of John Shattuck, and his eldest son John,
a young man nineteen years of age, who were killed
on May 8, 1709.
They were returning from the west side of the Na-
shua River, where Mr. Shattuck owned laud, and
were attacked just as they were crossing the Stony
Fordway, near the present site of Hollingworth's pa-
per-mills, where they were killed. At the time of his
death Mr. Shattuck was one of the selectmen of the
GROTON.
515
town. During the autumn of 1882 Messrs. Tileston
and HoUingworth, of Boston, at that time the owners
of the mill, caused a suitable btone to be placed by
the wayside, bearing the following inscription :
MEAB THIS SPOT
JOH.S SHATTUCK,
A EELECTMAN OF GBOTON,
AND
niS 60N JOHN
webe killed by the indians,
May 8, 1700,
while ceossing stony foedway,
just below the peesf.nt dam.
1882.
A remarkable fatality seems to have followed Mrs.
Shattuck's kindred. Her husband and eldest son
were killed by the Indians, as has just been mentioned.
Her father, James Blood, was likewise killed, Sep-
tember 13, 1692. So also were her uncle, William
Longley, his wife and five children, July 27, 1694;
and three others of their children were carried away
into captivity at the same time. A relative, James
Parker, Jr., and his wife were killed in this assault,
and their children taken prisoners. Her step-father,
Enoch Lawrence, received a wound in an engagement
with the Indians, probably in the same attack of July
27, 1694, which almost wholly prevented him from
earning a livelihood for himself and family. The
three Tarbell children, who were carried off to Canada
by the Indians, June 20, 1707, were cousins of Mrs.
Shattuck. John Ames, who was shot by the savages
at the gate of his own garrison, July 9, 1724, was the
father of Jacob, who married her niece, Ruth Shat-
tuck. And lastly, her son-in-law, Isaac Lakin, the
husband of her daughter Elizabelh, was wounded in
Lovewell's Fight at Pequawket, May 8, 1725. These
calamities covered a period of only one generation,
extending from the year 1692 to 1725.
In a list of prisoners held by the French and In-
dians in Canada, March 5, 1710-11, are the names of
"Zech: Tarbal, John Tarbal, Sarah Tarbal, Matt.
Farnsworth [and] Lydia Longley " (Archives, LXXI.
765), all of Groton, though no date of capture is
given. Lydia Longley was taken by the Indians on
July 27, 1694, and the particulars of her case have
already been told ; Matthia.s Farnsworth was captured
in the summer of 1704 ; and the Tarbell children were
carried off on June 20, 1707. Sarah. John and Zech-
ariah were children of Thomas and Elizabeth (Wood)
Tarbeli, who with a large family, lived on Farmers'
Row, near where James Lawrence's house now stands.
Sarah was a girl nearly fourteen years of age, John a
lad of twelve years and Zechariah only seven, at the
time when they were taken. They were near kindred
of the Longley family, who had been massacred
thirteen years before. The father was unquestionably
the Corporal Tarbell who commanded, in the autumn
of 1711, one of the eighteen garrisons in the town.
The story of their capture and captivity is a siDg;u-
lar one, and sounds like a romance. They were
picking cherries early one evening, — so tradition re-
lates,— and were taken before they had time to get
down from the tree. It should be borne in mind that
the date of capture, according to the new style of
reckoning, was July 1st, when cherries would be ripe
enough to tempt the appetite of climbing youngsters.
These children were carried to Canada, where, it
would seem, they were treated kindly, as no induce-
ment afterward was strong enough to make them re-
turn permanently to their old home. The girl, Sarah,
was sold to the French, and placed in a convent at
Lachine, near Montreal ; but what became of her
subsequently I am unable to say.
Thomas Tarbell, the father of these children, made
his will September 26, 1715, which was admitted to
probate six weeks later, and is now on file at the
Middlesex Probate Office in East Cambridge. After
making certain bequests to different members of his
family, he says:
"all the rest and residue of my Beall Estate I give to be Equally di-
vided between my three childreo, John, Zacliary, & Sarah Tarbell, npon
their return from Captivity, or In Proportion unto any of them that
shall return, & the rest, or the parts belonging: to them that do not re-
turn, shall be Equally divided among the rest of my children."
During jny visit at Montreal in the summer of
1877, I saw the Congregation of N6tre Dame, the
French record, of which the following is a trans-
lation :
" On Monday, July 23, 1708, the ceremony of baptism was performed
on Sarah Tarbell, who was born at Groton In New Engl&nd, October 9,
IbO.i. Her pareols were Thomas Tarbell and Elizabeth Wood, both
Protestants, and she was baptized by the minister shortly after her
birth. Having been taken by the eavagea on Blooday, June 20,1707,
she was brought to CaDoda ; she has since l)een sold, and has lived with
tiie Sisters of the Congregation of N6tre Dame, established at Lachine,
where she abjured her religion on May 1. Her godfather was M.
Jacques Vrbaiu Robert de LamorandiSre, Secretary of M. 1' Intendant ;
and her godmother was Madame Marguerite Bouat, wife of M. Etienne
Paacaud, the deputy treasurer of the King in this country.
Her name Sarah has been changed to Marguerite.
*' Signed,
"MC" BoDAT,
•'Pabcadd,
" Lauoeandiibe,
"Mebiel, Peetef.."
The boys remained for many years with their cap-
tors at Caughnawaga, an Indian village on the right
bank of the St. Lawrence River, directly opposite to
Lachine.
It is supposed that they left, this place about the
year 1760, when they moved up the river, in order to
establish another settlement.
In the year 1713 John Stoddard and John Wil-
liams were appointed by Governor Joseph Dudley to
go to Quebec and treat with the Governor-General
of Canada for the release of the New England pris-
oners. They were accompanied by Thomas Tarbell,
— probably the elder brother of the boys, — and we
find his petilion p/esented to the House of Repre-
sentatives June 1, 1715, "praying consideration and
allowance for his Time and Expences in going to
516
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Canada, witli Major Stoddard & Mr. Williams, Anno
1713, to recover the Captives."
The petition was referred, and, on the next day, —
"Capt. Noyet, from the Committee for Petitionp, made Report on the
Petition of Thomat TarboH, viz. That they are of Opinion that nothing
Is duo frtjni the Province to the aaid Turboll^ since he proceeded as a
Volunteer in that Service to Canada, Jc not inipinyed by the Govem-
ment, but recommended bim to tha fuvonr of the UouBe."
The report was accepted, and, in consideration of
Tarbell's services, he was allowed ten pounds out of
the public treasury. Captain Stoddard's Journal,
giving an account of the negotiations, is printed in
"The New England Historical and Genealogical
Register" (v. 26), for January, 1851, and Tarbell's
name is mentioned in it.
We find no further trace of these boys, now grown
up to manhood, during the twenty-five years follow-
ing this attempt to release the New England pris-
oners. In the winter of 1739 John and Zechariah
Tarbell came back to Groton in order to visit their
kinsfolk and see their native town. They were so
young when carried away that their recollections of
the place were of course very indistinct. It is not
known now under what circumstances or influences
they returned. An itemized bill of the expense in-
curred in bringing them back from Canada was
made out against their brothers, Thomas and Samuel,
and perhaps paid by them. Shortly afterward Thomas
Tarbell petitioned the General Court for means to
enable him to meet the necessary charges of the
journey, besides the expenses of an interpreter; and
a conditional loan was granted. The record does not
say whether it was ever paid back by him. The pa-
pers relating to the subject are among the Massachu-
setts Archives (XV. A, 15-19).
On April 20, 1739, Governor Belcher brought the
case of these captives to the attention of the Council
and the House of Representatives, when he made a
speech, in which he said:
"There are lately come from Canada some PerBons tliat were tnlien
by the Indians from Groton above thirty Veura ago, wliu (its believed)
may be induced to return into this Province, on your Kiving them some
proper Encouragement : If this Matter might be etfecled, I should
tbiuk it would be not only an Act of Compassion in order tu reclaim
them from the Errors and Delusions of the Romish faith ; but their
living among us might, in Time to come, be of great Advantage to the
ProTioce."
On the same day the subject was referred to a
Committee of the House, who reported a resolution
which was sent to the Council fur concurrence ; and
on several occasions within a short time the same
question came up in different forms.
All these efforts, however, to reclaim the two men
from savage life proved unavailing ; for it is known
that they remained with the Iiidians and became nat-
uralized, if I may use the expression. They married
Indian wives, and were afterward made chiefs at
Caughnawagtt and St. Regis, villages in Canada.
Their descendants are still living among the Indians,
and the Tarbells of the prebent day, in this town, are
their collateral kindred. Nearly forty years after
their capture. Governor Hutchinson met them in
New York State, and in his " History of the Province
of Massachusetts Bay" refers to them thus : —
"I saw at Albany two or three men, in the year 1744, who came in
with The Indians to trude, and who had been taken at Gruton in Ibis,
that is railed Qneen Ann's war. One of them, Tarbell, was said
to be one of Ihe weallhief-t of the Cnpnawnpn tribe. He made a visit in
bia Indian dress, and with his Indian cmplrxioii ifor by means of
grease and paints hut little dilTi-rence could be discernedl to bis rela-
tions at Groton, but had no inclination to remain there." (II. l:'.).)
Some years after this time, these two young men —
now occupying the position of chiefs — moved up the
St. Lawrence River, accompanied by several others,
all with their families, and established the village of
St. Regis. This Indian settlement is pleasantly situ-
ated on the right bank of the St. Lawrence, the
boundary line which separates the State of New York
from Canada running through it. From its peculiar
position, it was agreed, during the last war with Eng-
land, that the Indians should remain neutral, but the
compact was often broken. In the summer of 18.32
the tribe numbered about eleven hundred persons,. of
whom it is said that not one was of pure Indian origin.
Many interesting facts concerning the Tarbells at
St. Regis are found in the " History of St. Lawrence
and Franklin Counties, New York" (Albany, 1853),
by Dr. Franklin B. Hough. A part of the village
comes within the limits of Franklin County; and the
author has gathered up some of the stories still told
about these two brothers in that neighborhood.
In former years the St. Regis Indians had certain
rights in a land reservation in the State of New York ;
and more than once treaties were made between the
Governor of the State and the chiefs of the tribe,
among whom were descendants of these Tarbell boys.
A treaty was signed on February 20,1818, in behalf of
the Indians, by Loran Tarbell and Thomas Tarbell,
and two other chiefs. Another treaty was signed on
September 23, 1825, by eleven chiefs and trustees of
the tribe, including Peter Tarbell, Thomas Tarbell,
Mitchel Tarbell, Louis Tarbell, and Battice Tarbell.
Some of these names, I am sure, will sound familiar
to the older inhabitants of Groton. It is very likely
that Battice is the same as Sabattis, an Indian name,
which is said to be a corruption of Saint Buptistc.
Dr. Hough writes about one of the earlier members
of the family as follows : —
"A half-breed ludian, who usually was known as Petee the Big
Speak, was a sou of Leaor Tarbell, one of the lads who bad been
stolen ftway from Groton by the Indians, and who snbsequenlly be-
cai^ie one of the first settlers who preceded the founding of St. Reni3.
'* Ue was a man of much address and ability us it speaker, and was
selected as the mouthpiece of tlie tribe on the mule impunant occasiuns
that presented themselves." (Page 18Z)
The statement is wrong, however, that Lesor was
the name of one of the captured boys. It is perfectly
well known that their names were John and Zecha-
riah, but it is not improbable that one of their sons
was named Lesor. If such was the case, it was in-
tended, doubtless, for Eleazer, the name of their
youngest brother, who was less than two months old
GROTON.
517
when they were carried off. It certainly would be a
touching tribute to their childish recollections if they
had remembered this little babe at home and carried
him in their thoughts for so many years.
In ihe summer of 1877 I visited St. Regis, where I
met a grandson of one of the Tarbell captives. He
was more than eighty years old, and could speak only
Indian ; and I had to talk with him through an inter-
preter. I learned that he was aware that his grand-
father had been taken when a boy, from a town near
Boston, and that he had kinsfolk still living there.
What interested me exceedingly was the physical re-
semblance between him and some of his collateral
relations, who lived and died at Squaunacook withia
my recollection. He was a man of ordinary size, with
a sunburnt face and gray hair, though somewhat bald.
There was but little appearance of Indian blood in his
veins, and he would have passed anywhere for a good-
looking old man. He lived with one of his sons in a
small house that was clapboarded and painted, — and
one of the best in the village, — where, surrounded by
his grandchildren, he was passing the declining years
of his life in comfortable ease.
During the Kummer of 1723 " the Indian enemy" —
as the early settlers were wont to call them — still
threatened the western frontier towns. On August
IC, 1723, according to the printed Journal of the
House of Representatives, Lieutenant-Governor Dum-
mer, at that time the acting Governor of the Prov-
ince, was desired immediately to order detachments
of men, varying from three to six, from the inhabit-
ants of the several towns along the line of outer set-
tlements, to be constantly employed in scouting and
ranging the woods in their respective towns ; and un-
der this order Groton was to have six. On August
24th it was ordered by the House of Representatives
that thfse scouts should be placed under the direction
of the chief military officer of the several towns, and
such officer should receive five shillings a week for
his services. Owing to informalities in the matter, a
dispute arose between the House and the Lieutenant-
Governor, who within two days sent two messages
to that body, and some slight modifications were
made in the original draft.
Penhallow, in " The History of the Wars of New-
Ecgland," speaking of the Indians at this period,
says :
"Tlie next damase they did was at Groton, hul were so closely ptir-
Bued, that tLey left several of tbeir Packs behind." (Page 102.)
It was on Thursday, July 9, 1724, that John Ames
was shot by an Indian, one of a small party that
attacked his garrison in the northwesterly part of the
town. Ames lived on the north side of the Nashua
River, a short distance below the Hollingsworth
paper-mills. He is said to be the last person killed
by an Indian within the township. The Indian him-
self was immediately afterward shot by Jacob Ames,
one of John's sons. The Boston Gazette, July 13,
1724, thus refers to the event ; '
" A man was kill'd last Week at Groton. by tbe Indians, and 't la snp-
poe'd one Indian wua kill'd by one of our Men In tbe Garrison ; the In-
dians left tbeir Packs, 5 in liiuuber, wbicb were Ukeu and Mcur'd Xij the
EuglisU."
In the Gazette of July 27th it is said that "An Indian
Scalp was brought to Town last Week from Groton.''
The New England Oourant, July 13, 1724, reports
that " Last Week the Indians kill'd a Man at Groton,
and had one of their own Men very much wounded."'
The same newspaper, in its issue of July 27th, says
that " The Scalp of an Indian lately kill'd at Gro-
ton is brought to Town."
Jacob Ames' petition for an "Allowance" or boun-
ty, for killing the savage, is found in the printed
Journal of the House of Representatives, November
20, 1724.
In the summer of 1722 the Provincial governments
of Massachusetts and New Hampshire offered a bounty
of a hundred pounds for every Indian's scalp that
should be taken and shown to the proper authorities.
This legislation incited volunteers to scour the wilder-
ness for the purpose of hunting the savages, and with
this motive Captain John Lovewell, of Dunstable,
organized a company which soon became famous.
The story of Lovewell's Fight was for a long time
repeatedly told in this neighborhood, and there is
scarcely a person who has not from early infancy
heard the particulars of that eventful conflict. It
was in the spring of 1725 that Captain Lovewell, with
thirty-four men, fought a famous Indian chief, named
Paugus, at the head of about eighty savages, near the
shores of a pond in Pequawket, now within the limits
of Fryeburg, Maine, and known as Lovewell's Pond.
Of this little Spartan band, seven belonged in this
town ; and one of them, John Chamberlain by name,
distinguished himself by killing the Indian leader.
The fullest account of the Fight is found in a
pamphlet entitled, " Loeewell Lnmented, or, A
SERMON occasion'd by the Fall of the Brave Capt.
John Lovewell and Several of his Valiant COM-
PANY, in the late Heroic Action at Piggwacket Pro-
nounc'd at BradJoTd, May 16, 1725 By Thoman
iSymmw, V.D.M." (Boston, 1725.) The sermon con-
tains an historical preface, duly attested by three of
the company, which gives many particulars of this
ill-fated expedition. It includes a listof the men who
took part in the fight, with the names of the killed
and wounded. According to this list, the following
Groton men were members of Lovewell's company
and present during the action : John Jeflte, Daniel
Woods, Thomas Woods, John Chamberlain, Elias
Barron, John Gilson [Isaac Lakin ?], Joseph Gil-
son ; of whom Thomas Woods, Daniel Woods and
John Jefts were killed in the fight, and Elias Bar-
ron, John Chamberlain and John Gilaon [Isaac
Lakin ?], wounded. It is stated by Mr. Symmes, in
his preface, that Barron subsequently " strayed from
the rest, and got over Ossipy River, by the side of
which his Gun Case was found, & he has ner been
518
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
heard of since." (Page viii.) Joseph Gilson was the
only one of this quota who escaped injury.
The first edition of the sermon w.is pub-
lished on July 1st, and exhausted in a very few days.
A second edition was issued about the middle of
July, with a title-page somewhat changed from the
orginal one, as follows : " Historical Memoirs Of the
Late Fight at Piggwacket, with a SERMON Occa-
Bion'd by the Fall of the Brave Capt John Lovewell
And Several of his Valiant Company ; in the late
Heroic Action there. Prouounc'd at Bradford, May
16, 1725 By Thomas Symmes, V.D.M. The Sec-
ond Edition Corrected." (Boston, 1725.) In this
edition the running title of " An Historical
PREFACE" is changed to " Memoirs of the Fight at
Piggwacket." A few corrections are made ; in the
list both of the soldiers and of the wounded, the
name of Isaac Lakin is given in the place of John
Gilson's.
Captain Love\Yell, the commander of the company,
was a brave officer and a noted man. He was at this
time in the prime of life, and ambitious to distinguish
himself. He had previously led two successful expe-
ditions against the Indians, and his very name in-
spired confidence. Only a few weeks before, his sec-
ond expedition had returned to Dover, New Hamp-
shire, where he made a triumphal entry at the head
of his company. They bore ten Indian scalps
stretched on hoops, and were received with great joy
and excitement; thence they proceeded to Boston,
where they were paid a large bounty by the govern-
ment. The following Groton men were members of
the company which went on this second expidition :
Jacob Ames, Ephraim Farnsworth, Reuben Farns-
worth, Benjamin Parker, Samuel Shattuck, Samuel
Tarbell and Henry Willard. Throughout New Eng-
land, Lovewell's daring was made the subject of talk,
and the public looked to him as a natural leader in
border warfare.
With the small force now at his command, the
heroic captain pressed forward to meet the enemy,
and in a few days reached the borders of Saco Pond,
since known as Lovewell's Pond, southeast of the
present village of Fryeburg, Maine. On the morn-
ing of Saturday, May 8th, while engaged at prayers
they heard a gun, and shortly afterward discovered
an Indian on a point of land which ran into the
pond. They were distrustful of an ambush, and a
consultation was held in order to see whether they
should advance or retreat. Their decision was to pro-
ceed at all hazards. They said: "We came out to
meet the Enemy ; we have all along prayed GOD we
might find 'em ; and we had rather trust Providence
■with our Lives, yea Dy for our Country, than try to
Return without seeing them, if we may, and be called
Cowards for our Pains." After this answer, Lovewell
ordered his men to move forward cautiously ; and
they soon reached a place where they halted and took
oflF their packs, and piled them up togtther. Leaving
these behind without a guard, and advancing a short
distance, they came upon the Indian whom they had
previousily descried. He was returning to his com-
panions with some g.irae that he had killed. Several
guns were instantly discharged at him, when he in
tu»n fired and wounded Captain Lovewell and another
man ; after which he was killed and scalped. The
company then turned back, and with their wounded
leader repaired to the place where they had left their
packs. In the meanwhile Paugus, the far-famed
chief of the Pequawkets, at the head of eighty war-
riors on their way home from a marauding expedi-
tion, had discovered the pile of packs, and, couuting
them, had learned the number of the English. Find-
ing that the force was much less than his own, Paugus
placed his men in ambush and awaited the return of
Lovewell. When the company came up for their
packs, the Indians with hideous yells rushed forth
suddenly from their hiding-places and began to fire.
The brave captain ordered his men to return it, which
was done with terrible effect. Lovewell himself fell
at the first shot, and eight of his men soon .--hared the
same fate. Ensign Wyman, of Woburn, then as-
sumed the command, and, perceiving that the Indians
were trying to surround them, ordered a retreat to the
pond, where he took his stand. A ledge of rocks pro-
jecting into the water on one side of him, and a deep
brook on the other, made a position favorable for de-
fence. The fighting continued, and during the day
the savages vainly endeavored to compel the valiant
band to surrender; but they would not listen to the
proposition. Paugus was slain in the action by John
Chamberlain, of Groton. After the death of their
chief the Indians became somewhat disheartened,
and for a time withdrew from the skirmish. Later in
the day the combat was resumed, when, it is supposed,
the enemy received reinforcements, but with no deci-
sive result. As night approached they again with-
drew, and left this little forlorn band masters of the
field.
About midnight the survivors, with the excep-
tion of three men mortally wounded and unable to
travel, fell back and directed their course to the fort,
where they expected to find their former companions;
but in this hope they were sadly disappointed. It
seems that, at the beginning of the fight, a member of
the company, escaping, made his way to the fort, and
reported that Lovewell and his men were all cut to
pieces, which he may have believed. Disappointed
at finding the fort abandoned, the survivors of this
memorable command made their way back to the set-
tlements as best they could, coming in at different
places along the frontier line.
The name of Lovewell at once became famous, and
the story of the expedition was fold in every house-
hold, and even in the pulpit. It was made the subject
of ballads, which were sung at family firesides, and
excited the popular heart with the memory of the
brave and adventurous leader. Peace soon followed
GROTON.
519
the action at Pequawket, and deep and Bincere was
the public feeling at its restoration.
John Chamberlain, the surviviLg hero of Lovewell's
. Fight, was the son of Thomas and Elizabeth Cham-
berlain, of Chelmsford, where he was bora March 29,
1692. The father was a carpenter and miller, who
afterwards removed to Groton, and lived about a
quarter of a mile northerly of Wattle's Pond, on the
left-hand side of the road to Hollis. He is supposed
to have died about the year 1709. After the fight
the son was known as " Paugus John,'' and bore that
name through life. He owned a mill, situated near
Brown Loaf, on a small stream formed by the con-
fluence of Martin's Pond Brook and another, now
called Paugus Brook.
His death took place about the year 1756, though
no record of it is found. The appraisal of his estate
was made on March 31, 1756, according to papers on
file in the Middlesex Probate Office at East Cam-
bridge.
If ever young Paugus came to Groton in order to
avenge hia father's death, and it seems probable from
tradition that he did, it was undoubtedly at this place,
Furthermore, there is a deep hole in Paugus Brook,
known since the last century as Paugus Hole, where-
in it is said that Chamberlain sunk the body of the
Indian, after he had killed him. A small elm stands
on the south bank of the brook, very near the place.
Many other tales about the Indians have come
down by tradition, and some of thera are probably
true. The following story, told me by the late Charles
Woolley, refers to Isaafc Lakin, one of Lovewell's
men :
Lakin lived in a log-house near the Nashua River,
in the north part of the town. The house had no
glass windows, but had shutters instead, and a door
that swung on wooden hinges. One day an Indian
was seen lurking about the house, and hiding behind
the stumps, apparently bent on mischief Lakin
seized his gun, and, standing at a crack in the
shutters, told his wife to swing the door so that it
would creak on its hinges. Hearing the noise, and
seeing the door open, the Indian sprang from behind
a stump, and started for the house, when Lakin fired
and shot him dead. Seeing no sign of other Indian.s,
after dark he dug a hole and buried him.
In the year 1744 war was again declared between
England and France, called by the English colonists
King George's War. Civilization had now pushed
the belt of frontier towns far into the wilderness; and
Groton was no longer exposed to the assaults of the
Indians, though at times threatened with danger.
Her SODS and soldiers, however, were still found
during this period, on the outer rim of settlements,
whenever and wherever their services were needed,
either to extend the borders or to defend them. A
military organization was kept up in the town, ready
for emergencies here or elsewhere in the neighbor-
hood.
The first settlement of Charlestown, N. H. — then
known as No. 4, — was made in the year 1740, by three
brothers, Samuel, David, and Stephen Farnsworth,
natives of Groton ; and they were soon followed by
Isaac Parker and his sons, and Obadiah Sawtell, also
of this town. The Farnsworths were leading men at
Charlestown, and they distinguished themselves on
several occasions in fights with the Indians. Samuel
Farnsworth, the eldest brother, was killed in a
skirmish, May 2, 174G. David was taken priaoner
by a party of French Indians, April 20, 1757, and
carried to Canada. He managed to escape, and
reached home not a long time probably after his cap-
ture. Stephen, the youngest brother, had also his
bitter experience with the enemy. He was captured
April 19, 1746, and taken to Montreal, where he re-
mained seventeen long months before he was ex-
changed. His health was so broken down by the
hardships of his captivity that he never fully regained
it. He died September 6, 1771, leaving behind the
reputation of a brave man and a good citizen.
Ebenezer Farnsworth, a native of Groton and a
kinsman of the three brothers just mentioned, was
captured August 30, 1754, by the St. Francis Indians,
at Charlestown. He was carried to Montreal and held
a prisoner during three yearo. His ransom was paid
in the summer of 1755, but he was not then set at
liberty. Mrs. Susanna Johnson and her sister, Miriam
Willard, were taken at the same time. They were
both daughters of Moses Willard, who had formerly
lived in the south part of this town. A full account of
the afikir is given in " A Narrative of the Captivity
of Mrs. Johnson," published at Walpole, New Hamp-
shire, in 1796. Two years later, on June 18, 1756,
Moses Willard, the father, was killed by the Indians,
at Charlestown ; and in the same attack his son,
Moses, Jr., had* narrow escape from death by the
hands of the savages, being severely wounded at the
time.
Lieutenant Isaac Parker was taken by the In-
dians at the same time with Stephen Farnsworth,
and remained in captivity until the following winter,
when he was returned to Boston under a flag of
truce.
The Sawtell family is also largely represented in
Charlestown, where the name is now spelled Sartwell.
It is a numerous family in that town, and they sprang
from the early settler, Obadiah. who went from
Groton. He, too, had a sad experience in savage
warfare, and once was captured by the Indians. He
was taken by them on May 24, 1746, and remained a
prisoner until August 20, 1747. He finally met his
death at their hands on June 17, 1749, being attacked
while ploughing in his corn-field, unsuspicious of any
danger.
Charles Holden, Isaac Holden and Seth Walker,
natives of Groton, were early settlers and proprietors
of Charlestown. Moses Wheeler was another pioneer
and a distinguished soldier, taking part in some of
520
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the fiercest encounters of the French and Indian
War. He was a large man and noted for his strength.
He was called by the Indians "the strongman."
Moses Willard, Isaac Farwell and Micba Fuller, other
settlers, were also from this town. Eleazer Priest,
son of Joseph Priest, of Groton, and a soldier, was
captured by the Indians, on March 15, 1748, at
Charlestown, and died at Louisburg, Nova Scotia, in
September of that year, while on his way home.
The earliest minister of Groton was the Reverend
John Miller, who graduated at Gonvil and Caius Col-
lege, Cambridge, England, in the year 1627, and came
to this country in 1637. For a short time he lived in
Roxbury, where he was one of the elders in Eliot's
church. From the year 1639 to 1641, and perhaps
later, he was settled in the ministry at Rowley as as-
sistant to the Reverend Ezekiel Rogers ; and during
this period he filled the office of town clerk. He was
made a freeman of Massachusetts on May 22, 1639. In
theau'.umn of 1641 he was waited on by messengers from
Woburn, who desired his services for their church ;
but they found " Mr. Roggers loth to part with him."
Johnson, in his " Wonder- Working Providence of
Sion's Saviour, in New England," refers to him both
in prose and verse. The following is a specimen of
the poetry : —
*' WiUt courage bold Miller Ihrouyh Seas doUt venter.
To Toi/t it out in the ijreai Weitern icast,
Tlnf stature lovt one object hiyh doth center ;
Higher than Heaven thy faith on Cbi-iit u plac't: "
—Chap. XI., p. 131.
From Rowley Mr. Miller removed to Yarmouth,
where he was settled as a preacher, though the date of
his removal to that town is not recorded. Nor is it
known exactly when he came to Groton, but probably
at some time during 1662, as in that year the town
voted to build a house for the minister. On March
18, 1663, a vote was passed asking him " to continue
still with vs for our further editicat[ion]," which
shows that he was preaching at that date ; but in three
short months his labors ceased and he went to take
his reward. In the first return of deaths, made by
the town clerk of Groton to the recorder of the
county, it says: —
" M'. Jn°. Miller, minister of Gods holy word died.
June 12"' 1663."
The second minister of Groton was the Reverend
Samuel Willard, a son of Major Simon and Mary
(Sharpe) Willard, and born at Concord, on January
31, 1639-40. He graduated at Harvard College in
the class of 1659, and was the only member who
took his second degree. He began to preach at Gro-
ton probably late in the year 1662, or early in 1663.
In the latter year, on the 2l3t of June, it was voted
" that M'. Willard if he accept of it shall be
their minester as long as he Hues w' M'. Willard ac-
cepts Except a manifest providenc of God apears to
take him otf."
Mr. Willard was a scholar and writer of consider-
able note in his day, and even now would be con-
sidered such. But little is known of his early history ;
and no church-record during his ministry at Groton
is extant. Coming here in the vigor of young man-
hood, at the age of twenty-three, — if we may judge
him from the high position he afterward attained, — it
is fair to assume that he exerted a strong influence in
this neighborhood. It is probable that his early ex-
periences on the outer rim of civilization fitted him
for the places of honor and dignity that he was subse-
quently called upon to fill. A few weeks afier his
settlement he married Abigail, a daughter of John
Sherman, minister of Watertown ; and, after her
death, he married, as his second wife, Eunice, daughter
of Edward Tyng. He had a large family ofchildren,
of whom five were born in this town. One of his
great grandsons, Robert Treat Paine, was a signer of
the Declaration of Independence.
In the year 1673, Mr. Willard published a volume
of sermons entitled, " Useful Instructions for a pro-
fessing People in Times of great Security and Degen-
eracy : delivered in several Sermons on Solemn
Occasions."
It consists of three sermons, of which one wa3_
preached on the occasion of a case of witchcraft which
occurred in Grotor. It is evident, from a reference in
the sermon, that the fame or notoriety of the case had
spread far from this town. Mr. Willard says : " There
is a voice in it to the whole Land, but in a more es-
pecial manner to poor Groton; it is not a Judgement
afar off, but it is near us, yea among us."
The book is inscribed, "To his Beloved Friends the
Inhabitants of Groton." Like all the publications of
that time, it is purely theological, and contains
nothing now of particular interest. If he had given
us even a few lines of town history, it would be almost
invaluable. We look in vain through its pages lor any
thing that throws light on the manners and customs
of the early settlers. We do find, however, the modes
and habits of thought that were prevalent in those
days ; and with these we must be content, for the ser-
mons furnish nothing more.
After the town was burned by the Indians in the
spring of 1676 and the settlement deserted, Mr. Wil-
lard became the pastor of the Old South Church in
Boston, where he died on September 12, 1707.
The third minister was the Reverend Gershom Ho-
bart, a son of the Reverend Peter Hobart, of Hing-
ham, and a graduate of Harvard College in the class
of 1667. In the early spring of 1678, just two years
after the attack on the town, the old settlers returned
to their former houses ; and Mr. Hobart accompanied
them, or soon followed. He was not ordained, how-
ever, until November 26, 1679 ; and soon afterward
troubles between the people and the preacher began
to spring up. There was the usual controversy about
the site of the new meeting-house, which is not pecu-
liar to this town or to that period, but is common to-
day here and elsewheie; and there was a dispute over
GROTON
521
the minister's salary. Mr. Hobart's pastorate was
anything but happy and harmonious, and he appears
to have left Grolon about 1690. The records ot this
period are very meagre, but contain brief allusions to
his absence. During the next two years there was
no settled minisier of the town, though the inhabit-
ants were not without stated preaching. The Reverend
John Hancocli filled the pulpit for several months
and received a call to become the minister, which
was declined. He was the grandfather of John Han-
cock, Governor of the Commonwealth and signer of
the Declaration of Independence.
The fourth minister was the Reverend Samuel Car-
ter, who came on an invitation given by the town, on
October 21, 1692. It is evident, from the scanty records,
that he accepted the call and remained with his peo-
ple until the time of bis death, which took place in
the autumn of 1693. According to papers on file in
the Middlesex Probate Office at East Cambridge, ad-
ministration on his estate was granted on October
30th of that year. Mr. Carter was the eldest son of
Thomas Carter, first minister of Wobum, and born
on August 8, 1640. He graduated at Harvard Col-
lege in the class of 1660, and, before coming to Gro-
ton, had been preaching at Lancaster for a consider-
able length of time. He was followed in time by
Gershom Hohart, who became the fifth minister as
well as the third, in the order of settlement. Mr.
Hobart came back to his former parish in the autumn
of 1693, but it is not now known how the reconcilia-
tion was brought about between him and the town,
as the church records of that period are lost; perhaps
it was through an ecclesiastical council. He contin-
ued to preach here until about the end of the year
1704, when he gave up his charge. His dwelling
stood on the site of the present Baptist meeting-
house, and, at one time during the Indian wars, was
used as a garrison-house. On July 27, 1694, it was
captured by the savages, when one of Mr. Hobart's
children was killed, and another, Gershom, Jr., a lad
eight or ten years old, was carried ofT a prisoner
and held in captivity during nearly a year. Mr. Ho-
bart, the father, died at Groton on December 19,
1705.
During the year 1705 the pulpit appears to have
been filled by John Odiy, as the records have it, and
probably the same as John Odlin, a native of Boston
and a graduate of Harvard College in the class of 1702.
On July 3, 1705, he received a call to be the " town's
minister and the church's officer," which was not ac-
cepted.
The fifth minister was the Reverend Dudley Brad-
street, a son of Dudley Bradstreet, of Andover, and
a grandson of Governor Simon Bradstreet. He was
born at Andover on April 27, 1678, and a graduate of
Harvard College in the class of 1698. He was ihe
first master of the grammar school in his native town,
where he was teaching as early as the year 1704, and
perhaps earlier.
It is highly probable that he was connected with
this school when he received his invitation to come
to Groton. On May 4, 1704, he was married to Mary
Wainwright, and they had three sons, and perhaps
other children. Mr. Bradstreet was preaching here
as early as March, 1706, but was not ordained until
November 27th of that year. Under a vole of May 8,
1706, a house " of 38 foot long and 18 foot wide" was
built for the minister, which is etiil standing, and in
a state of good preservation. It is situated on the
east side of Hollis Street, and the present measure-
ments conform very nearly to the dimensiona given
in the record".
In the summer of 1712 Mr. Bradstreet was dismis-^ed
from his charge in this town, presumably for his
Episcopal tendencies ; and soon afterward he went
to England to apply for orders in the Anglican
Church. It appearx from a copy of the original docu-
ment in Latin, made in a manuscript volume, (page
90), by President John Leverett now deposited
among the archives of Harvard University in the
College Library, that he was ordained a deacon by
the Bishop of London, on April IS," 1714, and a priest
one week later, on April 25th. He died of small-pox
during the next month, only two or three weeks after
receiving priestly orders; and tidings of his death
reached this country in the following summer.
The sixth minister was the Reverend Caleb Tr >w-
bridge, a son of Deacon James Trowbridge, of New-
ton. He was born on November 17, 1692, and grad-
uated at Harvard College in the class of 1710. On
March 10, 1715, he waa married, first, to Sarah Oliver,
of Newton; and on September 18, 1718, to Hannah
Walter, of Roxbury. Mr. Trowbridge was blessed
with a family of nine children, and until recently
some of his descendants were living at Groton. He
died on September 9, 1760, and lies buried in the old
burying-ground, where the inscription on a slab of
slate laid over his grave makes a just statement of his
religious and social character.
The seventh minister was the Reverend Samuel
Dana, son ofWilliam Dana, and born in that part of
Cambridge which is now Brighton, on January 14,
1738-39. He was a graduate of Harvard College in
the class of 1755, and ordained in the ministry at
Groton on June 3, 1761. No articles of faith or
church covenant appear on the church records until
the period of his settlement. On May 6, 1762, he
was married to Anna Kenrick, of Newton ; and they
had five children born at Groton. His pastorale
appears to have been harmonious until the political
troubles of the Revolution began to crop out, when »
sermon preached by him in the early spring of 1775
gave great offence to his parish. Mr. Dana's sympa-
thies were with the Crown, while those of the people
were equally strong on the other side; and the ex-
citement over the matter ran so high that he was
compelled to give up his charge. After his dismissal
from the town and church he remained at Groton
522
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
during some years, preaching for a year and a half to
a PresDYlerian society, then recently organized ; and
later he removed to Anaherst, New Hampshire,
where he ditd on April 2, 1798.
The eighth minister was the Revereod Diiniel
Chaplin, a son of Jonathan Chaplin, of Rowley,
where he was born on December 30, 1743. He grad-
uated at Harvard College in the class of 1772, and
studied thejlogy under the tuition of the Reverend
Samuel Haven, of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. He
was ordained at Groton on January 1, 1778, when he
became pastor of the First Parish, and he continued
to hold this relation until the time of- his death, on
April 8, 1831, being the last minister settled by the
town. The degree of D.D. was conferred upon him
by his Alma Hater in the year 1817. On June 24, 1779,
he was married to Susanna, eldest daughter of the
Honorable James and Susanna (Lawrence) Prescott,
of Groton. After their marriage they lived for awhile
in the house built by Colonel William Lawrence, who
was Mrs. Chaplin's grandfather. It was situated on
the north corner of Main and Court Streets, lat-
terly the site of Liberty Hall, which waa burned
on March 31, 1878; and subsequently they removed
to the dwelling built by Major William Swan, and
situated on School Street, north of the burying-
ground.
Dr. Chaplin's youngest daughter, Mrs. Sarah
(Chaplin) Rjctwood, died in Cortland, Cortland
County, New York, on November 26, 1889, at the re-
markable age of 104 years and eighteen days.
The ninth minister was the Reverend Charles Rob-
inson, the eldest son of Caleb Robinson, of Exeter,
New Hampshire, where he was born on July 25,
1793. He graduated at Harvard College in the class
of 1818, and was ordained over the Unitarian Church
at Eastport, Maine, where he remained two years and
a half Mr. Robinson was installed at Groton on No-
vember 1, 1826, and resigned his charge in October,
1838. He was afterward settled at Medfield and at
Peterborough, New Hampshire, but in the year ISiiO
he returned to Groton, where he resided until his
death, on April 9, 1862. During his residence here
he was married, on July 3, 1827, to Jane, only daugh-
ter of the Honorable Stuart John Park, of Groton,
who died on March 23, 1828 ; and subsequently to
three other wives.
The tenth minister was the Rev. George Wads-
worth Wells, sonof Seth and Hannah (Doane) Wells,
of Boston, where he was born on October 17, 1804.
He graduated at Harvard College in the class of
1823, and then pursued his theological studies at the
Harvard Divinity School. For a while he preached
in Boston and Baltimore, and, on October 24, 1827,
was ordained at Kennebunk, Maine, as colleague pas-
tor of the first Congregational Church in that town,
where he remained during eleven years. On Novem-
ber 21, 1838, Mr. Wells was installed over the First
Parish in Groton, where he preached with great ac-
ceptance and success until his death, which took
place on March 17, 1843. The last time that he of-
ficiated in the pulpit was on Sunday, February oth of
that year. He was married on May 30, 1S33, to
Lucia Gardner, daughter of John Fairfield, of Bos-
ton. Jmt before graduation at college, his middle
name was inserted by an Act of the Legislature, on
June 14, 1823.
The eleventh minister was the Reverend Joseph
Couch Smith, a native of Waltham, where he was
born on July 18, 1819. He graduated at Bowdoiii
College in the cla^s of 1838, and subsequently pas-'ed
two years at the Andover Theological Seminary. On
October 11, 1842, he was ordained in Portland as an
Evangelist. Alter Mr. WelU's death he came to Gro-
ton, and was installed on July 12, 1843. Here he re-
mained during eight years, working diligently and
faithfully iu the cause of his .Master, to which he had
devoted his life. Finally the loss of his health com-
pelled him to ask a dismission, and his relations to
the society ceased in August, 1851. After passing
six or eight months in foreign travel, and returning
home much invigorated, he was called to the Chan-
uing Congregational Church, at Newton. Here he
preached for four years, when his physical infirmi-
ties again compelled him to seek retirement from hi-t
cares and labors; and he sailed for the Sandwich Isl-
ands in the hope that be would still be able to act as
an agent of the American Unitarian Association, but
in this he W.13 disappointed. After a rapid decline
he died at Honolulu, of consumption, on December,
29, 1857.
Mr. Smith was twice married, — first, on August 31,
1843, to Augusta Hep>ibah, daughter of Ivory and
Louisa (McCulloch) Lord, of Kennebunk, .Maine;
and secondly, on December 8, 1846, to JIargaret Ann,
daughter ^of George and Margaret (.Shattuck) Brig-
ham, of Groton. His fir^t wife died at Groton, on
June 20, 1844, and his widow in Lowell, on March
31, 1864.
The twelfth minister was the Rev. Crawford Night-
ingale, a son of Samuel and Elizabeth Kinnicut,
(Thompson) Nightingale, and born in Providence.
R. I., on November 3, 1816. He graduated at Brown
University in the class of 1834, and at the Harvard
Divinity School in 1838, and was ordained as an
Evangelist, in Providence, on November 7, 1838. He
was married, on May 13, 1846, to Mary Hoyt, daugh-
ter of William Henry and Frances Wiswall (Hum-
phrey) Williams, of Athol. Mr. Nightingale was
settled over the parish on January 26, 1853, and
received his dismissal on September 1, 1866, though
he continued to be a resident of the town until the
year 1875. Before coming here he held a pastorate
at Chicopee, and had previously acted as a mission-
ary in Tuledo, O., and in Chicago. He has now re-
tired from the laborious duties of his profession,
though he preaches occasionally, and is living at
Dorchester.
GROTON.
523
The thirteenth minister was the Rev. George Mc-
Kean Folsom, a son of Charles and Susanna Sarah
(McKean) Folsom, and born in Cambridge on Feb-
ruary 6, 1837. He graduated at Harvard C'llege in
the class of 1857, and at the Harvard Divinity School
in 186G. He was ordained at Groton on December
12, 1866, and married, on January 8, 18G7, to Susan
Cabot, daughter of Criarles, Jr., and Susan (C^bot)
Jackson, of Boston. In Apri', 1869, he left Groton
and removed to Dedham, where he was installed
over another parish. He died in Boston on May 20,
1882, and his wife at Dedham on June 27, 1871. An
only child, a daughter, born at Groton on November
16, 1867, survives the parents.
The fourteenth minister was the Rev. John Martin
Luther Babcock, a son of James Babcock, of Ando-
ver, Me., where he was born on September 29, 1822.
His father's family removed to Boston in the year
1825, where he remained until 1846. In early life he
studied for the Baptist ministry, and joined the cleri-
cil profession in 1852, though he was not ordained
until January, 1854. He held pastorates at different
towns in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont, but
later he changed his denominational relations and
entered the Unitarian pulpit, being settled at Lancas-
ter, N. H., before coming to this town. He was in-
stalled over the First Parish on April 26, 1871, though
he had been preaching here since December 1, 1870,
and received his dismission on August 31, 1874,
though he continued to fill ihe pulpit until April 1,
1875. Since leaving Groton he has given up the
profession. On November 30. 1843, he was married
(first) to Martha Day Ayer, of Plaistow, N. H., who
died on January 26, 1846; and, secondly, on April 5,
1849, to Miriam Clement Tewksbury, of VVilmot, who
died at New Hampton, N. H.,on September 22, 1888.
The fifteenth minister was the Rev. Joshua Young,
a son of Aaron and Mary (Coburn) Young, and born
at Pittston, Me., on September 29, 1823. He gradu-
ated at Bowdoin College in the class of 1845, and at
the Harvard Divinity School in 1848. He was mar-
ried, on Febraary 14, 1849, to Mary Elizabeth, daugh-
ter of Dr. Sylvanusand Mary Bell (Warland) Plymp-
ton, of Cambridge. Mr. Y'oung was settled in Gro-
ton at the beginning of 1875, and still continues to
be the minister of the parish. Before c >ming to this
town he had held pastorates in Burlington, Vt., and
in Hingham and Fall River. On commencement,
June 26, 1890, he received the honorary degree of
Doctor of Divinity from his Alma Mater.
The formation of a second church in Groton dates
back to the summer of 1825, when the venerable Dr.
Chaplin, enfeebled by age, became so infirm that he
required the help of an assistant. At that time he
was well past eighty years, and the powers of a vig-
orous manhood were beginning to fail him. On Sun-
day afternoon, July 10, 1825, a very hot day, Ht.
Chaplin, near the end of his sermon, fainted in his
pulpit ; and soon after the question of settling a col-
league pastor came up. This matter gave rise to
much controversy and discussion, and resulted in a
division of the old parish into two societies.
It happened during a period when throughout
the Commonwealth many of the Congregational
Churches were undergoing great changes in their
creed, and were forming new lines of theological be-
lief Few peisons of the present day are aware of the
bitter animosity that prevailed in New England at
that time, when these churches were torn asunder by
internal dissensions, and of the sectarian feeling that
followed the divi.tion of the parishes. At the begin-
ning of the troubles the Reverend John Todd, agrad-
uate of the Andover Theological Seminary in the class
of 1825, had received a call to become a colleague pas-
tor with Rev. Dr. Chaplin, but which, owing to cer-
tain informalities, was never recognized by the town,
and over his settlement the main controversy had
arisen. The second society, made up of those who
had now separated from the First Parish, was duly
organized and a house of worship built, which was
dedicated to the service of God on January 3, 1827,
and at the same time Mr. Todd was ordained in the
ministry. He remained as pastor of this society,
which became known as the Union Congregational
Church, until January 8, 1833, when he was dismissed
at his own request.
The Reverend John Todd was the eldest child of
Dr. Timothy and Phebe (Bud) Todd, and born in
Rutland, Vt., on October 9, 1800. He graduated at
Y''ale College in the class of 1822, and then entered
the Theological Seminary at Andover. On March 11,
1827, he was married to Mary Skinner, daughter of
the Reverend Joab Brace, of Newington, Conn., who
died at Pittsfield on April 29, 1889. After leaving
Groton, Dr. Todd held pastorales at Northampton,
Philadelphia and Pittsfield, where he died on August
24, 1873, after an illness of three months. In the year
1845 the degree of Doctor of Divinity was conferred
upon him by Williams College. He was the author
of more than thirty volumes, besides many sermons
and pamphlets, including among them "The Stu-
dent's Manual," a work which has exerted a wide in-
fluence on the young men of the country.
The second minister of the Union Church was the
Reverend Charles Baker Kittredge, a son of Joaiah
and Mary (Baker) Kittredge, and born at Mount Ver-
non, N. H., on July 4, 1806. He graduated at Dart-
mouth College in the class of 1828, and at the Ando-
ver Theological Seminary in 1832. He was ordained
at Groton on October 15, 1833, but the time of his
ministry here was short, as he was dismissed on
August 31, 1835. After leaving this town he was set-
tled over various parishes in different places, and died
at Westborough on November 25, 1884. Mr. Kit-
tredge was married, on July 9, 1830, to Sarah, daugh-
ter of Charles and Susanna (Bayliss) Brigham, of
Grafton, who died on March 26, 1871.
The third minister was the Reverend Dudley
524
HISTORY OP MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Phelps, a Dative of Hebron, Conn., where he was
born on January 25, 1798, and a graduate of Yale
College in the class of 1823, and of the Andover The-
ological Seminary in 1827. He was ordained at
Haverhill on January 9, 1828, where he remained
until the year 1833, and during 183-t and 1835 was
the editor of the Salem Landmark. Mr. Phelps was
installed at Groton on October 19, 1836, where he
continued as pastor of the church until his death,
which took place on September 24, 1849. He was
the father of the late Hon. Benjamin Kinsman Phelps,
district attorney of New York, an only child by the
first wife, who was Ann Kinsman, of Portland, Me.
The second wife was Lucretia, diiughter of the Hon.
Benjamin Mark and Lucretia (Gardner) Farley, of
Hollis, N. H., and of Groton, to whom he was mar-
ried on October 12, 1837.
The fourth minister was the Reverend Edwin
Adolphus Buikley, a son of Erastus and Mary (Wal-
bridge) Buikley, and born in Charlestou, S. C, on
January 25, 1826. He graduated at Yale College in
the class of 1844, and at the Union Theological Sem-
inary in 1848, and was married, on September 28,
1848, at Huntington, Long Island, N. Y., to Cath-
arine Fredrica, daughter of Daniel and Catharine
Fredrica (Kunze) Oakley. Mr. Buikley was installed
over the society on September 18, 1850, and dismissed
on January 10, 1864. Before coming to Groton he
was settled at Geneva, N. Y., and on leaving this
town he went to Platlsburg. At the present time he
has charge of a Presbyterian Church at Rutherford,
N. J. He has been blessed with eight children, of
whom three survive, and five of the eight were born
at Groton. In the year 1868 the degree of D.D. was
conferred upon him by the University of Vermont.
The filth minister was the Reverend William
Wheeler Parker, a son of Ebenezer and Hannah
Brooks (Merriam) Parker, and born at Princeton on
March 2, 1824. He gradu.ited at the Andover Theo-
logical Seminary in 1858, and on August 24th, of that
year, he was married at Holden to Emily, daughter of
Joel and Diodamia Walker. Mr. Parker was in-
stalled at Groton on May 16, 1865, and dismissed at
his own request on August 25, 1868. Since leaving
this town he has lived in several places, but is now
residing at Harwich Port.
The sixth minister was the Reverend Jeremiah
Knight Aldrich, a son of Nehemiah Knight and
Sarah Bowen (Branch) Aldrich, and born in Provi-
dence, R. I., on May 20, 1826. He became a licen-
tiate after an examination before the Windham
County (Connecticut) Association of Congregational
Ministers, on June 4, 1862, and was ordained at Cen-
tral Village, Plainfield, in that Slate, on February 17,
1863. He was settled at Groton on June 1, 1870, and
dismissed at his own requtst on May 18, 1873. Mr.
Aldrich was married, on June 3, 1848, in Providence,
R. I., to Sarah Hamer, of Taunton.
The seventh minister was the Reverend Benjamin
Adams Robie, a son of Thomas Sargent and Clarissa
(Adams) Roble, and born at Gorham, Maine, on Sep-
tember 9, 1836. He graduated at the Bangor Theo-
logical Seminary in the class of 1865, and was mar-
ried on July 6, 1869, at Vassalborough, to Lucy
Hedge Wiggin, of that town. He was settled as
pastor-elect on April 1, 1874, and resigned on April
1, 1884.
The eighth minister was the Reverend George
Austin Pelton, a son of Asa Carter and Ophelia
(Austin) Pelton, and born at Stockbridge, on April
15, 1833. He graduated at Yale College in the clafS
of 1861, and at Andover Theological Seminary in
1864. He was licensed to preach by the Essex South
Association in February, 1864, and ordained " to the
work of the Gojpel ministry " without installation, at
Franklin, on August 9, 1865. Mr. Pelton was mar-
ried in New Haven, Conn., on April 27, 1864, to
CatharineSarah, daughter of Seth Warner and Cath-
erine Po-t Brownson. He was settled as pastor-elect
on May 15, 1884, and resigned ou May 15, 1886.
The ninth minister wa^ the Reverend John Bar-
stow, a son of Ezekiel Hale and Eunice (Clark) Bar-
stow, and born at Newton Centre on February 16,
1857. He graduated at Dartmouth College in the
class of 1883, and at the Andover Theological Sem-
inary in 18S7. He beg.in his labors at Groton on
April 1, 1887, and was ordained and installed on June
29th, of the same year. Mr. Barstow was married at
Wethersfield, on July 5, 1887, to Mary Weller Wol-
cott, of that town. He was dismissed at his own re-
quest on September 12, 1889, and is now settled over
a society at Glastonbury, Conn. At one time his
father was the principal of Lawrence Academy.
The tenth minister is the Reverend Edward Leeds
Gulick, the present pastor. He is a son of the Rev-
erend Luther Halsey and Louisa (Lewis) Gulick, and
born in Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands, on March 21,
1862. He graduated at Dartmouth College in the
class of 1883, and at the Union Theological Seminary,
New York, in 1887. He began his labors on October
27, 1889, and was ordained on December 23d of the
same year.
A Baptist Society was organized on December 5,
1832, and the Rev. Amasa Sanderson was the first
minister. Captain Josiah Clark, one of the members,
generously gave them the use of a commodious hall
in the third story of a house at the south corner of
Main Street and Broad Meadow Road. In the year
1841 the society erected a meeting-house on the spot
where the Rev. Mr. Hobarfs dwelling stood, which
was a garrison-house in the summer of 1694.
Mr. Sanderson was a native of Gardner, Mass.,
where he was born on April 10, 1796. He was married,
first, at Weston, in 1822, to Abigail Rand, who died
on January 3, 1867 ; and, secondly, at Nashua, New
Hampshire, in July, 1867, to Mrs. Mary Rebecca
(Batchelder) Woodbury, widow of Seth Woodbury.
Mr. Sanderson supplied the pulpit until May, 1843,
GROTON.
525
when from feeble health he resigned his charge. He
died in Nashua, New Harapt-bire, on June 1, 1877,
and buried at Ayer.
The Rev. Alfred Pinney, of Auburn, New York,
was the second minister, and had charge of the society
from August, 1843, to August, 1844. He is a son of
Joshua Lasselle and Mary (Lake) Pinney, and
born at Middlefield, Otsego County, New Yurk,
on October 15, 1S12. In early life he studied the
profession of medicine, which he practised for a
while, but soon afterward gave up in order to enter
the ministry. He began a course of study in the
academic department of Madison University at Ham-
ilton, New York, with a view to graduate from the
college and the Theological Seminary, but owing to
trouble with his eyes he was compelled to abandon
the plan. On June 8, 1841, Mr. Pinney was married
in Troy, New York, to Olivia Marcia Brownell ; and
he is now living at No. 96 Madison Street, Brooklyn.
The Rev. Lewis Hulmes, a native of Plymouth, was
the third npini?ter. Born on April 12, 1813, he grad-
uated at Waterville College (now Colby University)
in the class of 1840. He was settled at Groton in
May, 1840. and remained until May, 1849. Mr.
Holmes was settled over various societies in Massachu-
setts, and died at Plymouth on May 24, 1887.
The Rev. John Allen was the fourth minister, and
his pastorate extended from June, 1849, to September,
1853. He was born at Manstield on March 27, 1792,
and died at East Providence Centre, Rhode Island, on
November 28, 1882. He was married, first, in the
year 1810, at Easton, to Sally Bonney ; and secondly.
on April 22, 1856, in Boston, to Mrs. Anna (Carpenter)
Carpenter, daughter of Caleb Carpenter, and a native
of Rehoboth. His father's name was Joseph Allen.
The Rev. George Everett Tucker was the fifth min-
ister, and his service began in November, 1853, and
lasted until June, 1857. Born at Canton on February
29, 1820, he fitted for college at Pierce Academy, of
Middlebnrough and graduated at Brown University
in the class of 1842. He has held pa-storates at var-
ious places in Rhode Island and Maine, and died at
Dedham on October 24, 1888, while on a visit, though
his home was at Brunswick, Maine. _
The Rev. Lucius Edwin Smith was the sixth min-
ister, and served the society from December, 1857 to
September, 1865. Mr. Smith is a native of Williams-
town, where he was born on January 29, 1822, and a
graduate of Williams College in the class of 1843.
He first studied law in his native town and was ad-
mitted to the bar in the year 1845 ; afterward studied
divinity and graduated at the Newton Theological
Seminary in 1857. His editorial services have been
extensive, and he is now associate editor of the
Watchman (Boston). The degree of D.D. was con-
ferred upon him by his Alma Mater in 1869.
The Rev. Oliver Ayer was the seventh minister, and
had charge of the society from April, 1866, till March
29, 1874. He is a son of Daniel and Nancy (Day)
Ayers, and was born at Plaistow, New Hampshire, on
August 2, 1810. He graduated at Brown University
in the class of 1834, in the same class with the Rev.
Crawford Nightingale, of Groton, and immediately
after graduation became theprincipal of Rockingham
Acadtmy at Hampton Falls, New Hampshire. In
the year 1837 he was ordained at Littleton, Massachu-
setts, where he was the pastor of the Baptist Church
until 1843, and then, after a settlement at Dover,
Claremont and Deerfield, all in the State of New
Hampshire, he came to Groton in the spring of 1866.
After leaving his town he was settled for six years
over a society at North Oxford, since which time he
has been living in Providence, with no pastoral charge.
Mr. Ayer was married, first, on November 6, 1835,
to Caroline Persis, daughter of William and Elizabeth
(How) Garland, of Portsmouth, who died on Sep-
tember 23, 1857 ; and, secondly, on September 16,
1862, to Susan French Sargent, of Lebanon, New
Hampshire.
The Reverend Benjamin Franklin Lawrence was
the eighth minister, and settled over the society from
July, 1874, to August, 1880. He graduated at Colby
University in the class of 1858, and studied at the
Newton Theological Institution during the years
1859 and 1860. He has had charge of various
parishes in New England, and is now at East Jeffer-
son, Maine.
The Reverend Herman Franklin Titus served the
church from December, 1880, to February, 1881, with-
out settlement. He is a son of Moses and Sophronia
(Patch) Titus, former residents of the town.
The Reverend Thomas Herbert Goodwin was the
ninth minister, and settled over the society from
October, 1881, to January, 1884. He is a son of
Benjamin and Lucy Adams (Mixer) Goodwin, and
born in Manchester, New Hampshire, on July 4,1847.
He was married, on March 23, 1871, at New London,
New Hampshire, to Arviila Olive Pattee, and is now
living at North Hanover.
The Reverend Frank Curtis Whitney was the t^th
minister, and settled over the church from Augui^l,
1884, to October 1, 1889. When he left the society' he
went to Minnesota.
The Reverend Samuel Bastin Nobbs, the present
pastor, is the eleventh minister, and took charge of
the congregation on December 1,1889.' He is a son
of James and Eliza (Haynes) Nobbs, and born at
Charlton Kings, Gloucestershire, England, on July 1,
1862. After a short residence in Australia he joined
his parents in their removal from England to New
York in September, 1881. Receiving his preparatory
education at Gloucester, England, he entered the
Theological Seminary at Hamilton, New York, in the
year 1885, where he graduated in 1888. His first
pastorate was at Newport, 'Vermont. Mr. Nobbs was
married, on July 1, 1886, to Loue Maud Richardson,
of Hamilton, New York.
During the year 1885 a house of worship was built
526
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
at West Groton, which was dedicated on October 7,
according to tlie ritual of the Methodist Church. The
Congregational, Baptist, and Episcopal Societies of the
town were well represented on the occasion, and
everybody seemed to feel that the new building was a
benediction to the village. In the " Life of John
Todd " (page 181), written by his son, there is an early
allusion to a chapel built during the winter of 1827,
as follows : " My friends are preparing rae a pretty
chapel over at this spot [West Groton], and as soon as
it is finished I am to open a battery there." All
recollection of this building among the inhabitants of
the village has now passed away.
During the first three years after the present church
was built, services therein were conducted under the
auspices of the Methodist denomination, but since
that period the society has made arrangements with
the Congregational minister at Groton to supply the
pulpit, and he preaches on each Sunday afternoon.
Services of the Episcopal Church were begun in
connection with the Groton School at its opening in
October, 1884. The parish is called St. John's Chapel
of Groton School, and the sittings in the church are
free. The services are conducted by the head master.
Reverend Endicott Peabody. The present chapel was
built in the year 1887, and consecrated on Jaiiuary 8,
1888, by the Bishop of the Diocese.
Lawrexce Academy. — During rhe early part of
the year 1792 a voluntary association was fo.med at
Groton, by certain people of the town and neighbor-
hood, in order to establish an academy where a
higher education could be obtained than was given
at the district schools of that period. A subscription
paper was circulated for the purpose of procuring
funds to erect a suitable building. A subscription of
five pounds currency was the smallest sum received
from any person, and was denominated a share; ten
pounds was called two shares; and so on. On April
27, 1792, the association organized by choosing trustees
and ihe other customary officers; and from this as a
beginning sprang the institution known formerly as
G(»ton Academy, but now as Lawrence Academy.
When it was first opened, in the spring of 1793, the
exercises were held in the district school-house, on
Farmers' Row. By a resolve of the Legislature, on
Feb. 27, 1797, agrant of land waa given totheacademy,
which consisted of half a township situated in Wash-
ington County, District of Maine. It comes now in
Hudgdon, Aroostook County, and lies on the eastern
frontier of the State, just south of Houlton.
Among the early friends and benefactors of the
institution may be mentioned, — Benjamin Bancroft,
Timothy Bigelow, James Brazer. Aaron Brown, Fran-
cis Champney, Daniel Chaplin, Samuel Dana, Na-
than Davis, Zechariah Fitch, Samuel Hemenway,
Samuel Lawrence, Joshua Longley, Joseph Moors,
William and Oliver Prescott, Samuel Rockwood,
William Swan and Sam-on Woods.
During the summer of 1841 the Academy building
was remodeled for the first time and somewhat en-
larged by au addition to the rear, at a cost of $2000,
generously given for the purpose by Amos Lawrence,
Esq., of Biiston. The grounds also were improved,
and a fence, consisiing of stone posts and chains,
placed in front of the yard, as well as on the south
side, separating it from the Brazer estate.
In the spring of 1844 William Lawrence, Esq., of
Boston, an elder brother of Amos, gave the sum of
$10,000 to be added to the permanent funds of the
in-'titution. In consequence of this liberal gift and
other manifestations of their interest in the school,
on the part of the two brothers, the trustees voted
the annual meeting, on August 20, 1845, to petition
the General Court to change the corporate name of
the school to " The Lawrence Academy of Groton."
At the next session of the Legislature the petition
was duly presented and granted on February 28,
1846.
The benefactions of the Lawrence brothers did not
cease with the change of name in the school. During
the month of July, 1841), Amos Lawrence, Esq.,
bought the Brazer estate (so called), adjoiiiing the
Academy lot on the south, and tbrmerly belonging to
James Brazer, Esq., for the sum of i<4400. and soon
afterward conveyed it by deed to the trustees of
Lawrence Academy. He also requested that all the
buildings and fences on the place should be put in
complete repair at his expense, which was accord-
ingly done at a cost of more than 81200. During the
next month William Lawrence, Esq., wrote to the
trustees, offering to give .^oOOO to be used for the
enlargement of the Academy building, for the erec-
tion of a substantial stone and iron fence in front of
the grounds, including the Dana and Brazer estates,
and for the purcha-e of another bell for the school.
The Dana estate, .idjoining the .Vcademy lot on the
north, had formerly belonged to the Hon. Samuel
Dana, and was bought by the trustees in the sum-
mer of 1836. With this sum, thus generously placed
in their hands, the trustees, during the ensuing au-
tumn, enlarged the Academy by an extension on its
north side, and very soon afterward carried out his
wishes in the other matters. At Mr. Lawrence's
death, which occurred on October 14, 1848, he be-
queathed the sum of §20,000 to the institution.
Unfortunately, the main building of the Academy
was burned to the ground on July 4, 1868, and a
structure of brick and stone erected on the same site,
which was dedicated June 29, 1871.
A celebration in connection with the history ot
Lawrence Academy took place on July 12, 1854,
when an address was delivered by the Rev. James
Means, a former principal of the institution. It was
a distinguished gathering, and known at that time
as the " .lubilee." A full account of the proceedings
waa afterward published, with a general catalogue of
the school from its beginning. Another re-union was
held on June 21, 1883, when a dinner was given in
m
o w
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GROTON.
527
the Town Hall to the old pupils. The assemblage
was Dot 80 large as the previous one, but quite as
enthusiastic. The wish was generally expressed that
the centennial anniversary of the school, which
cosies in the year 1893, should be duly celebrated.
The proceedings on this occasion also were printed
in a pamphlet form.
During the early days of New England there was
no distinct class of men following the profession of
medicine, but the practice was tulceD up in connec-
tion with some other calling. In every community
either the minister or the schoolmaster or some
skilled nurse was expected to act in ca«es of need,
and, for the most part, such persons performed the
duties now undertaken by the faculty. In the early
part of 1672 the Rev. Samuel Willard wrote a long
account of a case of witchcraft which befell Eliza-
beth Knapp, of Groton, und he relates how the
" Physitian '' came to see her on November 5, 1671,
when he gave his judgment on the case, or, in other
words, made the diagnosis. It would be an interest-
ing fact to know who was the doctor then practicing
in the neighborhood, but this is now beyond the reach
of historical inquiry.
The earliest physician in Groton, mentioned by
name, of whom I have found any trace, is Dr. Henry
Blasdell, who was impressed into the public service
by Colonel Edmund GofTe. On May 28, 1725, he pe-
titioned the General Court that an allowance be
made him for his professional services and for medi-
cines furnished during the campaign of the previous
autumn, while he was surgeon to the western forces-
The amount of his bill was £2C 14". and the General
Court allowed him £17 9s.
Dr. Ezekiel Chase, of Groton, wa.= married et New-
bury, on May 20, 1729, to Priscilia Merr.ll, of that
town. She was a daughter of Nathan and Hannah
(Kent) Merrill, and born at Newbury, on October 16,
1703.
Dr. Benjamin Morse was a son of Dr. Benjamin
and Abigail (Dudley) Morse, and born at Sutton on
March 20, 1740. He was married, on November 27,
] 760, to Mary, dnughter of Isaac and Sarah Barnard,
also born at Sutton, on September 13, 1741 ; and
while living in that town they had a family of six
children.
Dr. Morse came to Groton probably during the
Revolutionary period, acd was a Representative to
the General Court in the session of 1784, and several
succeeding ones ; and he was also a delegate to the
Convention for adopting the Constitution of the Uni-
tett States, in the year 1788, where he opposed the
adoption. He lived in the south part of the town,
near the present village of Aver; and the site of his
house is laid down on the map of Groton, published
in 1832. He died on May 31, 1833, aged ninety-three
years, and his widow, on December 16, 1835, aged
ninety-four years.
Dr. Ephraim Ware, a physician of Groton, wa.s
married at Cambridge, on October 13. 1785, to Mrs.
Abigail Gamage. He was a native of Needham, and
born on January 14,1725. His first wife was Martha,
daughter of Jobiah and Elizabeth Parker, of Groton,
where they were married on July 26, 1764. She was
born on January 7, 1737, and died at Groton on
April 4, 1776. After their marriage they went to
Dedham to live, as the records of that town say :
" The Selectmen on the 2d Day of Augt., 1765, gave
Orders to Israel Everett, Constable, to warn Ephraim
Ware, Martha Ware [and three others] to depart this
Town in 14 Days, or give Security to indemnify the
Town." Such orders were in accordance with an old
practice, then common throughout the Province, which
aimed to prevent the permanent settlement of families
in towns where they might become a public burden.
Their two eldest children, both boys, were bom at Ded-
ham ; and three other children — a daughter, Sarah,
and two sons, who both died in infancy — were born
at Groton. Sarah, born on September 18, 1769, was
married to Richard Sawtell, of Groton, on March 10,
1796, and died on March 23, 1851, hav.ng been the
mother of nine children.
Dr. Ephraim Woolson was practicing medicine
at Groton in the year 1766. He was a son of Isaac
and Sibyl Woolson, and born at Weston on April 11,
1740. He graduated at Harv«rd College in the class
of 1760, and was married to Maj\ Richardson on July
29, 1765. Dr. Woolson appears to have been living
at Weston just before his residence at Groton, and in
the year 1767 he bought land at Princeton, where six
of his children were born. He was a justice of the
peace, and is said to have died in the year 1802.
Dr. Jonathan Gove was a son of John and Tabitha
(Livermore) Gove, and born in that part of Weston
which is now Lincoln, on August 22, 1746. He grad-
uated at Harvard College in the class of 1768, and
studied medicine under the instruction of Dr. Oliver
Prescott, of Groton. About the year 1 770 he was mar-
ried to Mary, daughter of Nathan and Mary (Patter-
son) Hubbard, of this town, and here John and Lu-
cinda, their two eldest children, were born and baptized.
This son graduated at Dartmouth CcUege in the class
of 1793, studied law and died at Chillicothe, Ohio, in
the year 1802. From Groton Dr. Gove removed to
New Boston, New Hampshire, where three more
children were born. His wife was born at Groton on
January 9, 1748, and died at New Boston. He was
married, secondly, on January 6, 1791, to Polly Dow,
who became the mother of three children. Dr. Gove
subsequently removed to Goffstown, New Hampshire,
and died there on March 24, 1818.
Dr. Samuel Farnsworth was the youngest child o/
Isaac and Anna (Green) Farnsworth, and born at
Groton on September 29, 176(. He was married, on
November 25, 1788, to Betsey, daughter of Captain
Zachariah and Lydia (Tuck) Fitch, and they had a
family of eight children, of whom two sons, Samuel,
and Benjamin Franklin, were graduates of Dartmouth
528
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
College ia the class of 1813. Dr. Farnsworth subse-
quently removed to Bridgeton, Maine, where he had a
successful career as a physician. His eldest child,
Betsey, was born at Groton on July 2, 1789, and the
next one, Samuel, at Bridgton on October 9, 1791 ;
and the removal from this town took place in the
year 1790. He died on November 4, 1817.
These several physicians practiced their profession
in the neighborhood of Groton, though they had never
taken medical degrees. Before the present century
this was a common custom throughout the country ;
and the instances were very exceptional where prac-
titioners conid rightfully append M.D. to their names.
As a cla.03 they were men of shrewd sense and acute
observers, and their pr.ictice was attended with suc-
cess. Perhaps they made a better use of their oppor-
tunities than we make to-day with our richly endowed
medical schools and numerous hospitals.
During the last century Dr. Oliver Prescott was
an eminent physician of Groton, and he took high
professional rank throughout the Province. He was
the youngest of three distinguished brothers, of whom
the eldest was Judge James Prescott, who filled many
important positions in civil life as well as in military
circles; and the second was Colonel William Prescott,
who commanded the American forces at the Battle of
Bunker Hill. Both Dr. Oliver Prescott and his son.
Dr. Oliver Prescott, Jr., occupied exceptional place
among the physicians of Middlesex County.
Dr. Oliver Prescott was a son of the Honorable
Benjamin and Abigail (Oliver) Prescott, and born at
Groton on April 27, 1731. He graduated at Harvard
College with the highest honors in 1750, and then
studied medicine under the tuition of Dr. Ebenezer
Robie, of Sudbury. On October 19, 1756, he was
married to Lvdia, daughter of David and Abigail
(Jeiinison) Baldwin, of Sudbury, and they had eight
children. His high standing in the profession gave
him a place as a charter member of the Massachu-
setts Medical S.iciety in 17S1, and at the commence-
ment of 1791 Harvard College conferred upon him the
honorary degree of M.D. He was also the president
of the Middle-tex Medical Society during the whole
period of its existence. Apart from his professional
laurels he likewise enjoyed many civil and military
honors.
Dr. Prescott was town clerk during thirteen years,
and selectman during thirty-two years. Before the
Revolution he held the offices of major, lieutenant-
colonel, colonel and general, respectively, in the
militia. Subsequently, in the year 1778, he was ap-
pointed third major-general of the militia, and in
1781 second major-general, but soon afterward, on ac-
count of ill health, he resigned the position. He
was a justice throughout the Commonwealth, a mem-
ber of the Board of War, a meml)er of the Coi^ncil of
Massachusetts, until he declined the office, and, in the
year 1779, was appointed Judge of Probate, and con-
tinued as such until his death. He took an active
part in suppressing Shays's Rebellion, which had
many supporters in this neighborhood. Dr. Prescott;
was one of the original trustees of Groton Academy,
and the first president of the board ; and he was also
a member of the American Academy of Arts and
Sciences. He died on November 17, 1804, aged sev-
enty-three years, and his wife on September 27, 1798,
aged sixty-two years.
Dr. Oliver Prescott, Jr., was the eldest son of Dr.
Oliver Prescott, and born at Groton on April 4, 1762.
He pursued his preparatory studies under Master
Moody at Dummer Academy, and graduated at Har-
vard College in the class of 1783. He studied medi-
cine under the direction of his father and Dr. James
Lloyd, of Boston, and established himself in practice
in his native town. With every social advantage in
his favor he at once took high rank as a physician,
and soon enjoyed a wide reputation. On Feb. 22,
1791, he was married to Nancy, daughter of Captain
Leonard and Ann (Hall) Whiting, of Hollis, N. H.,
and they had nine children. His wife died on Sept.
13, 1821, aged fifty-eight years; and he was married,
secondly, on Nov. 6, 1823, to Mrs. Elizabeth (Atkins)
Oliver, who was born on Dec. 30, 1762, and died on
May 21, 1835. Dr. Prescott was the town clerk and
chairman of the selectmen from the year 1804 to 1811,
and represented the town in the General Court dur-
ing the sessions of 1809 and 1810. He was a trustee
of Groton Academy from the time of its incorpora-
tion until 1811, when he removed to Newburyport,
where he died on September 26, 1827.
Dr. Joseph ilansfield was a son of Richard and
Elizabeth (Whittemore) Mansfield, and born in Lynn
on December 17, 1770. He graduated at Harvard
College in the class of 1801, aud among his class-
mates were Tyler Bigelow, Thomas Bond, Jamej Ab-
bot Cummings, Timothy Fuller, Luther Lawrence,
Stephen Micot and William BantSnllivan, either na-
tives oratsome time residentsofGroton. Both while an
undergraduate, and while studying his profession, he
kept the district school on Farmer's Row, and
even after he had acquired his profession he
taught the same school with the understanding that
his hours of instruction should conform somewhat to
the needs of his practice. While in college he took
high rank as a scholar, and, at an exhibition near the
end of hisjunior year, he delivered a poem which at-
tracted some attention in literary circles, and subse-
quently was printed. He studied medicine with Dr.
Oliver Prescott, Jr., and, on June 11, 1805, was mar-
ried to Abi, daughter of Benjamin and Meriel (Nich-
ols) Hartwell. About the year 1810 he bulk the
large dwelling, with brick ends, near the Baptist
meeting-house, where he resided until his death,
which took place on April 23, 1830.
His son. Dr. George Mansfield, born at Groton on
October 8, 1807, studied medicine and graduated at
the Harvard Medical School in the class of 1832. He
was married, on November 15, 1832, to Hannah Maria
GROTON.
529
Curtis, of Boston, and died at Janesville, Wisconsin^
on July 25, 1869.
Dr. Amos Bancroft was a son of Edward and Rach-
el (Howard — Barron) Bancroft, of Pepperell, where
he was born on May 23, 1767. He graduated at
Harvard College in the class of 1791, and from the
same institution took the degree of Bachelor of JMed-
icine in the year 1794. He began the practice of his
profession at Westford, but soon afterwards removed
to Weston, where he remained until the year 1811.
He was married — first, on August 29,1790, to Abigail,
daughter of Captain Leonard and Ann (Hall) Whit-
ing, of HoUis, New Hampshire, who was born on
March 25, 1772, and died at Weston, on December 4,
1799 ; secondly, on October 7, 1800, to Sarah, daugh-
ter of Henry and Faith (Savage) Bass, of Boston,
who was born on April 21, 1708, and died on April
30, 1837 ; thirdly, on October 17, 1839, to Eliza Doane,
of Boston, who died on November 11, 1840 ; and
fourthly, on October 31, 1841, to Mary, daughter of
Richard and Martha (Hall) Kneeland, of Westford,
who was born on February 26, 1789, and died on
April 22, 1862.
Dr. Bancroft had a large practice and, at various
times, a considerable number of medical students under
his tuition, including among them the brothers James
Freeman Dana and Samuel Luther Dana, who were
grandsons of the Reverend Samuel Dana, a former
minister of the town, .and graduates of Harvard Col-
lege in the class of 1813. He was frequently called
in consultation by other physicians, and often at a
long distance from home. In those days there were
no railroads, and traveling was attended with many
difficulties. During the winter, when the roads were
blocked up with snow, he wa.s obliged, sometimes, to
travel on snow-shoes; and, a.s his patients lived many
miles apart, he was often ab»ent from home for sever-
al successive days. To add to his discomfort on such
occasions it was difficult to obtain proper food, though
there were at that period but few dwellings where he
could not obtain some New England rum or other
spirit to help restore exhausted nature. In the year
1811 his Alma Main- conferred upon him the honor-
ary degree of ^LD.
On July 12, 1848, while walking down State Street,
in Boston, he stepped from the sidewalk, in order to
cross the way, when a wagon, coming along rapidly,
knocked him down, and injured him so severely that
he died in the course of a few hours.
Dr. Mansfield and Dr. Bancroft were the last phy-
sicians of the town, who, while visiting patients, used to
ride on horseback with saddle-bags, although they
also drove much in sulkies. In early days, owing to
bad roads, physicians on their professional rounds
were in the habit of riding, and it was near the be-
ginning of the present century, in this neighborhood,
that the sulky, or covered gig, came into fashion
among them. At the present time the four-wheeled
buggy solely is used by physicians.
■ 34-ii
Dr. Joshua Green was a son of Joshua and Mary
(Mosley) Green, and born at Wendell, on October 8,
1797. He attended school at the academies in New
Salem, Westfield and Milton, and graduated at Har-
vard College in the class of 1818. He studied medi-
cine in the office of Dr. John Collins Warren, of Bos-
ton, and took the degree of M.D. at the Harvard
Medical School in the year 1821. Soon after taking
this degree he was appointed apothecary at the
Massachusetts General Hospital, then just opened
for the reception of patients, where he remained for
one year. At that time the apothecary, in addition
to his own duties, performed those of the house-
physician and the house-surgeon. In March, 1823,
Dr. Green began to practice his profession at Sunder-
land, and on January 5, 1824, was married to Eliza,
daughter of Major Samuel and Susanna (Parker)
Lawrence, of Groton. His wife was born on March
13, 1796, and died on August 20, 1874. During a
winter of his college course he taught a district school
at Groton, now known as the Moors School, and
boarded in the family of Major Lawrence, who lived
on Farmers' Row.
In the spring of 1825 Dr. Green removed to Gro-
ton, where he continued the practice of medicine, but
after about ten years, owing to ill health, he gradually
irave up his profession. In the year 1832 a pulmon-
ary- hemorrhage compelled him to pass a winter in
the island of Cuba, where to a fair degree he regained
his health. He joined the Massachusetts Medical
Society in 1820, and for many years was one of its
councillors. He represented the town in the Legis-
lature during the years 1830 and 1837, and was one
nf the trustees of Lawrence Academy from 1831 to
1867, and during most of this time either the secre-
tary or the president of the board. On the seventy-
fourth anniversary of his birth (October 8, 1871) he
had a paralytic stroke, from the effects of which he
never fully recovered. After the death of his wife he
went to live with his only daughter, Mrs. Elizabeth
Lawrence ((ireen — Kendall) Swan, at Morristown,
New Jersey, where he died on June 5, 1875.
Dr. Micah Eldredge was a son of Hezekiah and
Abigail (Whiton) Eldredge, and born at Ashford,
Connecticut, on May 24, 1776. He studied medicine
with an elder brother, Dr. Hezekiah Eldredge, and
in 1798 began the practice of his profession at
Dunstable, where he resided for many years, living
first on one side of the State line and then on the
other. On October 1, 1797, Dr. Eldredge was married
to Sally, daughter of Tilly and Abigail (Hale) But-
trick, of Princeton. In 1826 he removed to Groton,
where he remained for two years, when he established
himself at Dunstable, New Hampshire, (now Nashua).
The honorary degree of M.D. was conferred upon him
by Dartmouth College in 1841. He died at Milford,
New Hampshire, on July 2, 1849, and was buried in
the Hollis Street Cemetery at Nashua.
Dr. Jacob Williams was a son of Jacob and Han-
530
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
nah (Sheple) Williams, and bora at Groton on July
16, 1789. About the year 1816 he was practicing med-
icine at the Gilmanton Iron Works, New Hampshire,
and in June, 1822, he was married to Irene Locke, of
Epsom. In the year 1828 he returned to his native
town and established himself as a physician ; and
while here his wife died on March 11, 1831. During
the next year he was married, secondly, to Betsey
Wakefield, of Kennebunk, Maine. He remained at
Groton until the year 1835, when he removed to Ken-
sington, New Hampshire, where he died on July 7,
1857.
Dr. James Wilson was a son of the Honorable Abiel
and Abigail (Putnam) Wilson, and born at Wilton,
N. H., December 4, 1796, on the farm where his great-
grandfather, Jacob Putnam, began a settlement in the
year 1739. He studied medicine under the tuition of
Dr. John Wallace, of Milford, New Hampshire, and
graduated at the Dartmouth Medical School in the
class of 1821. He was practicing hia profession at
Boston in the early part of 1S25, as his name appears
in the directory of that year, and he removed to Gro-
ton near the beginning of 1828. He was married, in
February of that year, to Elizabeth P. Wilson, of Bos-
ton, a daughter of the city crier; and he came here
under the patronage of Dr. Amos Bancroft, who de-
sired some respite from a large practice, and acted
as his sponsor in the community. After living at
Groton during two years he returned to Boston and
l)assed a brief period, and ihen removed to New
York, where he remained for a short time. Soon af-
terward he went to Cuba, where he spent the remain-
der of his days, and died in Mafanzas on November
23, 1868.
Dr. George Stearns was the youngest child of Eph-
raim and Molly (Gilman) Stearns, and born at Wal-
pole. New Hampshire, on Jlay 10, 1802. He gradu-
ated at the Harvard Medical School in the class of
1827, and began the practice of his profession in Bos-
ton, where he remained about three years, when he
settled at Groton. He was married, on July 2, 1868,
to Mrs. Ann (Moulton) Gilson, widow of Joshua Gil-
son, of Groton. Dr. Stearns was the last survivor of
thirteen children, and died on March 7, 1882, at which
time he was the oldest physician in the town.
Dr. Amos Farnsworth was a son of Major Amos and
Elizabeth (Rockwood) Farnsworth, and born at Gro-
ton on August 30, 1788. He studied his profession
with Dr. Calvin Thomas, of Tyjjgsborough, and with
Dr. John Collins Warren, of Boston, but before his
graduation he was commissioned as surgeon's mate in
the Fourth Massachusetts Infantry Regiment, on
April 14, 1812, just before war was declared by the
United States with Great Britain ; and two months
later, on June 1.5th, his regiment left South Boston for j
Burlington, Vermont, for service on the frontier. He I
remained with the Fourth Infantry during thirteen
months, when he resigned his commission on May 14,
1813. Daring the following summer he graduated at
the Harvard Medical School, and began the practice
of his profession in Boston, where he remained until
the year 1832, when he removed to his native town.
On March 21, 1823, Dr. Farnsworth was married to
Mrs. Mary (Bourne) Webber, widow of Captain Seth
Webber, of Boston. He died in Roxbury on July 31,
1861, and his wife in Boston, on October 27, 1828,
aged thirty-seven years.
Dr. Amos Bigelow Bancroft wa.s a son of Dr. .\mo£
and Sarah (Bass) Bancroft, and born at Groton on
.\.pril 3, 1811. He graduated at Harvard College in
the class of 1831, and at the Harvard Medical School
in 1834. He began the practice of his profession at
Groton in connection with his father ; anfl on June
11, 1840, was married to Marietta, daughter of Nathan
and India (Emerson) Shepley, of Pepperell. Dr. Ban-
croft remained in town until the spring of 1853, when
lie removed to Charlestown, where for more than ten
years he was physician to the State Prieon. Under
the administration of Gen. Grant he was appointed
superintendent and surgeon in charge of the JIarine
Hospital at Chelsea, which position he held from Au-
gust 1, 1869, to .lune 30, 1877, when he took up his
residence in Boston. While traveling abroad with
his family he died in Florence, Italy, on November
8, 1879, much lamented by a wide circle of friends
and patients at home, — leaving a widow and two
daughters to mourn his loss.
Dr. Abel Hervey Wilder was a native of Winchen-
don. where he was born on June 16, l.*Oi. He was a
son of Levi and Grace (Wilder) Divoll; but by an
Act of the Legislature on February 7, l.'^12, his name
was changed from Hervey Divoll to Abel Hervey
Wilder, keeping the surname of his mother. He
graduated at the Dartmouth iledical School in the
class of 1828, and began to practice his profession at
Temple, New Hampshire. On February 29, 1828, he
was married at New Ipswich, New Hampshire, to
Mary, daughter of Ephraim and Elizabeth (Bent)
Brown, a native of Lincoln.
Dr. Wilder subsetiuently removed to Pepperell, and
in the year 1836 came to Groton, where he had the
management oi' an institution for the treatment of
nervous diseases. He continued to live here until
the death of his wife, which took place on February
12, 1843, when he removed to Pittsfield. After leav-
ing Groton he was married for the second time ; and
after a residence in ditlerent parts of the country, he
died at Bloomtield, New Jersey, on .lanuary 2, 1864.
Dr. James Merrill Cummings was a .son of Jacob
Abbot and Elizabeth (Merrill) Cummings, and born
in Boston on July 27, 1810. He graduated at Bow-
doin College in the class of 1830, and at the Bowdoin
Medical School in 1834. On November 4, 1835, he
was married to Sarah Thurston Phillips, daughter of
Joel and Sarah Phillips (Thurston) Hall, of Portland,
Maine. In the spring of 1842 Dr. Cummings came
to Groton and bought out the establishment of Dr.
Wilder, which he conducted for four years; and in
GROTON.
531
the spring of 1846 he removed to Salem, where be re-
maiaed for four years, when he settled in Portland,
where he died on July 20, 1883. His widow died on
January 29, 1890, at the advanced age of eighty-five
years.
Dr. Rufus Shackford, a son of Captain Samuel and
Hannah (Currier) Shackford, was born at Chester,
New Hampshire, on December 17, 1810 ; studied
medicine under the tuition of Dr. Cumraings, and
graduated at the Harvard Medical School in the class
of 1845. He practiced for a brief period at Groton in
the oflBce of hh preceptor, after which he lived in
Lowell for a short time, when he removed to Port-
land, Maine, where he is now in practice.
Dr. Norman Smith was a son of Jesse and Nabby
(Kittredge) Smith, and born at Mount Vernon, New
Hampshire, on October 1.3, 1811. He graduated at
the Vermont Medical College, Woodstock, in the
class of 1843, and began to practice medicine at Gro-
ton, where he passed his whole professional life, with
the exception of four years spent in Nashua, New
Hampshire. In April, 18<!1, at the outbreak of the
Rebellion, he went out as surgeon of the Sixth Massa-
chusetts Militia Regiment, and was with that famous
organization on its march through Baltimore and
during its first campaign of three months. He was a
member of the Union Congregational Church, and
prominent in alt matters connected with the welfare
of the town. His death took place at his farm on
Common Street, on May 24, 1888, and the funeral, on
May 28th, was conducted under Masonic rite.s.
Dr. Smith was married, first, on May 3, 1838, to
Harriet, daughter of John and Lydia Sleeper, of
Francestown, New Hamj>shire, who died on Septem-
ber 2, 1839 ; secondly, on November 6, 1843, to Mari-
ett Sleeper, a sister of his first wife, who died on July
6, 1846; thirdly, on September 22, 1847, to Abigail
Maria, daughter of Ephraim and Sarah (King)
Brown, of Wilton, New Hampshire, who died on
July 17, 1852; fourthly, on September 12, 1853, to
Sarah Young, daughter of Solomon and Dorcas (Hop-
kins) Frost, who died on December 4, 1856, and,
fifthly and lastly, on September 11, 1866, to Mrs.
Mary Jane (King) Lee, daughter of Daniel and Re-
becca (Parmenter) King, of Rutland, Massachusetts.
Dr. Lemuel Fuller was a son of Dr. Lemuel and
Mary (Shepherd) Fuller, and born at Marlborough,
on April 2, 1811. He graduated at the Vermont
Medical College, Woodstock, in the class of 1844,
and came to Groton from Harvard in the year 1847.
On June 6, 1844, he was married to Catherine Palli-
seur, daughter of Francis and Maria Foster (Palliseur) I
Barrett, of Concord. Dr. Fuller left Groton in 1850, j
and died at Harvard during a temporary visit from
home February 11, 1864. During the last ten years
of his life he lived at North Weymouth.
Dr. Miles Spaulding was a son of Captain Isaac
and Lucy (Emery) Spaulding, and bornat Townsend,
on April 4, 1819. He graduated at the Berkshire
Medical Institution, Pittsfield, in the class of 1842,
and he soon afterward tstablished himself at Dunsta-
ble, where he remained until the year 1851, when he
removed to Groton. Dr. Spaulding was married,
tirst, on January 12, 1848, to Sophia Louisa, daughter
of Aaron and Lucinda (Munson) Miller, of New
Haven, Connecticut, who died on September 4, 1852 ;
and, secondly, on August 27, 1863, to Mary Mehetable,
only child of Stephen and Mary (Kilborn — French)
Stickney He still lives at Groton, the senior physi-
cian of the town.
Dr. Peter Pineo is a son of Peter and Sarah (Stead-
man) Pineo, and was born at Cornwallis, Nova Scotia,
on March 6, 1825. He graduated at the Bowdoin
Medical School in the class of 1847, and was married
in Boston, on May 8, 1850, to Elizabeth, daughter of
Kendall and Betsey (Hill) Crosby. In the spring of
1853 he came to Groton, where he remained for two
years, after which time he removed to Quechee, a
village in the town of Hartford, Vermont. On June
11, 1861, he was commissioned as surgeon of the
Ninth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers, and soon
afterward was promoted to a brigade surgeoncy,
which office was abolished on July 2, 1862, by an
Act of Congress, when ofiicers of that rank became
surgeons of United States Volunteers. On February
9, 1863, he was made medical inspector United
States Army, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel,
and he served with distinction until the end of the
war. At the present time he is a resident of Boston.
Dr. Kendall Davis was a son of Joseph and Han-
nah Davis, and born at New Ipswich, New Hamp-
shire, on December 4, 1802. According to the State
Register of the years 1847-50, he was then living at
Groton, where he practiced for a short time. From
this town he went to Athol, and died at Templeton
on September 20, 1875.
Dr. Richard Upton Piper is a son of Samuel and
Mary (Folsom) Piper, and was born at Stratbam,
New Hampshire. He graduated at the Dartmouth
Medical School in the class of 1840, and began the
practice of his profession at Portland, Maine, where
he was married, on November 8, 1841, to Elizabeth
Frances Folsom, a native of Portsmouth, New Hamp-
shire. In the year 1864 he came to Groton and re-
mained five years, though without engaging in the
active practice of medicine. He afterward lived in
Chicago, but is now a resident of Washington. He
is an author of some note, having written a work en-
titled " Operative Surgery Illustrated," and another
on " The Trees of America."
Dr. Joseph Franklin Coolidge was a son of Charles
and Nancy (Spaulding) Coolidge, and born at West-
minster on Sept. 11, 1837. He graduated at the Har-
vard Medical School in the class of 1862, and in the
year 1864 came to Groton, where he remained until
his death, which took place on June 1, 1865. Dr.
Coolidge was one of a family of ten children, and was
never married.
532
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHITSETTS.
Dr. William Ambrose Webster \v;ia the only son of
William Gordon and Susan (Ambrose) Webster, and
born at Rochester, New Hampshire, June 13, 1830. He
graduated at the Medical School of the Long Island
College Hospital, Brooklyn, N. Y., in the spring of
1862. Soon after graduation, on July 1, 1862, he was
commissioned as surgeon of the Ninth New Hamp-
shire Volunteers, which left for the seat of war on
August 25, 1862, and he continued in that capacity
until January 5, 1865, when he was honorably dis-
charged. In September of that year he came to Gro-
too, where he remained during three years, when he
removed to Westford. He died in Manchester, N.
H., on February 8, 1887. Dr. Webster waj twice
married, — first, in August, 1851, to Mary Anne Kaime.
of Pittsfield, N. H., and secondly, on August 9, ISoS,
to Marion M. Ladd, of Middlesex, Vt. By the first
marriage two daughters were born, who both are now
living, and by the second raarriaee one daughter,
Susan Marion Webster, was born at Groton on June
25, 1866, but she died before her father.
Dr. David Roscoe Steere is a son of Scott and Mary
(Mathewson) Steere, and was born at Lisbon, Connec-
ticut, April 27, 1847. He graduated at the Dartnioulli
Medical School in the class of 1871, and, after gradu-
ation, practiced for a few mouths at Savoy. In .luly,
1872, he came to Groton, where he has since re-
mained ; and in the year 1878 he built the house, at
the corner of Main and Church Streets, which he
now occupies. On June 18, 1873, Dr. Steere was mar-
ried to Adelia, daughter of Jephtha and Betsey (Boyn-
ton) Hartwell.
Dr. Edward Hubbard Winslow was a son of the
Reverend Hubbard and Susan Ward (Cutler) Wins-
low, and born in Boston on Dec. 26, 1835. He was
married, on Sept. 1, 1859, to Helen H..\yer, of Mont-
vale, Me., and in the early spring of 1875 came to
Groton, where he remained about two years. Dr.
Winslow died in New York on Oct. 16, 1873.
Dr. George Washington Stearns is a son of Paul and
Lucy (Kneeland) Stearns, and was born at Reading,
Vermont, on Dec. 25, 1814. His mother was a sister
of Abner Kneeland, the preacher and author. He
took hia medical degree first in March, 1857, at Penn
Medical University, Philadelphia, and secondly, in
1858, at the Hahnemann Medical College, in the same
city. In the spring of 1878 Dr. Stearns came to Gro-
ton from Marblehead, and in November, 1882, re-
moved to Holliston, where he remained a few years,
when he went to Holyoke, of which city lie is now a
resident. He was married, first, on May 8, 1838, at
South Yarmouth, to Sylvia Crowell, and secondly, on
July 19, 1877, at New Bedford, to Julia Amanda,
daughter of Cyrus and Eliza Eastman (Cottrell)
Ware.
Dr. William Barnard Warren is a son of Noailles
Lafayette and Mary (Barnard) Warren, and was born
at Leominster on Nov. 16, 1853. He graduated at
the Medical Department of the University of the
City of New York in the cla^s of 1881, having pre-
viously attended a course of lectures in 1879 at the
Dartmouth Medical School. In December, 1882, he
came to Groton and established himself in practice,
where he now remains. Dr. Warren was married at
Groton on Oct. 31, 1880, to Ardelia Temple, daughter
of Thomas Haines and Relief (Cummings) Smith, of
Boston.
Dr. Marion Zachariah Putnam is a son of John and
Sophia (Weaver) Putnam, and was born at Mount
Sterling, Illinois, on August 14, 1844. In the year
1870 he graduated at the Medical Department of
the Northwestern University, Chicago, and began to
practice in his native town. On September 0, 1880,
Dr. Putnam wiis married to Harriet Elizabeth, dnugh-
ter of Thomas Spencer and Harriet Heyward (Law-
ton) Farnswortli, of < iroton. .\bout the year 1883 he
cume to this town from Lowell, where he had re-ided
fur a short period. He lives on Pleasant .Street, but
lias retired from the active practice of hi.s profession.
The Fitchburg Railroad was first opened to public
travel, through tlie southerly jiart of Groton, on De-
cember 30, 1844 ; and the Peterborough and Shirley
Railroad, under the management of the Fitchburg
company, was opened during the year 1847. The
Worcester and Nashua Railroad was operated for reg-
ular business, through its entire Itngth, on December
18, 1848, though the section from tiroton Junction to
Clinton had been previously opened on .Inly 3, 1848,
and from Clinton to Worcester on November 22(1; and
the Stony Brook beiran its operations on July 1, 1848.
Soon after these interconnections were made, a village
sprang up in the neighborhood, which became popu-
larly known as the " .riinction," though by the Post-
(JlBce Department at Washington it was otlicially called
" South Groton.' On .March 1, 1861, the name of the
post-office was changed by llie Department from
South Groton to (iroton Junction. This settlement,
growing in numbers, alter a while was set off from the
parent town, and, by an act of the Legislature on
February 14, 1871, incorporated as a distinct town-
ship, under the name of Ayer. After this date, there-
lore, the list of physicians, so far its they relate to the
.lunction, and their biographical sketches, will cease.
Dr. Ebenezer Willis wxs a .son of John and Nancy
(Spriggeus) Willis, and born at Newmarket, New
Hampshire, on January 26, 1815. He was married at
Exeter, on July 23, 1S36, to Mary Frances, daughter
of Benjamin and -Mary Seavey (Neal) Batchelder.
Dr. Willis came to Groton Junction in March, 1849,
and was the pioneer physician of the place. He died
at Ayer on May 10, 1890.
Dr. John Quincy .4.dams McCollester is a son of
Silas and .\chsah (Holman) McCollester, and was
born at Marlborough, New Hampshire, on May 3,
1831. He took his degree of M.D. from the Jerterson
Medical School in March, 1856. Dr. McCollester was
married, first, on May 6, 1856, to Sarah Elizabeth,
daughter of Joseph and Anna (Longley) Hazen, of
GROTON.
633
Shirley, who died on May 5, 1858 ; and, secondly, on
August 9, 1859, to Georgianna Lydia, daughter of
Daniel and Lydia (Fisk) Hunt, of Groton. During
the War of .the Rebellion he was the surgeon of the
Fifty-lhird Regiment Massachusetts Militia, having
been commissioned on December 1, 18G2, and mus-
tered out of the service on September 2, 1863. He is
now a resident of Waltham.
Dr. Edson Champion Chamberlin, a native of Thet-
ford, Vermont, came to Groton Junction in the sum-
mer of 1859 and remained one year. He graduated
at the Worcester Medical Institution on June 20,
1854. He was married to Mary A. Pierce, of South-
bury, Connecticut, where he died on January 2C, 1877,
aged fifty-six years.
Dr. Gibson Smith came to Groton Junction from
the State of Maine about the year 18G6. He was an
"eclectic " physician and a spiritualist, and died at
Ayer on September 20, 1885, aged seventy years.
Dr. John Eleazer Parsons is a son of John and
Rosalinda Davis (Robbins) Parsons, and was born at
Harrison, Maine, on November 20, 1835. He gradu-
ated at the Harvard Medical School in the class ol
1803, and on March 18th of the same year was com-
missioned as assistant surgeon of the Twenty-eighth
Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers, but for disability
was discharged on July 30, 1SC3. Dr. Parsons next
served as acting assistant surgeon. United State.^
Navy from October 10, 1863, to December 10, 1866,
when he resigned. During the last week of Decem-
ber, 1866, he came to the village of Groton Junction
(Ayer), where he is still living.
Dr. Benjamin Hall Hiirtwell is a son of Benjamin
Franklin and Emma (Whitman) Hartwell, and was
born at Acton February 27, 1815. He received his
early education at Lawrence Academy, Groton, o(
which institution he is now one of the trustees, and
graduated at the Jefferson ^ledical Collfge, Philadel-
phia, on March 7, 1868. In the early spring of 186ii
Dr. Hartwell came to Groton Junction (Ayer), where
he still resides, having filled many prominent posi-
tions of trust and usefulness. He was married, on
September in, 1879, to Helen Emily, daughter of
Major Eusebius Siisby and Mary Jane (Shattuck)
Clark.
Dr. James Moody Moore was a son of Dr. Ebenezer
Giles and Eliza Sarah (Hidden) Moore, and born at
Wells, Maine, on June 20, 1832. He graduated at
the Dartmouth Medical School in the class of 1860,
and in May of that year came to Groton Junction,
where he remained until April, 1861. Dr. Moore
then removed to Concord, New Hampshire, his father's
home, where he died on February 3, 1870.
A List of Representatives to the Genera)
Court, from the colonial period to the present time,
with the dates of their election and terms of service ;
including also the names of certain other officers —
1672-1887.
The Assistants of Massachusetts, sometimes called
Magistrates, were the forerunners of the Provincial
Council and the State Senate. They were few in
number, and, in point of dignity and honor, next to
the Governor and the Deputy-Governor. Major Simon
Willard, the only citizen of the town who ever held
the office, became a resident in the year 1672, remov-
ing here from Lancaster at that time. He was first
chosen to the position in 1654, when living at Con-
cord.
COUBT OF ABPlSTAMTfl.
DaU of firtl Election. Term of Strvice.
May 3, 1654 Major Simon WllUrd 1072-1C76
(Died iu office on April 24, IG76.)
8INATS.
October 2G, 1780 . . Honorable James Prescott .... 1780-1784, 178C
June I, 1797 .... Honorable Tlmotb; Bigeluw 1797-1600
May 6, 1605 Honorable Samuel Dana 1805-1812,1817
(Mr. Dana waspresideotofthe body during the jean 1807, 181 land 1812.)
November 13, 1837 . Honorable Stuarl Janiee Park 1838, 18.39
January 9, 1851 . . . Honorable John Boyoton 1861
November 13, 18M . Honorable Abijah Edwin Hildretb 1855
November 5, 18G7 . . Honorable Daniel Needbam 18CS, 1869
November 8, 1887 . . Honorable Moses Poor Palmer . . . .1868-1890
(Of tbeee Senators the last two are the sole survivors.)
There is no reference in the Groton records to the
election of any representatives to the General Court
before the year 1693 ; and even then the names are
not given, and only by the receipts for their pay, and
by some allusions to the subject, is it known that any
were chosen previously to that date. According to
the Colonial records. Captain James Parker served
as a deputy, or representative, during the session be-
ginning November 7, 1683, and it is probable that be
was the only one from the town under the first char-
ter.
The following entries comprise every allusion to
the subject found in the earliest volume of town
records, which is known as the " Indian Roll " :
*' Fabruarj- the C 1G93 the iohabitanc being met togather for to Con-
eider of sum waye for to preuent futar unnessesary ctiargea did by
uott declare that they would petii<hone nntu the geuaraiU Court that
thei' repreoeotetiue might be relesed (roui atending tbe Seshune any
mure
" tbe same daye the town did by uott declare that they would haue
dacon Lawranc for to manidge the portistione for tbem which the
Comitliy hath draw up" (Page 107.)
*' Groton April! 12 1C'J3 Know all peple by thes preseoc that Na-
tbanaeill Lawranc senor hath Heseiued full satisfactione by the select
men and Constables for Barueing the town as a Repreeentiiie at the two
fint aestione
" I saye reseiued by me Nathannil LAtTRANCE"
*' Groton April 12 1693 Know all peple by thee presenc that John Page
senor doth fully and [sic] Clearely acqnite tbe town select men and
constables for Barfing the town as a repreeentetine at tbe first [seesion]
held at boston in ye year 1692
"as witness my band Jou Page eeneyer "
** Payed to Natlianail Lawranc 8e[nior] algbt pounds in mony
" Payed to John Page Be[nior] two pounds sixteen shlllliu and nine
pen c in mony " (Page 109.)
"maye 15 1693 tbe Town being met together tber unto orderlle
warned then the town did by note declare that they would not send nor
Cbooee any parson nor parsons for to Represent them at the great and
genaraill C^rte or asembley
"John page senor Jearos Kemp John Stone and 'V^'illiam Longley
se[nior] desent from this uote John farnwortb and Steuen holden
" The Town Resons is they do not iudg tbemself layable nether
acordind to Law nor Charter
" as Bteet William Lonolst Town Clarck *'
(Page 109.J
534
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
" October 30 1693 at town meetiag Legally warned Capt Jeams
Parker was chouMD to KepreaeDt ttie towa at ye great and geniiraeell
awembly held at boston the eaight day of nonember insniDg the datu
hereof" (Page 110.)
It does not appear from the records of the General
Court that Captain Parker was present at any meet-
ing of this session.
" Jennary 1 169% the town this daye did ingage to sequer tlie seieck
men from any harm or damefdg that they shall meett with all in Re-
spect of Decon natbaoaall Lawranc in that he doth demand thirty <•
sbillins In money fur to be bis dew fur sarflng the said town iisa repre-
sentiue and the town doo Refuse to paye the said money the seteck nieit
being estemed as the rest of the iuhabitanc in the mater slso the town
did by the mafer uote choose Liftenant Jonah Prescot ^ Jeanis parker
Ju for to answer in the case if the said Lawrancsbould tnible y« selei-k
men or town and they did exaept of the cboiss and they are to haiie
their paye fur ttieir pains when the said town is able to payo Iheiu
" as wittness Williasi Longley town dark "
".Tohn page se[uior] desents from tlie aboiie mentioned propertis-
tlone" (Pages 111, 112.)
" at a town meting legelly warned Slay u"' 1C9'J : Capt : Prescot was
cbosea for to atende the i^enrell Curt ; for to aanie as a represintiue
".I.*HE8 BL.v.-vCUAKli Clark''
(Page 118.)
" May 17 1703 at a town metting legelly warned Ilie town did Ijy uut
declare that thay would pay deacon lan-ance the mony that the deacon
demande for saruing the : town ae ane represiutiue In the year lti9^1
" the town did uute and declare that Iliay would bonuvv the iiiuny
of thonias Williams'fur fuur mouth and pay for the use of it ulif
shilling
"jAMt;j Bla.ncm.%KD Clark"
(Page 124.)
"Groton Mayy" 3 1705 then capt prnscut was chosen to sarue as n
representetife for the yer Insiiing
*• Tau.MAS TiltBELL Clarck ■'
(Page 120.)
"Croton May the ftight 1700 .\t a town nietiug legally wonted to
cbuse a repreRsautlue the fre hooldaiv and other inhabitunts qiialalied
Hcunlingto law did l>y the uiaiur uute couse [choose] Simiu :St'jtie fur
this year 170lj a represaiileliue
" JuSEHH T.AKI.N town clurk "
(Page 129.)
The paging, as given after these .several extracts,
refers to the printed edition of " The Early Record.s
of Groton, Massachusetts, 1662-1707," from which
they are taken. Since the year 1707, and even before [
that date, in the town records, there are occasional j
omissions of the names of representatives, and these
gaps I have hiled from the Colonial and Provincial
records at the State-House. In such cases the names
are printed within brackets, and the dates given with
them refer to the beginning of each session ; and in
all other instances in the list, where dates of the ses-
sions have been obtained or inferences drawn from
these records, brackets are used.
In early times the representative to the General
Court was paid by the town that sent him ; and this
fact furnishes the reason why the town of Groton, on |
May 15, 1693, voted not to send one. It was then I
poor, and staggering under a heavy load in the shape I
of debts and current expenses. Notwithstanding the
receipt of Deacon Lawrence given on April 12, 1693,
the town was threatened by him witli a suit for thir-
ty-six shillings, for hia services as a representative,
perhaps during a short period after the petition of
February 6, 1693, when it was voted that he should
be released from attendance. It is not now known
whether a suit was ever begun, but, ten years later,
as appears by the vote of May 17, 1703, the town
agreed to settle the matter by paying the demand,
though it was obliged to borrow the money for that
purpose, — an indication of its extreme poverty. Dur-
ing some of these ten years Deacon Lawrence was a
resident of that quarter of Cambridge which is now
Lexington ; and his absence from Groton may have
been, in part, the cause of the long delay in settling
the dispute. Neither Deacon Lawrence nor Mr. Page
was chosen to the Assembly that convened on May
31, 1693.
John Paris was a member of the Council for Safety
of the People, which met on May 9, 1689, just after
Governor Andres was deposed. It is probable that
the town was unrepresented during the following
years: 1693 (6rst session), 1694-1698, 1700-1704, and
1707, as the Provincial records of those dates do not
mention any member from Groton.
In the following li.st of representatives I havegiven
the church, civil and military titles found in the rec-
ords, inasmuch as they indicate, approximately, the
period when they were acquired. For nearly a cen-
tury and a half the term of service of each member
was during the year of his election. The name of
.John Sheple, as spelled in the town records, is writ-
ten John Shepley in the Provincial records, but the
two names refer to the same man, and the Nathaniel
Sawtell of the town records is identical with the Na-
thaniel Sartle of the Provincial records,
jiot'.-i; OF nti'nr?ESTATivr-».
Ti.,le "/ Chvdn,,.
[NuveuiU-r 7, l<i.s;',, Cuiiiiiin .Iutne5 Piirk.-r.j
L.May y, IijS'.i. Juhn riiiia.j
I'liilcr Ilit I h.irler ,.f llV.7i.im .inj Mi.ij.
[.lutieS, 1092, Nathaniel Lawrence. I
[.June t, 1092, Julin I'npe.j
[.May :^l, li;9.3 ditst se-wion), proliably none clioseu.]
tictoU-r-iO, 1093 (H'ciiTid fH-ft-^ioii), (.'aptain James Parker.
[May ::o, l(i94, probably uuiie chosen.]
L31ay 29, lii'-t.'i, jii-uliiibly imiie cliurieu.]
[iMay 27, li''9ii, pruliably nuiie cliusen.]
[May 20, 1097, [irobably none rho'en.]
[May 23, 109.'*, prubiibly none chosen ]
May 9, 1099, Juuos Trescutt.
[.Msy 29, ITUti, probably nuue chosen.]
[May 2^. 1701, pnitiably none cliusen.]
[May 27, 17tr2, probably none cburieu.]
[May 20. 1703, [irubably tiuiie thosen.]
[May 31, 1704, prulrably none chosen.]
May «, 170.'i, .lonas i'res^ntt.
Mays, 1700, Siniou Stone.
[5Iuy 28, 1707, probably none chosen.]
[.May 2)1, 17o8, Juhn Farnswurth.]
.May -25, 1709, Knsign John F:irU3«i.rlli.
May 22, 1710, Ensign .loliii Furif.vvurtli.
[.May :i(', 1711. John Faniswurth.]
Mav 7, 1712, Ensign .luliii I'urnswurtli.
.May 11, 1713, EnfiiiU Juliu Farrnworth.
[BIny 20, 1714. .lulin Funiswurth.]
[May 2.i, 171."., Thonias Tai bell.]
[May 30, 1710, Juhn .shepley.]
May 21, 1717, John .slieple.
[May -28, 1718, John Shepley.]
[May 27, 1719, Juhn ^hepley.]
May 0, 172t), Captain Jonas Prescutt, Jr.
GROTON.
535
M»y li, 1T21, r^pwiu JuLii aUeple.
Augnrt 8, 1721, CapUin John Sheple.
[May 3U, 1T22, Captain John Sheple]
May 1, 1723, Lieutenant Benjamin Prescutt.
May 18, 1T24, Lieutenant Benjamin PreBCott.
May 14, 1725, Captain John Sheple.
May 19, 172G, Oaptain John Sheple.
May IT, 172T, Benjamin Prcscolt.
May 10, 1728, Captain John Sheple.
May 14, 1729. John Longley.
May IS, 173(j, Deacon John Longlsy.
May 17, 1731. Deacon John Longley.
[May 31, 1732, Nathaniel Sartle.]
May 21, 1733, Nathaniel Sawtell. Esq.
May 8, 1734, Benjamin Prcaccitt, Esq.
May 19, 173.5, Benjamin Prescott, Ksq.
May 18, 173C, Benjamin Preacott, Esq.
May 17, 1737. Colonel Benjamin Prescott.
May li. 1738, Benjamin Pieai-ott, Esq. (died in oBlLe on August 3, 1738)
December i.',, 173S. Justice Nathaniel Sawtell.in the place of Benjamin
Prescott. Esq., deceased.
May 23, 1739, Justice Nathaniel Sawtell.
[May2S, 17411, John Longle.v ]
May 25,1741, Justice Nathaniel Sawtell.
May 12, 1742, Nalbauiel Sawtell.
[May 20, 174:;, William l^wrence.]
May 14, 1744, Nathaniel Sawtell.
May 17, 1740, William Lawrence, Esq.
May 18, I74(i, William Ijiivrence, Eoq.
May 18, 1747, William Lawrence, Esq.
May 17, 1748, William Lawrence. i:sq.
May 22. I74'J, William Lawrence, Esq.
Slay 28, lT.Vt (the t.iwn voted not to seudj.
May 27, 1751. William Lawrence, Edq.
May 14, 1752, William Lawrence, Estj.
The district of Shirley was set off from Groton on
.T.anuary 0, 1753, and the district of Pepperell, three
months later, on April 12th, and after these dates, un-
til the period of the Revolution, the two districts
were represented in the General Court by the parent
town.
Date of Ehctioit.
May 14, 1733. William Lawrence, Esq.
[May 2y, 1704, W illium Lawrence.]
]May 13. 17.'i.',, CoIdmcI William Lawrence.
51ay 17, 1T5Ij, William Lawrence, Esq.
Slav 13, 17."iT, MiUiam I-awrence, Esq.
May 17, 17.'i6, Williiim Lawrence, Ijiq.
Slay 25, 17.*»9, William Lawrence, Esq.
May 2ij, 1700, William Lawrence, Esq.
May 15. ITiil, William Lawrence, Esq.
Slay 17, 17f.2, C;aptain -Miel Lawrence.
Miiv lii. 17C3, Captain Abel Lawrence.
Mwy 21, 17t4, Captain .\he\ Lawrence.
May U, 17ij.j, Captain Abel Lawrence
May 12, 17011, Colonel James Prescott.
Jlay 18, 17t'.7, Colonel James Piescott.
May 10, 17C8, Colonel James Prescott.
May 23, 1709, Colonel James Prescott.
May 21, 1770, (.k>lonel James Prescott.
May 2u, 1771, Colonel James Prescott.
May 18, 1772, Colonel .lames Prescott.
May 17, 1773, Colonel James Prescott.
May 9, 1774, Colonel James Prescott.
May 22, 1775, Honorable James Prescott.
Archives (CXXXVIII. 214) at the State House, as
follows :
" COLONT OF THE MASSACHDSETre BiT.
'■ These are to will, and require yon forthwith to caose the Freeholder!,
t other Inhahltants of,vonr town that haie an Brtate of Kreehold In
land within this Colony or Territory of forty Shillings *'. annum at Uie
least, or other Estate to the value of forty Pounds sterling, to ammble
at such Ume, 4 Place as yon shall appoint : then & there to elect, and
depute one or more Peiaons (being freeholders, and reiddent In the same
town) according to a number Mt, i limited by an Act of the General
Court or Assembly, which was conTen'd at Watertown on the nIneteenUi
day of July current for the Service of this Colony, and is still in being ;
and to cause the Person or Persons so elect, and deputed by the major
part of the electors present at such election to be timely notifled, & sum-
moned by one of the consubles of yonr town forthwith to attend the
Service of this Province In the said general Court, or Aseembly, 4 dar-
ing the Session or Sessions of the same. Hereof fail not, and make
a Retnm of this Precept with the name or names of the Penon, or Per-
sons so elected, i. deputed, with their being summoned Into the General
Assembly, as soon as may be after such election, & summons shall be
made.
"Dated at Watertown this 31«— day of July A.D. 1776.
" By order of the Houae of BepresenUtivee
■ ' Jab : Waebbk Speoin-
" To the Selectmen of the town of
Groton in the County
of Middlesex Greeting.
•' Pursuant to the Precept within writUn the Freeholders and other
Inhabitants of the town of Groton quallfy'd as is therein directed, upon
due Warning given, assembled and met together on the Twenty first day
of August and then did elect, 4 depute Capt. Joeiah Sartell— to sent
for, and represent them in the Session, or Sessioniiof the great, and gen-
eral Conn or Assembly which was conven'd at Watertown on the nine-
teenth day of July current for the Service of this Colony the said Per-
son being chosen by a major part of the electors present.
" Dated in Groton aforesaid the 21" day of August— A.D. 1775.
" Oliver Peescott \ tieUctrnen
ISAJIC Faehbwortm ►■ of
Auos Laweance } (liolon
"The Person chosen as aboveaaid
nutihed thereof 4 summon'd
to attend accordingly
by me Constable of Groton
Olivee Fletchee
[Indorsed] " Return from Groton Cap' Joeiah Sartell
■' Mr Fowle Please to make out a Precept for the towu of HancocW in
the County of Berkshire— according to this Foim—
[Addressed] "To The Selectmen of the Town of Groton."
hale of EUction.
.\ugust 21, 1776, Captain Joeiah Sartell.
Ma^- 20, 1770, Colonel Josiah Sartell.
May 20, 1777, Honorable James Prescott. Deacon Isaac Famsworth,
declined, and Colonel Josiah Sartell chosen in his place.
May 18, 1778, Honorable James Prescott.
Slay 17,1779, Honorable James Prescott.
May 15, 1780, Honorable James Prescott.
The first General Court of the Commonwealth of
IMaasachusetts met on Wednesday, October 25, 1780,
and the Honorable James Prescott was the represen-
tative from this town. He was chosen to the House
on September 4th, and a short time later, in order to
fill a vacancy in the Senate, he was elected to that
body by a convention of both branches on Thursday,
October 26, 1780 ; and subsequently by another simi-
lar convention on Friday, October 27th, to the Execu-
tive Council. At that time the Councilors and Sen-
ators were chosen on the same general ticket, without
After this date Pepperell and Shirley were each
represented in the General Court .separately, and not
by the parent town. Owing to the politioal disturb-
ances a new Assembly was chosen by the Province j any special designation of either ofiice, and then the
in the summer of 1775. The precept issued to the I Legislature selected from the upper body the mem-
towu of Groton, with the answer, is found among the
hers of the Council.
536
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The Continental Journal, etc., (Boston), November
2, 1780, gives a list of the loembers of the General
Court, where Mr. Prescott appears not only as a rep-
resentative, but also as a Senator apd a Councilor ;
and in another column of the same newspaper it is
announced, aa a resolution of the Legislature, that
owing to Mr. Prescott's acceptance of the Senatorship,
his office as sheriff of Middlesex County was render-
ed vacant, and owing, furthermore, to the lack of time
in filling it, agreeably to the new Constitution, the
session cf the Superior Court of Judicature, Court of
Assize and General Gaol Delivery would stand ad-
journed for one fortnight. He was also chosen, during
the years 1781, '82, '83, '84 and '86, first to the Senate,
and shortly afterwards to the Council, where he ap-
pears to have served through the respective termn.
He had previously represented the town in the three
Provincial Congresses of 1774 and 1775, and liis ex-
perience in legislative boilies was large.
Two of the representatives in the following list,
namely, the Hon. Timothy Bigelow and the Hon.
Luther Lawrence, have been Speakers of the House.
Mr. Bigelow was first chosen to that position on May
2'J, 1805, and for eleven years, at intervals, he con-
tinued to till the office — the longest term of service in
that capacity ever held by one person — though during
a part of this period he was representing the town
of Medford. He was Speaker at the time of the
separation of Maine from Jlassachusetts. Mr.
Lawrence, a brother-in-law of Mr. Bigelow, was
elected to the same otfice on May JO, 1822, and
held it during one year. It is not a little singu-
lar that they both were occupants, at ditrerenl
times, of the same dwelling, formerly situated on
Main Street, but now moved away ; and both had
their law-offices in a building near by, where, also,
Mr. Dana, the president of the Senate, had had his
law-office. This coincidence is by no means weak-
ened by the fact that (.iovernor Boutwell, the present
owner of the place, was once the Democratic candi-
date for the Speakership, when the Legislature met
on January G, 1847, and he also was a resident of the
town at that time. It may be worthy of note that
another Speaker, the Hon. Timothy Fuller, the father
of Margaret, who is known as the Counte.ss d'Ossoli,
was a citizen of Groton for some years before his
death, which took place on October 1, 1835.
Under the Constitution originally the political year
began on the last Wednesday of May, but the Sena-
tors and Representatives were chosen at different
times. The members of the House were elected,
annually, in the month of May, ten days at least be-
fore the last Wednesday of that month, and their
term of .service was during the year of their election.
UNDER THE STATE C0N3T1TIPTI0N.
Dait of Elxtion.
SepteintMr 4, 17tiO, Uon. Jauiea I'reacutt.
Maj U, 1781, Oeacou iBaac Farnaworth.
May 13, nsj, DuacoQ iBaac Farodwurtb, Jeclioed, auil Israel Uubart
chosen ia bia place.
51ay \'l, ITS.!, Israel UoLart.
May 10, 1T.S4, Or. Uenjamin Morse.
May 9, ITSO. Ebenezer Cbampney.
May 3, 1780, (the town voteU by one iiiajui-ily tiot to send).
On March 7, 1787, the (ieneral Court passed an or-
der fining the town of Groton twenty-four pounds and
ten shillings for its neglect to send a representative
during the preceding year. Forty other towns were
fined various suras at the same time for a similar
neglect ; and among them were Pepperell, Dunstable,
Westford, Littleton, Harvard and Lunenburg.
DaU of EUrtUin.
May 7, 1TS7, l»r. Benjaniiii Morse.
.May 1-, 17*8, Dr. Beujauiiu Monse.
May 11, 178H, Dr. Benjiioiiii Morse.
May 4, 1701), (tbe towa voted not to send).
May 9, 1791, Major .^aron Brown.
May 7, 179J, Major Aaron Urown.
May 0, 17'j;), 5I;ijor Aaron Bruwn, .Mr. Timotby Blgelonr.
May IJ, 17U4, Mr. Timotby Bigelow.
May li, ITUJ, Mr. Timotby BiRelow.
May •!, 17'."i, Mr. Tiinorhy Bigelow.
May t, 1797, .Mr. Tiuiotby lligelow .
.May U, 1798, Hon. Timotby Uiu-elow.
JIuy 1., KiTj, Hon. Timotby Bigelow.
May :i, IMM, Hon. Tiniolliy liigi-low.
May 4, l.S'll, Hon, Timotby Bigelow,
May 3, ISO^ Hon, Timothy Bigelow,
.M;ty -, I>*o:'., S;unnel Dana.
May 7, l>lit4, Hon, Timothy Bigelow,
May li, IM'.*., Hon. Timotby Bigeloiv, Spe^ikcr.
.Mfly o, Ihoii, Wuu. Timotby Bigeluw, .^jiruArt-.
May 4, ISOT, Josipb .Moors.
Miiy ■_', ISfiS, .losepb .Moors,
Jliiy 1, 1809, .losepli Sloors, Oii^r I'rescolt.
,^Iny 7, 18111, Oliver I'rescolt. .lunies Brazer.
May (J. l8ll, .Major .losepb .Moors, Major Tliomai t-Jarduer.
May 4. ISI'J, .lo«e|,b floors, I.iitln'i Lawrence,
."^lay ;l, l?l:;, .Jofieph ^loor.". I.iitlii'r I.awirhie.
M:i.\ -. IS14, Joseph -^Klor.-. l.ntlo.i l.awu-iit-e.
May I, |.Sl.'t, Lolber I.awrenco.
.May li, I^Iil, I.ullier Lawrence.
May o, IS17, Lntber Ljiwrenco.
^lay 4, l.sis, I. other Lawrence.
.May ;i, 1819, Lutber Lawrence.
May 1, l.>"iO, liOther Lawrence.
.May 7, 1>J1, Lntber Lawrence.
3Iay »J, lSJ',i, Lother Lawrence, i^jiettkfr.
May ri, 19'23, ithe town voted nut to seudl.
May 2o, 1824, t'aptain Noah Sbattuck.
May 'J, lSi.'», Hon. Sauniel Dana.
May 1, 1.S2G, Hon, Samuel Dana.
May 7. 1827, Hon. Samuel Dana.
May .=), 1828, (tbe l.-wn Voted not to send),
3Iay 4, IS29, faleb Bntler, declined, aiul William I-lvemioi-e chosen in
his place.
.May 3, 1830, Lutber Lawrence, William Livermore.
.May 11, 18-'Jl, C'aptaiu John Boyutou.
(Tbe town vot«d not to choose a second repreaantalive.)
By the tenth Article of Amendment to the Consti-
tution of Massachusetts, adopted by the General
Court during two successive sessions, and ratified by
the people on May 11, 1831, the beginning of the
political year was changed from the last Wednesday
in .May to the first Wednesday in .January, and the
day of election changed to the second Monday in
November. In this list hereafter the term of service
is during the year following the date of election.
Dute of Ettction.
Nuveiuber 12, 1832, Captain John Boyoton, Captain John BockwtMxl.
GROTON.
537
November 11, 1833, Captain Jobn Bo/nCou, Captaia Johu Rockwood.
NoTember 10, 1834, Captain John Boynton, Timotb; Blood.
November 9, 1836, Captain Jobn Boynton, Timotby Blood.
November 14, 1836, Jobn Gray Park, Dr. Joshua Greeti.
November 13, 1837, Dr. Joebua Green.
(Tbe town voted not to cbooee a second repreeeotative.)
November 12, 1838, Jobn Gray Park, Captain Daniel Sbattuck.
November 11, 18-39. (tbe town voted not to Bend.)
November 9, I81u, John Boynton.
November 8, 1841, George Sewall Boutwelt.
November 14, 1842, George Sewall Bontwell.
November 13, 1843, George Sewall Bontwell.
November 11, 1644, William Ltvermore, Jr.
November 10, 1845, William Livennore, Jr.
November 10, 1816, George Sewall Boutwell.
Mr. Boutwell was chosen on the third trial by five
majority. On the preceding day there had been a
tie vote twice between him and Edward Coburn, the
Whig candidate.
Duff of Election.
November 8, 1847, George Sewall Boutwell.
November 13, 1818, George Sewall Boutwell.
November 12, 1849, George Sewall Boutwell.
November 11, 1850, Phlnebaa Gilman Prescott.
November 10, 1851, PhtDebas Gilman Prescott.
November S, 1852, William Sbattuck.
November 14, 1853, William Sbattuck.
November 13, 1854, John Warren Parker.
November 12, 1855, Jobn Warren Parker.
By the 6fteenth Article of Amendment to the State
Constitution, adopted by the General Court during
two successive sessions, and ratified by the people on
May 23, 1855, the day of election was changed to the
Tuesday next after the first Monday in November.
bale of Election.
November 4, 1856, Warren Fay Stone.
Under Chapter CCCVIII.. Acte of 1857, a nev.
apportionment of Representatives was made through-
out the State, and the town of Groton became, there-
by, in connection with the towns of Pepperell, Shir-
ley, Westford and Dunstjible, the Twenty-pixth Mid
dlesex District, with two Representatives.
bate of Election.
November 3, 1857, Kliel Shumway.
November 3, 18.57. Robert Parker Woods.
November 7, 180i}, George Henry Brown.
November 4, 1863, Georgu Samuel Gates.
Novembers, 1S65, Benjauiin Franklin Taft.
Mr. Shumway 's election was contested before the
General Court by Allen Cummings, of Dunstable,
and a hearing was given by the Committee on Elec-
tions ; but the matter was decided in favor of Mr.
Shumway. For a full statement of the case, see
" Reports of Controverted Elections in the Senate
and House of Representatives of the Commonwealth
of Massachusetts from 1853 to 1885 inclusive " (page
41), by Edward P. Loring and Charles Theodore
Russell, Jr. (Boston, 1886).
By another apportionment, made under Chapter
cm.. Acts of 1860, Groton and Pepperell became
the Thirty-first Middlesex District, and were entitled
to one Representative. The town of Ayer, on its
incorporation, February 14, 1871, except that pari
which had previously belonged to Shirley, was added
to the district.
Dale of EUclion.
November 7, 18C6, Uanial Needbam.
November 4, 1868, William Livermore.
Novembers, 1869, Edmund Dana Bancroft.
Novembers, 1873, George Samuel Gales.-
By still another apportionment, under Chapter
XV., Acts of 1876, Groton became, in connection
with Westford, Dunstable and Pepperell, the Thirty-
fourth Middlesex District, and entitled to one Repre-
sentative.
Dale of Election.
November S, 1876, Aea Stillman Lawrence.
November 3, 1880, Asa Stillman Lawrence.
November 7, 1883, Muses Poor Palmer.
November 12, 188C, George Sumner Graves.
Colonel William Lawrence was a member of the
General Court during seventeen years, — the longest
term of service of any Representative from the town ;
and after him came the Hon. James Prescott, who
served fifteen years.
Mr. Boutwell is now the senior surviving member,
and, with the exception of Phineas Gilman Prescott,
William Shaltuck, Warren Fay Stone, George Henry
Brown and George Sumner Graves, all his successors
are still alive.
REVOLUTIONAEY PERIOD.
.FIRSTI-ROVINCIAL CONGRESS OF DEPUTIES.
Date of Election, Term of Service.
Way 9, 1774 Honorable James Prescott 1774
BECOND paOVlNCIAL CONOltESS OF DEPl'TIES.
December 26, 1774. , . Honorable James Prescott 1775
THIRD PROVINCIAL CONORi^S OF DET'UTIES.
Way 22, 1775 Honorable James Prescott 1775
HEMSERB OF THE BOARD UP WAH.
iictober 30. 1776 Oliver Pr«scoU. declined.
November 16, 1776. . . James Prescott 1776-1779
UEUBEIt op THE COUNCIL.
Way 29, 1777 Oliver Prescott 1777-1779
According to the records of the General Court,
when the Board of War was first cliosen on October
30, 1776, "Brigr Prescot " was elected a member.
This referred to Dr. Oliver Prescott, at that time a
brigadier-general, but it does not appear that he ever
took his seat with the board. On November 13th the
records state that two of the members, whose names
are given, had declined, and their places were at once
filled ; and on November 16th five more resignations
were announced, — though no names are mentioned, —
and the vacancies then filled. Dr. Prescott was un-
doubtedly one of the five who declined at this time.
Among those chosen at the second election was
" Colonel Prescot," who was James, a brother of
Oliver. It is a little singular that their Christian
names are not given in the records, as both were well-
known men. The " Journal of the House," October
30, 1776, prints the name of "James Prescott, Esq ; "
as one of the niue original members chosen at that
time, but this is an error. Colonet Prescott attended
his first meeting with the Board of War on Decem-
ber 18, — according to the manuscript minutes of the
Board.
538
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
VARIOUS OFFICERS.
GOVEB.SOE or THE OOSIMONWEALTn.
Date of EleciUm. Term of Service^
JaDDarr 11, 1851 . . . Houorabia George Sewall Bontwell 1851, 1852
6ECBETARY OF THE UNITED STATES TREASUKT.
(Under President Grant.)
March 11, 1869 .... Honorable George Sewall Bontvell . 1869-1873
8ENAT0B IN CONOBESS.
Matt:b 12, 1873 . . . . Honorable George Sewall Boutwell . 1873-1877
REl'BESKNTATIVES IN CONGRESS.
November 5, 1810 . . .Honorable William Merchant Rich-
ardson 1811-1814
November?, 1814. . . Honorable Samuel Sana 1814.1815
November 4, 1862 . . . Honorable George Sewell Boutwell 1863-1869
MEMBERS OF THE EXECUTIVE COUNCIL.
October 27, 1780 . . . . Honorable James Prescott . . 1780-1784,1780
May 28, 1802 Honorable Timothy Bigelow 1802
PRESIDENTIAL ELECTOR.
November 6, 1820 . . . Honorable Samuel Dana 1820
(The Electoral College of Maasncbusetts cast its vote on December 7,
1820, unanimously in favor of Jaines Monroe for President.)
DELEGATES TO CONiSTITUTIONAL CONVENTIONS.
Convention for forming the ConntitiUion of ^IniaacUunetta, September 1, 1779.
Date of Election. Term of Service.
Angust 16, 1779 .... Honomble James Sullivan 1779, 1780
(Mr. Sullivan was afterward Governor of the Commonwealth, and
died on December 10, \iit*i, while holding the otflce.)
Convention fur adopting the VtfnttUiitinn of the United States, Jnuuary
9, 1788.
December 3, 1787 .... Dr. Benjamin Morse, Joseph Sheple, Esq. 1788
(Both these delegates opposed the adoption.)
C^jnveulion for altering the ConMtitution of Mtiuachiiselt^, Soveinht^ 15, 18211.
f Honorable Samuel Dana, ) ,.,„,„.
August 21, 1820 • , „ , „ } ■ ■ .1820,1821
t Luther Lawrence, Esq. J
Cvnceiition for altering Oie Oonttitntion of MnssuchiiBella, .May 4, 1853.
March 7, 1853 lohn Gray Park, Esq 1853
(Mr. Bontwell, of Groton, represented the tuwu of Berlin, Worces-
ter County, in this Convention.)
JUDGE.S AND OTHER COURT OFFICERS.
CHIEF JISTICF OF TUE COtiRT OF COMMON FLEAS.
hate of Appointment. Term of Service .
June 3, 1803 . . . Honorable .lames Prescott, Jr 1803
(By an Act passed uD June 21, 1811, the Couitof Common Pleas
became the Circuit Court of Conimon Pleas.)
CHIEF JUSTICE OF THE CIRCUIT COtIRT OF COMMON PLEAS.
October 14, 1811 . . Honorable Samuel Dana 1811-1820
JUSTICE OF COURT UF COMMON PLEAS.
December 21, 1782 . . Honorable James Prescott I782-180U
JUDOES OF PBOBATE.
July 1,1779 Honorable Oliver Prescott 1779-1804
(Reappointed on March 27, 1781.)
February 1, 1805 . . . Honorable James Prescott, Jr 1805-1821
SHEHIFF.
September 6, 1775 . . Honorable James Prescott 1775-1780
CLERK OF THE COURT OF COMMON PLEAS.
May 28, 1783 .... William Swan, Esq 1783-1789
" The Massachusetts Register and United States
Calendar for the year of our Lord 1806" (page 75)
gives Ephraim Wood, of Groton, as one of the jus-
tices of the Court of Common Pleas in Middlesex
County, but the place of residence is without doubt a
mistake. I cannot find that Judge Wood ever lived
at Groton.
A LIST OF THE RESIDENTS
0/ Groton who held Commissions from the Governor
and Council, during the Provincial Period.
Date of Appointment .
Angust 27, 1713, Captain Jonas Prescott, Justice of the Peace.
December 9, 1715, Captain Jonas Prescott, Justice of the Peace.
December 26, 1727, Bei^amin Prescott, Justice of the Peace.
October 10, 1729, Benjamin Prescott, Justice of the Peace.
March 19, 1729-30, Captain Nathaniel Sartle, Justice of the Peace.
July 9, 1731, Benjamin Prescott, Justice of the Peace.
July 9, 1731, .Nathaniel Sartle, Justice of the Peace.
June 27, 1735, Benjamin Prescott, in place of Paul Dudley, a Special
Justice of the Superior Court of Judicature.
January 2, 1735-36, Benjamin Prescott. Justice of the Peace and of the
(Quorum.
November 10, 17l7,Benjamin Prescott, in place of Piuil Dudley, a Spec-
ial Justice in divers cases.
December 29, 1739, William Lawrence, Justice nf the Peace and of the
Quorum.
.\ngiist 12, 1749, William Lawrence, Special Justice of the Inferior
Court of Common Pleas.
June 21, 1751, William Lawrence, Special Justice i.f the Inferior Court
of Counuon Pleas.
January 2, 1753, James Pn-sdlt, .Tiistice of the Peace.
June 20, 176.'i, William Lawrence, Justice of the Inferior Courtof Com-
mon Pleas, In place uf Francis Fnlhuni, resiL'ned.
NovembtT 20, 1761, William Lawrence, Justice of the Peace and of the
Quorum.
November 20, 1701, James Pre»colt, Justice of the Peace.
June 8, 17C4, .\bel Lawrence, Justice of the Peace.
Coroners. — The first three names mentioned below
are taken from the Council records ; but the others
are found in the "Record of Civil Commissions," in
the office of the Secretary of State. Under the Con-
stitution coroners were appointed for life, unles.s
sooner removed ; but by an act passed on April 29,
1862, their tenure of office was limited to seven years,
subject to reappoiutment. By another act passed on
May 9, 1877, the office was abolished, and, so far as
related to inquests, the medical e.xarainer was substi-
tuted in place of the coroner.
Date of Appointment.
March 8,1759, Israel Hnbbard [Hobart].
November 20, 1761, Israel Hobart.
(These two persons were the same.)
July 12, 1769, Is.iac Faruswurth.
.\ugust 28, 1775, Isaac Farnsworth.
September 24, 1778, Ephraim Russell.
March 27, 1781, Ephraim Russell.
March 2, 1790, Samuel Lawrence.
March 2, 1790, Peter Edes.
January 7, 1801, Samson Woods.
Febniary 3, 1803, William Farwell Brazer.
July 4, 1803, Jaines Lewis, Jr.
July 5, 1809, WUIiam Lawrence.
Febmory 20, 1810, Abel Farnsworth.
August 20, Isll, Jacob Lakio Parker.
March 2, 1813, Amos Lawrence.
May 26, 1817, Benjamin Moors.
February 9, 1820, William Austin Bancroft.
(Mr. Bancroft was a resident uf Townseud at the time of hia
appointment.)
January 16, 1822, David Childa.
June 29, 1852, Jacob Pollard.
May 15, 1856, John Mason Porter.
April 2, 1858, Ensebius Silsby Clarke.
.Vpril 10, 1860, Asa Stillman Lawrence.
Januarj' 24, 1866, John Quincy Adams McCollester.
April 16, 1867, Asa Stillmao Lawrence.
April 30, 1869, Benjamin Lincoln Howe.
April 30, 1874, Asa SUllmau Lawrence.
GROTON.
539
NATIVES OF GROTON
And BetidenU of the Thwn, who have Afterward Filled
Important Positione Elsnchere.
Honorable John Prescott Bigelow, born at Groton
on August 25, 1797, Harvard College, ISIO ; Secretary
of the ConimoDwealth of Massachusetts, 183G-43 ;
Member of the Executive Council, 1845-49 ; Mayor
of Boston, 1849-51. Died in Boston on July 4,
1874.
Honorable Henry Adams Bullard, born at Groton
on September 9, 1788, Harvard College, 1807 ; Justice
of the Sixth District Court of Louisiana, 1822-31 ;
Representative in Congress from Alexandria and New
Orleans, Louisiana (Twenty-first, Twenty-second and
Thirty-first Congresses), 1831-34, '50, '51; Justice of
the Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1834-4(3, with the
exception of a few months in 1839, when he acted as
Secretary of State. Died in New Orleans on April
17, 1851.
Mr. Bullard's father was the settled minister at
Pepperell, but all the printed accounts of his life say
that he was born at Groton, which is my authority for
the statement.
Honorable Willard Hall, born at Westford on De-
cember 24, 1780, Harvard College, 1799 ; studied law
with the Honorable Samuel Dana at Groton ; Secre-
tary of the State of Delaware, 1811-14, '21 ; Repre-
sentative in Congress from Wilmington, Delaware
(Fifteenth and Sixteenth Congresses), 1817-21 ; Judge
of the United States District Court in Delaware,
1823-71. Died in Wilmington on May 10, 1875.
Honorable John Harris, born at Harvard on Octo-
ber 13, 17139, Harvard College, 1791; studied law with
the Honorable Timothy Bigelow at Groton ; Justice
of the Superior Court of Judicature of New Hamp-
shire, 1823-33. Died at Hopkinton, New Hampshire,
on April 23, 184.J.
Honorable Amos Kendall, born at Dunstable on
August 16, 1789, Dartmouth College, 1811 ; studied
law with the Honorable William Merchant Richard-
son at Groton ; Postma.ster-General under Presidents
Jackson and Van Buren, 1835-40. Died in Wash-
ington, D. C, on June 12, 1869.
Honorable Abbott Lawrence, born at Groton on
December 16, 1792; Representative in Congress from
Boston (Twenty-fourth and Twenty-sixth Congresses),
1835-37, '39, '40 ; Presidential Elector, 1844 ; Envoy
Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to Great
Britain, 1849-52. Died in Boston on August 18,
1855.
Honorable John Locke, born at Hopkinton, Massa-
chusetts, on February 14, 1764, Harvard College,
1792 ; studied law with the Honorable Timothy
Bigelow at Groton ; Representative in Congress from
Ashby, Massachusetts (Eighteenth, Nineteenth and
Twentieth Congresses), 1823-29; Member of the
Executive Council, 1831. Died in Boston on March
29, 1855.
Honorable Thomas Rice, born at Pownalborough
(now Wiscaaset), Maine, on March 30, 1768, Harvard
College, 1791 ; studied law with __the Honorable
Timothy Bigelow at Groton ; Representative in Con-
gress from Augusta, District of Maine, Maasachusette
(Fourteenth and Fifteenth Congresses), 1815-19.
Died at Winslow, Maine, on August 24, 1854.
Honorable William Merchant Richardson, born at
Pelham, New Hampshire, on January 4. 1774, Har-
vard College, 1797 ; Preceptor of Groton Academy,
1799-1802 ; studied law with the Honorable Samuel
Dana at Groton ; Postmaster, 1804-12 ; Representa-
tive in Congress from Groton (Twelfth and Thirteenth
Congresses), 1811-14; removed to Portsmouth, New
Hampshire, and afterward became Chief Justice of
the Superior Court of Judicature of that State, 1816-
38. Died at Chester, New Hampshire, on March 23,
1838.
Honorable Ether Shepley, born at Groton on No-
vember 2, 1789, Dartmouth College, 1811 ; Senator in
Congress from Maine, 1833-36 ; Justice of the Supreme
Judicial Court of Majne, 1836-48 ; Chief Justice of
the same Court, 1848-55. Died in Portland on Janu-
ary 15, 1877.
Honorable Samuel Emerson Smith, born at Hollis,
New Hampshire, on March 12, 1788, Harvard Col-
lege, 1808 ; studied law with the Honorable Samuel
Dana at Groton ; Justice of the Court of Common
Pleas of Maine, 1822-1830; Governor of Maine,
1831-1833; Justice of the Court of Common Pleas
again, 1835-1837. Died at Wiscasset, Maine, on
March 3, 1860.
Honorable Asahel Steams, born at Lunenburg,
June 17, 1774, Harvard College, 1797 ; Preceptor of
Groton Academy during a short period immediately
after his graduation ; studied law with the Honorable
Timothy Bigelow at Groton ; representative in Con-
gress from Chelmsford, Massachusetts (Fourteenth
Congress), 1815-1817; University Professor of Law at
the Harvard Law School, 1817-1829. Died in Cam-
bridge on February 5, 1839.
Honorable James Sullivan, born at Berwick, Maine,
on April 22, 1744 ; Member of the three Provin-
cial Congresses, from Biddeford, 1774, 1775; resident
of Groton, 1778-1782; delegate to the Continental
Congress, 1782; Member of the Executive Council,
1787; Judge of Probate, Suffolk County, 1788-1790;
Attorney -General, 1790-1807 ; First President of tne
Massachusetts Historical Society, 1791-1806 ; Gov-
ernor of the Commonwealth, 1807, 1808. Died in
Boston on December 10, 1808, while ic office.
Honorable John Varnum, born at Dracut on June
25.1778, Harvard College, 1798; studied law with
the Honorable Timothy Bigelow at Groton ; Repre-
sentative in Congress from Haverhill, Massachusetts
(Nineteenth, Twentieth and Twenty-first Congresses),
1825-1831. Died at Niles, Michigan, on July 23,
1836.
In the spring of 1765 the odious Stomp Act was
540
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
passed, which did much to hiisteii public opinion to-
ward the American Revolution. This town sympa-
thized warmly with the feeling, and prepared to do
her part in the struggle. A large number of her in-
habitants had received their schooling in the French
War, as their fathers before them had received theirs
during the Indian troubles. Such persons did not
now enter upon camp life as raw troops, but as ex-
perienced and disciplined soldiers. The town had
men willing to serve and able to command. The
leaders of the Revolution displayed great foresight in
the careful attention paid to the details of their work ;
and the final success of the struggle was due as much
to their sagacity as to the deep feeling of the jieople.
On the side of the patriots the skirmishes of .Vpril Hi.
1775, were fought by companies made up of minute-
men, organized on a recommendation of the First
Provincial Congre.ss of M;issachu.setts, in a resolve
passed at Cambridge on October 26, 1774. It was at
that time recommended to the field officers of the
various militia regiments that they should enlist at
least one-iiu,".rter of their respective commands, and
foim them into companies to be held in reailiness, at
the shortest notice by the Committee of .Safety, to
march to the place of rendezvous, .'^uch soldiers
soon became known as minnte-nien, and proved to be
of very great help and strength to the popular rau.se.
Two companies were enlisted at Groton ; and at the
desire of the officers, the Rev. Samuel Webster, o1
Temple, New Hampshire, on February "21, 177.'>.
preached a sermon before them, which was afterward
printed. It was there stated that a larare ni.ijority oi
the town had enjaged to hold themselves in readi-
ness, agreeably to the plan of the Provincial (Jongress
to act in the service of their country. The sermon is
singularly meagre in those particulars which would
interest us at the present time, and is made up largely
of theological opinions, perhaps as valuable now as
then, but not so highly prized.
On the memorable l'.)th of April two compa-
nies of minute-men, under the respective com;.iands
of Captain Henry Farwell and Captain .\sa Law-
rence, marched from Groton to Concord and Cam-
bridge ; and on the same day for the same ilestination
two other companies of militia, under the respective
commands of Captain .Tosiah Sartell and Cajitain John
Sawtell. According to the company rolls at the State-
House, there were in Farwell's com])any, at the time
of marching, three commissioned officers and fifty-two
men, and in Lawrence's three officers and forty-three
men; and in the two militia companies (.Sartell's)
three officers and forty-five men, and (Sawtell's) one
officer and twenty-five men, respectively, though in
Sawtell's company some of the men were from Pep-
perell.
In the battle of Bunker Hill, on June 17, 1775, one
commissioned officer and eleven .soldiers, residents of
Groton, were either killed in the fight or mortally
wounded. This roll of honor comprises the names of
' Lieutenant Amaziah Fussett, who fell wounded and
died a prisoner on July 5th; Sergeant Benjamin
Prescott, a son of the Hon. James Prescott, and a
' nephew of Colonel William Prescott, who commanded
) the American forces, and privates Abraham Blood,
Chambers Corey, James Dodge, Peter Fisk, Stephen
Foster, Simon Hobart, Jonathan Jenkins, Daviil
, Kemp, Robert Parker and Benjamin Woods. This
[ was the largest loss experienced by any town in the
' battle, and it shows ihe patriotic character of the citi-
zens at that period. Colonel Prescott, the commander
on the American side, and three (jf the Pepperell
soldiers who lost their lives in the fight, were natives
I of Groton.
' During the War for the Union the record of the
' town is ecjually honorable. According to General
William .^chouler's '•History of Ma.ssachiisetts in the
Civil War" (ii. 40'J). ^he furnished four hundred men
for the imblic service, whicii was a surplus of forty-
nine over and above all demands ; of whom twenty-
four were commissioned officers. Forty of these s<d-
diers were either killed in battle or died of their
wounds, or of sickness contracted in the army. X
' marble tablet with their names cut in the stone has
j been |)lace<l in the hall of the Town-House in grate-
' ful recognition of their services and dedicated to their
: memory. The whole amount of money raised and
ap]>ropriated by the town for war purposes, exclusive
' of State aid, wa.» thirty-one thousand seven hundred
and twenty-four dollars ami forty-seven cents (?<M1,-
\ 724.47).
'. Ca.mp Stf.vex>: at Gi'.otox. — During the War of
, the Rebellion, in the autumn of AW'l, the Common-
; wealth of .Massachu.setts established a military camp
I at (iroton, on the triangular piece of land situated in
the southwesterly part of the town, and bounded by
the Peterborough and Shirley Railroad, the Nashua
; River and the road to .Shirley Village. It contained
! eighteen or twenty acres, more or less, and at that
I time belonged to Joseph Cutts; the entrance was near
I the angle made by the railroad and the highway.
i The Fifty-third Regiment of Infantry, Ma.ssachuselt3
Volunteer Militia, while its ranks were recruiting,
was encamped on this ground. The regiment was
raised from Groton and Clinton, Leominster, F'itch-
] burg and other towns in the neighborhood belonging
! to Worcester County, and was mustered into the
' public service for nine months.
! Special Order, No. 91<), issued by the Adjutant-
General of the Commonwealth, September 19, 1862,
contains the following:
I " A camp ..f reiiilezvou3 is fatat.lislieil at tirotoii .fiinrtiun, Miildlesex
I Co.. wlit^re buiTacka are beint; hiiilt. wliicb is .iuai^imted Caujl> Stevenn.
f'ui.t. W. C Sawyer, I'.itX Rfgt. ^Fatw. Vols., is appointed Coruiiiaudulit.
[ Due notice will be giveo when the burrack.H are i-eaily for use."
.Special Onler, No. 055, under the date of Septem-
ber 23d, has the following:
"Liniisey Tllden [Cbarlee LiDzee Tilden], Jdth Kegt. Uam. Vola , is
detailed for Post AdjutaDt at Camp Steveus, GrotoD.^'
GROTON.
541
The camp was so named in memory of General
Isaac logalls Stevens, a native of Andover and a
graduate of West Point, who was killed in the battle of ,
Chantilly, Virginia, on September G, 1862, only a fort- i
night before the camp was established.
The commandant was Wesley Caleb Sawyer, born I
in the adjoining town of Harvard, on August 2t),
1839, who graduated at Harvard College in the class
of 1861. Soon after leaving Cambridge he was com-
missioned, on October 8, 1861, as a captain in the
Twenty-third Ma.ssachusetts Voiunteer.s, and he left
the State with that regiment. He was attached to
Burnside expedition, that went to North Carolina; in
the battle of Newbern, March 14, 1862, he was se-
verely wounded, which resulted in the amputation of
his left thigh, and necessarily prevented him from
further participation in aa active campaign.
The regiment left Camp Stevens on Saturday, No-
vember 29th, for New York, where it remained until
January 17, 1863, at which time it embarked for New
Orleans. Subsequently to the departure of the troops
from Groton, the following order was issued :
" COMM(tNWEALrH OP M.K8S.*''!! USPTTS,
" Heaii QrARTF.BB, BOSTON, Dec. 20, 1HG2.
"Special Order, Ko. 1;J11.
" Tbe troope which were ciilifitfj himI inuKlered intn Aer^ ice nt runip
Stevens. Grnton .liuiclion, liHviiit' left the Cnnniionwealtli fur the eeat of
war, (_"upt. WeHley I' Siiwver, C^itntiianilant of tlie t.'uiitp, is relieved
from furtlier Hervice. ati<l 1 am direeteii l»y liis Excellency, tlie <'«im-
mander-ili-Cliief, Ui tliank Capt. ^a\vyeI for the acceptable luauDei' in
uhicb lie baa iierfurnn^d tlie duties of iiin ]nysi.
" By ol^er of the Coiiimauder-ili-Cliief,
"WiLI.IABt Sr'MMlTER,
".Iii/t. GencT'tl.'^
Since the war Captain Sawyer has studied at
Giittingen, ('■erniany, where hf received tlie degree of
Doctor of Philosophy. He lias held the professorship
of Philosophy and Rhetoric at Lawrence I'niver.-itv.
Appletou, Wisconsin, but is now connected, as a
professor, with the Normal SlIiooI at Oshkosli, Wis-
consin.
The barracks and otiicr structure? used by the
soldiers at Camp Stevens htive long since disappeared,
and not a trace of the former occupation is to be seen.
Years ago some of the buildings were taken down, and
the rest were removed, mostly to Aver. George James
Burns, Esq., a lawyer of that town, wrote an interest-
ing article for The Grntoii Lnmlnmrh. June 25,
1887, which traces the history of many of these build-
ings.
In the autumn of 1862, Dr. Edward Jarvis, of Dor-
chester, was appointed by Surgeon-General Dale to
visit the various camps in the State, of which there
were ten, and report on their sanitary condition. The
result of his labors may be found in two communi-
cations printed in Tlie Boston Medical and Snrqinnl
JniiTiial for December 4 and 11, 1862 (LX VII. 364-
367 and 381-384, respectively), wherein he makes
some criticism on Camp Stevens.
According to the " Record of Massachusetts Volun-
teers, 1861-65" (I. 390-392), the following soldiers
died in camp at Groton : Henry A. Waters, of Shir-
ley, Co. D, on October 25, 1862; Spencer Stockwell,
of Athol, Co. E, November 20th ; and Daniel P. Hem-
enway, of Bprre, Co. F, December 1st.
The veterans of the war have organized a post of
Grand .\rray of the Republic, which is called the
E. S. Clark Post, No. 115. It is named after Major
Eusebius Silsby Clark, of Groton, a gallant officer of
the Twenty-sixth Massachusetts Volunteers, who was
mortally wounded at Winchester, Virginia, on Sep-
tember 10, 1864, and died on October 17, 1864.
The Population of Groton at Different
Times. — The town of Groton was formerly a much
more important place relatively, both in size and in-
fluence, than it is at the present time. According to
tbe census of 1790, it was then the second town in
Middlesex County, Cambridge alone having a larger
i)opulation. At that time Groton had 322 families,
numbering 1840 persons; and Cambridge, 355 fami-
lies, numbering 2115 persons. Charlestown had a pop-
ulation of 1583, and Newton, 1360. Reading, with
.341 families (nineteen more than Groton), numbered
1802 person.- (thirty-eight less than Groton). Woburn
then had a population of 1727 ; Framingham, 1598 ;
.Marlborough, 1554, and Waltham, 882. Peiiperell
contained 1132 inhabitants; Shirley, 677 ; Westford,
1229, and Littleton, 854.
There were at that time in Middlesex County forty-
one towns, which number has since been increased to
forty-seven towns and seven cities ; and in the mean-
while Brighton and Charlestown have been merged in
the municipality of Boston, and thus have lost their
separate existence. Major Aaron Brown, of Groton,
and General Henry Woods, of Pepperell, were the
marshals who took the census of the county, with the
exception of that small portion lying on the further
side of the Merrimack River.
A comparison of the population of the town at dif-
ferent [leriods is somewhat interesting to those famil-
iar with its history. John Tinker, in a ))etition to the
j General Court, dated October, 1659, four years after
the incorporation of the town, says that the planta-
tion "Continueth vnpeopled." The report of the
committee, — of which Thomas Danforth was chair-
; man, — dated May 23, 1661, and already quoted, states
! that there were four or five families "planted" at
j that time. In March, 1676, when the town was
i burned by the Indians, it was estimated by the Rev.
i William Hubbard, in his narrative, that there were
' then sixty families in the place. Another writer of
, that period puts the number of dwellings destroyed
1 at sixty-six, and says that only six liouses were left
I standing. From these estimates it would appear that
j the population of the town at the time of its destruc-
' lion was between 300 and 350 inhabitants. From
I March, 1676, until the early spring of 1678 the settle-
ment was abandoned and entirely deserted. In
March, 1680, there were forty families in the town, as
appears by some statistical returus printed in " The
542
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
New England Historical and Genealogical Register "
(V. 173) for April, 1851. In March, 1707-8, there
were sixty-seven polls (" Collections of the American
Statistical Association," p. 146), which wauld indicate
a population of about 300 persons. At the beginning
of the j'ear 1755 there were fourteen negro slaves in
town — seven men and seven women — who were six-
teen years old or upwards.
On June 2, 1763, Governor Francis Bernard sent a
message to the General Court, expressing his wish that
a census of the Province might be taken ; but that
body paid no heed to the suggestion. On January 19,
1764, he renewed the proposition, and apparently
with better success ; for the Legislature, on February
2d, adopted an order carrying out his wishes. The
popular heart, however, was not in the work, and no
interest was taken in the measure. The people were
suspicious of the rulers in England, and jealous of
all political interference; and it is but natural that
the census proceeded .-ilowly. On March 5, 176.J, an
act was passed by the General Court to carry into ef-
fect an order which had ]>reviously been pjtssed for
numbering the people within the Province. This ac-
tion shows that the Governor's pet scheme was not re-
ceiving a warm support.
With these drawbacks, and under such conditions,
the first census of the houses, families and number of
people in the Province of Massachusetts Bay ever
taken was finished in the year 176-'). Singularly
enough, there are now no returns of this enumeration
among the Provincial or i^tate Archives, where they
were undoubtedly placed. How or when they disap-
peared is a matter of conjecture; but probably they I
were lost amid the confusion that naturally prevailed |
during the Revolutionary period. Fortunately a copy
of this census was found by the late Judge Samuel I
Dana, of Groton, among some papers of a deceased
friend, which had then lately come into his posses-
sion ; and by him sent to the Cnlumbiaii Centiiiel
newspaper, where it was printed for the first time in
the issue of August 17, 1822, more than half a cen-
tury after the enumeration was made. From tliis
source is derived all the information concerning the
figures of the census of 1765 ; and the printed copy,
in the absence of any other, is an authority second in
importance only to the original manuscript returns.
At that time the town of Groton had 1408 inhabit-
ants.
Akin to this subject, there is in the Library of the
Massachusetts Historical Society a memorandum-
book, which contains some interesting facts con-
nected directly or indirectly with the population of
the Commonwealth during the Revolutionary period.
According to this authority the population of Groton
in the year 1776 was 1639; the number of ratable
polls in 1778 was 362, and the number in 1781 was
395.
In compliance with a resolution of Congress, an
act was passed by the General Court of Massachu-
setts on July 2, 1784, requiring the assessors of towns
to make certain returns, from which it appears that
there were at that time 418 polls in Groton. This
was the largest number returned by any town in the
county, with the single exception of Cambridge,
which had 457 polls: and after Groton came Reading
with 399 polls, and Woburn with 395, followed closely
by Framingham with 389.
At the several decennial dates of the United States
census, the population of Groton has been as follows
In the year 1790, 1,840; 1800, 1,802; 1810, 1,886
1820, 1,897; 18.30, 1,925; 1840, 2,139; 18.50, 2,515
1860,3,193; 1870, 3,584, and 1880,1,862. The town
of Ayer was incorporated on February 14, 1871, and
made up almo.st entirely from the territory of Gro-
ton, which accounts for the great diminution in the
population between the last two decennial periods,
as given above. The new town started on its corpo-
rate existence with a population nearly equal to that
of the parent town, and, with all the vigor of youth,
.soon surpassed it in size.
The population of Groion, as taken by the State
in the quinquennial years, has been as follows: In
the year 1855, 2,745; 1865, 3,176; 1875, 1,908, and
1885, 1,987. By all the enumerations. National or
State, made during the present century, it will be
seen that there has been a steady increase in the
population of the town, with the exception of the
period between the years 1860 and 1865, when there
was a slight decrease of seventeen inhabitants, and of
the period between 187.') and 1880, when there was a
falling off of forty-six inhabitants. The loss in the
first instance was due, of course, lo the disturbing
effects of the Civil ^Var.
The population of Ayer in the year 1885 was 2190 ;
and if that village had not been separately incorpor-
ated, the population of Groton would now be consid-
erably more than 4000 inhabitants. According to
the last State census there were thirty-two towns or
cities in Middlesex County larger than Groton, and
twenty-one towns smaller.
The original Groton Plantation, as granted by the
General Court on May 25, 16.55, has furnished the
entire territory of -Vyer; the whole of Pepperell, with
the exception of a narrow strip lying along its north-
ern boundary, which once belonged to the West Par-
ish of Dunstable (Hollis); the whole of Shirley, with
the exception of a small portion formerly known as
"Stow Leg;" one- half of Dunstable; and has con-
tributed more or less to form five other towns, namely.
Harvard, Littleton and Westford (including a part
of Forge Village), in Massachusetts, besides Nashua
and Hollis, in New Hampshire. The total popula-
tion of this territory is now more than 10,000 inhab-
itants.
Summary. — Population of Groton nt Different
Times. — Town incorporated on May 25, 1655; in Oc-
tober, 1659, "vnpeopled;" in May, 1661, four or five
families; in March, 1676, about 300 inhabitants; in
GROTON.
543
March, 1680, forty families; in March, 1708, 67 polls;
in March, 1765, 1408 inhabitants ; in 1776, 1639 in-
habitants; in 1778, 362 polls; in 1781, 395 polls, and
in 1784, 418 polls.
Year.
IohabitaDt£.
Tear.
InhabitaDls
1790 . . .
1840
1855 . . .
274.5
1802
31!13
1810 . . .
ISKB
18l>i . . .
317B
1820 . . .
1897
1870 . . .
3684
1830 . . .
. • . . . . n-2S
1875 . . .
1908
1840 . . .
2139
1880 .. .
1883 . . .
1862
1850 . . .
2515
1987
The approximate population of the town, under
the national census of 1890, is 2071, though these
figures are subject to change in the oflBcial count.
Slavery in Groton. — During a long period be-
fore the Revolution, Groton had one element in her
population which does not now exist, and which to-day
has disappeared from almost the whole civilized world.
At the beginning of the year 1755 there were fourteen
negro slaves in town, seven men and seven women
who were sixteen years old or upwards. At that
time Townsend had three slaves, two men and one
woman ; Shirley had one, a man ; and Pepperell made
no return of having any. Westford had five, but the
sex is not given. These facts are gathered from a
census of negro slaves in Massachusetts, ordered by
the Province, which is published in the third volume,
second series, of the Collections of the Massachusetts
Historical Society (pages 95-97).
William Banks, a negro or mulatto, was married at
Groton on December 21, 1719, by Francis Fullam, a
justice of peace, to Hannah Wansamug. William
appears to have been a slave belonging to Eieazer
Robbins, of Groton, and Hannah was an Indian, who
is called in the records "late of Lancaster; " but un-
fortunately the marriage was not a happy one. With
all confidence in her husband, the wife bought his
freedom, when he proved false to his plight and prom-
ise, and deserted her. The story, told in her own
words, is found in the Journal of the Massachusetts
House of Representatives, June 13, 1724 (page 39):
" A Petition of Haunah B-ntIa iDdiaii, ehewing that ebe bought of
Eltiizi^ Rot'hniB of Orptnn bis .Servant Man's Time, and gave a BoDd
of /. l.'i for Payment of the aaine, tliat afterwards sbe married the said
Servant 3Ian, wbo is gince abeconded, and tbe said Hfbbuui hatb put tbe
Mid Bond in Suit, and cast the Petitioner into Prison in Boston, that the
Principal Delit with tbe Charges bath arisen to L 25 which Mr. £ii(card
Bu-jglet of Hnxbttty bath paid for her, praying this Court would please
to enable tbe said Edward Hugrjlfs to Sell such a pan of her Land in
Snlu:i-, Bfi will satisfy him for his advance of said 7'wentt/-Fice Pounds.
" Read and committed to the Committee for Petitions."
The following advertisement, not an unusual one
for that period, appears in The Boston Evening-
Post, July 30, 1739 :
"O -^.V aujay from his Mast^, Mr. John Woods of Oroton, on Thursday
-^ ^' the I'lth of thu Instant July, *i Segro Mnn Servunl named Caesar,
abnut 22 Tenrs of Age, a pretty short toell sett Fellotc. He carried wUh him
a Blue 0'<U and Jacket, a pair of Tote Breeches, a Castor Hal, Stockingt
and Shoes of bis own, and a Bine Cloth Coat icUh floicei'd Metal Buttorts,
a ichUe Jiower' d Jacket, a good Berer Hal, a Gray Wigg, and a pair ofneir
Shoes "f bis Maater'B, tcUh some other things. It is suspected there is lome
tchiis Person that may be tcitli hint, or design to make Cse of hi^ Master's
,\pparel aboie liescribetl.
Whoever shall take up the said Servant, and bring him to his nbovo-taid
Master in Groton, or be a Means of convicting any person or CowfederaU
uti/h said Servant as above suspected, shall hat^ Fife Pounds Bsieard frrr
each of them, andaU necessary Charges paitt.
Another advertisement appears in The Boston
Oazette and Country Journal, June 13, 1774, as
follows :
Ten Dollars Retcard.
RAN AWAY from the SulMcriber, Joseph Moors, of Groton, In the
County of Middleeex, and Province of Maaaachnsetts-Bay, a
Molalto Man Servant, named TITUS, about 20 Yearn of Age, of a mid-
ling Stature, wears short curl'd Hair, has one of his Fore-Teeth broke
out, took with hlni a blue Surdan, a SnufT-coloured Coat, and a Pair of
white wasbM Leather Breeches, a Pair of new Cow-Hide Pnmpn and a
Furr'd Hat with large Bnnis, and sundry other Articles of Wearing
Apparel. Whoever will take up said Servant and confine him in
any of his Majesty's Goals, so that tbe Owner may have him again, shall
have TEN DOLLARS Reward and all neceaaary Charges paid, by
JOSEPH MOORS.
^* All Masters of Vessels and others, are hereby Vaulion'd against
Harbouring, Omceaiing, or carrying off said Servaittf as they would Uiereby
itroid the Penalty of the Lave.
The following marriage is entered in the church rec-
ords under the date December 28, 1742 .■ 'Triamus
(Cap' Boydens Negro man servant [)] to Margr'. Mo-
latto formerly servant to S. S. both of Groton." It is
also recorded that Margaret, the servant of Samuel
Scripture, Jr., was baptized on January 30, 1733-34,
and that she owned the church covenant at the same
lime. The initials " S. S." stand for Samuel Scrip-
lure. This negro couple was afterward blessed with a
family of children, and they lived on the west side of
the Nashua River, a short distance north of the
county road to Townsend. His surname was Lew or
Lue, and his given name became contracted into Pri-
mus ; and to this day the rise of ground, near the
place where the Pepperell road leaves the main road,
Is known as Primus Hill, so called after him. Mr.
Butler thinks that perhaps Margaret's name was
Lew. See his History (page 454). Their oldest child,
— Zelah, a corruption of Barzillai, — born at Groton
on November 5, 1743, was a famous musician, who
lived at Dracut and the father of numerous children
who were also musicians. He was a fifer in Captain
John Ford's company of the twenty-seventh Massa-
chusetts Regiment, in service at the siege of Boston,
and was present at the Battle of Bunker Hill.
About the year 1740 there was a negro slave in Gro-
ton by the name of Boad, who used to look after the
cattle sent up to Groton Gore in the spring to be pas-
tured during the summer. See " The Boundary Lines
of Old Groton" (page 37). The church records con-
tains the entry of the baptism of Hagar, a servant of
William Green, on August 1, 1765.
Akin to the subject of slavery in Groton is this
item, from The Groton Landmark, November 14,
1885 :—
" Gov. Boutwell haa in an old scrap-book the following intereeting
Memorandum ;
"August, 1856.
" Nuah Sbattnck, esq., informs roe that there were eleven ilaves in
Groton when slavery waa abolished, and be mentioned the following
names. Cbloe Williams, Pblllie Cutler, Phillis Sartell, Icbabod
544
HISTORY OF .MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
PhiDt-as Wait also owned one
Dftvis, Fftnny Borden and William Case.
BlaTe."
Noah Shattuck. a son of Job and Sarah (Hartwell)
Shattuck, was born on August 30, 1772, and died on
September 28, 1858.
The following entry is found in the town records,
and refers to the last survivor of negro slavery within
the limits of the town. The institution was abolished
by the adoption of the State Constitution in the year
1780, the courts holding that the Bill of Rights swept
away the remnants of involuntary servitude:
"Phillis Walby, HerTant to .Tosiah Sawlell, Jun., deceased,' died at
Groton, aged TD, February — , IS'JI."
The following extract from the town records refers
to Tilu.a, who is ;idvertised as a runaway in The
Boston-Gazette, and Country Journal, June 13, 1774,
as mentioned above. The advertiser was a son of
Abraham Moors, the owner of Zebinu, the slave-
mother :
" TitilB, a nioiaro iioy horn of 'Aehinah, a negro slave to 31^. .\brahani
Moora, March — , 17.">l."
A List of the Town Clerks (from the year 16i>2
to the present time, with the ilates of their election
and terms of service. In this list the years are given
according to the new style of reckoning, and in spe-
cifying dates, small fractions of years are overlooked.
The town was attacked by the Indians in the spring
of 1676, and abandoned by the inhabitants until
Jlarch, 1678.
The earliest records of the town were written by
Richard Sawtell, and begin on June 23, 1G62, though
his election as town clerk was not recorded until De-
cember 24, 1662. During the period since that date
there have been thirty-four town clerks, of whom live,
namely, Jonathan Morse, William I>ongley, Jr., James
Blanchard, Jonathan Sheple and Samuel Rockwood,
died while in office — Longley being killed by the
r J- T. 1 .»- iL^CiA 1^ ■ .1 1 ^ i- June IS, lsit4, Oliver Prescotr, Jr., I8'i4-1810,
Indians on July 2/, 1694. During the earlv part of „ . ; ,„,, , . ,, ',. ,^„ ,„,,
•' ® " .Alarrh 5, isn, Joseph Xansfield, 1811-1811.
1682 Captain James Parker, Richard Blood and Jonas
Prescott made entries in the records, though no one of
them appears to have been at the time town clerk. Jon-
athan Morse was the first who signed the records with
his name, though the practice with him was not con-
stant. William Longley, William Longley, Jr., and
.John Longley were representatives of three successive
generations in the same family, being father, son and
grandson. On December !), 1687, William Iiongley,
Jr., was chosen clerk, but he acted as such during
only a part of the ue.\t town meeting on May 21,
1688, when he was followed by Josiah Parker, who
made the entry for so much of that meeting as oc-
curred after his election. Mr. Bingham, the present
occupant, has filled the position for more than thirty-
five years continuously — by far the longest term of
service of any town clerk. Joseph Lakin, with a rec-
ord of seventeen years, comes next to him in length of
time. Of all the persons mentioned in the list, only
the last three are now living, namely, Mr. Boutwell,
Mr. Parker and Mr. Brigham ; and their combined
term of service covers just forty-four years. Since the
death of Jlr. Park, which took place on September
23, 1875, these three have been the only survivors.
Mr. Butler died on October 7, 1854, and Mr. Boyn-
ton on November 30, 1854 — less than eight weeks
apart.
D<tte of Eleclii'H.
December 24, ir.52, Richard Sawtell. lBfi2-16«4.
January 27, Ifitio, James Fisk, IGtv'i.
December 2, 1G66, William Longley, 1666, 16t;7.
December II, lfiG7, John Page, 1668.
Vovcniber 11, li'.ilg, Richard Blood, 1669.
Xoveniber M, ir.tJD. John Jtorse, 1670-1676.
(Town abandoned during two years.)
167S, James Parker, 1678, 16Tn.
December 23, 167n, John .Morse, 1680, IGSI.
16.S2, Jonathan Morse (died .luly M, 16S(;), 1682-1686.
December 10, 16.S6, Joaiah Parker, 1086, li;87.
December 0, 1687, William Longley, Jr., 16-'<3 (a short time only).
Slay 21, 1688. Josiah Parker, 168K-1 691.
December 1(1, 1691, Jonas Preficott, I6ti2.
December 12, 1692, William Lr,ngl^y, Jr. (kilM July 27, 1694), 169.1-
1694.
March 4, 16P5, ,lanies Blanchard, |p;il5.
March 3, li;96, J,.uas Preacolt, 1696.
December 10. I'. 9i;, .lames lllumbaid (die>l Feb., 17114), 1697-1704.
-Mari-h 8, 17li4, Tliuiiias Tarlwll. 17o4, 1705.
-March u, 1706, .lusepli l.akin, 1706-1722.
Mur.h .•,, 1723, .lohn Longley, 1723-1726.
Maivh 7, 1727, Joseph Lakin, 1727.
>farch ."., 1728. .lohn Longley, 1728, I72D.
March .3, 17.30, .lonalhan t^heple, I73i.i.
.March 2, 1731, Thomas Tarbeli, Jr., 1731-1733.
.March .i, 1734, .lonalhan Sheple, 1731-1714.
March .•>. 1745. Thoiiuu Tarbeli, Jr., I745-17:.6.
March I, 17.07, .Vltel Lawrence, I7.'i7-I764.
March 6, 176.5, Oliver Prescott, 17i'-'>-1777.
.Mari'h :;, 1778, Isaac Furnsworlh. 1*78-1781.
March .i. I7.^2. Abel Rancroft, 17.82. 17.S3.
March 3. 1781, Jonathan Keep. 1784.
.March 1, 178.5, .\l>el Bancroft was (hosen, but declined.
.^Iarch 1, KSr-, Isaac Farnsworth, 1785-1787.
March 1, 1788, Xathaniel .Sartel was chosen, but declined.
.March 10, 1788, Joseph Shed, 17R8-1794.
March 3, 1795, Samuel Lawrence, n9.".-I798.
March 5, 1799, Samuel Rockwood (died .May 29, 1S04J, 1799-1804.
March 7, 1815, Caleb Butler, 18l,-,-18l7.
March 3, 1818, Joseph Maoslield, 1818.
March 2, 1819, Noah Shaltuck, 1819-1822.
March 3, 1823, Caleb Butler, 1823-1831.
March 6. 1832, John Boynton, 1832. 18.33.
March 4, 1834, John C.ray Pork. 1834-1830.
.March 6,18.37. John Boynton, 1837-184S.
March 3, 1846, lieorge Sewall Boutwell, 1846-1S50.
March 4, 1851, John Warren Parker, 1851-18.54.
March .5, 1855. (ieorge Dexter Brighatn. 1855-
A Llst of THE TREA.'iURER.s (so far as they
are found in the town records, with the dates
of their election and terms of service). — Alden
Warren served during twenty-four years, which is the
longest term of any treasurer; and next to him, in
length of service, was Benjamin Bancroft, who filled
the otfice for seventeen years. After him came Cal-
vin Boynton, who served during si.xteen years, and
then Capt. Ephraim Sawtell, with a term of fifteen
years. William Livermore, who was treasurer in
1845, is the senior survivor ; and, with the exception
of the brothers George and Walter Shattuck, all his
successors are still alive.
GROTON.
545
bate of BUctioa.
[March ?], 1697, Capt. Ja«. Parker.
March 1, 1709, •' Siunuill Woods
traaewer"
March 7, 1710, Samuel Woods.
March P, 1711, Samuel Wooda.
March 4, 1712, Jooathau fioiden.
March 3, 1713. Jonathan Boiden.
March 2, I7U, " Shobuall hobart "
March 1, 1715, SheUuel Hobart.
March 6, 17IG, Jonathan Boiden.
March 5, ni7, Jonathan Boiden.
March i, 1718, John Loogley.
March 3, 1711J,John Longlej.
March 1, 17.0, John Longlej.
March 7, 1721, John Longley.
March 6, 1722, John Lungiey.
March 5, 1723, Thomas Lawrence.
March 3, 1724, Thomas Lawrence.
March 2, 1725, Thomas Lawrence.
March 1, 172b, Thoe. Lawrence, Sr
March 7, 1727, Thomas Lawrence.
March 6, 1728, Thomas Lawrence.
March 4, 1729, Samuel Tarbell.
March 3, 173U, Samuel Taihell.
March 2, 1731, Samuel Tarbell.
March 7, 1732. "Justis Preacott."
March 6, 1733, Benj. Prescutt, Esq.
March 5, 1734 (In the list of town
officera chosen on this day the
treasurer's name is omitted^
probably through an oversight
but without doubt it was Beu-
jamin Prescott^
March 4, 1735, Benj. Preacott, Esq.
March 2, 173G, Benj. Preacott, Enq.
March 7, 1737, Beoj. Prescott, Esq.
March 6, 173S, " Justice Sawtell."
March 4, 1739, Kath. Sawtell, Esq.
1740 (no record is found).
March 3, 1741, Kath. Sawtell, Esq.
1742 (no record Is fouud;.
March 1, 1743, " IMacon Longley."
March 6, 1744, Dea. John Loogley
March 5, 1745, Dea. John Loogley
March 3, 174G, Dea. Joho Loogley
March 3, 1747, 1)ea. JoliD Loogley
March 1, 174S, I)ea. John Loogl-y
March G, 1749, Dea, John Longley
March 5, 1750, Capt. Eph. Saw'tell
March 5, 1751, Capt. Eph. sawtell
March 3, 1752, Capt. Eph. S .wtell
March 6, 175.1, Capt. Kph Sawtell
March 5, 1751, Capt. Eph. Sawtell
Slarch 4, 1755, Capt. Eph. Sawtell
March 2, 1750, Capt. Eph. Sawtell
March 1, 1757. Capt. Eph. Sawlell
March T, 175S, Cupt. Eph. bawtell
March 6, 1759, Capt. Eph. Sawtell
March 4, 1760, Capt. Eph. Sawtdl
March 3, 1761, Capt. Eph. Sawt«ll
March 2, 1762, Capt. Eph. Sawlell
March 1, 1763, Capt. Eph. Sawtell
March 6, 1764, Capt. Eph. Sawlell
March 5, 1765, Benjamin Bancroft
March 4, 1760, Beujamiu Bancroft
March 3, 1767, Benjamin Bancroft
March 1, 176S, Beojaniiu Bancroft
March 7, 1769, Benjamin Bancroft
March 6, 1770, Beojaiuin Bancroft
March 5, 1771, Benjamin BaUL-roft
March 3, 177 J, Benjauijo Baocrott
March 2, 1773, Benjamin Bancroft
March 1, 1774, Dea. Beoj. Bancrolt
March 7, 1775, De.i. Beoj. Bancroft
March 5. 177G. Dea. Booj. Bancroft
March 4, 1777, Dea. Deoj. Bancroft
o5-ii
Dale of BUcUoH.
March 3, 1778, Dea. Benj. Bancroft
March 2, 177!i, Dea. Benj. Bancroft
March 7, 178u, Dea. Beoj. Bancroft
March 6, 1781, Dea. beoj. Bancroft
March 5, 1782, Lieut. Jooa. Keep.
March 4, 1783, Lieut. Jooa. Keep.
March 2, 1784, Israel Hobart, Esq.
March 1, anS, Lirael Hobart, Esq.
March 7, n86, Isaiah Edes.
March 6, 1787, Isaiah Edes.
March 4, 1788. Isaiah Edes.
March 3, 1789, Isaiab Edes.
March 2, 1790, Isaiab Edes.
March 1, 1701, Isaiah Edes.
March 6, 1792, Isaiah Edes.
March 5, 1793, Isaiah Edes.
March 4, 1791, Isaiah Edes.
March 3, 1795, Isaiah Edes.
March 1, 1796, Joseph Shed.
March 7, 1797, Joseph Shed.
March 6, 1798, Joseph Shed.
March 5, 1799, Joseph Shed.
March 4, 1800, Joseph Shed.
March 3, 1801, Joseph Shed.
March 2, 1802, Joseph Shed.
March 1, 1803, Joseph Shed.
March 6, 1804, Solomon Tarbell.
March 5, 1805, Solomoo Tarbell.
March 4, 18ofi, Lieut. Sol. Tarbell.
March, 3, 1807, Lieut. Sol. Tarbell.
March 1, 1808, Lieut. Sol. Tartwll.
March 7. 1809, Lieut. Sol. Tarbell.
March G, 1810, Lieut. Sol. Tarbell.
March 5, 1811. Lieut. Sol. Tarbell.
March 3, 1812, Lieut. Sol. Tarbell.
March 2, 1813, Lieut. Sol. Tarbell.
April 4, 1814, Alpheus Richardson.
March 7, 1815, Alpheus Richardson
March 5, 1816, Calvin Boyntoo.
March 4, 1817, Calvin Boyutoo.
March 3, 1818, Calviu Boyutoo.
March 2, 1819, Calvio Boyotoo.
March 7, 182<i, Calviu Boyotoo.
March 6, 1821, Culvin Boynloo.
March 5, 1b22, Calviu Boyn on.
March 3, 1823, Calvio Boyotoo.
March 2, 1824. Calvio Boyoron.
March 1,1825, Calvin Buyoton.
March 7, 18^G, Calviu Boyntoo.
March 6, 1827. Calviu Boyntoo.
March 4, 1828, Calvin Boyuton.
March 3, 1829, Calvin Boynton.
fllarch 2, 1830, Calvin boynton.
March 1, 1831, Calvin Boyuton.
March 0, 1832, John Peabody.
March 5, 1833, John Peabody.
March 4, 1834, Joho Peabody.
March 3, l&3i, John Peabody.
March 1, 18 )G, Joho Peabody.
March 6, 1837, Joho Peabody.
March 6, 1838, Joho Peabody.
March 5, 1839, John Peabody.
March 3, 1840. John Peabody.
March 2, 1841, Joho Pt-abody.
March 1, 1842, Joho Peabody.
March 7, 184.J, John Peabody.
March 5, 1844, Daniel Shattuck.
March 4, 1845, Wm. Liveroiore, Jr
March 3, 1846, George Shattuck.
March 2, 1847, George Shattuck.
March 6, 1S48, George Shutluck.
March C. 1849, Waller Sliatluck.
March 5, 185' i, W.iller Shattuck.
March 4, 1S5I, Walter Shattuck.
March 2. 1852, Walter Shattuck.
March 1, 1853, Daniel Needham.
Date of SlecUox.
March 3. 1873, Aldeo Warreo.
March 2, 1874, Alden Warrao.
Mareh 1, l«75. Alden Warren.
March 6, 1876, Alden Warren.
March A, 1877, Alden Warren.
March 4, 1878, Alden Warreo.
March 3, 1879, George S. Gates.
March 1, 1880, George S. Gates.
March 7, 1881, George S. Gates.
April 3, 1882, George 6. Gates.
April 2, 1383, George S. Gates.
April 7, 18s4, George S. Gates.
April 6, 1885, George S. Gates.
April 5, 1886, George S. Gates.
April 4, 1887, George B. Gates.
April 2, 1888, Oeorse S. Gates.
April 1, 1889, OMrge 8. Gates.
April 7, 1890, George S. Gates.
Date of Eltclim.
March 6, 1854, Daniel Needham.
March 5, 1855, Aldeo Warren.
March 3, 1856, Alden Warreo.
March 2, 1857, Alden Warren.
March 1, 1858. Alden Warren.
March 7, 1859, Aldeo Warren.
March 5, 1860, Aldeo Warreo.
March 4, I8G1, Aldeo Warreo.
March 3, 1862, Aldeo Warreo.
March 2, 1863, Aldeo Warren.
Merch 7, 18&1, Alden Warren.
March 6, 1865, Alden Warren.
March 5, 1866. Alden Waireo.
March 4, 1867, Alden Warren.
March 2, 1868, Alden Warren.
March 1, 1869, Alden Warren.
March 7, 1870, Alden Warreo.
Mareh 6, 1871, Aldeo Warreo.
March 4, 1872, Alden Warren.
The Old Stores and the Post-Office of Geo-
TON. — Tradition has preserved little or nothing in re-
gard to the earliest trading-stores of Groton. It is
probable, however, that they were kept in dwell-
ing-houses by the occupants, who sold articles in
common use for the convenience of the neighbor-
hood, and at the same time pursued their regular
vocations.
Jonas Cutler was keeping a shop on the site of Mr.
Gerrish's atore before the Revolution, and the follow-
ing notice, signed by him, appears in The Miaaachu-
setts Qazette (Boston), November 28, 1768 :
"i TBKrr.
*' Whereas on the 19th or 20th Night of November lostant the Shop
of the Subscriber was broke open in £;rofoH,at:d from thence wae slollen
a large Sum of Cash, viz , four Half Johaooes, two Guineas, two Half
Ditto, One Pistole mill'd, nine Crowns, a Considerable Number of Dol-
lars, with a coosiderable Quantity of small Silver i. Capper, together
with ooe Bever Hat, about fifteen Yards of Holland, eleven Bandannas,
blue Ground with white, twelve red ditto with white, Part of a Piece
of Silk RoniaiU. 1 Pair block Worsted Hose, 1 strip'd Cap, 8 or 10 black
barcelona Handkerchiefs, Part of a Piece of red silver'd Ribband, blue &
white do. Part of three Pieces of black Sattin Bibband, part of three
pieces of black Tafferty ditto, two bundles of Razors, Part of 2 DoEen
Penknives, Part of 2 Dozen ditto with Seals, Part of 1 Dozen Snnff
Boies, Part of 3 Dozen Shoe Buckets, Part of several Groce of Buttons,
ooe Piece of gellow [ysilow ?] Ribband, with sundry Articles not yet
known of Whoever will apprehend the said Thief or Thieves, so
that he or they may be brought to Justice, shall receive TEN DOL-
LARS Reward and all necessary Charges paid. Jonas CtrrLia.
" Crolon, Hoc. 22. 1703 [8].
*' ^^ If any of the above roentiooed Articles are offered to Sail, It is
desired they may be slop'd with the Thief, aod Notice giren to said OiU-
ler or to the Printers."
On October 21, 1773, a noted burglar was hanged
in Boston for various robberies committed in different
parts of the State, and covering a period of some
years. The unfortunate man was present at the de-
livery of a sermon by the Reverend Samuel Stillman,
preached at his own request, on the Sunday before
his execution ; and to many of the printed copies is
appended an account of his life. In it the poor
fellow states that he is only twenty-one years old, and
that he was born in Groton of a respectable family.
He confessed that he broke into Mr. Cutler's shop,
and took away " a good piece of broad-cloth, a quan-
tity of silk mitts and several pieces of silk handker-
546
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
chieft." He wj.8 hardly seventeen years of age at the
time of this burglary. To the present generation it
would seem cruel and wicked to hang a misguided
youth for offences of this character.
Mr. Cutler died on December 19, 1782; and he was
succeeded in business by Major Thomas Gardner, who
erected the building formerly known as Gerrish's
Block, which was moved away in the summer of 1885.
Major Gardner lived in the house now owned by the
Watters family.
Near the end of the last century a store, situated a
little north of the late Benjamin Perkins Dii's house,
was kept by James Brazer, which had an extensive
trade for twenty miles in different directions. It was
here that the late Amos Lawrence served an ap-
prenticeship of seven years, which ended on April
22, 1807 ; and he often spoke of his success in busi-
ness as due, in part, to the experience in this store.
Late in life he wrote that "the knowledge of every-
day affairs which I acquired in ray business ap-
prenticeship at Groton has been a source of pleasure
and profit even in my last ten years' discipline."
The quantity of New England rum and other
liquors sold at that period would astonish the tem-
perance people of the present day. Social drinking
was then a common practice, and each forenoon some
stimulating beverage was served up to the customers
in order to keep their trade. There were five clerks
employed in the establishment ; and many years later
Mr. Lawrence, in giving advice to a young student in
college, wrote :
' ' Id the flrat place, take '.his for your motto at the commeDcemeut of
your journey, that the difference of going juat rtgiti, or a Utile wrong^
will be the difference of finding yout^elf in good quarters, or in a ntiser-
able bog or slough, at the end of it. Of the whole number educated in
the Groton stores for some years t>(>fore and after myself, no one else, to
my knowledge, escaped the bog or slough ; and my escape I truce to the
simple fact of having put a restraint upon my appetite. We five boys
"were in the habit, every forenoon, of making a drink compounded of
rum, raisins, sugar, nutmeg, ic, with biscuit, — all palatable to eat and
drink. After being in the store four weeks, 1 found myself admonished
by ray appetite of the approach of the hour for indulgence. Thinking
the habit might make trouble if allowed to grow stronger, without fur-
ther apology to my senior* I declined partaking with them. My fit«
resolution was to abstain for a week, and, when the week was out, for a
month, and then for a year. Finally, I resolved to abstain for the rest
of my apprenticeship, which was for five years longer. During that
whole period, I never drank a spoonful though I mlied gallons daily for
my old master and his customers." 1
The following advertisement is found in the Co-
lumbian Centinel (Boston), June 8, 1805 :
** Jama Brazer,
■Would inform the public that having dissolved the Copartnership lately
subsisting between AAEON BROWN, Esq. SAMUEL HALE and the
Subscriber ; be has taken into Copartnership his son WILLIAM F.
BBAZEB, and tha business in future will be transacted under the firm
Jakes Brazer & Son ;
They will offer for sale, at their store in Groton, within six days a com-
plete assortment of English, India, und W.India GOODS, which Ihey
will sell for ready pay, at as low a rate as any store in the Couniry.
"Groton. May 29, 1806." " James Beazer.
Dl«ry and CorrcapoudeDce of Amoa Lawrence, pages 24, 26.
" Squire Brazer," aa he was generally called, was a
man of wealth and position. He was one of the
founders of Groton Academy, and his subscription of
£15 to the building fund in the year 1792 was as large
as that given by any other person. In the early part
of this century he built the house now belonging to
the academy and utuated just south of it, where he
lived until his death, which occurred on November
10, 1818. His widow, also, took a. deep interest in
the institution, and at her decease, April 14, 1826, be-
queathed to it nearly five thousand dollars.
After Mr. Brazer's death the store was moved across
the street, where, until the summer of 1885, it re-
mained, forming the wing of Gerrish's Block. The
post-office was in the north end of it during Mr.
Butler's term as postmaster. About this time the son,
William Farwell Brazer, built a store nearly opposite
to the Academy, which he kept during some years.
It was made finally into a dwelling-house, and ocou-
pied by the late Jeremiah Kilbourn.
The brick store opposite to the High School was
built in the year 1835, by Henry Woods, for his own
place of business, and afterwards kept by him and
George S. Boutwell, the style of the firm being Woods
& Boutwell. Mr. Woods died on January 12, 1841,
and he was succeeded by his surviving partner, who
carried on the store for a long time, even while hold-
ing the highest executive position in the State. In
the spring of 1855, when he began to practice law.
Governor Boutwell sold out the business to Brigham
& Parker. The post-oifice was in this building during
the years 1839 and 1840 and until April, 1841. For
the past thirty years it has been occupied by various
firms, but is now kept by John H. Sheedy & Com-
pany.
During the last war with England, Eliphalet
Wheeler had a store where Miss Betsey Capell and
her sisters, Sarah and Catherine, in more modern
times, kept a haberdasher's shop. It is situated op-
posite to the Common, and is now used as a dwell-
ing-house. They were daughters of John Capell,
who owned the saw-mill and grist-mill, which
formerly stood on the present site of the Tileston and
Hollingsworth paper-mills, on the Great Road, north-
west of the village. Afterward Wheeler and his
brother, Abner, took Major Thomas Gardner's store,
where he was followed by William F. Brazer, Park &
Woods, Park & Potter, Potter & Gerrish and lastly
by Charles Gerrish, who kept it for more than thirty
years. It was given up as a store in July, 1884, and
has since been moved away and made into a tene-
ment-house.
Near the beginning of the present century there
were three military companies in town : the Artillery
Company, commanded at one time by Captain James
Lewis; the North Company, by Captain Jonas Gil-
son, and the South Company, by Captain Abel Tar-
bell. Two of these officers were soon promoted in
the regimental service ; Captain Tarbell to a col-
GROTON.
547
onelcy, and Captain Lewis to a majorate. Captain
Gilson resiRned and was succeeded by Captain Noaii
Shattuck. They had their spring and fall training-
days, when they drilled as a battalion on the Com-
mon,— there were no trees there then, — and marched
through the village. They formed a very respectable
command, and sometimes would be drawn up before
Squire Brazer's store, and at other times before Major
Gardner's, to be treated with toddy, which was then
considered a harmless krink.
David Child had a store, about the beginning of
the century, at the south corner of Main and Pleas-
ant Streets, nearly opposite to the site of the Orthodox
meeting-house, though Pleasant Street was not then
laid out. It was subsequently occupied by Deacon
Jonathan Stow Adams, then by Artemas Wood, and
lastly by Milo Henry Shattuck. This was moved off
nearly twenty years ago, and a spacious building put
up a few rods north, on th" old tavern site across the
way, by Mr. Shattuck, who still carries on a large
business.
Alpheus Richardson kept a book-store, about the
year 1815, in his dwelling, at the south corner of Main
and Elm Streets, besides having a book-bindery in
the same building. Soon afterward an L was added
to the house, and for a short time he carried on a
country variety store in connection with his other
business. The book-store and binder's shop were
continued until about 18TO. It is said that this house
was built originally by Colonel James Prescolt, for
the use of his son, Abijah, as a store; but it never
was so occupied by him.
Joseph and Phineas Hemenway, uncles of the late
Augustus Hemenway, of Boston, built a store on the
north corner of Main and Elm Streets, about the
year 1815, where they carried on a trading business.
They were succeeded by one Richardson, then by
David Childs; and finally by John Hamilton Spalter,
who had for many years a book store and binder's
shop in the building, which is now used as a dwell-
ing-house. At the present time Mr. Spalter is living
in Keene, New Hampshire.
About the year 1826, General Thomas Adams
Staples built and kept a store on Main Street, di-
rectly north of the Orthodox meeting-house. He was
followed successively by Benjamin Franklin Law-
rence, Henry Hill and Walter Shattuck. At one
time the style of the firm was Shattuck, Brown &
Company. The building was burned down very early
on Tuesday morning, November 17, 1874, and its
site is now occupied by Dr. David Roscoe Steere's
house.
In November, 1844, a large building was moved
from HoUis Street to the corner of Main and Court
Streets. It was put up originally as a meeting-house
for the Second Adveotists or MiUerites, as they were
called in this neighborhood, after William Miller,
one of the founders of these*; and during the fol-
lowing winter and spring it was titled up in a com-
modious manner, with shops in the basement and a
spacious hall in the second story. The building was
known as Liberty Hall, and formed a conspicuous
structure in the village. It was first occupied by
tenants in July, 1845. The post-oflSce was kept there
while Mr. Lothrop and Mr. Andruss were the poBt-
masters. It was used as a shoe-store, a grocery and a
bakery, when, on Sunday, March 31, 1878, it was
burned to the ground.
The brick store, owned by the Dix family, was
built and kept by Aaron Brown, near the beginning
of the century. He was followed by Moses Carleton,
and after him came and Merriam, and then
Benjamin P. Dix. It is situated at the corner of
Main Street and Broad Meadow Road, and is now
used as a dwelling-house. A very good engraving of
this building is given in 7%e Oroton Herald, May 8,
1830, which is regarded by persons who remember it
at that time as a faithful representation, though it
has since undergone some changes.
Near the end of the last century Major.William
Swan traded in the house now occupied by Charles
Woolley, Jr., north of the Common, near the old
burying-ground. It was Major Swan who set out the
elms in front of this house, which was the Rev. Dr.
Chaplin's dwelling for many years.
At the beginning of this century two daughters of
Isaac Bowers, a son of Landlord Bowers, had a dry-
goods shop in the house owned and occupied by the
late Samuel William Rowe, Esq. About the year
1825 Walter Shattuck opened a store in the building
originally intended for the Presbyterian Church, op-
posite to the present entrance of the Groton Ceme-
tery. Before the Revolution there was a store kept
by Jonathan Clark Lewis, near the site of Captain
Asa Stillman Lawrence's bouse, north of the Town
Hall. Mr. Lewis was an Ecglisbman by birth, and
died on April 7, 1781. See "Groton Epitaphs" for
j a cut of the family coat-of-arms, which appears on
I his grave-stone. There was a trader in town, Thomas
Sackville Tufton by name, who died in the year 1778,
I though I do not know the site of his shop. Captain
! Samuel Ward, a native of Worcester, and an officer
in the French and Indian War, was engaged in busi-
ness at Groton some time before the Revolution. He
lemoved to Lancaster, where at one time he was the
town clerk, and died there on August 14, 1826.
The Groton Poet- Office. — The Groton post-office was
established at the very beginning of the present cen-
tury, and before that time letters intended for this
town were sent through private hands. Previous to
the Revolution there were only a few poet-offices in
the Province, and often persons in distant parts of
Massachusetts received their correspondence at Bos-
ton. In The Boston Gazette, or County Journal, June
30, 1755, a letter is advertised for Samuel Bowers, of
Groton, who at that time kept a tavern; and in the
same newspaper of August 4, 1755, another is adver-
tised for Captain Samuel Parker, and one for Dudley
548
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Woodbridge, who lived probably at Groton, Connec-
ticnt. It is also stated that " none of the above Let-
ters came by the last mails." In the supplement to
The Bolton Gazette, February 9, 1756, letters are
advertised as remaining uncalled for, at the Boston
ofSce, addressed to William Lakin and Abigail Par-
ker, both of Groton, as well as to Samuel Manning,
Townsend ; William Gleany, Dunstable; and Jonathan
Lawrence, Littleton. Nearly five months afterward
letters — and perhaps these identical ones — are adver-
tised for the same persons in The Boeton Weekly News-
Letter, July 1, 1756, as still uncalled for. The name
of David Farnnm, America, appears also in this list,
and it is hoped that wherever he was he received ihe
missive. The names of Oliver Lack (intended for
Lakin) and Ebenezer Parker, both of this town, are
given in another list printed in the Gazette of Jane 28,
1762 ; and in the same issue one is advertised for
Samuel Starling, America. In the supplement to the
Gazette, October 10, 1768, Ebenezer Farnsworth, Jr.,
and George Pierce, of Groton, had lette.'s advertised ;
and in the Gazette October 18, 1773, the names of
Amos Farnsworth, Jonas Farnsworth and William
Lawrence, all of this town, appear in the list. In
the Columbian Centinel (Bostxm) , January 29, 1794, a
letter is advertised for Benjamin Tarbel, of Groton.
I find no record of a post-rider passing through
Groton, during the period immediately preceding the
establishment of the post-office; but there was doubt-
less such a person who used to ride on horseback,
equipped with saddle-bags, and delivered at regular
intervals the weekly newspapers and letters along the
way. In the year 1794, according to the History of
New Ipswich, New Hampshire (page 129), a post-
rider, by the name of Balch, rode from Boston to
Keene one week and back the next. Probably he
passed through this town and served the inhabitants
with his favors.
Several years ago I procured, through the kindness
of General Charles Deveas, at that time a member of
President Hayes's Cabinet, some statistics of the Gro-
ton post-office, which are contained in the following
letter :
** PosT'Omcx Department, Afpointxent OrFici,
" Washixoion, D. C , Seplembcr 3, 1877.
"Hoif. Cbaalbs Detkns, Attornej-GeDeral, Department of Justice.
*'3lR, — I bare to ackuowledge the receipt of a comQiiiDiciition from
Samuel A. Green, of Boacoa, Uaa8acbus**tta, with your iniloiBement
thereon, requesting to be furaiehed with a list of postmasters at the
ufOcfl of GrotoD, in that State, from the date of its efftablisbment to the
present time.
" In reply, I have the honor to inform yon, that the Are which con-
sumed the department building, on the night of the tifteenth of D&.
cember, 1836, destroyed three of the earliest record-booiis of this
office ; but by the aid of the auditor's ledger-books, it is ascertained
that the office began to render accounts on the first of January, 1801,
but the exact day is not Icuown. Samuel Dana was the first postmaster,
and the following list furnishes the history of the office, as shown by
the old recorda
**Groton, Middlesex County, Massachusetts. Office probably estab-
lished in Novemlier, 1800. Samuel Dana began rendering accounts
January 1, 1801. Wm. M. Richardson, lictober 1, 1804.
*' From this time the exact dates are knowu.
" Abraham Moore, appointed po^tmuter January 31, 1812.
Elipbalet Wheeler, August 20, 1815.
James Lewis, September 0, 1815.
Caleb Butler, July 1, 1826.
Henrj- Woods, January 15, 1839.
George S. Boutwell, January 22, 1841.
Caleb Butler, April 15, 1841.
"Welcome Lothrop, December 21, 1848.
Artemas Wood, February 22, 1849.
George H. Brown, May 4, 1849.
Theodore Andruss, April 11, 1853.
George W. Fiske, April 22, 1881.
Henry Woodcock, February 13, 1867.
Miss Hattle E. Farusworth, June 11, 1869, who is Ihe present in-
cumbent.
** Each postmaster held the office up to the appointment of his succes-
sor, but it Is probable (hat Mr. Boutwell and Mr. A. Wood, allbuugh
regularly appointed, did not accept, judging by the dates of the next
postmasters.
" As to the 'income' of the ofitce, to which allusion is made, it is very
difficult to obtain any of the amounts ; but the first year and the last
year are herew ilh appended, as follows : —
(1801) FISCAL VIAE (1876)
" Fliat quarter, 81.91 First quarter, J3I4.15
Second " 2.13 Second " 290. '.i4
Third " 2.93 Third " 3U5.71
Fourth " 5.29 Fourth " 294.28
For the year, J12.26 For the year, Jl,211 08
••Trusting tlie foregoing, which is beliered to be correct, will be ac-
ceptable to you, T am, sir, respectfully,
" Your ob't serr't,
" Jamks H. 31abb,
" Acting Firai A$a't P. -If. General."
It will be seen that the net income of the oflice,
during the first seventy-five years of its existence, in-
creased one hundred-fold.
This letter of the Acting First Assistant Postmas-
ter-General supplements the account in Butler's " His-
tory of Groton' (pages 249-251). According to Mr.
Butler's statement, the post-office was established on
September 29, 1800, and the Honorable Samuel Dana
was appointed the first postmaster. No mail, how-
ever, was delivered at the office until the last week in
November. For a while it came to Groton by the
way of Leominster, certainly a verj' indirect route.
This fact appears from a letter written to Judge
Dana, by the Postmaster-Genera), under the date of
December 18, 1800, apparently in answer to a request
to have the mail brought directly from Boston. In
this communication the writer says: —
** It appears to me, that the arrangement which has been made for
carrying the mail to Groton is sufficient for the accommodation of the
inhabitants, as it gives them the opportunity of receiving their letters
regularly, and with despatch, once a week. The route from Boston by
Leominster, to Groton is only twenty miles farther than by the direct
route, and the delay of half a day, which is occasioned thereby, is not of
much consequence to the inhabitants of Groton. If it should prove that
Groton produces as uiucb postage as Lancaster and Leominster, the new
contract for carrying the mail, which is to be in operation on the first of
October nest, will be made by Concord and Groton to Walpole, and a
branch from Concord to Marlborough.
" I am, respectfully, sir, your obedient servant,
"Jog. UABERfiBAM."
The amount of postage received from the office,
after deducting the necessary expenses, including the
postmaster's salary, was, for the first year after its es-
tablishment, about twelve dollari", or three dollars for
three months. In the fear 1802 it was thirty-six dol-
lars, or nine dollars for three months, a large propor-
GROTON.
549
tional increase. At this time the mail came once a
week only, and was brought by the stage-coach.
Samuel Dana, the first postmaster, was a prominent
lawyer at the time of his appointment. He was the
son of the Reverend Samuel Dana, of Groton, and
born in this town June 26, 1767. He occupied a high
position in the community, and exerted a wide influ-
ence in the neighborhood. At a later period he was
president of the Massachusetts Senate, a member of
Congress, and finally chief justice of the Circuit
Court of Common Pleas. He died at Charlestown, on
November 20, 1835.
Judge Dana kept the post-oflSce in his own office,
which was in the same building as that of the Honor-
able Timothy Bigelow, another noted lawyer. These
eminent men were on opposite sides of the same en-
try, and generally on opposite sides of all important
cases in the northern part of Middlesex County. The
building stood on the site of Governor Boutwell's
house, and is still remembered as the medical office of
the venerable Dr. Amos Bancroft. It was afterward
moved away, and now stands near the railway-station,
where it is occupied as a dwelling-house. Judge Dana
held the position during four years, and he was suc-
ceeded by William Merchant Richardson, Esq., after-
ward the chief justice of the Superior Court of New
Hampshire. Mr. Richardson was a graduate of Har-
vard CuUege in the class of 1797, and at the time of
his appointment as postmaster had recently finished
his professsional studies in Groton. under the guidance
of Judge Dana. After his admission to the bar Mr.
Richardson entered into partnership with his former
instructor, succeeding him as postmaster in July,
1804 ; and the office was still kept in the same build-
ing. During Judge Richardson's term the net reve-
nue to the department rose from nine dollars to about
twenty-eight dollars for three months. He held the
position nearly eight years, and was followed by Ab-
raham Moore, who was appointed on January 31,
1812.
Mr. Moore was a native of Bolton, Massachusetts,
where he was born on January 5, 1785. He gradu-
ated at Harvard College in the class of 1806, and
studied law at Groton with the Honorable Timothy
Bigelow, and after his admission to the bar settled
here as a lawyer. His office was on the site of the
north end of Gerrish's Block, and it was here that the
post-office was kept. During his administration the
average income from the office was about thirty-three
dollars for the quarter. In the summer of 1815 Mr.
Moore resigned the position and removed to Boston.
Eliphalet Wheeler, who kept the store lately occu-
pied by Mr. Gerrish, was appointed in Mr. Moore's
stead, and the post-office was transferred to his place
of business. He, however, was not commissioned,
owing, it is thought, to his political views ; and Major
James Lewis, who wa-t sound in his politics, received
the appointment in his stead. Major Lewis retained
Mr. Wheeler for a short time as his a8Ji3tant, and
during this period the duties were performed by him
in his own store. Shortly afterward Caleb Butler,
Esq., was appointed the assistant, and he continued
to hold the position for eight years. During this time
the business was carried on in Mr. Butler's law-office,
and the revenue to the government reached the sum
of fifty dollars a quarter. His office was then in a
small building, — just south of Mr. Hoar's tavern, —
which was moved away about theyear 1820, andtaken
to the lot where Colonel Needham's house now stands,
at the fork of Main and HoUis Streets. It was fitted
up as a dwelling, and subsequently moved away again.
At this time the old store of Mr. Brazer, who had pre-
viously died, was brought from over the way, and oc-
cupied by Mr. Butler, on the site of his former office.
On July 1, 1826, Mr. Butler, who had been Major
Lewis' assistant for many years aud performed most
of the duties of the office, was appointed postmaster.
Mr. Butler was a native of Pelham, New Hamp-
shire, where he was born on September 13, 1776, and
a graduate of Dartmouth College in the class of 1800.
He had been the preceptor of Groton Academy for
some years, and was widely known as a critical schol-
ar. He had previously studied law with the Honorable
Luther Lawrence, of Groton, though his subsequent
practice was more in drawing up papers and settling
estates than in attendance at courts. His name is now
identified with the town as its historian. IMiring his
term of office as postmaster the revenne'tan from
fifty dollars to one hundred and ten^ollars a^fMrter.
He held the position nearly thirteen years, to the en-
tire satisfaction of the public ; but for political her-
esy he was removed on January 15, 1839, when Hen-
ry Woods was appointed his successor.
Mr. Woods held the office until his death, which
occurred on January 12, 1841 ; and he was followed
by the Hon. George S. Boutwell, since tlie Governor
of the Commonwealth and a member of the United
States Senate. During the administration of Mr.
Woods and Mr. Boutwell the office was kept in the
brick store, opposite to the present High School.
Upon the change in the administration of the Na-
tional Government, Mr. Butler was reinstated in office
on April 15, 1841. He continued to hold the position
until December 21, 1846, when he was again removed
for political reasons. Mr. Butler was a most obliging
man, and his removal was received by the public
with general regret. During his two terms he filled
the office for more than eighteen years, a longer period
than has fallen to the lot of any other postmaster of
the town. Near the end of his service a material
change was made in the rate of postage on letters ;
and in his History (page 251) he thus comments on it :
" The experiment of a cheap rate was put apoD trial. From Maj 14,
IS41, to Dereniber3l, 1844. the net reTeoue areraged one haodred aod
tweon.' four dollars and aeTeoty-ODe ceuta perqaartar. Under the Dew
Ian, fur tbe firai year aod a half, tbe reveoae baa been one bnndred
and fuor dollara and seTenty-eeven cents per quarter. Had the former
ratee remained, the natarat increaae of busineBs should hare rajaed it to
one hundred and fifty dollars per quarter. The department, which fur
550
HISTORY' OF .MIDDLESEX COUNTY, :MASSACnUSETTS.
Bome years before had fallen short of supporting itself, now became n i
be&Tjr char^ upon the treasury'. Whether the prctjent rotes will event-
nally raise a sufficient revenue to meet the expeniiitures, reniains tn bo ,
aeeQ. The greatest difficulty to be overcome is evasion of the post-office i
laws and fraud upon the department,"
Like many other persona of that period, Mr. Butler i
did not appreciate the fact that the best way to pre- 1
vent evasions of the law i.s to reduce the rates of post-
age 90 low that it will not pay to run the risk of
fraud.
Captain Welcome Lothrop succeeded Mr. Butler as
postmaster, and during his administration the office
ters as that of Groton, including, as it does, the
names of Judge Dana, Judge Richardson, Mr. Butler
and Governor Boutwell. One of Judge Richardson's
assistants was afterwards Postmaster-General of the
United States. The Honorable Amos Kendall was
studying law in his office at the time, and subse-
quently became Postmaster-General under Presidents
Jackson and Van Biiren, 1835-1840. In Mr. Ken-
dall's "Autobiography " (Boston, 1872), edited by his
son-in-law, William Stickney, it is said :
"Dnring the residueof the year 1813 Mr. Kenilall's !'luJies[nt firolonj
were much interrupted by tlie busitiess of the office, which devolved on
was kept in Liberty Hall. Captain Lothrop was a j l"'"' as the oldest student. He had ch.irce of Hie post-offic- ; received,
_4. c -c t '\r Lii jij I made up and despatched the mails, delivereil t lie letters and papers and
native of t,aston, Massachusetts, and a land surveyor ' f f , v
of some repute in this neighborhood. Artemas Wood
followed him by appointment on February 22, 1849;
but he never entered upon the duties of his office.
He was succeeded by George Henry Brown, who had
published The Spirit of the Times, a political new.spa-
per, during the Presidential canvass of 1848, and in
this way had become somewhat prominent as a local
politician. Mr. Brown was appointed on May 4,
1849; and during his term the office was kept in an
L of his dwelling, situated nearly opposite to the
Orthodox meeting-house. He was afterward the
postmaster of Ayer. Mr. Brown was followed by
Theodore Andruss, a native of Orford, New Hamp
made out the accounts. He was frequently sent on business to the
neighboring towns, and employetl in collecting office dues." I Page T^^.)
West Groton is a small settlement that lias sprung
up in the western part of the town, dating back in its
i history to the last century. It is pleasantly situated
on the banks of the Stjuannacook River, and in my
boyhood was known as Squannacook, a much better
name than the present one. It is to be regretted that
so many of the old Indian words which have a local
significance and smack of the region, should have
been crowded out of the Hat of our geographical
names. There is a small water-power here, and
formerly a saw- mill, grist-mill and a paper-mill were
shire, who ^as appointed on April 11, 1853. Mr. ] '" operation; but these have now given way to a
Andruss brought the office back to Liberty Hall, and
cootUlued to be'the incumbent until April 22, 1861,
when he was succeeded by George Washington Fiske.
On February 13, 1867, Henry Woodcock was ap-
pointed to the position, and the office was then
removed to the Town-House, where most e.'tcellent
accommodations were given to the public. He was
followed on June 11, 1869, by Miss Harriet Elizabeth
Farnsworth, now Mrs. Marion Z. Putnam ; and she in
turn wag succeeded on July 2, 1880, by Mrs. Christina
Dakin (Caryl) Fosdick, the widow of Samuel Wood-
bury Fosdick, and the present incumbent.
The office is still kept in the Town-House, and
there is no reason to think that it will be removed
from the spacious and commodious quarters it now
occupies, for a long time to come. This public build-
ing was erected in 1859, and the first town-meeting
was held within its walls, on Tuesday, November Sth,
of that year. The High School was first opened in
the lower hall on Monday, December 5th, antl the ex-
amination of classes for admission took place three
days previously, on Friday, December 2d.
A semi-daily mail was established between Boston
and Groton in the year 1849, during the early part of
postmaster Brown's administration; and a tri-daily
mail on Monday, April 18, 1887. The post-office was
made a postal-order office on Monday, August 16,
1886, and raised to the rank of a Presidential office
on February 15, 1890.
Few towns in the Commonwealth can present such
an array of distinguished men among their postmas-
factory where leather-board is made. The Peter-
borough and Shirley Branch of the Fitchburg Rail-
road passes through the place, and some local busi-
ness is transacted in the neighborhood, .^s a matter
of course, a post-office was needed in the village, and
one was rstablished on March 19, 1850. The first
person to fill the office was Adams Archibald, a native
of Truro, Nova Scotia, who kept it in the railway
station.
The following is a list of the postmasters, with the
dates of their appointment :
.\dams An:bibald, March 19. I80O.
Edrannd Blood, May 23, 1866.
Charles Henry Hill, July 31, 1871.
George Henry Bixby, July 11, 1878.
During the postmastership of Mr. Blood, and since
that time, the office has been kept in a store near the
station, and for a long while the only one in the place.
A post-office was established at Souih Groton, on
June 1, 1849, and the first postmaster was Andrew
Boynton Gardner. The village was widely known as
Groton Junction, and resulted from the intersection
of several railroads. Here six passenger-trains coming
from different points were due in the same station at
the same time, and they all were supposed to leave as
punctually.
The trains on the Fitchburg Railroad, arriving from
each direction, and likewise the trains on the Worces-
ter and Nashua Road from the north and the south,
passed each other at this place. There was also a
train from Lowell, on the Stony Brook Railroad, and
GROTON.
551
another on the Peterborough and Shirley Branch,
coming at that time from West Townsend.
A busy settlement grew up, which was incorporated
as a distinct town under the name of Ayer, on Feb-
ruary 14, 1871, 80 called after the late James Cook
Ayer, of Lowell.
The fojlowiug is a list of the postmasters, with the
dates of their appointment:
Andrew BoyntoD GardDer, June 1, 1840.
Harvey Alpheas Woods, August 11, 1853.
G«orge Henry Brown, December 30, 18G1.
'William Holmes Harlow. December 5, I8C2.
George Henry Brown, January 15, 18G3.
William Holmes Harlow, July 18, 186.5.
The name of the post-office was changed by the
Department at Washington, from South Groton to
Groton Junction, on March 1, 1862 ; and subsequently
this again was changed to Ayer, on March 22, 1871,
soon after the incorporation of the town, during the
postmastership of Mr. Harlow.
Closely akin to the post-office in ita functions is the
service of the telegraph «nd the telephone, and for
that reason I add the following facts :
The telegraph office was opened in the village of
Grcton on Saturday, March 20, 1880, mainly through
the exertions of the late Charles Harrison Waters
and of Francis Marion Boutwell, Esq. ; and the first
message was sent to Nashua. The office was estab-
lished in the railway-station, where it has since re-
mained, and the fir^t operator was Miss Etta Augusta
Shattuck.
The telephone office was opened in the village on
Friday, April 29, 1881, affording communication with
Boston and other places.
The Old Tateens and Stage-Coaches of
Gkoton. — It has been said that there is nothing
contrived by man which has produced so much hap-
piness as a good tavern. Without disputing the
statement, all will agree that many good times have
been passed around the cheerful hearth of the old-
fashioned inn.
The sites of the earliest taverns of Groton cannot
easily be identified, but the names of some of the
landlords are found in the records of the Middlesex
Court of Quarter Sessions, — now at East Cambridge,
— when they were licensed as inn-holders. At that
period no great preparations were made in the small
towns for the lodging of strangers, beyond obtaining
the necessary license, and guests were treated like
members of the family. Occasionally a farmer would
keep a tavern for a while, and thus make a market
for his home products. For a long time Groton was
a frontier settlement, and all beyond it was a wilder-
ness. The travel through the place was mainly along
the circumference of civilization, from one outlying
town to another, and there was but little patronage
for public-houses. The following list of early
landlords and retailers of spirits is taken from the
Court records, and the entries are made during the
months of July, August and September in the re-
spective years :
1699.— Joeepb Cady.
1700. — Probably no license granted,
1701.— Joseph Cady.
17C2. — Probably no license granted.
1703.— Samael Parker, Katban Hon.
1704— Samuel Parker.
1705. — Samuel Parker.
1706. — Samuel Parker.
1707.— Samuel Parker.
17ue.— Samuel Parker.
1709. — Probably no liceiue granted.
1710— Samnel Woods.
1711.— Mr. Samuel Woods.
1712. — Probably no llcenae granted.
1713.— Nathaniel Woods.
17 14.— Nathaniel Woods.
1716.— Nathaniel Woods.
1716.— Nathaniel Woods.
1717.— Nathaniel Woods, Eleazer Bobbini, Elaazer Oraen ; Jamei
Patterson, retailer.
1718 —Mr. Nathaniel Woods, Mr. Eleaier Robbina, Mr. Eleaier Green.
1719— Mr. Eleazer Green, Mr. Nathaniel Woods.
1720.— Mr. Eleazer Green.
1721 —Mr. David Whetcomb, Mr. Eleazer Green, Mr. Jonathan
Hubbard.
1722. — Mr. Eleazer Green, Mr. Jonathan Habbard.
1723. — Mr. Jonathan Hubbard.
1721. — Mr. JouAthau Hubbard, Mr. Joeepb Spaulding.
172i.— Mr. William Tarbell.
1726 —Mr. Jonathan Hubbard, Mr. William Tarbell.
1727— Mr. Jonathan Hubbard, Mr. William Tarbell, Mr. Josiah
Sautell.
1728.— Mr. Jonathan Habbard.
1729.— Mr. Jonathan Hubbard.
1730— Mr. Jonathan Hubbard, Mr. Joaiah Sartel, "Nathaniel Sartel,
Esq.
1731.— Nathaniel Sartel, Esq., Mr. Jonathan Hubbard.
1732.— Nathaniel Sartel, Esq., Mr. James Parker.
1733.— Nathaniel Sartel, Esq., Mr. John Bnlkley.
1734 —Nathaniel Sartell, Esq, Mr. John Bulkley, Mr. Benjamin
Bancroft.
1735.— Nathaniel Sartell, Esq., Mr. Benjamin Bancroft, Mr. John
Bulkley.
1736.— Nathaniel Sartel, Eaq., Mr. Behjamui Bancroft, Mr. John
Bulkley.
1737.— Mr. Benjamin Bancroft, Mr. John Bulkley.
1738.— John Bulkley, Captain Samnel Parker. Jonathan Sheple.
1739.— Captain Samuel Parker, John Bulkley ; Jonathan Sheple,
Abraham Moores, retailers.
1740. — John Bulkley, Abraham Moorea, William Lawrence, Esq.
1741. — Samuel Parker, John Bulkley ; William Lawrence, Esq., Abre-
bam Moores, retailerB.
1742 —Samuel Parker, John Bulkley, Abraham Mooree ; William
Lawrence, Esq., Thomas Tarbell, retailere.
1743 — Samuel Parker, John Bulkley, Abraham Moores, James Law-
rence ; William Lawrence, Esq., Thomas Tarbell, retailera.
1744. — Caleb Trowbridge, Jr., Isaac Famsworth, Beiijamin Bancroft,
John Bulkley, Samael Parker.
1745. — Isaac Green, John Bulkley, Abraham Mooree, James Law-
rence ; William Lawrence, Esq., Benjamin Chase, retailera.
1746. — Caleb Trowbridge, Jr., Benjamin Bancroft, John Bulkley,
Samuel Parker, Amoe Lawrence.
1747. — Isaac Greene, John Bulkley, Abraham Moorea, James L,aw>
rence ; John Sheple, Ezra Famsworth, retailers.
1748— Capt Benjamin Bancroft, Capt. John Bulkley, Abraham
Moores, Caleb Trowbridge, Jr., Amoe Lawrence.
1749. — John Bulkley, Abraham Moorea, James lAwrance ; Exrm
Famsworth, retailer.
1750.— John Bulkley, Abraham Moores, James Lawrence ; Ezra
Famsworth, retailer. .
1751.— John Bnlkley, Abraham Moores, James Lawrence ; Err»
Faroewonh, retailer.
1752 —John Bulkley, Abraham Moores, James Lawrence, James Ool«
burn, Jr , William White ; Caleb Trowbridge, Jr., reuiler.
552
HISTORy OF MIDDLESEX COUxNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
1763.— John Bulkley, Abraham Jloores, Thomas While, Caleb Trow-
bridge, Jr. ; JoBiah Sartell, retailer.
1754.— John Bulkley, ,\braham Moorea, Tbomus 'White, Caleb Trow-
bridge, Jr. ; Josiab Sartell, John Stevene, Esq., relailera.
1755.— John Bulkely, Abraham Moore», Samuel Bowers, Thomas
'White ; John Sterens, Esq., Jonathan Suriell, retailers.
In the Journal of the House of Representatives
(page 96), December 21, 1752, is a petition of Caleb
Trowbridge, Jr., of Groton, stating that :
"HellTes upon a puhlick Road leading from Diitiittdhle to Harvard,
which ia frequented by many Travelers; that the pnblick Houses on
eaid Road are tifteen Miles distant from each other; that he has only
Liberty to Betuit, yet is often crowded with People m Iio want necessjiry
Refre^hnlenl, bnt who is not allowed to sell it to them ; he therefore
pruys he may now obtain a Licence as an Innholder.
•'Pass'd in Council, li:. In Cduucil. fiecctTidrr 21st, 1T5'2. Read and
Ordered, That the Justices of llio Genenil Sessions of the Peace for the
County nf Jf/(^//e«eJ•, be and they hereby are allowed to prant ihe Peti-
tioner ft License to be an Innholder, if they see Cause, at their \djoiirn-
ment on Saturday, the 23d Instant, the Time for granting Licences lieiog
elapsed notwithstandinf:, provided the Petitioner first obtuiusthe .Appro-
bation of the Select-Men of (Irolon fur that purpose.
" Sent down lor Concurrence. Read and concur'd.'*
The Trowbridge tavern cannot now be identified
with certainty ; but it, is highly probable that it was
the same as the Bowers inn, mentioned in the next
parngraph.
The earliest tavern in Groton, of which there is
any positive record or knowledge, was kept by Samuel
Bowers, Jr., in ihe house lately and for a long time
occupied by the Champney family. Mr. Bowers was
born in Groton on December 21, 1711, and, according
to his tombstone, died on " the Sixteenili Day of De-
cember Anno Domini 1768. Haifa hour after Three
of the Clock in y" Afternoon, and in the Fifty Eight
year of his age." He was first licensed in the year
1755, and was known in the neighborhord as
"Land'urd Bower.','' — the inn-keeper of that period
being gtneraily addressed by the title of landlord. I
do not know who succeeded him in his useful and im-
portant functions.
The next tavern of which I have any knowledge
was the one kept by Captain Jonathan Keep, during
the latter part of the Revolution. In Tne Inde-
pendent Chronicle (Boston), February 15, 1781, the
committee of the General Court tor the sale of con-
fiscated property in Middlesex County advertise the
estate of Dr. Joseph Adams, of Townsend, to be sold
" at Mr. Keeps, innholder at Groton." This tavern
has now been kept as an inn during more than a
century. It was originally built for a dwelling-house,
and, before the Revolution, was occupied by the
Reverend Samuel Dana ; but since that time it has been
lengthened in front and otherwise considerably en-
larged. Captain Keep was followed by the brothers
Isaiah and Joseph Hall, who were the landlords as
early as the year 1798. They were succeeded in 1825
by Joseph Hoar, who had just sold the Emerson
tavern, at the other end of the village street. Except-
ing the year 1836, when Moses Gill and his brother-
in-law, Henry Lewis Lawrence, were the landlords,
Mr. Hoar kept it until the spring of 1843, when he
sold out to Thomas Treadwell Farnsworth. It was
then conducted as a temperance house, at that time
considered a great innovation on former customs.
After a short period it was sold to Daniel Hunt, who
kept it until 1852; and he was followed by James
Minot Colburn, who had it for two years. It then
came into the possession of Jo.seph Nelson Hoar, a
son of the former landlord, who took it in 1854, and
in whose family it has since remained. Latterly it
has been managed by three of his daughters, and was
known as the Central House. For a long time it was
the oniy tavern in the village, and for neatness and
comfort could not easily be surpassed. Within a few
months it has been shut up as a public-house, but it
j is hoped only temporarily. The following description
of the inn was written by the late Mrs. Delano .\.
Goddard, in a letter from Groton to the Worcester
' Daily Sp;i, July 7, 1876, after giving an account of
I the celebration on the Fourth of July :
" I cannot li-ave Groton without one word f.ir its 'Central House,' its
only tavern ; a long, low building, with a picturesque piazza its whole
length, covered with a lu.xuriaut woodbine. It is unique, and is kept by
three sisters [the Misses Hoar], who receive their visitors hoeiiitably and
serve them tliemselves ; who, in spite uf all their household duties,
never seem hurried, are nlwaya to be found, always courteous, always
ready. They are admirable representatives of the intelligent, capable,
attnictivo New- Englnnd girls who djii't know what shirking is, bnt who
take up the life they find waiting for them, and make of it the best
thing they can."
In August, 1877, a tavern, known as the Fletcher
House, was opened at the southerly end of the village
street. It is situated on the easterly side of the Boston
Road, near the Colonel Prescott monument, and fifty
years ago w.is owned by Dr. Farnsworth.
In a list of innholders printed near the end of
Isaiah Thomas's Almanack for 1785, appears the name
of Richardson, whose tavern stood on the present site
of the Bapti-t Church. It was originally the house
owned and occupied by the Rev. Gershom Hobart>
which had been considerably enlarged by additions
on the north and east sides, in order to make it more
suitable for its new purposes. Mine host was Captain
Jcphthah Richardson, who died on October 9, 1806.
His father was Converse Richardson, who had pre-
viously kept a small inn on the present Elm Street,
near the corner of Pleasant. It was in this Elm
Street house that Timothy Bigelow, the rising young
lawyer, lived when he first came to Groton. Within
a few years this building has been moved away. Soon
after the death of Captain Jephthah Richardson the
tavern was sold to Timothy Spauldiug, who carried
on the business until his death, which occurred on
i February 19, 1808. Spaulding's widow subsequently
married John Spalter, who was the landlord for a
short time. ,\bout 1812 the house was rented to
Dearborn Emerson, who had been a driver of a stage-
coach, as well as the owner of a line. He remained
in possession of it for a few years.
During the War of 1812 it was an inn of local re-
nown ; and a Lieutenant Chase had his headquarters
GROTON.
553
here for awhile, when recruiting for the army. He I
raised a company in the neighborhcod, which was
ordered to Sackttt's Harbor, near the foot of Lake
Ontario. The men were put into uniforms as they i
enlisted and drilled daily. They were in the habit |
of marching through the village streets to the music
of the spirit-stirring drum and the ear-piercing fife;
and occasionally they were invited into the yard of
some hospitable citizen, who would treat them to
"the cups that cheer but not inebriate," when
taken in moderation. William Kemp was the drum-
mer, and Wilder Shepley the fifer, both noted musi-
cians in their day. Sometimes Moses Kemp, a
brother, would act as filer. William, who died on
September 28, 1885, at the advanced age of cinety-six
years, used to give many reminiscences of that period.
He was born at Groton on May 8, 1789, and began to
drum in early boyhood. His first appearance in the
public service was during the year 1805, as drummer of
the South Company of Groton, commanded by Luther
Lawrence, Esq., afterward the mayor of Lowell.
Among the men enlisted here during that campaign
were Marqui:* D. Farcsworth, Aaron Lewis, William
Shepley and John Woodward, of this town ; and
James Adams and his son, James, Jr., of Pepperell.
During his boyhood Mr. Kemp knew Major Daniel
Simpson, the veteran drummer of Boston, whose
mother was Sarah, daughter of Job and Sarah (Hart-
well) Shattuck, of Groton. The major was born at
Harrison, Maine, on September 29, 1790, and died in
Boston on July 28, 188(5. In former years he used to
spend considerable time at Groton, where many a
trial of skill between the two drummers has taken
place.
It was about the year 1815 that Dearborn Emerson
left the Richardson tavern, and moved down the
street, perhaps thirty rods, where he opened another
public-house on the present site of Milo H. Shat-
tuck's store. The old tavern, in the mean time, passed
into the hands of Daniel Shattuck, who kept it until
the year before his death, which occurred on April 8,
1831. The business was then carried on during a
short time by Samuel Claik Tenny, who has the fol-
lowing advertisement in The Groton Herald, June 12,
1830:
" Old Stand.
" 'T'HE Sul«criber wonld respectfully infonn bis friends and the pubUc
geoerallj, that he htts tflken the Tavern lately occupied by
Mr. Da.mel Sbattuck, in Groton ; and having thoro'ighlv fitted op the
aanie for tlie reception and acconimodKtion of travellers, be flatteri blm-
Belf he Bhall obtain a share of their custom.
" Xo piiins shall be spared to give aatufaction to all those who may he
disposed to patronize him.
" Samuel C. Tesny.
"Groton, June 12, 18 0."
The next landlord was Lemuel Lakin, and after
him Francis Shattuck, a son of Daniel, for another
brief period. About the year 1833 it was given up
entirely as a public-house, and thus passed away an
old landmark widely known in those times. It stood
well out on the present road, the front door facing
down what is now Main Street, the upper end of which
then had no existence. In approaching the tavern
from the south, the road went up Hollis Street and
turned to the left somewhere south of the Buryiog-
Ground. The house afterward was cut up and moved
off. just before the Baptist meeting-house was built.
Dearborn Emerson married a sister of Daniel
Brooks, a large owner in the line of stage-coaches
running through Groton from Boston to the north-
ward ; and this family connection was of great ser-
vice to him. Jonas Parker, commonly known as
" Tecumseh " Parker, was now associated with Emer-
son in keeping the new hotel. The stage business
was taken away from the Richardson tavern, and
transferred to this one. The house was enlarged,
spacious barns and stables were erected, and belter
accommodations given to man and beast, — on too
large a scale for profit, it seems, as Parker & Emer-
son failed shortly afterward. This was in the sprini;
of 1819, during which year the tavern was purchased
by Joseph Hoar, who kept it a little more than six
year'', when he sold it to Amos Alexander. This
landlord, after a long time, wa" succeeded in turn by
Isaac J. Fox, Horace Brown, William Childs, Arte-
mas Brown, John M. Gilson, A-bijah Wright and
Moses Gill. It was given up as a hotel in 1854, and
made into a shoe- factory, owned by Messrs. Bigelow
& Randall ; and finally it whs burned on Wednes-
day evening, December 19, 1855. Mr. Gill had the
house for seven years, and was the last landlord. He
then opened a public-house directly opposite to the
Orthodox Church, and called it The Globe, which he
kept for two years. He was succeeded by Stephen
Woods, who remained only one year, after, which
time this also wa.s given up as a public-house.
The following advertisement in Tke Groton Herald,
March 13, 1830, shows that the selectmen of the town
at that time, wishing to be impartial in distributing
their official patronage, used to meet equally at all
the taverns in the village for the transaction of public
business:
" Stated Meetinos or the SzLEcnm.
" 'p HE Selectmen ef Groton will meet on tlie last Saturdays of each
month the present nianicipal year, at 3 o'clock, p. m., viz, :— At
Hoar't Tavern in March, April, May and Jnne; at Alexander'M in Jol.v
August, September and Octolwr ; and at Shattuck^i in Nuvemlwr, Decem-
l>er, January and February.
" Caleb Butlir, Chairman.^'
Another hostelry was the Ridge Hill tavern, situated
at the Ridges, three miles from the village, on the
Great Road to Boston. Thij was built about the year
1805, and much frequented by travelers and team-
sters. At this point the roads diverge and come
together again in Lexington, making two routes to
Boston. It was claimed by interested persons that
one was considerably shorter than the other, — though
the actual difference was less than a mile. In the
year 1824 a guide-board was set up at the crotch of
the roads, proclaiming the fact that the distance to
Lexington through Concord was two miles longer
554
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
than through Carlisle. Straightway the storekeepers
and innholders along the Concord road published a
counter-statement, that it had been measured by
sworn surveyors, and the distance found to be only
two hundred and thirty-six rods farther than by the
other way.
The first landlord of the Ridge Hill tavern was
Levi Parker, noted for his hearty hospitality. He
was afterward deputy-sheriff of Middlesex County,
and lived at Weatford. He was followed, for a short
time, by John Stevens, and then by John Hancock
Loring, who conducted the house during many years,
and was succeeded by his son Jefferson. After him
came Henry Lewis Lawrence, who kept it during one
year; he was followed by his brother-in law, Moses
Gill, who took the tavern in April, 1837, and kept it
just five years. When Mr. Gill gave up the house,
he was followed by one Langdon for a short time,
and he in turn by Ximball Farr as the landlord, who
had bought it the year previously, and who remained
in charge until 1868. During a part of the time
when the place was managed by Mr. Farr, his son
Augustus was associated with him. Mr. Farr sold
the tavern to John Fuzzard, a native of Brighton,
England, who kept it as the landlord for a while, and
is still the owner of the property. He was followed
by Newell M. Jewett, and he in turn by Stephen
Perkins, a native of York, Maine, who took it in
1880. The building had been vacant for some years
before that time. It was given up by Mr. Perkins in
the spring of 1884, when it ceased to be a public-
house, and was occupied again by Mr. Fuzzard as his
dwelling. A fair used to be held here on the first
Tuesday of every month for the sale of horses, and
buyers were attracted from a long distance. At one
time this property was owned by Judge Samuel
Dana, who sold it to John H. Loring.
As early aa the year 1798 there was a tavern about
a mile from the Ridges, toward Groton. It was kept
by Stephen Farrar, in the house now standing near
where the brook crosses the Great Road. Afterward
one Green was the landlord. The house known
as the " Levi Tufts place," in the same neighborhood,
was an inn duriag the early part of this century, con-
ducted by Tilly Buttrick. Also about this time, or
previously, the house situated south of Indian Hill,
and occupied by Charles Prescott, — when the map in
Mr. Butler's History was made, — was an inn. There
was a tavern kept from about the year 1812 to 1818
by a Mr. Page, in Mr. Gerrish's house, — near the
Unitarian Church in the village, — which was built
by Martin Jennison, about 1803. Last spring the
same dwelling was newly furnished and opened as
a boarding-house for transient or permanent guests,
according to an advertisement in The Groton Land-
mark:, May 3, 1890. There wa.s also a tavern, near
the present paper-mills of Tileston and Hollings-
worth, kept for many years (1820— i5) by Aaron
Lewis, and after him for a short time by A. M.
Veazie. It was originally the house of John Capell,
who owned the saw-mill and grist-mill in the imme-
diate neighborhood. Amos Adams had an inn near
Squannacook, a hundred years ago, in a house now
owned by James Kemp.
Forty years ago an attempt was made to organize
a company for the purpose of carrying on a hotel in
the village, and a charter was obtained from the
Legislature. The stock, however, was not wholly
taken up, and the project fell through. Of the cor-
parators, Mr. Potter was the last survivor, and he
died in Cincinnati, on December 2, 1884. Below is
s. copy of the act : —
."An Act to iscorporatk the Gboton Hotel Company.
" BE U enacted by, tht Senate and House of Repreaeniatitet, in Gtmeral
Court OMtembled, <ind btj the auUtoritij of the same, 119/ottowa :
"Sect. I. Lutber F. Potter, Nutbaoiel P. Smitb, SiineoD .Amea. their
afieociates aod succesaora, ure hereby ninde a corporation, by the name
of the Groton Hotel Cumpany, forllie purpose of erecting, la the town
of Groton, builtiings necesBjry .ind convenient for a public house, witli
all the powers and privileges, and subject to all the liiibilities, duties and
restrictioDB, set forth in the forty-funrtb chapter of the Revised Statutes.
"Sect. 2. Saffd corporation tnay bold sueli real and personal property,
as may be necessary and convenient fur the purposes aforesaid, not ex-
ceeding in amount twenty thousand dollars ; proi ulcd, that no shares in
the capital stock of said corporation »hall be issued for a less sum or
amount, to be actually paid in on each, than the par value of the sharps
which shall be first issued. Aud if any ardent spirits, or into.xicating
drinks of any kiud whatever, shall be sold by said company, or by their
agents, lessees, or persona in their employ, contrary to law, in any of
said buildings, then this act shall be void." [Aitprot-ed bij the Goeet-nur
May 2, 1830.]
In the spring of 1852 a charter was given to Benja-
min Webb, Daniel D. R. Bowker, and their associates,
for the purpose of forming a corporation to carry on
a hotel at the Mussapoag Springs, in the eastern part
of this town ; but the project fell through. It was to
be called the Massapoag Spring Hotel, and its capital
stock was limited to $30,000. The act was approved
by the Governor on May 18, 1852; and it contained
similar conditions to those mentioned above in regard
to the sale of liquors. In the spring of 1859 an act
was passed by the Legislature, and approved by the
Governor on April 1st, incorporating Abel Prescott,
Harvey A. Woods, Levi W. Woods, Stephen Roberts,
and Levi W. Phelps, their associates and successors,
under the name of the Groton Junction Hotel Com-
pany, for the purpose of erecting a hotel at Groton
Junction, now known as Ayer. The capital of the
company was limited to $15,000, but the stock was
never taken. These enterprises are now nearly forgot-
ten, though the mention of them may revive the recol-
lections of elderly people.
The Groton' Stage-Coaches. — During the first
half of the present century Groton had one charac-
teristic mark, closely connected with the old taverns,
which it no longer possesses. It was a radiating
centre for different lines of stage-coaches, until this
mode of travel was superseded by the swifter one of
the railroad. Wayfarers from the surrounding towns
off the line of travel came hither daily in private
vehicles to engage their seats and take theii' passage.
GROTON.
555
During many years the stage-coaches were a distinct-
ive feature of the place ; and their coining and going
were watched with great interest, and created the ex-
citeoient of the day. In early times the drivers, as
they approached the village, would blow a bugle in
order to give notice of their arrival ; and this blast
was the signal at the taverns to put the food on the
table. More than a generation has now passed away
since these coaches were wont to be seen in the vil-
lage streets. They were drawn usually by four horaes,
and in bad going by six. Here a change of coaches,
horses and drivers was made.
The stage-driver of former times belonged to a
class of men that has now disappeared from the com-
munity. His position was one of considerable respon-
sibility. This important personage was well known
along the route, and his opinions were always quoted
with respect. I easily recall the familiar face of Aaron
Corey, who drove the accommodation stage to Boston
for BO many years. He was a careful and skillful
driver, and a man of most obliging disposition. He
would go out of his way to bear a message or leave a
aewspaper ; but his specialty was to look after women
and children committed to his charge. He carried
also packages and parcels, and largely what to-day is
intrusted to the express. I recall, too, with pleasure
Horace George, another driver, popular with all the
boys, because in sleighing time he would let us ride
on the rack behind, and even slacken the speed of his
horses so as to allow us to catch hold of the straps.
In youthful dialect, the practice was called " ketching
on behind."
Some people now remember the scenes of life and
activity that used to be witnessed in the town on the
arrival and departure of the stages. Some remem-
ber, too, the loud snap of the whip which gave in-
creased speed to the horses, as they dashed up in ap-
proved style to the stopping-place, where the
loungers were collected to see the travelers, and listen
to the gossip which fell from their lips. There were
no telegraphs then, and but few railroads in the coun-
try. The papers did not gather the news so eagerly
nor spread it abroad as promptly as they do now ;
and items of intelligence were carried largely by
word of mouth.
The earliest line of stage-coaches between Boston
and Groton was the one mentioned in the Colum-
bian Centinel, April 6, 1793. The advertisement is
headed " New Line of Stages," and gives notice
that—
*'A Stage-CtirTiage drives from Bobfttiw' Tavern, at Charlea-River
Bridge, ou Monday and Friday, id each week, and paaaiog through
Concord and GToton, arrives at Wyman't tavero Id AahU^ [Aehby] iD the
eveDiDgs of the same days ; aDd after exchaogiDg passeDgers there^
with the Stage Carriage from JValixAf, it returDS OD Tuesdays aDd Sat-
urdays, by the saoie route to Hobbins's.
The ChnrUsloirn Carriage drives also from Rohbinf od Wedoesday iu
each week, and passiog through Concord arrives at HtchariUon' ^ tavero,
ill GroUni, OD the eveoing of the same day, and from theoce returos on
Thursday to Robbina'.
".^noth«r Carriage drives from Richnrdton't tarero to Groton, od Mon-
day in each week, at six o'clock iD the morning, and paaliDg by £«cAarc/-
aoii'a taverD in Co'icnrd, BT {«D o'clock in the foreoooD, arrivesat Charltt-
u>icn at three o'clock id the aftemooD. From Chartatown it drives od
Tuesday aud Thursday in each week, at three o'clock in the afternoon
aod returos back as fur a^ Rtchardfon a tavern io Concord — and from
that place it starts at 6 o'clock iD the moroings, of Wednesday and
Friday, and runs again to Charlettown. From there it mows «t six
o'clock on Saturday morning, and returns to Richardton' t tavern In
Groton, in the evening of the same day.*' *
It was probably one of these " Carriages" to which
allusion is made in Mr. Winthrop's " Memoir of the
Honorable Nathan Appleton," as follows:
" At early dusk on some October or November evening, in the year
17W, a fresh, vi^or^u? >»r:-ht-eyed lad, just turned of fifteen, might
have been seen alighting from a stage-coach near Quaker L&ne,^ as
it wap then called, in the old town of Boston. He bad t>eeD two days
on the road from bis home Id the towD of New Ipeuich, in the State
of New Hampshire. Od the last of the two days, the stage-coach
had brought biui alt the way from GrotoD in Massachusetts ; starting
for that purpose early in the morDiDg, stoppiog at Concord fur the
passengers to dine, trundling them through CharlestowD about the
time the evening lamps were lighted, and finishing the whole distance
of rather more tbau thirty miles in season for supper. For bis flrst
day's journey, there had t>een no siich eligible and expeditions con-
veyance. The Boston stage-coach, in tboee days, weDt do farther than
Groton in that direction. His father's farm-horse, or perhaps that of
one ol the neight>ors, had served his turn for the first six or seven miles ;
his little brother of ten years old having followed blin as far as Town-
send, to ride the horse home again. But from there he had trudged
along to Groton on ft»ot, with a bundle-liaDdkerchief id bis haDd, which
contaiDed all. the wearing apparel he bad, except what wasou bis back."
— Froctedrngt of the Mtutachtuetts HiMtorioal Society, v. 249, 260.
It has been said that the first public conveyance
between Boston and Groton was a covered wagon,
hung on chains for thoroughbraces ; but this was
probably subsequent to the time of the advertisement.
It was owned and driven by Lemuel Lakin, but after
a few years the owner sold out to Dearborn Emer-
son.
The following advertisemen*. from the Columbian
Centinel, June 25, 1800, will give a notion of what an
undertaking a trip to Boston was at the beginning of
the century :
" OEOTON STAGE.
" The subscriber respectfully informs the public that he drives the
Stage from Boston to Groton, running through Lexniglon, Concoid, and
LiUieton, to Groton : Starts from BotUtn every Wednetday morning, at 5
o'clock, and arrives at Groton the same day ; Starts from Groton every
Monday morning, at 7 o'cloik, aod arrives ot Botton the same day at 4
o'clock. Passage through, 2 dots, per mile. Ad.
" Danbohn EaiEBSo.s.
" Seats taken at Mr. SiLA£ Ihrrroii's in fioyaf Exchange Lame. News-
papers supplied on the road, and every attention paid to conveyances."
The given-name of Emerson was Dearborn, and
not "Danborn," which is a misprint. Two yeare
later he was running a stage-coach from Groton to
New Ipswich, New Hampshire; and on the first re-
turn tiip he brought three passengers, — according to
the " History of New Ipswich " (page 129). Emerson
was a noted driver in his day; and he is mentioned
with pleasant recollections by the Honorable Abbott
Lawrence, in an after-dinner speech at the Jubilee of
Lanrence Academy, on July 12, 1854, as appeare
1 Now Congress Street.
556
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
from the published account of the celebration. Sub-
Bequently he was the landlord of one of the local
taverns.
It is advertised in The Massachusetts Register, for
the year 1802, that the—
" GROTON St«ge sets off from J, and S Wheelock'e [Indian Queen
In^, Ko. 37, Marlbnro'-8treet [now a part of Washington Street, Bo?-
ton], every Wednesday at 4 o'clock in the morning, and arrives at Gro-
ton at 3 o'clock in the atteruoon, same day , leaves Groton every
Monday at 4 o'clock in the morning, and arrives in Boston at 6 o'clock
in the afternoon, same day." (Pages 19, 20.)
It seems from this notice that it took three hours
longer to make the trip down to Boston than up to
Groton, — of which the explanation is not clear. In
the Register for 1803, a semi-weekly line isadveriiaed,
and the same length of lime is given for making the
trip each way as is mentioned in the Register of the
preceding year.
About the year 1807 there was a tri-weekly line of
coaches to Boston, and as early as 1820 a daily line,
which connected at Groton with others extending
into New Hampshire and Vermont. Soon after this
time there were two lines to Boston, running in op-
position to each other, — one known as the Union and
Accommodation Line, and the other as the Telegraph
and Despatch.
One of the drivers for the Telegraph and Despatch
Line was Phineas Harrington, popularly known along
the road as " Phin " Harrington. He had orders to
take but eight passengers in his coach, and the trip
was made with remirkable speed for that period.
" Phin " was a man of small size; and the story used
to be told of him that, on cold and stormy nights, he
would get inside of one of the lamps fixed to the box,
in order to warm his feet by the lighted wick ! He
passed almost his whole life as a stsge-man, and it is
said that he drove for nearly forty years. He could
handle the reins of six horses with more skill than
any other driver in town. Mr. Harrington died at
Dracut, on May 23, 1870, aged eighty years, two
months and nine days.
William Shepard & Co. advertise in The Groton
Herald, April 10, 1830, their accommodation stage.
" Good Teams and Coaches with careful and obliging
drivers will be provided by the subscribers." Books
were kept in Boston at A. M. Brigham's, No. 42 Han-
over Street, and in Groton at the taverns of Amos
Alexander and Joseph Hoar. The fare was one dol-
lar, and the coach went three times a week.
About this time George Flint had a line to Nashua,
and John Holt another to Fitchburg. They adver-
tise together in the Herald, May 1, 1830, that " no
pains shall be spared to accommodate those who shall
favor them with their custom, and all business in-
trusted to their care will be faithfully attended to."
The first stage-coach from this town to Lowell began
to run about the year 1829, and John Austin was the
driver. An opposition line was established soon after-
ward, and kept up during a short time, until a com-
promise was made between the two lines. Later,
John Russ was the owner and driver of the line to
Lowell, and still later, John M. Maynard the owner.
Near this period there was a coach running to Wor-
cester, and previously one to Amherst, New Hamp-
shire.
Fifty years ago General Thomas Adams Staples was
a well-known stage proprietor. He was a man of
large frame and fine proportions, and is still remem-
bered by many residents of the town. He was born
in Boston on July 20, 1804, and died at Machias.
Maine, on November 13, 1880.
The following is a list of some of the old drivers,
who were well-known along iheir respective routes.
It is arranged in no particular order and is by no
means complete; and the dates against a few of the
names are only approximations to the time when each
one sat on the box.
Lemuel Lakin was among the earliest ; and he was
followed by Dearborn Emerson. Daniel Brooks drove
to Boston during the period of the last war with Eng-
land, and probably later.
Aaron Corey drove the accommodation stage to
Boston, through Carlisle, Bedford and Lexington, for
a long time, and he had previously driven the mail-
coach. He was succeeded by his son, Calvin, the
driver for a f^it years, until the line was given up in
1850. Mr. Corey, the father, was one of the veter-
ans, havine held the reins during thirty-two years ;
he died March 15, 1857, at the age of seventy-three.
Isaac Bullard (1817-30), William Smart (1825-30),
George Hunt, Jonathan Buttrick, Obadiah Kendall,
Albert Hayden, Charles Briggs, Levi Robbihs, James
Lord, Frank Brown, Silas Burgess, Augustus Adams,
William Dana, Horace Brown, Levi Wheeler, Tim-
othy Underwood, Bacon, Horace George (1838-
45). Leonard Williams Cuahing (1842—45) and Joseph
Stewart, — these drove to Boston. After the stages
were taken off, " Joe " Stewart was the driver of the
pa.«senger-coach from the village to the station on the
Fitchburg Railroad, which ran to connect with the
three daily trains for Boston. The station was three
miles away, and now within the limits of Ayer.
Among the drivers to Keene, New Hampshire,
were Kimbi«ll Danforth (1817-40), Ira Brown, Oliver
Scales, Amos Nicholas, Otis Bardwell, Abel Marshall,
the brothers Ira and Hiram Hodgkins, George Brown,
Houghton Lawrence, Palmer Thomas, Ira Green,
Barney Pike, William Johnson, Walter Carleton
and John Carleton. There were two stage routes to
Keene, both going as far as West Townsend in com-
mon, and then separating, one passing through New
Ipswich and Jaffrey, a northerly route, while the
other went through Ashby, Rindge and Fitzwilliam,
a southerly one.
Anson Johnson and Beriah Curtis drove to Wor-
cester; Addison Parker, Henry Lewis Lawrence,
Stephen Corbin, John Webber, and his son Ward,
drove to Lowell; the brothers Abiel and Nathan
GROTON.
557
Fawcett, Wilder Proctor and Abel Hamilton Fuller,
to Nashua.
Micali Ball, who came from Leominster about the
year 1824, drove to Amherst, New Hampshire, and
after him Benjamin Lewis, who continued to drive as
long as he lived, and at his death the line was given
up. The route lay through Pepperell, Hollis and
Milford.
The forerunner of this Amherst stage was a one-
horse vehicle, which used to go over the road each
way two or three times a week, and carry the mail.
It began to run about the year 1820, and took pas-
sengers as occasion required.
Other reins-men were John Chase, Joel Shattuck,
William Shattuck, Moses Titus, Frank Shattuck,
David Coburn, Chickering, Thomas Emory and
William Kemp, Jr.
The sad recollection of an accident at Littleton, re-
sulting in the death of Silas Bullard, is occasionally
revived by some of the older people. It occurred on
February 3, 1835, and was caused by the upsetting of
the Groton coach, driven by Samuel Stone, and at the
time just descending the hill between Littleton Com-
mon and Nagog Pond, then known a.s Kimball's Hill.
Mr. Bullard was one of the owners of the line, and a
brother of Isaac, the veteran driver. The Colum-
bian Centinel, February 5, 1835, contains the fol
lowing account of the nfTair:
" from Briijge'e A'eirs Room BuiUtin**
" Od Tuesday aflemoon [Febnmry 3], a* tiie Groton and Keeoe mall-
Etage voB returDiDg to this citj, ia a narrow paad of the road in Little-
ton, one of the fure wheels of the stage came tn contact with the hind
wheel of a wagon, which suddenly overturned the stage. — There were
eleven passengers In the vehicle at the time, who, with the exception of
Mr. Silas Bullard, of this city, and Mr Washington Shepley, of Groton,
escaped uninjured. Mr. Bullard was seated with the driver at the time
of the accident and was thrown, with great violence, to the ground, the
stage falling immediately upon htm. His collar-bone and two of bla
ribs were broken, shoulder blade ditilocated, and otherwise injured. He
was conveyed to a private dwelling, where be has the best medical aid,
but his recover^" is very doubtful. Mr. Sliepley's injuries were of an in-
ternal nature, but not such, as to prevent his immediate return to Gro-
ton. A passenger states that no blame can be attached to the driver."
Mr. Bullard died on Febrnary 5th, and the Centinel
of the nest day pays a worthy tribute to his char-
acter.
Besides the stage-coaches, the carrier-wagons added
to the business of Groton, and helped largely to sup-
port the taverns. The town was situated on one of
the main thoroughfares leading from Boston to the
northern country, comprising an important part of
New Hampshire and Vermont, and extending into
Canada. This road was traversed by a great number
of wagons, drawn by four or six horses, carrying to
the city the various products of the country, such as
grain, pork, butter, cheese, eggs, venison, hides; and
returning with goods found in the city, such as mo-
lasses, sugar. New England rum, coffee, tea, nails,
iron, cloths, and the innumerable articles found in
the country stores, to be distributed among the towns
above here. In some seasons it was no uncommon
sight to see forty such wagons passing through the
village in one day.
In addition to these were many smaller vehicles,
drawn by one or two horses, to say nothing of the
private carriages of individuals who were traveling
for business or pleasure.
The Groton Fibe Depaktment. — The first fire-
engine in Groton was made in the year 1802, by Lo-
ammi Baldwin, Jr., then a law-student in the office
of the Honorable Timothy Bigelow, but who after-
ward became a civil engineer. He was a son of
Loammi and Mary (Fowle) Baldwin, and born at
Woburn on May 16, 1780 ; and after his graduation
at Harvard College, in the class of 1800, he came to
Groton in order to study the profession of law. Like
many others he does not seem to have found out at the
Stan his proper calling, as his tastes were naturally
for mechanical science and the kindred arts. While
following his studies here, a house, situated just south
of the academy grounds, was burned down in the
winter-time and there was no fire-engine to stop it.
The neighbors had to fight the flames as best they
could, with snow as well as water. By this incident
he became so impressed with the need of an engine in
Groton, that with his own hands he constructed the
first one the town ever had. This identical machine,
known for a long time as Torrent, No. 1, is still ser-
viceable after a use of more than eighty-eight years,
and will throw a stream of water over the highest roof
in the town. It was made in Jonathan Loring's shop,
then opposite to Mr. Boynton's blacksmith-shop,
where the ironwork was done. The tub is of copper,
and bears the date " 1802." Mr. Baldwin, soon after
this time, gave up the practice of law, and became
distinguished in his new profession.
The following description of the engine is found in
The Firemen's Standard (Boston) for April, 1884 :
*' The old ' machine ' has a quaint appearance with its copper tub on
which is inscrilwd its name, Tubbent, Ho. 1, and its ancient tool box
which bears the date of its birtb, 1602. The said tub is three feet six
inches long, two feet two inches wide, and twenty-two inches deep On its
bottom rests an oak plank in which are set the valves and in which
stand the brass cylinders and air chamber, the fonner of which being
each five inches in diameter and sixteen inches high. A gooseneck on
tbe top of the air chamber serves as the outlet for the water and a reel is
attached to the hind part of the tub capable of carrying one hundred
teet of two-inch hose, the first supply of which was made at the harnem
shop and sewed with waxed thread" (page 4).
Among the active members of Torrent Company,
nearly fifty years ago, was Elijah Tracy, a deaf-mute,
who attended the stated meetings, and turned out at
the fires, with as much regularity as his more favored
comrades.
At two different times within sixteen years. Torrent,
No. 1, has done most excellent service in putting out
fires, and it is the testimony of all acquainted with
the facts, that on each of these occasions it prevented
a serious conflagration. Notably this was so at a fire
which took place early on Sunday morning, October
26, 1884, when a dwelling-house, owned by Andrew
Robbins, was burned down. At this time Mr. Dix's
558
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
buildings, in very close proximity, were in great
danger, but they were saved through the efTortsof the
Fire Department and the useof the old engine, which
waa worked to good advantage in narrow quarters,
where the other engine could not be taken. The
other occasion was when Walter Shattack's store was
burned down on November 17, 1874 ; and largely by
means of this engine the Congregational meeting-
house was saved from destruction.
Torrent, No. 1, until recently, was housed at the
end of a row of horse-sheds, near the First Parish
meeting-house, but in the year 1885 it was transferred
to West Groton, for the protection of that part of the
town. It was there placed in the charge of a volun-
teer company of young men ; and on April 5, 1886,
the town voted to authorize the Board of Engineers
to form a permanent company in that village, which
was accordingly done, with the volunteer association
as a nucleus. The engine has been re-named, and
is now known as the Squannacook. An engine-house,
next to the new church on Groton Street, has been
built, which was formally opened with appropriate
ceremonies, on the evening of December 30, 1887. In
the upper story is a hall for public meetings, where,
on January 6, 1888, the company gave a ball. A
pamphlet was printed (Ayer, 1887, 12uio, pp. 8), enti-
tled "Constitution and By-Laws of Squannacook En-
gine Co., No. 2, West Groton, Mass.," which sets forth
the rules of their government.
The Union Engine Company was organized in the
spring of 1830, and the immediate occasion of its for-
mation was the series of incendiary fires that occurred
during the year 1829. Presumably the name of the
engine company was taken from the Union Congre-
gational Church in the immediate neighborhood ; and
the engine was housed at the easterly end of the
horse-sheds, situated on the northerly side of the
meeting-house.
The following notice in the Groton Herald, May
8, 1830, is addressed to the subscribers for the engine :
"TAKE NOTICE.
»' rpHE Sub«:ril>rre to the New Engine ar« hereby requested lo meet
-^ at .\LEXA«DKE'8 Hotel. MONDAY the inth inst, atli oclock,
P.M. to heur the reiwrt of their Committee, chosen for the purpose Of
punhasiDg an Eugiue, aud to transact any other business which they
may thinlt expedient.
"Elijah Whiton, )
•■T. A. STAPLES. jC""""'^'-
"Groton, May 8, 1830."
A Board of Engineers of the Fire Department was
originally appointed in April, 1875, by the selectmen,
in accordance with Chapter 35 of the Public Stat-
utes. Their first report was made in the spring of
1876, and printed in the Town Report of that year.
A new engine, known as the Lawrence, was bought
in August, 1875, and is kept in the town-house. The
following is a list of the chief engineers, with the dates
of their several appointments, which are made by
the selectmen :
April 10, 1873, George Snmner Graves.
April 22, 1876, Charles Blood.
April 24. 1877, Charles Blood.
April 22, 1S7S, Charles Blood.
April 23, 1879, Charles Blood.
April 17, 1830, Charles Blood.
.\pril 20, 1881, John Gilson.
April 21, 1882, John Gilson.
March 20, 1883, John Gilson.
March 29, 1884, George Sunioer Graves.
March 18, 1883, George Sumner Graves.
Match 15, 1881), Charles Woolley.
March 26, 1887, Charles Woolley.
April 2, 1«83, Cliaries iVoolley.
April 1. 1S89, Charles Woollev.
April 1, 1890, Charles Woolley.
Orotoji Fire Club.— The Groton Fire Club was form-
ed during the winter of 1815 ; and the immediate oc-
casion of its organization was the burning of John
Wethered's dwelling on Wednesday evening, Febru-
ary 1, 1815. This house stood at the lower end of
Main Street, and some years previou.sly had been
owned and occupied by Dr. Oliver Prescott, Senior.
Mr. Wethered was from Wilmington, Delaware, and
came to Groton from that State. According to tradi-
tion the dwelling was set on fire by a negro in his em-
ploy, who had been a slave at the South.
On November 7, 1814, Mr. Wethered bought the
place of Dr. Oliver Prescott, Jr. ; and three months
later the house was burned, as has been stated. On
April 29, 1816, Mr. Wethered sold it to Robert C.
Ludlow, of Boston, a purser in the United States
Navy, who, at this time, in connection with Commo-
dore Bainbridge and Charles W. Green, was interest-
ed in the ownership of the Lakin farm, where they
were then raising sheep. On September 25, 1817,
Purser Ludlow sold it to Joshua Nash, who ten years
later became the father-in-law of the late Bradford
Russell, Esq., of Groton.
The present house on the same site was built about
the year 1826 by Miss Susan Prescott, afterward Mrs.
John Wright, for the accommodation of her school
for girls, a famous institution more than sixty years
ago. After Mrs. Wright's occupation of the place, it
passed into the hands of Dr. Amos Farnsworth, and
since that time there have been several owners. The
house is now kept as a tavern.
The first meeting of the Fire Club was held on
February 4, 1815, when the Honorable James Pres-
cott was chosen president of the association, and Ca-
leb Butler, Esq., secretary. The club used to meet
annually, for the choice of officers, at one of the pub-
lic-houses in the village, when a supper was served ;
and sometimes on such occasions members of one of
the engine companies would be invited to join in the
festivities. Each member of the Fire Club was re-
quired to provide two leather buckets and a fire-bag,
which were to be always ready for use; and a failure
to take them to a fire was met with a fine. Among
some of the descendants of the early members
these articles are now treasured as heirlooms.
On March 1, 1875, the town voted to adopt Chapter
XXIV., Sections 23-31, of the General Statutes of the
GROTON.
559
Commonwealth, by which action the need of a pri-
vate organization was largely superseded. The last
meeting of the Fire Club, according to the records,
was held in November, 1872, no day of the month
given. The following preamble, with a list of the
original members, is Ukeu from the first two pages of
the record-book :
" The undereigned, Inhabitants of Groton warned by the recent confla-
gration in this village ' and feeling one common interest and duty to be
constantly in readiness to act with promptitude and effect on such dis-
tressing emergencies, agree to form and procure immediately to organize
a society for that purpose, to be called, 'Groton Fire Club,' and do
pledge oureelves to comply with and conform to all such rulen and regu-
lations, as the Society may at any time adopt to promote that end.
" Dated the fourth d»y of February, A.D. 1816.
'■ James Prescott Luther Lawrence
8aro' Lawrance James Brazar
James Lewis Amos Farnsworth
Abr. Moore W» Bancroft
Waller Dickaon Caleb Butler
Alpheus Richardson Amos Lawrence
David Fletcher Aaron Lewis
Benjamin Moors Joseph Mansfield
Thomas T. Cunningham Asa Tarbell ,
John Bockwood Aaron Lewis i^
William Farnsworth Asa Graves
James Ridgeway Abel Farnsworth
Wro Livermore 1Lzt& Farnsworth
George Brigham Jon" Loring
Daniel Eaton Asa Lawrence, Jr.
Joseph F. Hall Luther Woods
Josiah Billings John Stebbens
Thos. C. liardncr in behalf Sani| Dana
of my father [Slajor W?' Childs
Thomas Gardner.] Sam' Farnsworth
Levi Wait Eliphal' Wheeler
Aaron Bancroft Stuart J. Park "
Samson Woods
On May 6, 1872, the town voted to build five reser-
voirs, which should hold 4000 gallons each. They were
to be 80 situated as to give protection to the greatest
number of houses in the village, with due regard
to a sufficient supply of water. The reservoirs were
placed, respectively, near the three meeting-houses,
the Town-House, and the High School ; and they are
kept full by the water which runs from the roofs of
these several buildings. After that vote, a few years
later, another reservoir was placed in Court Street.
Stabch-Factoey, Paper-Mills, Etc.— In the
spring of 1832 the following act was passed by the
General Court of Massachusetts ; and under the au-
thority of the enactment a company was organized at
Groton for the manufacture of starch.
A mill was built for the purpose on the Groton side
of the Squannacook Kiver, three-quarters of a mile
above the village of West Groton, but the undertak-
ing did not prove to be a success. It stood on the
site of the present paper-mill in that locality; and the
place is shown on Mr. Butler's Map of Groton. It
was expected that this new industr}- in the town would
help the farmers of the neighborhood by encouraging
the cultivation of potatoes, which were to be used in
making the article; but the scheme was a failure.
1 The dwelling-house of Mr. John Wetliered was entirely consumed
by fire on the evening of the let day of February, a.d. 1815.
•■ Chap. CXXVII.
" An Act to incorporate the Dana Manufacturing Company."
" Sic. 1. Be il CTWCled bij thr StnaU and Hmtte o/ Beprctnlaiica, <«
General Court oMembled, and b'j the authtirUij «/ tJit tamt. That OllTer
Sheple, Samuel Dana, Samuel Dana, Jr., Oliver Sheple, Jr., James
Dana, and W aabington Bheple, their associates and aalgns be, and they
hereby are constituted a corporation and made a body politic, by the
name and style of the Dana Manufacturing Company, for the purpose
of manufacturing cotton and woollen goods, iron wares, and starch from
any matMials, in the respective towns of Groton and Shirley in the
county or Middlesex, and for this purpose shall have all the powers and
privileges, and be subject to all tbeduties and requirements contained in
anactpa«ed the twenty-third day of February in the year of our Lord one
thousand eight huudred and thirty, entitled 'an act defining the general
powers and duties of manufacturing corporations.'
" Sec. 2. Be U furtiier enacted. That the said corporation may take and
hold such real estate, not exceeding in value the sura of two hundred
thousand dollars, and such personal estate not exceeding In value two
hundred thousand dollars, as may be suitable and convenient for carry-
ing on the business aforesaid."
[Approved by the Governor, March 13, 1832.]
The building was subsequently used as a paper-mill,
and burned many years ago, probably during the sum-
mer of IS-ie. Soon afterward another mill was erect-
ed on the same site, which was bought on October 22,
1852, by Lyman Hollingsworth of Jephthah Eichard-
son Hartwell. The plant was sold in 1881 by Mr.
Hollingsworth to Messrs. Hollingsworth and Vose, of
Boston, who still own it. The senior partner of this
firm is a nephew of the former owner. The product
of the mill is a Manilla paper of high grade, of which
about three tons are made daily. Ou August 7, 1889,
I visited the mill when they were making a paper,
which is sent to England in boxes, for the manufac-
ture of sand-paper, and very likely to be returned
here in that form. In the stock-houses there were two
hundred tons of old cordage, more or less, ready to
be ground up and used in connection with " wood
pulp," which enters largely into the composition of
the article. Last year a new dam, a solid granite
structure in place of the original one, was built ;
though, in times of low water, steam-power is re-
quired to turn the machinery.
The direct road from the village of West Groton to
the paper-mill — perhaps three quarters of a mile iu
length — was laid out by the county commissioners
on April Vi, 1838. An attempt was previously made
by interested persons, in the spring of 1832, to have
the same piece of highway built, but it did not meet
with success, as it was then adjudged by the commis-
sioners to be " not of common convenience and neces-
sity."' Of course the road was opened in order to ac-
commodate the business of the new factory.
The paper-mill on the Na-hua River, at the Paper-
Mill Village, was originally a wooden structure, and
built in the year 1841 by Oliver Howe, who owned the
saw-mill and grist-mill in the close proximity ; and
here the manufacture of Manilla paper was carried
on. During more than a century there has been a
dam at this place across the river, and in early times
there was, also, a ford known as the Stony Fordway
or Stony Wading-place. Among the Massachusetts
Archives at the State House is a rough plan, made
560
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
probably about the year 1740, which gives the names
of the bridges, etc., in this neighborhood, at that
period. It is found in the volume marked on the back
" Maps and Plans " (XVI. 6), and bears the catalogue
number 1482.
About the year 1846 the property, on which stood
these several mills, was sold to the brothers John
Mark and Lyman Hollingsworth ; and on Sept. 1,
1851, Lyman sold his share to the other brother, John
Mark, who rebuilt the paper-mill, making it of brick,
but the building was very soon afterward-j burned.
The followint; item is taken from the Boston Daily
Journal, Monday, June 7, 1852 :
" Papeb Mill Burnt. We learn that a paper-mill, dwelliug-house
and out-buildings adjuiniug, situated in Grotoo, and owned by Mr. J. i
M. HuUingBworth were totally consumed by fire on Saturday [June 51." |
The mill was at once rebuilt, and soon again in j
operation.
" ^g-J. M. Holllngsworth's extensive and costly paper mil la, atGroton |
Junction [Paper Mill Villagel, are nearly ready to go into operation.
Mr. H. intends to manufacture first quality book paper, employing \
about 33 bands." |
Lowell tt'eekli) Journal ciiid Courier, May 20, 1853. [
On March 7, 1865, Mr. Hollingsworth, just before j
his death, on April 6th of that year, sold the property I
to his brother Lyman, who himself died on April 1,
1890 ; and eleven years later it was burnt for the sec- I
ond time. The Boston Evening Journal, Friday, !
May 26, 1876, has the following account of the fire:
" Mill BoaNT .\t Gboton, Mass.
"The large paper mil! of Lyman Hollingsworth at Xorth [?] Groton
was destroyed by fire on Thursday afternoon [May 2.*>]. It gave em-
ployment to about fifty workmen, and was valued at SUO.OfiO. The in-
surunce is placed in the following companii s : Etna, Hartford, and
Phoeoix, of Hartford ; Home of New York ; North British and .Mer-
cantile; Springfield Fire and Marine ; Fire .VRSociatiou of Philadelphia ;
Meriden Fire: Roger Williams of Providence, and Sbawmut of Boston.
It is divided as follows : ijn null, Sol i.UOO ; machinery, Si4,iiOO, and on
stoclc, covering the probable loaa, 8S,0U1>. It is not yet known how the
fire oCCTirred."
The mill was again rebuilt, this time by Lyman
Hollingsworth, aud the manufacture of book paper
continued, now with a daily product of about five
ions. On Dec. 13, 1881, the establishment was sold
to Messrs. Tileston and Hollingsworth, of Boston,
and in July, 1889, by them transferred to the Tiles-
ton & Hollingsworth Company, of Boston, a corpora-
tion organized under the laws of the Common-
wealth.
At West Groton there is a leather-board mill, of j
which the daily product is about four tons. It em- I
ploys thirty-five men, and stands on the site of a saw- j
mill and grist-mill, which were built as early as the i
year 1765, and perhaps earlier. There is also a saw- (
mill on the Squannacook River, near the Townsend
line, giving employment to eight or ten men, where
box-shooks, reels, staves, etc., are made.
THE GEOGRAPHY OF GROTOy.
Rivers. — In early times, before the original Plan-
tation had been cut up in order to form other towns.
the Nashua River flowed through the township of
Groton for a distance of ten miles or more, and nearly
bisected its territory ; while to-day its course within
the town's limits is hardly more than three miles.
This river is formed by the union of two branches,
known respectively as the North Branch and the
South Branch, which come together at Lancaster.
The former has its source in Ashburnham, near the
foot of the Watatuck Mountain, and iu Westminster,
and passss through Fitchburg and Leominster; while
the latter rises in the neighborhood of the Wachusett
Mountain, at Princeton, and among the hills of Rut-
land and Holden, and passes through West Boylston
and Clinton. Both these branches for a considerable
distance above their confluence are known also as the
Nashua. The stream at Groton is about one hundred
feet above tide-water.
At a very early period the Nashua River was some-
times called the Penacook, and at other times the
Groton River. In Thomas Noyes's survey of the
grant of Major Simon Willard's farm, in the autumn
of 1659, the land is described as " lying and being for
the most part on the east side of Groaten Riuer.''
.^nd again, at the session beginning on Sept. 6, 1676,
the approval of the General Court was given to Jona-
than Danforth's survey of lands laid out to William
Hauthorue, " lying in the wilderness; on the North
of Groaten Riuer at a place called by the Indians
Wistequassuck," now within the limits of Townsend.
At a later period it was more frequently referred to as
the Lancaster River; and it is likely that the stream
bore different names in different towns along its
course even at the same time. In the record of " The
lands of Mr. Samuell Willard, which is layd out to
him in the towne of Grotten," on Sept. 29, 1680, ref-
erence is made to the Niushawag River — another form
of spelling.
The Squannacook River forms the divisional line
with Shirley for perhaps four miles, which is the whole
distance of contact with that town. This stream
rises in Ashby and fljws through Townsend and by
West Groton, emptying into the Nashua. The name
is fount! in the Proprietors' records as early as the
spring of 1684.
P0XD3. — Budilacook Pond — lies about two miles
from the village, near the Lowell Road. It covers an
area of 103 acres, and i.s the largest pond in the
town. It is mentioned iu the record of James Par-
kers land under the date of July 6, 1666.
Outlet: Baddacook Brook, which flows into Cow
Pond.
Cady Pond — a small and deep pond, covering per-
haps two acres, lying less than a mile from the village
in a southeasterly diiection, near the Boston Road.
It was named after Nicholas Cady, one of the early
settlers, who owned land in the neighborhood. This
pond and Flat Pond, both very small, are the only
ones in the town whoae waters ultimately reach the
Nashua River.
GROTON.
561
Outlet: a small unnamed brook running south-
westerly into James' Brook.
Cow Pond — sometimes called Whitney's Pond, iu
the easterly part of the town, covering an area of
seventy-one acres. Cow Pond Meadow is mentioned
in the record of Ralph Reed's land before the year
1664.
Outlet : Cow Pond Brook, which flows into Massa-
poag Pond.
Buck Pond — near the Ridges, east of Knop's Pond,
and separated from it by a ridge only — lies perhaps
half a mile south of Cow Pond. It covers fifty-five
acres, and has no outlet.
Flat Pond — a small sheet of water near the Throne,
in the west part of the town.
Outlet: a small unnamed brook into the Squanna-
cook River.
Half-Moon Pond — a small pond in the upper part of
the meadow, which lies south of the Hillside Road.
Knop's Pond — near the Ridges, west of Duck Pond,
and is of the same size as that pond, covering fifty-
five acres. So called from James Knapp, or Knoj),
an early settler who owned land in the neighborhood.
Outlet : a brook into Cow Pond.
Long Pond — lies on the southern border of the
town, partly in Groton, but mustly iu Ayer, covering
forty-five acres.
Outlet: a brook into Sandy I'ond.
Martin's Pond — near the foot of Gibbet Hill, on its
northeasterly side — covers sixteen and two-thirds
acres; it was named after William Martin, an early
settler. In the record of James Parker'.- land, on
July 6, 1661), "the pond called Goodman Martin's
Pond," is mentioned. The following article, found
in the warrant for the towu-uieeting held on .Septem-
ber 17, 17112, .seems to show that the outlet of the
pond was formerly through Hog .Swamp and Half-
Moon Meadow into .lames's Brook, though there is
now no other evidence to confirm this view :
" .\rt. R. To 8PP if the town will orrlei the water running fn.m Mar.
Iin*« Pv.nd W> be turoe.! info tlie ul.l < 'tmouel a*: it formerly need to i-un,
through the Town, and appoint some proper iK-rt^on or perwms to renii>Te
the obetnictioDP nod Effect the Bitfiineha."
In the proceedings of the meeting, it Is recorded
that this article was " Past in the Negative." A
measurement of the pond v/aa lately made, when
frozen over, which proves it to be much smaller than
it was half a century ago.
Outlet: Martin's Pond Brook into the outlet of
Knop's Pond, half-way between that pond and Cow
Pond.
Maseapoaf/ Pond — on the easterly border of the
town, but lies mostly in Dunstable and Tyngsborough,
covering an area of fifty-six acres. It is now used as
a storage basin of water by the Vale Mills Manu-
facturing Company, of Xashua, Xew Hampshire, and
in dry seasons it is drawn upon for a supply.
Outlet: Salmon Brook, which empties into the
Merrimack River at Nashua.
36-ii
Sprinffy Pond — a small sheet of water connected
with Knop's Pond by a brook.
Wattle's Pond — three miles north of the village, on
the road to East Pepperell, with no outlet. The origin
of the name is unknown ; but perhaps from Wattle,
" a rod laid on a roof for the purpose of supporting
the thatch." Many of the houses of the early settlers
were thatched.
The area of the ponds, with the exception of
Martin's Pond, is taken from the Fourth Annual
Report of the State Board of Health of Massachu-
setts (January, 1873), as given on pages 124 and 125.
A story is told relative to Massapoag Pond, based
on tradition, which probably has no real foundation.
It is said that —
"Ite outlet wafi on the eaBterly aide, and aa it wan the reserroir into
which CowpoDd brook poored ita watera, a cooaidereble miU-streaDi is-
soed from it. The waters paawd without any rapide for a considerable
diBtaoce, affording no favorable trite for a mill. The north end of the
pond waa bounded by a ridee of tooee fland, rising but little above the .
surface of the water, and being about sis rode only in width ; on the op-
posite side of which was a descent of about forty feet. Here, then, was
an eligible spot for an over>«hot mill. At a town-meeting held May 'Jl,
Iti88, a grunt was uiade to Samuel Adams of a entail pond near Buck
meadow, and leave given to drain it by a brook running into 'Tyng's
rove.' At the pame meeting, for the encouragement of any who would
set up irou-works at Massapoag, a grunt was offered of the wood on the
easterly side of l^nquetenaaaelt br(K)k. It is said that Adams, who is
fluppoeed to have accepted the grant, erected a grist-mill at the site above
mentioned, conducting the water across the sand-bank to the flume of
his mill. At the time of a flood about the year 170(1 (the precise time is
not known), a breach was made across the sand-bank, and it being verv
loose antl moveable, the whole bank was soon torn down by the water
to the depth of more than thirty feet ; and consequently a sheet of water
of that depth, where the pond was so deep, and where of less depth the
whole water upon the surface, flowed suddenly off (all In one nigbt),
with irresistible violeuce. The mill, of course, was demolished, and the
otones, though diligently sought for, and even the skill of the famous
Moll Pitcher, of Lynn, employed in the search, have never yet l«en
found. The lK>ttoiii of the p/tnd being uneven, fish in abundance were
left in the cavities, which wore easily taken, and the inhabitants of the
neighlH.niig towns, ar; well hh of Groton, came and carried off loads of
them. \\ here the water formerly isaued from the |>ond, a entail brf«k
now runs iu, and the outlet is, at the place of disruption, called the
'gulf.* The water finds its way into the old channel, two or three
miles from the pond, in a northwesterly direction from Dunstable meet-
ing-house."
[Butler's History of tiroton, pages 24G, 247 J.
The name of Buck Meadow, which has been in use
for more than two centuries, is firmly established,
and the site well known. The meadow lies near
Lovewell's Pond, formerly within the limits of Groton,
but now in Nashua; and Adams's mill stood undoubt-
edly at the outlet of this pond, where there is a
small water-power. This theory would tally with the
town records ; and furthermore a tradition is still ex-
tant that there was once a mill in the neighborhood.
Lovewell's Pond is much smaller than Massapoag,
and at that time probably had ly) designation. It
was named after Captain John Lovewell, who was
killed by the Indians on May 8, 1725. The following
is the entry in the records :
"Uay : 21. 1688. The inhabitants of Groton Granted to Bamnll
Adams y« pond that lye« neare buck medow which hath Its outlet into
the medow known by y« name of Tyngs Couee, and the swampy land
adioyeug tber to protilded y* sd land do not exceed fifteen accera ;
"atest , JosiAH Paeekb Claries
562
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
aDd 8d adams bath liberty to dr?an the s^ [)ood at y small brook that
niQeslD to Tyng'sToue protiidcd ad Adarues macksguod all dampgeg that
shall be don ther by "
There are now three small brooks running into
jrassapoag Pond on the easterly side, and their fall
is too great for any one of them ever toh&ve been the
old outlet to the pond. Furthermore, it would have
been impossible for any of these brooks to drain the
pond (which even at tiie present time covers fifty-six
acres) without causing too great damage for Adams to
make good. There is no indication along their banks
that they have been much larger streams than they are
to-day. While the formation of the banks at the
mouth of the pond, or the "gulf," so called, is pecu-
liar, there are no signs tiiat the water-line was ever
any higher than it is at the present time. None of
the local antiquaries are able to identify Tyng'sCove,
which is a name undoubtedly derived from .fonathan
Tyng, one of the earliest settlers of Dunstable.
At the same town-meeting, held on May 21, lOSS,
the inhabitants of tiroton —
" Peed ttien hy thp maior tioat gnint fur the im-iTPcineiit uf wiirh inpu
as will upt ii[> tonin wnrks ill niasabog pond ; that thay hliall liaiie \* iifs
.V iniprunmeiit uf (he woods and tiiiihr y' is rutw cnnimon une the pst -id
of uiK-iittaiiaset brook and so to nnshiiii riiier and grotou tine est uard A
south ward to giiofi man greens' mawibog medow. , , ,"
I give this e.Ktract from the town records in order to
show that the inhabitants at that period knew the
pond by its present name ; and if they had seen tit
then to grant .\dam8 any special privilege connected
with it. they would have called it " Massapoag," and
would not have said " y' pond that lyes neare buck
medow."
HlLt-s. — JlajTiilni-k Hill — is mentioned in the record
of Samuel Woods' lands ; but I am unab'.e to identify
it. Perhaps it is the hill due north of Baddacook
Pond.
Brown Loaf Hill — commonly called Brown Loaf —
is a handsome, symmetrical hill standing alone, more
than a mile from the village, near the Lowell road.
Brown Loaf Hill Meadow is mentioned in the descrip-
tion of Joseph Parker's lands, December 2, IG64, which
would imply that the hill was so named before that
time. Brown Loaf Hill is also mentioned in the
record of James Parker's lands madeon July 0, liiliB;
and Brownloafe Playne and Brownloaf Hill are given
in the record of James Fisk's lands in John Morse's
handwriting, of which the date is absent, but which
was certainly made at a. very early period. The
height of the hill is 448 feet .above mean tide on the
coast line.
Chestnut Hilh — the range lying northerly of Mar-
tin's Pond ; so c^led from the abundant growth of
chestnut-trees on its sides. The highest hills in the
town, their greatest elevation being .344 feet.
Clay-Pit Hill — the small hill at the corner of the
East Pepperell road and Break Neck.
Gibbet Hill — a noted landmark overlooking the vil-
lage on its easterly side. It is mentioned in the land-
grant of Sergeant James Parker, which was entered in
the town records of Richanl Sawtell, the first town
clerk who filled the office from June, l»iri2, to Jan-
uary, lKil4-<i5. The tradition is that the hill was so
called from the fact that once .in Indian was gibbeted
on its top. If this ever occurred, it must have hap-
pened before Sawtell's term of office. The town was
incorporated by the General ( 'ourt on May 25, 1655,
but no public records are known to have been kept
before June 23, 1(5<)2. Its height is '>\6 feet.
Horse Hill— in the eastern part of the town, near
Massapoag Pond. It lies partly in Dunstable, and is
covered with woods.
Iiiilian Jim, or Hilh — the range beginning near
James's Brook, a mile ~outli of the village, and run-
ning in an easterly direction on the south side of the
(Jreat Road to Boston. The height is .'124 feet above
mean tide.
.X'liimox — a low bill or ridge a short distance west
of the road to East Pejiperell. near the Longley mon-
ument, and limning parallel with the roail. The
name is also used in connection with the neighbor-
llOOll.
I'nispeii flill — very near < 'atly Pond, and east of
il ; perlia[>s 2'iO feel or more aliove the Nashua, and
"iilo feet above mean tide.
Ri'l'ie Hill,o) The Riiliiff — the name of a peculiar
ridge, three miles .smithiasterly from the village,
along wliich the (ireat Koail runs. It also gave the
name to a tavern formerly kej)! in the immediate
neighborhood.
Eoil.ii Hill — there are two bills of this name, one
lying northeasterly nf Baddacook Pond, near the old
District School- Imuse No. \'ll I. (now the Trowbridge
.School), which is al.so known as the Rocky Hill
f^chool, and the otiiiT situated in the southeast part
of the ti>wii, between Long Pond and the Ridges. A
visit to either of these hills will show why it was so
called.
Sdiiiltj Hill — a small elevatifm on the road to East
Pe|)perell, below the J>ongley monument, near the
place where the Nashua road branches otf.
Shrplfij Hill — lies Wist of the East Pepperell road,
near Naiimox. The name is rarely heard now,
though it was in use .as far b.ack as February 2S,
1670, — evidently so called from the .^hepley family.
SiiaLe Hill — in the simth part of the town, but
lies mostly in Ayer. Rattlesnakes have been killed
on it within the memory of the present generation.
Its height is 4!'" feet.
The Throne — a high hill in the western part of
the town, on the summit of which is a level field of
perhaps sixty acres, containing a small pond, — near
the Townsend line. A map of Groton resembles a
tea-kettle, the portion west of the Nashua River
forming the spout, and the Throne comes in the
spout. It is 4S4 feet high.
Meadows. — The early settlers of Groton, accord-
ing to the town records, had Uiany parcels of meadow
allotted to them in the assignment of land. Sergeant
GROTON.
563
James Parker owned in twenty different meadows,
and the other settlers also were large owners. It is
probable that they did not attach the same significa-
tion to the word " meadow " which now belongs to it
in New England, where it means low, swampy land,
without regard to the mowing. They called by this
name all grass-land that was annually mown for hay,
and especially that by the side of a river or brook ;
and this meaning of the word was and still is the
common one in England, whence they brought their
language. They sometimes spoke of a " swamp,"
meaning by it what we call a "bog;" but much of
this kind of land has since been reclaimed, and is
now known as " meadow." As a matter of fact, it
happened that the lands which could be mown for
the fodder were low lands; and it would require per-
haps less than a generation to transfer the meaning
of mowing lands to the low lands, which were nearly
the only ones that could be mown in the early days
of the Colony. This explanation will make clear the
following vote of the town, passed on February 18,
1680-81 :
" At the eamf^ njeeting it wrh agreed vpon and voteil that M' Hubbettl
sboold baue all the conion whicli waa caitahle tu tuak Difduw iti ewan
poDd tnedow vp to the vpland for seaueD acre and a balte for to mak
vp his fifteen acres of mednw.*'
The following names uf meadows are found in the
town records, and in a few instances I have indicated
their locality :
Accident ; Angle, in the northerly part of the
town; Big Spring, in the neighborhood of Hawtree
Brook ; Broad, immediately west of the village ;
Brook ; Brown Loaf, east of the hill ; Buck, now
lying within the limits of Nashua, New Hampshire;
Burnt, in the vicinity of Baddacook Pond ; Cow
Pond, near the pond of that name; East; Ferney,
near Brown Loaf; Flaggy, to the southward of the
Baddacook road, near the pond ; Flax ; Great
Flaggy, presumably near Flaggy, and perhaps the
same; Great Half- Moon, the same as Half- Moon,
which lies east of the village ; Little Buck, probably
a part of Buck Meadow; Little Half-Moon, a part
of Half-Moon, being an offshoot from it; Lodge;
Long; Maple; Massapoag, evidently near Massapoag
Pond; New Angle; Pine; Plain; Pretty; Provi-
dence ; Quasoponagon, " on the other sid of the
riuer," near the Red Bridge, through which Wrang-
ling Brook runs ; Reedy, known by this name to-day,
lying north of the Reedy Meadow Road ; Rock,
south of Snake Hill ; Sallo, perhaps Sallow, a kind
of willow; Sedge; Skull, through which Unqueten-
assett Brook runs, near the Dunstable line ; Sledge,
north of Reedy Meadow, near the Sledges ; South ;
South Brook ; Spang ; Spot ; Spring ; Spruce ;
Swamp ; Swan Pond ; and Weavers.
In the record of Daniel Pearse's land, by William
Longley, town clerk, on July 6, 1666, reference is
made to the " iland lying within the meadow called
Litle Halfe Moone Meadow." This land now be-
longs to Governor Boutwell, and there is upon it a
small knoll which is always spoken of as the island,
undoubtedly a survival of the expression applied to it
when more or less surrounded by water.
Brooks. — Oo/d Spring Brook — a small brook, rising
in Cold Spring " on y* Left hand of the high way
thatgoeto Reedy medow." It runs across the Nashua
road, the East Pepperell road, through Hazen Swamp
and Libby Lobby Moat, into the Nashua River.
Cow Pond Brook — has its source in Cow Pond
Meadows and Cow Pond, and empties into Massapoag
Pond. Formerly there was a dam between the mead-
ows and the pond, where there was a saw-mill ; and
later on the same site a paper-mill, which disappeared
about Ihirty-five years ago.
Gift Brook — in the north part of the town, rises in
Gift Meadow, crosses Chicopee Row, and empties into
Unquetenassett Brook.
James's Brook— one of the longest brooks within the
limits of the town. It takes its rise in Half-Moon
Meadow, crosses Main Street in the village, and runs
southerly and westerly for three or four miles into the
Nashua River. At its mouth is the beginning of the
line separating the town of Ayer from Groton. For-
merly there was a tannery on the banks of the brook,
near Indian Hill, known as Dix's tannery; and a mile
below, on land of the late Benjamin Moors, east of the
road, at one time there was a mill, — but now no traces
of either are left, except some remains of the mill-
dam. The stream took its name from an Indian,
who was a famous hunter and trapper in very early
times. It empties into the Nashua River, nearly
opposite to the mouth of the Squannacook.
Hawtree Brook — in the northerly part of the town,
near Chicopee Row ; after it unites with Walnut Run
and two or three other small streams, it forms Unque-
tenassett Brook. In the early records of the town the
Haw trees are frequently spoken of, which refer to the
neighborhood of this brook.
Nod Brook — rises near the Soapstone Quarry, crosses
the Nod road, and runs into the Nashua River.
Reedy Meadow Brook — rises in Reedy Meadow and
flows northerly, emptying into the Nashua River
below East Pepperell. It is sometimes called John-
son's Brook.
Sedge Brook — a small brook from Sedge Meadow,
running into Reedy Meadow Brook.
Tuity Brook — contracted from Gratuity — a very
small stream which rises near the head of Farmers'
Row and runs through Hazle Grove into the Nashua
River below Fitch's Bridge.
Unquetenaseeti Brook — often called Unkety — A
stream formed by the union of Walnut Run, Haw-
tree Brook, and one or two small tributaries, and run-
ning northerly through Skull Meadow and that part
of Dunstable formerly Groton into the Nashua.
Walnut Bun — a brook issuing from the sides of
Chestnut Hills and uniting with Hawtree Brook and
one or two other streams, forms the Unquetenassett.
564
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Also the name of a place — perhaps it waa the mouth
of a stream — on the Nashua River where in olden
times there was a bridge. It stood farther up the
river than Fitch's Bridge.
Wrangling Brook — in West Groton, a mile and a
half in length — meanders through Quasoponagon
Meadow, and then empties into the Nashua a short
distance below the Red Bridge.
Roads. — Baddacook Poiid Road — a continuation
of the Martin's Pond Road to the neighborhood of
the pond.
Break Xeck — the short strip of road from the East
Pepperell road to Common Street, south of the soap-
stone quarry.
Chicopee Rovj — running north for three miles from
the Cemetery. The district to which it leads is
known as Chicopee, a name given long ago.
Farmers' Row- applied to the road on the height
of land west of the village. It begins at the west end
of Pleasant Street, and runs in a southerly direction
for two miles, passing by the Groton School.
Great Road — one of the principal thoroughfares
between Boston and parts of New Hampshire and
Vermont. The section of the road through the vil-
lage is known as Main Street.
Hillside Road — the highway along the southern
slope of the Indian Hills.
Love Lane — the highway from the Lowell Road,
near the First Parish Meeting-house, to the Great
Road near Cady Pond.
Martin's Fond Road — the highway from the site
of the first meeting-house to the neighborhood of the
pond, where it becomes the Baddacook Pond Road.
Rctily Meadoiv Road — from the Nashua road to
Chicopee Row, immediately south of Reedy Meadow.
Squash Futh — through the woods from the East
Pepperell road to the Nashua road — a short distance
beyond Cold Spring Brook.
Tuity Road — a contraction of Gratuity Road — the
road leading to Fitch's Bridge from the Great Road
near the railroad bridge, half a mile north of the village.
The name had its origin in the early history of the
town, when grants of land were made to the inhabit-
ants as gratuities. Tuity Brook, a very small stream,
crosses this road and empties into the Nashua River,
below Fitch's Bridge.
MlscELI.ANEOOS. — Brickyard — on the north side
of the Great Road, about a mile from the First Parish
Meeting-house. It was much used during the last
century; and probably was the place where the bricks
were made for the parsonage, as mentioned in the
town-records, June 20, 1706. Only a few traces of it
are now left, though a clump of elms by the road-
side is a good guide to the site.
Brown Loaf Flain — to the west of Brown Loaf.
Covnnunity — the name of a district or neighbor-
hood beyond the Groton School, where many of the
residents formerly held similar religious views. It
had its origin nearly fifty years ago, when the Sec-
ond Adventists, or "Millerites,'' gave up their regu-
lar services in the village.
Dead River — the old course of the Nashua River,
around the island which waa formed by the cutting
through of the " neck."
Deep Soil — in the neighborhood of the race-course,
in Hazle Grove; so-called on the tncns a nan lucendo
principle.
Fitch's Bridge — over the Nashua River, a mile and
a quarter below the Red Bridge.
General Field — often mentioned in the early town,
records, refers to laud owned in severalty by the pro-
prietors of Groton, who kept it as one field, for rea-
sons not now understood. It was upland, and lay in
the southwest part of the town, near the river. It
appears to have been allotted to the proprietors, ac-
cording to the number of acre-rights which each one
owned. Perhaps it was land already cleared when
the first settlers came.
The Gift — a jiarcel of land near Reedy Meadow,
in the north part of the town.
Tlie Hawtrers — mentioned several times in the early
records, and referring, doubtless, to some native
shrubs or tree.s ; for instance, /.achery Sawtell had
meadow-land " Neare the hawtrees " confirmed to him
(in November IS, lt)7<i. It evidently became the niirae
of a limited district or neighborhood in the north part
of the town, and from it undoubtedly Hawtree Brook
wiis named. The late Professor .\sa < tray, the distin-
guished botanist, wrote me that there are three or four
species of wild hawthorn in Miwsachuseits. He says:
•■ One of the forms of the Black or Pear Thorn (t>a-
lcegu» tomeiilnsa) would be the likeliest for Groton, of
perhaps the Cockspur Thorn. The former has the
more edible fruit, and would be sure to attract atten-
tion."
Ilazen .Swamp — near the mouth of Cold Spring
Brook.
Hazle Grore — the neighborhood of the east bank of
the Nashua River above Fitch's Bridge.
Hicks's Hole — a small jiiece of meadow, lying north
of Reedy Meadow.
High Flain — on the north .-side of the Baddacook
road, ill the neighborhood of the pond. It lies in the
angle of the roads, west of the house of John John-
son, Jr., as laid down on the map of Groton, made
from a survey during the years 1828 and 1829.
Hog Swamp — lying between the westerly side of
Martin's Pond and Martin's Pond Road. (Jovernor
Boutwell's private way to the Chestnut Hills passes
through it.
Hoyt's Wharf — the name of a place on Cow Pond
Brook where one Hoyt formerly kept his boat. It
waa near the house of Samuel Hazen, — as laid down
on the map of Groton, made from a survey during the
year8l828and 1829, — nearly amilenorth of Cow Pond.
The Island — a small, though prominent, hill in the
meadow south of Hillside Road ; undoubtedly once
surrounded by water.
^^ C-i^^-
GROTON.
565
Javuiica — the name of a aiuall patch of meadow
behind the hills on the west side of Chicopee Row.
Libby Lobbij Moat — below the Ox Bow, opening into
the Nashua River. This word is probably another
form of Loblolly, in use at the South, and denoting
wet land.
Lily Moat — on the east side of the Nashua and
south of the road, near the Red Bridge.
Madagascar — the name of the district where the
paper-mill formerly stood on the brook, between Cow
Pond and Knop's Pond.
Nod — the district lyins; in the neighborhood of
the four corners, below the soapstone quarr)'. The
road from the Hoilingsworth Paper-mills to this place
is called the Nod Road.
Ox Bow — the beud of the Nashua River, in the
northerly part of the town, below the Lawrence pas-
ture.
Paugus Hole — in Paugus Brook, on the west side of
Brown Loaf, where, it is said, the body of Paugus's
descendant, who came to kill Chamberlain, was sunk,
after he himself was killed.
Pine Plain — probably near the Nashua River, and
perhaps on the westerly side. In December, 1673,
.Joseph Morse had meadow-lands on the Pine Plain,
" neare the fordway."
Pinch Bowl — one of several natural depressions
near the Lowell road, below Brown Loaf. The name
is also applied to the neighborhood.
Red Bridge — over the Nashua River, on the road
to West Groton.
Sledges — the name of a meadow northeast of Reedy
Meadow, mentioned in the early records, where John
Lakin owned land. Mr. Butler, in his History (page
273), says that " this word seems to signify strips of
meadow or parcels of low lands abounding in iron
ore." Bog-iron is found in that quarter of the town,
and in old times was worked by a company formed
for that purpose.
Sodom — the district in the northwest part of the
town, near the Townsend line. The name refers to
the quality of the soil, and not to the character of the
inhabitants.
Squaniiacook — an Indian word — the old name of
West Groton, — applied to the river passing by that
village.
Stony Fordway, or Wading-Place — near the site of
the Hoilingsworth Paper-mills, on the Nashua River,
a mile and a half northwesterly of the village.
Swill Bridge — was between the homesteads of Eber
Woods, Jr., and Joel Davis, — as given on Mr. Butler's
map of Groton, from a survey made in the years 1828
and 1829, — a short distance west of the present rail-
road bridge. Originally it was a causeway, perhaps
twenty rods in length, over the southerly end of
Broad Meadow, though now it is a solid road.
Thomas Tarbell'a Fordwaii — was between where the
Red Bridge now stands and Fitch's Bridge, which
is a mile and a quarter below.
Tobacco Pipe Plain — on both sides of the road
from the Ridges to Sandy Pond, near Rocky Hill. It
is mentioned in the ''Bye- Laws of Groton relative to
Schools; and .Instruction of the School Committee,
1805," and in old deeds.
Reflection of Light. — ^The reflection of the
electric light in Boston and the surrounding towns
can be seen from certain elevations at a great dis-
tance. When the atmospheric conditions are favor-
able, it is distinctly visible on particular nights from
Indian Hill at Groton, in the neighborhood of Ma-
jor Moses Poor Palmer's house, and from other
places in the town. A slight haziness in the air is
needed in order to receive the reflection. The dis-
tance from Boston to Groton in a straight line is
about thirty miles, though the illumination is helped
by the electric systems of Newton and Waltham,
which are somewhat nearer. From different points
in the village of Groton the reflection of the circuits
at Nashua, Lowell, Clinton and Fitchburg is often
visible, which places are twelve or thirteen miles dis-
tant as the crow flies.
The illumination of the heavens during the great
fire that occurred in Boston on the night of Novem-
ber 9, 1872, was distinctly seen by various persons in
diffierent parts of the town.
• BIOGRAPHICAL.
ABBOTT LAWRENCE.
The name of Lawrence is one of the earliest to be
found among the Puritan settlers of Massachusetts.
John Lawrence, t|^ first emigrant of the name, was
established in Watertown as early as 1635.
Abbott Lawrence was the fifth son of Samuel and
Susanna Lawrence. He was born in Groton on the
16th day of December, 1792. He received the family
name of his paternal grandmother, Abigail Abbott,
daughter of Nehemiah Abbott, of Lexington. His
education, begun at the district school, was completed
at the academy of the town, of which his father had
been a trustee for many years. He enjoyed nothing
in the way of educational advantages beyond this, but
he evidently improved thB time and turned all that
he received to the best account. In 1808 he was sent
to Boston and placed as an apprentice to hia elder
brother, Amos Lawrence, who had been for some
years established there as an importer of English
goods. By steady application and fidelity he pre-
pared himself in this suburdiuHlc position for the re-
sponsibilities which were soon to come upon him as
a principal. In 1814 he was admitted to partnership
with his brother. The times were by no means encour-
aging, as we were in the midst of our war with Eng-
land, and after a few months the prospect seemed so
unpromising that Mr. Lawrence proposed to withdraw
from the business and enter the army. He had pre-
566
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
vioasly been an active member of the New England
Guards. He applied to the War Department for a
comitaission, but before an answer could be received
the news of peace arrived, and he abandoned all
thought of a military life. He embarked in the first
vessel that left Boston for England after the procla-
mation of peace to purchase goods for the market.
" The passage was a short one. With characteristic
ardor, he was the first to leap on shore, being thus,
perhaps, the first American who touched his fatherland
after the war was ended." He remained abroad for
some time, on the occasion of this his first voyage to
Europe, visiting the Continent, where he saw the allied
.armies immediately after the battle of Waterloo.
Messrs. A. & A. Lawrence soon engaged largely in
the sale of cotton and woolen goods of domestic man-
ufacture, and devoted all their energies to foster this
great branch of the national industry. Mr. Lnwrence's
interest in the work of railroad construction in New
England was hardly less than iu the establishment
and extension of the manufacturing system. He was
a large subscriber to the various railroads projected
for the concentration of trade in Boston, and this
from a feeling of patriotism rather than the expecta-
tion of profit. Mr. Lawrence was chosen to represent
Massachusetts at the Harrisburg Convention in 1827
and took a prominent part in its proceedin<rs. In
1831 he was elected to the Common Council of Boston,
but declined a re-election. In 1834 he was elected to
Congress. On taking his place he was at once put on
the Committee of Ways and Means. On the expira-
tion of his term his constituents testified their sense
of his services by inviting him to a public
dinner. This he declined in a letter in which
he touches on the great questions o^he day. He de-
clined a re-election to Congress, although the mem-
bers of the opposite party gave him the remarkable
assurance that, if he would consent to stand, no can-
didate should be brought out against him. Two
years later he consented to accept a second nomina-
tion and again took his seat in the House. Shortly
after bis arrival he was attacked by typhus fever, so
that for some time small hopes were entertained of his
recovery. He resigned in the following autumn.
In the Presidential campaign of 1840, Mr. Law-
rence took an active part in favor of the election of
General Harrison. In September, 1842, he was pres-
ident of the Whig Convention which nominated Henry
Clay for President on the part of Massachusetts.
In 1842 Mr. Lawrence was appointed by the Gov-
ernor one of the commissioners on the part of Mas-
sachusetts to negotiate a settlement of our northeast-
ern boundary, which had been a source of irritatiou
for many years between the United States and Eng-
land. Quoting Mr. Preacott's language : " It is not
too much to say that but for the influence exerted by
Mr. Lawrence on this occasion the treaty, if it had
been arranged at all, would never have been brought
into the shape which it now wears." Mr. Nathan
Appleton in his memoir confirms this statement in the
following words : " It is the belief of the writer, who
was then in Congress, that to Mr. Lawrence more than
to any other individual is due the successful accom-
plishment of the negotiation which resulted in the
important Treaty of Washington."
In July, 1843, Mr. Lawrence, accompanied by his
wife and daughter, embarked from Boston for England
in the steamer " Columbia." The following day they
were wrecked on Black Ledge, near Seal Island.
After a week's detention on the island, they were
transported to Halifax whence they proceeded on their
voyage.
Mr. Lawrence's reputation had preceded him. He
was received in England with marked attention, and
the hospitality of many distinguished and influential
people was extended to him.
In 1844 he was a delegate to the Whig National
Convention and one of the electors at large for the
State of Massachusetts. He was an ardent sup-
porter of Henry Clay for the Presidency and deeply
disappointed on his defeat.
In 1845 the Essex Company was organized and Mr
Lawrence was its president and the first and largest
subscriber to its stock. The city of Lawrence, incor-
porated as a town in 1847, was named for him.
Most justly has it been iaid : " The broad compre-
hension, unwavering faith and large capacity of Ab-
bott Lawrence should never be forgotten by dwellers
in the city that bears his name."
In 1846 Mr. Lawrence addressed to the Hon. Wm.
C. Rivei", of Virginia, his celebrated letters on the
tariff. Mr. Webster wrote to Mr. Lawrence from
Washington : " Your letters to Mr. Rives have a verv
great circulation, as you are aware, and are highly
praised by intelligent men. The second of tlieni will
form the substratum of what I propose to say (if I
aay anything) on the tariff subject." "These letters
attracted much attention in all parts of the country
and especially in Virginia, where they were re-printed
and commented upon at length in the leading news-
papers. So deep was the impression made in that
State by them, and such a spirit of enterprise did they
enkindle, that some of the leading citizens invited
him to come and establish a manufacturing town at
the Great Falls of the Potomac. This appeal on the
part of a sister State for co-operation and leadership
in the development of its industry and capital was a
remarkable recognition and tribute to the ability and
character of Mr. Lawrence. . . . But vast interests
were at stake nearer home, and he could not allow
himself to be diverted from this work by the projected
enterprise on the shores of the Potomac, uo matter how
alluring the promise of results both to himself and to
others."
Mr. Hill in his Memoir thus spoke of Mr. Law-
rence : " His character, in all respects ihat of the pure
New England type, was peculiarly so in the love and
zeal which he always manifested in the cause of
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GROTON.
567
popular education. . . . We have au illustration of
this in the letters written by him when he established
the Lawrence prizes in the High and Latin Schools
of Boston, (1844-45) giving to each the sum of $2000
— using his own language — the interest to be expended
in medals, books, and other prizes among those pupils
who may excel in the various branches of learning
which are taught in those schools." In a like spirit
he aided in the endowment of the Franklin Library
at Lawrence which also received a bequest of $5000
at his death.
For several years he had felt (to use his own words)
'' the pressing want in our community (and in the whole
country) of an increased number of men educated in
the practical sciences." " He was satisfied," says Mr.
Prescott, " tliat, however liberal the endowments of that
institution " (Harvard University) " for objects of lib-
eral culture, no adequate provision had been made for
instruction in science." When, therefore, the Corpo-
ration of the University announced its purpose of or-
ganizing a school of theoretical and practical science,
lie responded by a gift in 1847 of fifty thousand dollars.
In recognition of his munificence the institution was
naffied the Lawrence Scientific School. Soon after its
establishment. Professor Agassiz was appointed to tlie
chair of Zoology and Geology. Mr. Lawrence en-
dowed the school with a further like sum by his will.
Mr. Lawrence was a leader in the movement to
supply the city of Boston with an abundance of pure
water. He attended several public meetings held to
promote that object, and made speeches in support of
it. One of them may be found in full in " Hill's Me-
moir" of him. The project met with the strongest
opposition. The first act of the Legislature (passed
March, 1845) authorizing the city to take water from
either Long Pond or Charles River was rejected at
the polls by a large majority, but a second act, such
had been the change in public opinion only eleven
months later, was accepted by a still larger majority.
Water was brought into the city from Long I'ond in
October, 1848, and Mr. Lawrence lived to see all his
prediction? more than verified.
In the Presidential canvass of 1848 the name of Mr.
Lawrence was prominently associated for the office of
Vice-President with that of General Taylor for Presi-
dent, and at the convention in Philadelphia he wanted
but .six votes of being nominated for that office.
This result was owing to the peculiar and unexpected
course of some of the delegates from his own State.
He, however, heartily sustained the nomination of
Taylor and Fillmore. Immediately after the inaugu-
ration of General Taylor, Mr. Lawrence was offered
a seat in his Cabinet, but declined it: soon after he
was nominated to the mission to England, which he
accepted. After serving three years his private
affairs obliged him to return, and in October, 1852, he
resigned. No minister from the United States was
ever more respected or left behind him a more envia-
ble reputation. The Rev. John Cumming, in dedicat-
ing the American edition of his " Apocalyptic
Sketches " to Mr. Lawrence, says: " I regard this us
an opportunity of expressing a conviction shared and
felt by the good and great of this country how much
they appreciated your presence in London, as the
representative of your magnificent nation, and how
deeply, — I may add universally, — they regretted your
departure. We never had so popular a minister from
America or one who has done so much to leave last-
ing and elevated impressions of his countrymen."
After his return from England, Mr. Lawrence held
no public position, though he still maintained a warm
interest in public affairs. He vigorously opposed the
new State Constitution of 1853 and made numerous
speeches against it ; but with this ex^ption and his
efforts in the " canvass for General Scott as President,
he took no active part in politics. He showed the
same zeal as ever in the cause of education, and
watched with the deepest interest over the rising for-
tunes of the Scientific School which he had founded
at Cambridge."
Mr. Lawrence married, on the 28th of June, 1819,
Katharine, the eldest daughter of the Hon. Timothy
Bigelow, the distinguished lawyer. He died in Bos-
ton on the 18th of August, 1855, and was buried with
civil and military honors.
Recognizing Mr. Lawrence's hearty and generous
interest in the cause of education, as well as his valu-
able public services, Williams College in 1852 and
Harvard College in 1854 conferred on him the hon-
orary degree of Doctor of Laws.
HOK. MOSES P. PALMER.'
Moses Poor Palmer is ason of Moses Harriman and
Mary Harriman (Hale) Palmer, and was born at Derr)-,
N. H., on May 1, 1830. His parents were cousins, and
in the year 1832 the family removed to East Bradford
(now Groveland), where the .son received his early
education, attending school at Merrimack Academy
in that village. During the summer months he
worked upon his father's farm, and in the winter on
the shoemaker's bench, as was the custom of young
men at that time in his neighborhood. He learned
the trade of shoe-cutting at Marlborough ; and in the
year 1854 he came to Groton in order to superintend
a shoe factory that had just been started. It wa-s or-
ganized by Messrs. Bigelow and Randall, in a build-
ing that had then only recently been given up as a
tavern, and situated near the Congregational meeting-
house. On December 19, i855, the establishment
was burned, and then the business was transferred to
the building previously used as a bakery and situated
at the corner of Main and West Streets. Here young
Palmer remained until 1858, when, in partnership
with his brother, he began the manufacture of shoes
at Marlborough, where he continued until the break-
^ By Hon. Samuel Abbott Greea.
568
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ing out of the Rebellion in the spring of 1861. He On July 7, ISOl, he was married to Martha Green,
then recruited a company of riflemen at Marlborough, I daughter of Joshua and ^latilda (Prescott) Eaton, of
and, on May 6th of that year, was commissioned as Groton ; and they have one son and two dauehters.
captain. In the mean time the quota of men asked '
for by President Lincoln was filled, and for that j
reason the company was not at once accepted, but | Charles hakrison avaters.
was assigned afterward to the Fourth Battalion of | For a period of twenty-eight years, from 1S55 to
Rifiee, which became the nucleus of the Thirteenth j 1S83, Charles Harrison Waters was one of Groton 's
Massachusetts Volunteers. On June 25th this or- i most capable, efficient and respected citizens. He pos-
ganization was ordered to garrison Fort Indepen- ^ sessed in a marked degree the qualities which make a
deuce, Boston Harbor, where it was soon recruited to
ten companies ; and on July 16th Palmer was com-
missioned as first lieutenant. On July 30th the regi-
ment left for the seat of war, and, on August 16,
1862, LieutenaS Palmer was promoted toacaptaincy,
although he had been in command of the company
during most of the time since the regiment left Boston.
In the campaign of 1862 he was in command through
all the principal battles of the Army of the Potomac,
notably the second battle of Bull Run, where he was
wounded three times, — one of which wounds was a
very severe one, a bullet passing through his neck
and lower Jaw, — and also slightly wounded at Fred-
strong character; and his u.sefulness was equal to his
energy.
He was the oldest son of Horace Waters and Ruth
Hovey, of Millbury, Mass., where he was born July
31, 1828. His school days were not protracted, end-
ing with a term or two at an academy. At the age of
fifteen he was a factory boy ; at eighteen, an overseer
in a mill, already with au aim in life, and to the end
of his busy career he pursued, in the main, the way
of his father before him, that of a successful manu-
facturer.
Dec. 21, 18.54 he married JFaiy J. Farnswortli,
daughter of James Farnsworth, of Groton, where, in
ericksburg. He took part in Bolivar Heights, Front | the following year, he took up his residence, at first,
Royal, Thoroughfare Gap, Chaucellorsville, and
various other battles and skirmishes.
During the fight at Gettysburg on July 1, 1863,
while ia the First Corps (Reynolds'), he was severely
shot in the right knee and crippled for life, and on
March 0, 1864, was honorably discharged from the
military service. Owing to this wound he has lost
the entire use of his knee, and is compelled t.i walk
ou crutches. On May 10, 1866, for gallant and meri-
torious .services in the field, he was breveted major
of volunteers.
After his discharge from the army Captain Palmer
returned to Groton, the home of his wife, and bought
a farm, situated on the Great Road to Boston, about
a mile from the village, where he now lives, much re-
spected in the community. For twelve years (1S77-
89) he served the town as selectman, assessor and
overseer of the poor, and for four years was the
chairman of the board. He has been commander of
E. S. Clark Post, No. 115, Grand Army of the Re-
public; master of Grange No. 7, Patrons of Hus-
bandry ; an officer of the Groton Farmers' and
Mechanics' Club, and a member of the Middlesex
North Agricultural Society at Lowell, having been
on the Farnsworth estate in the west part of the vil-
lage, and, subsequently, purchitsing and remodeling
for his occupancy the house nwned by Mr. ,fohn Pea-
body on Main Street (North). There were born to
him three children, two of whom remain.
Mr. Waters was a man of action ; his was an alert
mind, his a ready hand. He could not be of the number
of those " who merely e.xist iir a state of benumbed tor-
por, not finding it needful lo he more than half awake."
He must be up and doing. And so he worked and
over-worked until he broke down. Warning came to
him some five years before, and lie gave it heed just
long enough to make a flying trip to Europe, but only
to gird on the harness again as soon as he got back.
Mr. Waters had the genius of an inventor. Prob-
lems of natural philosophy, jihysics, books of science
had to him far more attraction than other subjects.
He was still a yfiung man only twenty-three when
he went to Jewett City, Connecticut, and engaged in
the manufacture of rope and twine, introducing origi-
nal methods. Much of the machinery now in use in
the extensive works of the Clinton Wire-cloth Com-
pany (of which he was first the agent, then the general
manager, then vice-president, and finally president.
for many years one of its vice-presidents and trustees, i which office he held at the time of his decease) was of
He has been a justice of the peace since March 30,
1881, and is now treasurer of the New England Milk
Producers' Union. His success as a farmer show.o
what can be accomplished by skill and application,
and furnishes a good example for young men to follow.
Major Palmer was a member of the House during
the session of 1884, and a member of the Senate dur-
ing the sessions of 1888-90, a period of three years,
a longer term of service than has ever been accorded
to any other Senator from his district.
his invention.
In prosecuting the new enterprise known as the
.Vvery Lactate Company, and while personally super-
intending the construction of the building at Little-
ton, from the walls of which he was descending when
attacked by paralysis, he either made himself, or
caused to be made, some important and original in-
vestigations in chemistry. Had his life been spared
1 By Rev. Juahua VuuDg, D.D.
y-
^a/^i^^r^-z^
/
GROTON.
569
it is uot. impossible tliat this business venture would
have been successful.
Undoubtedly the quality of efficiency would be
mentioned as his chief mental characteristic. By vir-
tue of his natural executive ability it was his right to
lead — not simply to have his own way, but to have
things rfo«e and well done. He used hi^ power for good.
And underneath that large, forceful brain there was
also an equally large and benevolent heart. The charity
that emanated from his house was widely recognized,
his own kindness of heart being seconded by that of his
estimable wife. As a citizen, he was public-spirited in
an eminent degree. He was in favor of improvements,
whether it was to have better schools or better roads.
In the beautiful village of his residence, whatever gives
attractiveness to the place, or character and dignity to
the people, is due as much to his personal effort as to
that of any other man of his generation. His relig-
ious affiliation was with the Unitarians. His atten-
dance on the ministrations of the house of God was as
regular and constant as the return of the Sabbath.
His mind recognized a Supreme Intelligence, and
bowed with reverence and adoration to an authority
" EntbroDeJ above the rejich of sight."
For several years he was the president of the North
Middlesex Conference of Unitarian and other Chris-
tian churches. He died March 13, 1883, aged fifty-
four years.
A unique monument of his own design marks his
restiug-piace in the village cemetery.
I-UTHER BLOOP.
Luther Blood was born at Groton, October 21,
1810, and is a sou of Luther and Sally (Cook)
Blood. His grandfather, Caleb, married Hauuafa
Holden, November 1, 1753, and Elizabeth Farns-
worth, March 3, 1774. He had twenty-seven chil-
dren, of whom Luther was the twent}.'-fifth. Eliza-
beth, the grandmother, was a member of the old
Farnsworth family, whose name was among the first
settlers of the town. Caleb was born November 23,
1734, and was the son of John and .Joanuii (Nutting)
Blood, who were married July 13, 1712. The first
ancestor in Groton of Luther Bl&od was probably
James, who was one of four by the name of Blood
who early went to the township and became original
proprietors, and are mentioned as petitioners for a
plantation at that place. The family name is a fa-
miliar one ; and while some who bear it have become
widely scattered in the land, there have yet been
those who have continued it in Groton and the adjacent
places, which were formerly a part of the ancient
town. The old homestead, where the subject of this
sketch was born, is situated in West Groton, near
Fitch's Bridge. It is on the west side of the Nashua
River, and is now owned and occupied by Augustus
Blood, a brother of Luther. This estate has for many
years been in the possession of the Blood family.
The grandfather of Luther came into possession of it
when it was wilderness land, and by his industry and
thrift it became a smiling homestead, where succes-
sive generations of the family have been reared. On
this farm the subject of this sketch spent his early
years, where his life was in accord with the customs
and ways of the rural and sparsely-peopled places of
our old New England towns. There was plenty of
hard, rough work ou the farm, and that substantial
and wholesome fare, which may have been a condi-
tion of the robust health which he, at his advanced
age, now enjoys. The education he received was at
the humble 8chool-hou«e in what is still known as
District No. 4, and consisted in what could he ob-
tained in a course of six or eight weeks each year.
At the age of eighteen he left, home and learned
the carpenter's trade. Two school buildings still
stand which were erected under bis supervision, and
which, by their coutrast, suggest the rapid improve-
ment in our educational means. One of these is a
small, unoccupied, brick school-house, in District
No. 4, built in 1835 ; the other the beautiful Law-
rence Academy, erected in 1870.
May 2, 1844, Mr. Blood married Sarah Park Stone,
of South Groton, now the town of Ayer. Miss Stone's
birthplace was about a mile from Ayer Junction; but
her later home was the "Stone Place," on the old
road from Ayer to Groton. Mr. and Mrs. Blood have
no children. Their residence is pleasantly situated
on High Street, near the Lawrence Academy and tbe
Unitarian Church. Mr. Blood was an old-time Whig,
till the breaking up of that party, since which time
he has been a Republican. His habits have been
simple and regular. He has been temperate and in-
dustrious, and bears the marks of well-developed
old age.
SAMUEL A. GREEN.'
Samuel Abbott Green was born in Groton, Mass.,
March 16, 1830. He graduated at Harvard in 1851.
After receiving his medical degree, in 1854, he spent
several years in Europe. On his return he began the
practice of his profession in Boston. May 19, 1858,
he was appointed by Governor Banks surgeon of the
Second Massachusetts Militia Regiment, and at the
breaking out of the Rebelliou he entered the service
as assistant surgeon of the First Massachusetts Regi-
ment, and was the first medical officer in the Com-
monwealth mustered in for three years' service. Sep-
tember 2, 1861, Dr. (rreen was promoted to surgeon of
the Twenty-fourth JIassachusetts Regiment, a posi-
tion which he occupied until November 2, 1864.
During this time he was on the stafls of various cavalry
officers. On the Burnside expedition to Roanoke he
had charge of the hospital-ship '' Recruit," and later,
' B; the Editor.
570
HISTORY OF .M1DD].ESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of the hospital-ship " Cosmopolitan," on the South
Carolina coast. He was also chief medical officer at
Morris Island during the siege of Fort Wagner.
He was appointed post-surgeon at Jacksonville and
St. Augustine, Fla., in October, 1863, and from this
point went to Virginia, and was with the army when
Bermuda Hundred was taken. After the surrender of
Richmond Dr. Green was appointed acting staff-sur-
geon in that city, where he remained three months.
In 1862 he was successful ia organizing Roanoke
Cemetery, one of the first regular burial-places for
Union soldiers, which was dedicated, with appropri-
ate ceremonies on February 23, 1862. Dr. Green was
faithful to his trust, and those characteristics which
have market! his later life shone resplendent in the
service, and in 1864, for gallant and distinguished !
services in the field, he was breveted lieutenant-col- j
onel of volunteers. 1
At the cloie of the war he returned to Boston, where
he has filled various positions of trust and responsi- j
bility. From 1865 to 1872 he was superintendent of !
the Boston Dispensary. He was a member of the
Boston .School Board in 1860, '62, '66 and 72; trustee j
of the Boston Public Library from 1868 to '78, and !
acting librarian from October, 1877, to October, 1878. j
In 1870 he was appointed by Governor Claflin on the j
commission to care for disabled soldiers. He was I
city physician from 1871 to 1880, and also, in 1878,
he was chosen a member of the board of experts, I
.■luthorized by Congress to investigate the yellow fever. \
He is now serving his fourth term as an Overseer of ;
Harvard College, and is also one of the trustees of j
the Peabody Education Fund, which was established \
by the late George Peabody for educational purposes i
at the South. I
In 1882 Dr. Green was elected mayor of Boston. !
While Dr. Green has been active and prominent in I
the affairs of Boston generally, the distinguishing
feature of his career, perhaps, is the time and research
he has given to historical studies, and the various
works which he has prepared and printed — many of
t.hem privately — form an invaluable addition to the
historic literature of the Commonwealth.
Among his works may be mentioned the following:
"My Campaigns in America," a journal kept by
Comte William de Deux Ponts, 1780-81 ; translated
from the French manuscript, with an introduction
and notes (Boston, 1868); ".\n Account of Percival
and Ellen Green and .Some of their Descendants,"
(printed privately, Groton, Mass., 1876); "Epitaphs
from the Old Burying-Ground in Groton, Mass."
(1879); " The Early Records of Groton, Mass, 1662-
1677" (1880); " History of Medicine in Massachu-
setts," a centennial address delivered before the Mas-
sachusetts Medical Society, June 7, 1881 (Boston,
1881); "Groton during the Indian Wars" (Groton,
1883); " Groton during the Witchcraft Times" (1883);
" The Boundary Lines of Old Groton " (1885) ; " The
Geography of Groton," preserved for the use of the
Appalachian (Mountain) Club (1886); "Groton His-
torical Series," thirty-seven numbers, 1883-1890, and
the " History of Groton," in this work.
CHAPTER XLI.
gONCORD.
BY HON. JOHN S. KEYES.
9
Settlement — Early HMory — Indian Truuble* — Capt. M'ftw/er'* Kan-alive.
Whatever other distinction Concord has obtained,
it has surely that of being the oldest inland Anglo-
Saxon town in America. The first English settle-
ment made above tide-water was here.
In 1635 a small company of twelve or fifteen fami-
lies broke their way along the Indian trails into the
forest, away from the sea-shore. Starting from New-
town (now Watertown), at the head of tide-water in
the Charles River, they made their toilsome way along
either the route still known as the "Trapelo" road, or
that called the " Virginia," over hills and across
swamps, to the " Musketaquid." Their object was
the wide, grassy meadows of that stream, free from the
forest growth, and the level plains on its banks where
the Indians had raised their corn. These meadows
and plains Simon Willard had known, if not seen, in
his trading for furs with the natives. He was the
leader of the small company, made up of Peter Bulke-
ley, the minister, John Jones, the teaching elder,
William Buttrick, .James Hosmer, Robert Fletcher,
John Ball, George Hayward, Richard Rice, William
Hartwell, John Heald, William Judson, Luke Potter,
John Scotchford, Merriams and Wheelers, with their
families, — sturdy Englishmen from Kent, .Surrey,
Yorkshire and Bedfordshire, who had come to this
country in the ''great emigration" of that time.
They had secured from the General Court an act of
incorporation, dated September 2, 1635, granting
them "six myles of land square," and the name of
"Concord."
For shelter the first winter they made rude hovels
of earth and brushwood on the southerly slope of the
mile-long ridge east of the Common. The next year
they built their first frame house for the minister and
elder, on the little knoll at the northwest end of the
ridge nearest the river, and their first meeting-house
on the summit of the ridge. In this dwelling-house
they made their bargain with the Indians for the land,
three miles north, south, east and west, and obtained
a deed signed by Squaw Sachem, Tahattawao, Nim-
rod, and others. For this they paid in wampum,
beads, blankets, hoes, knives and cloth, to the satis-
faction of the native owners, and were " made wel-
come." This laud was laid out, and the corners of
the tract marked by stone bounds, with surprising
exactness, considering the difficulties of the task. It
CONCORD.
571
iDcluded a part of the present Carlisle od the north,
of Bedford on the east, and Lincoln on the south,
and agrees with the line of Sudbury and Acton on
the other sides. These lines took in Fairhaven Bay,
White, Bateman's, Flint's, Walden and Beaver Ponds,
and Nashawtuck, Annursnack and Punkatasset Hills.
The first road was laid out along the foot of the
ridge, and the earliest houses were built in the place
of the hovels of the first winter. New-comers to the
growing settlement soon extended the hamlet across
the brook that flowed near the first road. A dam
across this brook at the side of the Common gave the
power to the first mill erected as soon as practicable.
The farms taken up by the settlers, as their choice or
fancy inclined, were very early extended out in a
northwesterly direction across the river. " Canows "
were for a time used for access to and from these,
but a bridge was soon aeeded. The first, built over
the south branch to the foot of Nashawtuck Hill, wa^
carried away up stream by a freshet coming from the
Assabet or North River as it was then called. The
second bridge was built over the great river below the
junction of the two branches at the spot destined to
become historical. The South bridge took the place
of the one first mentioned at a point higher up the
stream. These, with the roads leading over them,
were the public works of the first generation, and they
were great undertakings for the time and the men.
In such a community as this, after food and shelter
were found, religious concerns were most prominent.
A Puritan church was organized for Concord by a
council that, met at Cambridge July 5, 1630. Rev.
Peter Bulkeley was ordained pastor, and Rev. John
Jones, elder. The latter, after a few years' j.erviee, left
Concord with a part of the settlers and moved to
Connecticut. The former remained, and spert his
life and fortune in the service of the small company
he had joined for the settlement of this town. Peter
Bulkeley, B.D., was of noble birth, scholarly attain-
ments and ample resources, probably the foremost of
all the earlier ministers of New England. He was
born at Wodell, in Bedfordshire County, January 31,
1583, educated at , .St. John's College, Cambridge,
settled in his native town, and preached there twenty
years. Persecuted by Archbishop Laud, he left his
parish and emigrated to this country. He was an
elfxjuent preacher, a useful pastor and a great help to
the infant settlement. He published a volume of
sermons which reached a second edition, and was
dedicated "to the church and congregation in Con-
cord," and to his nephew "Oliver St. John, Lord Em- 1
baasador Extraordinary from the Parliament of the !
Commonwealth of England to the High and Mighty :
Lords, the States General of the United Provinces of
the Netherlands and Lord Chief Justice of the Common
Pleas," (afterwards Lord Bolingbroke), London, 1651.
Mr. Bulkeley married for his first wife Jane, j
daughter of Sir Thomas Allen, by whom he had nine ,
sons and two daughters. For Ms second wife he mar-
ried Grace, daughter of Sir Richard Chetwood, and
had by her three sons and a daughter. He died
March 9, 1659, leaving an estate of £1302, Including
books valued at £123.
He was succeeded by bis son, Rev. Edward Bulke-
ley, who, though not the equal of his father, continued
to preach till the increase of the town and his in-
firmities required the aid of a colleague in 1667.
His only printed work is the sermon preached at a
special Thanksgiving held October 20, 1675, on the
return of Captain Wheeler's expedition, and pub-
lished with the narrative of that striking event of
Philip's War. He died January 2, 16%, after fifty-
three years' service as minister at Maishfield and
Concord.
Rev. Joseph Estabrook graduated at Harvard Col-
lege in 1664, and, first settled here as a colleague, re-
mained the minister till his death, September 16,
1711, and left of all his sermons only the annual
election sermon of 1705 in printed form.
Rev. John Whiting succeeded to the charge. He
was a graduate of Harvard in 1700, and a tutor there
before bis settlement in Concord. He preached till
1737, when he was dismissed by a council, but con-
tinued to reside in Concord till bis death. May 4, 1752.
Thus through more than a century the church and
the town, one and inseparable, had prospered under
the preaching of these learned, pious and useful min-
isters, with as little of incident or disturbance as falls
to the lot of such organizations.
With the settlement of Rev. Daniel Bliss in 1738,
and the differences of opinion that grew up in New
England about this time, troubles began in this
church and community. A revival occurred under
Mr. Bliss' preaching, and in 1741 the celebrated
W'hitefield preached in Concord, who greatly excited
his hearers, so that a great awakening ensued and
fifty persons joined the church that year, and sixty-,
five more in 1742. As usual, out of this excitement
much controversy and division arose, and council
after council failed to satisfy the discontent. A new
Bociet)- was formed by the seceders from the old parish
in 1745, and met for worship in a tavern. This stood
near the site of the present Library building, had a
sign of a black horse over the door, which caused the
society to be called in derision "The Black Horse
Church."
The early settlers soon found the meadows wet and
the plains unfertile, so that in 1644 quite a number of
the disheartened followed Elder Jones to Connecticut.
Those left in Concord were persevering, and soon ob-
tained from the General Court new grants of land
westerly and northwesterly of the "Six Miles Square,"
furnishing fields and "pastures new" to the old set-
tlers and attracting new-comers to the town.
From the bargain made with the Indian owners
of the place, and the kind treatment these received
from the white men, no serious raid was made by the
Indians upon Concord, while the towns beyond Buf-
ol-S
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
fered greatly from their attacks. X few of the more
exposed homesteads in remote parts of the town were
raided, and one or two unwary farmers were killed
at their work, but no great damage was done. Con-
cord, however, furnished its full proportion of the
soldiers and scouting-parties to defend the more
remote settlements.
Captain Tbomaa Wheeler, who led a company of
troopers, chiefly from this town, to the defence of
Brookfield in Philip's War, wrote an account of the
expedition that was printed with the sermon of Rev.
Edward Bulkeiey, preached to the survivors on their
return, in 1675. Only two copies of this pamphlet
are known to be in existence, and from the one pre-
sented to the Concord Library by the Hon. George F.
Hoar the following extracts are made. It shows, bet-
ter than pages of modern writing would describe, the
dangers and hardships our ancestors incurred in the
savage warfare that for a century was carried on by
the Indians against the white settlers of this colony:
C.vpT. Tho.mas Wheeler's Narrative
of an expedition with ('apt. Edward Hutchinson into
the Nipmuck Country and to iluaboag
(now Brookfield ).
" A true narrative of the Lord's providences in va-
rious dispensations towards Capt. Edward Hutchin-
son, of Boston, and myself, and those that went with
us into the Nipmuck Countrj', and also to Quaboag,
alias Brookfield : The said Captain Hutchinson, on
having a Commission from the Honoured Council of
this Colony to treat with several Sachems in those
parts, in order to the public peace, and myself being
also ordered by the Said Council to accompany him
with part of my troop, for security from any danger
that might be from the Indians ; and to assist him in
the transaction of matters committed to him —
" The said Captain Hutchinson and myself, with
about twenty men or more, marched from Cambridge
to Sudbury July 28, 1675; and from thence into the
Nipmuck Country, and finding that the Indiana had
deserted their towns, and we having gone until we
came within two miles of New Norwich, on July 31st
(only we saw two Indians having an horse with them,
whom we would have spoke with, but they fled from
us, and left their horse, which we took) we then
thought it not expedient to march any further that
way, but set our march for Brookfield, whither we
came on ihe Lord's day about noon. From thence
the same day (being August 1st), we, understanding
that the Indians were about ten miles northwest from
ua, we sent out four men to acquaint the Indians that
we were not come to harm them, but our business was
only to deliver a message from our Honoured Gover-
nour and Council to them, and to receive their
answer, we dejiring vo come to a treaty of peace with
them (though they had for several days fled from us),
they having before professed friendship and promised
fidelity to the English. When the messengers came
to them they made an alarm, and gathered together
about an hundred and fifty fighting men, as near as
they could judge. The young men amongst them
were stout in their speeches, and surly in their car-
riage. But at length some of the chief Sachems
promised to meet us on the next morning about 8 of
the clock upon a plain within three miles of Brook-
field, with which answer the messengers returned to
us. Whereupon, though their speeches and carriage
did much discourage divers of our compaqy, yet we
conceived that we had a clear call to go to meet them
at the place whither they had promised to come. Ac-
cordingly we, with our men, accompanied with three
! of the principal inhabitants of the town, marched
1 to the place appointed, but the treacherous heathen,
! intending mischief (if they could have opportu-
nity) came not to the said place, and so failed our
' hopes of speaking with thera.there. Whereupon the
said Captain Hutchinson and myself, with the rest of
our company, considered what was best to be done ;
I whether we should go any further towards them or
return, divers of us apprehending much danger in
case we did proceed, because the Indians kept not
1 promise there with us. But the three men who be-
j longed to Brookfield were so strongly persuaded of
their freedom from any ill intentions towards us (aa
\ upon other bounds, so especially because the greatest
part of those Indians belonged to David, one of their
chief Sachems, who was taken to be a great friend to
the English): that the said Captain Hutchinson, who
' was principally intrusted with the matter of Treaty
! with them, was thereby encouraged to proceed, and
I marche forward towards a Swampe where the Indiana
then were. When we came near the said swampe
the way was so very bad that we could march only in
a single file, there being a very rocky hill on the right
hand and a thick swampe on the left. In which
there were many of those cruel, bloodthirsty heathen,
who there waylaid us, waiting an opportunity to cut
us off": there being also much brush on the side of
the said hill, where they lay in ambush to surprise us.
" When we had marched there about sixty or seventy
rods, the said perfidious Indians sent out their shot
upon us as a showre of haile, they being (as was sup-
posed) about two hundred men or more. We seeing
ourselves so beset, and not having room to fight, en-
deavored to fly for the safety of our lives. In which
flight we were in no small danger to be all cut off,
there being a very miry swamp before us, into which
we could not enter with our horses to go forward, and
there being no safety in retreating the way we came,
because many of our company who lay behind the
bushes and had left ua pass by them quietly ; when
others had shot they came out and stopt our way back
so that we were forced as we could to get up the
steep and rocky hil! ; but the greater our danger was
the greater was God's mercy in the preservation of so
many of us from sudden destruction. Myself being
gone up part of the hill without any hurt, and per-
CONCORD.
573
ceiving some of my men to be fallen by the enemies'
shot, I wheeled about upon the Indiana, not calling
on my men who were left to accompany me, which
they in all probability would have done, had they
known of my return upon the enemy. They firing
violently out of the swamp and from behiud the
bushes on the hillside wounded me sorely and shot
my horse under me, so that he faltering and falling I
was forced to leave him, divers of the Indians being
then but a few rods distant from me. My son,
Thomas Wheeler, flying with the rest of the company,
missed me amongst them, and fearing that I was
either shot or much endangered, returned toward the
swampe again, though he had then received a danger-
ous wound in the reins, where he saw me in the dan-
ger aforesaid. Whereupon he endeavored to rescue
me, showing himself therein a loving and dutiful son,
he adventuring himself into great peril of his life to
help me in that distress, there being many of the en-
emies about me. Jly son set me on his own horse
and so escaped, awhile on foot himself, until he
caught an horse whose rider was slain, on which he
mounted, and 8(j through God's great mercy we both
escaped. But in this attempt for my deliverance he
received another dangerous wound, by their shot, in
his left arm. There were then slain, to our great
grief, eight men, viz. : Zachariah Philips of Boston,
Timothy Farlow of Billerica, Edward Coleborn of
Chelmsford, Bamuel Smedley of Concord, Sydrach
Hopgood of Sudbury, Sergeant Eyres, Sergeant
Prichard and Corporal Coy, the inhabitants of Brook-
field, aforesaid. It being the good pleasure of God
that they should all these fall by their hands, of
whose good intentions they were so confident and
whom they so little mistrusted. There were also then
five persons wounded, viz.: Captain Hutchinson, my-
self, and ray son Thomas, as aforesaid. Corporal French
of Billerica, who having killed an Indian was (as he
was taking up his gun) shot and part of one of his
thumbs taken off, and also dangerously wounded
through the body, near the shoulder. The
fifth was John Waldo, of Chelmsford, who was not so
dangerously wounded as the rest. They also then
killed five of our horses and wounded some more
which soon died after they came to Brookfield. Upon
this sudden and i^nexpected blow given us (wherein
we desire to look higher than 'man the instrument)
we returned to the town as fast as the badness of the
way and the weakness of our wounded men would
permit, we being then ten miles from it. All the
while we were going, we durst not stay to staunch the
bleeding of our wounded men for fear the enemy
should have surprised us again, which they attempted
to do, and had in all probability done, but that we
perceiving which way they went wheeled off to the
other hand and so by God's good providence towards
us they missed us, and we all came readily upon and
safely to the town, though none of us knew the way
to it, those of the place being slain, as aforesaid, and
we avoiding any thick woods and riding in open
places to preveut danger by them. Being got to the
town we speedily betook ourselves to one of the largest
and strongest houses therein, where we fortified our-
selves in the best manner we could in such straits of
time, and there resolved to keep garrison, though we
were but few and meanly fitted to make resistance
against such furious enemies. The news of the In-
dians' treacherous dealing with us, and the loss of so
many of our company thereby, did so amaze the in-
habitants of the town that they being informed by
us, presently left their houses, divers of them carrying
very little away with them, they being afraid of the
Indians suddenly coming upon them, and so came to
the house we were entered into, very meanly provided
of clothing or furnished with provisions.
" I perceiving myself to be disenabled for the dis-
charge the duties of my place by reason of the
wound I had received, and apprehending that the
enemy would soon come to spoyle our town and as-
sault us in the house, I appointed Simon Davis, of
Concord, James Richardson and John Fiske, of
Chelmsford, to manage affairs for our safety with
those few men whom God hath left us, and were fit
for any service, and the inhabitants of the said town ;
who did well and commendably perform the duties of
the trust committed to them with much courage and
resolution, through the assistance of our gracious
God who did not le.ave us in our low and distressed
State but did mercifully appear for us in our greatest
need, as in the sequel will clearly be manifestad.
" Within two hours after our coming to the said
house or less, the said Captain Hutchinson and my
self posted away Ephraim Curtis, of Sudbury, and
Henry Young, of Concord, to go to the Honoured
Council at Boston, to give them an account of the
Lord's dealing with us in our present condition.
When they came to the further end of the town they
saw the enemy rifling of houses which the inhabit-
ants had forsaken. The ]>ost fired upon them and
immediately returned to us again, they discerning no
safety in going forward, and being desirous to inform
us of the enemies' actings that we might more pre-
pare for a sudden assault by them, which indeed
presently followed, for as soon as the said post wa.s
come back to us, the barbarous heathen pressed upon
us in the house with great violence, sending in their
shot amongst us like baile through the walls and
shouting as if they would have swallowed us up alive,
but our good God wrought wonderfully for us so that
there was but one man wounded within the house,
viz — the said Henry Young who looking out of the
garret-window that evening was mortally wounded by
a shot, of which wound he died within two days after.
There was the same day another man slain, but not
in the house, a son of Serjeant Prichard's, adventur-
ing out of the house wherein we were to his Father's
house not far from it, to fetch more goods out of it,
was caught by those cruel enemies as they were com-
574
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ing towards us, who cut off his head, kicking it about
like a foot ball, and then putting it upon a pole they
set it up before the door of his Father's house in our
sight.
" The uight following the said blow they did roar
against us like so many wild bulls, sending in their
shot amongst ua till towards the moon rising which
was about three of the clock, at which time they at-
tempted to fire our house by hay and other combusti-
ble matter which they brought to one coruer of the
house and set it on fire. Whereupon some of our
company were necessitated to expose themselves to
very great danger to put it out. Simon Davis, one of
the three appointed by my self as Captain to supply
my place by reason of my wounds as aforesaid, he
being of a lively spirit encouraged the soldiers within
the house to fire upon the Indians ; and also those
that adventured out to put out the fire (which began
to rage and kindle upon the house side) with these
and the like words, that God is with u&, uml fights Jor
ua, and will delicer us out of the hands n/ these heathen,
which expressions of his the Indians lieariii)^ they
shouted aud scoffed, saying, now see how your God de-
livers you or will delicer you, sending in many shots
whilst our men were putting out the fire. But the
Lord of Hosts wrought very graciously for us in pre-
serving our bodies both within and without the house
from their shots and our house from being consumed
by fire, we had but two men wounded in that attempt
of theirs, but we apprehended that we killed divers of
our enemies.
" I being desirous to hasten intelligence to the Hon-
ourable Council, of our present great distress, we
being so remote from any succour (it being between
sixty and seventy miles from us to Boston, where the
Council useth to sit), and fearing our ammunition
would not lastlougto withstand them if they continued
to assault us, I spake to Ephraim Curtis to adventure
forth again on that service, and to attempt it on foot,
as the way wherein there was most hope of getting
away undiscovered ; he readily assented and accord-
ingly went out, but there were so many Indians
everywhere thereabouts, that he could not pass with-
out apparent hazard of life, so he came back again ;
but towards morning, the said Ephraim adventured
forth the third time and was fain to creep on his hands
and knees for some space of ground, that he might
not be discerned by the enemy, who waited to pre-
vent our sending, if they could have hindered it.
But through God's mercy, he escaped their hands and
got safely to JIarlborough, though very much spent
and ready to faint by want of sleep before he went
from us, and his sore travel night and day in that
hot season till he got thither, from whence he went
to Boston ; yet before the said Ephraim got to Marl-
borough, there was intelligence brought thither oi
the burning of some houses and killing some catlel
at Quaboag by some who were going to Connecticut,
but they, seeing what was done at the end of the
town, and hearing several guns shot off further with-
in the town, they durst proceed no further, but imme-
diately returned to Marlborough, though they knew
not what had befallen Captain Hutchinson and my-
self and company, nor of our being there, but that
timely intelligence they gave before Ephraim Curtis
his coming to Marlborough occasioned the Honoured
Major Willard's turning his march towards Quaboag
for their relief, who were in no small danger every
hour of being destroyed, the said Major being,
when he had that intelligence, upon his march
another way as he was ordered by the Honoured
Council, as is afterwards more fully expressed.
"The next day being .\ugust 3d, they continued
shooting and shouting and proceeded in their former
wickedness blaspheming the name of the Lord and
reproaching us his afflicted servants, scoffing at our
prayers as they were sending in their shot upon all
quarters of the house, and many of them went to the
town's meetiug-house (which was within twenty rods
of the house in which we were), who mocked, saying
come and pray and sing psalms, and in contempt
made an hideous noise somewhat resembling sing-
ing. But we to our power did endeavour our own
defence, sending our shot amongst them, the Lord
giving us courage to resist them and preserving
us from the destruction they sought to bring upon
us. On the evening following we saw our enemies
carrying several of their dead or wounded men on
their backs, who proceeded that night to send in their
shot as they had done the night before, and also still
shouted as if the day had been certainly theirs, and
they should without fail have prevailed against us
which they might have the more hopes of in regard
that we discerned the coming of new companies to
them to assist and strengthen them, and the uulikeli-
hood of any coming to our help.
"They also used several stratagems to fire us,
namely, by wild fire in cotton and linen rags with
brimstone in them, which rags they tied to the piles
of their arrows sharp for the purpose and shot them
to the roof of our house after they had set them on
fire, which would have much endangered the burning
thereof, had we not used means by cutting holes
through the roof and otherwise to beat the said ar-
rows down, and God being pleased to prosper our en-
deavours therein. They carried' more combustible
matter as Hax and hay to the sides of the house and
set it on fire and then flocked apace towards the door
of the house either to prevent our going Ibrth to
quench the fire as we had done before or to kill our
men on their attempt to go forth or else to break into
the house by the door, whereupon we were forced to
break down the wall o( the house against the fire to
put it out. They also shot a ball of wild-fire into the
garret of the house which fell amongst a great heap
of flax or tow therein, which one of our soldiers,
through God's good Providence soon espyed, and
having water ready presently quenched it, aud so we
CONCORD.
575
were preserved by the keeper of larael both our bodies
from their shot which they sent thick against us and
the house from being consumed to ashes, although we
were but weak to defend ourselves, we being not
above twenty and six men with those of that small
town who were able for any service, and our enemies
as I judged them about (if not above) three hundred.
I speak of the least, for many there present did guess
them to be four or five hundred. It is the more to be
observed that so little hurt should be done by the ene-
mies' shot it commonly piercing the walls of the
house and flying amongst the people, and there being
in the house fifty women and children besides the
men before mentioned. But abroad in the yard one
Thomas Wilson, of that town, being sent to fetch
water for our hel)i in further need (that which we had
being spent in putting out the fire) was shot by the
enemy in the upper jaw and in the neck, the anguish
of which wound was at the first that he cried out
with a great noise by reason whereof the Indians
hearing him rejoyced and triumphed at it, but his
wound was healed in a short time praised be God.
"On Wednesday, August 4th, the Indians fortifyed
themselves and the barns belonging to our house,
which they fortified, both at the great doors and at
both ends, with posts, rails, boards and hay, to save
themselves from our shot. They also devised other
stratagems to fire our house on the night following,
namely, they took a cart and filled it with flax, hay
and candlewood and other combustible matter, and
set up planks fastened to the cart to save themselves
from the danger of our shot. Another invention
they had to make the more sure work in burning the
house : they got many poles of a considerable length
and bigness, and spliced them together at the ends
one of another, and made a carriage of them about
fourteen rods long, setting the poles in two rows,
with peils laid cross over them at the front end, and
dividing these said poles about three feet asunder,
and in the said front end of this, their carriage, they
set a barrel, having made a hole through both heads,
and put an axle-tree through them, to which they
fastened the said poles, and under every joynt of (he
poles where they were spliced, they set up a pair of
truckle wheeles to bear up the said carriages, and
they loaded the front or fore end thereof with matter
fit for firing, as hay and flax and chips, &c.
" Two of these instruments they prepared that they
might convey fire to the house with the more safety
to themselves, they standing at such a distance from
our shot whilst they wheeled them to the house.
Great store of arrows they had also prepared to shoot
fire upon the house that night, which we found after
they were gone, they having left them there. But
the Lord, who is a present help in times of trouble,
and is pleased to make his people's extremity his
opportunity, did graciously prevent them of effecting
what they hoped they would have done by the afore-
said devices, partly by sending a shower of rain in
season, whereby the matter prepared, being wett,
would not 80 easily take fire as it otherwise would
have done, and partly by aide coming to our help.
For our danger would have been very great that
night had not the only-wise God (blessed for ever!)
been pleased to send to us about an hour within
uight the worshipful Major Willard. with Captain
Parker, of Groaton, and forty-six men more, with
five Indians, to relieve us in the low estate into which
we were brought. •
"Our eyes were unto him, the holy one of Israel;
in him we desired to place our trust, hoping that he
would, in the time of our great need, appear for our
deliverance, and confound all their plots, by which
they thought themselves most sure to prevail against
us; and God who comforteth the afiiicted as he com-
forted the holy apostle Paul by the coming of Titus
to him, BO he greatly comforted us, his distressed ser-
vants, both souldiers and town inhabitants, by the
coming of the said honoured Major and those with
him. In whose bo soon coming to us the good Prov-
idence of God did marvellously appear; for the help
that came to us by the honoured Council's order
(after the tydings they receive by our post sent to
them) came not to us till Saturday, August 7, in the
afternoon, nor sooner could it well come, in regard of
their distance from us, i. e., if we had not had help
before that time, we see not how we could have held
out, the number of the Indians so increasing, and
they making so many assaults upon us that our am-
munition before that time would have been spent,
and ourselves disenabled for any resistance, we being
but few and alwaies fain to stand upon our defence;
that we had little lime for refreshment of our selves,
— either food or sleep. The said honoured Major's
coming to us bo soon was thus occasioned : he had a
commission from the honoured council (of which
himself was one) to look after some Indians to the
westward of Lancaster & Groaton (where he himself
lived), and to secure them, and was upon his march
towards them on the foresaid Wednesday in the
morning, August 4"", when tydings coming to Marl-
borough by those that returned thither as they were
going to Connecticut, concerning what they saw at
Brookfield, as aforesaid, some of Marlborough know-
ing of the said Major's march from Lancaster, that
morning, presently sent a post to acquaint him with
the information they had received. The Major was
gone before the post came to Lancaster; but there
was one speedily sent after him who overtook him
about five or six miles from the said town, he being
acquainted that it was feared that Brookfield (a small
town of about fifteen or sixteen families) was either
destroyed or in great danger thereof, and conceiving
it to require more speed to succour them (if they
were not past help) than to proceed at present as he
before intended; and being also very desirous (if it
were possible) to afford relief to them (he being then
not above thirty miles from thein), he immediately
576
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
altered hia course, and marched with his company
towards us, and came to us about one hour after it
was dark, as aforesaid, though he knew not then
either of our being there nor of what had befallen us
at the Bwampe and in the house those two davs be-
fore.
"The merciful providence of God also appeared in
preventing the danger that the honored major and his
company might have been in when they came near
us, for thote beastly men, our enemies, skilful to de-
stroy, indeavoured to prevent any help from coming
to our relief, and therefore sent down sentinels (some
nearer and some farther off), the farthest about two
miles from us, who, if they saw any coming from the
bay, they might give notice by an alarm. And there
was about an hundred of them, who for the most
part, kept at an house some little distance from us, by
which if any help came from the said bay they must
pass, and so they intended (:is we conceive I having
notice by their sentinels of their approach to waj-
lay them and if they could, to cut them oti' before they
came to the house where we kept.
" But as we probably guess they were so intent and
busy in preparing their instruments (as above said)
for our destruction by fire that they were not at the
house where they used to keep for the purpose afore-
said, and so the major's way was clear from danger
till he came tu our house. .Vnd that it was their pur-
pose so to have fallen upon him or any other coming to
us at that house is the more probable in that (as we
have since had ir\telligence from some of the Indians
themselves) there was a party of them at another
place who let him pass by them without the least hint
or opposition, waiting for a blow to be given him at
the said house, and then they themselves to fall upon
them in tlie rear, a.s they intended to have done with
us at the swamp, in case we fled back as before ex-
pressed.
" The major and company were no sooner come to
the house and understood (though at first they knew
not that they were English who were in the house,
but thought that they might be Indians and therefore
were ready to have shot at us till we discovered they
were English by the major's speaking, I caused the
trumpet to be sounded) that the said Captain Hutch-
inson, myself and company with the town's inhabit-
ants were there, but the Indiana also discerned that
there were some come to our assistance, whereupon
they spared not their shot, but poured it out on
them ; but through the Lord's goodness, thougli they
atood not far asunder one from another, they killed
not one man, wounded only two of his company, and
killed the major's son's horse ; after that, we within
the house perceived the Indians shooting so at them,
we hastened the major and all his company into the
house as fast as we could, and their horses into a
little yard before the house, where they wounded five
other horses that night; after they were come into
the house to us the enemies continued their shoot-
I ing some considerable time, so that we may well aay
I had not the Lord been on our side when these cruel
, heathens rode up against us as they had swallowed us
; up quick when their wrath was kindled against us.
But wherein they dealt proudly the Lord was above
i them.
i " When they saw their divers designs unsuccessful,
and their hopes therein disappointed, they then fired the
house and barne (wherein they had before kept to lye
' in wait to surprize any coming to us), that by the
i light thereof they might the better direct their shot
I at us, but no hurt was done thereby, praised be the
Lord. And not long after they burnt the meeting-
house, wherein their fortifications were, as also the
barne which belonged to our bouse, and so, perceiv-
ing more strength come to our assistance, they did, as
we suppose, despair of effecting any more mischief
against us. And therefore the greater part of them
towards the breaking of the day, August the fifth,
went away and left us, and we were quiet from any
I further molestations by them ; and on that morning
we went forth of the house without danger, and so
daily afterwards, only one man was wounded about
two days after, us he went out to look after horses, by
: some few of them skulking thereabouts. We cannot
tell how many of them were killed in all that time,
but one that afterwards was taken confessed that there
I were killed and wounded about eighty men or more.
' Blessed be the Lord (iod of our salvation who kept
us from being all a prey to their teeth. But before
they went away they burnt all the town except the
: house we kept iu,aiid another that was not then fin-
; ished. They also made great spoyle of the cattel be-
longing to the inhabitants, and after our entrance
into the house, and during the time of our confine-
' ment there, they either killed or drove away almost
i all the horses of our company.
" We continued there both well and wounded
i towards a fortnight, and August the thirteenth Cap-
tain Hutchinson and my self, with the moat of those
! that had escaped without hurt, and also some of the
wounded came from thence, my son Thomas and .some
other wounded men came not from thence, being not
then able to endure travel so farr as we were from the
next town till about a fortnight after. We came to
.Marlborough on .\ugust the fourteenth, where Cap-
tain Hutchinson, being not recovered of his wound
before his coming from Brookfield, and overtyred
with his long journey by reason of his weakness,
quickly after grew worse and more dangerously ill,
and on the nineteenth day of the said month dyed,
and was there the day after buried, the Lord being
pleased to deny him a return to his own habitation
and his near relations at Boston, though he was come
the greatest part of his journey thitherward. The in-
habitants of the town also not long after men, women
and children removed safely with what they had left
to several places, either where they had lived before
their planting or setting down there, or where they
CONCORD.
577
had relations to receive and entertain them. The
honoured Major Willard stayed at Brookfield some
weeks after our coming away, there being several
companies of souldiers sent up thither, and to Hadly
and the towns thereabouts, which are about thirty
miles from Brookfield, whither also the Major went
for a time upon the service of the country in the pres-
ent wars, and from whence there being need of his
presence for the ordering of matters concerning his
own regiment and the safety of the towns belonging
to if, he, through God's goodness and mercy, returned
in safety and health to his house and dear relations
at Groaton.
"Thus I have endeavoured to set down and declare
both what the Lord did against us in the loss of several
person'^ lives and the wounding of others, some of
which wounds were very painful in dressing and long
ere they were healed, besides many dangers that we
were in, and fears that we were exercised with, and
also what great things he was pleased to do for us in
frustrating their many attempts and vouchsafing such
a deliverance to us. The Lord avenge the blood that
hath been shed by these heatben, who hate us with-
out a cause, though he be the most righteous in all
that hath befallen there and in all other parts of the
country ; he help us to humble ourselves before him,
and with our whole hearts to return to him, and also
to improve all his mercies which we still enjoy, so
that his anger may cease towards us, and he may be
pleased either to make our enemies at peace with us
or more destroy them before us.
"I tarried at Marlborough with Captftiu Hutchin-
son until his death, and came home to Concord
August the 21 (though not thoroughly recovered of
my wound), and so did others that went with me.
But since I am reasonably well, though I have not
the use of my hand and arm as before. My son
Thomas, though in great hazard of life for some time
after his return to Concord, yet is now very well
cured and his strength well restored. Oh, that we
could praise the Lord for his great goodness towards
us. Praised be his name, that though he took away
some of us, yet was pleased to spare so many of us
and adde to our days ; he help us whose souls he hath
delivered from death, and eyes from tears, and feet
from falling to walk before him in the land of the liv-
ing till our great change come, and to sanctifie his
name in all his ways about us, that both our afflic-
tions and our mercies may quicken us to live more to
his glory all our dayes."
This narrative has been well called the "Epic of
New England Colonial Days." The combination of
bravery and piety, of " trust in the Lord and keeping
their powder dry," that characterizes this expedition
is a marked example of the spirit of the times. The
men who could do and suffer and believe as this
troop did, were true founders of
In April, 1676, a force of Concord soldiers sent to
the defence of Sudbury were decoyed into an ambus-
cade and nearly all killed by the Indians. Ten men
are reported slain, but the names of only eight of
them are now known. In the fall of that year the
praying Indians of Nashoba, being short of food,
i were removed to Concord, and placed in the charge
of John Hoar. The excitement about the attacks of
the savages on the outlying settlements was so great
that the presence here of these Christian Indians was
not tolerated by many. A force under Captain
Moseley, of Boston, appeared here on Sunday, and
with scant ceremony hustled these poor converts off
to Boston, where they were detained on Deer Island,
in the harbor. John Hoar protested vigorously, and
the Colonial authorities were appealed to in vain.
' A Charch witliout h Bigliop,
A ^tate x^'itliout a KiDg."
CHAPTER XLII.
CONCORD— ( Continued).
IndeptnAenot in Church and Blate—Prep/traiioiu for BevoUUion — Journal
of a BrUith tipy.
Foe the first century of its life Concord had strug-
gled for food, shelter and clothing, yet had sent forth
its sons and daughters to found other settlements of
the wilderness. It had increased in numbers and
wealth, and had become one of the mother-towns. To
the Province of Massachusetts it was the important
central town, holding much the same position that
Worcester now does to the State. With the troubles
in the church, and the disturbance in politics, to
which the citizens now found time from other labors to
give their attention, a new era began. The new min-
ister, Mr. Bliss, was at heart a Tory, and his views did
not agree with those of his flock, who had helped to
depose Governor Andros, and were already beginning
to think of independence. Discussion was rife, and
the town-meetings ere long held " high debate," and
passed strong resolutions. The stir of national. life
was arising, and echoes from Boston and Salem
were heard with quick response by this central town.
Next to the church, the military organization
was the most important in the town. It began
the first year after the settlement, when Simon Wil-
lard was appointed to exercise the freemen of Con-
cord in training, and has been kept up in some form
to this day. The story of Capt. Wheeler's command
has been told. In 1689, on the thrice memorable
19th of April, the Concord company, under Lieut.
John Heald, marched to Boitin and helped exe-
cute the order of the Representatives, signed by Eben-
nezer Prout of this town as clerk to the Representa-
tives, fur the removal of Andros to the castle. This
bloodless revolution ended the Colonial period of
Massachusetts history.
The milita of Coucord had their full shore in the
37-
578
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
Indian and French Wars that kept the settlers in
arms through the firit half of the eighteenth century.
They were present at Sudbury, where ten of their
number were killed, Lancaster, Groton, in Love-
well's Fight, in the expedition against Cuba, at the
capture of Louiabourg, at Crown Point and Fort
Edward. Wherever long marches, sharp fighting
and great privations were encountered, soldiers from
Concord, in single files or full ranks, were found at
the front. This military spirit and these adventurous
expeditions fostered, even among those who remained
at home, a tendency to emigration farther into the
wilderness. Lancaster, Littleton, Rutland and Graf-
ton, in Massachusetts, Peterborough and Keene, in
New Hampshire, and many other settlements to the
west were founded by Concord men.
The mutterings of the coming storm of the Revo-
lution excited all, some with hopes and others with
fears. Daniel Bliss, the lawyer, son of the Rev. Daniel,
and Joseph Lee, the physician of the town, took the
side of the King. James Barrett and Joseph Hosraer
were as ardent for their country. Rev. William
Emerson, the newly-settled minister, after Dr. Bliss'
death, had healed the church difficulty, and this left
more time for his hearers to consider political mat-
ters. As a town. Concord stood manfully for the
rights of the Provincials, and her leaders were soon
in consultation and agreement with Otis and Adams
in resisting the arbitrary acts of the Parliament and
the King of England.
The Boston Port Bill, the massacre in State Street,
the tea party in Boston Harbor gave new fuel to the
fire of excitement that raged in Concord and through-
out the Province. It was much increased here by
the meeting of the First Provincial Congress in this
town, October 11, 1774. A Legislature had been
chosen under the proclamation of General Gage, the
Governor of Massachusetts, to meet at Salem. Find-
ing that it would be hostile to his administration, he
forbade its meeting, whereupon it organized as a
Congress, and adjourned to Concord. Here, with
its r^nks filled up with sturdy patriots, chosen for
the purpose by the towns, began the real work of
organization for the conflict of arms that impended.
Concord was the suitable place for this meeting.
Her part in the reaistAnce to the King's encroach-
ments on the charter and liberties of the Province
had been conspicuous in both word and deed. In
1773 the town adopted a patriotic response to the
address of the citizens of Boston. In 1774 Concord
passed strong and bold resolutions against the illegal
taxation and the importation of tea and other articles
from England. These were made effective by the sub-
scription of more than three hundred of the voters to
a covenant not to consume such goods. So few opposed
the patriot cause that, except three or four individ-
uals, the town was a united body of Sons of Liberty.
A county convention was held here in August,
1774 — the first of those in Massachusetts — at which
resolutions were passed denouncing the acts of Par-
liament and the new officers of Government appointed
for the Province. To carry these into effect, some
hundreds of men from this and neighboring towns,
partly armed, marched to Cambridge. Finding no
body of men in arms to oppose them, they laid aside
their guns and visited several persons who were To-
ries and compelled them to recant their acceptance of
offices under the Crown.
In September, 1774, the County Court was to meet
here, but the assembling on the Common of a large
number of men from this and other towns prevented
its sitting and compelled it to adjourn.
At another large meeting, soon after, all suspicious
persons were brought before a committee of the meet-
ing, tried for Toryism, and if found guilty, were
" bumbled " as much as the crowd thought fit.
The Provincial Congress having begun the pur-
chase of arms and ammunition and the collection of
military stores Concord followed the example by
procuring cannon and ammunition, the enlist-
ment of two companies of minute-men and the
raising of a liberty pole. The military stores and
arms obtained by the Provincial Congress were
mainly deposited in this town in the keeping of
trusted patriots. This work and the sessions of the
Congress made a busy, stirring season for the stout-
hearted Whigs of the village, where the manufacture
of gun-carriages, fire-arms, harnesses, accoutrements,
musket' balls and cartridges went on lively all that
winter. The Congress held its meetings in the old
church, that yet stands, strangely altered, on the Com-
mon, being then a plain, barn-like structure, with two
tiers of galleries and without any of its present adorn-
ments. John Hancock presided ; Samuel and John
Adams, Otis, Warien and others spoke; rousing reso-
lutions were passed, a Committee of Safety appointed,
regiments and companies of militia and minute men
raised and the officers commissioned by the authority
of the Congress. Concord agreed to pay the min-
ute-men of the town for their time spent in drill
and exercising, and examined them by a committee,
and furnished with guns those not already supplied.
In March, 1775, a review was held of all the
military companies of the town, and they marched
into the meeting-house and heard a sermon from the
Rev. William Emerson. On the next Thursday a
solemn fast was kept, and Mr. Emerson again preach-
ed. To protect the arms and stores deposited here,
guards were stationed at the bridges and in the cen-
tre, and on the road to Boston. The morning gun
and guard-mounting at night gave the town the ap-
pearance of a military camp, and the excitement
and enthusiasm was so great that some of the men
carried their guns at all times, even to church on
Sundays.
On March 22d, the Second Provincial Congress
met here and remained in session till April loth.
This adopted measures to save the collected stores
CONCORD.
579
and arms from seizure and destruction by the Brit-
ish forces, for improving the discipline of the min-
ute-men and for organizing companies of artillery.
After their adjournment the Committee of Safety
were empowered lo take ail necessary steps to secure
the safety of the Province.
Gea. Gage, the commander of the British forces
in Boston, alarmed at these preparations for war,
sent out spies and officers to find the condition and
location of the stores and arms, and the opinion of
the Tories as to the probabilities of resistance to
the King's troops.
One of these spies came to Concord on his return
from Worcester and kept a diary of his adventures
on the trip. This was printed in 1827 at Concord,
N. H., but as the edition was nearly all burned,
only two copies are known to exist. From this cur-
iously accurate journal the extracts that follow give
a vivid picture of the state of feeling that existed
in this county, and of the habits of the officers in
Boston :
" Journal kept by Mr. John Howe while he was Em-
ployed as a British Spy during the Revolu-
tionary War."
" On the 5th of April, 1775, General Gage called on
me to go as a spy to Worcester to examine the roads,
bridges and fording places, and to see which was the
best route to Worcester to take an army to destroy the
military stores deposited there. Accordingly Col.
Smith and myself dressed ourselves as countrymen
with gray coats, leather breeches, and blue mixed
stockings, with silk flagg handkerchiefs round our
necks, with a small bundle tied up in a homespun
checked handkerchief in one hand, and a walking-
stick in the other.
" Thus equiped we set out like countrymen to find
work. We travelled to Cambridge, about two miles,
and found the roads good. Nothing extraordinary
took place until we got to Watertown, about six
miles ; here we called for breakfast at the tavern.
While at breakfast there came in a negro woman to
wait on the table. Col. Smith asked her where we
two could find employment. She looked Col. Smith
in the face and said, Smith, you will find employment
enough for you and all Gen. Gage's men in a few
months.
"This conversation about wound up our breakfast.
Smith appeared to be thunderstruck, and my feelings
were of the keenest kind. Directly the landlord came
in and asked how our breakfast suited. Smilh re-
plied very well, but you have a saucy wench here.
The landlord asked what she had said. Smith re-
peated very near what she had said, the landlord then
replied that she had been living in Boston and had
got acquainted with a great many British officers and
soldiers there, and might take you to be some of them.
Then we paid our reckoning as soon as possible, the
landlord said it was likely that we could find work
up the road. We bid him good morning and set off,
traveled about one mile, found the road very good;
here we were out of sight of any house and got over
the wall to consult what was bestio be done.
" I told Smith that for us to go any farther together
would be imprudent. Smith said he thought so, and
would return back to Boston, if I would pursue the
route. He then gave me up the journal-book and
pencil, and ten guineas with several letters to tories
between Boston and W,orce8ter. Smith said if he
came out with a regiment tj^t road, he would kill
that wench. He told me if I would pursue the route
and got through he would insure me a commission.
So we parted. The last I saw of Smith was running
through the barberry bushes to keep out of sight
of the road.
" I then set out towards Waltham Plains, and found
the roads good. When I got to the head of the plain,
being about four miles from where we breakfasted, I
called at a tavern and inquired if they wanted to hire.
The landlord asked me where I was from, I told him
from the eastward, he asked me what kind of work I
could do. I told him farming work, but that I should
rather work at gunsmithing, for that was my trade.
" When I mentioned that he told me I could get
employment at Springfield, for they were in want of
hands to work at that business, and said that I had
better get there as soon as possible for they were in
want of guns, for they expected the regulars out of
Boston, and they meant to be ready for them. He
asked me if I would take some spirij, I told him I
would take some New England and molasses, for I
well knew that to be a Yankee drink, and the good
man wished me prosperity in my business and I set
off.
" I found the roads hilly, stony and crooked for
about three miles, when I came to a hollow with a
narrow causeway over it ; here I left the road and
went below to see if there was any place where our
artillery could cross, but finding none there I ex-
amined above and found it bad. Here I saw a negro
man setting traps. The negro asked me what I was
looking for, I told him for sweet flag root for the
stomach ache. He said it did not grow here, but be
had a piece he would give me ; he walked out to the
road with me. About ten feet from this narrow road
stood the largest tree I ever saw. I asked the black
man what kind of wood that tree was. He said but-
ton wood, and further said that the people were going
to cut it down to stop the regulars from crossing with
their cannon. I asked him how they would know
when the regulars were coming in time enon^hto cut
the tree down. He said they had men all the time at
Cambridge and Charlestown looking out. This tree
would completely blockade the road should they do
it. I asked this negro how far it was to a tavern. He
said one mile to a tavern by Weston meeting-houee,
another tavern half a mile above. I asked him which
was the best, and what their names were. He said
580
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the first was kept by Mr. Joel Smith, a p;ootl tavern,
aod a good liberty man ; the other was kept by Capt.
Isaac Jones', a wicked tory, where a great maay Brit-
ish oflBcers go from Boston to his house.
" Here I left the negro man and proceeded on my
way one mile, found the road hilly, stony and crooked.
Came to Smith's tavern, where two teamsters were
tackling their teams. I asked them if they knew of
any one who wanted to hire, one of them answered
and said he did not know of any body who wanted to
hire Englishmen, for they believed I was an English-
man. I asked them wifkt reason Ihey had for think-
ing so. They said I looked like them rascals they
see in Boston, here I wished myself at Capt.
Jones', but to start off then I thought it would not
do. So I walked into the house, called for some rum
and molasses, one of them followed me in, and told
the landlord he guessed I was a British spy. The
landlord then questioned me very closely, where I was
from and where I was going. I told him I was going
to Springfield to work at the gunsmithing business as
I understood arms were very much wanted, but I
should like to work a few days to get money to bear
my expenses. The landlord told me he believed
Capt. Jones would hire.
" I asked him where he lived, he said about half a
mile above and kept tavern at the sign of the golden
ball. This seemed to pacify the teamsters. I now
went on to Capt. Jones, here I handed him a letter
from Gen. Gage. After perusing it, he took me by
the hand, and invited me up stairs. There I made
him acquaintecf with ail that had taken place from
Boston here, it being fourteen miles-
" He informed me that it would not do for nie to
stay over night for his house would be mobbed and I
should be taken. Here I got some dinner, then he
said he would send his hired man with me to the
house of one Wheaton in a remote part of the town
where I must remain till he sent for me. After dinner
I set out with the hired man for Mr. Wheaton's, I
arrived there about .sunset. The hired man informed
Mr. Wheaton of my business, and that I was a British
spy, and Capt. Jones wished him to keep me secure
until he sent for me. Then I was conducted into a
chamber with a table furnished with a bottle of
brandy, candles, paper, etc. Now I w»nt to work to
copy from my head on a journal. I remained here
all night, the next day being the sixth, the good hired
man came to see me early in the morning. He in-
formed me that the news of the conver.'ation which
took place at Watertown between Col. Smith and a
black woman reached Capt. Jones' last evening by the
same teamsters you saw at J. Smith's tavern yester-
day. They insisted that there were British spies in
the house. The news spread and by eleven o'clock
there were thirty men collected. Capt. Jones gave
them leave to search the house, which they did, in
part, then they went into the kitchen and asked the
black woman if there were any strangers or English-
men in the house. She replied she thought not. They
asked if there had been any there that day. She
answered, one or two gentlemen dined up stairs this
afternoon. They asked her where they went to. She
answered, they sent them off to Jericho S^amp, a dis-
mal swamp about two miles from Jones' tavern. By
this time their fury was subsided, Capt. Jones set on
a bottle of spirits to drink, which they drank, and all
retired.
" Now the hired man went home, saying he should
call again in the evening. After breakfast I went to
work upon my journal, here I set down the number
of militia arms and ammunition of this place, sent
to me by the hired man from Mr. Jones. After din-
ner Mr. Wheaton introduced his two daughters, stat-
ing to them that I was a British officer in disguise.
Here we sat and played cards till tea time. Afcer tea
the ladies retired and I lie down, being very tired and
expected company. That evening about eight o'clock
the hired man called for me, and said he was
going with me to Marlborough, but said we could not
go by Capt. Jones', for they were lying in wait for me
there. So I bid Mr. Wheaton and his family Good-
bye, and off we seton the back road, coming out above
Capt. Jones one mile on the Worcester road. Here I
found the roads good to Sudbury River. Here I
found myself twenty-five miles from Boston. Here
we examined the river for a fording place, providing
the bridge should be moved. We found a place
which was fordable in Framingham, a town opposite
from here. We proceeded for Esq. Barnes', in Marl-
borough, and found the roads bad. We traveltd all
Light, examining the roads as well as possible, and
arrived at the house of Esq. Barnes at two o'clock in
the morning of the seventh. Here we knocked at the
dour, the £^q. put his head out of the window and
asked who was there. My guide answered Capt.
Jonts' hired man. He ctruck a light and let us in.
I gave him a letter from Gen. Gage. My guide like-
wise gave him one from Capt. Jones. After reading
them he took me by the hand, saying he wished me
good luck in my undertaking, and promised to assist
me all in his power. He set on the table a bottle of
brandy and some victuals. After refresliiag ourselves
I asked him if he had heard of the affair of the spies
at Watertown and Weston. He answered he had, but
it w.is not believed in that quarter. Here my guide
bid me good-morning, and left me. The E^q. said I
had better go to bed and rest myself, and that he
would find means to help me to Worcester. I went
to bed about four o'clock and slept till nine. Then
the Esq. waked me, informing me that he had been
to the tavern, and reports were the re tliat two men,
supposed to be spies by their examining a small
bridge near the house where a woman, being up with a
sick child, saw them. She said they went on toward
Worcester.
"The Esquire told me I must remain there that day,
make out the plan of the road so far aa I had come.
CONCORD.
581
and any other writing I wished to do. He said he
would go bacli to the tavern and see if there was any
stir about the spies. If there was, he would let me
know seasonably enoujjh so that I could be conveyed
to the swamp. Here the table was furnished with
victuals and drink, pen, ink and paper, and the Es-
quire left me to go to the tavern. About four o'clock
in the afternoon he returned and said all was quiet,
the stories had turned out to be negro stories. I must
wait till dark, when he would let me have a horse, as
he concluded I was tired to go to Worcester, when I
must examine the roads and bridges as well as I could
in the night, and I must remain in Worcester till the
ner.t night.
" About eight o'clock in the evening I started for
Worcester on the Esquire's horse. I rode all night
and it snowed all the time. I arrived in Worcester
about an hour before sunrise, found the roads very
hilly and bad. I had slow work getting along for I
had to get off my horse to examine the road and
bridges. Here I delivered a letter to Mr. . . . from
Esquire Barnes, aad one from General Gage. After
reading them, he ordered my horse put up, and con-
veyed me to a private chamber, where he said I must
remain all day. Here I was furnished with all things
which were comfortable. I was informed of the num-
ber of militia, and of the quantity of military stores
in this place. Nothing particular took place during
the day. After dark Mr took me to the place
where the military stores were deposited, showed me
the place where I could break in ; also two old wells
where I could throw in them the flour and ammuni-
tion. Now I returned to the chamber, after he had
looked over my papers, I asked him what he thought
of an army coming from Boston to Worcester. He
said he did not think a man would dare lift a gun to
oppose the regulars, and asked me what was my opin-
ion. I told him if he would keep it a secret, I would
give him my opinion. He frankly declared he would.
I then told him if General Gage sent five thousand
troops with a train of artillery from Boston to Wor-
cester, they would never one of them get back. Then
he answered, We, his Majesty's friends, are in a bad
situation.
"Then I collected up my papers, ordered my horse,
and started from Worcester about nine o'clock in the
evening to go to Esquire Barnes. The night was clear
and cold, I was now fifty miles from Boston and in
danger of being captured every moment. The night
was long and dismal. I often wished that night that
I had never undertaken the business of a spy. Noth-
ing particular took place during that night. I arrived
at Esquire Barnes' about the break of day on the 9th,
where the Esquire kindly received me.
" Here I had some hot sling and a warm breakfast.
Soon after breakfast 1 gave the Esq. my papers. He
told me I must go to rest and lie till one o'clock and
he would go to the tavern and see if he could make
any discoveries which would operate against me. At
one o'clock he called upon me and informed me that
all was safe, but it would not do forme to tarry in his
house that night. I got dinner and then I collected
my papers, after the £^g. bad given me an account of
the militia and ammunition from there to Worcester,
and from this place to Weston, and all this be found
out while I was gone to Worcestter. Now he took me
to his garret window and pointed the way for me to
go to Concord. He said I must go across the lots and
roads. He said I must start about eight o'clock.
Then we retired to a private chamber ; we conversed
about the British coming to Worcester. Then I got
my papers and tied them up in a bundle and threw
them on a table all ready for a start, then he set on a
bottle of brandy and we drank. Now, it being about
eight o'clock, we heard a knocking at the front door.
The Esq. told me if he did not return in one moment
to make my escape oat of the chamber window upon
the shed and from there into the swamp, and make
for Concord. I heard a man say, E->q., we have come
to search your house for spies. I heard him say, I
am willing. I then hoisted the window, leaped upon
the shed, which being covered with snow, my feet flew
up and I fell flat on my back in the garden. I recov-
ered a little from the fall, picked up my bundle and
hat, and made for the swamp, though considerably
lame. Here I was afraid they would track me, the
snow lying about six inches deep. When I got into
the swamp I looked back to the house, and could see
lights dodging at every window. I heard horse's
feet in the road as if great numbers were collecting
at the Esqr.'s house.
" Now, I traveled, as near as I could judge,
four miles, the snow being on the ground. It was
tolerably light. I came to a negro's bouse, where I
found a black man and his wife. I told them I be-
lieved I had got out of my way and enquired the way
to Concord. The man said I had better stay all night
and he would show me the way in the morning. I
told him my business was urgent, and if he would
show me the way to the road which led to Concord I
would pay him, showing him a silver dollar. He
asked me what my business was, that I wished to go
that night. I told him I was going to making guns
to kill the regulars, for I thought they would be out
of Boston in a few weeks. Now the man consented
to go. The woman observed, she wished I could
make guns to kill the regulars, as she understood
there had been a number about Esq. Barnes' a day
or two. I asked her if Esq. Barnes was a tory. She
said he was. I said J hoped tbey would catch him
and hang him.
" Then I set out with my black guide. We pro-
ceeded on to Concord River ; my guide went to a black
man's, a little above, where he borrowed a canoe, and
carried me safe over. He said he would go with me
a mile farther if I would give him a half a dollar,
which I readily granted. ^ When we arrived here he
went up to a house and said we could buy some rum
582
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
here if I wanted. I told him I should be glad of it,
and if he would go in I would follow him. Then he
knocked and they bid us come in. Here my guide
told them about mj coming to hia house, and our
route across the lots, and my business. The people
in the house appeared to be very glad. I called for
some brandy and it was set on. I told my guide to
help himself, which he did quite freely. The man of
the house said I better tarry till morning and he
would go to Concord with me, it being now nearly
daylight. By this time my guide was fast asleep. I
slept till about sunrise, and I called for some break-
fast. I set out for Concord, which was in sight. Mr.
Wetherby accompanied me to Concord, where he in-
troduced me to Major Buttrick and several other
gentlemen, and informed them that I wanted to get
into business, which was gunsmithing. They said I
was the very man they wanted to see, and would
assist me all they could, and immediately went to
hire a shop. Here they brought me several gun locks
for me to repair, which I repaired with neatness and
dispatch, considering the tools I had to work with.
" I was now invited to take dinner at the tavern
with a number of gentlemen. The conversation at
dinner was respecting the regulars at Boston, which
they expected out. I asked them if there were many
tories in the place. The answer was, they expected
there were, but not openly. I was asked by a gen-
tleman where I was from. I answered Pownalbor-
ough, down eoft. The gentleman asked what I might
call my name. I answered him. Wood. He asked
me if I was a relation of Col. Wood, of Pownalbor-
ough. A distant relation, I said. He asked me
. whether he was called a liberty man. I answered him
it was doubtful which way he would be. He said he
would write the Col. a letter immediately to stand
his hand. He asked me when I was going to return
there. I answered him that I was going right down
to get some tools to carry on my business here. Id-
fonn the Col. when you see him, that you have seen
old Major Parmenter of Sudbury ; tell him I say, that
if he turns tory I will seek his life at the risk of my
own.
" By this time we had got through dinner. After
dinner we walked up to the store house co examine
some guns, they asked me if I could make such guns.
I told them I could make any kind they wished.
Here I found a quantity of flour, arms and ammuni-
tion. After examining the gates and doors attached to
yard and store house, I returned to the tavern, where,
after taking some brandy and water, I took leave of
them, and set off for Pownalborough after my tools as
they supposed.
" Now I set out on the road to LfCxington, I travel-
led about two miles, here I called at a small house a
small distance from the road. I found it inhabited by
an old man and his wife. The old man was cleaning
his gun. I asked him what he was going to kill, as
he was so old I should not think we could take sight
at any game. He said there was a flock of red coata
at Boston which he expected would be here soon, he
meant to try and hit some of them, as he expected they
would be very good maiks.
" I asked him when they were expected out, he said
he should not think strange if they should come be-
fore morning, he said some supposed they would go
up through Watertown to Worcesterfor we hear they
have sent out spies that road. I asked the old man
how he expected to fight. He said open field fight-
ing or any way to kill them red-coats. I asked him
how old he was ? he said seventy-seven, and never was
killed yet. The old man asked me what parts I was
from, and what my business was, I repeated the same
story I did at Concord. I asked the old man if there
were any tories nigh there. He said there was one
tory house in sight, and he wished it was in flamfs.
I asked what the man's name was. He said it was
Gove. I very well knew where I was now, being the
very house I wanted to find, it was situated in Lin-
coln, about four miles from Concord, Mr. Gove being
one of his majesty's friends. Here the old gentleman
told the old lady to put someballs in the bullet pouch.
She asked him how many. He said 30 or 40, perhaps
I shall have an opportunity to give some to them
that have not got any. The old woman pulled out
an old drawer and went to picking out. The old
man says. Old woman, put in a handful of buck shot
as I understood the English like an assortment of
plumbs. Here I took leave of them. I travelled on
the Lexington road about one mile, then I turned out
west for Mr. Gove's house, arrived there about half
hour after sunset, inquired for the man of the house,
he immediately came forth. I told him I wanted to
speak to him in private. He took me to a private room
I informed him of my business and told him I put my
life in his hands. I laid my papers on the table and
asked him to examine them. He told me to give my-
self no uneasiness for he was my friend. He informed
me he was at Southboro at the time I escaped from
Esq. Barnes', he informed me the mob were supplied
with tar and feathers to apply to the Esq., if they
found me in the house.
" I was furnished with refreshment and apparatus
for continuing my Journal. I wrote until about 10
o'clock when Mr. G. came into the chamber and in-
formed me he must remove me to an out house he had
at a small distance to lodge, for fear the plot would be
found out at Concord, and his house would be imme-
diately searched. Accordingly I did, and retired to
rest. He called me about break of day, this being the
11th day, and said I might return to my chamber, and
he would go to Concord, and see if he could hear any
thing new.
" He returned from Concord about 10 o'clock, and
said they were very much pleased with the prospect
of having an armory established there. He said I
must stay until evening, and he would convey me to
CharlestowD which was about 12 miles. Accordingly
CONCORD.
583
about eight o'clock in the evening, we set out for
Charlestown both on horseback and examined the
road through Lexington to Charlestown, and arrived
thereabout 12 o'clock. I took leave of Mr. G. and
he took the horse I rode and returned back. I went
to the ferry, and took a boat and crossed over to Bos-
ton the 12th (April), about two o'clock in the morning
and retired to my quarters to rest.
" About sunrise I turne^ out, threw by my yankee
dress and put on my British uniform, and walked
down King Street, and directly met Col. Smith, he
took me by the hand, and said how do you do John ?
We heard- you broke your neck jumping out of
Barnes' chamber window. Smith further said come
go up to the General's quarters. I told him I should
rather go after breakfast.
" Tell me nothing about your breakfast ; you are
under me now. Accordingly we went to the gene-
ral's quarters, where the ofiBcers were generally col-
lected. I thought they had been taking their bum-
pers rather too freely by their actions. The general
said ' Good morning, John. How do you like the
Rebels?' I replied I should not like to fall into their
hands. I took my papers out and presented them to
the general. I asked him after he had perused them
if he would return them to me. He told me he
would, with fifty guineas with them. The general
said, adjutant take charge of the papers. He took
the papers, handed me a guinea. He said, take that,
John, and go and get some liquor; you are not half
drunk enough for officers' company. The general
told me to call at his quarters at 11 o'clock. Accord-
ingly I did. The general said, 'John, we have exam-
ined your journal ; you are well deserving the name
of a good soldier and a lucky and expert spy. How
largo an army will it take to go to Worcester and de-
stroy the stores and return safe 7' By answering that
question I must stand or fall, but I was determined to
give my opinion in full, turn as it would. I said, if
they should march 10,000 regulars and a train of artil-
lery to Worcester, which is forty-eight miles from this
place, the roads very crooked, stony and hilly, the in-
habitants generally determined to be free or die, that
not one of them would get back alive. Here Smith
exclaimed, ' Howe has been scared by the old women.'
Major Pitcairn says, ' Not by a negro wench, John,'
which caused a great laughter. The general asked
me what I thought of destroying the stores at Con-
cord, only eighteen miles. I stated that I thought
600 mounted men might go to Concord in the night
and destroy the stores and return safe ; but to go with
1000 foot to destroy the stores the country would be
alarmed; that the greater part of them would get
killed or taken. The general asked me what I
thought of the Tories? I stated that they were gen-
erally cowards, and no dependence could be placed
on them.
" The general asked me how old I was. I told him
I was twenty-two. He said my judgment wa9 very
good for a beardless boy of twenty-two. Here arq
your papers and money, John. You shkU be exempt
from carrying a firelock ; " and I was diamiased for
that day. He said I must call again the next day
at nine o'clock. Accordingly the next day at nine
o'clock I called at the general's headquarters. He
said he should want me to pat on my Yankee dress
and go on horseback through Maiden, Lynn, and
Marbiebead to Salem, on the 18th, at night to carry
letters to the Tories in those places, to have them use
their influence to restrain the militia and secure the
arms and ammunition, if they sbonld attempt to take
up arms against his majesty's regulars, as I shall
detach Major Pitcairn to march on the 19th, at 1
o'clock in the morning with 800 grenadiers; to have me
on my return from Salem, if I heard of any alarm from
the Americans to ride through the adjacent towns east
of Concord to see what preparations were making, if
any, to let Major Pitcairn know without delay. This
I told the general I would undertake ; he might rely
on my faithfulness in this dangerous undertaking.
" Accordingly, on the 1 81 h, the troops were put in
readiness ; about two o'clock we embarked and
crossed over to Charlestown. Here I left the troops,
mounted on a country horse prepared for the purpose,
with my Yankee dress. I called at Maiden on one
Mr. Goodridge, delivered him a letter from the Brit-
ish general. I rode from this place to Lynn. Here
I called on anoth^ tory ; delivered my letter. I now
proceeded to Marbleh^d ; there I delivered another
message. Then I proceeded to Salem, where I ar-
rived about daybreak, making the distance about 15
miles. Here I refreshed myself and my horse.
About sunrise I mounted, returned back to Lynn,
where I called for a breakfast. While at breakfast, the
thundering news came that the regulars had gone to
Concord, and had killed 8 men at Lexington. Such
a confusion as the people were in I never heard or
saw. They asked me where I had been and where I
was going. I told them I was a Bostonian and had
been to Salem to notify the people that the regulars
we were afraid were going out of there to Concord.
Tbey said I had better make my way through Read-
ing and Woburn, also through Billerica to Bedford
and Concord, and notify the people that the regulars
had gone on, and have themselves in readiness to
march to Concord. Now I set out full speed ; wher-
ever I saw the people were alarmed, I informed them
that the British had come out and gone to Concord, and
for their lives and country to fly to arms. Where
there was no alarm I made none. When I arrived
at Woburn, ten miles irom Boston, I found the militia
about on their march for Concord. Here I omitted
going to Billerica, it being ten miles further into the
country.
" I made the best of my way through Bedford to
Concord. Here my horse failed me in some measure.
Here I overtook crowds of militia; I told them to
drive on. I also told them there had been 8 men
584
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
I^illed at Lexington by the British. I told them I
was afraid the regulars would leave the town of Con-
cord. This kind of alarm I gave the people all the
way. I soon arrived at Concord, where I found con-
fusion, sure enough. Here I found the militia pour-
ing in from every quarter. I rode up to Major Pitcairn
and informed him that the militia were turning out
all the way from Concord to Salem. Major Pitcairn
informed me that he must have a reinforcement from
Boston, or else he could not get a man back to
Charlestown, for they were very sore and fatigued.
I was furnished with a fresh horse and set off for
Boston and alarmed the people on the road to fly to
arms and waylay the regulars from behind fences and
walls and any thing that would cover them from
their fire. No person mistrusted but what I was a
faithful American through the whole route. When I
arrived at Charlestown I met Lord Percy with a regi-
ment of regulars and two pieces of artillery. I passed
the troops and went on the ferry and crossed over to
Boston ; went to General Gage's headquarters and in-
formed him of my route, and all that had taken
place. He eaid he did not. think the damned rebels
would have taken up arms against His Majesty's
troops, etc,
" From this time I was determined to leave the
British Army and join the Americans."
CHAPTER SLIII.
CONCORD— { Continued).
Concord Fight — Bruni and Strife of Revolutiim.
The Birthday of American Liberty.— There
are several personal accounts written by those who took
part in the events that made the I'Jlh of April, 1775,
forevM memorable. Rev. William Emerson's diary is
the most complete and accurate. The journal of
Lieut. Barnard, of the British Army, is clear and inter-
esting in its details. Capt. David Brown's entry in
his almanac, " Had a sharp squirmish with the Regu-
lars to-day " is graphic. John Howe, the spy, writes :
" That at Concord I found confusion sure enough."
Martha Moulton's description of the conduct of the
British at Concord is vivid. The depositions of the
patriot soldiers, taken by the Committee of Congress
a few days after the fight, are exact and carefully
given under the solemnity of an oath. The report of
Lieut.-Col. Smith, the commander of the regulars, is
in print, and from this Gen. Gage's report to his King
was garbled by the ministry before it was published,
to meet the political necessities of the government,
and is therefore unreliable. A letter to JetTerson,
printed in his Virginia newspaper, aad probably writ-
ten by Gen. Warren the night after the battle, is the
best of the published accounts in the press of that
time. While the stories and traditions that have
grown up since, and the sermons and orations, the
pamphlets and histories of the events, would fill a
larger volume than this whole book. Relying on
contemporaneous accounts, and neglecting the after-
thoughts and one-sided statements when controver-
sies had arisen, the real facts may be ascertained.
Concord Fight. — General Gage, aware by the re-
ports of his spies of the condition of things at Con-
cord, determined to destroy the military stores and
arms collected there. An expedition was secretly or-
ganized for this duty, composed of six companies of
the Tenth Light Infantry and the grenadier compa-
nies of several other regiments in Boston. Lieut.-
Col. Smith was the commander, with Major Pitcairn,
of the marines, as the second officer. These troops
were taken off their regular duty under pretence of
learning a new drill, and were quietly embarked in
the boats of the meo-of-war from the foot of the Com-
mon late in the evening of April 18th. The project
was found out by the vigilance of the patriots in Bos-
ton, and when tlie column started, Paul Revere set
forth from Charlestown on his famous ride, and
" (.iave the alarm
M^ To every Middlesex house and farm.'*
The troops were rowed across the Charles River and
landed at Lechmere's Point (now East Cambridge).
After some delay, and a wet tramp through the marsh
covered by the spring tides, they kept on through
West Cambridge (now Arlington) in the great road
leading to Concord. The country was alarmed, as the
ringing of bells and firicg of guns in the surrounding
towns proved to the British officers, and Col. Smith
sent back to Gen. Gage for reinforcements. Major
Pitcairn hurried on with the Light Infantry to secure
the bridges over the Concord River. His detachment
arrived at Lexington as the militia company there
under Capt. John Parker were forming on the Com-
mon. Major Pitcairn rode up just at daybreak, and
ordered the Provincials to disperse. They obeyed his
orders when repeated by their captain, and were leav-
ing the Common when the British fired on them a
volley that killed eight and wounded ten men, — a
massacre of which the inscription on their monument
says: "The blood of these martyrs was the cement
of the Union of these States." After the grenadiers
had come up and joined the light infantry, the col-
umn marched on to their destination, Concord.
Several British officers, well-mounted and armed,
had been sent out the day before to reconnoitre the
scene, and on their return in the evening to intercept
any messengers from Boston who might give the alarm.
They captured Revere andjiis companion, Ebenezer
Dorr, just below the line in Lincoln, while Samuel
Prescott, who had joined Revere, escaped by jumping
his fleet horse over the wall of the road and taking a
by-way through Lincoln, gave the alarm there, and
reached Concord between one aud two o'clock on the
morning of the I'Jth.
He aroused the guard at the town-house, who fired the
CONCORD.
585
signal gun and rang out the alanu bell. ThiB assembled
the minute-men, tbe militia and the townsmen, old
and young. Rev. William Emerson, the pastor, with
hib gun in his band, was among the first to join the
guard. Major John Buttrick and his son, thefifer of
Captain Brown's company, were among the early arriv-
als. Mefsengera were despatched to tbe adjoining
towns, Samuel Prescott to Acton, William Parkman
to Sudbury, and R^juben Brown was sent towards Boh-
ton to report the approach of the enemy. The Com-
mittee of Safety began the removal of the cannon, am-
munition and stores to places of security, and the
women and children, with their valuables, fled to the
woods or to houses remote from the village. Tbe min-
ute-men and militia companies took position on the
hill in front of the church, around the liberty pole, on
which the pine-tree flag was raised, and awaited the
return of the messenger. Brown. They were sup-
plied with ammunition from the town-house, and about
seven o'clock saw, from their post on the hill, the
British approaching. It was a pleasant morning of an
early spring, after a mild winter; the fruit trees were
in bloom and the spring grain waved in the breeze,
foretelling a warm day. yi
As the King's troops came in sight, their bayonets
glistening in the sun and their solid platoons fliliug
the wide, old highway, the officers of the Concord
companies saw that they could not resist such a supe-
rior force successfully. The provincials fell back to
another hill, some eighty rods distant, and from this
watched the movements of the regulars. The British
force marched to the Common in the centre of the
town, paraded there and sent out squads of soldiers
to find and destroy tbe stores of flour, fish, salt and
rice, and the magazine of arms, cannon, powder and
balls the provincials had collected. The officers
made the taverns their headquarters ; Colonel Smith
at Jones' tavern, on the main street, and Major Pit-
cairn at the Wright tavern, next the church. Col.
Smith finding that the early alarm bad nearly spoiled
the object of his raid, and that the patriots were in-
creasing in numbers, sent a company under Captain
Munday Pole to guard the South Bridge, and five
companies under Captain Lawrence Parsons to the
North Bridge. Three of these companies remained
there to guard the bridge, while two companies went
two miles beyond to destroy the cannon and ammu-
cition at Col. James Barrett's farm. Captain Lawrie
commanded the guard at the bridge, and, while Cap-
tain Parsons was absent on his errand, permitted the
soldiers to seek food and drink at the neighboring
houses.
Captain Parsons found but little to reward his
search. He burned a few carriages for cannon, but
the cannon had been hidden in a new-plowed field,
and when he heard signal guns fired at the bridge
his command retreated hastily towards the village.
While Colonel Smith and Major Pitcairn were rest-
ing and refreshing themselves at the taverns the
grenadiers sacked the store-bouses, broke up sixty
barrels of flour, disabled two * twenty-lour pound
cannon, burned four gun carriages and sixteen ar-
tillery wheels and some bairels of wooden spoons
and plate.-', threw into tbe miil-pood about five
hundred pounds of bullets and cut down tbe lib-
erty-pole on the hill. The town-house, in which the
powder was stored, was set on fire, but by the remon-
strances of Martha Moulton, who pointed out the
danger from tbe explosion, the fire was put out and
the building saved with its valuable contents.
This was all the expedition accompliiihed. The
Americans fell batk, as the detachment advanced,
towards the North Bridge, crossed it and took posi-
tion on Punkatasset Hill, half a mile north. Here
their numbers increased by squads and files of min-
ute-men from the adjoining towns, till they were in
sufficient force to advance to the high ground just
west of the causeway and bridge. From this point
they could overlook the village and watch the guard
at the bridge. Here they were joined by the compa-
nies from Lincoln, Sudbury and Acton, and by Lieu-
tenant-Colonel John Robinson and some minute-men
from Westford. Joseph Hosmer, of Concord, acting
as adjutant, formed tbe companies and squads into
line as they arrived on the ground, while the officers
held a council of war to determine what should be
done.
The smoke of the burning gun carriages and other
spoils in the village could be plainly seen, bnd it
seemed as if the British were burning the town.
This determined the council to march to its protec-
tion, and Colonel James Barrett, as the commanding
officer, gave the order " to march to the bridge and
pass the same, but not to fire on the King's troops un-
less they were first fired upon." Major Buttrick
took the command, first offering it to Lieutenant-Col-
onel Robinson, who declined the post, but went with
the major &■* his aid, and Colonel Barrett left for his
farm to take care of his family and the stores. The
American force numbered more thHn the guard at the
bridge, but the British force in the villnge was the
larger, and an advance on this would bring Captain
Parsons' detachment in their rear, and place the pro-
vincials between two fires. It was a hazardous move-
ment but the patriots did not flinch from the danger
when the crisis came. Captain Davis' Acton com-
pany, who were aiuned with bayonets on their guns,
took the right, and the Concord company, under Capt.
David Brown, came next, and thus the "embattled
farmers " in double files marched down the hill to the
tune of the " White Cockade." As they reached the
causeway at the foot of tbe hill the British guard be-
gan taking up the planks of the bridge to prevent
their crossing it. Major Buttrick ordered them to
desist, and they soon stopped this work and formed
in solid column on the e-asterly bank of the river.
The Americans pressed forward till within a hundred
yards, when the British fired two signal guns and then
586
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
B. Yolley at the advancing minute-men. This killed
Captain Isaac Davis and private Abner Hosmer of
the Acton company, and wounded two or three men
of the other companies. Major Buttrick sprang
from the ground and gave the order. " Fire, Fellow-
Soldiera, for God's sake Fire ! " The order was re-
peated along the line, and the Americans fired a
volley that killed two British soldiers, fatally wounded
Lieutenant Kelly and a sergeant, and severely
wounded several officers and many privates. This
firing with sure aim from the shoulder was too effect-
ive for the regulars to return with their guns only
pointed from their hips without aim. They broke
and retreated towards the village, bearing their
wounded, bleeding and dying, in their ranks. The
signal guns had given the alarm to the main body of
the British on the Common, and it soon marched
to the aid of the retreating detachment.
The Americans crossed the bridge and occupied
the hill on the east side of the river, from which they
could see the advance of the main body to join the
retreating companies. After some consultation, and
before the return of Captain Parsons' command over
the bridge, the Americans left this hill and passed by
a bridle-road through the woods around the centre of
the town to the road leading to Boston. They might
have cut off the two companies returniog from Col-
onel Barrett's, but the risk to their force and the town
was too great, and they wisely decided to reserve
the attack until after the British had left the vil-
lage on the retreat to Boston. The war had begun.
" Major Buttrick gave the order to fire to British
subjects. It was obeyed by American citizens," who
" fired the shot heard round the world."
This fight proved to Col. Smith not only that the
Americans would resist, but that his force must return
to Boston at once. Arranging for the care of his
wounded who could not be removed, and taking
chaises and pillows for those unable to march, he
hastily collected his troops and before noon left the
village on his retreat. Throwing out flank guards on
the ridge that lined the road for a mile, he kept his
force in column unmolested till Merriam's Corner was
reached. Here the patriots from the fight at the
bridge were posted in safe positions, and were joined
by companies from Reading and Chelmsford and
Billerica. As the British left the protection of the
ridge and called in their flank guards to cross a nar-
row causeway over the meadows, the Americans
poured a sharp fire on the retreating columns, causing
some loss, and then passed round the next hill to re-
new the attack. Another sharp skirmish took place
at the foot of Hardy's Hill where a Sudbury company
came up on the south flank of the regulars and the fire
was hot from both sides of the road. A little farther
on the woods lined the highway, and from behind
trees and rocks and walla the Americans sorely galled
the retreating column. The officers dismounted and
sought shelter in the ranks of the soldiers. Col.
Smith's horse was shot, and Major Pitcairn's captured
with his pistols in the saddle-holsters, which are still
preserved as memorials of the fight. The retreat be-
came a rout long before the reinforcement under Earl
Percy was reached, and if any American officer could
have been found in command Col. Smith would have
surrendered.
It was the first and perhaps the only instance when
a body of veteran soldiers of England fled before an
undisciplined and unorganized armed mob of inferior
numbers.
This reinforcement sent out by Gen. Gage in the
forenoon with two field-pieces checked the pursuit by
the Americans, and received the worn-out men of
Smith's command into the shelter of their ranks,
where they laid down like tired dogs with their
tongues hanging out of their mouths from the heat
and dust of the rout. After a short rest the British
took up the march for Boston, and were again attacked
by the Americans, who pursued them, and poured a
hot fire into their ranks, till they reached Charlestown
Neck and were under the shelter of the guns of the
ships of war in Boston Harbor.
The victorious patriotic farmers encamped that
night in Cambridge, and formed the nucleus of the
Continental Army around Boston, where the British
were shut up till they evacuated that town early the
next year.
The British loss that day, as reported by Gen. Gage,
was sixty-five killed, 176 wounded, and iwenty-seven
missing. The American loss was forty-nine killed,
thirty-six wounded and five missing.
Of this battle, which has passed into hietory under
a new and wrong name, Senator Hoar said, ia his ad-
dress at the quadro-millennial celebration of the town
of Concord, " the number of the slain is no necessary
test of the importance of a battle. The English lost
at Agincourt but four gentlemen, ' none else of name,
and of all other men, but five and twenty.' Piassy,
which gained India to England, cost the victors seven
European and sixteen native soldiers killed, thirteen
European and thirty-six native soldiers wounded.
The Americans lost but twenty-seven at New Orleans.
There were more Englishmen slain on the retreat
from Concord than fell of Wolfe's army who captured
Quebec, more than were slain on the Greek side at
Marathon ; more men fell on both sides that day than
at the first battle of Bull Run." Concord, the first
battle-ground of the Revolution, is well named the
birth-place of American liberty ; for if in Boston was
the conception, and in Lexington the agonizing
throes of deadly pain, here the blessed child was
born.
The British retreat begun here never ended till
Yorktown, and, however it may be called in history,
this is glory and honor enough for any place, any
men, any generation — in this broad land or the world.
Of the many incidents of that day in Concord —
whether of the large, fleshy, bulky Col. Smith being
CONCORD.
587
run against and knocked over by Ephraim Jones, the
tavern-keeper, or of Msjor Pitcairn stirring bis glass
of brandy with his finger at the Wright Tavern, and
hoping '' to stir the damned Yankee blood so ere
night," the shrewd reply of the miller, Wheeler, to
preserve his meal from the spoilers, the cute Yankee
answers of the women to save the property in their
houses from the raid, the cool remarks of the slightly
wounded, that " a little more and it wouldn't have
hit me " — there is no occasion here for more detail.
Nearly 200 of the men of Concord were engaged in
the fight that day. As they were volunteers, and the
rolls of the companies are not preserved, all their
oames cannot be ascertained. A partial list only can
be given, and this includes almost every Concord
family name of that period. Of the prisoners cap-
tured that day, Lieut. Kelly was buried in Concord,
Lieut. Gould was exchanged, Lieut. Potter was con-
fined atHeuben Brown's house — and his sword is still
there in the Antiquarian Society's collection — several
of the soldiers were confined in the old jail, and one
or two of them, when released, remained during
their lives in the town. The horses and other prop-
erty taken from the British were advertised and sold
at auction, and the leading men in the fight gave
their depositions within a few days after it occurred.
No more genuine Yankee or American trait than
this is recorded in history, that, after beginning a
war, shooting down the King's troops, and shutting
them up in Boston, the victorious leaders coolly sit
down, deliberately draw up, and solemnly swear to
their account of the engagement. It marks their
Puritan spirit, their devotion to duty, their conscien-
tious regard for truth, and carries out the honest say-
ing of one of them, Captain Miles, " that he went to the
battle in the same spirit that he went to Church."
When a Revolution is undertaken by such men, it
will be carried through and a firm government suc-
cessfully established.
In the Revolution thus begun on her soil, Concord
did her full part throughout the war. This town
furnished, in answer to all the calls for men, over two
thousand soldiers for longer and shorter terms of ser-
vice. For the expenses of the war there was raised
here by taxation annually more than $10,000 of silver
money, an amount that made a greater burden on the
property of the town at that time than twenty times
as much would be now. To the expedition to
Ticonderoga in 1775 a full company went from Con-
cord, and her beloved minister. Rev. William Emer-
son, accompanied the Middlesex Regiment as chap-
lain. He fell a victim to the camp-fever and died at
Rutland, Vermont, October 20, 1775, at the early age
of thirty-three years.
While Boston was occupied by the British forces,
Concord furnished the patriots with fuel and provis-
ions to a considerable amount. So many of the in-
habitants of Boston were received and sheltered here,
that in July, 1775, a town-meeting of and for Boston
was duly held in Concord, a representative chosen
and other votes passed — perhaps the only instance in
which a town held its meeting outside its own limits.
The American Army having occupied for barracks
the buildings of Harvard College at Cambridge, that
institution removed to Concord in 1775 and remained
here nearly a year. It held its exercises in the
Court-House, its students and professors living in
various houses in the town. The large dwelling-bouse
on the Lee farm, in which the Tory Dr. Lee had been
confined by order of the Committee of Safety became
the Harvard Hall of that episode. The commence-
ment exercises of 1776 were held in the old church,
and on the return of the college to Cambridge
its authorities passed votes of thanks to Concord for
their reception and kind treatment.
CHAPTER XLIV.
CONCORD— ( Continued) .
Progrtu and Protperily a» a Bhirt-lovm and a LUerary CetUre — CeUbraiiont —
SlonumenU -BebtlUan.
After tlie Revolution had triumphed, and peace
and independence were won, the sacrifices and bur-
dens of the war were felt more fully than while it
lasted. Debts had accumulated, the currency inflated,
distress increased and culminated in Shays' Rebellion.
Concord as a shire-town was the place of meetings
and conventions to consider the state of the times,
and at length, in 1786, an attempt was made by an
armed mob to prevent the court from sitting here in
September. Although this town had taken measures
of precaution by its committees and resolutions, a
mob of armed men, several hundred in number, assem-
bled here to oppose the authority of the Government.
They were led by Captain Job Shattuck, of Groton,
and, after spending the night of September 12th in
the court-house and in barns in the village, they took
position on the Common and formed their lines to
stop the judges from holding court. Their leader
held them in some order while a committee of a con-
vention called by Concord had a parley with him,
and at last succeeded in persuading him to consent to
the court opening and adjourning to the last of No-
vember. The rain and the rum had badly demoral-
ized the mob, and they dispersed to their homes with-
out acts of violence or any bloodshed. The invasion
created great alarm and anxiety in the town, and
would have had serious consequences but for the
prudence and firmness of her leading citizens. Captain
Shattuck was afterwards arrested for this and other
treasonable acts, was badly wounded by the officers
who made the arrest, and was confined in jail till
May, 1787, when he was tried in Concord, convicted
of treason and sentenced to be hanged. He was, how-
588
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ever, pardoned in September, through the efforts of
Jadge Wood, of this town, and lived in Groton till
1819.
After the troubles that caused this insurrection had
subsided, the era of growth and prosperity that fol-
lowed national independence was felt in Concord.
Trade and manufactures increased here. As a shire-
town in the centre of Middlesex County, it attracted
population, capital and ability, and soon became a
prominent rival with Boston for the seat of the State
Government, and came near having the State- House.
Men of character and distinction in the profession of
the law settled in the town and gave it influence. In
1798, at the time of the difficulty with France, Wil-
liam Jones, a lawyer here, led a detachment of forty-
one men from Concord to join the Oxford army, so
called, because that was the place where the troops
a'sembled.
When the War of 1812 was declared the old hrstility
to England induced Concord's leading lawyer to give
up his practice and his offices of county treasurer and
postmaster and take command of a regiment re-
cruited in the vicinity for service on the Canada fron-
tier. Although political feeling at that time ran so
high in Massachusetts that he did not escape sneers
and reproach, yet Colonel John L. Tuttle was brave
and patriotic, and deserved a better fate than death
by poison for the purpose of robbery, which he met at
Sackett's Harbor, N. Y. The town furnished both
its military companies for the defence of Boston when
in danger of an attack from the British fleet, and
raised a large company of exempts to protect its
homes in case of invasion. Several English prisoners
of war were confined here till they were exchanged
or paroled.
In this busy prosperity Concord moved even faster
after the peace of 1814 without noticeable events till,
in 1824, the visit of Lafayette as the nation's guest
occurred. During his triumphal tour he visited this
historic town and was received with all the manifesta-
tions ot gratitude and hospitality that could be made.
Military escort, address of welcome, collation, greet-
ings of old comrades of the Revolution, and of men,
women and children, united to bring tears of joy from
the companion of Washington. His visit revived the
memory and stirred the patriotism of 'hat generation
so much that the fiftieth anniversary -of Concord
fight, April 19, 1825, was fitly celebrated. The corner-
stone of a monument on the centre of the Common
was laid with due ceremonials. Edward Everett,
then in the flush of his youth and eloquence, deliver-
ed an oration seldom equaled by him in his after-years.
But the corner-stone never found its superstruct-
ure, opposition to the site developed and the project
slumbered for nearly a dozen years without fulfillment.
In the next decade various institutions started that
mark the growth of the town, — the Middlesex Mu-
tual Fire Insurance Company in 1826, that in its long
and useful existence has developed into one of the
largest and strongest in the State; the Concord
Bank in 1832, an equally successful corporation, and
the Middlesex Institution for Savings that has pur-
sued a steady growth to a strong financial position.
An academy was founded somewhat earlier, in 1822,
and under teachers of good repute a higher education
than the town schools afforded was given. In 1828 a
Lyceum was formed, growing out of an earlier debat-
ing society. This has continued to the present time,
furnishing a course of lectures each winter from some
of the best minds of New England. It is now incor-
porated, has an invested fund and increases in popu-
larity every season.
A social library was established in 1821, and soon
obtained a useful collection of books, reviews and
pamphlets. An ornamental tree society planted
many of the fine trees that shade the village streets.
A public bathing-house contributed to the physical
health of the community. The Concord Chapter of
Royal Arch Masons was formed in 1826, and a vol-
unteer engine company in 1827.
The Western Society of Husbandmen and Manu-
facturers, incorporated in 1803, removed from the
upper part of the county to Concord in 1821, and has
i held its annual cattle shows here nearly every year
since. In 1852 its name was changed to the Middle-
sex Agricultural Society. It has a large exhibition
building, ample fair-grousds and a good half-mile
track.
More than all these, the single parish system of the
town broke up, and a second religious society was
formed. Rev. Ezra Ripley, whosuiceeded Rev. William
Emerson in 1778, had grown liberal in his views and
preaching with bis years — had, in fact, become Uni-
tarian. A Trinitarian society was organized in 1826
by those who held to the old faith. Sixteen joined
the new church, and built a meeting-house and set-
tled a minister the next year. By the successful
result of an act of incorporation of the trustees of the
old ministerial fund that money was preserved to the
Unitarian Society, and the town saved from the usual
lawsuit attending such divisions.
The influence of all these was shown in 1835,
on the two hundredth anniversary of the settle-
ment of Concord. An appropriate celebration was
arranged and carried out on the twelfth of Sep-
tember of that year. It was among the first of
the long line that have followed, and equal to
the best of these town holidays. The address by
Ralph Waldo Emerson was the earliest of those
that have made his words and thoughts known
throughout the English-speaking world. The Gov-
ernor and his staff attended ; the procession, escorted
by the infantry and artillery companies, marched to
theold church, through the linesof theschool children,
and a crowded audience listened to the eloquent
words there uttered. A dinner and speeches at ihe
table by the distinguished guests from Boston, Plym-
outh, New York and other places concluded the
CONCORD.
589
celebration. The address was printed and reprinted
in 1875, and may be found in the complete edition of
Emerson's works.
The occasion furnished a pattern example to later
towns, especially in the matter of expense. This,
the committee reported, amounted to S168.79, of
which the town voted 875.00, private subscribers gave
$45.50, and the balance, §48.24, was paid by the com-
mittee themselves.
Shattuck's " History of Concord " was published
this same year, and is one of the earliest and best of
town histories, since so numerous. It gave much in-
formation about the olden times, and has become
very rare and valuable.
Now began the period of literature and culture
which for a generation marked Concord more promi-
nently than its historical, political or business traits
had before.
A great awakening of thought was springing up in
New England about this time. In part it had been
brought over the sea by the brilliant young men who
had studied abroad. In part it was the uprising of
the intellect of a people who had found leisure from
the sordid cares of life to seek some higher ideas. Mr.
Emerson's residence here, which began on his return
from Europe, attracted much of this transcendental-
ism, as it was called. Margaret Fuller, Hawthorne,
Alcott and Channing came to Concord to live. The
Dial, the organ of the new philosophy, was often
mainly composed here, and from this town, as a cen-
tre, many of the converts drew their inspiration, and
to it made their pilgrimages, as to their Mecca.
This " newness," as it has been styled, soon domi-
nated the village, and found ils expres^sion in many
forms of the life and society of the town. It gave
birth to and encouraged the literary effurts of that
generation. Hawthorne wrote his " Mosses from the
Old Manse,'' to which he had brought his bride in
1842, and in which Emerson had written his " Na-
ture " a few years earlier. Thoreau wrote and pub-
lished his works chiefly about Concord scenes, Chan-
ning printed his poems, Alcott his conversations,
his daughter Louisa her stories, Mrs. Austin her
novels, and others, inspired by these examples, rushed
into print till the alcove in the Free Public Library
devoted to Concord books is nearly filled. So much
of this literary work was done here that a distin-
guished state and national officer, when asked by a
fellow-traveler in the cars through Concord, " What
was the chief occupation of the villagers ?" promptly
replied, "Principally writing for the Atlanlic Month-
ly." This dwarfed and soon overcame the business
and political importance of the town, and although
the railroad came here in 1844, the quiet repose of the
place was hardly stirred by the locomotives.
One result of Mr. Emersnn's address in 1835 should
be recorded. The next year the town decided to
build a monument at the battle-ground, a matter
that had been too long neglected. A fund had ac-
cumulated in the town treasury for this purpose sufB-
cient for a modest memorial. This money was origi-
nally subscribed in this vicinity for the Bunker Hill
Monument Association, which had planned to mark
both the earlier battle-grounds of the Revolution wi:h
enduring monuments. Finding that the work on
Bunker Hill was more than they could accomplish,
that Association gave up their plan of building one
at Concord and returned a part of the subscriptions to
this town. Dr. Ripley, who had gained a title by pos-
session to the old road leading to North Bridge, recon-
veyed the same to trustees for the purpose of a me-
morial.
A simple design was selected by a committee of the
town, and from a granite boulder within the original
limits of the "six miles square" the modest shaft
was obtained and placed on the river-bank, where it
now stands. The task of framing a suitable inscrip-
tion was a difficult one. Several inscriptions had
been sent in by persons asked to contribute, and
while each had merits, no one exactly suited the
committee. Thereupon, they made a composite,
taking sentences from such as they approved, and
inscribing this on the monument:
" Here,
on the 191h of April, 1770,
was made
the firat forcible resistance
to British aggreseioD.
On the opposite bank
stood the Aioehcan inihtta.
Here stood the Invading Army,
and on this spot
the first of the enemy fell
in the War of that Revolution
which gave
Independence
to these United States.
In gratitode to God
and
in the love of Freedom,
this Uonumeot
was erected,
AD. 1836."
For the dedication of this monument July 4, 1837.
Mr. Emerson wrote his immortal hymn, that was
sung by the assemblage, and is copied below from
the original printed slip :
" By the nide bridge that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled;
Here once tbe embattled farmers stood,
Aud fired the shot heard round the world.
** Tbe foe long since in silence slept ;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps,
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down tbe dark stream that seaward creeps.
'* On this green bank, by this soft stream.
We place with joy a votive stone,
That memory may their deed redeem.
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
*' 0 Thou who made those buroes dare
To die, or leave their children free, —
Bid Time and Nature gently sjiare
Tbe shaft we raise to them and Thee.*'
A prayer by Rev. Dr. Ripley, then in the eighty-
590
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
seventh vear of hia age, and an address by the Hon.
Samuel Hoar completed the simple exercises. On
the 19th of April, 1838, the four rows of trees lining
the avenue to the monument were planted by the
towns people.
In 1841 the old meeting-house, built in 1712 and
remodeled in 1794, was so changed and altered as to
leave no trace of the old structure, either inside or
out. The tall, slender spire surmounting the square
clock-tower was torn down, and in its place the Gre-
cian temple porch, with the heavy wooden columns,
was added. The old tquare pews and long gallery
seats were replaced by modern slips. The high pul-
pit, with graceful sounding-board above, gave way to
the reading-desk, and those " who knew it so well
would know it no more."
The alteration of the church of which he had been
minister for sixty-three years was coincident with the
death of Dr. Ripley, and his funeral was held in the
Orthodox Church, where the Unitarians worshiped
during the repairs.
This quiet of Concord was broken in the Presiden-
tial campaigns of 1840 and 1844 by mass-meetings
of the county, which gathered thousands of voters to
renew on this historic spot their patriotism. They
were addressed by distinguished speakers brought here
from Maine to Georgia, including Webster, Choate,
Winthrop, Lawrence, and others of this State. The
etTect of these on the town subsided when the election
was over, and peace reigned.
Again in 1850 the repose of the town was inter-
rupted by a union celebration of the seventy-fifth
anniversary of the battle. At this all the neighbor-
ing towns that took part on the 19th of April, 1775,
united in commemorating the day. The Legislature
and the State officers attended, escorted by the An-
cient and Honorable Artillery Company, and listened
to the oration delivered by the Hon. Robert Rantoul,
of Beverly. This, with the eloquent speeches of
Hon. E. R. Hoar, who presided, and of the distin-
guished guests at the dinner-tables, was printed by a
resolve of the General Court as a legislative docu-
ment. The last survivor of Concord fight, Amos
Baker, of Lincoln, was present on this occasion, at
the great age of ninety-four years and eleven days.
During these quiet years ending in 1860 Concord
did some useful work by improving her public
grounds, laying out the pleasant Sleepy Hollow
Cemetery, establishing a Town Library, building a
commodious Town Hall, and organizing various so-
cieties that helped in many ways. In agriculture the
railroad made a great change from the old general
farming to the milk-producing and fruit-raising of
the present. This was stimulated by a successful
Farmers' Club, of which Hon. Simon Brown was the
founder, and the profit of it increased largely by Hon.
Ephraim W. Bull's discovery of the Concord Grape,
the greatest vegetable improvement of the age. This
grape, raised by him from seeds of the native wild
grape, has extended to the Pacific, and across the
Atlantic to Europe, while the mother vine, from
which millions have grown, still lives and bears
here.
Through the great Civil War the manhood, the
wealth and the spirit of Concord were poured out for
the Union and to put down the Rebellion.
Her company left home on the memorable 19th of
April, 1861, with full ranks, under the command of
Lieut. George L. Prescott. They were duly muster-
ed into the United States' service and sent forward to
Washington by way of Annapolis, Maryland. On
their arrival they were quartered for a time in the
Senate Chamber of the Capitol. They took part in
the first battle of Bull Run, and bad four men taken
prisoners by the Rebels on the retreat that day. At
the expiration of their three months' term of service
they were received on their return home with enthusi-
astic greetings. Another company was soon re-enlist-
ed by the same commander, now Captain Prescott,
and were stationed at Fort Warren, guarding Rebel
prisoners for some months, as a part of the Thirty-
second Regiment Macsachusetts Volunteers. This
regiment was sent to the front in 1862, and saw ac-
tive service in the Army of the Potomac at the great
battles of Antietam, Gettysburg, the Wilderness and
others throughout the war.
Captain Prescott, promoted to colonel, was killed
at Petersburg, Va., in 1864, giving his life for his
country after a brave and honorable service. Hia
name heads the roll of.the illustrious dead on Con-
cord's Soldiers' Monument.
A third company, under Captain Richard Barrett,
served under Gen. Banks, in the Forty-seventh Regi-
ment, in Louisiana for the nine months of that cam-
paign. This regiment was stationed in New Orleans,
and held that city in subjection during their term of
service. By the skill and care of Captain Barrett every
man of the company was brought back hpme on its
return to be welcomed by the rejoicings and thanks of
the town's people. Others enlisted in various regi-
ments,— asquad of eleven, headed by Sergeant Love-
joy, in the Fortieth Regiment, and nine in the Fifth
Regiment, for one hundred days' service. In all, two
hun-dred and twenty-nine men from Concord served in
the war, making twelve over and above all demands on
the town. Of these, thirty names are inscribed en the
Soldiers' Monument in the public square as " Faith-
ful unto Death," and the town '■ records with grate-
ful pride that they found here a birth-place, home or
grave."
To support their soldiers in the field and the fam-
ilies left at home. Concord raised during the war near-
ly twenty thousand dollars in money. Besides this,
the donations and supplies to theSanitary Commission,
collected and forwarded by the ladies of the Soldiers'
Aid Society, amounted to even more in value. The
bandages alone, carefully prepared for wounds, ex-
ceeded the dollars in number.
CONCORD.
591
This town also gave to the Sanitary Commission, in
the person of Louisa Jane Barker, one of the most
earnest, useful and indefatigable of their agents at
Washington. She was the sister of William Whiting,
Lincoln's solicitorofthe War Department, and the wife
of Rev. Stephen Barker, chaplain of Massachusetts
Heavy Artillery Regiment. Her services and labors
for the cause were of such interest and value as to
merit a longer and more enduring record than this
mention.
Other brave men and fair women of the town did their
utmost in thoughtand word,in help and counsel for the
Union, who could not render military or hospital serv-
ice. And the record of Concord in the putting down
the Rebellion is as patriotic as that of other Northern
towns, and worthy of its historic iame. The completion
and dedication of the Soldiers' Monument, one of the
earliest in the State, shows how mindful of the duties
and sacrifices of the war was this town. The plain,
but severely simple structure, raised to commemorate
her dead soldiers, was the first work to be done after
the war ended, and Peace and Union were established.
The next work was to build a High School-house on
the ample lot, generously given to the town by Cyrus
Stow, who thus remembered his native town in his
life-time, and at his death gave a fund of $.3000 for
the use of the High School. Soon after this the town
built a large new almshouse.
By the liberality of Mr. William Monroe, also a
native of the town, a library building was erected,
and, with a fund for its preservation and increase, giv-
en to a Library Corporation as trustees of the public.
To this Concord handed over the books and funds of
the Town Library, and the new building was opened in
1873, and has proved the great attraction of the town.
It has already required enlargement to hold the
twenty-two thousand volumes mentioned in the last
report of the trustees.
Water-works had become a necessity for Concord.
Looking for a source of supply, Walden Pond was
found insufficient in size and height to be used with-
out pumping ; Nagog Pond, in Acton, too far away ;
Sdndy Pond, in Lincoln, the most available. This
clear sheet of one hundred and fifty acres, about two
miles from and ninety feet above the village, was
selerted. It is fed wholly by springs, has three hun-
dred acres of water-shed, a large outflow, a sandy bot-
tom and but two houses within its drainage limits.
The water, by analysis, contains les^ than two grains,
chiefly vegetable matter, to the United States gallon.
Having obtained an act of the Legislature authoriz-
ing the taking of this source, the town, by its water
commissioners, secured a favorable contract, under
which a ten-inch main, one and three-fourths of a mile
in length, was laid to the Common, and branches of
suitable sizes to all the streets of the village. The
water was let on December 2, 1874, and has proved a
real blessing to the town. Tne supply is ample for
all uses, the pressure sufficient for fire in any build-
ing within the water limits, and the interest on the
cost, with one per cent, to a sinking-fund, has been
paid by the water rates from the start. The ttyatem
has been since extended to the west to supply the
Reformatory, Concord Junction and Weslvale, requir-
ing another main to the pond and a reservoir on
Nashawtuck Hill. The whole work was executed
under the direction of William Wheeler, civil engin-
eer, a native of this town, a graduate of the State Ag-
ricultural College, and president of the Agricultural
College in Japan for two years.
Thtt was an interesting town-meeting in 1873, when
on one side of the platform were the plans of the
water-works, and on the other the model of the
statue of the minute-man, by Daniel C. French, a
Concord youth, shown for the inspection and adop-
tion by the voters of the town after a full examinatioa
and discussion.
Some feeling had always existed among the older
citizens that the monument at the battle-ground stood
on the wrong side of the river ; that it was on the
British and not on the American ground of the fight.
This feeling was specially cherished by Ebenezer
Hubbard, who led the solitary life of a bachelor on
his farm in the middle of the town for ninety years.
He had accumulated by the frugal ways of an odd
and queer recluse some money, and inherited strong
prejudices as well as the old house in which Hancock
and Adams lived while attending the Provincial
Congress. To carry out his patriotic sentiments, he
left by his will the sum of $1000 to Concord towards
building a monument on the spot where the Ameri-
cans fell on the opposite side of the river from the
present monument "in the battle of the 19th of April,
1775," and further provided that if it " is not built,
nor sufficient funds for that purpose obtained within
five years after my decease," then the sum is to be
paid over to Hancock, New Hampshire. As showing
the habits of Mr. Hubbard, he found, some years after
the time for redeeming them had expired, six one
hundred dollars bills of the Concord Bank care-
fully hidden in an old family Bible. These he
presented at the bank, and as the president of the
Concord National Bank oflered, though not legally
obliged, to redeem them, Mr. Hubbard gave the sum
to him for the purpose of re-building the old North
Bridge across the river to make a way to the new
monument he wished built. A committee of the town
recommended the acceptance of this l^;acy and gift,
in 1873, and the erection of a statue of a minute-man
on the right bank of the stream. Stedman Buttrick,
Esq., gave the land for this purpose, and at the town-
meeting before named the project was voted almost
unanimously. The statue was finished by the sculp-
tor, Mr. French, and cast in bronze from condemned
cannon given by Congress by a resolve passed on the
anniversary of the fight, through the influence of the
Hon. £. R. Hoar, then Representative of this dis-
trict at Washington. The bridge was built. The statue
592
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
was set up on a granite pedestal cut from the same
boulder as the older monument, with the first verse of
Emerson's hymn, before quoted, for an inscription on
the front, and the dates " 1775, 19th of April, 1875,'
on the rear panel.
The centennial of the battle wa" set for the dedica-
tion of the new memorial, and the statue was unveiled
in the presence of Gen. Grant, President of the Uni-
ted States, his Cabinet, the Governors of all the New
England States, with their staffs and body guards, the
Legislature of Massachusetts, escorted by the Boston
Independent Corps of Cadets, the Fifth Regiment
of Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, and an immense
concourse of people. The exercises at the battle-
ground were an address by Mr. Emerson, a poem by
James Russell Lowell, an oration by George William
Curtis, and speeches at the dinner table by Speaker
Blaine, Secretary Boutwell, Senator Ha wley. Governors
Peck and IngersoU and others. Judge Hoar pre-
sided, General F. C. Barlow was marshal, and the cel-
ebration was in all respects fit to begin the long
line of centenuials of the Revolution. As the first of
these it attracted attention throughout the nation,
and the only limit to the attendance upon it was the
inability of the railroads to bring all who wished to
come. The estimates of the number present varied
from 15,000 to 20,000, while the severely cold weather
and the crowds at the car stations kept as many more
away. The festivities closed with a splendid ball in
the agricultural building, where the decorations gath-
ered from the United States navy yards, the music of
the Marine Band from Washington, and the brilliant
company made an unequaled display.
A decade later, in 1885, Concord celebrated her
250th anniversary. As a preparation a large com-
mittee designed and set up in the right places,
tablets of scone or bronze inscribed thus. On the
rock at the junction of the rivers :
" OS THE HILL N.^SHAWTUCK
AT THE MEETING OF THE B1VEE3
ASD ALONG THE BANKS
LIVED THE Indian owners of
musket.\(1uid
Before the white men c^me."
On a slate in the wall of the Hill Burying-Ground :
" On this HILL
The SETTLERS OP CoNrORD
built their MEETING-nOCSE
near which thev wf,re buried.
on the southern slope of the ridge
were their dwellings during
the first winter.
below it they laid out
their first road and
on the summit stood the
Liberty Pole of the Revolution."
Oq a bronze plate set in granite near the square:
" Here, in the house of the
REVEREND PETER BULKELEY,
first MISISTEF. ASD ONE OF THE
founders of this town,
a bargain was m.\de with the
Squaw Sachem, the Sagamore Tauattawan
and other indians.
Who then sold their right is
the six miles square called concokd
TO THE English planters
AND GAVE THEM PEACEFUL POSSESSION
OF THE LAND,
A.D. lH3ti.'
On a stone west of the three arch bridge :
"OS THIS FARM DWELT
SIMON WILLARD
one of the founders of coscord
who did good service for
Town and Colonv
for more than fortv years.''
On a bronze plate on the west side of the Square :
" NEAR THIS SPOT STOOD
THE FIRST TOWN HOUSE
USED FOR TOWX-MEETISGS
ASD THE rOL'XTY COURTS
1721-1T»4."
On a stone by the road northwest of the minute-
man :
"on THIS FIELD
THE MINUTE MEN AND .MILITIA
FORMED BEFORE MARCUINO
DOWN TO THE
FIGHT AT THE BRIDGE ''
On a stone at the junction of the Old Bedford and
Boston roads :
"meriam's corner
The British troops
retreating from the
Old North Bridge
were here attacked in flask
by the men of concord
and neighboring towns
asd driven 'under a hot fire
TO Charlestows"
The Other arrangements for the occasion included a
reception of their guests by the town's people, on the
evening of the day before. And on Saturday, Sep-
tember 12, 1885, the usual procession, oration and
dinner. The weather was perfect, in marked contrast
to that of ten years previous. The attendance of
former residents and natives of the town added to the
interest, and the exercises were of a high order of
merit. The report upon the historic tablets by
Charles H. Walcott, the address by George F. Hoar,
the remarks after the dinner by the Governor, George
D. Robinson, by James Russell Lowell, William M.
Evarts, George W. Curtis and Concord citizens, were
CONCORD.
693
appropriate and eloqueut. Much of the succeBsof
the celebration was due to the chairman of the com-
mittee, Henry J. Hosmer, and the chief marshal,
Richard F. Barrett.
Rev. B. R. Bulkeley, a descendent of the first min-
ister of the town, was the chaplain, and John S.
Keyes, son of the president of the bi-centennial, pre-
sided at this anniversary. A gratifying feature of
the day was the gift by Hapgood Wright, of Lowell,
of a fund, to this, his native town, of $1000, to
accumulate for fifty years, the interest then to be
spent on the tri-ceniennial, and the principal to be
again invested for terms of the sime length; so
on indefinitely, thus providing for future semi-cen-
tennials. Concord accepted this gift and will keep
and use it carefully.
CHAPTER XLV.
CONCORD-{ Continutd).
CoutU, ScbooU, SocifUes, Donatioiu, Etc.
CoNCORn Courts. — This was a shire-town as early
as A.D. 1692, and the Courts were held here first in
the meeting-house. In 1721 a court-house and town-
house was built on the west side of the square, chiefly
out of the materials of the former church. This new
building was nearly square, with a hip roof and a tur-
ret on the top, in which a bell was hung and the
whole surmounted by the vane of the old meeting-
house, bearing the date of 1673, which is still pre-
served. A new and commodious court-house was
built in the year 1794 on the opposite side of the
square by the county, and had a double lantern
tower rising seventy-five feet from the ground.
This furnished room for the Supreme and Com-
mon Pleas Courts, the Probate Court and the Court
of Sessions, and for the county treasurer's office.
In this, by the gift of the lot of land on which it
stood, the town had the right to hold their town-
meetings, and many other gatherings were accommo-
dated. The militia, or "old shad " companies assem-
bled in its spacious lower entry ; the fruits and vege-
table at the cattle shows were here exhibited. Stowed
away in its dark recesses were the stocks in which
many a poor fellow had sat to expiate his offences, and
the gallows on which a man had been hung, the only
execution in Concord of which there is a record. This
took place in the field east of the burying-hill, and
was witnessed by a great crowd, and under circumstan-
ces 80 remarkable as to be worth noti ng. It seems by the
court records that "Isaac Moore and Samuel Smith,
both of Sudbury, on the night of the 21st of June, 1799,
broke and entered the dwelling-house of William Tuck-
er, in Sherburne, with intent to steal, and stole seven
yards of tannin, worth $2.90; five yards shalloon,
38-ii
worth $2 ; thirteen yards of mode, worth $2 ; two and
one-half yards check linen, worth $1.25; seven yardi
muslin, worth $5.75; nine yards gauze, worth $3.50 :
eight pounds sewing silk, worth $8 ; three pair spec-
tacles, worth $1.25 ; 500 needles, worth $2.50 ; three
and one-half yards tow cloth, worth $1.16; eight
handkerchiefs, worth $10 ; three yards calico, worth
$1.84; six pair hose, worth $2.50 ; three and one-half
yards India cotton, worth $1.16; twelve knives, worth
$2.16; 24.000 pins, worth $4.68; two hats, worth
$2.12; twelve sticks of twist, worth $0.68 ; one pound
of thread, worth $1; one tea canister, worth $0.50;
two pounds tea, worth $1.32 ; thirty yards stuff,
worth $11.68, of the goods and chattels of William
Tucker, in the dwelling-house aforesaid. To the in-
dictment Moore and Smith plead not guilty. Levi
Lincoln (afterwards Governor) and Timothy Bige-
low. Esquires, were appointed by the Supreme Judi-
cial Court counsel for defendants, and they were tried
at the October term, 1799, for the offence. The jury
found Moore not guilty of the burglary, but guilty
of the stealing and found Smith guilty of both.
Moore was sentenced to be " publicly whipped on the
naked back twenty stripes, to be confined at hard
labor three years, to pay William Tucker $170, which,
with the goods restored, is treble value of the goods
stolen, and to pay the costs of prosecution." Novem-
ber 9th the attorney-general moved for sentence of
death on Samuel Smith, and the Court, after asking
him if he had anything to say and his replying
nothing additional to what bad been said before, sen-
tenced him to be hanged by the neck until he was
dead.
The warrant was issued by the Governor and Coun-
cil November 19, 1799 and the day of the execution
was set for the 26th of December 1799. On the day
before (Christmas), Smith was taken to the meeting-
house and a sermon preached to him by Dr. Ripley,
and on the 26th, the dread sentence of the law was
executed on him by Sheriff Hosmer.
Smith must have been a hardened offender, or the
extreme penalty of the law would not have been in-
flicted. Tradition " says that he sold his body to the
doctors, and while waiting execution spent the money
received from them for ginger bread for his own con-
sumption."
In front of the court-house stood the large elm-tree,
planted in 1776, that was used for the whipping-post
for the culprits who, at each term of the court, re-
ceived their thirty-nine lashes on their bare backs,
their hands being tied up to the big staple long since
grown over by the bark. In this court-house many
important trials took place ; that of the rioters who
burned the Ursuline Convent in Charlestown in
1836, about whom so excited was the feeling of the
community that the officers of the Court were armed
and juries disagreed, so that only one boy was con-
victed and punished; and the PhcEnix Bank cases, in
which Diuiel Webster, Rufus Choate, Sidney Bart-
594
HISTORY OF .MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tell Hod Franklin Dexter were counsel for the presi-
dent and cashier, who were charged with embezzle-
ment, and Isabel Huntington and Charles Allen,
district attorneys, conducted the prosecution.
This court-house was thoroughly remodeled in
18-40 and was burned in June, 1849, by an inceudiary
who wished to destroy a criminal indictment against
him.
Previous to the fire Lowell had drawn away from
Concord the April term of the Supreme Court and
the September term of the Common Pleas. This last
had been for years the great holiday of the county.
On the farms haying must be done, and corn-stalks
cut before the September Court or the hired men and
boys could not be spared to attend its sessions. A
long row of booths for the sale of eatables and drink-
ables and for shows of various kinds covered both
sides of the square. Crowds of both sexes and all
sizes came for the fun, which was often fast and
furious. Drinking, gambling and horse-racing went
on openly, sometimes ending in fights and rows. The
disorder occasionally rrse to such extremes that the
court would adjourn and the ■■heritt snd his deputies,
with the judges and jurors as a posse, would sally forth
to put down the riot.
After the burning of the Court-House an attempt
was again rasde to remove the terms of the court to
Lowell and Cambridge and prevent rebuilding in
Concord. This failed mainly through the sngacity of
the town in sending as its Representative to the Legis-
lature the Hon. Samuel Hoar, whose wisdom and in-
fluence controlled votes enough in that body to defeat
the removal. The present Court-House was built in
1851, and during the interval the courts were held in
the vestry of ;lie church. With the change of the i
Common Pleas to the Superior Court, the March term
was removed to Lowell, and only acivil andacriminal
term in the summer were left in Concord. In 1857
the Supreme Judicial Court held a session here for
capital trials. The presence for a week of Chief Jus-
tice Shaw, Justices Metcalf and Bigelow, with Attor-
ney-General Cliflbrd, revived the former glory of
Concord Courts, while Abbott, Butler, Train, Somer-
by, Gale and Kelly kept up the old reputation of the
Middlesex Bar by successful defences of the accused.
These were the last important trials in this town,
and in 1867 the courls were removed to Cambridge
and Lowell, and Concord ceased to be a shire. The
act authorizing this removal provided that the county
property here should be given to the town which had
furnished the sites of the county buildings. This was
done, and the Court-House was sold by the town to
the Middlesex Mutual Fire Insurance Company.
The jail, built in 1791 of split granite, with large
rooms, strong doors and safe gratings, frequently
crowded with prisoners during terms of the courts had
held in its walls Alcott and Thoreau for refusing to
pay their taxes, was sold, taken down and used for
ulverta and cellar walls. This jail took the place of
an earlier one built of wood that stood on the rear of
the Main Street Burying-Ground, in which Sir Arch-
ibald Campbell, lieutenant-colonel of theSeventy-first
British Regiment, was confined with other prisoners of
war during the Revolution, and bis sketch of the build-
ing now hangs in the Public Library. There are some
traditions of a still earlier jail that is said to have
been placed near the Orthodox Church grounds, but
it has left no distinct record. The county house near
the jail became the property of the Catholic Church,
and all traces of the shire-town were taken from
Concord.
Militia Companies. — The two companies into
which the Concord soldiers had been for nearly a
hundred years divided were the originals of the two
which Icught at the North Bridge.
The heavy drafts on the town by the Revolution
and ihe organization of theLiglit Infantry Cumpany,
.'eft but one company of militia, called the Standing
Company, in Concord. This continued till the change
of the law, in 18-10, enrolling the militia. Great
consideration to military titles was always paid in the
town. These are set out in the earlier records, dis-
played on the old grave stones and handed down in
the speech of the generations. Since the Revolution,
there havebeen in Concord three generals, — Hildreth,
Colburn and Biittrick, — a dozen colonels, several
majors, and two-score captains, who were .always
spoken of and toby their titles.
In IS04 a company of artillery was chartered for
Concord, and made its first parade the 4th of July of
that year. By the charter act it was ordered that two
brass field-pieces, suitably engraved, be provided for
the company, and in pursuance of this a pair of six-
pounders were given them.
The inscription on these cannon reads:
" Tlie Lepislatiire
of Ma:idHi-hrisett8
cuilsec|-.lte.i the liaillt'S of
Mujur JoliQ Duttrick
and
Captain Isaac Davis
vliose valuiir and exumple
excited their fellow citizens
to a successful resistance
of a superior, number of
British troopa,
at Coucord Blidge,
the I'.pil' of -\pril. 1775,
^vhich was the U-giunilig
of a contest in arms
that ended in
American Independence."
These field-pieces, after a service of more that forty
vears in the company, were exchanged for a new pair
having the same inscription, pursuant to a resolve
passed in 1846. The first pair now stand in the
Doric Hall of the State-House, on either side of the
statue of Washington. The new pair, after nearly
forty years of service, were transferred by the Legis-
lature to the town of Concord, and with all their
equipments of caissons, harnesses, &c., are carefully
CONCORD.
595
kept in the town-house under the charge of an iude-
pendent battery of light artillery.
The Concord Light Infantry gave up its charter in
1848, being then the oldest corps in the State ne.^ct to
the Ancient and Honorable Artillery of Boston. The
Concord Artillery, about the same time, changed its
drill to infantry, secured an armory on Bedford Street
and has since become a leading company of the Mas-
sachusetts Volunteer Militia — Co. L, Sixth Regiment.
A few years ago the town built a new and convenient
armory on Walden Street, in which this corps take
pride and keep up the spirit and drill of their high
rank as soldiers. While the two uniformed corapan
ies, the infantry and artillery, continued, great rivalry
exi.sted between them, and showed in their street pa-
rades as well as in their military balls.
These dances were held each winter by the infan-
try at Shepard's Coffee-House, on Main Street, and by
the artillery at the Middlesex Hotel, and great efforts
were put forth by either company to secure the fairest
partners, the finest music and the best supper of the
season. The rivalry culminated in a grand training in
October, IS.SS, when each company turned out with a
full band of music from the city and paraded on opposite
sides of the square. The bands strove to drown each
other's music, the soldiers to crowd the ranks of the
other company off their line of march as they passed
and repassed, till hot blood was raised and spilled be-
fore the interference of wiser and cooler heads stopped
the fray.
The next year " Cornwallis day" was duly honored
in Concord by a gathering from all the county.
The uniformed companies, under the command of
Gen. Joshua Buttrick, as Lord Cornwallis, repre-
sented the British army, aud the militia companies
led by Col. Sherman Barrett, as General Washington,
the American force. The line was formed on the
Common in the forenoon, extending the whole length
in double ranks of Continentallers, displaying every
old and odd article of dress that could be ransacked
from the garrets of the county. They were armed
with any and everj- kind of weapon that had seen
service, from the old fire-locks of the Indian wars to
the modern rifles and fowling-pieces. A more quaint
motley than these presented has rarely been seen in
this age and community.
The two armies had a sham fight in the afternotm,
that was hardly bloodless, one or two being wounded
with ramrods, fired off in the haste of loading, or a
bayonet prick in the excitement of a charge. At
dark Cornwallis surrendered, and this was duly
celebrated at the taverns, where both forces frater-
nized afterward. The occasion fully proved the truth
of Lowell's lines :
" Recollect what fun we had.
You "n" I an" Ezra Hollis,
t'p there to Concord plain last fall,
Along of the Cornwallie."
Twenty years later, in 1859, Governor Banks as-
sembled the whole volunteer militia of Massachusetta
for a five days' muster at Concord. Seven thousand
well-drilled uniformed soldiers were present, and were
reviewed by the State oflioers and the Legislatiye, in
the presence of a great crowd of people. This mus-
ter helped materially to make the State troops ready
for the breaking out of the Civil War. After that
war was over, in 1869, Major-Gen. Butler, then in
command of the Massachusetts Volunteer Milicia,
repeated this general muster of all the force, on the
same field in Concord. It was almost a review of the
veterans of the Union Army from this State, so many
of them who had gallantly borne themielves on
Southern battle-fields, had continued in the service
to that time.
Meadows. — Stretching along the Concord River and
its south branch are great meadows, containing more
than 10,000 acres. Thesewerethebedsof ancient ponds
or lakes, now drained by the river, and are covered
with deep, rich soil. The early settlers found on
these a supply of grass for their cattle, and gradu-
ally, as the forest was cleared off, the meadows should
have become dryer and fit for cultivation. But in
1793 the Middlesex Canal Company was chartered to
make a canal from the Merrimack River to the Mys-
tic River. This was then a great public work, and so
much interest was taken in its success that the char-
ter was very loosely drawn, withoutsuitable provisions
for damages to private property. It was intended to
take the water of the Merrimack and bring it through
the canal to the Mystic near Boston. Complete sur-
veys showed the Concord River, where the canal
would cross it at Billerica, too much above the level,
and the plan was changed. The Concord River had
to be used as the feeder, and the water of that stream
taken to fill both ends of the canal. To get a suf-
ficient supply a dam was required at Billerica that
would hold the water of the Concord iu the dry sea-
son. Au old mill-dam, used only in the wet portion
of the year, existed there, and was secured by the
canal for its purposes, raised and tightened bo that the
river was flowed back on the meadows, and they grew
more wet every year and of less value. The meadow
owners brought various suits for damages sustained
by this flowing, but were never successful in getting
any pay, because of the insufficient provisions of the
Canal Act.
After the Boston and Lowell Railroad was in oper-
ation the canal lost most of its business, and was
finally given up as a water-way, aid in places filled up
and the land put to other uses. In 1851 the Canal
Company released all their land and rights in the
dam and vuier-powef at Billerica to the Messrs. Tal-
bott for $20,000. This was a small consideration if
they had a right to maintain the dam after the canal
was abandoned. Earlier than this the city of Boston
built large reservoirs on the upper waters of the Con-
cord River to compensate for taking the water of
Lake Cochituate to Boston. The natural outlet of
596
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUxNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
this lake was through the Sudbury River, and the plan
was to make good the supply of water to the mills at
Billerica and below. Between the dam below and
the reservoirs above theae meadows, the wetness so
increased thattliey became worthless, and the owners
at last were roused to take measures of redress. In
1859 the citizens of Bedford, Carlisle, Concord, Sud-
bury and Wayland petitioned the General Court for
relief, and a special committee of the Legislature sat
in Concord during the recefs to hear and esamine
the complaints and the cause of the trouble. This
committee reported their findings and all the evi-
dence, both documentary and oral, to the Legislature
of 1860. The case of the meadow-owners was so
strong that an act was passed by a great majority ap-
pointing commissioners to take down the dam at Bil-
lerica to the level from which it had been raised by the
Canal Company, and to pay the damages caused by such
reduction of the dam, if any, from the State Treasury.
This act was to take etfect the next September, in
order to give the mill-owners time to substicute steam
for the water-power they might lose. When Septem-
ber came legal proceedings were had, and au injunc-
tion laid on the commisbioners, on the ground that the
State might not pay these damages, which delayed
their action till winter had set in, and the work was
difficult. Meantime a new Legislature had been
chosen, to which the manufacturers were incited to
send representative? by the alarm that' dams were in
danger. The Legislature of 1861, although chosen to
some extent under manul'acturing influence, could
not be induced to repeal the act of the former year,
so strong was the case of the meadow-owners for re-
lief. The most that could be passed was an act to
suspend the former law, and have a commission ap-
pointed to examine into the trouble again. This
commission sat, surveyed and experimented all sum-
mer at an expense of $15,000, and reported to the
next Legislature in substance that although the top
of the dam was higher than the bottom of the river
for its length of over twenty miles, and that there
was only thirty-four inches of fall to the stream in
that distance, there were so many bars and weeds and
rocks in the river that the dam didn't do all the
harm. This report was adopted, and the law taking
down the dam repealed in 1862, so that the meadow-
owners got no relief for the depreciation of their
crops for more than half a century, and the decrease
in value of the land from one hundred to ten or fifteen
dollars an acre; in all a loss of more than a million
dollars by a dam that was never worth or cost more
than $20,000, and the improvident legislation under
which it was built.
Education. — The schools of Concord have been
from the earliest days objects of great interest. The
town had a grammar school before IGSO, and in that
year the constable returned, on an order of the Council,
that he " had made dillegent inquiry and find no de-
fects to return ; " i. e., of any children or youth not
" taught to read the English tongue, have knowledge
of the capital laws, be taught some orthodox cate-
chism, and brought up to some honest employ-
ment." This grammar school has been kept since
1C92 to the present time, some years in the centre of
the town, and in other years partly in the centre and
partly in the different quarters of the town.
After the Revolution the districts were revised,
and the money appropriated for schools divided
among them according to the taxes paid by the resi-
dents, but there uever were legal school districts es-
tablished. In 1831 a new system of division of the
school money was made, by which each district re-
ceived a certain percentage of the sum raised. There
were six outer districts in addition to the ceutre one
as early as the present century. In 1799, when new
echool-houses were built in nearly all of the districts,
a School Committee was chosen for the first time, con-
sisting of five citizens, who had the general charge of
all the schools, and a prudential committee for each
district was usually chosen to provide teachers and
sundries for that school. This system substantially
continued until 1S60, when a larger committee was
chosen, consisting of three from the Centre District
and one each from the other six districts, one-third of
the number being elected annually. Under this new sys-
tem a superintendent of schools was appointed by the
committee, and this plan is still in force. A highschool
was established by this committee, though the gram-
mar school had been called high school for a few
years previous, and a superintendent of schools had
been sometimes chosen before 1S60. The sum raised
by the town for the schools that year was •i'SSOO. This
has been almost yearly increased, till in 1890 S14,400
was raised for schools, besides SI. 000 for text books,
and s800 for repairs of school-houses.
Meantime a itill greater change in the school sys-
tem has taken place. The school-houses in five of
the six outer districts are closed, and the scholars of
each of these districts are brought to and car-
ried from the Centre, so that except at Wtstvale all
the children of the town are taught in the graded Emer-
son School and in the High School, both new and
modern school-houses of eight and four rooms. At
the Junction a new four-room school-house was built
in 1887, and the children of that village, Westvale
and the Reformatory .attend there in a graded school.
The teachers of the grammar and High School since
1830, have been, —
0 C. Field, ISXi-M.
Newton Goodhue, 183.>-36.
E. .1. Marsli, IS30-J7.
Frederick Piirker, 183.S.
Henry D. Tliort-au.-i
Hiram li. Dennis, 1 1839.
Mr. Ellison, )
Mr. Drown, )
Mr, Xourse. ) '' *'•
Henry .\. B.irnlt, lS-K>-42.
Jaiuefl Sliernmn. lS4:i-47.
Sercno D. Hunt, lS47-o5.
Charlea J. Froat, 1855,
Henry Chase, lS5r,-o7.
Cliarlos Carroll, Id.'iS,
Charles A. Allen, ISSS-CO,
Eiiivurd O. Sliep:ird, ISl>-i;2,
C, -V. Stone, IbiJi
X S Fol^iii, iSi^-'I-to.
Einma F. Moore, IS';*;.
Georf^ W. Xeal, I.m;T-71.
H. K. Spauldini:, lS-71.
Charles .\lniy, ^^7.'-T4.
George W. Minns, l.s74-7.'t.
William L, Eaton, l&To and since.
CONCORD.
597
Private Schools. — Since the close of the acad-
emy in 1834, various private schools have existed in
Concord at different times, some of these remarkable
for a high order of teaching and scholarship. As an
instance of longevity and continuance of families in
town, out of twenty-two scholars altending a private
school here, sixteen were living fifty years after its
close, and twelve of these were present at a wedding
in Concord half a century from its commence-
ment.
Societies. — Beside those already mentioned, various
associations were formed that have liad much influence
in this town. The first and oldest, growing out of the
Committee of Safety of the Revolution, is the Social
Circle in Concord. This was formed in 1782 and con-
sists of twenty-five members, meeting at each other's
houses weekly, in the season from October to April.
It has, with two slight interruptions, been steadily
continued to the present time and celebrated its cen-
tennial in 1882. The proceedings of that meeting
were printed with the memoirs of the twenty-five
original members. During this century of its life it
consisted mainly of the leading citizens of the town,
acd contributed to the improvement of Concord in
many ways. Of late years its chief work ha.s been
the preparation of memoirs of all its deceased mem-
bers. In 1889 a second series of these memoirs
was printed, containing sixty-two more, conclud-
ing with that of Ralph Waldo Emerson, by his
sou, and completing the list ti 1839, the dale of
Mr. Emerson's admission, of all who joined the
Circle previously. It is of this club that Emerson
wrote, in 1844, " Much the best society I have ever
known is a club in Concord called the Social Circle,
consisting always of twenty-five of our citizens, doc-
tor, lawyer, farmer, trader, miller, mechanic, etc.
Solidest of men who yield the solidest of gossip."
Perhaps it should be noted, that of the present mem-
bers, only one, Hon. E. R. Hoar, belonged to it at the
time of that writing above quoted.
In 1879 a similar club of fewer members and some-
what younger men was formed, called the Tuesday
Club. Not to be outdone by the gentlemen, last year
the ladies got up a club of their own, which, like the
other two, meets for the same purpose on the same
evening^.
In 1791 a Fire Society was formed, each member
of which was reijuired to keep in readine.ss for use,
two leather buckets, a ladder and a large canvas bag.
It was expected that each member, at an alarm of
fire, would seize his buckets and bag and go to the
scene and help save the property from destruction.
This society, with its annual supper, paid for by the
fiues of delinqueut members, was for many years a
useful and flourishiug institution of the town, till
superseded by a Fire Department in 1855.
The Female Charitable Society was established in
1814 and ha^^ continued ever since its good work of
relieving the wants of the poor and needy. It h:is
now more than a hundred members and a fund of
two thousand dollars.
Musical, Temperance, Coloaization, Anti-Slavery,
Bible and Missionary Societies have existed in Con-
cord for many years, changing from time to time as
their purposes waned or expired. In recent years
church associations, lodges, orders and clubs have
multiplied till they include in their membership a
large part of the population. The latest society, and
destined to become one of the great interest, is the
Concord Antiquarian Society. This was incorporated
in 1887, and received from Mr. Cummings E. Davis
his collection of antiquities and relics valued at
many thousand dollars. The society purchased the
old Reuben Brown house, near the Square, for a
home for their collection, has held regular meet-
ings at which historical papers are read, and by
its annual meeting on the 12th of September keeps up
an interest in the anniversary of the settlement of the
town. The rooms are open daily for visitors, on the
payment of a small fee, and its attractions receive
much praise. It furnishes a nucleus around which in
the future will gather many interesting articles that
will whisper of the Past, and become rarer and more
valuable with years.
The gift of twenty thousand dollars by Miss Mar-
tha Hunt for a Home for the Aged in Concord
caused the incorporation of such an institution in
1886. The large mansion of the late Cyrus Snow, on
Walden Street, was purchased for the purpose, and
several inmates have availed themselves of its shelter
and support.
The literary epoch of Concord closed with, if it did
not culminate in, the School of Philosophy. This was
got up in 1879 by A. Bronson Alcott and held its first
session in his house. It attracted a class of metaphys-
ical thinkers and speakers from various sections of the
land, and was reported largely in the newspapers and
quoted as a new departure in Philosophy. A small
chapel-like structure, capable of holding several
score persons, was built the second year for the
purpose, and in this lectures, essays and discussions
went on for seven summers. Some old and some
new ideas were uttered, some worshiped and some
scoffed, and the world outside made fun of its dialec-
tics and lucubrations. Eminent men and women at
times read papers at its meetings, but the failure of
Alcott's mind and health, and the secession of some
of its leaders, took away from its interest. The at-
tendance fell off, and after a season or two of literary
and biographical notices of Goethe, Dante and Emer-
son, it quietly passed away in 1887 to the oblivion it
merited. The outcome, except to those who attended
its sessions, was little except the ridicule of the unbe-
lieving world.
Newspapers. — In 1S16 Messrs. Bettes & Peters be-
gan the publication of a weekly in Concord called
the Middlesex Gazette. This was changed to the Yeo-
man :< Gazette in 1830, and continued under various
598
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
editors till 1840. The last editor was William S.
EobioEoa, a native of this town, and well known in
ai'ter years as " Warrineton."
Meantime in the Anti-Masonic excitement of 1834
another paper, the Concord Freeman, was published
here by Francis R. Gourgas, and continued by him
and ChsrlesC.Hazewell till aboi't 1850. While these
two rival sheets existed, much controversy went on
between them, and lively, tharp and personal ed-
itorials appesred. A curious instance of their disa-
greement was shown in September, 1835. The Gazette
for several issues was filled with the notes of prepara-
tion for the Bi- Centennial of the town, and printed a
long account of the celebration. The Freeman of
that time makes no mention of the occasion, either be-
fore or after that date, although nearly the whole peo-
ple of the town were present or interested in the
great event.
In 1875 the Concord Freeman was revived as a
branch of the local newspapers of several of the
neighboring towns and still continues to be published.
In 1885 the Concord Transcript was started by Frank
A. Nichols, and i.ssued for a single year, printing in
ihepiiptrof September 19th a full account of the
250th anniversary of the town and a verbatim report
of the speeches at the dinner (with the oration of Sen-
ator Hoar, in a supplement), making over thirty col-
umns of the paper. More recently the Concord En-
terprise was published on the same plan as the Free-
man, and still exists, so that the town has the advan-
tage of two local newspapers and their advertise-
ments.
Manufactures — Damon Manv/acturinff Cum-
pwiy. — The earliest industry engaged in by the col-
onicts of New England, which could properly be
called a manufacture, was the working of iron, estab-
lished in 1G43, in Lynn, Mass. Considerable quanti-
ties of bog-iron ore had been discovered in the
western part of that town, and a company was organ-
ized in London to furnish capital for the erection of
a furnace and forge, which was etl'ected, and the
bufcinets was continued for many years, until the
supply of ore was so far exhausted that it became
unprofitable. The superintendent of the works, about
1668, was Oliver Purchis, who was also one of the
most influential citizens of Lynn, as was indicated by
his election to various oflicfsof civil trust, s>uch as
selectman, town clerk, representative to the General
Court, etc. Through his influence, as is probable, a
company was incorporated on the 5th of March, 1C58,
" to erect one or more Iron Works in Concord." A
considerable deposit of iron ore had been discovered
in the southwest part of the town. The company
was immediately formed, and consisted of (Oliver
Purchis, who held five thirty-seconds of the stock ;
John Payne, a merchant of Boston, thirteen thirty-
seconds ; Edward Bulkley, the parish minister of
Concord ; Robert Meriam, Timothy Wheeler, Sr.,
William Buss, John Niles, Joseph Hay ward, and
Mary Griffin, of Concord, and Michael Baron, of
Woburn, being the other stockholders. Operations
were commenced in 1660. The company had permis-
sion from the General Court, by vote passed May 30,
1660, " to digg iron oiewithout molestation in any land
now in the Court's poesefgion." As a further en-
couragement to the enterprise, a thousand acres of
land, on the north side of the North River, as the
Assabet River was then called, were- granted and
became known as the "Iron Works Farm." A dam
was built across the river, and near its northern end
the iron works were built, and at once went into
aetive operation.
In 1664, on the 18th of October, John Payne sold
eleven ihirty-seccnds of the stock to Simon Lynde,
a merchant of Boston ; and in 1H71, on the 15ih of
December, Oliver Purchis sold all of his stock to the
-ame gentleman. In 1670, on the lOth of December,
John Payne told the remainder of his stock to Thomas
Brattle, a merchant of Cambridge, and on the 19th of
November, 1672, the other stockholders sold their
interest to Mr. Brattle. So that, lielbre the close of
1672, the whole properly was owned in ef|ual -shares
by Simon Lynde and Thomas Brattle, both of them
wealthy and iLfiueniial men in the Colony.
In 1684, on the 30th of May, the half belonging to
Mr. Brattle was sold to James Russell, Esq., of
Charlestown. The description of the property is of
interest. The deed conveyed "one moyety or half
part of al! the Iron Mills and Iron Works or Forge
at Concord aforesaid, together with one moyety or half
part of ?11 the laud whereupon the 'rame doth stand,
and of all the Ponds, Dams. Gates, Headwards, ^V'a-
ters. Water-courses, Rivers, Fi^hillgs, Gears, Harnes-
ses, Bellows, Hammers, Anvills, Houses, Shedds,
Buildings, Scales, Weights, Utensils, Tools and Im-
plements whatsoever, to the same belonging.''
The share of Simon Lynde was conveyed, Decem-
ber 13, 1694, to Nathaniel Cary, a merchaut of
Charle=town. The terras of the deed show that the
iron works were still in operation in 1694. On the
1st day of April, 1700, Mr. Cary sold bis share to
James Russell, who thus became sole proprietor.
This deed conveyed " one moyety or half part of all
the land whereupon the iron works did formerly
stand," showing that, between 1094 and 1700, the
works had ceased to be operated.
In 1702, on the 3l8t of March, Mr. Russell con-
veyed to Jonathan Prescott, " chirurgeou " of Con-
cord, " eighty-eight acres on the north side of the
North River, adjoining to ye said river, both above
and below the old Iron Works or Forge." This deed
makes no reference to any grist or other mill on the
premises, but speaks of a road on the south side of
the river, leading to Hay ward's corn- mill, which
was on another iirivilege on the brook which enters
the .\.ssabet River, a short distance below the Iron
Works Dam.
On the 14th of January, 1708-09, Dr. Pretcott con-
CONCORD.
599
veyed the property to Josiah Wood, of Beverly, Mass.
The deed embraced " eighty-eight acres and a small
dwelling-house thereon standing, as also a corn-mill
and a forge or iron-works thereon standing, with all
the tools, implements and utensills i)roperly belonging
to and for the use of," showing that some part at least
of the old iron-works and tools still remained and
were in operation, probably only for the convenience
of the people in the vicinity for work ordinarily done
in a blacksmith's shop. The manufacture of iron from
the ore had, without doubt, been abandoned some
years previously from the failure of the supply of ore.
The deed also shows that, before 1708, a corn or grist-
mill had been built at this dam, so utilizing a part of
the power.
On the 12th of March, 1714-15, Mr. Wood conveyed
to Jonathan Herrick and Lot Conant, Jr., both of
Beverly, Mass., " the very place or same, which was
conyionly called the Iron Works Farm, where the old
works stood, and the which now doth contain the
new dwelling-house that I at present dwell in, as also
another small dwelling-house stands upon itt, together
with a barn and a shop, as also two mills, the one of
which is a grist-mill and the other a fulling-mill, all
stand upon the premises with a dam to them belong-
ing." From this deed it appears that, before 1714, a
fulling-mill or clothier-shop for fulling and dressing
the homespun and home-woven cloth made in the vi-
cinity, had been established on the privilege, which,
after the lapse of nearly a century and three quarters,
is occupied for a branch of the woolen manufacture
in successful operation.
The property remained in the hands of Mr. Conant
and his descendants for nearly a century. His
grandsons. Lot and Ezra, on the loth of June, 1808,
sold three-fifihs of the privilege to Ephraim Hartwell,
of New Ipswich, X. H. and John Brown, of Concord.
These person.^ entered into partnership, under style of
Hartwell & Brown, for the purpose of establishing
a cotton factory. Ephraim Hartwell was a pioneer in
the cotton manufacture in New Hampshire, having,
with Charles Barrett and Benjamin Champney, built
the tir.st cotton factory in that State, at New Ipswich,
in 1S04. There is little doubt that they at once car-
ried out their purpose and that one of the earliest
cotton factories in New England was then established
at what is now called West vale. It was a consider-
able enterprise for those times, as in 1813, on the 19th
of February, Ephraim Hartwell Bellows, a nephew
of Ephraim Hartwell, paid six thousand dollars for
one-third of the factory and land, and became a mem-
ber of the firm, the style being changed to Hartwell,
Brown & Company. Mr. Bellows afterwards, by pur-
chase or inheritance — probably the latter, as there is
no record of a deed — became the owner of Hartwell's
share of the property. On the 14th of July, 1817,
John Brown sold four-fifths of his interest to Caleb
Bellows, of Windsor, N. H. who thus became a part-
ner in the tirm, the style of w hich was changed to E.
H. Bellows & Co. On the 23d of July, 1823, E. H.
Bellows purchased from the administrator of the es-
tate of Caleb Bellows, deceased, the interest which
had belonged to that gentleman. Messrs. Bellows &
Brown continued the business until 1825, when, in
consequence of certain disagreements between them,
Mr. Bellows determined that the business should stop.
This gave rise to a lawsuit, which became one of the
caunw celehres of the period. It was decided in favor
of the plaintiff, Mr. Brown, and Mr. Bellows sold for
ten thousand dollars the whole property to Thomas
Lord & Company, commission merchants in Boston,
the deed being dated April 14, 1831.
On the 20th of September, 1833, Thomas Lord &
Company sold the property to James Derby, of Ex-
eter, N. H., a manufacturer of cotton and woolen ma-
chinery. Mr. Derby established his business in a
part of the factory, which was then a building of
wood, one hundred feet long and five stories high, in-
cluding the basement and attic. He continued the
business there but a little more than a year, and on
the 26th of December, 1834, sold it to Calvin C. Da-
mon, of Framingham, Mass., for eighteen thousand
dollars. The mill was run by Mr. Damon as de-
scribed in his memoirs at the end of this sketch of
Concord.
The charge of the mill was assumed by Mr.
Damon's eldest son, Edward Carver Damon. He was
born in Concord, Mass., July 19, 1836. In addition
to instruction in th? schools of his native town, he
enjoyed the advantage of attendance, for several
terms, at the Lawrence Academy, Groton, Mass., and
the Phillips Academy, Andover, Mass., both of them
seminaries of a high grade. On the occurrence of
the sickness of his father and the consequent stop-
page of the mill, he closed his attendance on school,
and though yet lacking some six months of being
eighteen years of age, and with only such knowledge
of the operations of the mill as he had gained by
employment in it during the intervals of the school
and academic terms, he started up the mill. Assum-
ing the entire charge of the business, he continued it
with efficiency and success till the summer of 1862. On
the 19th of June of that year the mill, which was of
wood, was destroyed by fire. Arrangements were im-
mediately made and the new mill, constructed of
brick and with reference not only to the essential re-
quirements of the business, but to architectural taste
and proportions, was completed in 1863.
Mr. Damon continued the business alone till May,
1864, when he received as partner Henry F. Smith,
his cousin, their mothers being sisters, and nieces of
I James Johnson, the commission merchant of Boston,
referred to above. Mr. Smith had had a somewhat
varied experience in woolen-mills. He was em-
ployed by George H. Gilbert, at Ware, Mass., from
1851 till about 1853, when he went to Rock Bottom,
Mas.s., and entered the employ of B. W. Gleasou,
whose partner, Samuel J. Dale, had receutly died.
600
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
He remained at Rock Bottom some two years, and in
the winter of 1854-55 went to Holderness, N. H., and
thence, after a few months, to Ballardvale, Mass.,
where he was associated with J. Putnam Bradley till
1863. In May, 1S64, he was received into partner-
chip hy Edward C. Damon, under the style of Damon,
Smith & Co. On the 1st of May, 1865, Benjamin
Harper Damon, a younger brother of Edward, born
in Concord, Mass., September 15, 1843, and having
been trained in the work of the mill, became a part-
ner. He lived less than two years after his admission
to the firm, his death occurring November 11, 1866.
The firm of Damon, Smith & Company was dis-
solved Dec, 1876, Mr. Smith retiring, and Edward
P. Almy becoming a partner, under the firm-name of
Damon & Almy. Mr. Almy was a practical woolen
manufacturer, having been educated to the business
in the American Mills, at Rockville, Conn. He bad
also operated a small woolen-mill in Windham, N.
H., for about a year and a half before associating
himself with Edward C. Damon. This partnership
continued about four years, and on the 1st day of
December, 1880, Mr. Damon purchased the interest
of Mr. Almy, and organized ajoint-stock corporation
under the name of the Damon Manufacturing Com-
pany.
The business, in the nearly sixty years since the
Damons took control, has been largely increased and
diversified, especially in the last ten years. The
various kinds of goods manufactured in the past two
year.< comprise one hundred and fifty styles. The
annual product is now over thirty thousand pieces, or
one million two hundred and fifty thousand yards, in
the place of seven thousand pieces, or two hundred
and twenty-five thousand yards, made in the old mill.
The number of persons employed has increased from
forty to one hundred and sixty. The hours of labor
have decreased from thirteen in the summer and
eleven in the winter .season, to ten hours for a day's
work, and the wages have increased in a greater pro-
portion. The present officers of the corporation are :
Ralph H. Damon, president : Edward C. Damon,
treasurer ; Charles E. Manock, superintendent.
The manufacture of lead pipe waa begun in 1819
and of sheet lead iu 1831, by David Lcring, at the
falls of the brook into the Assabet, half a mile east
of Westvale. This continued till about 1850, when it
was changed to a wooden-ware factory, and has been
enlarged and the businei's much increased since. The
junction formed by the Lowell and Framingham Rail-
road crossing the Fitchburg Railroad near this pail
factory about 1870, and the building of the prison iu the
vicinity, have given an impulse to manufacturing in
this part of Concord. Several other establishments
are in operation or are building there, and the latest,
a leather harness factory, owned by Mr. Harvey
VVheeler, of Concord, is now in operation. This
section promises to become the busy industrial por-
tion of the town, and to uuild up a uew town with
these various industries. Meantime the old or central
part of Concord is becoming rather more a place of
residence than of business.
Prison.— In 1873 commissioners were appointed,
under a resolve of the Legislature, to build a new State
Prison. This was located in the westerly part of
Concord by the decision of the Governor and Council.
The prisoners were removed here from Charlestown
in 1878, and after being here six years were taken
back to the old prison. The Massachusetts Reform-
atory was established in Concord in the piace of the
State Prison. A few of the best behaved prisoners
svere returned to the Reformatory and it soon filled up
to the maximum. Col. Gardner Tufts was appointed
superintendent and has hail the charge of the insti-
tution to the present time. The inmates are divided
into three classes according to their behavior, wear
different uniforms and have different privileges. By
a recent law, sentences to the Reformatory are made
indeterminate, and convicts are to be kept here not
more than two years for minor ofl'ences and not more
than five years for airgravated crimes. There are
about seven hundred in confinement, instriicttd,
guarded and employed by nearly fifty officers,
who make, with their families, ([uite a village.
Several different industries are carried on for the em-
ployment of the prisoners, and the institution is
highly commended.
FiRE.s. — The firstand the most serious loss by fire iu
this town was the burning of the Simon Williird
house, at the foot of Nashawtuck Hill, in the middle
of the seventeenth century. By this the earliest
records of Concord were destroyed, and the names of
the first settlers, the division of lands among them,
their trades and troubles with the Indians, and with
each other, were lost forever. In 1784 Samuel Heald's
house was burned and three lives were lost. In 1819
the alms-house was destroyed by fire and the same
year the Centre School-house, causing considerable
loss to the town as a municipality. In 1823 Col.
William Whiting's carriage factory and part of his
dwelling-house on Main Street were consumed. In
1829 a new house, built by Major Samuel Burr on
Monument Street, was burned before it was entirely
finished. In 1834 another large fire destroyed the
foundry and blacksmith-shops of Whiting's carriage
factory. In 1842 the large, new store of Phineas How
was robbed, set on fire and burnt. In 1845 the old
Middlesex Hotel was consumed by a fire which hap-
pened during the June term of the Court, much to
the inconvenience of those attending that session. In
1849 ttie court-house was set on fire and burnt, with
the dwelling-house and stable of Mr. Keyes adjoin-
ing. In 1859 the large mansion on the Lee farm, on
the site of the Simon Willard house, and occupied
by Harvard College in 1776, was burnt, and in ly62
Damon's woolen factory sharetl the same fate. Several
other dwellings and barns and shops have been
burned, but those mentioned are the most important.
CONCORD.
601
Since the introduction of the water no large fire has
occurred in the town, and the losses by fire here have
been slight.
Musical Matters. — Some attention was early
given to psalmody, and singiog-schools were the first
and almost the only amusement of the young people
of the olden time. Musical societies were formed
after this century began, and aided the improvement
of this art. Until 1800 the tuning-fork for the church
choir was the only instrument used. Soon after that
year a bass-viol, a violin, a clarionet and flute were
added to the voices in sacred music on Sundays.
On the remodeling of the old meeting-house, in
1841, an organ was procured, and with it came a new
interest in the choir: some well-trained, sweet voices
made melody never before heard here. The town
appropriated money for singing-schools, and these in
the winter evenings were well attended by both old
and young. Later an instrumental band was formed
that for several years furnished pleasing music for
public occasions i»nd village concerts. A choral club
is the latest and best of the musical societies. This,
besides occasional concerts, has as its climax brought
out the opera of "Priscilla, or the Puritan Proxy," an
original production of its members, which has been
received with favor by several audiences both here
and elsewhere, and shows the great stride from psalms
to opera.
A play-ground containing four acres of level land
was presented to the town in 1887 by the family of
Ralph Waldo Emerson. It is situated near the Em-
erson School on Hubbard Street, and is admirably
adapted to furnish a place for out-door games and
sports. In the future it will have apparatus for gym-
nastic exercises and probably a gymnasium within its
limits. The control and improvement of the play-
ground is vested in officers chosen by the town,
and it affords now almost the only open space in
the centre for military drill and the plays of youth.
Of course in these days this town could not fail to
take an interest in the national game and form a
base-ball club. Under the management of Mr. Wil-
liam Barrett this has become a popular institution of
the town. It has played nearly every week of the
last season on the Agricultural Grounds and attracted
crowds of people to see games with similar clubs of
amateurs. In nearly every instance the Concords have
been successful, and if they persevere in this course the
town will have reason to be proud of this latest
achievement of her boys.
Taverns. — The earliest tavern in Concord of which
there is a record is that of William Buss, in 1660.
This stood near the present library building and was
kept by William several years, though he objected to
selling liijuor and asked to be relieved from that part
of the business.
In 1GG6 John Haywood kept a tavern, which, if not
the same .o-s that of Buss, stood quite near it. This
part of the present Main Street was for two hun-
dred years the site of one or more taverns. The Black
Horse Tavern, which in the next century gave the
name to the seceding church, if not one of these two
earlier taverns, was very nearly on the same site.
The Wright tavern, built in 1747, and still standing
on the Common, was kept as a public-house till after
the Revolution, when it was changed to a bake-house
and used as such for the next half century. This change
did not take from itquite all its character as "a public,"
for while Deacon Jarvis was the baker, it was resorted
to on Sunday noons for lunch by many who stayed for
afternoon service. After the baking business was
given up it held various tenants, both for domestic
and trading purposes, until about 1882, it was restored to
its original design, and is still kept as a tavern under
h-i first name.
Previous to the Revolution Ephraim Jones kept a
tavern at the west end of the Main Street burying-
ground, in a large, roomy house, that had grown by
various additions, perhaps from that of John Hay-
wood. The site of this, now the fine lawn of Colonel
R. F. Barrett's residence, was close to the old wooden
jail, and feeding the prisoners was part of the tavern-
keeper's business. This tavern continued, under the
charge of a son of Ephraim Jones, and under Major
Paine, Nathan Patch and Han well Bigelow, to be"the
resort of the teamsters who carried over the highway
from Boston to Keene, N. H., the bulk of the trade
of this section till after the railroad took away their
business.
After the Revolution John Richardson opened a pub-
lic house on the Common, in what is now the priest's
house. After the stone jail in the rear of this was
built, he swapped houses with the county and took
the corner of the Main Street for the tavern, which
was enlarged and improved into the Middlesex Hotel.
Here he and his successors did a thriving business
of a better class of custom than the Bigelow tavern
for half a century. This hotel was the sojourn of the
lawyers, jurors and witnesses during the terms of
court, furnished the dinners for the conventions and
cattle-shows, the suppers of the societies and the balls
of the village. Its ample bar-room on the front
corner was the scene of many jolly carouses, and its
public room, overhead, held many gatherings of the
more sober and sedate sort, while the large hall in
the third story had dancing schools and parties, both
numerous and gay. In 1845, while occupied by
Thomas D. Wesson, it was burned, and the present
building was erected by him the next year. Mr.
Wesson, then an old man, long a tavern-keeper, could
not see the change made in travel by the railroads,
and persisted in rebuilding on the same plan as the
old hotel, instead of adopting a newer style. The
result was unsuccessful, and the house, under various
landlords, has never filled the demand for a hotel of
the modern type. After the removal of the courts its
business fell off, and for several years past it has been
closed and neglected, until now, almost a ruin, it
60S
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
is an eye-sore to the citizens and a disgrace to its
owner.
Early in this century a third tavern was opened in
the village, and was Icdpt by Major Wheelock, in the i
house on the Main Street nearly opposite the present
library building. This was owned by Dr. Isaac Hard,
and was enlarged by several additions as the business
increased, and kept by various landlords for the next
twenty-five years. In 1829, Wca. Shepherd, a proprie-
tor of the line of stages from Boston to Keeiie, bought
this hotel, and kept it for the next ten years under the
sign of " Shepherd's Coffee-House." In his hands it
acquired much fame and was noted as one of the best
hotels outside of Boston. Mr. Shepherd added a large
hall for dancing parties, and had the best custom of
the town and the road, while the stage passengers
stopped there for breakfast and supper. He left Con-
cord in 1839, selling the tavern, which passed through
several landlords, the last of whom Colonel Joseph
Holbrook, after keeping it as a hotel till about ISUO,
moved off the hall, and converted both that and the
main hotel into dwelling houses.
Of course the most profitable [lart of the business of
these taverns was selling liquor over the bar to their
thirsty customers. Before the temperance reforma-
tion had made such a change in the habits of drink-
ing, a line of customers could be seen daily wending
their way from workshops, fields and house?, at eleven
and four o'clock, for their forenoon and afternoon
bitters. On a still summer day the music of the
several toddy sticks crunching the sugar and clink-
ing the glasses could be heard through the main street
of the village at the hours above named. But the
taverns at last had to yield to the growing seiuiment
for prohibition and no license, though they kept up
the fight stoutly till the law prevailed, the bar-
rooms closed, the taverns shut their doors, and
for a time Concord had no lavern in its borders.
Since then the Wright Tavern has been re-opened,
and in 1889 the Thoreau House was started as a hotel
on the north side of the Common.
Mention might have been made of several other
houses, some still standing, that for longer or shorter
periods were kept as taverns in this town, notably the
Wheeler House, on Great South road at the Nine
Acre Corner ; but this must suflBce on the subject.
Town Donatioxs. — Peter Wright, a weaver by
trade, in 1718, devised to the town by his will as fol-
laws : " Unto ye poore of the Town of Concord that
shall be, I do will and bequea'h unto their use all
the produce and income of all my real estate (after the
death of my wife) forever. The orderingof thesame I
do empower the worthy minister of the said town that
either is or shall be, together with the selectmen that
shall be successively forever. The minister that shall
be to have a double vote to any one that shall be of
the selectmen that shall be in that affair." This was
the beginning of the Silent Poor Fund in Concord,
and this donation now amounts lo $3UU.
John Beaton in 1776 gave to the poor of Concord
the sum of one hundred pounds, and this now amounts
to !f400. John Cuming in 1782 gave to the same ob-
ject the sum of one hundred and fifty pounds sterling,
which now amounts to ;:<900. Abel Barrett in 1802
gave to the Silent Poor the sum of §500. Jonathan
Wheeler in 1809 gave a similar amount for the same
purpose. Ephraim Merriam in 1844 gave SSOO to
this fund. Perez Blood in 1857 gave his wood lot to
the town for the same object, and it realized on a sale
the sum of S1200. Charles Merriam, of Boston, in
1S64 gave $1000 to this fund. Reuben Hunt, of
Charlestown, in 1867 added ^'loOO. Samuel Barrett,
of Concord, gave by his will S500 more. Ebenezer
Hubbard in 1872 added SIOOO. Abel Hunt in 1874
bequeathed $1000. The trustees of William Monroe,
uuder his will, in 1880 gave $1000. Cyrus Stow in
1877 bequeathed the sum of s800. Lydia Russell
Whiting, the widow of William Whiting, of Boston,
in 1882 by her will added $2000. Reuben N. Rice in
1884 bequeathed $2000. Sundry persons have added
to this fund $175, and the whole now amounts to
$14,175, the income of which is distributed annually
in the manner directed by the first giver a century
and three-quarters ago.
For Schooh. — John Beaton and John Cuming gave
the same sums as above to the Silent Poor, viz., .$400
and $900, and Cyrus Stow gave by his will .$3U00 to
the High School, which, invested in real estate, is
now by accumulations $4000.
For Shade Treen. — Reuben N. Rice left by his will
for this object $2000.
Seini-Ceidennial Fund of 81000. — The Hapgood
Wright Fund, already mentioned, is to accumulate for
fifty years, and the income then to be spent as the town
by a two-thirds vote may determine, and the princi-
pal to be again put on interest for another half-cen-
tury, and the income thfeu spent, and so on indefi-
nitely.
Cemetery Donations. — Twentysi.\" persons have given
to the town various sums for the care and preserva-
tion of their lots in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery, and in
some cases the surplus income for the general use of
the cemetery, amounting in all to $4750. Other per-
sons in 1860 subscribed to a fund for the care and im-
provement of the cemetery that now amounts to
$2000. All these funds are in the charge of three
Trustees of Town Donations, who are chosen as va-
cancies in their number occur, and this arrangement
has existed for nearly a century.
By the act of 1872 for introducing Sandy Pond
water into Concord, the Trustees of Town Donations
have the charge of the Sinking Fund for the water
debt, and they now hold over $22,000 for that pur-
pose.
Before the Town Library was incorporated dona-
tions to the amount of several thousand dollars had
been made to the town for the support of die library.
These funds were transferred with the books to the
CONCORD.
603
Free Public Library corporation and are now heid by
that institution.
CHAPTER XLVI.
CONCORD— \ Continued).
Pro/euioiial aud Official CUuetif — Couctnmoii.
Clergymen. — Beside those already mentioned
as ministersof the First Parish (now Unitarian), Rev.
Hersey B. Goodwin was settled as a colleague with
Rev. Dr. Ripley in 1829, and died in 1836. Rev.
Barziliai Frost succeeded him; settled in 1837, and
died in 1758. Rev. Grindall Reynolds was settled in
1858, and resig-ned in 1882, but has continued as
honorary pastor since. Rev. Benjamin Reynolds
Bulkeley was his eucceesor, and is the present min-
ister.
Over the Second Parish, the Orthodox Society.
Rev. Asa Rand preached the first year, 1826. Rev.
Daniel S. Sonthmayd was settled in 1827, and re-
signed in 1832. Rev. John Wilder was settled in
1833, and resigned in 1839. Rev. James Means was
settled in 1839, and resigned in 1844. He was suc-
ceeded by Rev. "William L. Mather, who resigned in
1849, and Rev. Luther Farnham served till 1850,
then Daniel Foster till 1851 ; Rev. Luther H.
Angier, from 1851 to 1858 ; Rev. Charles B. Smith,
from 1861 to 1863 ; Rev. Edmund S. Potter, from 1863
to 1860 ; Rev. Frank Haley, to 1867 ; Rev. C. H. S.
Williams, 1867 to 1870; Rev. Andrew J. Rogers, 1871
tolS72; Rev. Henry M. Grant, 1S72 to 1886; and
Rev. William A. Depew from 1886 to 1890.
The Universalist Society had one minister, Rev.
Addison G. Fay, who was settled in 1842 and re-
signed in 1846.
The Catholics who succeeded to the church of the
Universalists have had for priests : Rtv P. J. Can-
iiey, from January, 1868. to August, 1870; Rev. F.
Dclahanty, from August, 1870, to December, 1870;
Rev. John O'Brien, from January, 1871, to 1873 ; Rev.
T. Brosnahan, from 1873 to January, 1877; Rev. M.
J. McCdll, from 1877 to the present time.
Rev. John A. Crow has for some years been in charge
of the Catholic worship at the Reformatory. Eev.
W. J. Batt is the chaplain of that institution.
An Episcopal chapel was built here in 1885, and
services have been conducted in it since by Rev. Mr.
Rand, Rev. Mr. Judkins and Rev. Mr. Breed.
At Westvale a religious society is formed, to which
Rev. H. G. Buckingham, Methodist, preached in
1SS6-S7, and Rev. Bartlett H. Weston, Congregation-
alist ill lSSS-89, and a church is soon to be organized.
Lawyer.--. — John Hoar is the earliest lawyer in
the town, if not in the Colony, and he was ordered
not to practice in 1660, and died iu 1704, being noted
for his difficulties with the church and his humanity
to the Indians.
Peter Bulkeley, son of the first minister, held many
places of honor and trust in the Colonv, and died in
1688.
Daniel Bliss, a son of the minister, was an ardent
Tory, left Concord in 1775, had his property confis-
cated, and settled in New Brunswick, where he be-
came chief justice.
Jonathan Fay came to Concord from Westborough
in 1780, and practiced his profession here till his
death, in 1811.
John L. Tuttle opened an office here in 1799, and
was postmaster and county treasurer till he led a reg-
iment to the Canada frontier in the War of 1812, aud
died in the army, being robbed and poisoned.
John Merrick practiced law here for ten years be-
fore 1797, when he died at the age of thirty-six years.
William Jones, a native of the town, had an office
here for a few years after being admitted to the bar
in 1795, moved to Maine and held important posi-
tions there.
Thomas Heald practiced law in Concord from the
beginning of the century to 1813, when he went south
and became a judge in A 'abama.
Samuel Hoar, a descendant of Jolin Hoar, was
born in Lfncoln, started in practice in Concord in
1807, and took the foremost rank in his profession.
He was chosen Representative in Congress in 1836,
and sent to Charleston, S. C, in 1844, as agent for
Massachusetts to protect negro sailors from being sold
as slaves. He was forcibly sent home by the pro-
slavery mob, and narrowly escaped violent treatment.
He retired from practice in 1849, after representing
the town in both branches of the General Court, and
died in 1857, universally beloved and lamented.
John Keyes, a native of Westford, came here in
1812, took the practice and the offices of Colonel Tut-
tle, held the positions of postmaster and county treas-
urer for twenty-five years, was Senator and Represen-
tative several years and died in 1844, at the age of
fifty-eight years.
Nathan Brooks, born in Lincoln, opened his office
here in 1811, and became secretary of the Middlesex
Mutual Fire Insurance Company in 1826, and con-
tinued in that office till his death in 1863. Mr.
Brooks beside service in the Legislature and the Gov-
ernor's Council, had a large practice in the Probate
Court as administrator or executor of a large number
of estates.
Elisha Fuller practiced law in Concord from 1823
to 1831, when he removed to Lowell.
John Milton Cheney, who gr.adua'ed in 1821 at
Harvard College, studied law with Hon. Rufus Hos-
mer, at Stow, settled here in June, 1831, and was
made cashier of the Concord Bank in 1832. In 1836
he was chosen treasurer of the Middlesex Institution
for Savings, and filled both places till his death, in
1869. AVhile healoue discharged the duties of these
604
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
positions, the great robbery of the bank safe took
place in 18G7. In broad daylight at noon the bank
was entered, the safe opened, and $300,000 in bills
and securities was carried off by two expert cracks-
men. Of this, $200,000 was afterwards secured and
restored to the institution.
Albert H. Nelson, a son of Dr. Nelson, of Carlisle,
graduated at Harvard, studied law and began the
practice here in 183G, in partnership with John
Keyes. He afterwards opened an oflBce on his own
account and continued here till 1841, when he re-
moved to Woburn. There he had a large practice
and was district attorney for the Northern District
for two years, 1846 to 1848. He served two years in
the Senate and was a Councillor in ISoo. He was
that year appointed chief justice of the Superior
Court of Suffolk County, and held that office till his
death, in 1858.
Ebenezer Rockwood Hoar began practice in Con-
cord in 1839; waa appointed justice of the Common
Pleas Court in 1849, and served five years ; in 1859
was appointed to the Supreme Judicial Court, and
served there ten years; in 1SG9 wa-f Attorney-Gene-
ral of the United States, and in 1872 a member of the
High Joint Commission to settle the disputes with
England growing out of the War of the Rebellion.
After this he resumed practice in Boston ; was coun-
sel in many important causes, and, though par-
tially retired from active work in his profession, still
appears in court occasionally. He served one year in
the State Senate, and one term as member of Con-
gress, in 1873-75.
John S. Keyes opened an office here with his father,
in 1844 ; waa sheriff of Middlesex County from 1853
to 1860; United States marshal for Massachusetts
from 1861 to li66, and since 1874 has been standing
justice of the District Court of Central Middlesex.
George Merrick Brooks, son of Nathan, began as a
lawyer, in 1847, in Concord; held the oflBce of State
Senator in 1859, and of Representative in Congress, in
1869-71 ; was appointed judge of Probate and Insolv-
ency for this county in 1871, and still fills that office.
Charles W. Goodnow practiced law here from 1848
till his death, in 1856.
George Hey wood studied law with Samuel Hoar;
began practice in 1851 ; has been Representative and
Senator in the General Court, member of the Govern-
or's Council, and is now president of the Concord
National Bank and of the Insurance Company, and
has been town clerk more than thirty-seven years.
Charles Thompson, a native of Sudbury, has prac-
ticed law in Concord since the war, and was trial
justice here from 1872 to 1874, and is an associate
justice of the District Court.
Charles H. Walcott opened an office here and in
Boston, in 1874, and is now chairman of the State
Board of Arbitration and Conciliation.
Prescott Keyes, son of John S., has also had an
office here and in Boston since 1SS2.
Henry A. Richardson has recently begun the prac-
tice of law in Concord.
Judge Henry F. French resided here from 1870,
till his death in 18S5, although his duties as As-
sistant Secretary of the Treasury in Washington
kept him there for nearly ten years.
George A. King, Samuel Hoar and Woodward Hud-
son reside in Concord and practice law mainly in
Boston.
In 1877 every board of town officers save the Fire
Department had a lawyer at its head.
PuYsiriAXrj. — In addition to the long !ist of those
in Concord prior to 1835, as given in Shattuck's
" History of Concord," there may be now mentioned :
Dr. EJward Jarvis, a native of Concord, who prac-
ticed from 1832 to 1837, when he went to Louisville,
Kentucky. He returned to Massachusetts in 1843,
settled in Dorchester, and made a specialty of the
care of insane persons. He took great interest in sta-
tistics, founded a stat-stical society in Boston ; was a
trustee of the Worcester Lunatic Hospital ; wrote
voluminous reports, lecture, pamphlets and books;
represented his society in the Imernational Statisti-
cal Congress, in England, in 1860; did much labor
for the censu.s of that year and of 1870, and, after a
long and useful life, died in 1884, and was buried in
Concord.
Dr. Henry A. Barrett, a son of Col. Sherman Bar-
rett, of Concord, began practice here in 1845, in the
place of Dr. Isaac Hurd, and continued till his death,
in 1889.
Dr. Edward W. Emerson began in 1873 to practice
herein partnership with Dr. Josiah Bartlett, who had
been the ler.ding physician since 1819. and continued
I after Dr. Bartlett's death in 1878, till he gave up his
profession in 1884.
Dr. George E. Titcomb succeeded to Dr. Emerson's
I practice in 1884. Dr. N. H. Kirby began to practice
I here in 1888 and Dr. Braley in 1889, and all continue
I in Concord to the present time. Other physicians
I have at various times practiced in Concord, — Drs.
Gallup, Sawyer, Whiting and Ballon, as homa?opa-
thists; Drs. Tewksbury and Dillingham as eclectics,
and some others.
GRADrATES. — Since the publication of Shattiick's
" History," the following Concord young men gradu-
ated at Harvard College:
18.^4, lleorge Moore ; lS;i5, Iltrant Barrett DeniiiB, Eliene7er RuckwiRtd
Hoar; 1817, Henry David Tboreuu ; 1S4I, John ?liepard Keyi-a , 1144,
George dlcrrick Brooks, Edward Sbennan Hoar; 1S45, Gorliain Ifcirt-
lett ; 1 84G, George Frisbio Hoar: 1.S47, George Hey wood ; ISlfl, Josepb
Boydon Iveyes; IS^n, Epbmtru Merriani Ball; I80I. Nalltaii Henry Bar-
rett; 18o4, riiarles Pickering Gerribb ; 18ot>, Nebeniiiili Ball, George
Brooks Bigelow ; 1»5», Henry Walker Frost ; 1804, Charles Henry Hil-
dretb, Gardner Wbltuey Lawrence ; I8'i6, Kd^^ard Waldo Emerson ;
18(37, Samuel Hoar; William Hamlnatt ^intniODs ; ISTO. Charles Emer-
son Hoar. (Jbarles Hosnier Walcutt ; 1871. Henry Natbau Wheeler ; IsTo,
Francis Hagar Bigelow ; 1874, Edward Emoraon Simmons; 187*1, Frank
Wheeler Barrett ; 1870, Woodward Hudson, Prescijtt Keyes ; 188_', Sbcr-
iiiau Hoar; 188,1, George lleywood; 1881, Herbert Wheeler Blalicliard ,
George Williaui Brown ; 188G, Thounie Parker Sunborii ; 18S7, Nt-lson
Miuy U;irrctt.
CONCORD.
605
Making, with the sixty-six whose Dsmes are given
in Sbatt'Jck'R " History," over one hundred graduated
from Concord since John Bulkley, in the first class in
1642. This gives an average of more than one stu-
dent in the college all the years of its existence.
Statistics. — The population of Concord was : 1840,
1784; 1850, 2249; 1865, 2244; 1860, 2246; 1865,
2232; 1870, 2412; 1875, 2676; 1880, 3922; 1885,
3727 ; 1890, 4435. Number of legal voters, in 1885,
760. Valuation of real estate in 1889, $2,194,020;
valuation of personal estate, $1,165,017 ; number of
polls, 957; number of dwelling-houses, 639; number
of horses, 575; number of cows, 1528; number of
other cattle, 259; number of swine, 208; number of
acres of land, 14,879. Rate of taxation, $10.40 on
$1000.
Officials of the United States Government.
— E. R. Hoar, United States Attorney-General, 1869,
and member High Joint Commission, 1872 ; J. S.
Keyes, U. S. Marshal, 1861 to 1866 ; A. G. Fay,
Provost Marshal, 1863-64; L. Eaton, assessor inter-
nal revenue, 1865-66; Richard Barrett, Edwin S.
Barrett, George Keyes and D. G. Lang served as
Deputy United States Marshals during and since the
war; William W. Wilde, Geo. Keyes, H. H. Buttrick
and Lyman Clark were in the Boston Custom-House
before and after the war ; Samuel Hoar, Representa-
tive in Congress, 1835 ; George M. Brooks, Represen-
tative in Congress, 1869; E. R. Hoar, Representative
in Congress, 1873. Be>ides these three, two others:
William Whiting, of Boston, and George F. Hoar, of
Worcester, have been members of Congress. The
five lived, and four of them were born on an acre of
land on Main Street, in Cjncord, and one of these
has been a member of the Cabinet, and another is a
Senator in Congress now.
Two graduates of the West Point Military Acade-
my, Amiel W. Whipple in 1840, and Elbert Wheeler
in 1874, were both appointed cadets from the same
house in the southwest part of the town, known as the
" Nine Acre Corner."
OmaALS OF THE Commonwealth of BIassachi'SETts.— Lieutenant-
Governor, Sioion Brown, 1855 ; Slate Treasurer, Josepli Barrett, I&4.S-49 ;
Councillors. Natban Brooks, 1829-:jl, George Hej'wood, 1880-83 ; State
Board of Arbitration and Conciliation, Charles FI. Walcott, 1886 ; Clerk
of the Senate, Henry D. Coolidge, 188!>-90; Senators: Joseph Hosmer,
178.i-93; John S. Tiittle, 1808-12; John Keyes 1822-29 ; Samuel Hoar,
1825, '32; Nathan Brooks, 1831, '35 ; Daniel Shattuck, 18.3C; Phineas
How, 1S41 ; Ephraini Merriain, 1842 ; F. E. Gourgas, 1843 ; E. E.
Hoar, 18411 ; J. S. Keyes, 1849 ; C. C. Hazewell, 1852 ; E. W. Bull, .1850 ;
George M. Brooke, 1859 ; George Heywood, 1865 ; Henry J. Hosmer,
1889-90 ; Trial Justice, Charles Thompson, 1872-73.
Officials of MmnLESEX Cor.vTV. — Justice of Court of Common Pleas,
Ephmim Wood, 1785-93 ; Justice of Court of Sessions, Abiet Heywood,
1801-27; Judge of Probate, George M. Brooks, 1671- ; County Treasu-
rers : John L. Tuttle, 1808-12 ; John Keyes, 1812-37 ; Stedman Buttrick,
1837-55; Sheriffs : Joseph Hosmer, 1794-1808; William Uildretb, 1809-
13 ; John S. Keyes, 1863-00.
Officials of the Tow.n of CoNCOBn.— Town Clerks : Abiel Heywood.
1790-1834; Phineas Allen, 1834-.-!.'.; Nehemiah Ball, 1835-39; Cyrus
Stow, 1840-48 ; F. E. Gourgas, 1848-53 ; George Heywood, 1853-; Town
Treasurers: John M. Cheney, 1834-40; Timothy Prescott, 1841; Sted-
man Buttrick, 1842-51 ; A. A. Kelsey, 1852 ; Albert Slacy, 1853 ; Samuel
Staples, 1854-55; Joseph Holhrook, 1856-57 ; John B. Moore, 1858-59 ;
Julius M Smith, 1860-61 ; George Heywood, 1862-76 ; Henry J. Walcott,
1876-*4 ; Charles E. Brown, 1884-87 ; George E. Walcott, 1887-88 ; John
C. Friend. 1890 ; Selectmen : Abiel Heywood, 1796-1834 ; Daniel Qark,
1630-44, '49 ; Cyms Hubbard, 1822-34 ; Joseph Barrett, 1834 ; Cynu
Stow, 1835-40, '42-43 ; Isaac S. Lee, 1835-^0, '42 ; Timothy Prescott,
1840-41 ; Ellsha Wheeler, 1840-41 ; Joseph Darby, 1843-48 ; Fruicis B.
Gourgas, 1844-60 ; Jacob B. Farmer, 1844-49 ; Blcbard Barrett, 1848-49 ;
Nehemiah Ball. 1860; A. A. Kelsey, 1850-56; C. A. Habhuil. 1850, '76-
80 ; J. S. Keyes, 1851-68 ; A. G. Fay, 1861-63, '62-63, '71-72 ; Samuel
Staples, 1854-55 ; George M. Brooks. 1858-69 ; B. N. fiodaon, 1868-62 ;
J. M. Smith, 1858-60 ; E. W. Bull, 1800-61 ; Elyah Wood, 1862-63; N.
B. Stow. 1862-66; B. Tolman, 1864-66; L. A. Surette, 1867-69; E. C. Da-
mon, 1867-69; L. W. Bean, 1867-69; W. F. Hurd, 1870; Edwin Wheeler,
1870 ; Jowjpb Derby, Jr., 1870 ; A. J. Harlow, 1871-72 ; n. F. Smith,
1871, '73-73; W. W. Wilde, 1872-75; J. B Moore, 1873-76; Churles
Thompson, 1876-82; George Tolman, 1870-80 ; B. F. Barrett, 1881-82 ;
W. H. Hunt, 1883 ; C. H. Walcott, 1883; Samuel Hoar, 1884-86; H. J.
Hosmer, 1884-80; S. G. Brooks, 1884-87 ; C. E. Brown, 1887-88 ; A. G.
Fuller, 1887-88; G. E. Walcott, 1883-90; Prescott Keyes, 1889; Wood-
ward Hudson, 1889; John H. Moore, 1890; Caleb H. Wheeler, 1890;
Representatives to the Legislature; John Keyes, Joseph Barrett, 1833-
35 ; Cyrus Stow, Sledman Buttrick, 1836-37 ; Sti>dnian Buttrick, 1838 ;
Stedinaii Buttrick, Ephraim Merriam, 1839 ; Epbraim Merrlam, Francis
R. Gourgas, 1840 ; Ephraim Merriam, 1841 ; Francis E. Gourgas, 1842 ;
Anthony Wright, 1843-44; Isaac S, Lee, 1845-47; John Stacy, 1846;
Samuel Staples, 1848, '62-53, '56, '83 ; No choice, 1849 ; Samuel Hoar,
1850; Aaron A. Kelsey, 1851; William W. Wilde, 1853, '77; Ephraim
W. Bull, 1856; Kichard Barrett, 1857, '76; George M. Brooks, 1858;
Simon Brown, 1860; George Heywood, 1863-64, '66-67 ; Edwin Wheeler,
1871; John B. Moore, 1874; Samuel Hoar, 1881 ; Henry J. Hosmer,
1884, '86-87.
The latest vote of Concord, in a matter of public
interest, was that in 1889, when it was learned that
one of the new naval cruisers was named for this his-
toric town. Under an article, in the warrant for the
annual meeting, it was voted " to present to the gov-
ernment of the United States some appropriate orna-
ment for the new gunboat ' Concord,'" and an appro-
priation for the purpose was made, and a committee
chosen to carry out the vote. A reduced copy of the
mitiute-man in bronze was suggested to the Navy
Department and accepted by the Secretary of the
Navy as appropriate for the purpose. Mr. Daniel C.
French, the sculptor, kindly offered to make a new
model of this famous work, which has been success-
fully cast at the Chicopee Foundry. It is nearly
three feet in height, and presents the same figure, with
the musket and plow, as does the original at the bat-
tle-ground. It is to stand on the front of the poop-
deck of the ship, with an appropriate legend beneath
expressing its meaning. The "Concord "has been
built at Chester, Pennsylvania, by the Delaware Iron
Ship Works, formerly John Roach & Son^, and with
all her machinery from the Quintard Works in New
York on beard, was safely launched March 8, 1890.
When the vessel is completed with her armament,
and put in commission, the statue will be presented
and permanently placed in position to carry on the
ship the honor of the name and the victory it repre-
sents around the world.
The centre of the town is every year becoming
more a place for residence rather than business.
Many of those in active life go to Boston daily, and
more who have retired fiom busy occupations seek
Concord for a quiet home. The largest farms are
secured by persons of taste and wealth for great and
606
HISTORY OF -MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
permanent improvements. The smaller and worn-
out farms are falling into the hands of the indus-
trious and saving of our foreign population. The
change that these departures from the old-time ways
are fast making in the Concord of to-day can hardly
yet be fully estimated. The business activity, the
political influence, the literary prominence of the past
generations seem to be gone, never to return. What
the future will be must be left to the coming men and
women to determine.
In the closing words of Senator Hoar's oration this
sketch may well finish : "It may be that the separate
municipal and social life which has given this town
her character and history is about to come to an end ;
that this little river is to lose itself in the sea ; that
the neighboring city will overflow her borders, or
that railroad and telegraph and telephone will mingle
her elements inseparably with the great mass of
American life. I do not believe it. I think the
town will preserve for a long and indefinite future her
ancient and distinctive quality. But however this
shall be, the lives of our fathers will not be lost. The
town will have made her impression upon America
herself Among the memorable figures in history
shall be that of dear, wise, brave, tender, gentle Old
Concord — she who broke the path into the forest —
she who delivered her brave blow between the eyes of
England — she by whose firesides the rich and the poor
sat together as equals — she whose children made her
famous by eloquence, by sculpture and by song."
BIOGRAPHICAL.
NATHAN BROOKS.
Thomas Brooks was of the early settlers of Concord,
and the family name has been handed down through
every generation since, till in the Revolution it was
borne by one of the minute-men at the Old North
Bridge, who was slightly wounded by the British
fire.
His son Nathan, the subject of this sketch, was born
in Lincoln, just over the Concord line, Oct. 18, 1785,
He was one of fourteen children, and, as was the cus-
tom and necessity of those days, was obliged to help
in the farm work as soon as he was old enough to be
of service. He had no other schooling than was af-
forded by the district school three months in a year
until he was seventeen years old. Then, desiring to
go to college, he studied with Rev. Dr. Stearns, the
clergyman of Lincoln, fitted for college and graduat-
ed at Harvard in 1809. He taught school in the
winters, and thus earned som« part of the expenses
of his education, which his father could not afford to
pay. He held a fair rank in his class, and taught
school a year and then began the study of the law in
the offices of Hon. Samuel Hoar, and Thomas Heald,
Esq., in Concord, and was admitted to the Middlesex
Bar in 1813. He began practice in Concord in a small
office on the Lexington road previously occupied by
Jonathan Fay, Esq.
Here he got some clients, and, by his faithfulness
and care of their cases, soon acquired a fair share of
the business of this shire-town. He removed in a
few years to a more central office on the Main Street,
which he built in conjunction with Mr. Hoar, and oc-
cupied his part of it till 1833. His practice, more es-
pecially in the Probate Cjurt, increased, and his in-
dustry and honesty became almost proverbial.
In 182t) the Middlesex Mutual Fire Insurance Com-
pany was organized, and Mr. Brooks was chosen the
secretary and treasurer of the company. This em-
ployment soon required so much of his time that it
interfered with his practice of his profession, and
afterwards he confined his legal work mainly to
office business and the settlement of estates. He
was for many years master in chancery for Middlesex
county, and under the " Insolvent Laws " of that time
had a large share of that business. He had great
industry and capacity for work, aud in all his oc-
cupations he found plenty to do, as he was a
director of the Concord Bank and the president of
the Savings Bank from their incorporation. He was
early interested in politics, and as a stanch National
Republican he was elected representative from Con-
cord to the Legislature of 1823, '24 and '25, and was
a useful and popular member. After this service he
was chosen by the Whigs to the Council in 1823 and
1830, and to the Senate in 1831 and 1835. He was
the candidate of the same party for Congress in
1838, and, after nine stoutly-contested trials, his
Democratic opponent, Hon. William Parmenter, was
chosen. In town affiiirs he was active and influen-
tial, though heseldora had any leisure for town offices,
and in his office many important town matters were
discussed and practically agreed upon.
Why insurance offices should be such centres of
talk, news and gossip, it might be hard to tell, but the
Old Middlesex was no exception to the rule. In the
dark, dingy back-room of the bank building, where
Mr. Brooks worked as secretary, more stories have
been told, more anecdotes repeated, more politics dis-
cussed than perhaps in any other room in the town
if not the county. Always there, never interrupted
by sickness, uniformly courteous, rarely impatient
with the prolonged stay of callers, from nine o'clock
A.M. when the mail had come and directors and neigh-
bors collected to read the paper and chat about the
news, till nine o'clock in the evening a constant suc-
cession of visitors were entertained by Mr. Brooks, till
the great wonder was how he ever found time to do
his work. In the winter a great open fire of walnut
logs tempted many to toast their shins around his
hearth, and the warmth of his smiling welcome
equalled that of the fire. To all who came h3 listeaed
patiently, and with a rare fund of humor answered
V -
1
^-===^
CONCORD.
607
with an apt story or a ready joke or a sound advice,
that seldom failed to make them go away the better
for the visit. Indeed if those walls could repeat what
was said there, it would be a history of Concord, of
Middlesex and Massachusetts, if not of the country
and the world. Very regular in his habits and so uni-
form in his ways that the village clock might have
been set by his movements, and it has been said that
his neighbors used bis passsing their windows for a
timepiece.
Mr. Brooks was interested in all matters of social
improvement, especially that of temperance, and while
avoiding fanaticism, by his moderation and good sense
helped their progress. His fund of humor aided him
in many a difficult situation with ultra zealots, and his
ready wit and imperturbable good nature often soothed
the troubled waters so that without eloquence he was
a favorite speaker on all occasions, and as toast-mas
■ ter a great success of many important festivities.
Mr. Brooks married, in 1819, Caroline Downes, of
Boston, who died March, 1820, leaving a daughter now
the wife of the Hon. E. R. Hoar. In 1823 Mr.
Brooks married Mary Merrick, daughter of Tilly
Merrick a prominent merchant then living in Concord.
Of this marriage Hon. George M. Brooks, judge of
Probate for Middlesex County is the only surviving
child, a younger brother having died in infancy.
In his pecuniary affairs Mr. Brooks was too unable
to say no to applications for loans, and lost many hun-
dreds of dollars by his willingness to help those who
persisted in borrowing of him without repayment.
He bore these losses, as he did the other troubles of
life, with great equanimity and without worry or anger.
His sunny temperament and his equable disposition,
his good health and contented mind, enabled him to
go through a long lift' wilh less anxiety and more
comfort than falls to the lot of many men. His habit
was to look on the bright side of everything and to
take cheerful views of all subjects, but he had well-
considered opinions and the strength of his convic-
tions was not lessened by his courteous listening to
opposing views. He had great charity for those who
differed trom him, kindness for all, and enmity to
none. He was a firm believer in the Unitarian reli-
gion, a constant attendant on public worship and in
his later years joined the church of the First Parish
in Concord.
Mr. Brooks was of medium height and size, with
dark eyes and hair, and a strongly-marked face. Not
robust, he had uninterrupted good health and a strong
constitution that carried him almost to the four-score
limit of man's life with all his faculties in use. He
never wore glasses, aud always carried a cane, but in-
variably under his arm, not as a staff, and for many
years bore a lighted lamp to and from his office with
a skill to keep the flame burning that only a severe
storm could overcome. His health failed very gradu-
ally at last, and he died December 11, 1863, after only a
week's sickness, a loss to the community and his friends.
CALVIN C. DAMON.'
Mr. Calvin Carver Damon was descended in the
sixth generation from Deacon John Damon, one of
the early settlers of Reading, Mass. John Damon
was born in Reading, Berkshire County, Eng., in
1620. In 1633, being then a lad of some thirteen
years, he came to America and found employment in
Lynn, Mass., where he resided till about 1644, in
which year the township of Reading, including what
had been for several years known as Lynn Village,
was set off from the town of Lynn. He fixed his
residence on the hill, known in later times as Cow-
drey's Hill, in Wakefield, formerly the South Parish
of Reading, and the part of the town first settled. In
the next year, 1645, he was registered as a freeman of
Reading. In the early colonial history, those who
wished to become " freemen " were required to be
members of the Congregational Church, and to take
a solemn oath of allegiance to the Commonwealth,
binding themselves to maintain its laws. None but
"freemen " were allowed to hold office, or to vote on
public affairs. About the same time he married .Abi-
gail, daughter of Richard Sherman, a wealthy mer-
chant and leading citizen of Boston. He was also
at an early period chosen one of the deacons of the
Church. And it is claimed that to his influence was
due the fact that the new town took the name of his
birth-place in England. These facts indicate that, in
his early manhood he had developed qualities
which secured for him an alliance with a leading
family in the Colony, as well as a prominent position
in the Church and in the town. Prior to the incor-
poration of the town a grant of one hundred and
sixty acres of land had been made by the General
Court to each person who was, or might become a
resident, on condition that he should raise thirty
bushels of Indian corn in two years. In the early
colonial records, under the date of 1639, it is said
that "John Damon, bringing good and satisfac-
tory evidence to that effect, and being a man of
substance, having much cattle, took his lot on Bear
Brook, at the head of the great pond." This lot was
within the present limits of Reading. Mr. Damon
did not remove to it, but lived always at his original
place of residence. It was occupied by Samuel Da-
mon, his second son, who came to manhood. The
fourth son of Samuel Damon, named for his grand-
father, John, and who was a thriving, wealthy farmer,
built there, in 1751, the Damon Mansion, one of the
best dwelling-houses of the period in Middlesex
County, and which still stands,. after the lapse of
nearly one hundred and forty years, and having been
occupied by six generations of the family.
The grandson of the second John Damon, named
above, was Benjamin, who was born in Reading, June
4, 1760. He served from 1776 till the close of the
war as a soldier in the army of the Revolution,
1 By BeT. W. K. BagnalL
608
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
though he attained his majority only some four
months before the virtual close of the conflict. He
had enlisted when he was only some sixteen years
old. He soon afterwards removed to Amherst, N. H.,
where he married Polly Hesea, the daughter of a. sea-
captain who had removed, in 1775, from Plymouth,
Mass., to Amherst, N. H.
Speaking of his secluded home, without another
house in sight or hearing, and approached in all di-
rections through the woods, the historian of the Fiske
family says : " There, in the fear of God and in keep-
ing his commands, Deacon Damon, with his young
wife, sat him down in peace and content, driving his
saw-mill in the spring when water was abundant,
working his farm in summer, and enjoying the fruits
of his labor in the winter. There he lived and died in
a good old age, an humble, honest man, rich in faith
and good works, and unambitious of the world's
gilded honors. There his children were born and
reared, in all the loveliness of rural simplicity and
Christian education. Nor was their training ineffi-
cient, since it is believed by those who knew them
well that no one of Deacon Damon's family was ever
guilty of a dishonest or dishonorable deed."
His third son was Calvin Carver, born in Am-
herst, New Hampshire, February 17, 1803. The
son of a farmer, and spending his childhood and
youth in what was then a sparsely-settled region, his
early opportunities for education were very limited,
but he was of an enterprising, ambitious spirit and
disinclined to pursuits with which he had been famil-
iar from early childhood. Accordingly he sought and
obtained employment in a store in Concord, N. H.,
where, as clerk and salesman, he acquired experience
in mercantile pursuits. He remained there till he
had attained his majority. He then decided to go to
the city of New York, and to seek employment there.
He had, however, formed the acquaintance of John
Marland, a young man of his own age, the son of
Abraham Marland, one of the pioneer woolen manu-
facturers of New England. The latter was at this time
increasing the facilities of his industry, and his son in-
vited his friend Damon to go to Andover and accept a
position in the counting-room of his father. He did so
and remained there two years. He then engaged in
trade, forming a co-partnership with Edwin Farnham,
under the style of Farnham & Damon, doing the mis-
cellaneous business of what was then known, every-
where in the rural districts of New England, as a
country store.
He continued that business till about the close of
1831, and in December of that year went to the vil-
lage of Saxonville, in the town of Framingham, Mass.,
on the invitation, again, of John Marland. Mr. Mar-
land was then in charge of the mills there, known as
the Saxon Mills. He had, shortly before this time,
established a small factory for the manufacture of
wooleu goods at the outlet of Lake Cochituate, and
at this time engaged the services of Mr. Damon as
its superintendent, his own time being occupied with
the management of the Saxon Mills. Early in 1833
Mr. Damon entered into partnership with Mr. Mar-
land, and soon bought Mr. Marland's interest, and
continued the business alone till early in May,
1835, when the mill was destroyed by fire. In the
month of December previous he had purchased the
property at West Concord, and now removed to that
place.
He had been aided in the purchase by his wife's
uncle, James Johnson, the head of the old and
wealthy commission house of Boston — Johnson, Sew-
all & Co. — who proposed to take the agency of his
goods. During the years of his employment in the
mills — first at Andover and then at Saxonville — he
had become familiar with the manufacture of satin-
ets, a fabric having a cotton warp and wool filling,
then used largely in the manufacture of men's cloth-
ing, and made very generally by woolen manufactur-
ers throughout New England. In deciding to en-
gage in this specialty of manufacture he was guided
by the advice of Mr. Johnson. He soon found that
his business did not pay expenses. The goods, with
his facilities for manufacture, cost too much for the
price which they would bring, deducting commissions,
and he was in competition with long-established and
wealthy manufacturers, among whom were Welcome
Farnuni, Edward Harris, Abraham Marland and
others. He determined on a change, at first partial,
by devoting a portion of his machinery to the manu-
facture of white wool flannels. He soon found that
it was neither convenient nor economical to carry on
in so small a mill the manufacture of fabrics of two
distinct classes. He therefore removed all the ma-
chinery adapted only to the manufacture of satinets
and filled up the mill with flannel machinery. Mr.
Johnson, who, when the mill was started by Mr. Da-
mon, had suggested the manufacture of satinets as its
business, and still believed that it might be made
profitable, was much displeased, and at first was dis-
posed to stop the business — as he might have done,
with Mr. Damon's large indebtedness to him — but
this, on the other hand, would involve him in loss.
Finding that Mr. Damon was inflexible in his pur-
pose, he oflered him a considerable sum if he would
induce some other merchant to take the account and
to relieve him from all liability. Mr. Damon's reply
was : " No ; you have got me into this scrape, .ind
you must get me out." At this time it occurred to
Mr. Damon that a kind of cloth might be made with
the flannel machinery which would be likely to have
a considerable sale and to afford a more profitable
employment for his mill than even all-wool flannels,
the manufacture of which had been rapidly devel-
oped in the little more than twenty years since it had
been first undertaken in this country by Nathaniel
Stevens. So many mills had been devoted to this
specialty, that the competition in it had become quite
active.
CONCORD.
609
The fabric, proposed to himself, by Mr. Damon, was
to be woven in the same manner as ordinary flannel,
but with a cotton warp and a wool filling. An addi-
tional consideration in favor of the experiment was
the fact that Mr. Dimia had on hand a considerable
number of warps of cjtton which had been prepared
for making satinets. Proceeding with the experi-
ment, Mr. Damon produced some cloth, a sample of
which he carried to Boston and shiwed to Mr. John-
son. It is said that the merchant, on looking at it,
exclaimed : " Dom it, that is good cloth ; it will sell,''
and that this was the origin of the name which,
slightly chinged to domet or domett or dommet, as
it has been variously spelled, was at once given to the
fabric, and which it still retains, the name being
found on tbe books of Mr. Damon as early as Janu-
ary, 183C. Whether or not this was the origin of the
name, the remark was one which might naturally
have fallen from the lips of tbe bluff, hearty, old
merchant, pleased with the solution of a question
which had cau;ed him much anxiety, viz., the profit-
able employment of the mill in which he had a con-
siderable pecuniary interest, as well as a good busi-
ness for a kinsman for whose welfare he was con-
cerned.
The merits of the fabric were apparent. It would
shrink but little in washing, and, being both light
and warm, was well adapted to be a substitute for the
linsey-woolsey, originally of home manufacture,
which had been long u-ted for the undergarments of
women and children. It was also of domestic manu-
facture and free from foreign competition. The do-
mett flannels soon assumed the place which they
have since maintained as a staple article of American
manufacture.
The business, thus placed by Mr. Damon on a basis
of permanent prosperity, was continued under his
personal management till about the close of 18-53,
when he was subjected to an attack of pleurisy, which
resulted in his death January 12, 1854.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON".'
Ralph Waldo Emerson was the son of William
Emerson, minister of the First Church in Boston,
and Ruth Haskins his wife. He was born in Boston,
May 20, 1803, the third child in a family of six sons
and two daughters, both of whom, as well as the
oldest son, died in infancy. His early education was
carried on in the Boston schools, the Latin School
among others ; but he was, as a boy, an eager re.ader,
and composition in prose and verse was the constant
amusement of his youth. The death of his father
when Emerson was but eight years old, although
kind friends and the First Church Society came to the
aid of the widow of their pastor, made it important
that the boys during the whole period of their edu-
* By Edward W. Eiuerdou.
39-ii
cation should work and help the family. Hence
Emerson became a teacher before he entered college,
and contmued to teach during the college course and
afterward until 1826.
He graduated at Harvard in 1821, and while
teaching, and struggling with very bad h<ialth, pre-
pared himself for the ministry aad was approbated
to preach by the Middlesex Association of Ministers
in 182G. Sickness obliged him to journey by sea to
Florida, and his health improving, he came slowly
northward, preaching by the way as opportunity
oflfered. On this trip he was brought into contact
with slavery. In 1829 he became the associate pastor,
with the Rev. Henry Ware, of the Second Church
in Boston. The same year he married Ellen Louisa
Tucker, of Concord, N. H. Mr. Ware's health failing,
Mr. Emerson succeeded to the pastorate of that church.
These were years of change and rapid growth in the
mind of the young minister and it seemed to him that
he and the flock committed to his charge were cramped
by usage and tradition. The duty of slated prayer,
a perfunctory act, was one from which he shrank, and
the communion rite seemed to him foreign and not
helpful to Americans of the nineteenth century. He
hoped that his people would feel as he did, and wel-
come the liberating innovations for which he asked
after three years' ministry. The church, however, was
not ready for the changes which he proposed in the
administering of the rite of the Lord's Supper, and
they parted with regret and afiection. His wife had
died before this time and his own health had been
sorely tried by his loss and his parting with his
church, so on Christmas Day, 1832, he sailed for
Europe for rest and refreshment. He remained
abroad less than a year and this visit was chiefly
memorable because it was the occasion of his
visiting Landor, Wordsworth, and Carlyle, whose
writings drew Emerson to seek and find him far
among the Scottish moors.
On his return from Europe, restored in body and
spirir, he was invited to become pastor of the Unitar-
ian Church in New Bedford, but the society not
accepting his condition that public prayer be not ex-
pected from him unless he felt moved to that act of
devotion, he refused the invitation.
In the autumn of 1834 he went to Concord and
wrote much of his first book, "Nature," staying with
his kin at the Old Manse, which had been built by
his grandfather, William Emerson, the patriot minis-
ter of the town in the Revointion. In 1835 he bought
the house in Concord in which he lived through the
remainder of his days, and in September was married
to Lydia Jackson, of Plymouth.
The little farm which he acquired, where the Cam-
bridge Turnpike leaves the great road to Boston,
(three hours away by stage in those days) had the
recommendation, foi him, of convenience in reaching
the city when he went to lecture or visit, and also of
lying on the edge of the village near to Walden and
610
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
its wide woodland ranges, which became a temple, vis-
ited almost daily, and there he waited for the thoughts,
the oracles which he was sent into the world to re-
port. Concord was thereafter his home ; he loved
and honored the ancestral town, and held it a privi-
lege to bear his part of civic duties and neighborly
relations, yet held closely to his task of writing,
which involved a life mainly secluded during more
than half the year ; but, as all his essays were tirst
read as discourses before literary societies, or lectures
in the lyceums, he was, of necessity, brought into
a contact, which he highly valued, with minds and
work of all sorts of men and women. He considered
the lyceum his wider pulpit, and, though he put off
the gown of the preacher, held the larger office of
teacher through life.
He was interested in all that tended to emancipate
the bodies, the minds, the souls of his race. Hence,
he early and constantly allied himself with the pro-
tectors of the Indian and the slave, and maintained
that woman had only to ask for greater freedom be-
fore the law and wider opportunitie-o, and these would
be granted her. Although he had rebelled .against
forms which he bad found hindrances in worship, he
required religion and reverence in all true men, and
had no sympathy with destructive methods. He
watched and helped the spiritual and intellectual
awakening and growth in his generation. He was
one of the founders of the Dial magazine, and for
a time its editor. Margaret Fuller, Alcott, Thoreau,
Channing, Mrs. Ripley, Agassiz, Hawthorne, Lowell
were among his friends and neighbors. Through life
a strong friendship existed between him and Carlyle,
whose works he had welcomed and edited in America
when they were little known in England.
"Nature" was Emerson's first work, published in
1836, but later grouped with other addresses and
lectures in a volume. The other prose works came in
the following order : " Essays," 1841 ; " Essays " (sec-
ond series), 1844 ; " Representative Men," 1850 ;
"English Traits" (written after his visit to England
in 1847—48, lor the purpose of lecturing there), in
1856; "Conduct of Life," 1860; "Society and Soli-
tude," 1870; "Letters and Social Aims," 1874; and
after Mr. Emerson's death two other volumes were
published by his friend and literary executor, Mr.
James Elliot Cabot, entitled " Lectures and Bio-
graphical Sketches " and "Miscellanies."
The office of poet always seemed to Emerson the
highest, and even in boyhood he had aspired to
express himself ia verse, but not until 1847 did
he give to the world the volume of poems which
he had been rehearsing to himself in the woods
through many years. In 1867, " May Day " was pub-
lished— the poetical fruits of riper years.
Emerson received the degree of Doctor of Laws
from Harvard University, and was also chosen an
overseer in 1867, and soon after was appointed a lec-
turer on philosophy there. The failure of his strength
at this lime was increased by the exposures aiid exer-
tions incident lo a partial burning ol' bis hcuse in
1874. His many friends rebuilt his house and sent
him abroad to ri store his health meantime. On this
trip he visited England, France, Italy, and made a
journey up the Nile. He returned in better health,
but, although he read a few lectures after his return,
he ceased to write, and bis public life was at an end.
He passed the remainder of his days quietly and hap-
pily in Concord, where he died April 27, 1882.
EEVBE^- N. RICE.
Richard Rice was among the early settlers
of Concord, and the name has existed here al-
most ever since. Nathaniel, a native of Sudbury,
was probably a descendant of Richard, and was
the father of the subject of this sketch. He was in
business in Boston when Reuben Nathaniel was born
there, Jlay 30, 1814, and moved to Concord when the
son was fifteen years of age. Here the father lived
for several years, and in 1834 built a large four-story
windmill on the summit of the New Burying-ground
Hill, which was a sight if not a success. The son,
who had been educated in the Boston schools of that
day, became a clerk in the " Green Store," tbcu kept
by .1. P. Hayward, who had married the sister of R.
N. Rice, with whom the boy lived. He was a bright,
handsome, clever youth, full of fun and active in both
work and play. The post-office was then kept in the
■' Green Store," and as this brought many customers,
the clerk soon became acquainted with every family
in town, and was popular and liked by all who knew
him. Here he saw and talked with all sorts of peo-
ple, from the professional magnates of the village to
the teamsters and loafers who came for their supplies
of rum and molasses. To all he was accommodating,
and interesting,and hesoon became foremost in all that
was going on in the town, either of pleasure or profit.
Here was his real training and education for the suc-
cess of his after life, and here he acquired the friends
to whom he was ever dear and true.
At the death of Mr. Haywood, about ten years
after his entering the store, Mr. Rice succeeded to the
business, and though without capital, secured a silent
partner in David Loring, who furnished the means to
carry on the business. This was for a time successful,
but in the end Mr. Loring became dissatisfied and
withdrew, leaving Mr. Rice deeply involved in debt
and out of employment, as the store was closed in
1843. R. N., as he was familiarly called, had mar-
ried, July 1, 1840, Mary Harriet Hurd, the daughter
of Col. Isaac Hurd, Jr., and granddaughter of Dr.
Isaac Hurd, a leading physician for many years in
Concord. Mrs. Rice h.id a pleasant manner, a happy
temperament and a charming smile, that made their
home an attractive resort for their numerous relatives
and friends, and a centre for many pleasant gather-
ings. When the reverse of fortune came she bore
/ ^' (
CONCORD.
611
her Bhare of the burdea, and kept her husband's
spirits from sinking into despair by her hopeful
joviality.
The opening of the Fitciiburg Railroad to Concord
in June, 1844, gave Mr. Rice a position as station
agent, and he very soon acquired the knowledge ol
the duties that made him a success in his new em-
ployment. His brother-in-law, Chas. Henry Hurd,
had gone West to engage in railroading under John
W. Brooks, then superintendent of the Rochester and
Syracuse Railroad, in New York. After a year's trial
of the station in Concord, Mr. Rice decided to join
his brother-in-law, and, furnished with strong recom-
mendations to Mr. Brooks, he left Concord in the
spring of 184G. The change was the turn of the tide
for him, readily securing from Mr. Brooks a situation
in which he could show his ability and real worth,
he was soon promoted to higher positions, till, on the
completion of the Michigan Central Railroad, of
which Mr. Brooks was superintendent, Mr. Rice and
Mr. Hurd were assistant superintendents, the one of
the passenger and the other of the freight traffic. Mr.
Rice's headquarters were at Detroit, Michigan, and
here he soon became as much at home as he had been
in Concord, occupying a pleasant cottage on the best
street of that city.
His acquaintance with all the Eastern men who
had gathered in this growing place was, of course,
intimate, and his good qualities were generally made
known by his intercourse with the older residents.
He took there the same interest in all that was going
on, was as public-spirited and ready for work in
every useful cause as he had been in Concord. His
reverses had not embittered him, but had taught him
charity and kindness, and he showed it in many be-
nevolent ways. Many a New Englander going to or
through Detroit enjoyed his hospitality and felt
his grateful aid and assistance. To any one hailing
from Concord there was no attention too great and no
trouble too burdensome for him to undertake in their
behalf.
These years of prosperity rolled on, the road in-
creasing in its importance, his work for it improving
in quality and quantity, until, when Mr. Brooks out-
grew the limits of a single State and undertook the
great Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad, Mr.
Rice became superintendent of the Michigan Central.
In this capacity of chief manager he showed great tact,
energy and ability. He had found his true vocation
and the place for which he was fitted and he filled it
with success. The Rebellion brought great labor and
strain upon his road and his resources, but he was
equal to the emergency and aided the Government in
the transportation of troops and military stores
efficiently.
He had frequent occasion to visit Washington on
the business of the railroad, and he became well
known to President Lincoln, Secretary Stanton, Gen-
eral Grant and other leaders in the nation's struggle.
He was intimate with Zach. Chandler, the Senator
from Michigan, and wa£ often relied on by the Sena-
tor for prompt and important services. Though not
a politician, he had strong and patriotic convictions
on public questions, and his loyalty to the nation and
his friends was never questioned. He made few ene-
mies, but nearly every one with whom he came in
contact was impressed by his quick-witted, genial
cleverness, and, if they saw him often, were sure to be-
come his friends. An instance of this was the Prince
of Wales, who, when traveling over the Michigan
Central Railroad and its connections, was so much
pleased with Mr. Rice's unfailing courtesies and ac-
commodations, that, on parting, he presented Mr.
Rice with a diamond pin forming the Prince's crest,
which the receiver ever after wore with pride.
Another was that of Gen. Grant, who, when Presi-
dent Johnson was " swinging round the circle" at the
West, was so annoyed by the calls for him to speak at
the stations where the crowds met the President's
party, that he accepted Mr. Rice's invitation to go to
Detroit, and thus escaped a part of the circle. Qen.
Grant never forgot this kindness and often spioke of
Mr. Rice favorably afterwards.
In the opportunity he enjoyed for investments Mr.
Rice had been fortunate, and in 1867, when he re-
signed the place on the railroad, he had become rich
for his wants and for those of his family, consisting of
his wife and an adopted daughter. He returned to
Concord, and after a trip to Europe in 1867, and again
in 1868, in whicu he went to Palestine and Egypt in
the company of the Rev. Dr. Bellows, of New York,
he took up his residence here in the town of his youth
to pass the remainder of life in ease and comfort.
He had settled with all his old creditors and paid
them in full. He purchased a fine estate on Main
Street and built the best house in the village, taking
great pride in perfecting every detail of its construc-
tion. He moved into it in January, 1872, and was
happiest when he could welcome an old friend within
its spacious rooms. In these many pleasant parties
were held, notably the marriage of his daughter,
Cora Belle Rice, to Richard Fay Barrett, of Concord,
now secretary and treasurer of the Middlesex Mutual
Fire Insurance Co. and colonel on the staffii of Gov-
ernor Ames and Governor Brackett. The young
couple made their home with Mr. Rice and cheered
his declining years, especially after the death of Mrs.
Rice in 1880, when Mrs. Barrett filled her place in the
household.
Another instance was the centennial meeting of
the Social Circle, which was held March, 1882, at Mr.
Rice's house. He had been a member of this society
before he left Concord, and was re-elected after his re-
tnrn here, in 1870. He took great pleasure in the
meetings, and so much interest that the only instance
of the presence of every one of the twenty-five mem-
bers occurred at his house in 1880.
Though not a student Mr. Rice was a great reader
611
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
fond of booka of travel and biography rather than
works of fiction, except those of tbe great novelists.
He pofsessed a fine library of hundreds of volumes of
standard works, and he had read most of them. This
taste for reading led him to accept the only town
office he would consent to fill, that of chairman of
the Library Committee when the " Free Public
Library " was established in its new building, in from
of his home. To this he gave great attention and
much time and thought, and he continued to discharge
its duties while he lived, and he left by his will a
bequest of $2000 to this library.
He took much interest in the historical matters
connected with Concord, had a good memory of the
traditions and events of its past annals, and gave the
plan and paid the extra cost of rebuilding the bridge
at the battle-ground in 1875, for a proper approach to
the statue of the Minute-Man. He left also a be-
quest in his will of $2000 to an Antiquarian Society,
for the collection and preservation of relics of the
past.
In his charities he was so considerate and thought-
ful that many received his aid without others know-
ing from whom it came, but that it was large and
generous to all deserving causes was well known by his
intimate friends. His will provided for several who
bad been pensioners of bis bounty while he lived,
and also liberal bequests to the Silent Poor Fund,
and to the Female Charitable Society.
In his religious views he was Unitarian, and both
at Detroit and Concord a useful and active member
of the societies of that denomination, ready and will-
ing to help in their work. He gave in his life $1000
towards the new Unitarian building in Boston, and at
his death he devised his part of the estate adjoining
the church of the First Parish in Concord to the
Unitarian Society of the town.
In these pleasant lines he spent his last years, grat-
ified by the birth of a grandson who was named for
him, and the boy's paternal grandfather, "Richard "
" Rice," and upon whom he lavished fondness and
care without stint. After the death of his wife his
own health failed, the asthma, which had troubled
him for years, increased, and active exercise became
impractical. But he was cheerfiil and hearty in his
greeting of those who called while he was shut up, and
enjoyed his gamesofwhisf, of which he was always very
fond, even playing one on the top of the great pyra-
mid of Egypt with his fellow-travelers. In the
spring of 1885 he was confined to his house, and after
a few weeks of illness he died June 25th, leaving a
pleasant memory to all his friends and neighbors, and
after a long, active and useful life.
His large estate, after providing for his dependent
relatives and pensioners, and $2000 for the protection
and care of the shade-trees in Concord, and the other
bequests named, became his daughter's and his grand-
son's.
Thus ended a truly fortunate life, for the only re-
I verse he sufl!ered served to make better and kindlier
the many years that remained to him.
CHAPTER XL VII.
LINCOLN.
BY WII.I.IAM F. WHEF-LER.
Earhj lligiory — Cliwchen — .'i[UUunj IlUtnnj — French ami Indian ll'dr— T//e
Iteiolulioii—Litl ../ .Vj/JwTi— Il'iir ../ 1S12— Il'ur 0/ lln' llebtlli<jii—
Act of Incorporalion — Toioi i'jjicets, etc.
The town of Lincoln was incorporated April 10,
1754.' It is bounded on the northwest by Concord,
on the north by Bedford, on the east by Lexington
and Waltham, south by Weston, and southwest by
Wayiand. Its greatect length is about five miles,
from southwest to northeast, and greatest width three
and one-half miles from enst to west. The cenlreof
the town is thirteen and one-half miles west-north-
west from the State-House, and three and one-half
miles southeast from the churches in Concord. The
town contains upwards of SdOi) acres of land. Sandy
Pond, known in Colonial times as " Flint's Pond," a
beautiful sheet of water, with an area of 200 acres,
lies in the westerly part of the town, and if "water
in the landscape is like the eye in the human counte-
nance," no other town in the county has a fairer or
clearer feature on its face. Beaver Pond, covering
fifty acres, lies une mile south of .Sandy Pond, with a
high hill between them. Unlike Sandy Pond, its
shores are muddy, and produce large quantities of
white lilies. For more than a mile on its southwest-
ern border the town is bounded by the peaceful waters
of Concord River. Here the river expands into a
pond or bay of upwards of seventy acres. The name
of the bay, " Fairhaveu," tersely describes it. On
the Lincoln side of the bay Mr. William A. Burnham
is building a costly mansion.
Hardly less attractive than its little lakelets are its
lovely hills. They stand in the village and about the
town "as tbe mountains are round about Jerusalem,"
and none, whether they come from the east or the
west, the north or the south, can get into Lincoln
without getting nearer to heaven. Brooks arise in
and flow out of the town, but not a tubful of water
comes into the town from any source save the rains
and dews of heaven, and, whatever else may happen,
its pure waters can never be polluted by the manu-
factories or sewage of other towns. From the hill
near the centre of the town the prospect extends from
the Bunker Hill monument to the New Hampshire
hills, and from the Seminary buildings in Andover to
the churches in Hopkinton, and a lovely panorama is
spread around.
1 This is the true date. April 23, 1754, Is tha data of the certification
by the secretary.
LINCOLN.
G13
The residences of Mr. George G. Tarbell and Mr.
George Ropes, on the central hill, and that of Mr.
Julian de Cordova, on a cliff overlooking the pond,
have rural views of surpassing loveliness, and the
historic mansion of Mr. Ogden Codm.an, in the south-
erly part of the town, built in the Colonial period, is
surrounded by a princely domain.
Portions of the present town of Lincoln were at
different periods of Colonial history parts of the towns
of Watertown, Cambridge, Concord, Lexington and
Weston. The grant of the General Court, April,
1635, to Watertown of a tract of land extending
eight miles from Fresh Pond west-northwest into the
country, and the grant to Concord of September 3d
of the same year " of six myles square of land " over-
lapjied each other about two miles, and included
about one-half of the i)resent town of Lincoln. This
gave rise to a controver-y between Concord and
Watertown, and on the 8th of June, 1C38, the Gen-
eral Court ordered, for the final end of all differences
between Watertown and Concord, that Watertown
eight miles shall extend on Cambridge line as far as
Concord bounds give leave. Thi^ action gave the
principal part of the territory in dispute to Con-
cord.
The first meeting-house, built in 1747, occupied the
site of the present meeting-house of the First Parish,
while farther up and near the summit of the hill
three years afterwards a house was built for Rev. Mr.
Lawrence. Beautiful indeed for situation was the
house of the Lord, and the residenceof its first minis-
ter, "on the sides of the north.'' In the meeting-
house ail the people of the town gathered for worship
on Sunday, and held its town-meetings and transacted
its secular business for more than ninety years.
In the early days of the town the whole population
usually attended the Sunday services. Well they
might — ihey had nothing else to do — no books to
read, nowhere else to go. The Colonial laws imposed
erjual penalties for labor and recreation on the Sab-
bath, and required all adult persons to attend meet-
ing at least once in three months ; and in one case
the law was enforced, and a man was fined for non-
attendance. He satisfied the offended majesty of the
law by coming to meeting quarterly afterwards,
usually coming in during the delivery of the sermon
and sitting down and looking around, then marching
out, not caring to step lightly or to shut the door
gently after him. The ubiquitous tithingman, with
his long crook, was always on hand, and woe to the
urchin who was caught playing or napping!
Punctuality, too, marked the day, and people were
usually in their pews before the minister entered the
pulpit, and the services began with a cry from the
town clerk, heralding the approaching weddings.
Then the minister arose and announced ihat worship
would commence with singing one of the Psalms of
l)avid, which he read from the version of Steruhold
and Ho]>kiu6. Then the chorister set the tune, and
one of the deacons, standing in front of the pulpit,
read the first line of the psalm, which was immedi-
ately sung ; then another line was deaconed and
sung.
After the singing came the long prayer, prefaced by
the reading of notes, — i.e., the particular requests of
persons for divine favor or consolation. Next came the
sermon, the hour-glass, — tbatinezorabledeterminer of
the length of sermons, — being set. on the pulpit at the
left hand of the speaker, not on the right, lest some er-
ratic gesture should upset the simple chronometer on
the deacon's head below. After the sermon a short
prayer was made, and the benediction pronounced.
Two services were generally held ; the order of the
afternoon services being the tame as the morning,
with the addition of a third psalm. No evening ser-
vices were held, the house not being furnished with
appliances for heating or lighting.
In 1703 the reading of the Scriptures was intro-
duced as a part of the exercises of public worship.
In 1768 a short prayer was made before this reading.
In 1767 '■ Dr. Brady's and Mr. Tate's version of the
Psalms of David, with some of the hymns of Dr.
Watts which are now bound up with them,'' were
substituted for tbe version of Sternhold and Hopki s.
In 1795 a bass viol was allowed to be used on trial to
assist the singers in divine service; after two more
seasons it was allowed to be used until further order.
The old sexton of the church, who cultivated a few
flowers beside his cottage, brought every year, in its
season, a large red peony to meeting, which was con-
spicuously displayed from his seat in the gallery.
Strange, that stern worshipers of " ye olden time,"
did not catch an inspiration from the crimson flower,
and, instead of smiling at the simplicity of the old
man, inaugurate the custom of bringing flowers to
grace the house of the Lord — an offering so emblem-
atic of innocence and purity, so sweetly in accord-
ance with the teachings of the Master, so peculiarly
appropriate to the worship of Him who hath robed
the earth in beauty, and the heavens in glory, and
caused the lilies of the field to grow and the rose ol
Sharon to bloom, — not to feed the perishing body,
but to heal the wounded spirit, and soothe the sor-
rowing soul.
The first movement for the incorporation of the
town was made in 1734. On the 7th of June of that
year Joseph Brooks and others, inhabitants of the
easterly part of Concord, northerly part of Weston
and westerly part of Lexington, presented a petition
to the General Court setting forth their difficulties
and inconveniences by reason of their distances from
the usual places of public worship in said towns, and
praying to be erected into a separate township. This
petition obtained no favor and was summarily dis-
missed.
The next year, 1735, John Flint and others, inhab-
itants of the same locality, again petitioned for a sep-
arate town. Upon this petition a viewing committee
614
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
was appointed to view the place proposed for a new
township, to hear the parties in relation thereto, and
make report to the Court what they judge proper to
be done on this petition. After varrous delays the
committee reported that "They have carefully per-
formed the service and are of the opinion that the
prayer of the petition be not granted," which report
was accepted.
The next movement was for the incorporation of a
precinct. On the 18th of August, 1744, Joshua
Brooks and others, inhabitants ot the same locality,
]>etitioned to be incorporated as a precinct. This pe-
tition was favorably received, and a committee ap-
pointed to view the location, hear the parties and re-
port what action should be taken thereon. This com-
mittee reported April 24, 1746, that the petition ought
to be granted, which report was accepted, and it was
" Ordered, the petitioners, together with the persons
living within the bounds mentioned in the petition
(except such persons and estates as are excepted by
the report) be and are hereby erected into a distinct
and separate precinct, and vested with all such powers
and privileges as other precincts within this province
have, or by law ought to enjoy, and that such of the
aforesaid exempted persons as shall within one year
signify to the secretary, under their hands, their wil-
lingness to join with the petitioners, be, together witli
their, estates incorporated with them, to do and receive
alike duty and privilege as the petitioners." It was
also " Ordered that Benjamin Brown, one of the prin-
cipal inhabitants of the parish, this day set ofT from
Concord, Lexington and Weston, be and hereby is
enabled to call the first precinct meeting in said par-
ish, to choose parish officers, and to act and do all
other things according to law." The first precinct
meeting was held at the house of Mr. Edward Flint,
May 26, 1746, and the following officers were chosen ;
Benjamin Brown, moderator; Ephraim Flint, pre-
cinct clerk ; Chambers Russell, Esq., Benjamin Brown,
Josiah Parks, John Headley and John Hoar, precinct
committee; Samuel Dakin and Jonathan Wellington,
collectors ; Stephen Wesson, treasurer ; Ebenezer Cut-
ler, Daniel Adams and Ephraim Flint, assessors.
Before the incorporation of the precinct, meetings
had been held and children baptized at the house of
Mr. Edward Flint. Measures had also been taken to
build a meeting-houae. This house, built and partly
finished, was presented to the precinct, June 22, 1747,
by Benjamin Brown, Edward Flint, Judah Clark,
Joshua Brooks, Joseph Brooks, Samuel Bond, Jona-
than Gove, Benjamin Monroe, John Headley, Samuel
Dakin, Ebenezer Cutler, Jeremiah Clark, Amos
Meriam, John Gove, Jonathan Wellington, Ephraim
Flint, Thomas Wheeler, Joseph Pierce, Nathan
Brown, Jonas Pierce, Timothy Wesson, George Peirce,
builders.
On the 10th of August, 1747, twenty-five members
of the churches in Concord, Weston and Lexington,
having obtained leave of the churches in said towns.
met and mutually agreed to form themselves into a
separate and distinct church. These were : From the
church in Concord, Joshua Brooks, Nathan Brown,
Edward Flint, Ephraim Flint, Josiah Parks, Stephen
Wesson, Timothy Wesson, Thomas Wheeler; from
the church in Weston, Samuel Bond, Joseph Brooks,
Benjamin Brown, Benjamin Brown, Jr., Joseph
Brown, Thomas Garfield, Thomas Garfield, Jr., Jona-
than Gove, John Gove, John Headley, Woodis Lee,
Benjamin Munroe, George Pierce, Jonas Pierce, Jos-
eph Pierce; from the church in Lexington, Judah
Clark. The organization of the church took place
two days afterwards — Rev. .John Hancock, of Lexing-
ton ; Rev. William Williams, of Weston ; Rev. War-
ham Williams, of Waltham, and Rev. Israel Loring,
of Sudbury, participating in the public services of the
occasion.
On the 18th of May, 1748, the church and precinct
united in extending a call to Rev. William Lawrence
to settle in the ministry. The invitation was accom-
panied by an offer of £800 as a settlement, an annual
salary of £400, and thirty cords of wood. Subse-
quently a committee was appointed to treat with Mr.
Lawrence in reference to his settlement, and it was
mutually agreed that his salary should be regulated
by these prices of the following articles, viz. : Indian
corn, 15s. per bushel; rye, 20*. per bushel; pork, Is.
8rf. per pound, and beef, Is, per pound ; it was also
agreed to give him ten cords of wood annually, in
addition to the £400. Mr. Lawrence's ordination
took place Dec. 7, 1748, the ordaining council con-
sisting of the elders and messengers of the churches iu
Lexington and Weston, two churches in Cambridge,
the first church in Groton, and the churches in Wal-
tham and Littleton. Rev. Caleb Trowbridge, of Gro-
ton, preached the ordination sermon. "During his
ministry his church, unlike many in the neighbor-
hood, enjoyed great peace."
His funeral expen.^es, amounting to £366 currency,
and £300 to purchase mourning for the family, were
paid by the town. The town also placed a monu-
ment over his grave, bearing the following very mod-
est and truthful inscription :
"Id memory of Rev. William Lawrence, A. 31., Paator of tlie Church
of Christ in Lincoln, who died April 11, 1780, in the 5""> year of bi3 age
and 32°^ of hia ministry. He was a gentleman of good aUilitieH, both
natural and ucquired, a judicioiia divine, a faithful minister i\nd Hrm
supporter of the order of the churches In his last sickness, which was
long and distressing, he exhibited a temper characteristic of the luiiiis-
ter and Christian. ' Be thou faithful unto death and I will give ther a
crown of life.' " *
Rev. William Lawrence, son of Colonel William
and Susanna (Prescott) Lawrence, was born in Gro-
ton May 7, 1723, and graduated at Harvard 1743, and
married, February 7, 1750-51, Love Adams, daughter
of John and Love (Minott) Adams. They had a
family of three sons and six daughters. Mrs. Lawrence
survived her husband nearly forty years, dying Janu-
ary 3, 1S20; outliving all Uer children except her
daughters Susanna and Sarah.
LINCOLN.
615
Mr. Lawrence's succ3.S3)r in the ministry was R^v.
Charles Stearns, D.D. He was first employed to
preach here in October, 1780. On the 15th of Janu-
ary following the church voted unanimously to inviie
him to become their pastor. On the 5th of February
the town concurred in this vote, and voted to give
him £220 hard money or its equivalent (to which
£70 was subsequently added) as a settlem-fnt, and an
annual salary of £80, and fifteen cord< of wood. His
ordination took place November 7, 1781, the council
being composed of the ministers and delegates of the
churches of Concord, Waltham, We*ton, Reading,
Leominster, Lunenburg, Sudbury, East Sudburv and
Stow — Rev. Mr. Adam<, of Lunenburg, preaching
the sermon. Dr. Stearns continued in ihe ministry,
counting from the time he was first employed as a
candidate, upwards of forty-five years. He was at his
post of duty the first Sabbath of July, 1826. During
the following week he was stricken with disease
which resulted in death.
The town buried him beside his children, who had
gone before, and marked the spot with a marble tablet
bearing the following inscription, prepared by Rev.
Dr. Ripley, of Concord :
" Erectcii by tlie iDhiibilHtita of this town to the meinon' "f Itov.
Charles Steartii, D.D., who dieii .Iiity JO. T8iG, In the Bereiity-ruurth year
of hJM Rge and folty-tifth year of his niiniBtry
** He was didtih^iiMlied for his hig:li attainments in various branches
of PCience ; for streuf^lli and sounducas of mind ; for method and accur-
ary in reaaining and facility in comniniiicating knowledge. By lii^
piety, benevolence, and levrning. he gained the affection and respect of
his beloved people, the esteem and contidence of his numerous friends,
nnd the well deserved honors of literary societies. His life was full of
practical goodness, the genuine fruit of deep ft-lt piety, and his death of
religious hope anil p^ace. By the luvbitual exercise of faith, humility,
patience and charity, he exhibited Christianity In a strong and promi-
nent light, and is gone it is believed, to enjoy the rewards of a good aud
faithful servant of Jestis Christ."
Senator Hoar in his admirable address at the dedi-
cation of the Lincoln Library, after speaking of the
moulding infiaencei which the ministers of former
times exertei upon the characters of their congrega-
tii)us, piys a glowing tribute to the memory of Dr.
Stearns :
"The memory of such a clergyman as I have descrihfd i*? still fresh
in Ihe traditions of Lincoln. Dr. (-haries Stearns, a man trained in the
best learning of his time, with his aalapf of eighty pounds and fifteen
cords of wo'fd a year, devoted fur forty-five years abilities fit to adorn the
highest stations in church or state to the service of this tow o. To him is
due much of the high character which for a century it has maintained.
1 have often heard my lather, vvbo was hiii pupil, speak of b ni with
reverence."
During the later years of Dr. Stearns' ministry
dissensions arose in many of the churches of New
England upon the subject of pulpit exchanges
between ministers holding difierent views upon
matters of faith and doctrine — but Dr. Stearns
steadily refused to take any part in the contro-
versy and continued to make exchanges with all
the neighboring ministers until his death. His ser-
mon before the convention of Congregational minis-
ters in 1S15 is an earnest plea fur union and harmony.
After the death of Dr. Stearns the flames of sec-
tarian strife broke forth, and the work of division
and disintegration has steadily gone on to the present
time, and although the population of the town has
not more than half doubled since its incorporation,
Lincoln worshipers now gather weekly in seven con-
gregations, and the percentage of non-church-goers
is probably larger than ever before.
Rev. Charles Stearns, .son of Thomas and Lydia
(Mansfield) Stearns, was born in Lgnenburg, July 19,
1753 ; graduated Harvard University 1773 ; Mr. Tutor
1780-81; D.D. 1810; married Januarys, 1782, Susan-
na, daughter of Jonathan and Rachel (Green) Cowdry,
of Reading. They had six sons and five daughters.
Dr. Stearns' successor in the ministry was Rev.
Elijah Demond, born in Rutland, March 1, 1790 ; Dart-
mouth College, 1816, and the Theological Seminary in
Andover, 1821, and ordained at West Newbury, March
7, 1821, and was installed at Lincoln, November 7,
1827. After a ministry of nearly five years he was
dismissed at his own request, and wa.s installed at
HnllisUn, 1833, and Princeton in 1836.
Mr. Demond was a gentleman of good abilities, of
dignified and courteous manners, and great firmness
and decision of character — as thoroughly furnished
unto knightly service in the church militant as in the
church triumphant. His call was not without oppo-
sition, and he was installed in a violent snow-storm —
emblematic, if not prophetic, of his ministry.
During his ministry the First Parish was organized,
and ecclesiastical aflfairs ceased to be managed by the
town.
Mr. Demond married, March 29, 1821, Lucy,
daughter of Aaron Brown, Esq., of Groton, and died
in Westboro', July 20, 1877.
Mr. Demond was succeeded by Rev. Ebenezer New-
hall. He was born in New Ipswich, N. H., August 5,
1789; graduated at Harvard in 1818, and at the An-
dover Theological Seminary, in 1820, and was ordained
at Oxford, December, 1823, and installed at Lincoln,
January 16, 1833, and was dismissed, April 22, 1847,
to accept a call at Willsboro', N. Y., and was subse-
quently pastor of the churches in Chesterfield, N. H.,
aud Litchfield, N. H. He was a man of very method-
ical habits, of discreet life and conversation, and dili-
gent and faithful in all things pertaining to pastoral
duties.
He married, Sept. 16, 1824, Miss Sarah Burr Clark,
daughter of Stodard Adams Clark, of New York, and
died in Cambridge, August 15, 1878.
Rev. William C. Jackson, the fifth pastor of the
church, was born in Madison, N. H., February 17,
1808, and graduated, D. C, 1831, and was ordained
a missionary at Lancaster, N. H., October 14, 1835,
and soon afterwards sailed, under appointment of the
A. B. C. F. M., for Turkey, where he successfully
labored for about ten years, returning to this country
in December, 1845.
' He was installed at Lincoln, April 15,1848, having
616
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
supplied the pulpit from July, 1847. He remained
pastor of the church until October 13,1858. His next
field of labor was at Dunstable, where he remained
about nine years, and was subsequently, for eleven
years, pastor of the church in Brentwood, N. H.,
where he still resides.
" Mr. Jackson, in all his ministerial labor, has been
recognized as sn able, judicious, and devout minister
of the gospel. His work was, for many years, prose-
cuted under peculiar difBcuItie.", owing to ill-health in
his family ; yet in addition to his pastoral work while
in Lincoln, h'e wrote for many months regularly for
the Congregationalist."
Mr. Jackson married, September 9, 1835, Miss
Mary A. Sawyer, of Westminster. Une of his son",
Edward Payson Jackson, born Erzeroom, Turkey,
March 15, 1840, was for a time a member of the class
of 1863 in Amherst College. He enlisted in the fall
of 1862 in the Forty-fifth Regiment of Massachusetts
Volunteers, and in 1864 was commissioned second
lieutenant in the Fifth Regiment. He subsequently
received the degree A.M. from Amherst College. After
the war he engaged in teaching, and for the last ten
or twelve years has been engaged as master in the
Boston Latin School. He has also been engaged in
literary work, and is successful as an author.
Another son of Rev. Mr. Jackson, George W., born
in Lincoln, November 10, 1853, has been for several
years a clerk in Hollis' apothecary store in Boston.
Rev. Henry J. Richardson, the present pastor of the
Congregational Church, was born in Middleton, June
23, 1829; graduated at Amherst College in 1855, and
at the Theolrgical Seminary in Andover in 1860, and
was ordainf d in Lincoln, Septemljer 0. 1860, the pres-
ent church edifice being d<dicated at the same time.
He is now in the thirtieth year of his minialry, and
the oldtst clergyman, in point of service, in the asso-
ciation to which he belongs.
He married, June 26, 1864, Mrs. Harriet Amelia
(Colburn) French, of St. Paul, Minn., a daughter of
Deacon William Colburn, of Lincoln.
In 1798 a Methodist Episcopal Society was formed
in Weston, and a small house for worship was built in
the northerly part of that town, near the Lincoln line,
some Lincoln families joining in the movement. The
society grew and prospered, and in 1828 a new church
edifice was built on the North road, as it is called in
Weston, or South county road, as it is called in Lin-
coln. From 1830 to 1850 a large percentage of those
worshiping there were from Lincoln. Since 1850 the
number of Lincoln families belonging to the society
has materially decreased.
In 1841 a Unitarian Society was formed in Lincoln,
and a house of worship built and dedicated Novem-
ber 2, 1842. The following persons have been its min-
isters or preachers : Rev. Samuel Ripley, five years;
Rev. Seth Alden, five years; Rev.Chas. C.Sewall, seven
years; Rev. Edward F. Stone, une year; Rev. Wa>h-
ington Gilbert, four years ; Rev. Jaua-s C. Parsons,
five years; Rev. Jeseph H. Allen, five years; Rev.
Francis B. Hornbroke, three years; Rev. Henry Wes-
cott, one year; Rev. Edward J. Young, eight years.
Since 1877 the services have been held in the after-
noon, and discontinued during the winter months.
In 1873 a church was built by the Episcopalians,
but the legal organization of the society appears not to
have taken place until April 6, 1874, when a meeting
was held under a warrant issued by Frank W. Bige-
low, Esq., of Weston, to Mr. Howard Snelling, di-
recting him "To notify the qualified voters of the
Episcopal Society worshiping in Lincoln to meet at
the church for the choice of officers and parish organi-
zation." At this meeting Ogden Codman, Esq., was
chosen moderator, and F. W. Bigehnv, Esq., clerk.
A constitution and code of by-laws wut adopted, and
a name — St. Anne's — selected for the church. Jlcsrrs.
Howard Snelling and George G. Cheney were chosen
wardens. Ogden Codman, James Farrar, John Tasker,
Albert Griffiths, James E. Baker, Charles E. Smith
and George H. Smith, vestrymen, and Howard Snel-
ling, treasurer and collector.
The church was consecrated by Bishop Paddock,
June 3, 1874. Rev. William M. Groton was rector
from July, 1876, to November, 1878. Rev. Dr. P. H.
Steinstra was lor several years minister in charge.
Rev. James S. Bush, D.D., and others, have also otli-
ciated as minister in charge.
In 1882 the society received the gift of a bell from
Mr. John H. Hubbell, and a tower was erected
wherein to place it.
Alter detailing the incidents attending the incor-
poration and and organization of the town, Mr. Shat-
tuck goes on to say, " The proceedings of the town
were conducted with great harmony, and no occur-
rence worthy of notice marks its history until the
great question of opposition to Ei;gland was agi-
tated." Within a year after its incorporation I he
town was engaged in active preparations for war.
The j'ear 1755 is memorable for the defeat and death
of General Braddock, the battles of Lake George, the
devastation of Acadia, and the deportation of its in-
habitants, and the great earthquake. In this year
Massachusetts alone raised ?.n army of nearly seven
thousand nine hundred men " For the defence of His
Majesty's dominions in North America," being nearly
one-fifth part of the able-bodied men of the Province.
To this force Lincoln contributed fifteen or sixteen
men, being the town's full proportion.
The central expedition was designed for the cap-
ture of the forts at Ticonderoga and Crown Point,
and incidentally to prevent the French sending any
reinforcements to Forts Duquesne and Niagara.
Capt. William Pierce, of Stow, commanded a com-
pany in Col. Ephraim Williams' regiment, and Judah
Clark, who had removed from that part of Lexington
which became a part of Lincoln at its incorporation,
was his lieutenant, and Robert Munroe, said in the
mustcr-roil to bn of Lincoln, was the ensign. In 'his
LINCOLN.
617
compHny were also Robert Wilson, Bfrgeant, Simon
Pierce, corporal ; Jonntban Barnard, Patrick Disney
and Natban Willington were privates. Elisha Cutler,
Silas Fay and Gershom Flagg were in Captain Sam-
uel Dakin's company; Jonas Cutler, of Lincoln,
was clerk of Captain Timotby Hnugbton's company ;
Robert Angier, Cornelius Melony, Jonas Jones,
Charles Lee and Natbaniel Stearns were in tbe east-
ern expedition ; Joseph Blancbard was a'so in tbe
service. All tbe above, except Jonas Cutler, bad
their poll-taxes in tbe country rate for tbe year 1755
abated, " they being in His Majesty's service."
Of the soldiers of Captain Pierce's company, Simon
Pierce and Jonathan Barnard were killed in battle at
Lake Georgr, September 8, 1755. Joseph Bulkley, of
Littleton and Robin Raymond, of Lexington, were
killed in the same battle, and Lieutenant Clark was
severely wounded.
The eabtern expedition was designed for the con-
quest of Acadia. The provincial troops had for
their commander Lieutenant-Colonel John Winslow,
who was a major-general in the militia of tbe Prov-
ince, and Lieutenant-Colonel Monckton commanded
the regulars or British troops, and as tbe British otfi-
cers outranked the provincial, Monckton was in com-
mand of the expedition.
The expedition left Boston on tbe 22d of May, and
reached Cliignecto on tbe 2d of June. The reduc-
tion of Forts Beau-Sejour and Gaspereaux took but
fifteen days, and cost tbe English but twenty men
killed and as many more wounded, and the Acadians
were at tbe mercy of the English. Mo one can read
the story of tbe devastation of that beautiful country
without recalling the declaration of the wise man:
" Tbe tender mercies of the wicked are cruel." The
French bad landed on the shores of Cape Breton and
effected settlements there before the arrival of th^
Pilgrims at Plymouth. By the treaty of Utrecht in
1713, Nova Scotia and Newfoundland had been ceded
to England, and in 1730 tbe French inhabitants of
the Province, who composed more than nine-tenths of
tbe population, bad taken an oath of fidelity and sub-
mission to England, and had been promised indul-
gence in tbe exercise of their religion and exemption
from bearing arms against the French or Indians.
Hence they were known as " French Neutrals."
From 1730 to 1755 they had increased and pros-
pered. They were at peace among themselves, and
were not tbe enemies or a menace to any people or
nation. But the English ministry bad resolved upon
their destruction. Upon flimsy pretexts and false
accusations, without any regard to law or equity,
justice or humanity, they were hunted from their
homes and driven at the point of the bayonet on
board crowded transports and cast abandoned on the
shores of the Colonies from New Hampshire to
Georgia, the object being to scatter them as far or as
wide apart as possible. Of these, one thousand were
lauded on the shores of Massachusetts, .vud an equal
or greater number in South Carolina. In this crime
of the centuries a Massachusetts general led, and
some Lincoln men assisted. Of those landed in Bos-
ton, Joseph Hibert, aged twenty-nine years, Nanny,
his wife, aged twenty-four years, Mary and Modlin,
tbeir children, were quartered on the town of Lincoln
and supported at the expense of the Province. From
tbe official documents we learn that "This family is
of a healthy constitution. Joseph can do some kinds
of work, can reap, chop wood, &c. .Nanny can sew,
spin, weave, and do housework." The town paid for
building an oven in the Southwest School-house, for
a coffin and for digging a grave for the French family.
History shudders over the cruel fate of the Acadi-
ans. The lament of the Jewn, " who wept by the
rivers of Babylon," which has come down through
the centuries, is not sadder than the Lay of Long-
fellow. Tbe number of tbe Jews in tbe Babylonish
captivity was not so great or their captivity more
hopeless than that of the Acadians. The horrors of
the Libby and Andersonvilie Prisons were lesser
afflictions compared with those of the French exiles.
Hoary men and aged women, separated from their
children, mothers and maidens, innocent children and
little babes, were not tbe victims of rebel barbarity.
The children of Bethlehem and its lovely coasts,
which tbe soldiers of Herod went forth and slew,
were not subjected to hunger and cold and lingering
deaths. " I know not if the annals of the human
race keep the records of sorrows so wantonly inflicted,
so bitter and so perennial as fell upon the French
inhabitant-! of Acadia."'
Although war had raged on the Canadian frontier
for more than two years, no formal declaration of
war between England and France was made until
May 17, 175G, — the forces before that time being
raised " For tbe defence of His Majesty's domin-
ions in North America" and after that date, for "The
Reduction of Canada," and Lincoln contributed men
for that purpose every year from 1756 to 1763. In
1757 a new impulse was given to the zeal of the Col-
onies, and Massachusetts alone raised an army of
nearly ten thousand men, of which Lincoln contrib-
uted seventeen, viz.: W. Bond, sergeant, and J.Adams,
J. Billings, A. Darby, Saml. Farrar, Jonas Whita-
ker and Joseph Wiukley, privates in Capt. Thomas
Adams' company ; John Thorning, Samuel Whitaker
and Israel Underwood, in Capt. William Angler's
company ; William Hartwell, Francis Arpin, Isaac
Billings, Joshua Pierce, El iakim Robinson and Jona-
than Wellington, in Capt. Salmon Whitney's com-
pany ; and David Hagar and Ephraim Parks, in
Capt. Henry Spring's company.
The events which led to tbe Revolutionary War
belong to the history of the whole country. The
part performed by tbe people of the town collectively
in its municipal capacity, and by its men individually,
1 Biilicroft'8 " }Iiblor\ uf V. fc," Vol. V. |.. 20C.
618
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
is what we have to record, and is highly creditable to
its citizens.
March 15, 1770, the town "Voted, That we will
not purchase any one article of any persoa that im-
ports goods coDtrary to the agreement of the mer-
chants of Boston." And in answer to a circular
dated February 8, 1773, they say, " We will not be
wanting in our assistance according to our ability, in
the prosecuting of all such lawful and constiturional
measures as shall be thought proper for the continu-
ance of all our rights, privileges and liberties, both
civil and religious; being of opinion that a steady,
united, persevering conduct in a constitutional way,
is the best means, under God, for obtaining the redress
of all our grievances."
November 2, 1773, Dea. Samuel Farrar, Capt.
Eleazar Brooks and Capt. Abijah Pierce were chosen
a Committee of Correspondence. The first letter
emanating from this committee is dated December 20,
1773, and was in answer to a letter from the Cimmii-
tee of Correspondence of Boston. It is as follows :
"Gentlemen; — We have read your letter oncIoRinf; the prnceedinpa
of the town uf BoetoD at their late meeting ; as ulao another letter en-
cloami; the proceedings of a collective Imdy of |>eople, not only of Bnston,
but of the adiacent towna; in which, after some very pertinent obaerva-
tioos on the alarming situation of our public affaira, yon deaire nur ad-
vice and to be acquainted with theaenae of this town reapectint^the prea-
ent KloofDV aituation of our public affaira. We rejoice at every appear-
ance of public virtue, and resolution iu the cause of liberty, inasmuch
as upon ourown virtue and resolution, under Divine Providence, depends
the preservation of all our rights and privileges.
" We apprehend that we in America have rights, privileges and prop-
erty of our own as well as the rest of mankind, and that we have the
right of self-preservation as well as all other beings. .\nd we are con-
Btrnined to say that after the moat careful and mature deliberation, ac-
cording to our capacitiea, weighing the arguments on both sides, we ap-
prehend our rights and privileges have been infringed in nmnv glaring
instances, which we mean not to enumerate, among which the hite min-
isterial plan, mentioned in your letter, is not the least,
" The act impoeing a duty on tea ia alarming, because in procuring
the aame our enemiea are dealing by ua like the great enemy of iimnkind.
viz., endeavouring to enslave us by those things to which we are nut
necessitated but by our own contracted evil habits ; although if tea were
properly used it might be of some advantage. When we speak of our
enemies, oa above, we mean those persons on either side of the water,
who, by many ways, either secret or open, are sowing the seeds of strife
and discord between Briltain and her colonies ; or are in any way the
active instruments of our distress.
'* Now, since it must he gntnteil that our rights and privileges are in-
fringed, and that we have the right uf seirdefence, the imi>orTant ques-
tion is by what means to nuike such defence. Doubtless, in all coars the
means of defence ought to quadrate with the nature of the atUick ; and
since the present plan seems to be to enahive us, we need only (had we
virtue enough for that) to shun the bait, «» we would shun the most
deadly poison. Notwithstanding cousiderin^' su many are so habituated
to the use of tea, na perhaps inadvertently to niin themselves and their
country thereby ; and others su abandoneU to vice, expecting to aliare in
the profits arising from the ruin of their country, as to use all nie^ns in
their power to encounige the use of tea ; we cannot, tlierefi>re, but com-
mend the spirited behaviour of the town of Boston in endeavouring to
prevent the rale of the East India Company's teas, by endeavouring to
persuade the consignees to resign their ulflce, or any other lawful means,
and we judge the consigucea, by refusing to rumply with the ju?t de..ire
uf their fellow-citr/.eos ha\e lietrayed a greiiter r('g:iril to their ririvate
interest Ihan the public good and safety of Iheir country, and unght to
bo treated accordingly.
"The situation of our public affairs growing more alarming and hav-
ing heretofore tried the furee uf pclitiuns and remonstrnucea and finding
Do redress, we, the iububitauts of this town, have now come luto a lull
determination and settled resolution not to purchase nor use any tea,
norsulTer it to be purchased or used in our families, so long as there ia
a duty laid on such tea by an .\ct of the Bntiali Parliament. .\nd will
hold and eateem auch as do use such tea enemies to their country ; and
will treat them with the greatest neglect. And we beg leave to recom-
mend it to the several towns within this province, who have not done it,
to go and do likewise.
" How easy the means I Ilovf sure the event ! But be the event what
it may, auppoae this method ahould not obtain a repeal of the Act which
we judge to be unrighteous, but the event should be a total disuse of
that destructive article, we might tlien (if we may so express ourselves)
bless God that he ever permitted tliat act to p.ass the British Parliament.
" We trust we have courage and resolution sufficient to encounter all
the horrors of war in defence of those rights and privileges, civil and
religious, which we esteem more valuable than our livus. .\nd we do
hereby assure, not only the town of Boston, but the worhl that when-
ever we shall have a clear call from Heaven, we nrp ready to join with
our brethren b5 face the formidable forcea, rather than tamely to surren-
der up our rights and privileges into the hands uf auy of our own
species, n.jt distinguished from ourselves except it be in adisposiiiun to
enslave us. .^t the same time wo have the higlu-st esteem fur all lawful
authority, and rejoice in our connexion with Great Britain so long aa we
can enjoy our charter rights and privileges.'*
At the annual town-meeting, March (5, 1775, it was
Voted, That £52 h. be granted to provide for those
persons who have enlisted as minute-men, each one a
bayonet, belt, cartridge-box, steel rammer, gunstock
and knapsack, and that they attend military eserci.ses
four hours in a day, twice a week, till the 1st of May
next. In case any one refuses to attend, 2s. for each
four hours, and in proportion for a less time, shall be
deducted from their wages.
These votes show that the men had already enlisted
as minute-men, and that many of them were destitute
of proper accoutrements, and the payments from the
treasury of the town show that sums varying from 3s.
lOd. to ISs. were paid to forty-five men for furnishing
themselves with equipments, and £12 14s. lOd. paid
the committee to provide equipments for the soldiers,
the whole amount paid being £48 -'ys. 5rf. At what
time the minute-men of Lincoln were enlisted or their
officers chosen, cannot be ascertained. Mr. Shattuck
says, "There was at this time in this vicinity, under
rather imperfect organization, a regiment of militia
and a regiment of minute-men. The officers of the
militia were: James Barrett, col.; Ezekiel How, of
Sudbury, It.-col. ; Samuel Farrar was captain, and
Samuel Hoar was lieutenant of the Lincoln company.
The officers of the minute-men were: Abijah Peirce,
of Lincoln, colonel ; Thomas Nixon, of Framingham,
lieutenant-colocel ; John Buttrick, of Concord,
major." William Smith was the captain of the min-
ute-men of Lincoln, and Samuel Farrar and Samuel
Hoar were lieutenants. The officers of the minute-
men had no commissions and derived their authority
from the suffrages of their companies.
Such was the condition of things in the spring of
1775. The Provincial Congress had collected a quan-
tity of military stores at Concord, and an attempt to
seize them was not unexpected, and measures had
been taken to give a general alarm in case an expedi-
tion should be sent out for that purpose.
The main road from Cliarlestown, through Lexing-
ton, to Concord aud Grotou, pusses through the north-
LINCOLN.
619
erly part of Liacoln, the distance from Lexington
line to the point where the road becomes thedividing
line between Lincoln and Concord being about two
miles. In the northeasterly part of Lincoln, within a
few rods of Lexington line, dwelt Mr. Josiah Nelson.
He was an ardent patriot, and the men of Bedford
had arranp-ed with him to give them warning in case
an expedition should be sent out. Awakened in the
night by the noise of horsemen riding along the road,
he ru'^hed out half-dressed to ascertain the cause of
the riding, and on asking what ii meant he was struck
with a sword, gashing his head, and told he was a
prisoner. At the same moment he was surrounded
by several men. some of whom were British scouts,
and the others, evidently Tories, acting asguid^s. After
detaining him awhile the scouts left him in charge of
the Tories, who soon released him, telling him to go
into his house, and threatening, if he gave any alarm
or showed any light, tu burn his house over his head.
Nevertheless, after dressing himself and his wound, he
started to give the alarm at Bedford. He had not two
miles to go to reach some of the Bedford patriots.
About the same time and near the same place Paul
Revere was captured on his midnight ride — immortal-
ized in song.
On the same road, about midway between the boun-
daries of Lexington and Concord, lived Capt. William
Smith. He must have received very early the intel-
ligence that the British troops were in motion.
Mounting his horse, he assisted in alarming his com-
pany, and then rode to Concord. He, with a part of
his men, reached Concord about seven o'clock in the
morning. Being directed by a field officer to parade
his men on the hill, he left his horse at the tavern
and obeyed the order. When the British troops left
Concord his horse was taken to carry off one of their
wounded, and he lost his horse and his equipments.
When the British troops approached the town the
provincials retreated over the North Bridge. When
Major Buttrick sent a request to Capt. Brown to dis-
lodge the British troops who were guarding the bridge,
C.ipt. Smith offered to lead with his company in the
attack.'
The British soldiers passed up the road between
the hours of six and seven in the morning. The re-
treating column re-entered the town soon after noon.
From the foot of Hardv's Hill, the first considerable
* "Lincoln, November, IGTC. — Thia may certify lUat Captain William
Smith, uf Lincoln, in the county of Middlesex, appeared on Oincord
parade early in the morning of the 10th of April, 1775, with bis com-
pany of minute men ; waa ordered to leave hi* borae, by a tield officer,
and take liis poet on an adjacent bill —the British troops poeseasiUK the
Nolth Bridge. He voluntarily oflered, with his compuny, to endeavor
to dislod(;e tlieni, leaving his Lorse at the tavern; by which means oD
their retre.it the horse, Ac, were cunicd ofl with one uf their wounded
men.
".John Buttrick, V-^-t."
^ee nlS" |)i-liti<)ii and a<-C'>uiit or Williari
cllives," \ul. IM', I'l'. 'J-JU-JtM' Iludooti'^
Smith, " MtieajifliuM'tf* Ar-
'lli^litry of l-eXMii;liiri.*' p.
ascent on the returning march, to the foot of the next
hill the road is the dividing line between Concord
and Lincoln. At the southwest corner of the tan-yard
the line of the town leaves the road and turns north-
ward. Eastward from the tan-yard the road ascends
a steep acclivity and bends northward also. To re-
duce the grade of the hill and get material for the re-
pairs of the road an excavation had been made in the
brow of the hill. Through this excavation the road
passed, and on the easterly side of the road was a
dense forest which afforded a covert for the provin-
cials, while the curves of the road exposed the British
to a raking fire from front and rear. It was here that
the retreat first became a rout — here that the trained
warriors of England's haughty King first paled in
wild dismay and then fled in dire confusion before an
impromptu army of enraged and embattled farmers.
The hardest fighting of the day was done in Lin-
coln.' Within a short half-mile from the excavation
at the brow of the hill eight British soldiers were
killed. Capt. Jonathan Wilson, of Bedford, Daniel
Thompson, of Woburn, and Nathaniel Wyman, of
Billerica, were slain here. Two more British sol-
diers were killed before the fugitives re-crossed the
dividing line between Lincoln and Lexington.
The bodies of five of the British soldiers were gath-
ered up and buried in the old burying-ground in
Lincoln, three more were buried by the side of the
road and two in a field near Lexington line.
Mr. Shattuck says : " About the same time (t. e. that
Capt. Brown paraded his company on the Common)
a part of the minute company from Lincoln, who had
been alarmed by Dr. Prescott, came into town and
paraded in like manner. The number of armed men
who had now assembled was about one hundred. The
morning had advanced to about seven o'clock, and
the British army were soon seen approaching the
town on the Lexington Road. The sun shone with
peculiar splendor. The glittering arms of eight hun-
dred soldiers, the flower of the British army, were in
full view. It was a novel, imposing, alarming sight.
What was to be done? At first it was thought best
they should face the enemy, as fey! as they were, and
abide the consequences. Of thia opinion was the
Rev. William Emerson, the clergyman of the town,
who had turned out amongst the first in the morning
to animate and encourage his people by his counsel
and patriotic example. ' Let us htand our ground,'
said he, ' if we die, let us die here ! ' Eleazer Brooks,
of Lincoln, was then on the hill. ' Let us go and
meet them,' said one to him. ' No,' he answered,
'it will not do for im to begin the war.' They did
not then know what had happened at Lexington."
And Eleazer Brooks was rig/it. It would not have
been well or wise for the Provincials to begin the war;
better, far better, to wait until the British soldiers
-nnikc's" History of Middlesex County," vol. 1, p. 126. Hudsuu'a
'Hiitury of Lexington," p. I!i5.
620
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
had fully manifested their purpose to kilTand plunder,
burn and destroy. The coloniata atoOi] better in their
own estimation and in the eyes of their countrymen,
and stand better in the light of history than if they
had rushed madly or inconsiderately into the fight.
And not only did the British soldiers kill armed men
and destroy public property that day, but they burnt
the houses of private and unoffending people, butch-
ered old and unarmed men and drove a woman with
a babe three days old from her house and set fire to it,
— atrocities unparalleled except in savage warfare.
And no sequel to the events of the morning can be
conceived of, more animating or encouraging to the
Colonies, or one which would better unite them in a
common cause against the cnmmou euemy, or one
which could be more mortifying or discouraging to
the English people and ministry.
Suppose the Provincials had captured the whole
force sent to Concord. The capture would have cost
tiie Americans the lives of many brave men, whom
they could not well spare, and the captives would
have been an elephant on their hands which they had
no use for or place to keep. Or, suppose the British
troops had baited in some open field or on some hill
and engaged the Americans in mortal combat. If
they had fought well and died bravely, the English
nation might have been filled with admiration at their
valor, and aroused to gigantic efforts to avenge their
deaths. Far better they should ignominiousiy run
away, giving courage and hope to the Colonists, grief
and shume to the English people.
List of Revoi.utionaey Soldiers. — To com-
pile this record has required a large amount of time
and patience. The records of the town give some
reliable information as to the amount of money raisfd
for the war, but very little information a3 to whom it
was paid. From 1775 to 1784, £17,784 16a. 7d. was
paid to individuals, mostly citizens of the town, " For
money loaned to the town's committee for hiring men
for the war, while but about £4538 was paid directly
to the soldiers." The difficulty is further enhanced
by the constantly depreciating value of the currency,
the amount paid each soldier furnishing little infor-
mation as to the length of his service.
Various attempts have been made by different
writers to explain this depreciation, and to determine
the comparative value of specie and currency at dif-
ferent dates during the war. A few items, tran-
scribed from the payments from the treasury, may give
as correct an idea of it as can be obtained in any
other way :
March 27, 1775, Hannah Munroe was paid £3 19s.
6(/. for teaching school seventeen weeks.
December 5, 1775, Lucy Eveleth was paid £1 17s.
4rf. for teaching school two months.
In 1780 Elizabeth Hoar, Molly Brooks, Polly Bond
and Ruth Flint were paid £255 each for teaching
school ten weeks.
In 1777 tweuty-nine men were paid a bounty of
£30 each for enlisting into the Continental Army for
three years.
In 1780 Daniel Child was paid £180, in part, and
Isaac Munroe was paid £150, in part, for three
months' service at Rhode Island, and Micah JIunroe
and John Wheeler were paid £720 each for service at
Rhode Island.
In 1781 twelve men were paid an average of £73
10s. each, " Hard money," for engaging in the Couti-
nental service for three years.
And these sums were not paid for articles of food
or clothing, which, by reason of famine or scarcity,
sometimes command exorbitant prices, but for the
personal services, which have a. less changeable value.
It is not claimed that the following list contains
the names of all the men of Lincciln who servetl in
the Revolutionary War. Much less is it claimed that
the record contains an account of all the service each
one performed. In many c;ises it is believed, and in
some instances known to be imperfect. It is certain
that the men of Lincoln were at Trenton and Cam-
den, at Monmouth and White Plains, anil traditions
of their sufferings in the winter of 177(; were common
in the early life of the writer. The soldiers who
served in later years of the war are said, in the rec-
ords of the town, to have been in service " at the South-
ward," the term being used to designate all thecountry
west and south of New York.
I have not been able to find any of the company-
rolls of Colonel Eleazar Brooks' regiment, which was
in service at New York in 1776 and 1777, except " A
Bounty Roll of a company commanded by Capt.
Samuel Farrar in Col. Jonathan Reed's regiment,
detached from Col. Eleazar Brooks' regiment and sent
to re-inlbrce the Northern army under Gen. Gates,"
and was at the capitulation of General Burgoyne's
army.
Mr. Shattuck says, under date of " Nov. 28, 1777,
Capt. Simon Hunt, of Acton, commanded a company,
to which most of the Concord men were attached
under Col. Eleazar Brooks and Gen. Heath. Nine com-
panies guarding Burgoyne's troops down, five com-
panies marching before and four behind."
In the town treasurer's books are entries of sums
paid to citizens of the town for a " Three years' cam-
paign," and for one-half and one-third of a three
years' campaign in the Continental Array. In 1777
the town was called upon to furnish twenty-six men
to serve three years in the Continental Army, and
these were paid a bounty of £30. Jlost of these
bounties were paid to citizens of the town who per-
formed the service, but some of them were paid to
persons who singly, or in connection with others, pro-
cured recruits. Those who were not citizens or resi-
dents of the town were Samuel Bailey, Benjamin
Cleaveland, John Gordon, Wiliam Gilbert, Zodith
Henderson, John Langtry, John Lunt, John Porter
and Adonijah Rice.
A list of a company of luinutc-iuen, under the
LINCOLN.
621
command of Captain William Smith, in Colonel
Abijah Peirce'e regiment of minute-men, who en-
tered the service April 19, 1775 :
MEN'S NAMES.
RANK.
t-^
c «=
c <y
Williftm Smith
SHiiiUfl Karrar
Samuel Hoar
Samuel Hartweli
David Fiske
Joim Hartwell „.
Jonas Mason
Abiiali Mead
Elijah Wellinpton...
Eljeoezer Brown
Joseph Abbott
Joseph Mason
Elijah Mason
Daniel Brown
Nelieniiali Ablwii....
Daniel Child
Abel Adams
Daniel Hosmer
Abijah Muuroe
Josejili Peirce
Abraham Peirce
Arternns Heed
Jes-^i- Smith.
Narhan Tidd
AVilliain Thurniiip...
Solomon Whitney....
.JonKtlian Gape
Isaar <ijme
J'lhn Park*
EbeneziT Parks
Jona-P:irks
A:iriin Parks
Nathan Hilling-
Tnii'ithy Billing......
Nnili:\niel Baker
Jame* Baker
Nathan Bmwn, Jr...
Saniui'i Dakih. Jr....
Humphrey Farrar..
Jame> Piirk-^
Jonathan Smith
John We.-^Fon, Jr
Eno-i Wheeler
Jr' ob Baker, Jr
■iuhn Gearheld
Joel Adams
Joshua Brooks, Jr..,
Benjamin Brooks....
Thomas Blo<»pett...,
Joshua Cliikl, Jr
Jacob Foster
Nathaniel (jmvn
Daniel Harrini^ton..
I-aac Hartwell
Gregory St<>ne, Jr...
J-'hh ThorninK
John We«i**on
Joseph Wheat
Daniel liillinps ,
William Parks
Willard Parks
William Hoiimer....
iCnptftin
'Lieiit
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Sergt
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WiLLiAsi Smith.
Captain,
*' CoLOKY OF MASSACHTSnTE BaT,
** January 25, 177C.
" William Smith made solemn oath that this roll, by him pub-
pcrihed, is true in all its parts according to the best of his know-
ledge.
" Before me Moses Gill,
'^Justice of Peace throu't y * Coiony.^'
"A list of a company of militia commanded by Cap-
tain John Hartwell in Colonel Eleazar Brooks' regi-
ment, called down for the fortifying the Dorchester
hills March y' 4, 1776 :
"John Hartwell, Capt.; Samuel Farrer, Lient.; Samuel Uou, LieDL;
Jonaa Maaon, Sergit.; Nathan Weatoo, Sergt.; Isaac Hartwell, Sergt.;
Joseph Abbott, Sergt-; Joshua Brooks, Corp.; Nathan Brown, Corp.;
Abijnb Munroe, Corp.; Nehemiab Abbott, Edward Adams, Abel Adams,
James Adajns, Uulkley Adams, Epbmim Brooks, Noah Brooks, Epbraim
Brooks, Jr., Stephen Brooks, Timoth}- Brooks, Daniel BUlings, Timothy
Billings, Joseph Billings, lAniel Brown, Ephraim Brown, Samuel Bond,
Nathaniel Biiker, Amoe Baker, Edmund Bowman, Noah Bacon, Joahua
Child, Amoe Child, Abel Child, Ellsba Child, Samuel Dakln, Jacob Fos-
ter, Jonathan Fobler, Ephraim Flint, Uuinphre; Farrar, Samuel Hart-
well, Isaac Munroe, Salem Middlesex, Isaac Fierce, Joseph Pierce,
Jueeph Pierce, Jr.; James Miles, Willard Parks, Isaac Parks, J utiiah Parks,
Beiijamiu Parks, Eleazar Parks, Joehua Stone, Timothy Stone, Gregory
Sloiic, Jiibe Savage, Enoe Wheeler, Joseph Wheat, Elisha Williogton,
Ndtbun Tidd, John Lander, 6U men, 6 days' service — travel 4U miles."
Joseph Abbott (Lieut.) was in the service at Cambridge in 1776 and
at Dorchester in 1776 and 1777. He was at Lexington en the morning
of April Yi, 1776, and his deposition was one of those that was taken
and sent to England to prove that the British soldiers commenced the
war by firing upou the provincials on the morning of the 19th of April,
1775. Ue was a son of Nehenitah and Sarah (Foster) Abbott, born In
that pan of Lexington which became a part of Lincoln upon the incor-
poration of the town in 1754 ; married Hannah White and died in Lin-
coln June 29, 1794. They were the parents of Joseph, Nehemiab and
Abiel Abbott.
Joseph Abbott, Jr., whs in service at Cambridge in 1775 and at Ticon-
derogu in 1770 ; bom in the Precinct July 10, 1752 ; married, 1776, Both
buckuam, and died in Sidney, Maine.
Nehemiab Abbott, born In Lincoln, September 27, 1764, mirried,
February 17, 1791, Sarah Hoar, and died in Lincoln October 28, 1839.
He was in the service at Cambridge eight months in 1775, and enlisted
in 1777 for three years in the Continental Army. He was a Revolu-
tionary pensioner and received a bounty of two hundred acres of land.
Ue had the reputation of being a good soldier. Any one who remem-
bers the imperturbable old gentleman can readily believe that nothing
kbs thau an army Willi tanners vould terrify him.
Abiel Abbott, born in Lincoln, September IC, 1759, married, Decem-
ber 10, 1786, Polly Merriam and died, in Lincoln, in 1617. He was in
the service at Dorchester in 1776, at Rhode Island in 1779 and 1781.
Aliel Adams, born in Lincoln, February 20, 1757, was in service at
Dorchester in 1776 and at Saratoga in 1777. He died in Mason, N. H.,
April 25, 1826.
Edward Adams, born in the precinct March 27, 1763, was in service
at Dorchester in 1776 and at the surrender of Burgoyue in 1777.
bulkley Adaias whs in service ut Dorchester in 1770, at Point Judith
in 17T7 and at Rhode Island in 1779 and 1780; born March 14, 1759;
died June 29, 1827.
Abel, Bulkley and Edward were sons of John and Lucy (Hubbard)
Adama.
Amoe Adams, born in Lincoln, January' 12, 1750, enlisted under a
resolve of December 2, 1760, and was paid a bounty of £61, bard
money.
Asa Adams, bom in Lincoln, November 7, 1759, was a fifer in Cap-
uiu Edmund Bemis' company, of Westminster, in 1775; enlisted in 1777
to serve during the war ; served thirty-seven months and deserted.
Amos and Asa were sons of John and Elizabeth (Shaw) Adams.
James Adams was in service at New York in 1776 and in the expedi
tioo to Canada, and at Cambridge in 1777 and 1776, and was paid for
one half of a three years' campaign in the Continental Army.
James Adams, Jr.,6er^-ed in Captain Joseph Griffith's company one
year from January 1, 1778, and was in service at Rhode Island 1779 and
1780.
Joel Adams was in serrice at Cambridge in 1775, at Rhode Island in
1779 and 1780, and enlisted for three years March y*6, 1781, having ** re-
ceived security of the class to which 1 belong for the sum of three hun-
dred silver dollars, being engaged in the Continental Army for the term
of three years."
Joel Adams was a son of Josiah and Grace Adams, who come from
Mendon to Lincoln in 1754.
Captain Joseph Adams was paid for service at Ticnnderoga In 1776
and for one-half of a three years' campaign to the Continental Army.
Pbineas .Mien was in service at Boston in 1776 and at Cambridge in
1778 ; born in Weston (now Lincoln). April 6, 1745.
Samuel Avery enlisted under a Resolve of the General Court of De-
cember 2, 178U, and received a bounty of £60, hard money.
Joseph Bacon was in ^1 vice aX fsew Vurk in 1776 and 1777.
622
HISTORY OF iMIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Noah BacoD waa in Berrice at Cambridge in 1778.
Samuel Bacoa waa io Herrice at New York in 177G and at Rhode Isl-
and in 1777-78.
Joseph, Noah and Samuel were sona of Captain Samuel Bacon, who
died ID Lincoln in 17S6.
Ajdob Baker waa in serrice at Dorcheater in 1776 and 1777 and at
Cambridge 1777 and 1778, and waa a Revolationary pensioner ; born in
Lincoln, April 8, 1756, and died July 16. 1850.
Samuel Baker waa in serrice at Cambridge and Dorchester in 1776
and at Saratoga in 1777 ; bom in the precinct February 22, 1752, and
died at Enoeburg, Vt, March 25, 1828.
Abel Billings was in service at Rhode Island in 1780. Bom in Lin-
coln Feb. U, 1757 ; died in Sedgwick, Me., Oct. 27, 1833.
Daniel Billings waa in service at Ticonderoga in 1776, and at the aur-
render of Burgoyne'n army iit 1777, and waa paid for one-third part uf a
three years* campaign in the Cuutiueutal army. About the year 1708 he
removed to Livernioro, Me., and afterwards to Bangor, where he died.
larael Billinga waa in service at Winter Uill in 1773, and at Rhode
Island In I78t. Baptized in Lincoln May 13,1769; died, unmarried,
Aug. 13. 1828.
Joseph Billings waa in aervice at New York in 1776 and 1777, and fire
montha at Winter Hill in 1778, and at Rhode Island in 1780. He died
in Lincoln April 30, 1810, aged 77 years.
Joseph Billinga, Jr., waa in service at Cambridge in 1778, to guard the
Convention, and served in two campaigns at Rhode Island in 1779 and
1780. Born Jan. 21, 1762 ; died Jan. 17, 1825.
Nathan Bitlinga waa in service at New York in 177C, at Rhode Island
in 1779, and enlisted for six months under a resolve of the General Court
of June 5, 1780, and served six months and ten days. He died in Lin-
coln Dec. 27, 18U9.
Timothy Billings was paid for services at Ticonderoga in 1776, at Sara-
toga in 1777, and for a three years' cnnipaign in the Continental Army.
Born in the precinct Oct. 14, 1748 ; died in Lincoln Nov. 2fi, 1812.
Samuel Bond wax in service at Cambridge in 1775, at New York in
177G, ut the surrender of Burgoyne in 1777, and in the e:ipeditioD to
Rhode Island in 1778. In 1779 he sailed fur Francein aletter-of-umrque
ship, which waa taken by the British and carried into St. Lucin, wbere
he died of fever. Bom Nov. 2, 1757.
Jonaa Bond enlisted under a resolve of the General Court for filling
up and completing fifteen battalions, April 2^, 1778 ; was a Revolution-
ary pensioner. Bom In Lincoln March 7, 17G0; died in Robbinston,
Me., Sept. 15. 1843.
William Bond waa paid £52 lOi. for service at Rhode Island In 1780.
Born July 12, 1761 ; died in Whittingham, Vt.. Sept. 22, 1837. Samuel,
Jonaa and William were sons of William and Lydia (Farrar) Bond ; all
bom in Lincoln.
Aaron Brooks was in service at Cambridge in 1775, at Ticonderoga in
1776, and Saratoga in 1777. Burn in Concord, now Lincoln ; died Feb.
23, 1811, aged 84 years.
Abner Brooks waa in service ut Rhode Island in 1777, and was dis-
charged from service Nov. 30, 1777, and died four days afterwards, Dec.
4, 1777. Bora io Lincoln Feb. 29, 1760.
Benjamin Brooka was in Capt. William Smith's company at Concord
Fight, April 19, and died .\ug. 29,'1775. io bis twentieth year.
Ephraim Brooka, Jr., waa in Cnpt. Hartwell's company in 1776, and
Ephralm Brooka was at Ticonderoga in 1776, and at Saratoga in 1777.
Baptized In the precinct Apnl 29, 1753.
Levi Brooka was In Capt. Minott's company from Aug. 14 to Nov. 30,
1777. Bom in Lincoln Oct. 23, 1762, and died Sept. 20, 1833.
Ephraim, Jr., Benjamio, Abnar and Levi were aooaof Ephraim and
Sarah (Ueywood) Brooka.
Joshua Brooka (Dea.) waa at Ticonderoga in 1776, and at Saratoga in
1777.
Joahna Brooks, Jr., wn« in Capt. Farrar's company before New York
in 1777, and was a aergeant in a company detached from Col. Elenzer
Brooks' regiment, and sent, under the command of Cupt. Samnel Far-
rar. In Col. Jonathan Reed's regiment, to reinforce the Northern arihy
under Gen. Gate*, and waa at the surrender of Burgoyne's army. He
waa also a sergeant in Capt. Francis Brown's company in the expedition
to Rhode Island in 1778. Born in Lincoln Feb. 11, 17Jo ; died Nov. 8,
1825.
Noah Brooka waa in aervice at Ticonderoga in 1777. Died in Lincoln
Feb. 18, 1791, aged 57 years.
Stephen Brooks waa in service at Dorchester in 1776, In Capt. Hart-
well'acompany, in Col. Dyke's regiment, in 1777, and at Klaverick, on
he Hudson River, in 1780. Son of Aaron and Mary (Stone) Brooka,
bom March 22, 1759 ; died in Rindge, N. H., Jan. 29, 1848.
Timothy Brooks waa in aervice in Cambridge in 1775, and at New
York in 1777, andjwaa paid £30 for three years' service in the Omti-
iiental army. Died in Liocola June IS, 1803.
Benjamin Browu waa in service at Cambridge in 1773, and waa paid
fur one-lialf uf a three years' camjiaign in the Continental army.
Ebenezer Brown waa in Captain Smith's cumpauy at Concord, April
19, 1775, and died Dec. .% 1776.
Joseph Brown waa in service at Boston in 177o, and at New York in
1776, and was paid for one-half of a three years' man in the Contiuentat
army.
Nathan Brown waa in service at New York in 1776, and at Saratoga in
1777 ; son of Nathan, Jr., and Rebecca (.^dams) Brown ; born in Lincoln
April 16, 1755 ; died December 12, 1814.
Tim'^tby Brown whs in service at New York in 1776, and at Saratoga
in 1777 ; born in the precinct December 12, 1701); died in Lincoln Sep-
tember 5, 1796.
Edward Cabot was in aervice nt Cambridge in 1775 and in 1778. He
married in Lincoln, December 4, 1772, Beulah 5Iunroe, and lived in Lin-
coln about eight years.
Abel Child waa in service at Ticonderoga in 1776, eight months at
Cambridge in 1778, and at Rhode Island 1780 ; son of Isaac and Hannah
Child ; bom in Lincoln .\pril in, 1737.
Daniel Child was in service at Cambridge in 1775, In the expedition to
Canada in 1776, and was in aervice at Rhode Island in 1779.
Joshua Child wasin service at Saratoga in 1777 ; born March 26, 1749 ;
died January 5, 1822.
Joseph Colborn was in Captain Marrett's company of artillery in 1777,
and in Captain Harrington's company in 17TS, and was a Revolutionary
pensioner. Born in Leominster, and died Febniary 16, 1841, aged
eighty-three.
Nathaniel Culburn was in service at Boston in 1776, and at Saratoga
In 1777.
John Conant waa in service at Rhode Island in 1778.
Samuel Dakin, Jr., was in service atKuxbury iu 1776, and at Saratoga
1777.
Daniel Farrar was in service at Cambridge in 177.'» ; born in Lincoln
March 2.1, 175.^, and died In Lincoln in 1810.
Humphrey Farrar waa io aervice at Cambridge iu 1775, and at the
Suuthward iu 1776.
Jubn Farrar " residence stated in Lincoln, and credited with thirty-
six months' service in the Continental Army."
Nebemiah Farrar was in aervice to guard the convention at Cambridge
in 1778, and ut Rhode Island iu 1778 ; born in Lincoln November 23,
I'Cd, aud died in 18U9.
Zebediah Farrar was in Captain Asahael Wheeler's company at Cam-
bridge in 1776 ; born May 9, 1751 ; died in Lincoln August :!, 1825.
Ephraim Flint was in service at New York in 1770-77 ; born in Coo-
cord (now Lincoln) May 13, 1745 ; died September 1, 18.i4.
John Flint was in service at Cambridge 1775, and at Canada in 1776 ;
born in Lincoln October 6, 1755 ; died in Walpole, New Hampshire,
September 6, 1810.
Isaac Gage was a serfteant in Captain Nathan Fuller's company eight
months at Cambridge in 1775 ; wau a lieutenant ; and was a captain in
acompanyat West Point, New York in 1780; son of Robert and Mary
Gage ; baptized in Lincoln September 23, 1753.
Jonathan Gage was in service eight monthsat Cambridge in 1775 ; eu-
listed for three years in 1777 and served forty-six months in the Conti-
nental Army ; son of Jonatban and Ruth (Underwood) Gage; born In
Lincoln, October 6, 1755.
Abraham Garfield waa in Captain William Smith's oompany at Con-
cord Fight April 19, 1775, and his deposition, taken four days afterwards,
was one of those sent to England to pruve that the British trix>ps began
the war by first firing upon the provincials. He died August 15, 1775.
The name of Abraham Garfield does not appear upon the pay-roll of
Captain Smith's company, probably because the roll waa not made until
the following January.
John Garfield waa in service at Roxbury in 1776, and was paid £8 for
going to Worthington with a team.
John Oove waa paid £11 for service at New York in 1776, and £10 for
one-third part of a three years' man with the Continental .\rmy. He
waa a soldier in the French and Indian War.
John Hagar and John Moore served a three years' campaign In the
Continental Army. John Hagar serving about twenty and John Moore
about sixteen months.
Captain Daniel Harrington waa at service at Ticonderoga in 1776, and
at Cambridge In 1778 ; waa a captain in Lincoln ; born in Walt ham, July
12, 1750 ; married, April 9, 1772, Anna Cuolidge ■. died in Lincoln August
LINCOLN.
623
Q, 1618. (Captaio Daciel HarriDgton uitb bis company started from
Lincoln Januanr' 2, 1787, for Nortbamptoo, to aid in ttie auppresioD of
Sbflvfe" Rebellion. Wben the conipaoy reacbed Marlborough tbev re-
ceived intelligence tbat tbe inaurgents bad dispersed, and tbey returned
borne.)
Isaac Dartwell was a sergeant in Captain Smith's company in 1775,
was in service at Ticonderugn in 1T7C, and was a lieutenant in Captain
John Griffiths' company in Colonel John Jscobe' regiment, one year from
Januarj- 1, 1778; born July 6, 17o2 ; niiirried, July 9, 1786, Eunice
lUyrick ; died in Princeton January f, 1822.
John Hartwellwasa lieutenant in Captain William Smith's company
in C-olonel John Isixon's regiment in 1775, and a captaiu iu colonel
Eleazer Brooks' regiment in 1776, and in Colonel Dyke's regiment in
1777. He wwsborn in Concord (now Lincoln) August 21, 1747 ; married,
December 18. 1783, Hepzlbab Krooks, and died November 2, 1820.
Samuel Ilartwell whu qusrtermaster in Colonel Eleazer Brooks'
regiment in 177G, and naa in service at Cambridge in 1778, and Rhode
Island in I77'.t and '80 ; was u Revolutionary peuaioner. Bom in Con-
cord (now Lincoln), June 26, 1742; married September 12, I7Cu, and
died August 12, l8J9.
Samuel, John and Isaac were sons of Kpbraim and Elizabeth (Hey-
wooil) Hartwell.
Samuel lioar was an ensign in Captain William Smith's uimpany of
miuute-meu in 1770, a lieutenant in Captain John Hartwell's company
in 1776, and in Captain Samuel Farrar's company at the Burreuder of
Burgoyne in 1777. Son of John and Elizabeth (Coolidge) Uoar ; bom
in Lexington (now Lincoln). August 23, 1743; married, July 8, 1773,
Susanna Pierce, atid died May 22, 1832.
Leonard Hoar was in Captaiu John Hartwell's company in 1776, and
was at the surrender of Burpoyne'e army in 1777, and in service at
Rhode Island in 1779 and 178U, and wa* a Revolutionnn.' pensioner.
Son of John and L^lizabeth (Coolidge) Uoar; born June 29, 1758; died
December 12. 1842.
Brister Hoar (Scipio Brister) was in Captain HartwcH's company at
Cambridge in K7<>, and m Capinin Minott's company in 1777. lie was
born in Boston in 17o(i; was a slave until 178U, and died November 1,
1820.
Jeremiah Knowlton was a sergeant in Captain Simon Hunt's com-
pany at New York in 177C, and at Saratoga in 1777, and in Captain
Francis Brown's company at Rhode Iitliiud in 1778.
William Lawrence, Jr., was paid £^0 for a three years' campaifn^ in
the Continental Aimy.
Jonas Mason was a sergeant in Captain William Sm th's company in
1775.
Joseph Mason was in service nine months at Ciimbridpe in 1775 ; was
in service at New V«)rk in 177('', and at Rbmle linliind in 1779, and was
dralied for nine months' servicu after arrivnl at Fidhkill.
Joseph JIasou, Jr., was in service ut Oambriilpe in 1775, at New
York in 177G, ut Sanitopa in 1777, and at Uliude Island in 1778.
Joseph Mason is credited with three yearb' service in the Continental
Army. (Probably Joseph Mason, Jr.) Born in Lincoln, March 6,
I'rtX: married, April 23, 1780, Lucy Flint; died in Walpole, N. H.,
February IS, 1834.
Elijah Mason was a fifer at tbe battle of Bunker Hill, and was in
service at New 'V'urk in 177C, and enlisted f-tr cumplet ng and fiUine up
fifteen battalionb nn<lcr a resolve of April 2n. 1778. Born in Lincoln,
October 29, 17j7: died, unmarried, in West Woodstock, Conn., February
IC, 1849. Jonas, Joseph and Elijah were eon^ of Jona* and Gnic«
(Bond) Mason. Eight British soldiers were killed. April 19, 1775, within
half a mile of their house.
Abijab Mead was a sergeant in Captain Asahel Wheeler's company iu
1776, and enlisted in 1777 for three years, and waa a Revolutionary p-n-
sioner ; baptized in the precinct March 4, 1749, and died in Lincoln Msy
1, 1837.
Tilly Mead was in Captaiu Francis Brown's company at Rhode Island,
in 1778, and enlisted for three years, and was r Revolutionary pAusioner ;
born iu Lincoln July 21, 17 '7; died unmarried in Barre Mrtrch 1, 1848.
Jonathan MeoJi was in service at Rhode Island in 1778 ; be enlisted
for three year^ November 12, 1779, and served the full term ; bom in
Lincoln March 12, 17C1, and died in Hardwick March 24, 1814.
Abijah, Tilly and Jonathan were sons of David and Mary (Bond) Mead.
Abner Malhais was nt the surrender of Burgoyne in 1777, and in the
expe lition to Rhodi- Island in 1S7S. He wa£ the son of Barnabas and
Anun (Munroe) Mathais. He was a captaiu in Lincoln ; married Lydia
Suiith and removed to Billerici in 1807.
James Meriaui was in service at Now "Vork in 177G, at Saratoga in
1775 and at Rhode Island in 1778 ; bom in LexiogrtoD ; muried in Lin-
coln, February' IC, 1704, Mary Cutler, and died in LincolD February 21
1816.
James Miles was in service at Rhode Islaud in 1777.
Abijah Munroe was in service at Cambridge in 1775, and at Boeton in
177C, at New 1'ork in 1776-77 ; bom June 10, 1755 ; married, January 9,
178C, Sally Wheeler ; removed in 1795 to Livermore, Me., where he died.
Isaac Munroe waa in service at Rhode Island in 1779. He enlisted for
three yf ais and served thirty-four months and ten days. He received a^
bounty of fifty dollars and was a pensioner; born in Lincoln March 10,
1758, and died August 5, 1840.
Micab Munroe was paid £720 for service at Rhode Island in 1781 ; bom
in Lincoln April 23. 1762, and died unmarried in Livermore, Ue.
Abijah, Isaac and Micab were sons of Benjamin and Mary (Meriam)
Munroe.
Joslah Nelson was in Che service at Cambridge in 1775, at Ticondero^
iu 1776, and at Saratoga in 1777.
Jonathan Page was in service In a campaign in Rhode Island in 1779,
enlisted for six months under a resolve of June 6, 178U, and re-enlisted
for three year? June I, 1781, receiving a boonty of three hundred and
fifty silver dollars. Ue married, Jannary 18, 1783, Lydia Monroe, of
Lexington.
Aaron Parks was in service at Winter Hill in 1775, and in the expedi.
tion to Canada in 1770. He enlisted March 28, 1781, to aerve during tbe
war, having "Received of tbe class whereof Lt. Benjamin Roe and
others are members, security for two hundred and forty dollan, silver
money," and was a Revolutionary pensioner. He was a son of Joseph,
Jr., and Lydia (Garfield) Parks, and married, December 23, 1783, Anna
Jennieon, and bad two children baptized in Lincoln.
Benjamin Parks was in service eight months at Cambridge in 1776;
about tbe year 1800 he removed to Livermore, Maine, and died there in
1825, aged ninety-two years
Eleazer Parks was in CapL Nathan Fuller's company eight moDtbe
at Cambridge in 1775, and was In service at Point Judith in 1777. Born
iu Lincoln, Nov. 20, 1754 ; married Elizabeth Whitney, and removed to
Winchendon
David Parks in service at Cambridge in 1776, in tbe expedition to Can-
ada in 1776, and at Cambridge In 1778, iind was paid for one-fourth part
of a three years' campaign in tbe Continental Army.
Isaac Parks was in vervice at New York In 1776.
Jam^s Parks was a lieutenant in Capt. Saranel Farrar's company In
1776. and at Cambridge in 1777 and 1778 ; son of Jusiab and Thankful
(Coolidge) Parks; baptized March 1, 1740; married Dec. 6, 1771, Han-
nah Wesson, and died in Lincoln.
John Parks was in service eight months at Cambridge In 1775, and
was paid £8 for going to Wortbington with a team.
Jositth Parks, in service at Dorchester iu 1776, and Saratoga In 1777
and WHS a Revolutionary pensioner ; son of Ephraim and Mary (Hobbe;
Parks ; boro August 9, 1747, and died June 13, l84t.
Jouos Parks was in service eight months at Cambridge In 1775, and in
the expedition to Canada in 1776, and was a Revolutionary pensioner ;
son of David and Sarah (Gibbe) Porks; born Oct. 10, 1755 ; married, Jan.
30, 1783, Eunice Tower.
Leonard Parks was n flfer in -Capt. Fuller's company at the age of six-
teen years ; eight months at Cambridge in 1776, and was a flfer in Capt.
Samuel Farrar's company at tbe surrender of Burgoyne's army in 1777,
and was [uud £4U fur his service at Boston in 177S. Born in Lincoln,
Oct. 25, 1760 ; died in Cambridge, June 6, 1838. Aaron, Eleazer, Jonas,
John and Leonard Parks were in Capt. Nathan Fuller's company, in
the regiment commanded by Cot. Thomas Gardner, who was killed at
Bunker Hilt.
Willard Parks was in service eight months at Cambridge in 1775 ; son
of Stephen and Abigail (Garfield) Parks ; baptized Id the precinct, Jan.
21, 1763, and died March 2, 1816.
Abraham Pierce was in service at Cambridge in 1775, in Capt. Mar-
rett's company of artillery in 1777, and enlisted in 1777 for three years
in the Continental Army ; son of Jonas and Mary (Adams) Pierce, bom
Sept. 2, 1755, and died In Rindge, N. H., Sept. 12, 1802.
**Col. Abijah Pierce was chosen colonel of the regiment of mlnnte-
men in 1775, and was at Concord on the 19th of April, 1775, and in ser-
vice at Cambridge in tbe summer of 1775- Born in Waltham, May 23,
1727 ; married, Sept. 23, 1751, Thankful Brown ; died in Lincoln, Sept.
18, IHOO."
Jottepb Parker enlisted at the age of 16 years, nnder a resolve of Dec.
2, 1780, for three years in tbe Contineutut Army ; son of Joseph and £u>
nice (Hobbs) Parker ; born iu Lincoln, Dec. 6, 1765.
624
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Keen Rubinsoa waa ia Capt. John Watson's company in Col. Eleazar
Brooks' regiment at New Tork io 1776, and in oervice at Cambridge in
1778.
Peter Sharon (colored) wns in aerrice at Rhode Island in 1780, and
enlisted at the age of 18 years under reeolve of Dec. 2, 17o0, for three
years in the Continental Army, and was paid a bounty of tliree hundred
and fifty silver dollars. He died in Lincoln in the winter of 1792-93.
Isaac Pierce was in service in Captain Marrett's company of artillery
an 1777, and in Captain Harrington's company in 1776, und in Captain
John Mloott's company in the expedition to Rhode Island in 1773 ; born
November 17» 1757 ; married, Uarcb 20, 1786, Anna Sanderaon.
Jonaa Pierce was in service at Dorchester in 1776, at Cambridge in
1778, and at Rhode Island in 1779 and 1780 ; born September 19, 17aO ;
died in Wardsboro', Vt.. December 24, 1840.
Joseph Pierce served in Captain Marrett's and Captain Swan's com-
panies of artillery. He enlisted for three years in tbe Continental
Army and served the full term. Born March 13, 1750 ; died in Lincoln
December 25, 1825.
Artenms Reed was in service at Cambridge in 1775, and in New York
in 177(s and enlisted in 1777, for three years, in the Continental Army,
and served thirty-six months.
Abner Richardson, aged sixteen years, enlisted for three years under a
Resolve of the General Court, of December 2, 1780, receiving from the
class whereof Deacon Joshua Brooks and others are members a bounty
of £73 tOir., hard money. He married Anna Moore, and had a family of
thirteen children ; was a Revolutionary pensioner, und died in Luzerne,
Warren County, N. Y., February 2; 18:)5, aged ninety-four years, two
months and thirteen days, the last of tbe Lincoln soldiers in the Revo-
lutionary War.
Captain William Smith commHnded a company in Colonel Nixon*s
regiment at Cambridge in 1775, and in Colonel Brooks' regiment in 1776;
son of Rev. William Smith, of Weymouth ; bom December 1, 1746.
Jesse Smith was in service at Cambridge In 1775, and was paid a
bounty of £30 for enlisting in the Continental Army for three years,
and served thirty-five months annd thirteen days.
Jonathan Smith was in service at Cambridge in 1775, at New York in
1770, and iit Cambridge in 1777 and 1778. He married, February 7,
1772, Lucy Billings, and died in Lincoln July 19, 18:13.
Gregory Stone was in service at Cambridge in 177G, and was paid £-20
for two-thirds of a three years' man in the Continental Army. Ho was
a son of Gregory and Bephzibah (Brooks) Stone ; born February 5, 1764 ;
married, February 21, 1788, Lucy Jones, and died April 12, 1807.
Joehua Stone was in Cuptaiu Samuel Farrar's company, in Colonel
Broolu' regiment, at New York, in 177G ; at tbe surrender of Burgoyne
in 1777 ; baptized iu the precinct in 1752, and died in Concord Mari_-h
10, 1822.
John Thoming was in service at Cambridge in 1775, at Dorchester in
177G, and at Saratoga in 1777; born in Lincoln June 7, 1756, and re-
moved to Lexington in 1781.
William Tborning was in Captain Asabel Wheeler's company at Cam-
bridge in 1776, was drafted to serve nine months after arrival at Fish-
kilJ, was at the surrender of Burgoyne in 1777, and enlisted under a
resolve of April 2a, 1778, for completing and filling up fifteen battalions
of troops, and was a Revolutionary pensioner. He was born in Lincoln
January 20, 1758, married Eunice Phillips, and died in Lexington March
23, 1829.
Jonathan Tower, Jr., enlisted April 2, 1781, for three years, in the
Continental Anny, and was a pensioner; son Jonathan and Eunice
(Allen) Tower ; born io Lincoln October 16, 1764, and died here January
26, 1835.
Nathan Tidd waa in service at Cambridge in 1775, in Captain Swan's
company of artillery in 1777. He enlisted for three years in the Conti-
nental Army in 1777. He served sixteen months, and died in the
service.
Abraham Weston was in service in 1777 and 1778. and enlisted. April
Z, 1782, for three years, receiving a bounty of £70. He waa born in
Concord (now Lincoln), Oct. 29, 1738, and died near Livermore Falls,
Me., June 29, 1801.
Zechariah Weston was in service at Dorchester in 1776 and 1777, at
Cambridge in 1778, at Roxbun' in 1779, and Rhode Island in 17S0, and
waa paid for one-third part of a three years' campaign in the Continen-
tal army. Baptized in the precinct March 15,1752; died in Lincoln
Aug. 13, 1833.
Nathan Weeton was qnartermoater's sergeant in the regimeut com-
manded by Col. Thomas Gardner, who was mortally wounded in the
battle of Bunker Hill, and waa cjuartermaater in the same regiment,
afterwards known as Lieut. -Col. William Bond's regiment, and waa paid
£lUfor one-third part of a three years' cainpaij^n in the Continental
army. Born in Lincoln Nov. 3, 1753, and died here Dec. S, 182').
Daniel Weston was iu service in (.'apt. Johu Minott's company, in
Capt. John Hartweh's corupaoy in 1777, in :*ervice at Rliode Island in
1779, and at Klaverick, ou the Hudson, iu 178U. B.iptizeJ June 11, 1758,
and died Sept., 18i3.
John WeHton was In service at Point Juiiith in 1777, and at Rhode
Island in 1779, and was paid for one-third part of a three years' cam-
p>aign in the Continental army.
Jonathan Weston was iu service at Roxbury in 177^, and was in Capt.
Isaac Gage's company, neor West Point, X. Y., in 1781.
Zechariah. Nathan, Daniel, John and Jonathan Weston were sons of
Zachariali and Mary (Hoar) Weston, all born in Lincoln.
Edmund Wheeler was in 3..'rvice at Cuiiibiidge in 1775, and at Ticon-
deroga in 1776, and xvn^ paid for on?-tliirJ part of a three yenra' cam-
paign in the Continental Army. Sun of Thomas and Mary i,Munroe)
Wheeler, born March 4, 1731, died June 1, ISuo.
Euos Wheeler waa in service at New York iu 1776 and 1777, and at
Cambridge in 1778. Son of Joseph ;in<l RutU (Fu.v) WHii-eler. born in
Acton Sept. 17, 1733 ; married, in Lincoln, Oct. 22, 1705, Mary Garfield,
ahd removed to Weston in 1782.
John Wheeler was in service at the surrender of Burgoyne in 1TT7,
and iu Capt. Simon Hunt's company in 1778, and was a Kevohitiunary
pensioner. Son of John and Lydla (\llen) W'leeler, horn March 23,
1761, and died in Walpole, N. H., Jan. 2^, 18+5.
Jonas Whittaker was in Capt. Simon Hunt's company at Winter Hill
in 1778, and In service at Rhoda Island in 1780. He was ;i soldier in the
French and Indian Wars, serving in Capt. Thomits Adams' company in
1758, and in Capt. William Barron's company in 17G2.
Solomon Whitney was at the surrender of Burgoyne's army :it Sara-
toga 1777, and in service at Rhode Island in 1770, and was in the ser-
vice nearly all the rime during the Revolutionary War. He served sev-
eral campaigns in the French and Indian Wars, and enlisted in 1780, :it
the age of 47, for three years in the Cltjntinental Xrmy. Son of Solomon
and Martha (Fletcher) Whitney, born in Weston ^now Lincoln) in 1735,
married, June 14, 1771, il&ry Fay, and removed in 17'.il to Canterbury,
N. H.
Elijah Willington was a sergeant in Captain William Smith's com-
pany in Colonel Nixon's regiment at Cambridge in 1775, and waa in the
Service in 1776; baptized in Llnccdn March 25, 1750, removed to Liver-
more, Maine, about 1310, and died there December 15, 1S2S.
Elisha Willington was in service in Camida in 1770, and enlisted in
1777 for three year? in the Cuntioental .\rniy and served tliiity-funr
months ; born in Lincoln July 20, 1759 ; dietl in Concord JnnuniT 12,
1799. Elijah and Elisha were sons of Jonathan, Jr , and Lydia (Fiskt- )
Willington.
War of 1812. — The part performed by this town in
the War of 1812 waa very small compared with its ser-
vices in the War of the Revolution. In the spring of
that year a regiment was raised in Middlesex County,
'*To be armed, equipped and stand ready to march at
a moment's warning," and to this force the following
persons volunteered, viz. : Gabriel Weston, corporal ;
Jonas Wheeler, William Hoar, John Brownell, Rufus
Babcock, William Jones, Stephen Esty and David A.
Davis, privates ; but it does not appear that they
were called into service. June 28, 1814, John Billings
and Daniel Weston were detached from the company
*' Roll by lot," to strengthen the forts in Boston Har-
bor, and September 20, 1814, Eliphalet Weston, ser-
geant, and Artema-i Hayden and John Nelson were
drafted for the same purpose.
In 1812, Colonel Daniel Brooks and Major Ephraim
Flint resigned their commissions in the militia of the
State, and applied for commissions in the National
Army, but were unsuccessful.
Colonel James Miller, the hero of Lundy's Laue,
married a sis'.er of Major Flint, and his family re-
LINCOLN.
625
sided in Lincoln about ten years, covering the periods
of his service in the army and as Governor of Ar-
kansas Territory, and three of his children were born
in Lincoln.
Jonas W. Colburn was taken prisoner and confined
several months on board a British prison-ship, where
he suffrired great hardships.
Leonard Hoar, Jr., was aid-de-camp to Colonel Mil-
ler. He was taken sick at Buffalo, and attempted to
return home, but died at Canandaigua, N.Y., Septem-
ber 21,1814, aged twenty-one years and two months.
He was a young man of winning personal appearance
and gentlemanly and military manners and bearing.
" None knew him but to love him.
Or named him but to praise."
The people of Lincoln were as earnest and patri-
otic in the War of the Rebellion as the War of the
Revolution, but the relative condition of the town had
greatly changed. The city of Lowell had sprung
into existence where there was, in the Revolutionary
period, nothing but forests and pastures and unre-
strained water-power running to waste, and Waltham
and other towns having manufacturing facilities had
increased in wealth and population from two to ten-
fold, while Lincoln, being entirely an agricultural
town, remained nearly stationary.
The first town-meeting called to act on matters per-
taining to the war was on May 13, 1861, and it was
" Voted, That two thousand dollars be appropriated
to provide bounty, arms, ammunition, clothing, pro-
visions and extra pay for such of the inhabitants of
the town as have enlisted or may hereafter enlist
into the military service of the United States, and for
aid to their families."
July 28, 1862, the town "Voted, That eighteen
hundred dollars be raised to pay nine men who may
enlist as our quota of soldiers in the service of the
United States, and that said eighteen hundred dol-
lars be forthwith assessed upon the taxable property
of the town, and so much of it as may be necessary be
expended by the committee appointed at a citizens'
meeting for securing said recruits; and that all per-
sons be requested to pay the same to the collector on
the presentations of their tax -bills, on or before the
first day of September next." This vote was passed
in a full town-meeting without a dissenting voice or
vote ; and although it was known that the town
could not enforce the payment of this tax, it was im-
mediately assessed and more than nine-tenths of it
was paid upon the presentation of the bills.
August, 1862, the town " Voted, To pay each volun-
teer who shall enlist for nine months and be mustered
in and credited to the quota of the town, a bounty of
two hundred dollars," and the same committee which
recruited the three years' men was requested to recruit
the nine months' men.
At the annual meeting in March, 1863, six hundred
dollars were appropriated for the payment of aid to
soldiers' families. In the spring of this year town-
40-ii
officers were forbidden to pay bounties, and the gov-
ernment resorted to drafts.
April 25, 1864, the town voted to raise fourteen
hundred dollars to refund the money raised by sub-
scription and paid for recruiting ten volunteers in
December and January last, and seven hundred dol-
lars to pay the veteran volunteers belonging to Lin-
coln.
And on the 13th of June following, a committee
was appointed to recruit eight men to serve the town
as volunteers, and the treasurer was authorized to
borrow twenty-five hundred dollars for the purpose,
and in October following, the town " Voted, To refund
to the citizens the money subscribed and paid by
them last spring for procuring recruits to fill the
quota of the town." Various other sums were paid
by the town during those years for expenses inciden-
tal to the war, and for bringing home and burying
their dead.
Lincoln fiimished seventy-nine men for the war,
which was a surplus of four over and above all de-
mands. Five of them were commissioned officers.
The amount raised by taxation and expended by the
town, on account of the war, was $10,385.50, all of
which was paid before the close of the year 1865.
The town also paid $3915 for aid to soldiers' families,
of which sum $3205 was reimbursed by the State.
Of those who rendered gallant service in the Civil
War were the following : First Lieutenant Thomas J.
Parker enlisted as a private at the breaking out of
the war, and continued in active service until his
death. He was twice promoted for meritorious con-
duct, and was mortally wounded before Petersburg,
March 25, 1865.
Elijah H. Wellington enlisted in the Forty-fourth
Regiment, September 12, 1862, and died of disease at
Newbem, N. C, January 13, 1868. He was a young
man of excellent character, universally beloved and
respected.
Frederick D. Wellington enlisted June 29, 1861, in
Co. H, Sixteenth Regiment Massachusetts Infantry,
and was wounded at Fredericksburg, Va., Dec. 17,
1862, and remained in hospital until his discharge,
March 12, 1863. He is a pensioner.
Edward L. Deering, of Lincoln, enlisted in a Maine
regiment, and was killed in the assault on Fort
Wagner.
Among those who volunteered and served with
honor to themselves and the town, the following de-
serve especial commendation. They are named in the
order of their enlistment, so far as it is known: Albert
Johnson, George E. Sherman, Eugene M. Deering,
James Hill, Francis C. Bro?vn, John Tasker, Franklin
Jones, Edward N. Haynes, James E. Hayden, Thomas
W. Hayden, John Atkins, Edward Stone, James A.
Walker, John W. Hoar, James E. West, B. Franklin
Hoar, Cassius M. Flagg, William H. Flagg, William
Messer, Cornelius Stone.
An act for erecting a new town within the coonty
626
UlSTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of Middlesex, by the came of Lincoln, April 23, An-
no Domini, 1754;'
" Whereas, the inhabilants of the easlerly part of Concord, the sonth-
weslerly part of Lejfngton, and the northerly part of Weston, have ud-
dreawd this coart, setting forth the many difficulties they now labor un-
der, which might be effectually remedied if they were constituted a
township ;
" Be It therefore enacted by the Governor, Council and Bouse of Bep-
resentatlTes, That the easterly p«rt of said town of Concord, the south-
westerly part of said town of Lexington and the northerly piirt of said
town of Weston, aa hereafter set forth and described, be and hereby are
set off, constituted and erected Ir to a separate and distinct township by
the name of Lincoln; the bounds of said lowntbip to be as follows, viz.
To begin at Concord River where the line goes over said river between
Concord and Sudbury, and runs down said river to a brook that runs out
of Well meadow (so called) ; fromlhencelo the southeasterly side of Wal-
den Pond (so called) ; from thence to the northwesterly corner of a lot
of land lately belonging to Daniel Brooks, on the southerly side of the
country road ; thence ruuniug e<isleily with the country road (one-hulf
whereof to beloug to and bo maintaiued by each town) until it coniea to
Joshua Brooks' tun-bouse, and from the northwcKt corner of said lau-
hotise to the northwest corner of John Wheat's land adjoining to Ben- !
janiin Wheeler's land ; i hence by said Wheeler's land to Bedford line, !
and by Bedford line to Concord corner adjoining to Lexingtou ; and from
thence in a straight line to a little bridge in the country road a littlo |
westerly of Thomas Nelson's bouse; thence to the top of a little hill
eastward of N'eheniiah Abbott's house; thence to Walthani northwest !
corner, including Eliaha's Cutler's laud; from theuce on Walthuiii line i
to the southwest corner of John Beuiis' land ; thence running south to I
the southeast corner of Benjamin Brown's land; thence tuniiiig and '
running westerly by said Brown's land to aatuke and heap of stuuea be- I
ing the northwest corner of Braddjl Smith's land ; thence to a rock iu |
the squadron line, a little northwest of the school-house ; thence to the
corner .)f the wall on the north side of Concord road (so called), being <
upon the division line between Theoph' Mansfield and Josiah Parks; [
thence turning south, upon the divisiou line between said Maaj-fleld and I
said Parks to the squadron liue ; theuce in the same course to the divi- '
sion line between Nathaniel Allen and Ephraim Parks ; thence westerly j
by the division line between said Allen and said Parks til! it conies to a !
townway; theuce westerly iu a straight line across a corner of said ;
Parks' land, to a heap of stones, being a corner between said Allen
and said Parks ; thence westerly between said Allen and said Parks
till it comes to Abbott's meadow ; thence in the same course to '
Sudbury line, aud by said lino to the place first mentioned, and that '
the lubabitantd of said lands as before bounded and described, be and
hereby are vested and endowed with the powers, privileges and immuni-
ties that the inhabitants of any of the towns within the province are
or ought by law, to be endowed with.
"Provided, That the inhabitants of the said town of Lincoln shall pay
their proportion (agreeable to what the inhabitants taken off by the said 1
town of Lincoln from the town of Concord, paid in the last la.\), of the
charges that may hereafter arise in building or repairing of a bridge or
bridges over the great river iu the town of Concord, aud the said town
of Lincoln. And also their proportion of the charges of maintaining
any poor person or persons that are now out of the town of Concord,
but by reason of their former residence there, may become a charge to
the town of (Joncord.
" Provided also, and be it further enacted, that the said several inhab-
itants taken off from the towns of Concord, Lexington ana Weston by
this act, shall pay their proportion of all the town, county, i»ecinct and
province taxes already assessed on said town or precinct, aa if this act
hod not been made.
"And be it further enacted. That James Minot, Esq., be and hereby is
directed and inipowered to issue his Warrant to some principal inhabi-
tant of said town of Lincoln, requiring him to notify and warn the in-
babilantsof the suid town of Lincoln, qualitied to vote iu town offalis,
to meet at such time and place as shall therein be set forth, to choose all
such otflcers as towns choose in the month of March annually, and said
officers shall be enjoined to take the oaths now required to be taken by
town officers.
•' Examined p» Tho' Clarke, Dep'j Seel. "
i This is the date given in the town recortis.
19, U5i.
The true date is April
SEIXtrrSIEN TEOM 1754 TO 1890.
In the following list the nnmber of years of service are given ; siso
the first and the last year of senice;
Ephraim Flint, 3 years, 1754-67; Ephraim Hartwell, 12 years, 1734-
74; Ebenezer Cutler, 6 yeais, 1754-74; temnd Farrar, 20 years,
17o4-7t( ; John Hoar, 5 years, 1754-71 ; Nathan Brow n, 6 years, 1755-72 ;
Joshua Brooks, 5 years, 1756-63 ; JohnGove, 7 years, 1756-65; Samuel
Dakin, 1 rear, 1766 ; Timothy Billings, 4 years, 176t'-71; John Head-
ley, 1 year, 1757 ; Benjamin Munroe, 3 years, 1757-79 ; Timothy Weston,
5 years, 1758-63 ; Thomas Gartield, 1 year, 1769; Amos Heald, 6 years,
1760-65; John Adams, 8 years, 1764-77; Joseph Adams, 4 years, 1766-
74; Abijah Pierce, 12 years, 17tC-«l ; Eleazar Brooks, 9 years, 17C4-
1782; Charles Russell, 1 .\ear, 177n; Joseph Abbott, 2 year», 1770-72;
Jacob Fox, 1 year, 1770; Edmund Wheeler, 11 years, 1773-91; AnniD
Brooks, 1 year, 1774; William Brown, 1 year, 1773; James Adams, 2
years, 1770-77; Jacob Baker, 1 year, 177S; Samuel Farrar, 13 years,
1779-'jr, ; Ephraim Brooks, 1 \ei.r, 1779 ; ismuel Hoar, 17 years, 178t-
1H09 ; John Hart well. 7 years, 17So-leol ; David Fiske, 3 years, 17Sl -63 ;
Timoihy Brook.", 1 year, 17S( ; Humphrey Farrar, :l years, 1781-66;
James Parks, 4 years, 1782-8i: Daniel Harrington, 3 yeais, 1783-85;
Daniel Fnnar, 1 year; F.leazer llelvin, 1 year, 178G; Elijah Welling-
ton, 1 year, 17S0; Richard Russell. 1 year, 1786; Samuel Uartwell, 1
year, 1787 ; Timothy Brown, 1787; Jcshua Brooks, 13 yeais, 1788-18U0;
John Perr)-, 1788; Nathan Weston, 7 years, 1780-iiO; William Law-
rence, 4 yean-, 1792-90; Bulkier Adana, 1 year, 1793: Gregory Stone,
1 year, 1793: Ephraim Flint, 1797; Efhiaini Br..wn, 'J years, 170J-I8n9;
Leonard Hoar, S years, IbOU-lo; Elij»h Fi=ke, 18 yeais, 18li4-33; Tho-
mas Wheeler, 5 years, 1S03-12 ; Daniel Brooks, 5 years, 18(j5-13 ; Charles
Wheeler, 4 years, 1S16-.30 ; Solomon Fnster, 2 years, 1816-17 : Ephraim
Flint, 1 year, 1817; Charles A. Wheeler, 6 years, 1818-24; Stephen
Patch, 0 years, 1819-27; Abel Hnrtwell, 1 year. 1S19; Gregory Mone,
li years. 1822-27 ; John W. Warren, 1 year, 1825 ; Daniel Haynes, 2
I years, 1826-27 : Calviu Weston, 2 years, 1828-29 ; James Baker, 6 years,
182S-:0; Emery Bemis, 1 year, 18:1(1; Amos Hagar, 7 years, 1831-43;
George Russell, 5 years, IS.'M-.'IS; Jonas Smith, 2 years, 18.'i4-.3.5; Samuel
Hftrtwell, 2 years. 18.'14-35; Leonard Hoar, Jr., 4 years, 1836-E9; D.iniel
Weston, 4 years. 1836-39; Abel Wheeler, 9 years. 18:i9-47 ; Aaron
Davis, 4 years, It40-4I ; Charies L. Tarhell, 9 years, 1844-i;4 : William
Foster, 11 years. 1844-39; Henry C. Clinpin, 1 year, 1848; Amos Hagar,
Jr., 13 years, 1848-70; Francis D. Wheeler, 1 year, 1848; John W.
Farrar, 3 years, 1849-32 ; William F. Wheeler. 26 years, 1849-82 ; James
L. Chapin, 10 years, 1832-73; William Mackintosh. 1 year, 1859; J.
Dexter Sherman, 1 year, 1859; George Flint, 3 years, lS6.i-67; George
Hurtwell, 3 years, 1868-74; Francis .-milli, 2 years, 1868 69; Samuel
H. Pierce. 2 yean-, 1871-72; Geoigo H.Smith, 2 years, 1871-72; Andrew
J. Drake, I year, 1S73; John W. Gray. 3 years, I(,74-70; William L. U.
Peirce, 1 year, 1873; Ssmuel Hortuell, 15 years, present incumbent;
Albion N. Brown, 1 year, 1877; Amos P. Sherman, 3 yeais, 1878-82 ;
Thomas F. Hartington, 1 year, 1882; Edward C. Foster, 8 years, 1683,'
present incumbent; George F. Hairington, 8 yeais, 1863, present
incumbent.
1'ows CLEtlKS.
Ephraim Flint, 3 years, 1754-37 ; Ebenezer Cutler, 2 years, 1755-59 ;
Samuel Farrar, 8 yearn, 173e-i;6 ; John Adams, 11 years, 1707-77;
Abijah Pierce. 3 years, 1778-81 ; Samuel Hoar, 17 years, I780-I8II9 ;
Richard Russell, 4 years, 1763-88; Grovesnor Tarbell, 5 years, 1799-
1803 ; ThomasWheeler, 3 years, 1804-66; Elijah Fiske, 15 .vears, 1810-33 ;
Stephen Patch, 6 years, 1822- '27 ; Charles Wheeler, 3 years, 1828-30;
George Russell, 5 years, 1634-.38; Abel Wheeler. 5 years, 1839-43;
Henry C. Chapin, 34 yeais, 1344-77 ; James L. Chapin, 13 years, present
incumbent, 1878.
Tows TREASiniERS.
Ephraim Flint, 2 years, 1754-30 ; Samuel Bond, 1 year, 1755 ; Tim-
othy Wesson, 1 year, 1757 ; Nathan Brown. 1 year, 1738; John Gar-
field, 2 years, 1739-60 ; John Adams, 3 years, 1761-63; Samuel Farrar,
1 year, 17(i4 ; Eleasar Brooks, 3 years, 1765-(;7 ; .\bijah Pierce, 2 years,
1768-<i9; Tlioraas Garfield, 1 year, 1770; .locob Fox, 1 year, 1771 ; Ed-
mund Wheeler, 14 years, 1772-96; Joseph Paiker, 2 years, 1775-76;
Ephraim Brooks, 2 years, 1777-78 ; Samuel Hoar, 6 years, 1779-92 ;
Samuel Hartwell, 1 year, 1780; Bulkley Adams, 3 years, 1797-99,'
Thomas Wheeler, 17 years, 1829; Leonard Hoar, 7 years, 1804-11 j
Charies Wheeler, 15 yeais, 1810-47 ; Elijah Fiske, 3 years, 1812-14 ; Joel
Smith, 1 year, 1815 ; Henry Rice, 2 years, I830-;)l ; Frederick A. Hay-
den, 1 year, 18:i2 ; Charles L. Tarbell, 1 year, 1841; Francis D.
Wheeler, 1 year, 1848; William F. Wheeler, 28 years, 1849-84; James
L. Chapin, 8 years, 1868-75 ; Charles S. Wheeler, 6 years, 1885, present
iDcumbeut.
LINCOLN.
627
Repbesentative-s.
Chambere Buaaell, 11 years, 1754-65 ; Samuel Farrar, 3 yeara, 1766-68 :
Eleazur Brooks, 1774 ; CUsmbers Ruiaell, 1 year, 1788 ; Samuel Hoar,
10 yea™. 1792-18 )8 ; Joshua Brooks, 3 years, 1800-11 ; Leonard Hoar,
2 years, 1812-14 ; Wm. Hiyden, 2 years, 1815-16 ; Elijah Fiske, 2 years,
18iJ-21 ; Joel Smith, 3 years, 18Ji-2o ; Silas P. Tarbell, 3 yeare,
1827-:)U ; Geerge Kusaell, 1 year, 1832 , Solomon Foster, 2 years, 1833-
34: Charles Wheeler, 1 year, IMj; Abel Hartwell, 1 year, 1837;
Eiisha Hagar, 2 years, IgSri-SO ; Daniel M. Stearns, 2 years, 1841-42 ;
LeonarJ Hoir, 2 years, 1815-46 ; William Foster, I year, 1850 ; Daniel
Weston, 1 year, 1851 ; William F. Wheeler, 1 year. 1853 ; Samuel H.
Pierce, 1851. f/.ufcr the Dialrict St/tUm. — Charles L. Tarbell, 10th Mid-
dieses District, 1861 ; Janjes L. Chapln, 10th Middlesex District, 1865;
Samuel H. Pierce, loth Middlesex District, 1S70 ; George M. Baker, 20th
Middlesex District, 1878 ; Charles S. Wheeler, 19th Middlesex District,
1890.
CODNCILOES.
Chambers Buaaell, 5 years ; Eleazar Brooks, 11 years.
Senators.
Hon. Eleazar Brooks, 9 years ; Hon. Samuel Hoar, 3 years, 1813-16.
Delegates.
Delegate to the Oinveaiion to Frame Stale OononUion. — 1779, Hon. Elea-
zar Brooks.
Delegate to the Ooneention to Raii/t/ the ConMiUiUion of the United StatM
in 1788. — Hon. Eleazar Brooks.
Delegate* to the Conventiotu to Revue the CoiutUulion of the Statee. —
1820, Hon. Samuel Hoar ; 1833, William F. Wheeler.
Justices of the Peace.
Chambere Russell, James Russell, Charles Russell, Eleazar Brooks, Jo-
seph Adams, Chambers Russell, Samuel Hoar, Eleazar Brooks, Jr.
Joshua Brooks, Grosvenor Tarbell, William Hayden, Charles Wheeler,
Elijah Fiske, Stephen Patch, Abel Wheeler, Constant F. Minns, Wil-
liam Foster, James L Chapio, Geo. H. Smith, Charles S. Wheeler.
CHAPTER XLVIIL
LINCOLN -{ Ctmlinued).
College Graduates — Phyaiciam — EducaiionaJ — Bitrial-Plaeei.
College Graduates.' — Stephen Farrar, son of
Dea. Simuei and Lydia (Barrett) Farrar, born Sept.
8, 1735 ; graduated in 1755, and was ordained first
minister of New Ipswich, N. H., Oct. 22, 1760, and
continued the only minister of that town until his
death, June 23, 1809. He married, Nov. 29, 1764,
Eunice Brown, daughter of Isaac and Mary (Balch)
Brown, of Waltham. They had a family of thirteen
children, twelve of whom survived him, married and
hud families of their own. Mrs. Eunice Brown Far-
rar died Sept. 9, 1818. His pastorate was a long and
ail eminently successful one.
Timothy Farrar (Hon.), brother of the preceding,
born June 28, 1747, graduated in 1767, studied law
and settled in New Ipswich, New Hampshire,
and became eminent in his profession. For more
than forty years he was a judge in the Supreme
and Common Pleas Courts of the State of New Hamp-
shire. He was four times chosen an elector of Presi-
dent and Vice-President of the United States, and was
' Where no other college is mentioned they were graduates of Har-
vard.
for many years a trustee of Dartmouth College. He
married, Oct. 14, 1779, Anna Bancroft, daughter of
Capt. Edmund and Mrs. Rachel H. (Young) Bancroft,
of Pepperell. They had a family of one son and
three daughters. Mrs. Anna (^anc^oft) Farrar died
May 1, 1817. Judge Timothy Farrar died Feb. 21,
1849, aged 101 years, seven months and twelve days.
** Long did his golden lamp in splendor burn :
£ero in Caelum I bite to heaven return."
Rev. Joseph Farrar, son of George and Mary (Bar-
rett) Farrar. born June 30, 1744; graduated at Har-
vard, 1767, and was ordained at Dublin, N. H., when
the church was organized, June 10, 1772. He was
dismissed June 7, 1776, and installed at Dummers-
ton, Vt., in 1779 ; dismis.sed, 1783, and settled at
Eden, Vt., where he remained three years. He mar-
ried, July 28, 1779, Mary Brooks, of Grafton, Mass.,
and died in Petersham April 5, 1816.
Jonathan Gove, M.D., son of John and Tabitha
(Livermore) Gove, born August 22, 1746 ; gradu-
ated, 1768; studied medicine, and settled in Gro-
ton, where he married and two of his children were
born. He removed to New Boston, N. H., and in
1794 moved to Goffstown, N. H. He married, in
Groton, Mary Hubbard, and in Goffstown Polly Dow,
and died in Goffstown March 24, 1818.
Moses Brown, son of Isaac and Mary (Balch)
Brown, was born in Waltham, April 6, 1748.
His father died in 1759, and his mother married, May
22, 1760, Nathan Brown, of Lincoln, and brought her
children to her new home. Hence he is said to be of
Lincoln. He graduated in 1768 ; taught school in
Framingham, Lexington and Lincoln. In 1772 he
engaged in trade in Beverly. On the breaking out of
the Revolutionary War he raised a company which
was attached to Col. Glover's regiment, and was en-
gaged in the battle of Trenton. After the term of
the enlistment of this company had expired he re-
turned to Beverly and engaged in trade, and acquired
aa ample fortune. He married — first, Elizabeth
Trask, and second, Mary Bridge, and died in Beverly
June 15, 1820.
Jonas Hartwell, son of Ephraim and Elizabeth
(Heywood) Hartwell, born June 26, 1754; graduated
in 1779. He engaged in mercantile pursuits ; went
to Bilboa, in Spain, was arrested and confined in
prison by order of the Holy Inquisition. After sev-
eral months' imprisonment he was released upon the
request of the President of Congress. He died soon
after his release, as was supposed, from pbison.
Nathaniel Pierce, son of CoL Abijah and Thankful
(Brown) Pierce, was born Sept. 27, 1754, and gradu-
ated in 1775. He engaged in trade in Boston, and
died in Watettown Dec. 30, 1783. He married — first,
Polly Flake, and second, Elizabeth Cheever.
Abel Flint, son of Ephraim and Ruth (Wheeler)
Flint, was born June 22, 1758, and graduated in 1780.
He taught in Lincoln and Haverhill, and died in
Lincoln Jan. 25, 1789.
628
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
William Brooks, son of Joshua, Jr., and Hannah
(Simonds) Brooks, was born March 13, 1757, and
graduated 1780. He wsa a successful merchant iu
Augusta, Me. He married, June, 1780, Mrs. Susanna
Howard, and died May 12, 1824.
Daniel Stone, son of Gregory and Hepzibath
(Brooks) Stone, baptized in Lincoln June 7, 1767;
graduated in 1791, and was ordained at Hallowell,
Maine, October 21, 1795, and was dismissed by mu-
tual consent in 1809. He pfterwards held the oflBces
of justice of the peace and treasurer of the county of
Kennebeck. He married, August 27, 1800, &isanna
Williams, of Easton, Mass., and died May, 1834.
Samuel Farrar, eldest son of Samuel and Mercy
(Hoar) Farrar, born December 12,1773; graduated
1797; was tutor in Harvard, 1800; studied law and
settled in Andover. He was treasurer of the Theo-
logical Institution and president of the bank for
many years. He married, October 30, 1814, Mrs.
Phoebe (Edwards) Hooker, and died in Andover iu
1864.
John Farrar, a brother of the preceding, born May
1,1779; Harvard University, 1803; LL.D. Bowdoin,
1833 ; tutor in Harvard two years, 1805-07, and was
appointed Professor of Mathematics and Natural Phil-
osophy in 1807, the duties of which position he dis-
charged with ability and success for twenty-nine years.
During those years he published several valuable
scientific treatises, and was a frequent contributor to
the North American Review and the Memoirs of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences, of which
he was secretary and vice-president. Professor Far-
rar married, 1st, Lucy, daughter of Rev. Dr. Buck-
minster, of Portland, and 2d, Miss Eliza Rotch, an
English lady, and died in Cambridge May 8, 1853,
leaving no children.
Hon. Samuel Hoar, son of Hon. Samuel and Su-
sanna (Pierce) Hoar, born in Lincoln, May 18, 1778,
graduated in 1802, LL.D., Harvard University, 1838.
He studied law with Hon. Artemas Ward, and was
admitted to the bar in 1805, and commenced his pro-
fessional career in Concord the ^ame year, and was a
leading member of the Massachusetts bar for more
than forty years. He was a member of the conven-
tion for revising the Constitution of the State in 1820,
Senator 1825 and 1832, and member of the Executive
Council, 1845 and 1846, and was a member of the Leg-
islature in 1850.
" In 1844 he was appointed by Governor Briggs, in
accordance with a resolve of the Legislature of Mass-
achusetts, a commissioner to proceed to Charleston,
South Carolina, to test in the Court of the United
States the constitutionality of an act passed by the
Legislature of South Carolina of the 20ih of Decem-
ber, 1835, legalizing the imprisonment of colored per-
sons who should enter their boundaries. Mr. Hoar
accepted this new duty and lelt home accordingly in
November, 1844, for Charleston, reaching that city
on the 28th of that month. So utterly unsuspicious
was he of giving offence that his young daughter ac-
companied him. On his arrival at Charleston, and
making known the object of his visit, such was the
excitement against him, on account of the object of
his mission being deemed by the people of '.he place
an unwarrantable interference with their State rights,
that he was obliged to leave the city, and he returned
to Massachusetts without fulfilling the object of his
mission."
One of Mr. Hoar's biographers has said : " The
mission w.os attended with no other result than to
disgrace the people of Charleston, and aggravate the
increasing hatred between the two sections of the
country." But this seems to be an inadequate con-
ception of the results which flowed from Mr. Hoar's
mission to South Carolina. Up to 1844 it had been
claimed by the slaveholders and pro-slavery men that
the Constitution and laws of the United States sanc-
tioned slavery, and that the abolitionists werceeking
to overthrow the government. But when Mr. Hoar,
a most learned and courteous gentleman of sixty-five
years, went to South Carolina on an errand as peace-
ful as the mission of Jesus, with no other escort or
attendant than his own daughter — an amiable and in-
telligent young lady — only to be told by the " Re-
spectable gentlemen of Charleston" that he could
not be secure from the insults and violence of a mob,
even in the citadel of Southern chivalry — the tables
were turned, and the sober and self-respecting men of
the North were able to see at a glance who the law-
abiding, and who the law and gospel-defying people
were, and the result of his mission was to arouse the
people cf the North to gigantic efforts for the over-
throw of slavery — or, in the espre.ssive language of
the time : " It drove a whole cask lull of nails into
the coffin of slavery.''
He married, October 13, 1812, Sarah Sherman,
daughter of Hon. Roger and Rebecca (Prescott) Sher-
man, of New Haven, Connecticut, and died in Con-
cord, November 2, 1856. They had the following
children: Elizabeth, born July 14, 1814. Ebenezer
Rockwood, born February 21, 1816; Harvard Univer-
sity, 1835 ; LL.B., 1839 ; a distinguished counselor
and judge; married, November 26, 1849, Caroline
Downs Brooks, daughter of Hon. Nathan Brooks, of
Concord. Sarah, born November 9, 1817 ; married
Robert Boyd Storer, a merchant of Boston. Edward
Sherman, born December 22, 1823; Harvard Univer-
sity 1844. George Frisbie, born August 9, 1826 ; Har-
vard University, 1846 ; LL.B., 1849; settled in Wor-
cester and is a Senator in Congress.
Hon. Nathan Brooks, son of Joshua and Martha
(Barrett) Brooks, born in Lincoln, October IS, 1785;
graduated in 1809 ; studied law and settled in Con-
cord. He was a member of the Massachusetts House
of Representatives from Concord for the years 1823,
1824 and 1825 ; was a Senator for the county of Mid-
dlesex for the years 1831 and 1835, and a member of
the Governor's Council from May, 1829, to May, 1831.
LINCOLN.
629
In 1838 he was nominated by the Whigs to represent
the Middlesex District in Congress, but was defeated
by the Hon. William Parmenter.
Upon the incorporation of the Middlesex Mutual
Fire Insurance Company, in 182G, he was chosen its
secretary and treasurer, and discharged the duties of
those offices with distinguished ability and fidelity
until his death. He was for many years largely
engaged in settling the estates of deceased persons.
He married, first, Caroline Djwns, and second,
Mary Merrick, and died in Concord, December 11,
1863.
He had a daughter, Caroline Downs Brooks, now
the wife of Hon. E. Rockwood Hoar, and a son, Hon.
George Merrick Brooks, Judge of Probite for the
county of Middlesex.
Nathaniel Pierce Hoar, son of Hon. Samuel and Sus-
anna (Pierce) Hoar, born Sept. 2, 1784; Harvard Uni-
versity, 1810 ; studied law with his brother in Concord
and commenced practice in Portsmouth, N. H.,in 1813.
He died of consumption in Lincoln, May 24, 1820.
Thomas Fiske, son of Elijah and Anna (Barring
ton) Fiske, born October 2G, 1800 ; Harvard Univer-
sity, 1819; studied law and began his professional
business in Charleston, S. C, 1826, and died at Pine-
ville, S. C, August 30, 1831.
William Lawrence Stearns, son of Rev. Dr. Stearns,
born October 13, 1793; Harvard University, 1820;
studied divinity and was ordained at Stoughton, No-
vember 21, 1827. He subsequently sustained pastor-
ates in Rowe and Pembroke. He married, June 5,
1828, Mary Munroe, daughter of Isaac and Grace
(Bigelow) Munroe, and died in Chicopee, May 28,
1857. Mrs. Mary (Munroe) Stearns died in Cam-
bridge, March 2. 1890. Hon. George M. Stearns, of
Chicopee, and Albert B. Stearns, appraisers' office,
Boston Custom-house, are his sons.
Daniel Mansfield Stearns, twin brother of the
above; Brown University, 182.5 ; studied divinity and
was ordained at Dennis, May 21, 1828, and contin-
ued in the ministry eleven years, and returned to his
native town in 1839. He married, in 1825, Betsey
Munroe, sister of his brother William's wife, and died
in Lincoln, October 19, 1847. He had a family of
three sons and one daughter. One of his sons, Ed-
win M. Stearns, is a clerk in the custom-house, Bos-
ton. The other children died young.
Joseph Green Cole, son of Capt. Abraham and
Martha (Green) Cole, born in Lincoln, March 16,
1801, and graduated at Harvard University, 1822.
He studied law one year with Gov. Lincoln, in Wor-
cester, and finished his studies with Gov. Enoch Lin-
coln, in Maine, and was admitted to the bar in 1826,
and immediately opened an office in Paris, Me. He
was secretary of the State Senate, member of the
Legislature, clerk of the courts, and register of
deeds for Oxford County, and judge of the District
Court, which latter office he held at the time of his
death. " He was a man of distinguished ability.
great industry and exalted character, and no death in
Oxford County was ever more generally regretted."
He married, February 12, 1834, Mehiiable M. Marble,
and died November 12, 1851.
George Fiske, son of Elijah Fiske, Esq., bom Au-
gust 22,1804; Brown University, 1825, and was aa
I Episcopal minister at Oriskany and Rome, N. Y., and
I Richmond, Ind., where he died February, 1860. He
I married Sophia Northrop and had a daughter,
Theresa, born 1842, and married in 1864 to Col. W.
W. Dudley, of the Union Army.
Humphrey Farrar, son of Humphrey and Lucy
(Farrar), born September 15, 1773; graduated Dart-
mouth College 1794, and died July, 1840.
Joseph Farrar, brother of the preceding, born Feb-
ruary 21, 1775; graduated as classmate of his brother,
and settled as a lawyer in Chelsea, Vt., afterwards
removed to Wolfborough, N. H. He married Me-
hitable Dana, and died in New York February, 1851.
George Farrar, brother of the preceding, born Oc-
tober 16, 1778; graduated at Dartmouth College in
1800, and settled as a physician in Derry, N. H.,
where he obtained an extensive practice and was
eminently successful in his profession. He married,
1st, Sarah Prentice and 2d, Hannah Crocker.
William Farrar, another brother, born September,
13, 1780; graduated at Dartmouth College 1801, and
settled in Lancaster, N. H., as a lawyer. He married,
1st, Margaret Kibbe and 2d, Tryphena Burgio, and
died in Lancaster, N. H., March 3, 1851.
Charles Stearns Wheeler, son of Charles and Julia
(S'.earns) Wheeler, born December 19, 1816; Harvard
University, 1837. After his graduation he taught a
classical school in Cambridge one year and was four
years tutor in Greek in the university. During these
years he studied for the ministry and was licensed to
preach by the Cambridge Association and preached
at Brookline, Medford, Concord and Lincoln. He
published a Greek Reader in 1840, and an edition of
Herodotus with English notes in 1842.
On the Ist of August, 1842, he sailed from New
York for Havre, intending to spend a year in study
and travel in Europe. He spent the following winter
in Heidelberg, and early in the spring visited Gottin-
gen and reached Leipsic early in April, where he was
arrested by disease and died. During his sickness he
was tenderly cared for by his friend, Mr. John Fran-
cis Heath.
The following inscription, prepared by President
Felton, appears on his monument in the college lot
in Mount Auburn :
*'ChaRLKS STEAaNE WhEELEB,
a gradoAte of the claas of 1837.
Born to LIdcoId, Ma^s., December 19, 1816.
Died Id Leipsic, SazoDj, June 13, ]6i3.
He was four yeare an able and raitbful iiietructor in Harrard UDirer-
eity. To tbe learning of the Bcbolar beadded tbe piety of the Chriftian.
Ardent and indffatipible, in a abort life be did tbe work of many yean.
Simple in liiannern, pure in bcart, affectionato in dispoeiliou, he was be-
loved by all wbo knew hioi. While purauiug hii> aludies iu a loruign
630
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
country be was attacked by the dispose which eoded bis 1 fe. His re-
mains, restored to hisDafire land, rest here."
George Farrar, son of Deacon James and Dorcas
(Cbapin) Farrar, born July 9,1818; Amherst College,
1&39; Harvard Law School, 1844, and settled in
Charltstown. He married, 1848, Julia Carlton, and
died of consumption at Aiken, South Carolina,
January, 1852, and was buried in Mount Auburn.
He was a man of large frame, fine physical develop-
ment, and universally esteemed for his genial nature
and social qualities.
Rev. Charles Hartwell, son of Samuel, Jr., and Mary
(Hagar; Hartwell, born December 19, 1825; Amherst
College, 1849 ; studied theology in East Windsor
(Connecticut) Theological Seminary, and was ordained
as an evangelist at Lincoln, October 13, 1852. He
married, September 6,1852, Lucy Estabrooks Stearns,
and in Novtmber following sailed under appointment
of the A. B. C. F. M. for Foo Chow, China, where he
has successfully labored for more than thirty -six years,
revisiting his native land only once. Mrs. Lucy E. [
(Stearns) Hartwell died July 10, 1883. I
One of their sous, Charles S. Hartwell, born Sep- I
tember 3, 1885, graduated at Amherst College, 1877. I
Their daughter, Emily S., born April 7, 1859, was ed- ]
ucated at Wheaton Seminary, and is assistant mission- '
ary to her father, especially for the instruction of
women and girla. I
Rev. John Hartwell, brother of the preceding, born !
December 20, 1827 ; Amherst College, 1855 ; studied
in the East Windsor Seminary and was ordained pastor i
of the church in Leverett, in 1859, where he remained '
about five years. He was pastor of the church in i
Becket six years, and pastor in Souihbury, Conn.,
seven yfarp. Hemarritd, June 20, ISliO, Sarah W.
Southmayd, of Middletown, Conn., and died iuSoulh- '
bury, December 13, 1878. I
Rev. Ephraim Flint, D.D., son of Major Ephraim
and Susan (Bemis) Flint, bcm November 29, j
1828; took a preparatory course of study at Phillips
Academy, Andover, and Lawrence Academy, Groton,
and graduated at Williams College in 1851. He
taught the academy in Orleans and the high schools
of Lynn and Lee, and obtained an excellent reputa- '
tion as a teacher. After teaching nearly fourteen ,
years, he pursued a theological course in the seminary j
at Andover, and was ordained pastor of the Congrega- |
tional Church io Hinsdale in the autumn of 1867, I
where he remained until his death.
He married, April 7, 1857, Miss Orilla J. Hagar, of
Lincoln, and died suddenly, in the evening of Novem-
ber 28, 1882— the day that completed the fifiy-fourth
year of his life.
Dr. Flint was a man of great industry and of singu-
lar beauty and purity of life and character. Possessing
a large share of sound common sense and a sweet dis-
pobitioii — gifted with the talents and graces which
adorn the ministrj- — he was one who might well in-
scribe on his banner
"Tama soldier of the Cross,
A follower of the Lamb,"
and engrave on his shield the legend of Sir Hilde-
brand,
" My streD^h is as the strength of ten.
Because my heart ia pare."
Cornelius Fiske, son of Esq. Elijah and Mrs. Balh-
sheba (Brooks) Fiske, born March 24, 1830; A.B. Har-
vard Universiiy, 1853; studied law in the offices of
Hon. F. B. Hayes and Messrs. Hutchins and Wheeler
in Boston, and was admitted to the Suffolk bar in
1855. Immediately after his admicsion to the bar in
Boston he went to New York and entered the office
of Messrs. Benedict, Burr & Benedict, and six mt nths
later was admitted to practice in all the courts of
New York and the District and Circuit Courts of the
United States, and opened an office at 37 Wall Street,
May 1, 1856.
He married, August 25, 185S, Mary Amanda,
daughter of Henry B. and Mary E. Greenwood, and
has two sons and four daughters.
Lewis Everett Smith, son of Cyrus and Tryphenu
(Brooks) Smith, born Jan. 2, 1831 ; graduated Brown
University, 1S53. He taught the high school in Ports-
mouth, N. H., and substquenlly e.-tablished Smith's
Academy and Cf.mmercial College thfre, of which he
is principal. He married, Ji ne 17, 1856, Eliza
Abbott, of Charlestown.
Dr. George Grosvenor Tarbfll,son of Charles L.
and Martha E. (Fibke) Tarbell, born September '.»,
1841; A.B., Harvard University, 1S62 ; M.D., 1865.
He served as assistant .surgeon in the Union Army in
1865, and has since been apratticirg physician in
Boston and a member of the statf of the Massachu-
setts General Hospital, 1868 to 1889.
Dr. Leonard Wheeler, son of Abel and Charlotte
( B( mis) Wheeler, born August 31, 1845; fitted for
college at Exeter, N. H., and graduated A.B., 1866,
M.D., 1867; was in the Massachusetts General Hos-
pital one year, 1869-70. Since 1870 he has been a
succesfful practitioner in Worcester.
Charles Francis Tarbell, son of Charles L. and
Martha E. (Fiske) Tarbell, born May 6, 1853 ; Har-
vard University, 1873. Since his graduation he has
been engaged in manufacturing and mercantile pur-
suits. He married, June 6, 1883, Ida Adams, daugh-
ter of C. C. Adams, of Brooklyn. They have two
children — Sarah Adams and George Grosvenor (3d).
Frank Webster Smith, son of Francis and Abigail
E. (Baker) Smith, born June 27, 1854; fitted for col-
lege in the public schools of Lincoln and Phillips
Academy, and graduated in 1877. He taught classics
and mathematics four years in .\tlanta University,
Georgia ; pursued a post-graduate course at Harvard
two years, and since 1883 has been a teacher in the
State Normal School at Wcstfield.
Edward Irving Smith, son of Cyrus G. and Emily
(Huddleston) Smith, born October 20, 1862; fitted
for college in the public schools of Lincoln, aud grad-
LINCOLN..
631
uated Harvard Uoiversity, 1885. He was a private tu-
tor one year, and graduated at the Law School in
1889. He attained a high rank, both in the academi-
cal and professional departments of the University.
Edward Francis Hodges, son of Edward Fuller and
Anne Frances (Hammatt) Hodges, born Aug'ist, 1851 ;
Harvard University, 1871 ; M.D., 1876 ; settled in In-
dianapolis, Ind., where he is a successful practitioner.
George Clarendon Hodges, brother of the preced-
ing, born October 14, 1857; Harvard University,
1S77 : studied law and entered on his professional
career in Boston in 1880.
George Henry Flint, son of George ar.d Caroline
A. (Rice) Flint, born January 25, 1855; graduated
at Williams College, 1886. After his graduation he
taught in the academy at Peekskill, N. Y., and is
now an instructor in Williams College.
Physicians. — Dr. John Binney lived in that part
of Weston which became a part of Lincoln upon
incorporation of the town in 1754. He was son of
Deacon John and Hannah (Paine) Binney, and was
born in Hull April 23, 1705. He married, October
21, 1726, Hannah Jones, and settled in Meodon as a
physician, and afterwards removed to Weston. He
died in Lincoln August 14, 1760. His widow mar-
ried, October 30, 1765, Captain Daniel Adams, and
died June 11, 1776.
Dr. Charles Russell, son of Hon. James and Cath-
arine (Graves) Russell, was born in Charlestown, De-
cember 27, 1738. He graduated at Harvard, 1757,
and received a medical degree at Aberdeen. After
the death of his uncle, Hon. Chambers Russell, in
1767, he came to reside and practice in Lincoln. He
was a Loyalist, and left Lincoln on the 19th of April,
1775. He subsequently went to the West Indies,
and died at Antigua May 27, 1780. He married.
February 15, 1768, Elizabeth Vassal, daughter of
Henry and Penelope (Royal) Vassal, of Cambridge.
They had four daughters born in Lincoln : Penelope,
born March 17, 1769; married, November 7, 1808,
Hon. Theodore Sedgwick ; died May 18, 1827. Eliz-
abeth Vassal, born January 10, 1771 ; married, June
12, 1797, Charles Furlong Degen ; died in Marion
County, Miss., August 28, 1824. Catharine Graves,
born January 9,1772; died unmarried in Roxbury
September 5, 1847. Rebecca, born February 20,
1773; married, first, November, 1793, David Pierce;
married, second, Joseph Ruggles, and died in Phila-
delphia December 15, 1825. Mrs. Elizabeth (Vassal)
Eussell died in Plymouth February 23, 1802.
Dr. Oliver Mann, son of Ebenezer and Mary
(Gould) Mann, was born in Wrentham June 5, 1756.
He practiced in Lincoln between 1777 and 1783. He
was a surgeon in the Revolutionary Army, and, after
the close of the war, removed to Castine, Me. He
represented Castine in the Massachusetts Lejrislature
in 1798, 1802, 1803 and 1807, and died in Castine July
4, 1832. He married Lucy, daughter of John and
Lucy (Hubbard) Adams. They had several child.-en.
two of whom were born in Lincoln : Nancy, born
April 25, 1780 ; Lucy, born September 1, 1781.
Dr. Richard Rusiell, son of Richard ^nd Mary
(Cary) Russell, was baptized in Charlestown Febru-
ary 24, 1750. He served an apprenticeship at the
tanner'.s trade with Deacon Joshua Bro )k8 ir. Lincoln
On the morning of the day he became of age he rose
early, washed his hands thoroughly, and made a vow
never to put them into the tanyard again. He im-
mediately commenced the study of medicine, and
subsequently commenced practice in Lincoln. He
married, July 28, 1777, Elizabeth, daughteryaf Nathan
and Rebecca (Adams) Brown, of Lincoln. He was
drowned by the upsetting of a boat in Beaver Pond,
August 12, 1796. His widow died May 18, 1838.
They had a family of six sons and three daughters.
Of the sons, James was a dry-goods merchant in Bos-
ton, and George was a physician. The other children
died young or unmarried.
Dr. Grosvenor Tarbell, son of Lieutenant John, Jr.,
and Susanna (Hobbs) Tarbell, was born in Sturbridge
February 3, 1768, and graduated at Yale College,
1793. He studied for his profession in Boston, and
came to reside and practice in Lincoln in 1796. He
received a degree, A.M., Yale, 1806, and an honorary
degree, A.M., Harvard University, 1810. He mar-
ried, August 25, 1801, Thankful, daughter of Hon.
Samuel and Susanna (Pierce) Hoar. He was emi-
nently skillful and successful in his profession, an
excellent town officer and an enterprising and useful
citizen. He died, universally lamented, March 19,
1822. His mdo77 died February 7, 1861. They bad
the following children : Louisa, born May 23, 1802;
died July 17, 1825. Sarah (name changed by Legis-
lature to Sarah Harding), born September 16, 1803;
died, unmarried, October 19, 1866. Lucia, born July
27, 1805; married, June 10, 1830, Stephen Swift.
George Grosvenor, born June 10, 1807 ; died Decem-
ber 23, 1889. Jane, born January 24, 1810 ; died Df-
cember 22, 1888. Charles Lee, born January 22, 1812;
married, on December 25, 1838, M. E. Fiske ; died
December 24, 1889. Mary Elizabeth, born August
27, 1814 ; died August 30, 1818.
Dr. George Russell, son of Dr. Richard and Mrs.
Elizabeth (Brown) Russell, born Sept. 23, 1795; gradu-
ated at the Harvard Medical School in 1820, and com-
menced practice in Lincoln in 1822. He removed to
Waliham in 1838 and soon after to Boston, where he
obtained an extensive practice. He bequeathed his
library (except the medical books) to the town of
Lincoln; also SIOOO, the annual income of which is
to be expended for the purchase of books for the pub-
lic library. He married, December 5, 1826, Miss
Hannah Green Cule, daughter of Capt. Abraham
Cole, of Lincoln, and died in Boston, February 18,
1883. Mrs. Hannah Green Cole Russell died in Bos-
ton in 1882. They had one daughter, Ellen Louisa,
boru in Lincoln, September 11, 1828, and died in
Boston, November 11, 1854.
632
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Dr. Henry C. Chapin, son of James and Apuma
(Parsons) Chapin, was born in Greenwich, N. Y., De-
cember 25, 1815. He was educated at the academies
of MoDson and Amherst, and graduated at the Berk-
shire Medical College, Pittsfieid, in 1840. Immedi-
ately after graduating he came to reside and practice
in Lincoln, and still continues in the active duties of
his profession. He married in Southbridge, Decem-
ber 30, 1840, Lydia Bacon. They had a family of
three sons and two daughters.
Schools and School-Houses. — At the time of
the incorppration of the town there were within its
limits three school-houses, one near what is now the
Snelling place, one near the railroad crossing on the
South Road and one on the Common near the old
chestnut tree, now standing. Soon after the incor-
poration of the town school-houses were built in the
north and east parts of the town seemingly partly at
the expense of the town, and partly by contributions
of labor and materials from persons living in those
localities. The first recorded action in relation to
schools was taken September 2, 1754, when it was
" Voted, that there shall be a moving-school kept in
said town, and to remove to three several places, and
that the selectmen provide a schoolmaster ; " but the
payments do not seem to be in accordance with this
vote, Samuel Farrar and Amos Heald being paid,
February 14, 1755, £1 2a. 8rf. each for teaching school,
and Timothj' Wesson, Jr., and Ephraim Flint were
paid, March, 1754, £2 13«. id. each for teaching school
two months. In the following years a movable school
was usually kept, the teachers going from one house
to another, according to the directions of the select-
men.
Mr. Joseph Brooks, who died September 17, 1759,
after giving legacies to the church in Lincoln, to Rev.
William Lawrence and various relatives, devised the
remainder of his estate to the town of Lincoln, " the
income therefrom to be applied to the support of a
grammar-school in said town forever." The amount
received was £388. As there were no books on Eng-
lish grammar then in existence, the words "grammar-
school " were construed to mean a Latin school, and
for more than sixty years the income of the legacy
was paid only to such teachers as were qualified to
give instructions in Latin and Greek. This led to a
more general employment of graduates and under-
graduates of colleges, and tended to elevate the char-
acter of the schools. Among the teachers in the last
century were Stephen Farrar, Timothy Farrar, Jacob
Bigelow, Micah Lawrence, Joseph Willard, Abel
Flint and Fisher Ames, all graduates of Harvard,
and in later times Rev. Drs. Lamson, Hosmer and
Hill.
The Liberal School, an institution diflering in no
respect from the academies of the time, was estab-
lished in 1792, and Mr. Stearns became its first pre-
ceptor. The origin of the school was on this wise: Dur-
ing the middle and latt«r part of the last century mauy
families from Middlesex County removed to the border
towns of New Hamphiie and Vermont. Amongst the
first settlers of New Ipswich, Stephen Farrar, its first
minister, and Timothy Farrar, its first lawyer, were
from Lincoln. The wife of Dr. John Preston, its first
distinguished physician, wa.s a sister of the Farrars.
Other men and families from Lincoln emigrated to the
same place. After the close of the Revolutionary War
the people of New Ipswich, feeling the need of better
facilities for the education of their children, projected
and established the New Ipswich Academy, which
afterwards became one of the best educational institu-
tions of the State. The articles of the associate
founders were signed in 1787, and the school was
opened the same year. Five of the thirty-two original
members of the association were natives of Lincoln.
During the three following years several young ladies
of Lincoln, who had relatives in New Ipswich, at-
tended the academy there. The fame of the academy,
and the superior advantages enjoyed there, led the
people of Lincoln to wish for a similar school here,
and in 1792 articles of association, similar to those of
the founders of the New Ipswich .•\cademy,and prob-
ably drawn by the same hand, were signed by twenty-
one of the leaading men of Lincoln, under the name
of " The proprietors of the Liberal School in Lin-
coln." The names of the proprietors, in the order in
which they first appear, were Abijah Peirce, F.dmond
Wheeler, Elcuzer Brooks, Joseph Adams, John Cod-
man, Samuel Hoar, Samuel Farrar, Daniel Brooks,
Joshua Brooks, William Lawrence, Bulkiey Adams,
Leonard Hoar, .Abner JFalhieR, John Adams, Zecha-
riah Smith, Ephraim Flint, Ef hraim Weston, Andrew
Adams, Is.aac Monroe, Elijah Fiske.
A house was built and the school opened in the
spring of 1793. Instruction was given in rhetoric, as-
tronomy, the higher branches of mathematics, and in
the principlss of religion and morality, text-books
being prepared by Dr. Stearns and transcribed by the
pupils. Instruction was also given in Latin and Greek,
and particular attention paid to manners and morals
of the pupils. This school gave a new impulse to the
cause of education and tended to elevate the character
of the town. The first exhibition was given Septem-
ber 27, 1793, Misses Anna Harrington, Hannah Fiske
and .Susannah Hoar being assigned the highest parts.
The innovation of allowing young ladies to speak in
public caused considerable discussion and some cen-
sure, but Dr. Steams was able to sustain himself and
his school. If any other town in Middlesex County
led the way of allowing young ladies to speak in
public on the stage, let it be proclaimed. If any one
knows of any evils arising from the custom inaugu-
rated here, let him cry out.
The school continued in successful operation about
fifteen years. In it, under the tuition of Dr. Stearns,
Samuel Farrar, Esq., Prof. John Farrar, Hon. .Samuel
Hoar, Hon. Nathan Brooks, Nathaniel Bemis, Francis
Jackson, Dr. Winslow Lewis, and Rev. Cyrus Peirce,
LINCOLN.
633
better known as " Father Peirce " — the first principal
of the first Normal school established in the United
States — were prepared for admission to Harvard. Prof.
Farrar and Father Peirce were known throughout the
land for their great attainments in knowledge and
eminent abilities as teachers. How much they were
indebted to their early preceptor for their success in
after life the muse of history saith not. It is presum-
able that they got a good start.
In 1810 the building was sold to the town, and was
uaed for a school-house until 1872, when the present
high school building was erected at a cost of $8000.
In 1852 a high school was established and the lower
room of the town hall fitted for a school-room. After
the removal of the high school to the new building
the room was used for the public library until the
erection of the present library, the munificent gift of
Mr. George G. Tarbell, in 1884.
The town was never divided into school districts,
and the difficulties which attend the abolition of the
district system were unknown here. Seventy years
ago the examinations of the schools were usually at-
tended by as many as could find sitting-room, and
sometimes by more than could find standing-room,
and jealousies were engendered if one school or
teacher was praised or censured more than another.
Sixty years ago Mr. Sbattuck wrote : " Lincoln has
always given liberal support to her common schools
and has been rewarded in the distinguished character
of its educated sons." As it was in the beginning so
is it now, and so may it be forever.
Bhrial- Places. — Soon after the incorporation of
the precinct, Mr. Ephraim Flint gave an acre of land
for a burial-place, and Mr. Jonathan Gove, who died
in 1747, was the first person buried in it. Soon after
the incorporation of the town. Deacon Samuel Far-
rar purchased and presented to the town an acre of
land near the meeting-house for a burying-ground.
In 1832 the town bought of the heirs of Abraham
Cole about an acre of land for a third burying-
ground. This place was not well or wisely chosen,
being a triangular piece of ground bounded on all
sides by highways. In 1882 Mr. George F. Bemis
gave upwards of ten acres of ground to enlarge the
oldest cemetery. Mr. Bemis' gift had an intrinsic
value far beyond the cost of the laud. The town had
struggled for two years over the question of a new cem-
etery, and had several meetings without being able to
agree upon a location. Mr. Bemis settled the matter
quietly and in the best way. No other spot possesses
such peculiar attractions and associations. There the
spring comes early and the summer stays long, and
nature has done her part to make it a beautiful rest-
ing-place for the dead. There 'neath grass-grown
graves and moss-covered stones repose the founders
of the church and town. There too, victors and vic-
tims of the first battle of the Revolution sleep in kin-
dred dust and have memorial stones.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
HON. ELEAZER BROOKS.
In the early history of the town and the subse-
quent years of the Revolutionary War no man rose
higher in the esteem of his fellow-citizens, or exerted
a more commanding influence in the affairs of the
town and councils of the State, than Gen. Eleazer
Brooks. In the discussions and contests about the
Stamp Act, the Writs of Assistance and the declwa-
tioD of the English Ministry, " That the Parliament
had, and of right ought to have, power to bind the Colo-
nies in all cases whatsoever," he came early to the
front, and maintained his position there to the close
of the war and the century. He was commissioned
by Gov. Barnard, May 11, 1768, a lieutenant in the
company in Lincoln commanded by Captain Abijah
Pierce, and a captain by Gov. Hutchinson, July 13,
1773. When a collision between the Colonies and
the British Parliament became inevitable, he returned
his commission to the Royal Governor, and was pres-
ent at Concord on the 19th of April following as a
private citizen. From the breaking out of the war in
1775, to the adoption of the State Constitution in
1780, the Colony of Massachusetts Bay, in New Eng-
land, had no executive ofiicer styled Governor, the
executive powers being exercised by "The Major
part of the Council." By the Council he was ap-
pointed colonel of ihe Third Regiment of the Mid-
dlesex troops, February 14, 1776, and a brigadier-
general October 15, 1778, and re-appointed to the
same ofiice under the new Constitution, August 22,
1780.
The laborious duties which his military offices im-
posed upon him were performed with marked ability
and precision. He was cautious and considerate in
the formation of his plans, prompt, diligent and per-
sistent in the e.xecution of them — elements essential
to success in all the great enterprises of life. To him,
to resolve was to do, and seldom, if ever, did he fail
to accomplish his purpose.
Once, and only once, as far as can be ascertained,
was he ever accused of any neglect of public duty.
On the 10th of November, 1779, the Council sent him
a letter, censuring him for not forwarding to General
Washington " certain recruits enlisted at Medford,
within the limits of your brigade, who are greatly
needed for the public service, and are said to be loit-
ering about in idleness, instead of being at the place
of rendezvous." Gen. Brooks promptly asked for a
committee of investigation, and his request was as
promptly complied with. Nine days after the com-
mittee reported as follows :
" The committee appointed by this board on the
Hon""'" Brigadier Brooks' memorial of the Uth inst.,
have attended that service, beard the Hon""* Gentle-
man on the subject matter thereof, inspected the pub-
lic orders which the said Brigadier issued in conse-
634
HISTORi' OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
quence of an order of the General Assembly of the
ninth of October last, and are unanimously of the
opinion that said Brigadier has in this instance acted
up to his duty as a General officer, and fully complied
with the order aforesaid, and should be exonerated
from all blame," which report was unanimously ac-
cepted.
He was elected a representative to the Colonial
Legislature in 1774, and continued by successive elec-
tions either a member of the House of Representa-
tives, the Senate or the Executive Council, for twen-
ty-seven years. In 1801 he declined a re-election,
and retired to private life. The journals of the House
of Representatives and Senate, and the records of the
Council, show that he was an active and intiuential
member, seldom absent from the sessions, except
when engaged on his military expeditions. He was
appointed a justice of the peace in 1777, and special
justice of the Court of Common Pleas March 27,
17S6. He was a delegate to the cinvention to form a
Constitution for the State at Cambridge in 1779, and
a delegate to the convention at Boston in 17S8 to
ratify the Constitution of the United States. He was
often appointed on committees for laying out and
constructing roads, and many times engaged in .«et-
tling the estates of deceased persons.
In reviewing the life and services of Gen. Brooks
it is not easy to find a standard by which to measure
him, or a man among the natives of the town to com-
pare him with, unless it be Judge Timothy Farrar.
Both typical men — typical Puritan gentlemen — both
were eminently soldiers of the cross, and followers of
the Prince of Peace. Both were conservatives of the
strongest kind in matters of faith and doctrine; both
progressive and aggressive in asserting the rights of
man, and advocating the independence of the na-
tion ; both gave many years of their lives to the pub-
lic service, and enjoyed the confidence and respect,
the love and esteem of their fellow-citizens, from the
beginning to the end of their careers.
In other respects they greatly differed. Judge Far-
rar was educated in the best schools and highest in-
stitutions of learning in the land, enjoying the coun-
sels and assistance of an elder brother, who had
graduated at Harvard and was settled in the ministry
in the town and State of their adoption, while Gen.
Brooks had no other opportunities for education than
those afforded by the common schools of the time,
and, for some unexplained reason, we read that his
opportunities there were not equal to those of other
boys of his age and time. Little owed he to school
or college, or the teachings of other men — all to the
brightness of his own genius, his unquenchable
thirst for knowledge, and his indomitable pursuit of
it under difficulties. How he acquired his knowledge
let his pastor tell : " He was necessitated to be his
own preceptor. He was accustomed to read the best
books, and then, as opportunities offered, to converse
with intelligent men concerning them. With this
i judicious project ever in view, notwithstanding all
I the disadvantaces under which he labored, he ac-
I quired a valuable fund of knowledge. To classical
knowledge, indeed, he made no pretensions, having
never learned any other language than the English.
I In the art of reasoning he was expert, and deeply
I read in the philosophy of the mind ; he appeared to
possess those branches of science systematically, and
to meet any man on equal grounds of dispute. He
never suffered himself to dispute with heat or acri-
mony. His object was to state points fairly, and ana-
lyze them accurately, with the single view of diacov-
I ering truth. Those who at anytime compUined of
1 his manner of treating subjects used generally to say
he was too attentive to the niceties of logic and meta-
physics ; i. e., he examined his subject too minu'.ely
and accurately. If this be a fault, it must be con-
fessed it is one in which disputants are not accus-
tomed to err. In one instance, then, it may be ex-
cused. Or, rather, should it not be commended as a
virtue ? He had a competent share of mathematical
knowledge. This he must have obtained without any
living preceptor, his own genius excepted. In theol-
ogy he was not merely conversant, but deeply versed
in the science. He not only knew his duty as a
Christian, but was acquainted with the different
schools — knew their characteristic opinions, their
modes of defending them, and their points of contro-
versy one with another. Few men could more ably
defend their own sentiments, or treat with more can-
dor the arguments and opinions of others. He held
truth without persecuting error. He strenuously
maintained his own faith, yet discovered no animosity
j towards those who opposed him.''
i " It was truly astonishing that without a regular in-
stitution he could comprehend, so far as he did, the
principles of natural philosophy. He attained to
the great, leading principles of the Newtonian sys-
tem, and looked through Nature to the great God and
Father of all."
Eleazer Brook?, born September 10, 1726, was the
son of Job and Elizabeth (Flagg) Brooks, and a de-
scendant of the fourth generation from Captain
Thomas Brooks, one of the first settlers of Concord.
He married, August 4, 1763, Mary Taylor, of Con-
cord. She died July 4, 1769, and he married, second.
May 27, 1777, Elizabeth, daughter of Thomas and
Sarah (Stoddard) Greenough, of Boston.
General Brooks died November 9, 1806, and was
buried on the 11th with military honors. Mrs.
Elizabeth (Greenough) Brooks died December 25,
1825. They had two children, — Eleazer (Dea.), born
July 10, 1778, died, unmarried, in Burton, III., Octo-
ber 11, 1860; Elizabeth, bom December 26, 1780,
married, November 20, 1800, Edmund Wheeler, Jr.,
and died in Lincoln December 12, 1860.
And the writer knows of no fitter time or place to
record the virtues of this worthy daughter of a dis-
tinguished sire, or one more worthy of a grateful trib-
LINCOLN.
635
lite to her memory — a womao who did a large amount
of gratuitous watching and nursing; wise lo advise
and strong to help, —
"Both in tbe natal and the mortal bonr/*
putting the first and the last dress on more new-
breathing and breathless forms than any olher person
in the town ever did ; always a gratelul presence in
the sick-rocm, most of all when Iriends gathered
round —
** Id treoibling hope and SDrging fear,
The vhite<wjnged angels bovering near."
And she was but a specimen of those sainted mothers
and grandmothers of departed days who were help-
meets for theirhusbands — who nourished and brought
up large families of children, their sons being their
jewels and their daughters their crowns of glory, —
who carded and spun, wove and knit, from the wool
and flax grown on the farm, garments for themselves
and their families, — who had no servants and but lit-
tle he/p, except that of their own or their neighbors'
daughters, — who had no vacations or outings, except
to get up a little earlier in the morning and work a
little later at night in the hottest seacon, to alleviate
tbe labors of their husbands and sons in the haying
and harvest time, — who toiled patiently six days in
the week, prepared their Sunday dinners on Saturday
and went to meeting twice on the Sabbath — not to
exhibit new bonnete and artistic dresses, but to wor-
ship the I>ord in ihe beauty of holiness.
GEORGE F. WESTOK.
George Fiske Weston, son of Colonel Calvin and
Eliza Ann (Fiske) Weston, born October 27, 1839,
fitted for college in the High School in Lincoln and
Phillips Academy, and graduated as A.B. at Harvard
University in 1860. Immediately after graduating
he commenced the study of l.iw, a profession to which
his tastes had strongly inclined him from boyhood,
and had nearly completed his professional studies
when he enlisted in the Forty-fourth Regiment Mas-
sachusetts Volunteers, and was mustered into service
September 12, 1862, and went with hi? regiment —
then commanded by Colonel Francis L. Lee — to
Newbern, N. C, and was in the expeditions to Tar-
borough and Goldaborougb in November and Decem-
ber following. He was commissioned by Governor
Andrew, March 4, 1863, second lieutenant in the
Eighteenth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers,
and, after a brief visit to his home, joined his regi-
ment in Virginia.
Tbe history of his military career is modestly and
truthfully told by a comrade and classmate: "Lieu-
tenant Weston was one of the many who left a home
and loving friends to serve his country. But the cir-
cumstances which attended his enlistment were not j
of an ordinary character. Devoted for many years to
academic studies, he graduated at Harvard in 1860,
and immediately entered upon the study of law, a pro-
fession in which his peculiarly quick, shrewd and
penetrating intellect promised him undoubted success.
It wits whilst he was in the midst of his legal studies
that the call for our nine months' volunteers was
made. With hardly a moment's hesitation he decided
to enlist, abandoning the professional work in which
he had become deeply interested, and in which he
had made great progress, to serve in the ranks of the
Forty-fourth Massachusetts.
"There were probably very few in the regiment to
whom the unavoidable discomforts and annoyances
of a private's life were more thoroughly distasteful
than to Lieutenant Weston ; and yet through them
all his disposition remained unchanged. He wai
always the light of the company, — genial, bright and
kind, — making the barracks ring with laughter at
the brilliaut sallies of his wit, and enlivening the
march with his ever-ready and delightful humor.
And all this with a bearing habitually respectful to
his ofl^icers and a conscientious discharge of all his
duties as a soldier. Ever kind and considerate as
well as cheerful, he gained at once both the affection
and admiration of his comrades, and hie name was
the constant theme for the liveliest expressions of
affection and regret after he had left the Forty-fourth
Regiment for the Eighteenth.
" Physically delicate, he was exposed, on the expe-
ditions of the army corps, to the greatest suffering
and fatigue, all of which be bore with a fortitude
truly wonderful, — his mind, by the sheer force of his
energy and courage, sustaining him when his body
had become quite disabled.
"In March he decided to accept the offer of a com-
mission in the Eighteenth Atassachusetts Volunteers,
deliberately entering upon a longer term of service,
and again postponing his entrance upon his favorite
pursuits. He was with bis regiment at Chancellors-
ville and Gettysburg, and was in command of a
company at the battle of Rappahannock Station,
where he was wouuded. The same qualities that had
distinguished him as aprivatesoldier marked his career
as an officer. He was always thoroughly kind, cool and
brave, patient in suffering and bold before danger.
"In mind. Lieutenant Weston was as we have de-
scribed him, — quick, peqetrating and shrewd. In his
disposition he was thoroughly modest and adverse to
display, preferring rather to be underrated than over-
rated, even by his most intimate friends. It would,
indeed, be impossible to do justice to so noble and
beautiful a nature by any enumeration or description
of the fine traits of his character; but one quality
certainly gave the key-note of his disposition, and
was especially associated with him by his friends :
his rare geniality of soul, which sprung from a sunny,
warm and loving heart, and which brightened the
lives of all who lived with him. His memory will
be cherished tenderly by all who loved, and they
are all who knew him, and his heroic death is at
once their grief and their glory."
636
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Lieutenant Weston inberited the instincts of vir-
tue, valor and patriotism. His grandfather, Nathan
Weston, was a soldier in the regiment commanded
by Colonel Thomas Gardner, who was killed in the
battle of Bunker Hill, and was quartermaster in the
same regiment, afterwards under the command of
Lieutenant-Colonel William Bond, who died at Mount
Independence, August 31, 1776. His grandmother,
Mrs. Anna (Fox) Weston, was a descendant of the
martyrologist. His father was a colonel in the mil-
itia in the piping times of peace, and his mother a
great-granddaughter of Thomas and Rebecca (John-
son) Garfield, the ancestors of the President. " Who,"
said General Garfield, in his eulogy on General
Thomas, " sshall estimate the effect of these latent
forces, enfolded in the spirit of a new-born child, —
forces that may date back centuries and find their
origin in the life and thought and deeds of remote
ancestors, — forces the germs of which, enveloped in
the awful mystery of life, have been transmitted si-
lently from generation to generation."
HON. CHAMBER3 RUSSELL.
Hon. Chambers Russell, son of Hon. Daniel and
Rebecca (Chambers) Russell, was born in Charlestown
July 4, 1713, and graduated in Harvard College in
nai. His maternal grandfather, Hon. Charles
Chambers, by hia will devised to his grandson, Cham- i
bera Russell, his farm in Concord (now Lincoln), and !
he came into possession of it and came to reside here
before 1740. |
He was appointed in 1747 a judge of the Court of ,
Admiralty and a judge of the Superior Court in j
in 1752. He represented the town of Concord in the I
Colonial Legislature three years. But failing of a
re-election in 1753, he turned his influence and that |
of his wealthy friends to secure the incorporation of
the town of Lincoln and was successful. According
to tradition the town was named by him for the home
of his ancestors in England. After the incorporation
of the town he was elected representative several times;
in 1759 he was chosen to the Council and was a mem-
ber of that body several years. When he declined
serviog as representative, the town voted not to send.
He seems to have been the pride of the town, and the
town his pet. He not only paid the highest tax in
the precinct and town, but was distinguished for
generous acts of public and private benevolence.
Some glimpses of the man may be seen in the follow-
ing extracts from the town records :
May 5, 1765, "To act on the article referred from
the last town-meeting to the next meeting, which was
To see what the town will give Timothy Weston and
Samuel Farrar, a committee chosen by the town to
petition the Great and General Court for relief under
the heavy burden of an additional tax levied on the
town in the year 1762. Dismissed on Judge Russell's
promising to pay said Committee."
" July 10, 1766, Paid Mr. Joseph Willard three
pounds for his boarding while he kept the School in
the Southwest part of the town. Judge Russell being
please to give him his board.'
Hon. Chambers Russell married Mary Wainwright,
and died in England November 24, 1767. Mrs. Mary
(Wainwright) Russell died in Lincoln, August 13,
1762.
GEORGE n. TARBELL.
George Grosvenor Tarbell was a son of Dr. Grosve-
nor and Mrs. Thankful (Hoar) Tarbell, born in Lin-
coln, June 10, 1807. His father was a physician of
good repute and his mother a lady of more than
ordinary refinement and intelligence. In addition to
his professional business, his father owned and carried
on a fine farm. There is no better place to train the
young to habits of industry and virtue, or where they
can be so securely kept from the temptations of idle-
ness and dissipation, or where the physical, intel-
lectual and moral capacities can better be developed
than on a farm. He attended the district schools of
Lincoln until he was sixteen years old, and was a
pupil in the Concord Academy two or three terms
in 1823.
In his school-boy days he was distinguished for his
manly and correct deportment, his attention to his
studies, and "his politeness," as a lady schoolmate
testifies, — traits of character which he carried with him
all through his long and useful life. At the age of
seventeen he entered the store of his uncle, Mr. Abi-
jah H. Pierce, then a grocer in Cambridgeport, where
he remained until he attained his majority, learning
all the details of the business from store-sweep to
head clerk, and acquiring what is of more consequence
to success in life, a correct knowledge of human
nature.
After attaining his majority he entered into part-
nership with Mr. Francis Dana Kidder and was suc-
cessful in business for several years. In 1842 he went
to Lexington, Kentucky, and entered into partner-
ship with his brother-in-law, Mr. Stephen Swift. But
the atmosphere of slavery was not congenial to his
tastes, and in 1847 he returned to Boston, and estab-
lished the commercial house of Tarbell & Dana, of
which he remained the senior member until his re-
tirement from business in 1865.
All through life he was the same polite, sociable,
companionable, considerate and agreeable man, never
aspiring to lead the multitude or lord it over men, but
always —
" Nobly ambitioQS well to rule
The empire of Lis fioul.*'
His eye might flash with fire, or his face turn white
with indignation, without his losing for a moment
the control of his temper or tongue. He was as hon-
est and upright in dealing with the assessors of taxes
as with his brother or bosom friend. One anecdote
may reveal the man. (Jue May day, in conversation
9^^'"'—^'^
'J^y 7''?'^'-e^,'^—
LINCOLN.
637
with the assessors, he stated that he owned certain
property which he thought was not taxable in Lin-
coln. " Oh, yes,'' said the assessor, " that property
is taxable in Lincoln." " Do you think bo?" queried
Mr. Tarbell. " Yes, I am confident I am right."
" I'll see and let you know," said Mr. T. A week
afterwards he came and said smilingly to theaasessor,
" You were right and I was wrong, and I want you to
tax me for that property. I wish to be taxed for
everything I have that is taxable."
If any one wants to knew human nature from its
serene heights to its grovelings, let him be an assessor
of taxes for a quarter of a century.
In what estimation Mr. Tarbell wac held by the
merchants and business men of Boston may be
learned from the following note from Rev. Dr. Hale,
in whose church Mr. Tarbell was a constant wor-
shiper:
" Boston. April 28, 1890.
" -l/y dear Mr. ^'heeler^ — What yon know of Mr. Tarbell gives you a
perfect key to what, 1 auppofle, you do Dot know so much — bis life In
BostoD.
"There lias been none of the mercbant^ of tbe city who was more
thoroughly respected, and I might fairly Bay loved, among tboee who
knew him. And this makes a large circle, for he was a public-spirited
man, ready to take his share in anything that was going forward. He
wa>i an interested member of our congregation for I do not know how
many years — always after I knew the church until he removed to
Lincoln. .\od, indeed, after that time I used to receive the most kindly
noteti of remembrance from him. As you know, he was a man of pro-
found religious eentimeuts, although not perhaps much given to what
iH called religious conversation. His heart was open to every one in
distress, and his judgment so good that the impulses of bis heart could be
relied upon. I am very glad to hear that you are preparing some per-
manent record of the life of such a man. I am sure that his example
has not been without its fi^it among tbe young men who grew up
knowing bow be discharged his daily duty.
" I am always truly yours,
*' Edw. E. Hale."
What Mr. Tarbell was as a neighbor and friend
no one knows better than the writer. From his
schoolboy's days for nearly sixty years he had busi-
ness transactions with Mr. Tarbell, and knows him to
have been an upright and reliable man, and after he
retired from buoiness and came to reside in Lincoln
Mr. Tarbell was his near neighbor and obliging
friend, and he never went to him for any favor,
whether it was for the loan of a dollar or a thousand,
or suretyship for twice ten thousand, or for a contri-
bution for any charitable, political or religious pur-
pose, and was met with a refusal or put ofl' to a more
convenient season. He never sounded his trumpet
before men, or let his left hand know what his right
hand gave in charity. Yet it is believed his benevo-
lence was large and well considered, and doubtless
many pounds of sugar and tea and barrels of flour
went to the homes of the needy of which no record
was ever made, save in the hearts of the grateful re-
cipients and the Book of Life. And all his works and
deeds of charity were done unostentatiously, noise-
lessly, " as the fragrance of flowers ascends on the
wings of the morning, or the moonbeams descend on
the mantle of night."
But the crowning grace and glory of Mr. Tarbell's
life was the erection of the Lincoln Public Library.
At first he decided to leave the town a sum of money
to build a library, but afterwards concluded to erect
the edifice himself, thus avoiding all contention
about the location or construction of the building.
He purchased a site for and began the construction
of the library in the summer of 1883. The building
was finished in the spring and summer of the follow-
ing year, and dedicated August 5, 1884. The princi-
pal address was delivered by a cousin of Mr. Tarbell,
Hon. George F. Hoar, of 'Worcester, a Senator in
Congress, whose father was a native of Lincoln. In-
teresting letters from Hon. George Bancroft and Dr.
Andrew P. Peabody were incorporated into the ad-
dress, and suitable mention was made of Mrs. Eliza
(Rotch) Farrar, who bequeathed her books to the
town to form a nucleus for a library.
And long may it remain an ornament to our vil-
lage, a blessing to all the people of the town, an ever-
increasing inheritance of wisdom and knowledge, a
lasting monument to the wisdom and worth of the
founder, more enduring than marble, most glorious
among the monuments of the land, save those that
rise on the fields where tyranny and slavery were
slain, or hallow the heights where independence was
born.
Mr. George G. Tarbell died unmarried in Lincoln
December 23, 1889, and his brother, Mr. Charles L«e
Tarbell, died the following day. They had resided
under the same roof, making one family, for twenty-
four years, and were buried at one funeral service.
" They were lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in
their death they were not divided."
GEORGE F. BEMIS.
Mr. George F. Bemis, son of Amos and Susanna
(Fiske) Bemis, was born in Lincoln, July 19, 1809,
and learned the rudiments of knowledge in the pub-
lic schools of his native town. He passed the danger-
ous periods of youth in the healthful and invigorating
labors of a farm, and subsequently taught district
schools two or three winters. When about 20 years
old he went to Amherst, where he learned the trade
of a printer.
In 1834 he went to Concord, Mass., where he printed
and published TTie Yeoman's Oazette for eight or nine
years, but the paper was not a financial success.
About 1843 he went to Boston, and with the assist-
ance of his brothers-in-law, Messrs. Oliver HastingH
and Abel Wheeler, established a printing-office which
did a large business for the times, printing the Puri-
tan Recorder, Christian Register, Massachusetts
Ploughman, and other weeklies, first leasing and
afterwards owning the building on School Street, now
occupied by Charles A. Smith & Co. About twenty
years ago he gave up the printing business and en-
gaged in real estate transactions, where he laid the
foundations of his prosperity.
638
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
His last investment in real estate was erecting, in
company with Mr. E. F. Waters, the Boston Daily
Advertiser Building. Afterwards he purchased Mr.
Waters' interest in the edifice, and later on sold it to
a company. Since selling that estate he has invested
his wealth chiefly in copper stocks.
In 1864 he returned to his native town and contin-
ued to reside here until his death, taking a lively
interest in its churches and schools and in its young
people, with whom he was a great favorite, mingling
in their amusements and entertainments until he was
more than eighty years old, — enjoying an abundance
of wealth, and possessing a heart which found itj own
bliss in seeing others blest.
In 1883 he purchased upwards of ten acres of land
adjoining the old Revolutionary burying-ground, and
presented it to the town, thus providing a cemetery
sufficient for the needs of the town for centuries.
By his last will and testament, executed two davs
before his death, he bequeathed to the town $30,000,
the income of which is to be used to provide an an-
nual course of public lectures of an instructive and
elevating character, and §20,000 to build a new town-
hall, in which shall be a room or hall of sufficient
capacity and proper construction for public lectures,
and for seating an audience of such size as would
naturally attend such lectures in the town.
Mr. Bemis also bequeathed to the Congregational
Church in Lincoln $5000 towards building a new
church edifice, to be used by the church for the pur-
pose of a building fund whenever they see fit to re-
build.
All honor to the men who honor themselves bv
their deeds of generous and thoughtful benevolence;
who build the libraries which hold the tomes con-
taining the recorded wisdom of the bygone centuries,
and provide the halls where the present and future
generations may learn from living lips the ever-in-
creasing unfoldings of wisdom and knowledge, of
science and philosophy ; and provide cemeteries
where the forms of the loved and departed may be
laid to rest amid the serene beauties of nature, — the
sighing of the winds, the song of birds, and sweetne.-s
of flowers, — reposing till the trumpet of the arch-
angel shall sound, and the earth and the heavens be no
more.
■WILLIAM FRANCIS WHEELER.'
On the 11th of March, 1812, unto Charles and Julia
(Stearns) Wheeler, the latter being a daughter of Rev.
Charles Stearns, D.D., second minister of Lincoln,
was born a son, the subject of this biographical
sketch. If among the numerous and varied incarna-
tions of the genius of industry, other manifestations
have been circumstantially more conspicuous, few
have been more perfect, permanent or persistent. At
the proper time he was christened by his grandfather
> By Edwin U. Steuni.
Eev. Dr. Stearns; consequently, in the fear and ad-
monition of the Lord, he immediately commenced
upon an industrious, honest and successful agricul-
tural career. His education was principally obtained
in the district school of his native village, supple-
mented by a few terms in the academies of Concord
and Northfield, institutions similar to the high schools
of our time. That he made commendable use of these
limited advantages is evidenced in the fact that at
the age of eighteen he began to teach. For thirteen
winters, from 1830 to 1843, this was bis vocation, viz.:
two terms on Cape Cod, two in Concord, one in
Acton, one in Charlestown, two in Sudbury and Ave
in Lincoln. The summer vacations were devoted to
recuperation by freely indulging in those wholesome
recreations which unremitting labor on a farm so lib-
erally supplies, and of which poets, snugly ensconced
in upholstered chairs, so blithely sing. In those times
rainy days, on which hired men were permitted to
rest and boys to go a-fishing, were devoted by Mr.
Wheeler to practical labor for the temperance cause;
by working what in these latter days is becoming
more and more a miracle, viz., the changing of cider
into pure and unadulterated vinegar, which baa lat-
terly become the most profitable product of the farm.
While he was engaged in teaching on the Cape he
contracted a more agreeable and continuous engage-
ment with Miss Hannah Crowell Paddock, daughter
of Judah and Mary (Crowell) Paddock, which culmi-
nated in marriage October 4, 1838. This harmonious
union, which lasted nearly twenty years, was severed
by the death of Mrs. Wheeler April 21, 1858. She left
one son, Charles Stearns Wheeler, who is treasurer of
the town of Lincoln and a member of the State Legis -
lature. He lives at the old homestead on the farm
which belonged to his ancestors previous to 1680,
since when it has been divided and sub-divided
among their descendants many times, but has all been
recovered and many acres added thereto during Mr.
William F. Wheeler's time. On the 16th of October,
1864, Mr. Wheeler was married to his present wife,
Martha Jane, daughter of Rev. Morrill and Hannah
Dean Allen, of Pembroke. They removed from the
farm to a cottage on the road to Concord and near the
centre of the village, from which Mr. Wheeler, now
seventy-eight years old, walks over a hill from which
on a clear day over thirty towns are visible to the old
farm, where he enjoys himself hugely at his old vaca-
tion pastimes, varied by the entertainment of his three
grandchildren. The saying " If you want anything
done, apply to a busy person," has always been amply
verified by Mr. Wheeler. A very dear friend writes
of him as follows: Perhaps no native of the town,
living or dead, has been prompted to perform the last
offices for and help lay away in their narrow beds so
many of its inhabitants; and possibly there is not an-
other to whom so many have entrusted their property
and commended their wives and little ones at the
hour of death. The demand upon an individual for
^ /'., //' ,7'. '// // cr /r,_
AYER.
639
public serTices may reasonably be coDsidered as a fair
estimate of his ability to perform them.
Mr. Wheeler has served twenty-six years as select-
men, twenty-eight years as town treasurer, eight
years on the School Board, of which he was chair-
man. These duties he performed without prejudice
or partiality. For a layman, be is well inlormed in
legal matters, which has increased his efficiency as a
town officer, and the value of his advice in town-
meetings, which he seldom (jffered until a subject had
been freely debated. He has been criticised as par-
simonious in municipal expenditures of which his
judgment did not approve, but he should be credited
with carefulness for other pockets than his own.
Politically, he was a Whig until the formation of
the Republican party, to which be siill adheres. For
forty years he has been treasurer of the Unitarian
Society, as well as one of its active supporters. In
his literary labors he is indefatigable. He prepared
a historical sketch of Lincoln, which was incorpo-
rated in Drake's " History of Middlesex County,"
publi>hed in 1880. The time be has devoted to and
the labor he has expended upon the requisite re-
searches for the work, of which this is a portion, can-
not be even approximately apprehended by those
who have had no experience in such obscure and in-
tricate dclviugs.
As a uselul citizen, kind friend and neighbor, as a
strictly honorable, yes, righteous man, Mr. Wheeler
is esteemed and respected by all who know him well.
CHAPTER XLIX.
A YER.
BY GEORGE. J. BURNS.
Introduction — Topography — Early Ivdian Trdjta—Bcu\tdarus of the Totcn.
I AM met at the outset by a doubt as to whether,
and to what extent, in an article of this character,
an explanatory preface is admissible ; but beg indul-
gence for just a word. If this article was to be an
independent publication, I would not be doing jus-
tice to the reader, or to the subject, if I did not lay
hold, with a sense of proprietorship, on the history of
Groton down to the time of oiir separation from her;
but as the history of both towns is to appear in the
same publication, I would not be excused, if I did
more or less than to refer with pride to the h istory of
our parent town.
I desire, therefore, to acknowledge the indulgence
of Groton's historian, in not limiting me to the dates
that mark our corporate existence, and in permitting
ine to appropriate to ray exclusive use all events that
occurred within the territory over which our munici-
pality now exercises jurisdiction. I also desire to
acknowledge the valuable aid I have received, and
the liberal use I have made, of the results of his
labors, published by him in " The Groton Series." I
also desire to acknowledge the aid I have received
from William A. Wright in the matter of fire statis-
tics.
I regret that I am obliged to omit from this article
a narration of many things I would be pleased to
record, particularly such history as our village and
its inhabitants made during the War of the Rebel-
lion ; but the accessible data is so meagre, and go
blended with the history of Groton, that were I to
attempt it, in the space and time allotted me, I feel
that I would, by omission, be unintentionally doing
injustice to many, as deserving of mention as those
whom I should be able to notice. I trust that I may
be able, in the near future, to do, in this respect,
what I am not permitted to do at this time.
This is the second time that the history of this
town has been published, the first being an article of
six pages in Drake's " History of Middlesex County,"
published by Estes & Lauriat in 1880.
Ayer is the youngest of that group of towns in the
northwestern part of Middlesex County, that might
with great propriety be called the Groton family. It
is bounded on the north by Groton, on the east by
Littleton, on the south by Harvard, and on the
west by Shirley.
The general form of the town is that of a parallelo-
gram, being about four miles in length from east
to west and about two miles in width Irom north to
south. About three hundred acres of its area are cov-
eaed by the waters of different ponds.
The town is situated near the southern apex of that
triangular outcrop, composed principally of what is
known as Chelmsford granite, whose northern shoul-
der turns the south-bound waters of the Merrimack
almost back upon themselves. The greater part of
this area, extending from near the Ridges northerly to
the New Hampshire line, retains to this day the pic-
turesque wildness of two centuries ago. No region
in Eastern Massachusetts has been less tubdued. It
has been aptly suggested tha; it be called North Mid-
dlesex Highlands. We are situated so near the sum-
mit of the divide, between the waters of the Merri-
mack and the Nashua, that when Calvin Fletcher,
while owning the mill on the site of our pumping
station on Sandy Brook, raised the height of his dam,
he found that it was necessary to erect another at the
easterly end of Sandy Pond, to prevent the surplus
water flowing ofl^over the summit through the mead-
ows into .Spectacle Pond ; thence through the Stony
Brook into the Merrimack River at Chelmsford.
The nature and character of our soil and surface
are varied. A range extends from the southwesterly
corner of the town northeasterly to the Groton line,
there uniting with what are known as the Indian
Hills. In the deed from John Solendine to James
Park in 1730 the most southerly of these elevations is
called " Coiacus Hill.'' Snake Hill is the most north-
640
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
eriy of this range, and upon it, within the memory of
men now living, rattlemakes have been killed. Its
altitude is 497 feet, and h is the highest elevation in
our town. About fifty years ago there lived on the
easterly side of Snake Hill a woman named Prudence
Shedd, who became celebrated as a rattlesnake killer,
and pelts of these reptiles, killed by her, adorned the
side of her barn in large numbers. In 1830, when the
wood-choppers were clearing the hill near Levi S.
Bngham'd, many rattlesnakes were killed. Dr. Edwin
Y. White, of Cambridge, tells me that his mother was
present when a rattlesnake having thirteen rattles
was killed a short distance easterly of Brigham's
house.
I am not aware of there being any name for the
two hills lying between Snake Hill and Coiacus Hiil.
The prominent elevation just southeast of Sandy
Pond, near Pingry Village, is Brown Hill, sometimes
erroneously called Brown Loaf Hill, the latter being
an elevation about one mile easr. of Groton Centre.
Just east of Brown Hill is Round Hill. The hill just
north of George Pierce's is Flat Hill.
Around and between these hills are meadows bear-
ing names almost as old as Groton herself. Just north
of Flannigan's Pond and easterly of the old road to
Groton is Pine Meadow. Through this meadow flows
Pine Brook. Rock Meadow is north of Pine Meadow
on both sides of Snake Hill road. South Meadow
and South Meadow Brook, sometimes called Bennett's
Brook, is in the southeasterly part of the town, near
the Littleton Une. Sandy Pond Meadow is just east
of Sandy Pond, and Long Pond Meadow is north and
east of Long Pond.
Sandy Brook Meadow is on both sides of Sandy
Brook. It is now flowed by the dam at the pumping-
station. Noniacoiacus Meadow is on both sides of
Noniacoiacus Brook, which begins at the junction of
the Mill Brook and Sandy Pond Brook, just westerly
of the Harvard road and empties into the Nashua
River, just north of Fitchburg Railroad. The east-
erly half of this meadow is flowed by the dam at
Phelps' Mill. Davis Meadow is in the valley north
of the poor farm, and on both sides of the Boston &
Maine Railroad, so named from its first owner, John
Davis, one of the original proprietors of Groton.
The region north of the Catholic cemetery was at
one time known as the Nashua High Plains. The
elevation of land on both sides of Sandy Brook Mead-
ow was, in early days, called Sandy Brook Plain.
Tobacco Pipe Plain is in the vicinity of Levi S. Brig-
ham's. "The Plains " are the level land in the south-
erly part of the town on both sides of the Boston &
Maine Railroad. These latter are nearly all pine
plains, and the soil, being very light, produces most
commonly the shrub oak and hard pine, and, where
they are in the vicinity of the railroads, are periodi-
cally damaged (?) by fire, furnishing the proprietors a
claim against the railroad companies more substantial
than the natural income of the soil itself. There is
a deep deposit of peat bog in nearly all of our mead-
ows, and the gathering and preparing of this prom-
ised, at one time, to be a considerable industry. The
general character of our soil varies from too light to
too hard, and as a rule is poorly adapted for agricul-
ture.
There are two natural ponds in town : Sandy Pond,
with an area of eighty acres, and Long Pond, with an
area of forty-five acres. Both of these names were
given shortly after the settlement of Groton. The
other large ponds were formed by flowing the mead-
ows to obtain water-power for the different mill-sites.
Nonaicoiacus Brook, sometimes called Major Brook,
from Major Simon Willard, through whose farm it
flowed, and Sandy Brook, from Sandy Pond to Major's
Brook, have already been mentioned. The old Mill
Brook enters Ayer from Harvard and, joining with
Sandy Brook, forms Major's or Nonaicoiacus Brook.
i James Brook flows, for the last third of its course,
I within the limits of our town, and the junction of its
thread with that of the Niishua River forms the
northwesterly monument of our town's lines. From
Beer's County Map, it would appear that ihe dividing
line between Ayer and Groton passes through the
centre of Long Pond. This is incorrect, as nearly,
if not quite all of that pond is in our town.
The range of hills in Groton and Ayer was one
of the last strongholds of the wolves in Eastern
Massachusetts. These animals were killed there as
late as 174(5. Until within a few years there were
abundant flocks of wild pigeons in this region and
they were taken in large numbers by pigeon stands.
Salmon and shad were formerly caught in the Nashua
River.
The nearest Indian tribe was the Xashobas, who
lived in what is now Littleton. This tribe was small in
numbers and they were eari^ CLiistianized. The next
nearest tribes were the Nashuas, in Lancaster and
Sterling, and the Pawtuckets, in the vicinity of Paw-
tucket Falls on the Merrimack River, at Lowell.
These were once powerful iribes, and as between
them our territory was debatable ground.
The find of Indian relics has been small in this
vicinity. Stone implements and weapons have been
found in considerable numbers upon the Holden farm
upon the Nashua River. Quite a quantity have also
been dug up on the farm now owned by George Little,
between the main road from Sandy Pond to Forge
Village and the Stony Brook Railroad. A few imple-
ments have come to light on what was formerly the
Calvin Fletcher farm, while some have been dis-
covered on Round Hill.
Of all Groton's oflsprijig, Ayer is the only one not,
reaching, in any part, the limits of the Danforth Sur-
vey of 1667 ; and in this respect she is, as ti) Groton,
an inland town. Except in her westerly boundary, the
Nashua River, there seems to the casual observer to be
no sense or reason in her particular limits. The origi-
nal grant of the township of Groton was made by the
AYER.
641
General Court May 25, 1655, and it gave the proprie-
tors a tractof land eight miles square, but some modifi-
cations to the grant were subsequently made. It was
stipulated in the grant that it should be laid out with
all convenient speed, but it was twelve years before
the survey was made. It appears that two copies of
the plan of the survey were made, one for the pro-
prietors and the other for the Colony, both of which
have since disappeared, the latest trace of either
being in June, 182(3, when one was in the possession
of Honorable James Prencott, of Groton, and from it
a copy was transcribed by Caleb Butler, Esq., into one
of the town record-books. From this copy, that sur-
vey seemj to be exceedingly crude an 1 indefiaite, but
by dint of perseverance and persistant investigation,
Honorable Samuel A.bbott Green has established
what, without doubt, are the original bounds of the
survey. For some reason, or possibly through
neglect, the copy of the survey intended for the
General Cjurt was mt returned, and the survey con-
firmed, until Feb. 10, 1717, sixty-two years afier the
original grant. In the mean time Nashoba (afterwards
Littleton), embracing a portion of the territory in-
cluded in the survey of the Groton plantation, had
been incorporated. The southerly line of the Groton
plantation crosssd the Nashua River not far south of
the mouth of the Cattacoomaug River, now in Shir-
ley, and extended easterly to the present Boxborough
line, a short distance south of the northwest corner
of that town ; thence it ran northerly to a point not
far from the present Littleton Station, on the Fitch-
burg Railroad ; and thence it ran northeasterly to
about the centre of Forge Pond. The original grant
of the Nashoba Farms was made by the General
Court to the Nashoba Indians in 1654, and, as in the
case of the Groton grant, was to be defined as to its
limits and location by survey, which was completed
and returned in 1686. The plan of this survey shows
the tract to be nearly rectangular, four miles square,
and to include a portion embraced within the Gro-
ton survey. Toe controversy over this disputed
territory remained unsettled until 1714, when it was
decided by the Legislature in favor of Nashoba.
This decree established the northwest corner of the
Nashoba tract to be on the south side of Brown, or as
it is now more generally known, Bruce's Hill. A
reference to the map of Ayer plainly shows the right
angle indenture at the southeast corner of our town,
marking the northwest corner of the town of Little-
ton. From the north line of the original Nashoba
survey to Spectacle Pond, the boundary between
Ayer and Littleton follows the thread of Bennett's
Brook. This change was made in the winter of 1838
-39, by the General Court setting oif from Gro-
ton to Littleton the farms of certain persons own-
ing on the southeasterly side of said brook. The
original petition on which this transfer was made
41-ii
cannot be found, and consequently the names of the
petitioners and purpo.-tes of the transfer can only be
surmised. It is probable that the reason was oue of
personal convenience to the petitioners. In those
days the Legislature, as the map of the State abund-
antly testifies, had no regard for the certainty, symme-
try or permanency of town boundaries, and any person
could get his lands transferred from one town to
another, almost as readily as he can now transfer his
national allegiance or move his furniture.
Shirley, as originally incorporated, January 5, 1753,
is identical with the present limits of that town. By
an act of the Legislature, passed February 6, 1793,
the farms of Simon Daby, Moody Chase and Samuel
Chase, lying on the easterly side of the Naahua River
and between Nonaicoicus Brook and the Harvard line,
were transferred from Groton to Shirley. This latter
territory was made a part of the new town of Ayer in
1871.
The town of Harvard was incorporated June 29,
1732, from parts of the towns of Lancaster, Groton
and Stow, and the northerly boundary thereof,
which forms our southerly line, is described in the
act of incorporation as follows : " running on said
Littleton line, near the northwest corner thereof,
viz.: as that a West-North West Line shall leave the
dwelling-house of James Stone [now Charles Stone]
in Groton, six perch to the Northward, and continu-
ing the same course to Lancaster [Nashua] River
aforesaid, excepting Coyacus fikrm or so much thereof
as shall fall within the bounds above said." The
Coyacus or Nonaicoicus Farm, of which more will
be said hereafter, was the 500-acre grant made by
the Legislature to Maj. Willard. It is the approxi-
mate, but not the correct boundaries of this farm that
forms the projection on the westerly half of our
southerly boundary line. Our northern boundary line,
which is the line of separation between Ayerand her
parent town, was agreed upon by the committee repre-
senting the petitioners, and the committee appointed
by the town of Groton. It runs in a straight line from
the mouth of James Brook to a point where the
southerly line of the County road, leading from Gro-
ton by Ridge Hill Tavern to Littleton Old Common,
intersects the town line between Groton and Little-
ton. This line was surveyed by Horace C. Hovey
shortly after the incorporation of the new town.
The boundary line between Groton and Shirley,
prior to the incorporation of Ayer, began at Nonai-
coicus Brook, between the hoose formerly owned by
Dennis Coughlan and the boose now owned by Mi-
chael D. McGrail, on the northerly side of West Main
Street, and ran southerly to the Harvard line in a
somewhat irregular course, crossing the Fitchburg
Railroad between the house of Daniel Scully and the
house of Michael Shea. Most of the monuments
marking this line are still standing.
642
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
CHAPTER L.
A YER—{ Continued.)
Early Selllirri.
The first settlement of the Groion plantation was
where the centre village now is. The ever-ihreaten-
ing depredations of the Indians made it necessary to
centralize, so far as possible, for mutual protection,
and in most ca*e8 ihe original proprietors of Groton
simply did us the honor to own, as pan of the out-
lying farms, the territory now embraced within the
limits of the town of Aver. The descriptions of these
farms are ao indefinite that it is diflScult, if not im-
possible, to locate most of them, more than approxi-
mately.
The earliest settler, whom I am able to locate as liv-
ing within our limits, was Daniel Peirce, the name
being at that time spelled upon the records " Pearse.''
His farm was situated between Sandy Pond and what
is now known as Ridge Hill, embracing nearly all of
the territory lately owned by Oliver Peirce, deceased ;
and the original house-lot must have beeu in the im-
mediate vicinity of the homestead buildings now-
standing a short distance westerly from those of Levi
S. Brigbam. It is remarkable as well as interesting
that this farm should continue in ibe same family un-
til a few years ago. Daniel Peirce was the son of
John Ptirce, who settled in Watertown about 163i),
and was one of the proprietors of Groton, being
the owner of a ten-acre right, and was living here
about 1G(J2. His lands are recorded with the proprie-
tor's records May 6, 1666. (Early Record.-* of Groton,
page 167.) He appears as a member of Lieutenant
Jonas Prescott's garrison, in 1691-92.
Among ihe early settlers of this country was John
Page, who emigrated here wiih his family frim Ded-
ham, England, and settled in Watertown. He was
the first constable of that town, being appointed in
1630 by the Court. He died December 18, 1676, and
his widow, Phebe, died September 25, 1677. His
children settled in various parts of the country, John,
Jr., coming to Groton, and from him has descended
nearly all of that name in this vicinity. The original
settler was one of the original proprietors of Groton
and the owner of an extensive grant. It is, however,
probable that he never resided in Groton. His estate
is settled as of Watertown, and the grants to his son
John, of nearly all of the Groton land, described him
as of Wateitown.
John Page, Jr., was born in 1630. He removed to
Groton about 1662. He married Faith Dunster, who
is supposed to have been a niece of the prtsident of
Harvard CoUejie of ihnt name. She died April 3,
1699. He returned to Watertown at the time of the
destruction of the town by the Indians, and died
there about 1711. Francis M. Boulwell, Esq., states
the location of his dwelling' hou^e to be on the west
l«
bide of Farmers' Row, where the buildings of the
Groion School now siand. He owned an extensive
tract of land in the southerly part of the town, and,
next to Simon Willard, was the largest land-owner in
this vicinity. His land comprised what was sub-
sequently Calvin Fletcher's farm, and a very large
tract to the east of it. The description of the land
shows that it bordered on the Nonaicoicus Farm.
The pumping station is upon what was originally his
land, and under his proprietorship the first mill-dam
at that place was built.
Among his children was Samuel Page, who was
born at Groton June 4, 1772. He removed to Lunen-
burg and was the first settler of that town, and for a
time his was the only family within its limits. He re-
ceived the title of '• Governor" since he was presumed
to control the whole of the town.
Peleg Lawrence, one of the early proprietors of
Groton, at one time lived near the outlet to Spectacle
Pond. In the Indian wars of 1691-92 he was a mem-
ber of the garrison of John Davis.
Cornelius Church owned and probably lived where
George Little now does, on the northerly side of the
Stony Brook Railroad, between Sandy Pond and North
Littleton station. His name is given among those
who occupied the garrisou-house with John Davis in
1691-92. It is said that one of the garrison-houses of
Groton stood upon this farm.
Farwell was formerly a very common name in the
southern part of Groton. William Farwell and John
Solendine purchased of Jonathan Tyng in 1713 the
Nonaicoicus farm. Henry Farwell, a son of William,
was born July 21, 1724. He married Lydia Tarbell,
daughter ot Samuel and Lydia (Farnsworih) Tarbell,
on December 6, 1749, and subsequently Sarah Taylor,
of West lord, June 3, 1761. He was a soldier in the
French Wars and was captain of one of the companies
of minute- men of Groton at the commencement of the
Revolutionary War. He marched with his company on
the 19th of April, 1775, to Cambridge; was at the battle
of Bunker Hill and was severely wounded. A mus-
ket-ball passed through his body, lodging in the spine,
from whence it was extracted. He engraved upon
the ball the figures 1775 and kept it as a precious
relic. He was a man of small stature, but very strong
and athletic and of undaunted courage. He died in
1803. He was at one time the owner of a larger
part of the land on which our village stands, and re-
sided in. the vicinity of Phelps' mill, where he owned
and operated a saw and grist-mill. His dwelling-
house was quite commodious, and after he sold to
George Peirce in 1758, the place was used as a tavern.
It is said that he lived upon the George Little place
at the time he marched to the battle of Bunker Hill.
Joseph Farwell at one time owned the Levi S.
Brigham place. He was a deacon in the church and
served in the French Wars. A note-book kept by
him, and now in the possession of one of his descend-
ants, Deacon Joseph Farwell, of Hyde Park, Mass.,
AYER.
643
contains many interesting memoranda of his obser-
vations, and was published in the "New England His-
torical and Genealogical Register" (xxxv. 275, 276),
for July, 1881, and also in the "Groton Series," Vol-
ume i. No. 14.
The Stone family settled in the southerly part of
Groton at a very early day. Simon Stone, one of the
original proprietors, owned extensive tracts of land
in this vicinity, and the families of that name living
here are his direct lineal descendants. Several mem-
bers of that family have been prominent citizens of
the town of Groton. Simon was a soldier ic King
Philip's War; was garrisoned at Exeter, New Hamp-
shire, in King William's War, and during an assault
upon that place July 4, 1690, was severely wounded.
March 17, 1691-92, he was in the Farnsworth garri-
son-house at Groton. He was one of the selectmen
of Groton in 1697.
Joseph Stone for years owned the Calvin Fletcher
farm and is supposed to have built the mill at the
pumping station and the red farm-house opposite,
which was burned in 1880. He was a prominent citi-
zen of Groton and was one of the bayonet-men in
Captain James Prescott's company in the French
and Indian War. He married Mary Prescott, a cousin
of Colonel William Prescott, on May 9, 1728. His
daughter Thankful married Joseph Harwood, of
Littleton, grandfather of Hon. Joseph A. Harwood,
of that town, on October 21, 1773.
The first physician of whom we have any knowl-
edge as residing within Ayer territory was Doctor
Benjamin Morse, who was a son of Doctor Benjamin
and Abigail (Dudley) Morse, and born at Sutton
March 20, 1740. He was married, on November 27,
1760, to Mary, daughter of Isaac and Sarah Barnard,
who was also born at Sutton Sept. 13, 1741 ; and they
had a family of six children bore in that town. Dr.
Morse carae to Groton, probably, during the Revolu-
tionary period, and was a representative of the town
to the General Court during the session of 1784 and
in several succeeding years ; he was also a delegate to
the Convention for adopting toe Constitution of the
United States in the year 1788, where he opposed the
adoption. He lived on the westerly side of Park Street,
where the small cottage house, for a long time occu-
pied by Joseph St. Catrina, now stands. He owned an
extensive tract of land in this vicinity, including the
present mill-site of Levi W. Phelps. He died on May
31, 1833, aged ninety-three years; and his widow, on
December 16, 1835, aged ninety-four years.
His son, Isaac Morse, succeeded him in the owner-
ship of the mill properly, and was residing here at
the time the railroads were built. He lived on the
southerly side of Shirley Street, where Alfred Page's
tenement-house now stands. The well at this place
is known as the old Morse well, and is a monument
mentioned in many deeds of land in that vicinity.
There are few names in colonial history more
worthy of an enduring fame than that of Simon Wil-
lard. In him were combined the qualities of mind
and body calculated to foist the civilization of Europe
upon the unbroken wilderness, against the prejudice
of the savage. We cannot claim Simon Willard as
all our own. We must share the honors of his resi-
dence and labors with Cambridge, Concord and Lan-
caster. The histories of these towns are not com-
plete without more than a passing mention of this
distinguished man. While his residence here was
brief, beityg but little more than five years, it was dur-
ing the most stirring and critical days of the Colony's
history, and was the last and most eventful of our
hero's life.
Simon Willard was born at Horsmonden, in the
County of Kent, England, in the early days of 1605.
He came to New England in 1634, and settled in Cam-
bridge, where he continued to reside about six years.
He was early rated as a merchant, probably on ac-
count of his dealings with the Indians, which, while
it gave him a valuable knowledge of the interior ot
the country, and the advantages that the different lo-
calities afforded for settlements, also gave him an ac-
quaintance with the individualities of the most prom-
inent chiefs and leaders among the Indians, and the
strength and peculiarities of the different tribes — a
knowledge that proved of great advantage in the
stormy days of his residence in our vicinity.
September 2, 1639, the General Court of the Col-
ony granted to Rev. Peter Bulkeley, Simon Willard,
merchant, and twelve other families authority " to be-
gin a town at Musquetaquid to be called Concord.''
This little colony pushed out into the wilderness, on
to the then frontier, and, until his removal to Lancas-
ter, in 1059, Simon Willard was the foremost man of
the new colony. A stone tablet set into the wall on
the northerly side of Elm Street, in Concord, a short
distance westerly of the Sudbury River, indicates the
farm upon which he lived. It would not be permit-
ted, in an article of this character, to dwell to any
extent upon his public acts that are a part of the his-
tory of Concord, further than to speak of some of the
positions he filled. While he resided there he wajs
chosen " Clerk of the Writs," not unlike that of jus-
tice of the peace, an office he held for nineteen years.
In 1630 he was made " surveyor of arms," which
was the beginning of that military record, on account
of which he is often spoken of as "a Kentish sol-
dier." In December, 1636, he was chosen represen-
tative to the General Court, and with the exception
of three years was re-elected for fifteen years. Dar-
ing these terms of service he was identified with
many of the most important acts of the Colony. In
1653 he was a member of a commission appointed to
establish the northerly line of Massachusetts, thus be-
ing prominently identified with a controversy that the
present generation witnesses as still unsettled. The
northerly line of the Colony was then claimed to be
much farther north than to-day, and the grant to the
Colony was presumed or claimed to extend to the
644
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
head-waters of the Merrimack. At the southerly ex-
tremity of Lake Winnipiaeogee there was discovered,
some yeans since, a large rock upon the face of which
is the following inscription :
EI sw
WP lOHN
ENDICrVT
GOV
which heing interpreted, reada (EI) Edward Johnson,
(SW) Simon Willard, (WP) Worshipful John Endi-
cott, Governor. It is said that this is the earliest
sculptured inscription of Massachusetts Colony. It
was made by Edward Johnson and Simon Willard,
joint commissioners, and establishes what was at
that time claimed to be the northern limits of the
patent of the Colony. In 1653 Simon Willard was
elected aergeant-major, the chief miUtary oiBce of
the county, and next in rank to sergeant-major-gene-
ral, who had command of the military forces of the
Colony. In 1654 he was chosen assistant, a homo-
geneous ofSce, combining the honors and burdens sus-
tained by State Senator, Ci,uncilor and justice of the
Superior Court.
On October 3, 1654, Major Willard was placed in
command of an expedition set on foot by the commis-
sioners of the United Colonies against the Niantica —
a tribe of the Narmgansetts — whose sachem was Nin-
nigret. Their chief seat was what is now embraced
in the towns of Westerly and Charlestown, iu the
State of Rhode Island. The expedition was an im-
portant one and Major Willard's appointment to the
command provoked some feelings of jealousy among
the military men of the day. While the expedition
cannot be considered as a great military success, the
government of Massachusetts considered that the
main design of it was accomplished.
In the discharge of his o£Scial duties Major Willard
was called to Lancaster from time to time to advise
the inhabitants and superintend the management of
the concerns of that plantation. The inhabitants
finding it difficult to conduct the business of the town,
and needing assistance from without, sent a letter of
invitation to Major Willard " to come and inhabit
amongst" them, "with such measures concerning
accommodations as have been formerly propounded."
It would appear from the records that these " accom-
modations " were certain gifts of land in the second
and every subsequent division of the common lands.
He accepted the invitation, sold his mansion-house,
homestead and a part of his other land in Concord,
and in the course of the year 1659 removed to Lan-
caster. His residence in Lancaster was near the
opening of the present " Centre road," so called, in
the middle of the town, and his estate was bounded
on two sides by the Nashua River. His house was
one of the principal garrisons in King Philip's War.
Major Willard resided in Lancaster not far from
twelve years, removing to Groton probably some time
in 1671. The precise time of his removal cannot now
be determined. The proprietors' records of Lancas-
ter establish the fact that the selectmen met at his
house January 30, 1670. The first mention made of
him in the Groton Records is the following vole :
" At a.GeDerall towne meeting beld Janevary 13 1072 Thisday agreed
vpou and by vot declared that iLeir Hhallbe a commit cbowen fur to seat
tbe pereoti9 in tbe meeting house according to tkeir beat discretion and
at tbe Bam time a commitee choeen and tbeir namea are thea
" Major Wilard
Sergent Parker and sergent Lakin
James fflake Jobn Lakin."
(Early records of Groton, p. 42.)
At the session of the General Court beginning
May 6, 1657, on account of his public service. Major
Willard had granted to him tive hundred acres of un-
appropriated land wherever he could tind it. One
year later, at ihe session beginning May 19, 1658,
after the tract had been selected by him, a definite
grant was made which appears to have been in satis-
faction, in part, at least, of debt due Major Willard
through John Sagamore, an Indian living at Paw-
tucket, in the present city of Lowell, though he is
sometimes mentioned as of Groton. The debt was
recovered in the County Court in Middlesex, June,
1657, but the grant was made directly by the General
Court.
The entry in the General Court was recorded as
follows :
" In Answer to tbe petition of 3Iajo»Symon Willard tbe Ct-urt Judgetb
it meete to graunt biti Uequest viz a lanue uf tive hundred acres on
tbe soutb side of tbe Bluer tbat Uunoetb from
Courts Graunt to Nushaway [Lancaster] to Merreniack betvveene
Major 3y Lancaaler Ji; Groien i is In sutisfuctioa of a debt of
raon Willard forty fov^er pounds Ju" .Sagamore of Patuckelt
dolb owe to bim Provided lie make ouer ul) bis
Right title i Interest in tbe execution, obtayued ugt the said Saga,
more to tbe councrje web uas doune."
At the adjournment of the October session, 1659,
Thomas Noyes returned his survey of the tract, which
was duly approved by the Court as follows:
" In obedience to tbe act or Graunt uf tbe Honnored General! Court
of tbe Massachusetts, in New England Iiijd out & exactly uieasured
major Symon willards famie . conteyningtiue
Major WiMardsfarme hundred acres scittuate lying and beiug fur
of 5uO acres the most part, on tbe East side of Groatea
by Groaten Ac. Riuer=bctwixt tbe plantation . graunted to
the Infaabitauts of Lancaster and tbe now In-
habitHnts of Groten at the place web ia Called by the Indians nanaj-
coyijcuB . beginiug at tbe great huei side . about one hundred ru<lds
to the Kortward of nanajcoyijcua brooke beginlng wee say at tbe riuera
side mnlng a due east Ijne ninety fower rodds there making an angle
varying forty flue degrees . to the soutbwanl then Ruuing one mile
aud a balfe and forty Rods . vpon a southeast point there making an
.\ogle varying twenty degrees from tbe old Ljne . Rnoing on tbat
point sixty Rodds . there making an Acute Angle of sixty degrees.
Runing on a west & by South point balfe a mile there making an
angle varying two 4 twenty degrees . to tbe Northward Runing on a
west i by North point one mile . there making an .Vogle . varying
thirty-three degrees from the cid Ljne . Runing on a northwest point
to tbe Riuer It being seven Score Rods . and from thence vpon a
streigbt line to tbe place . where wee begann . which last Ijne doth
Crosse Groten Riuer twice, this by me
"Thomas Nojes."
"The Court AUowea and Approves of this Returne provided the
tbirtje acres lajd out ouer tbe North East side of tbe Riuer be left out •$;
taken on some other part of tbe ljDea,fe that there be not aboue one
hundred acres of meadow Ityd out iJi this farme."
AYER.
645
The territory embraced within this grant com-
prised the iarf^er part of that at present occupied by
our village, and, consequently, it was a part of the
territory claimed by the proprietors of Groton under
their previous grant from the General Court in 1655.
But as the Groton proprietors had not, in accordance
with the terms of their grant, returned a description
of the land taken by them, the Court had no means
of knowing that Major Wi Hard's farm embraced the
same territory. There consequently arose conflicting
claims regarding the territory embraced within the
Nonaicoicus farm, which were not settled until 1681,
when the territory was conceded to Hezekiah Usher
and Samuel Nowell, assigns from Major Willard's
heirs. This territon,-, being principally meadows, was
particularly "valuable on account of their natural
yield of grass. It was upon this farm that the major
erected his mansion-house, destined to become one of
the most important garrisons of Groton.
In the summer of 1674 Major Willard conveyed
one-fourth part of the Nonaicoicus] grant to his son
Henry, and in the followins; year another quarter to
his son Simon. Both of these sons afterwards recon-
veyed their respective interests to the mother, then a
widow, and administratrix of her husband'.s estate.
The original deed of Major Simon Willard to bis son
Henry is now in the possession of Hon. Samuel A.
Green, of Boston.
At time of his death Major Willard owed the estate
of Hezekiah Usher, a merchant of Boston, the sum of
£272. 2^!. 3rf., and on June 20, 1679, the widow Wil-
lard, in payment of the debt sold the farm to theU.-<her
heirs — three-quarters to Hezekiah Usher, Jr., and one-
quarter to Samuel Nowell, who had married the widow
of the elder Usher. Both of these parcels of land
were afterwards conveyed, on May 11, 1687, to Jona-
than Tyng, of Dunstable, in trust for his son .John,
a nephew of Hezekiah. On December 3, 1713, Tyng
in his own name transferred the farm to William Far-
well (supposed to be the father of Henry Farwell, of
Revolutionary fame) and John SoUendine, both of
Dunstable. From that time the chain of title can be
readily traced.
As has been before stated, the coutroversv between
the owners of the farm and the proprietors of Groton,
respecting the title to this farm, was not settled until
1681, and at that time a survey of the farm was taken
and a plan made by Jonathan Danforth, of Cambridge
a noted surveyor, who ran the lines of the Groton plan-
tation. This map of Nonaicoicus farm is drawn upon
parchment, and is now in the possession of Mrs. Sarah
J. S. (Nutting) Bennett, wife of Charles Curtis Bennett,
of this town, having come into her hands through the
owners since Hezekiah Usher's time. Upon the face
of it, in the handwriting of Mr. Danforth, is the fol-
lowing memorandum :
" Mjy. Willards tarme at Groaton. Tlie bounds of it renued A a plal-
fonne of taken at the request of ye worsh'"" Sam" Vewell. E*<|.. & Mr.
Hezakiab Uetler, owners, tlie t>oiindd of ye a hull were ehewed t>y S>rj.
James Knapp and James Pr«acott appointed by ye selectmen of that
towne. Also CapL James Parker and Blr. Henre Willard shew ye
bounds who knew tbem of old. & it was agreed of all bands that tbeae
were the exacts bounds known t owned in ye Majan days, a record
of ye wholl was drawn up 4 Siibecr)l>ed by lx>tbe parties & a^red ye
same should be entered in f^roaton towne Ixxike & in ye Connty Re-
cords 8 . 4m 1081. Jooatb Danforth, Suver.
" this is commonly called ye 400 acres. "
Upon this map is shown the location of themajor'a
macsion-house, as it stood at the time of its destruc-
tion by the Indians, March, 1676. It stood about
one-eighth of a mile almo-t directly north from
the westerly end of Bobbins' Pond, and consequently
must have been very near the Harvard line. It prob-
ably stood upon the ridge or elevation just east of the
brook that flriws from Robbies' Pond to the Nashua
River. As the westerly half of our southerly bound-
ary is presumed to follow the southerly boundary of
the farm, and it is bordered on the west by the Nashua
River, and on the east by what has since been known
as the Calvin Fletcher farm, we are thus able to locate
three sides of this farm with tolerable accuracy. The
northerly line began at the river on the Holden farm,
a short distance northerly of the dwelling-house now
occupied by Asa S. Burgess, and ran southeasterly in
a somewhat irregular course to a point not far from
the easterly end of Spaulding's Pond, between the
Fitchburg Railroad and Main Street. On account of
purchases and sales along the northerly line of the
farm by subsequent owners, the location of th&t line
has become lost.
It is to be regretted that the translation of the word
Nonaicoicus cannot be had, as a knowledge of its
meaning would add a renewed interest to our history,
by enabling us to appreciate whatever geographical or
perhaps religious significance the aboriginal prede-
cessor upon this soil attached to what he saw about
him. The word has come to us from ita connection
with Major Willard's farm. To what extent we have it
in it" original Indian pronunciation cannot now be de-
termined, as in its transition from the unwritten Indian
to the written English it has been subjected, not only
to the discrepancies found existing between the tongue
of one language and the ear of another, and the un-
conscious liability of perversion, by likening it to
sounds with which the bearer is familiar, but, in this
instance, to the additional and not inconsiderable
risk of distortion through the abominable spelling of
those hardy frontiersmen of two hundred years ago.
Our connection with the word, while it lacks a variety
of original spellers that might, by a system of general
average, assist ns to arrive at a general result, comes
to us from a reliable source. Major Willard was a
scholar for his day, and possessed more reverence for
orthography than the average of his cotemporaries in
America.
The high position of trust and importance he oc-
cupied in the Colony shows him to have been a man
of learning, while his extensive acquaintaintance and
dealings with the Indians gave him a knowledge of
646
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
their language and an ability to correctly understand
and render it. The earlifst use I can find of the name
ia in the original grant to Major Willard of his Gro-
ton farm, and the word '' Nanajcoijcua " indicated
about how well the Colony officials were able to trans-
late its sound into writing. It is there spoken of as a
place, "the place which ia called by the Indians
Nanajcoyjcus." At one time the locality now known
aa the old mill diatrict, in the northerly part of Har-
vard, was included as Nonaicoicua. It was there that
Jonas Prescctt built his first corn-mill. John Pres-
cott, of Lancaster, in his will dated October 8, 1673,
and now on the files of the Middlesex County Pro-
bate at East Cambridge aays, in reference to hia third
son Jonas : " he has received a full child's portion at
nonecoicusin, a corn-mill and other goods."
In the conveyance of Major Willard to his son
Henry of the one-quarter of his Groton farm, herein-
before referred to, which is in the handwriting of Rev.
Samuel Willard, the name of the farm is spelled
" Nonaicoiacus," thus adding another syllable, and in
this instrument it is still spoken of as a place. In the
conveyance by Major Willard's widow to the Usher
heirs, it is spelled Nonaicoicua, which spelling has
since been retaiued. The will of Hezekiah CJsher,
Jr., ia dated " Nonaicoicua, August 17, 1689." In
the original grant of the farm to Major Willard, above
referred to, the name of the locality ia also given to
the br»ok. Danforth, in hia survey of the farm, in
1682, spella them both " Nanaicoicus.' Since that
time the word haa been variously spelled and dis-
torted. As good an authority aa Caleb Butler ought
to have been, spelled it " Nanicanicus." The same
error appears in the Atlas of Middlesex County, pub-
lished by Beers & Company (New York), 1875, it be-
ing undoubtedly copied from Caleb Butler's map of
Groton of 1829. The word is sometimes contracted
to Coicus, Coycus, Coiacus and Coyacus.
In the deed of John Sollendine to James Park,
dated on May 18, 1738, the farm conveyed is spoken
of as " at Nonaicoucus," and the hill in the south-
west part of the town is called " Coicua Hill," speak-
ing of it aa if the name was at that time a well-known
one for that eminence.
In the description of the land of John Farnsworth,
recorded December 9, 1680, the bridge across James
Brook, near the house of George H. Brown, is men-
tioned as " the bridge that goes to Nonaicoicus."
These Indian names are in link, connecting us with
those pre-historic days, and there is about them a
euphony that is more pleasing as time wears on ; and
it ia to be hoped that Nonaicoicus, the only Indian
name that ia exclusively our own, may be attached to
some landmark of pleasing importance.
One of the reasons that induced Major Willard to
remove to his Groton farm was undoubtedly that
he might be nearer hia son, the Rev. Samuel Willard,
then miniater of that place. Samuel Willard, whose
portrait, a gift of Hon. Samuel A. Green, of Boston,
is hung in our public library, was the miniater of
Groton from 1663 to 1676. He removed to Boston at
the time of the abandonment of the town, in the latter
year, and never returned. He was subsequently pastor
of the South Church, and aa such baptized Benjamin
Franklin, who was born on Milk Street, nearly opposite
the church edifice, the rite being administered when
Franklin was but a few days old. Subsequently
Samuel Willard was president of Harvard College.
He died on September 12, 1707.
For nearly forty years immediately following the
Pequot War the Colonies remained substantially at
peace with the various Indian tribes among them and
on their frontier. It was the policy of the English
to encourage the petty jealousies between the difl'erent
tribes, and thus prevent a coalition of any serious
magnitude. In the mean time the Colonies were
rapidly increasing in wealth and population.
Philip, the Sachem, commonly known as King
Philip, was the ruler of the Wompanoags, an incon-
siderable people numbering scarcely 300 warriors.
The amount of territory possessed by this tribe was
small, as Philip's father, Massafcoit, had conveyed
nearly, if no't all, their territory to the Colonies.
Philip was a man of remarkable sagacity and judg-
ment both as a statesman and warrior. He perceived
with alarm the rapid increase of the English, and
appreciated the existence and cause of the jeal-
ousies that prevented the union of the Indians
against what he considered to be their common
enemy. He foresaw that a conflict of race was in-
evitable, and determined to strike the blow before hia
people became hopelessly in the minority. Had his
plans been perfected, the calamity known as King
Philip's War would have been far more serious than
it was ; but by a coup d'etat, the murder of Sassamon,
he precipitated the conflict. The execution of the
murderers revealed the rising cloud of the conspiracy,
and forced Philip to take the field with unperfected
plans. The first attack was made at .Swanzey, June
24, 1675, and the second at Mendon, July 14th. Au-
gust 2d, Captains Hutchinson and Wheeler, with their
party of horae, and accompaniecPby several of the
principal inhabitants of Quabaog (now Brookfield)
were attacked about four miles from that place and
eleven of the party killed. The rest retreated and
barely succeeded in reaching the town ; the Indians
following closely, and burned all the dwelling-houses
and most of the other buildings in the place, except
the one in which the soldiers and inhabitants had
taken refuge. The alarm in which these calami-
lies placed the unprotected towns on the frontier
may well be imagined. Every one naturally ex-
pected that their home would be the next place of
attack, and immediate measures were taken to organ-
ize the best forces that their limited means and dis-
tance from each other would permit. Military regi-
ments and companies were organized, and moved
from place to place, according as they apprehended
AYER.
647
danger of attack. At thU time Major Willard had
been in command of the Middlesex regiment for
more than twenty-one years, and, being second in
command in the Colonies, his services were imme-
diately demanded, and although well advanced in
years, he immediately responded.
One of his first acts was to march to the relief of
Brookfield, accompanied by Captain Parker, of Gro-
ton, with forty-sis dragoons and five Indians, the
latter being employed as guides. They reached the
besieged town shortly before light on the morning of
August 4th, and after a stormy fight relieved the gar-
rison, who had been closely pressed, the house hav-
ing been set on fire several times. I here append the
earliest account of this rescue — that written by Capt.
Thomas Wheeler, of Concord, who was in command
of the besieged -town at the time. After narrating
the preceding events, and the dangers to which they
were exposed, he proceeds :
**Our danper would have been very great that nipht (Aii^. V, had
not the only wise God (lilessed for ever) been pleasfd to send to us,
aUoiit an hour within night, the worshipful Major Willard, with Cap-
tain Parker, of Crouton, and forty-six men more, with five Indians, to
relieve us in the low estate into whicit we were brought. . . . Aud God,
who coniforteth the afflicted, ae he comforted the holy Apostio Paul by
tlie coming of TitU8 to him. — so he greatly comforted us, his distressed
aervantb, l-olh souUiers and toun inhabitants, by the coming of tlie
Said honoured Major aud those with him. His coming to us bo soon
WHS thus occasioned : He had a conim ssiou from the Honoured Council
(of which himself was one; to look nfter ponie Indians to the westward
of Lancaster and Grouton (where he himself lived), and to secure thern,
and WHS upon bis march towards them on the aforesaid Wednesday, in
the morning. August 4tb, when tydin^s coming to Marlboroogh by
those that returned hither, as they were going to Conueciicot, concern-
ing what they saw at Brookfield, as aforesaid, some of Marlborough,
knowing of (he said Slajor's march Irjni Lanc.ister that mortiing, pres-
ently sent a post to acquaint him with the information they had re-
ceived- The Major v^&i^ gone befjrp the post ciime to Lancaster ; but
there WHS one ^peeddy sent after hjm. who overtook him hbout five or
six miles from the s.iid town. He being acquainttrtl that it was feared
that Brookfield (a am ill town of about fifteen or si.'cteen f-imilies) was
either destrjycd or iu great d.iu^er thereof, and couciviug it to require
more speed to siiccuur tlietn (if tliey were not past help) than to pro-
ceed at present, a^ he bef ire intended, and bt-ing also very de-irous (if
it were possible! to afford relief lo tliem ihc being tlieu not above thirtv
miles from theni), he inimedi.iitrly altered hij course, and marched with
his comp.iny towards u«. and c ime lo us about an hour after it wus
dark, as aforesaid ; though he knew not then either of onr being there
nor of what hud bL-fallen oa at the swanipe and in the bouse two days
bafoic.
"The meciful providence of God also appeared in pret-entin^ the
diuger tluit Ihf honoured Mnjor and his company mijilil have been iu
when they came near us. . . . Our enemies, skillful to destroy, endeav-
ored to prevent any help frjm coming to our relief, and therefore
sent down sentinels, . . . tiie farthest about two miles from us. who, if
they saw any coming from the Bay, tliey might give notice by an |
alarm. And there were about an hundred of them, who, for the most '
part, kept at an bouse some little distance from us, by which, if any !
help came from the said Bay, they must pass; and so they intended i
(as we couceive), baling notice, by their eentinele, of their approach,
to waylay tht-m, and, if they could, to cut them off, before they came ;
to the house where we kept. j
•' But, as we probably guess, Ibey were so intent and buiey iu pre- (
punng their instniments for our dfRtrnction by fire, that they *ere j
not at the house where tbey used to keep lor the purpose aforesaid, aud |
that thfv heard not their sentinels whei they siiot ; and so the Major's ]
way was clear froui danger till he came to our house. And that it was <
their puipose So to have fallen ufwn him ... is the more probable in
that (as we have since bad intelligence from some of tlie Indians them- i
selves; there were a party of thoiu at aiiolbcr place, who let bim iiass I
I
by them without the least hurt or opposition, waiting for a blow to
be given him at the said house, and then tbey tbomselves to fall upon
them in the reaie. The Major and company were no sooner come to
the bouse, and understood (though at first they knew not they were
Euglidh who were in the bouse, but thought that they might be In*
dians, and therefore were ready to have shot at na,— till, we discerning
tbey were English by the Major's speaking, I caused the trumpet to
be sounded), that the said (Japtain Hutchinson, myself and company,
with the towu's inhaldtanti), were there, but the Indians also dincerned
that there were some come to our assistance; whereupon tbey spared
not their shot, but poured it out on them Bat tbrouch the Lord's
goodness, though they stood not farr asunder one from another, tbey
killed not one man, woundod only two of bis company, and killed the
Major's sou's horse. After that, we within the bouse perceived the
Indians shooting so at them, we hastened the Major and all his com-
pany into the house as fust as we could, and their horses into a little
yard before the house, where they wounded fiue other horses that
night."
" The Honoured Major Willard stayed at Brookfield some weeks aft«r
our coming here, there being several companies of souldiers sent up
thither and to Uadley and the touns there abouts, which areabout thirty
miles from Brookfield; wbitberalsu the Major went fur a time, upon
the service in the present warr, and from whence, there being need of
bis presence for the ordering of matters concerning his own regiment
and all the safety of the towns t>elonging to it, he, through God's good-
ness, returned to safety and health to bis bouse and dear relations in
Grotcn."
The cotemporaneous authorities give abundant
evidence of the valuable and timely aid rendered by
Major Willard in the relief of Brookfield. It is cer-
tain that had he not acted with promptness, that the
entire town would have been destroyed, and the in-
habitants massacred. After leaving Brookfield Major
Willard went with the larger part of his forces to
the town of Hadley, where he left Captains Lathrop
and Beers with their companies. He then returned
to Brookfield and shortly after to Boston.
While Major Willard was upon this journey he
wrote several letters to the Council, but unfortunately
they are not on file in the archives of the Common-
wealih. That they were in relation to the expedi-
tion in which he was engaged, seems clear from the
following answer by Secretary Rawson in behalf of
the Council, written August 24th :
" Major Willard. Sr.. we rec'd. 2 or 3 letters from you, where in we
understood tbatour furcescannot meet the enemy. The Lord humble
us under bis afflictive hand. Touching the ordering and dispoaing the
forces under your command, we cannot particularly direct what to do ;
only, in general, we hope yon will endeavour to your utmost to distress
your enemy. Also we thiuk it incumbent upon you to employ your gar-
rii>on to fortify your gunison at Quaboage what you may. And also we
propose, whether it be not advisable to send a party of soldiers to ye
Nipmuck towns of Wabqusitte and Manexit (?). where there is good
store of corn. Possibly some Indians may be about tbosu places to get
food ; and if you can engage any person, English or Indians, by pro-
mise of rewartl, to scout abroad, to discover where the enemy lurkest,
and to bring you tidings before a great body march to them, and if they
do march upon any discovery, will it not be beat to march in the night
as secretly as you can, and, when you come near the enemy, to leave
an ambusbmeo(t), and by a retreat, after a little charge, to draw the
enemy into the ambushment? And, further more, we advise, if you
send to the towns where the com grows, not to cut it op, but rather
preserve it ; for, it being near ripe, cutting up will not destroy It: and
though at a distance, yet we conceive the scarcity among divers English
is like to be such that necessity will find some to fetch it from thence.
We have inclosed a letter to Major Piucbeon, which we desire you to
peruse and seal ; thereby you may perceive our apprehensions touching
sending forces to secure those towns. But yet we advise, if you think
fit, to ride up with a guard to Springfield, aud give M^or Piocheon a
visit, and encourage bim and the people in thoee pirta. Toucbing sup-
648
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, M.^SSACHUSETTS.
plj of those small particnlan yoo send for, order Is given to the com-
mittee to send them. So, committioi? yon to the Lord, desiring his
presence with yo« and guidance of you, with our love and reepects to
yourself and rest of yonr officers, we remain,
" E. K. 3.
" Past 21 August.
" Pray do the l>est endeavour to send the wounded men home as soon
as posnble."
Upon his return from Brookfield and Hadley, Major
Willard reaomed his duties as commander of the
Middlesex Regiment, his time being expended in
making provisions for the defences for the frontier
towns, establishing garrisons, issuing orders and di-
recting the movement of the troops and performing
such further duties as the exigency of the times re-
quired. During all this time hia residence was at
Nonaicoicus. Here was the rendezvous of the troops,
and, without doubt, it was one of the most important
^military posts upon the frontier.
About this time the Council, being undoubtedly in-
formed of the situation, gave orders to detach eighty
men from MMJor Willard's regiment, to take part in
an expedition to Pennecook. Major Willard imme-
diately communicated to the Council his views, which
were contained in the following letter, and succeeded
in convincing that body that hia position was the
correct one for the hour, for the withdrawal of the
troops was countermanded :
"Bonotirahle Genllevien, the Govemoiir avd Comicil :
" This afternoon, we had, according to your order, liiecourse with
Captain Hinclibman in reference to his actings in his way as to the
commission he received from you. He is to take eiglity men from our
garrisons— that is all we have— or more ; and we stand in need of m(»re
but we dare not be so bold. Our corn, that little we have, its lime it
were gathered ; but, if our scouts be taken off, here is little is to be
gathered, and many will hardly be kept with us, but will run away from
nllourlowns. Ton haply may think we lire ufniid. We will nut boast
there about ; but we dare say onr lives are not dear unto us in any way
that God shall call us to. Clur thoughts are that it is not advisable
to marcbe up to Pennecook, where they are many Indians at the pres-
ent, yet many abroad atHiiit ull our towns, as appears daily period. But
our present thoughts are that it might be, for the present safety for the
country that a garrison was settled over Merrimack Kiver about Dun-
stable, that there may be intercourse between our towns and that
garrivn.
" We have appointrd (?) Captain Parker and Lieutenant Hinkeeman,
who will relate things to give you real light much further than it's
meet now to do, or than time will permit. We are not willing totrouble
you any further, but rest your bumble servants.
" Simon Willabd,
"Samuel Apams,
" James Pabkeb,
*' James KjnoER.
" Grolan. this 25th, 7, '75."
" 2. Captain Henchman, in hia letter to the Governor, dated Chelms-
ford, Sept. 21tb, 1675, says that, in pursuance of bis instructions, he aud
his Lieutenant met at Major H illards the last day of the week, with
the captains of the several towns directed to, as well for the dniwingoff
of the soldiers as to advise wlib them. For the tirsl, they promised that
they should be sent to Chelmsford at any hour s warning, and so will be
ready here by that time. . . . Tbo Major aud the rest of the officers will
advise no other motion than about this and other towns, but I under-
stand the intent of the Honorable Council to be that I should march to
Penny-Cook, although not named in ray instructions, etc. "
So active was Major Willard in the guarding of
that part of the frontier under his charge that the
Indians made no disturbances, and the settlers began
to have such a feeling of security that the inhabit-
ants of Groton expressed themselves as entirely satis-
fied at the charge of supporting the soldiers detailed
for their protection. During all this time it became
frequently necessary to discharge some of the soldiers
and secure forces in their places. We find memoirs
here and there which show the continued employ-
ment of the commander in this business in the months
of November and December.
Early in February, 1676, Major Willard received
orders from the Council to raise a body of troops and
dragoons to range the country between Groton, Lan-
caster and Marlborough. The forces placed under
Major Willard's command at this lime were entirely
inadequate for the performance of the duties thus de-
volving upon him. The principal security consisted
in garrison-houses in the frrnrier towns, constructed
in such a manner as to hold out until the arrival of
assistance, and the business of the troops was to go
from point to point to protect or relieve the besieged
inhabitants. With such means as were at his dis-
posal Major Willard was constantly employed to pro-
tect the inland towns. His duties were such ihat he
was unable to take a .»eat at the Council board.
About Feb. 16, 1G76, John Parker and his son were
fired upon after leaving Major Willard's house at
Nonp.icoicus, but both, being in the saddle, managed
to make good their escape, although the .son was
badly wounded.
The incurslfni of the enemy, which had been
drawing nearer and neartr, and the fear of which had
become intense amorg the inhabitants of Groton,
were now to be realized at that place. In ihe mean
time the major, with an insufficiint force at his com-
mand, had been ranging the cf untry back and forth
to ward off, if pos.sible, the thrr atening calamity. He,
however, found it to be necessary to abandon the
house at Nonaicoicus, and removed his family to the
centre of the town. His house lay upon the out-
skirts, and was the first to be destroyed. There are
several cotemporary .accounts of the destruction of
Groton, in which the burning of the major's house is
mentioned. They differ from each other somewhat
in the details as well as in the dates. I here quote a
few as showing the esteem in which the major was
held, and the importance with which his house was
regarded :
The 14th of March the savage enemy set upon a considerable town
called Grougbton and burned Major Willard's bouse first (who with his
family removed to Charlestown), and afterwards destroyed sixty-five
dwelling houses more there ; leaving but si.v houses standing iu 'he
whole town, which they likewise funously attempted to set on fire ; but,
being foitified with arms and men as garrisons, they with their shot
killed several of the enemy, and prevented so much of their design.
Nor do we hear that any person on our side was here either slaiu or
taken captive."
" The seventh of March following, these bloody Indians marcht to a
considerable town called Groaton where first they set fire to Major Wil-
lard's bouse and afterwards burnt i-ixty-five more ; there being seaveiity
two houses at first ; so that there waa left standing but 8i.\ lioiiseoof llie
whole town,"
"The Indians laid siege to the Groton houses in which the inhabitants
AYER.
649
had takeD refuge. These tbey were unable to subdue, and tbe iobabitaDtfi
held uut until Major Wiilunl arrived with eoventy troops. About the
same time there came forty foot from Walertown to their relief. The
Indians fled upon tbeir appro&ch and the inhabitants abandoned the
town and took refuge in other places."
It is supposed that Major Willard remained in
Groton with the Essex and Norfolk troops until
March 21st. A short statement in Major Willard's
handwriting shows how he was employed from March
2ist and 29th. It shorws that he was constantly upon
the move every moment of his time, devoting it to
the protection of the defenceless people of the fron-
tier. His last public appearance was the term of
County Court in Cambridge, on Tuesday, April 4,
1076, where he resided. He died at Charlestown in
April, 1676.
James Patterson, who moved into this vicinity from
Dunstable in 1715, and purchased of John SoUendine
one-fourth part of the Nonaicoicu-i farm, was a son
of James Patterson, a soldier in the army opposed to
Cromwell and the Commonwealth. He was taken
pri^oner at the battle of Dunbar Sept. 3, 1650, and
transported to America by the order of the Protector,
and settled in Billerica. His house was a garrison in
King Philip's War, and fur his services in this war, he
was granted a tract of land in Narragansett Number
6, which is now Templeton. James Patterson, the
son, resided here until his death, in 1738. His dwell-
ing-house was in the westerly partof the town, in the
v'cinity of what is now the Lewis Blood place.
Hezekiah Usher, Jr., who was a part owner of the
Nonaicoicus farm from June 20, 1679, to May 11,
1687, was the son of Hezekiah Usher, a prominent
merchant of Boston, whose tomb and that of his son,
Lieut. Gov. John Usher, may be seen in the north-
easterly corner of the King's Chapel burying-ground,
resided upon the Nonaicoicus farm. The farm con-
tinued to be called the Usher farm for several years
after Usherhad conveyed it to Jno.Tyng, of Dunstable,
in trust for his son John, a grandson of Usher, Senior.
Hezekiah Usher, Jr., married Bridg_et Hoar, the widow
of President Leonard Hoar, of Harvard College, who
was the daughter of John Lisle, one of the commis-
sioners of the Great Seal under Cromwell; but the
marriage was not a happy one. She left him and went
to England in 1687, and did not return until after his |
death, which took place at Lynn, on July 11, 1697.
Usher's will is dated Nonaicoicus, August 17, 1689,
and in it he refers very plainly to his domestic trou-
bles, and bitterly blames his absent wife. Usher was
a man of morbid temperament and hardly responsi-
ble for what he wrote. He says himself that some
people may attribute his will '' to melancholy or dis-
tractedness," which is probably the correct way of
judging him. The document which is long and
quaint is published in full in The Historical Maga-
zine (Morrisania, N. Y.) for September, 1868 (pages
120-122).
It wa* upon the Usher farm that one of the garri-
son-houses of Groton was stationed in the vear 1692,
being occupied at that time by Samuel Bennett,
Bennett and three soldiers — in all five men. Mr. But-
ler, in his " History of Groton" (page 91), gives it as bis
opinion that this garrison was in the southeasterly
part of Groton, now included in Littleton, basing his
conclusions on the fact that there is a birook in that
vicinity named Bennett's Brook. It is, however,
clear that the Usher farm was none other than the
Nonaicoicus farm. From an examination of the con-
veyances, I am of the opinion that this garrison-
house was situated in the vicinity of the Lewis Blood
place, 80 called, between onr village and Mitchellville,
as the deeds immediately subsequent to that show
clearly that the dwelling-house was in that locality.
In fact, the first hamlet in the southerly part of Gro-
ton was there.
J"hn SoUendine, who, with William Farwell, was
at one time a part owner in the Nonaicoicus farm,
was a resident of the town of Dunstable and one of
its most prominent early citizens. It is probable that
he never resided here.
Moody Chase was a grandson of Aqnilla Chase, of
Newbury, Mass., and one of the first settlers in the
colony. He was born at Sutton on September 23,
1723, and married Elizabeth Hale, of that town, on
January 1", 1748. On June 30, 1777, he purchased of
Oliver Farwell several parcels of land, being the
westerly part of Nonaicoicus farm, and moved there
shortly after, where he continued to reside until his
death, which occurred April 7, 1815. In his early
life he took a great interest in the education of the
Indians, and he was the leader of the company who
cleared the lands in Hanover, N. H., where the ven-
erable Doctor Wheelock establifhed an Indian school,
from which Dartmouth College took its rise. He was
one of the petitioners for the set-off to Sliirley of a
portion of land on the easterly side of the Nashua
River, that, upon the incorporation of the town of
Ayer, was annexed to this town. His house stood not
far from the Lewis Blood house.
Moses Willard, a grindson of Major Simon Willard,
was born at Lancaster about 1702, and married at
Groton, on September 28, 1727, to Susanna Hastings.
Between 1723 and 1733 he resided near the Lewis
Blood place, in the westerly part of our town, on a
part of the Nonaicoicus farm territory. About 1733
he removed to Lunenburg, and there joined Captain
(afterwards Colonel) Josiah Willard in obtaining from
the Province of Massachusetts the grant of the town
of Winchester, and became one of the grantees. A
new charter was obtained from the Province of New
Hampshire in 1753, it having been ascertained to be
within the limits of the latter Province. Much of his
time seems to have been passed within the new town-
ship and guarding the frontier of Fort Dumraer and
Ashuelot. He was an early inhabitant of Charles-
town, New Hampshire, then known as Charlestown
No. 4. August 30, 1764, two daughters of Mr. Wil-
lard— Mrs. Susanna Johnson, wife of James Johnson,
650
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
and her sister Miriam, fourteen years of ase, after-
ward the wife of Rev. Phineas Whitney, of Shirley —
were taken captives by the Indians and carried to
Montreal. A full account of the affair is given in
"The Narrative of 'he Captivity of Mrs. Johnson,"
published at Walpole, New Hampshire in 1796. June
18, 1756, when Moses Willard and his son of the same
name, were at work upon hisfarm within sight of the
fort, the Indians made a sudden attack upon them.
The father was killed and the son was severely
wounded, butmanaged to make his escape into the fort.
Two families by the name of Park settled in this
vicinity in the last century. It is probable that they
were related to each other, although I am unable to
verify that supposition. In 1738 James Park pur-
chased what was formerly the James Patterson farm,
in the southwesterly part of our town near the Nashua
river. Wm. Park came to this country from Scotland
in 1756 and lived here until his death, June 17, 1788.
It is supposed that he resided in a stone house built
into the bank northwest of the brick house en Park
Street, about where Groton Street now is. This stone
house contained but one room about sixteen feet
square. There was a rude fire-place in the northeast
corner, the door and window being on the south side.
He was a stone-mason by trade. His wife Anna and
his three sons, John, Thomas and James, came to this
country in June, 1767. James died in 1778. John,
the oldest of William's children, was thirty-six years
of age when he came to this country. He purchased
of Henry Farwell two lots of land of about one hun-
dred acres each, one on each side of the present Park
Street. Like his father he was a stone-mason, and,
before coming to this country, he was for seven years
in the employ of the Duke of Argyle in building his
castle and laying out his grounds. After coming to
this country he received repeated letters and liberal
offers from the Duke to induce him to return to Scot-
land. He finally concluded to go, and went to Boston
to engage his passage, but upon arriving there he
found that the harbor had just been blockaded by the
British fleet; consequently he never returned to Scot-
land. He was the first person to introduce into this
country the practice of splitting stones with flat steel
wedges. A short time before the Revolution he began
building the jail at Worcester, but the war interrupted
the progress of the work. It was, however, resumed
in 1787 and completed the next year. In 1789 he
built the jail at Concord, Mass. In 1791 he built the
brick house on Park S.reet, which was the first brick
house erected in Groton. Upon the southwest corner,
about fifteen feet from the ground, is a stone sun-dial
on which is the following inscription :
ooooooooooo
1 J- p J
I 1791. §
COOOOOCOOOQ
In 1793 he began building the jail at Amherst, N.
H., and died August 15th of the same year, in conse-
quence of an accident in the course of the construction
of the jail.
Stuart James Park, son of Juhn, was born Feb. 7,
1773, in the dwelling-house formerly standing on the
site of the cottage house on the westerly side of Park
St.,and just north of the old Park House, now occupied
by Douglas C Smith. Like his ancestors he wa^? a
stone-mason. He built the jail at Portland about 1798,
the jail at North Hampton about 1801. In 1803 he,
with his brother John, contracted to build the Mi-isa-
chusetts State's Prison at Charlestown and completed
the same in 1806. In 1808 he contracted to build the
Vermont State's Prison at Windsor, and completed it
in 1810. In 1811-12 he built the New Hampshire
State's Prison at Concord. In 1816 he was employed
by the State of New Hampshire to superintend the
construction of the State House at Concord. Between
1820 and 1822 he was superintendent in the construc-
tion of the mill-dam, now the lower end of Beacon
Street, in Boston. After that he built the jail at
Dover, N. H., and in 1824 was employed by the County
of Middlesex to superintend the construction of the
County buildings, at Newburyport, Mass. In 1827 he
was employed by the Navy Department to superintend
the construction of the dry dock at Charlestown Navy
Yard.
In Drake's " History of Middlesex County," it is
stated that Colonel William Prescott, who commanded
the Colonial forces at the battle of Bunker Hill, was
born on Park Street, near the brick house. However
gratifying tc our local pride such a belief might be, it
is but justice to truth to state that there is no founda-
tion for such tradition. Colonel Prescott was un-
doubtedly born at the Centre. The owners of what is
now the Nathaniel Stone and John Mills farms can
be readily traced from the grant to Major Willard to
the present owners, and it is certain that the land was
never owned by the Prescott family, who always re-
sided at the middle of the town.
CHAPTER LI.
A YER—{Cu7Uinued).
' nighuaifa — Fordicmji- Bridges — Tavem» — ^Taps and Plnnf.
I The early highways were naturally very imperfect,
; being in many instances but rude paths through the
j forests, following in some cases the Indian trails and
I in others the paths made by the farmers' cows.
j The population was much scattered, and good
I roads were a luxury they could ill afford. Very little
I labor was expended in the construction of highways,
I and distance was .sacrificed to the selection of the
I route most feasible for immediate use, with the least
I possible expenditure of labor to render it passable.
' Consequently many of the ancient ways were subse-
AYER.
651
quently abandoned for routes that, by a little outlay,
would be more direct and more readily passable at all
seasoDB of the year. As the farmers naturally settled
alorg these highways, their location serves as land-
marks that enable us to know where our ancestors
upon the soil lived.
Groton was settled upon the frontier. Her nearest
neighbor, Lancaster, was fourteen miles to the south-
west and there was naturally between the two settle-
ments a community of interest and dependence, and
consequently a necessity for interchange of products
and protection. The first communication was doubt-
less had immediately after the settlement of Groton,
and when the intervening territory was to the settlers
a trackless and unknown wilderness. Naturally they
took the most favorable portion of the year for their
journey and selected the most accessible and legible
route. The settlements being on opposite banks of the
Nashua River, that stream served as a more than
compass and guide to wayfarers through the forest.
The intervals along the river, being generally un-
wooded, afforded at certain seasons a ready progress.
Consequently, as we would naturally expect, the first
highway between Lancaster and Groton was in the
vicinity of the Nashua River, and it was undoubtedly
the first highway ever constructed or used through
the territory now within the limits of Aver. It was
at its best but a very rude cart-path, and but little
labor was expended upon it. It is probable that for
the first few years this road was used, each traveler
was forced to pick his way the best he could, and that
wherever possible the streams were forded. The first
record of the expenditure of any money upon this
wav was in the month of December, 1663, when the
foliowing vote was passed at a meeting of the pro-
prietors of Groton :
••(" ) Due to Ric Blud & Joh. Lakin for laving out tbe hie-way to
Lankesler twenty ehillings when they have perfeted the work v,' they
Engage to doe Boone."—" Early Becords of Groton," r- W-
Judging from the meagre appropriation, the in-
habitants were either expecting a poor highway or
were relying upon a public spirit on the part of their
committee, to which the present generation is a
stranger. If the highway was built along the river,
as we have supposed, it would naturally be unstable,
and at certain seasons of the year impassable, and
the labor of maintaining it greater than a route upon
higher and firmer ground. Such we find to have been
the fact, as appears by the following votes by the
proprietors of Groton
■ \t a meeting of BKllect men may 28,73 Sergenl Parker and cor-
perall knop wot chussen a comitte to meet with lancaoter men for tbe
altering the high wav to lancaster."-" Early Records of Groton," p. 46.
•• Wedensday 6 of June 1G73 fforuBmuch as the countrey hye way as it
was furmerlT lavd out by Lankaster and groaton vpon seuerall yeare«
triall proued to be very insufficient and very difucult to he made passa-
ble in regard it was for the most part lyeing in the (Intervailes wheirin
their are seuerall soft places and lltle brookes vpon which bridges and
other mater for making the sam. p«s8.-ible is apt to be raised and torne
vp by flood-) and vpon experiance of the same Lancaster made apl.cat.on ,
to groalen for Kemou.na uf the sa.d way U, Run more vpou the vpland
which was Readily attended and John Prescott senir and Roger Snmner
for Lancaster and sergent Parker and corperall Knop for groaten wer
chuse committe by both to townes to lay out the .aid bye way a. afor-
nld which was .tended the day aforaaid as followeth (riz) flnt within
the bounds of groaten they toke their begining at their meeting-house
to the mlUe of Jonas Prwcott by Matthias ffamaworth! b.. ''"'^ J"
Bods wide turning of out of the common mill-way near twenty Rod
ahone the mllle and then it Runs 4 Bode wid Ihrongh the land of the
afon«.d Jonas Pre«ott acording as it is described by trees marked by
the men aforesaid and frxim the-aaid Jonas PtMCOtt. land to penicooke
Riuerin Lancaster Uirough swan swamp b Rod wide as it is already
marked ont by tbe comitte aforsaid and from the way afonuiid bolting
vpon Penicook near to the night pasture wading place, they tak tbe
way as it is left in width through the Intervayie and ouer nashaway
bridge and soe to the meeting! ouse and a. it is to be vndetsiood that
the way within lancaster bounds Runes neare the midway betweene the
brook medow and plumtrees medowes ouer a hill called MahaneknlO
hill and so. along on the vpland to tbe pond path a. ItBune. near to
the Still Riuer medow and Josiah Whits medow vntill it come to the
Swan Swamp path a. afors id andtotheconSmiatlon hereof the comitte
aforsaid haue here vnto put their hands the day and year abone eaid.
" John Pbescott
ROGEU Sl'mnee
JiMte Pabkee
(" Eariy Eecoris of Groton," p. 46.) ^^"^ Kmop."
No portion of the first Lancaster highway is now
in use as a public road in this town ; but from its
known location in Groton, and the few traces of it
that can be seen in our limits, its site can be deter-
mined with considerable accurracy. Farmers' Row
Road in Groton is known to be a part of it. From
the description given in a deed from John Sollendine
I to Nathaniel Smith, October 23, 1727, the location of
the bridge over which the highway crossed Nonaico-
icos Brook is given, and traces of this bridge may
still be seen on the farm of Asa S. Burgess. Between
this brook and Farmers' Row the geography of the
country would seem to indicate that the location of
the road was not far from, and more than likely fol-
lows, the old road through the woods from the junc-
tion of the highway near Page's Bridge to the house
of Asa S. Burgess. On the northerly side of the road
to Shirley Village, a short distance easterly from the
house of Nelson Root, can be seen the cut in the
bank by which this road ascended from the meadow,
and if, for the purpose of still further confirming the
above, we would be permitted to deal with the history
of Harvard, we will find that the highway now in
I use from the junction of the roads, a short distance
I southerly from Mitchelville to house of Henry Mead
' in Harvard, is in line with the location of the Lan-
caster highway above given and is probably the
original highway itself. Upon Mr. Mead's farm are
to be seen the remains of abutment^ of a very old
bridge that at one time crossed the Nashua River
into Lancaster, a few rods southerly of Lancaster's
northerly line. As this latter bridge is in almost a
direct line between Lancaster and Groton, and about
midway between the two towns, and between it and
Lancaster there is an ancient road now in use to
within a few rods of this bridge, and the second high-
way to Lancaster would appear to converge toward it
on the easterly side, there seems to be good evidence
from which to believe that the Groton and Lancaster
652
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
highway crossed the river at this point at a very early
day.
The " Intervailes wheirin their are seuerall soft
places and litis brookes vpon which bridges and other
mater for making the same passable is apt to be
raised and torne vp by floods," undoubtedly refers
largely to meadows in this town upon Nonaicoicus
and James Brooks. From our knowledge of these
meadows and brooks, we can readily appreciate the
difficulty they presented to these early highways.
At a meeting of the selectmen of Groton, February
16, 1670, the description of the location of the then
existing highways in the town was made and re-
corded. These descriptions are as a rule very meagre
and indefinite, but the location of some of them can
be determined at the present day. The following
appear to be either wholly or partly in this town:
" I Lancbester hye way from our meetiog house to James hia brook
six poll wide as the HooU now lye otier Jamee his brook Bri<Ji;e and soe
to continue ti po [II] wide to nashaway meeting house according to the
commitleea order." — Earlu HeconUof Groton, p. 32.
This is the first Lancaster highway, the location of
which I have attempted to give.
*'4 A high way goeingout of Lancbester Rood near John pages of
four poll wid so goeing into tlie way that goo to mill near IJenjumin
rrisps which high way was ptiy purcliafied of Samuell dauia Richard
holden Duniell peirce and .fames Knop butting vpon William Longley
John Morse vpon the weet and Thomua TarbiiU James Knop on llie east
and the rest of the way goeing through thos mens lots for mentioned
and satisfaction giuen them to their content by the towne committee." —
Euiiij Jtecorda of Groton, p. 33.
This is probably the highway that leaves Farmers'
Row near the Groton School, pasf^es to the east of the
brick school-house near the John M. E. Gilson place,
and crossing the Boston and Maine Railroad joins
our main road Lo Groton near the stone quarry north-
east of the poor farm.
"A liigh way goeing out of Lancbester roode of fourpolle wide goeing
to the south end of the generatl field lots next to James bis Brook
bonnded south with Richard boldens swamp and medow and John
Morue north with the land of John Sawtell and Richard holden from
which their goe a high way along the general! field till we com to the
common land by Samnell Dauis the said way beeing four poll wid run-
ning between Richard holden and the general feild,"
Probably the highway crossing James Brook near
James F. Culver's and running westerly toward Page's
bridge.
" And near about the midle of that way their goetb a high way of
four pole wide downe the generall feild to the neck vpon the riuer." '
Probably not now in use.
'* And for the mill Road between Jamee tflsk and Samuel Woods Run
a way to the mill of sixe poll wide excepting by the lioTise of Richard
Sawlell from James filskea stake to Richard Sawtella house soe runing of
six poll wid till we come to Matthias ffarnwortbs land continuing C poll
wid to the mill leading to the mill." -
As this highway is, excepting a very small part,
now in use as a public way in this town, and its entire
location can be accurately determined, it deserves
more than a passing notico. The successive efforts
' Early Records of Orulon, p. 33,
2 Early Recorda of Groton, p. 34.
that were made by the inhabitants to procure the
erection of the mill at which their corn could be
ground, is treated more at length in another chapter.
It finally resulted, in 166.5, in a contract with John
Prescott, of Lancaster, who erected a corn-mill, the
site of which is now within the limits of Harvard.
To reach the mill a new highway became nece^saryi
and it was laid out with a prodigality due, perhaps, to
a great abundance of land or from a sense of the im-
portance of the enterprise. This highway enters
Ayer from Groton, near the dwelling-house of Henry
A. Gilson. from which point to near the dwelling-
house of Edgar A. Hastings its location is the same
as now traveled. From this point to the dwelling-
house of Charles Living,ston the highway passed at
the foot of the ridge a short distance north of the
present Main Street; the latter portion was in use up
to about twenty years ago.
From this latter point to Harvard line the highway
is now traveled substantially as laid out, though it
probably originally passed to the west and south of
what was subsequently the Calvin Fletcher farm-
house. The mill highway became the new Lancaster
highway in 1673 ; part of it was re-located as Lunen-
burg and Littleton highway in 1762, and the whole
was subsequently the stage line between Groton and
Worcester.
" and out of that way Run a way to Rock mi-dow near to Multhiiis fTuiiis-
worth and thea waves runing thorow pt of his liiiid ne [.ir] the pliice
wheir thea wayes are now impruued." 3
The northerly end of this way is now known as
Snake Hill road. It leaves the Mill highway between
A, W. Lewis's and the Gaut places, passes along the
westerly side of .Sandy Pond, easterly of the dwell-
ing-house now occupied by William Hendricks, and
enters Harvard southeast of Rural Home. It was
discontinued between the Mill highway and dwelling-
house recently occupied by John B, Bagin, Nov. 2,
1869.
Major Simon Willard, of whom more is said in
another chapter, lived in Groton from some time in
1671 to the spring of 1676. The location of his man-
sion-house on Danforth's map, made in 1682, shows it
to have been near our southerly line and almost di-
rectly north from Robbins Pond. He was a man of
great prominence. He commanded, and his house
was the rendezvous of, the Provincial troops assigned
for the protection of the frontier between Groton,
Lancaster and Marlboro' during King Philip's War-
His house was not built upon any then existing high-
way, and to its presence and necessities are doubtless
due the considerable number of highways radiating
from its site. When Major Willard removed to Gro-
ton the first Lancaster highway was in use, and the
two roads, one running northwesterly to near the
Lewis Blood place, and the other southwesterly to the
Shabokin road, were doubtless built between 1671
3 Early Records of Groton, p, 34.
AYER.
653
and 1G73 to connect wiih it. The ScuUey road, so
called, was probably built about 1673, as a way from
Major Willard's house to Groton, and very likely
crossed Nonaicoicus Brook west of the mouth of
Waste Brook, and joined with what is now Park
Street near the dwelliug-house of Bridget Touhey ;
thence to Groton past Charles C. Wood's, and over
James Brook near George H. Brown's. Ic the loca-
tion of the land of John Farnsworth, recorded De-
cember 9, 1680 (Early Records of Groton, page 182),
part of his land is described as " lyeing betwixt the
pond at John Page's saw-mill and the bridg that goe
to Nouaicoicus." John Page's saw-mill was on
James Brook, nearly opposite Mr. Brown's dwelling-
house. The present highway from Phelps Mill
through Shirley Street and old road to Shirley, cross-
ing the Fitchburg Railroad near John Shea's house,
following the base of the hill southerly of the present
highway, was built by the towns ol Groton and Shir-
ley iu 1798, and re-locaied by the county of Middle-
sex in 1800.
The Lunenburg and Littleton highway, then so
called, was located by the county of Middlesex in
1762. It entered Ayer from Littleton at Pingry Vil-
lage, passing southerly of Sandy Pond, following the
Mill or new Lancaster highway from just east of the
bridge over Sandy Brock to near the house of Edgar
A. Hasting; thence to near the site of John H.
Whitcomb's house; thence through our Main and
Park Streets and old road to Shirley and over the
Nashua River at Page's Bridge. The straight section
between Charles W. Liviugstont's and John H.
Whitcomb's waslocaled by the county in 1793.
The highway from Sandy Pond School-house to the
Ridges was laid out by the selectmen of Groton about
1720, though it had been traveled as a private way
lor many years prior to that time.
Prior to 1830 there was a road sometimes called
Shaker's Lane, from the Lunenburg and Littleton
highway on the southerly side of land of Leonard
J. Spaulding to Snake Hill road, southeast of Rural
Home. It can be readily traced at the present day,
and from the Rural Home road to Snake Hill road is
now in use as a public way.
The old road to Gro'.on, now known as Groton
Street, has been in use for over a century. Formerly
it passed to the east of the brick house and south of
the Mills house, and united with what is now Park
Street between the Mills and Frye houses. It was
re-located east of Washington Street in 1856. The
present Littleton road, from near the dwelling-house
of Oscar A. Balch, easterly past the dwelling-house
of James Gilson to the Littleton line at Pingry Vil-
lage, was located by the county in 1833. West Main
Street, from Park Street westerly to the Lewis Blood
place and Washington Street, were both located by
the county commissioners in 1856. At a meeting
held April, 1885, the town appointed a committee,
consisting of James R. Gray, Alfred Page and George
J. Burns, with instructions to have all the Btreets and
roads between the junction of the roads north of the
poor farm on the north to the Harvard line on the
south, and from the Lewis Blood place on the
west to the£ural Home on the east, re-located and
bounds defined. In accordance with the suggestions
of this committee, accurate surveys were made, and
the streets as thus located were laid out and estab-
lished by the selectmen and county commiasioners,
and adopted by the town. An accurate map of the
whole was made, and permanent stone monuments
marked " A " erected at all the termini and angles.
FoKDWAYS. — As a wet substitute for bridges, ford-
ways are practically unknown in Eastern Massachu-
setts at the present day. About the middle of the
last century there was a well-known iordway over the
Nashua River near the dwelling-house of AsaS. Bur-
gess on the Holden farm. It was at one time called
the Pierce Fordway, probably from a family of that
name who lived on the west side of the river not far
from the site of the fordway. Prior to that time men-
tion is made of a Rye Fordway in this vicinity (see
Boundary Lines of Groton, p. 83), the exact location
of which I am unable to learn. It is more than likely
that it is what was subsequently called Pierce's Ford-
way. Before the meadows were permanently flowed
there was a well-known fordway over Nouaicoicus
Brook, a short distance southwesterly from the dwell-
ing-house of N. A. Spencer, and another, known
as Shaker's Fordway, over Sandy Brook at the Nar-
rows, so called, near the dwelling-house of Frank
Mitchell.
December 27, 1669 (Early Records of Groton, p. 28),
the selectmen voted to make " a sufficient cart bridge
ouer Sandy Brook." This is undoubtedly the bridge
on the Harvard, then the Mill road, a short distance
southerly of the pumping station.
In a petition dated January 26, 1747, for the set off
of the territory now principally comprised in the
town of Shirley, mention is made of a bridge over
" Wast brook in Coicors farm whear people Gener-
ally pass ouer" (Boundary Lines of Groton, p. 85).
From the description given in this petition I am of
the opinion that Nonaicoicus Brook and not Waste
Brook is intended. In Prescott's map of Groton. Pep-
perell and Shirley, made in the latter part of the laaL
century, there is shown a bridge over the Nashua
river a short distance southerly from the present
site of the Fitchburgh Railroad bridge, and it is prob-
ably what was subsequently known as Kelsey's
Bridge, from Captain Kelsey, who lived on the farm
now owned by John Gardmer in Shirley. From the
following vote of the town of Groton, passed April 1,
1793, it would appear that this bridge was carried
away by afreshet about that time:
" Art. 6. To B«e if tbe towo will make aoj grant to Mr. Moody Cbaae
Id money, or aoj other way, to enable him to rebuild tbe bridge acrofls
tbe NaBbua River near bis land, lately carried away by tbe freshet.
*' Voted, to give £6 to Mr. Moody Cha«e for to enable blm to rebuild
tbe bridge over the rirer near bis land."
654
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, ^lASSACHUSETTS.
Moody Chase, at that time, owned and lived upon
what is now commonly called the Lewis Blood place,
and the bridge was upon his farm. Traces of its abut-
ments may be seen to this day.
In 1790 Joshua Longley erected millet llitchell-
ville, and induced the town of Shirley to locate near
them a new bridge, probably in place of the Kelsey
Bridge above mentioned, and another which had re-
cently been washed away near Lovering's in Harvard.
In consideration that the town of Shirley would ap-
propriate $250 towards the building of the bridge,
Longley agreed to be at the entire expense of the
erection beyond that sum. It would appear by the
Shirley records that Longley's Bridge was very im-
perfectly constructed, and repairs upon it were neces-
sary within three years. In 1842 a covered truss
bridge was erscted in this place, the work being done
by Stillman D. Benjamin. The present structure was
built in 1871, the work being done by Benjamin F.
Hartwell,of Groton. In 1886 new abutments to this
bridge were built by the order of the county com-
missioners.
The first structure over the Nashua River on the
site of Page's Bridge, on the road to Wood's Village,
was erected about 1726. The present bridge at that
place was built about 1873.
There was a bridge over James Brook, near the
dwelling-house now owned by George H. Brown, as
early as December 9, 1680. (" Early Records of Gro-
ton," p. 182.) The present bridge at this place was
built about 1834.
There was a bridge over Nonaicoicus Brook, near its
mouth, in 1727. This was probably where the first
Lancaster highway crossed that brook.
About 1863 Calvin Fletcher built a bridge across
Nonaicoicus Brook at Pulpit Rock, as means of ac-
cess to his land on the south side of the mill ponds.
This structure broke down April 16, 1870, as J. Hart-
well Priest was crossing it with a load of wood, and
has not been rebuilt.
Taveens. — There is something of the old-fashioned
hospitality and comfortable leisure associated with
the tavern of the days before the railroad superseded
the stage-coach that we do not attach to the more
mercantile modern hostlery. While we cannot en-
dure the thought of returning to our ancestors' mode
of transportation, there is to us a pleasing glamor
about the recollections and traditions of the entertain-
ment at the wayside inn. The iron horse seems to
have revolutionized everything. The screech of his
whistle has dissipated the country tavern. He has
made traveling a principle to which all other neces-
sities of life are incidental, while we are indulging in
it. We read, eat, sleep and are entertained while be-
ing whirled across the country at forty miles per hour.
There is now no occasion for those diversions that the
tavern found to be necessary to relieve the tedious
over-night halts by the way. The travelers are not
thrown together now, as they were then, and we do
not feel it to be a duty we owe our fellow-traveler to
entertain him. nor do we exact of him a similar duty.
The hospitality of the taveru was a business. Before
the telegraph and the .isaociated press, we were not
called upon to assume that every one knew just as
much of the world's doings as ourselves, and conse-
quently we did not deem an apology to be necessary
before retailing home or foreign gossip. In the win-
ter evenings the tavern guests would gather around
the blazing fire in the public room and exchange ex-
periences, and rumors, and news, or, as a cynical
writer has styled it, "swap lies." Thus, the tavern,
while satisfying the outer and inner man, furnished
the entertainment that his surroundings demanded.
The number of places within the limiti of Aver
where the farmer found a convenient home market for
his products, by furnishing, for a consideration, a
more or less occasional entertainment for man and
beast, cannot, of course, be now known. The farm-
house where such an entertainment could not be had
was probably the exception. Aside from a license, I
am unable to say just what is the criterion that deter-
mines when the farm-house ceased to be such and be-
came the tavern.
The earliest records that we can obtain of any tav-
erns being kept in the southerly part of Groton was
in 1717, when James Patterson, who resided in the
vicinity of the Lewis Blood place on the road from
Ayer to Shirley Village, was licensed as a retailer.
Abraham Moors, who resided in the vicinity of the
Reuben Hartwell place, now owned by George H.
Brown, and probably in the identical dwelling-
house now standing on the premises, was for many
years licensed as an inn-keeper, and the inventory ot
his estate, as returned to the Probate Court shortly
after his death, would seem to indicate that his occu-
pation was that of a tavern-keeper. The most
famous tavern kept within the limits of Ayer during
the last century was that of George Pierce. Its lo-
cation has until quite recently been much in dispute.
In Drake's "History of Middlesex County "it is
given as that of the Calvin Fletcher red house, so
called, in the vicinity of the pumping station, and
the same statement is made in the history of the
Peirce family, published in 1880. There can, how-
ever, be no doubt but that this tavern was in the im-
mediate vicinity of the present site of the Phelps
Mill, which Mr. Pierce at that time owned, having
purchased it of Henry Fanvell, April 11, 1758. The
mill at that time was located farther to the southeast,
near the site of the wood-shed of the Fitchburg Rail-
road Company, and the tavern probably stood on the
westerly side of the brook and northerly side of the
old road, on the site of Alfred Page's tenement-house,
and was subsequently owned and occupied by Abel
Morse. November 21, 1764', George Pierce purchased
of Nathaniel Smith the following tract of land, the
location of which is too definite to admit of any
doubt :
ATER.
655
'* About 2 acive of land in GrotoD aforesaid and lyes easterly from
snid George's oow dwelliog house aDd east of the bruoli culled Coicus
Br>)ok and buuoded westerly by said Brook. Northerly by my own
land and easterly by the new County road leading to Lunenburg and
south' rly by or near the path that leads to said Pierce's mills and by said
house, and is to be understood as to include the barn the said Pierce has
lately built on said ^>ltmiseb and yaids before the same as tlie fence
now stands.*'
Pierce's farm and tavern were advertised for sale
according to the following advertisement ia Boston
Gazette, September 27, 1773 :
" To be Sold at Public Vendue, to the highest Bidder, on Wednesday
the 3d day of Novemt>er next, at four o'clock in the Afternoon (if not
Sold before at Private Sale) by me the Subscriber, A valuable FARM in
Grotou. in the County of Middlesex, pleasantle situated on the i^reat
County Road, leading from Crown Point and No. 4 to Boston : Said
yann contains 172 Acres of Upland and Meadow, with the bigger Part
under improvement, uitb a large Dwelling House and Barn, and Out
Uniises, together with a-good Grist Mill and Saw Mill, the latter new
last Year, both in good Repair, and on a good Stream, and within a few
Bods of the House. Said Farm would make two good Livings, and
would sell It in two Divisions, or together, as it would best suit the
Purchaser. Said House is situated very conveniently for a Tavern, and
has been improved as such for Ten Years past, with a Number of other
Conveniences, too many to enumerate. And the Purchaser may depend
upon haviu;^ a good warrantee Deed of thesame, and the bigger Part of
the Pay made very easy, on good Security. The whole of the Farming
Tools, and Part of the Stock, will be sold as above raentiODed, at the
Subscriber's House on said Farm.
" Gi'otun Aug. 3u, 1773. Geouge Pieece."
It would appear that the tavern was not sold ac-
cording to the above advertisement, for in the Gazette
of November 15, 1773, the following notice appears:
*' The Poblick are hereby Notified that the Sale of the Farm in
Groton which wa^ to have been the 3d Instant OD the Premisses, at the
House of Mr George Pierce, is adjouro'd to the house of Mr. Joseph
Moullon, liiu-bolder in Boston, where it will certainly he Sold to the
highest Bidder, on Wednesday the Ist Day of December, at 4 o'clock,
r. ji."
It would seem that during the period of the ad-
jnurnment Pierce had made a sale of a part, at least,
of the properly to Abraham Amsden, the deed of
which is dated November 23, 1773, though his name
is continued as an inn-keeper in the series of alma-
nacs until 1784.
In the early part of the present century Jesse
Stone kept a tavern on the site of the house now oc-
cupied by Jaraes Gilson, at the junction of the Sandy
Pond Road with the highway from Ayer to Littleton.
The following advertisement appeared in The Inde-
pendent Chronicle (Boston), September 19, 1808 .
*'X FARil— FOE BALE,
" CON'TAINTNG 140 acres of Land, situated in the South part of Groton,
(Maas.) with a now and well-finished House, Barn & Out-Houses, and
Aqur^uct, pleasantly situated, where a Tavern has been kept fur the
last seven years . — a parlor the whole wilLbe sold, as best suits the pur-
chaser. For further particulars, inquire of THO'S B. BAND, of
Charleinown or the Subscriber, living on the Premises.
" Sept. 12. Jesse Stone."
The property was sold by Jesse Stone to Jloses
Day about 1812, and by him kept as a tavern until it
■n'as destroyed by fire in the spring of 1836.
Plans anp Maps. — Like all villages of rapid
growth, resulting from suddenly becoming a commer-
cial centre, we existed for several years largely upon i
paper. Tracts of land were purchased by speculators, '
streets laid ont and houBe-lots staked oat, haying re-
gard solely for the immediate profits to the specula-
tor, regardless entirely of the future relations to the
community.
In 1845 the principal farms within our village lim-
its were Calvin Fletcher's, Silas Nutting's, William
Stuart Nutting's, John Mills', Nathaniel Stone's and
Abel Morse's. The first extended as far west as John
Henry Whitcomb's, on Main Street. Silas Nutting's
extended from Calvin Fletcher's as far west as the vi-
cinity of Main Street crossing, William Stuart Nut-
ting's was the next and was bounded on the west by
Abel Morse's and John Mills', who owned to near the
Boston and Maine Railroad. Nathaniel Stone's was
north and west of these.
July 31, 1849, William S. Nutting conveyed to Wil-
liam H. Hovey and John M. Merriam a tract of four-
teen acres, which subsequently became known as the
Hovey & Merriam purchase. It was bounded east-
erly by Silas Nutting's land, northerly by Nathan-
iel Stone's farm, westerly by a line about midway be-
tween Washington and Pleasant Streets, and south-
erly by a line not far from the present Newton Street.
Walter M. Wilson, of Cambridge, civil engineer, was
employed to make a survey of this tract, and his plan
which wa§ lithographed and circulated as an adver-
tisement, is known as the Walter M. Wilson plan for
Hovey & Merriam. A copy of this plan, now in my
possession, shows the railroad tracks and buildings
then in our village. On it is the following inscrip-
tion : "Grand Junction Railroad at So. Groton,
Massachusetts. Besides freight and other trains, six
passenger trains meet and depart from this place
three times a day. This land, which is for sale in
lots, as here represented, is within 150 yards of the
depot." The purchase was divided into sixty-nine
lots, the lines of which, as established by this survey,
are, with a few exceptions, existing and recognized
to-day. On this plan are also established Washing-
ton Street, Newton Street, Cambridge Street, Colum-
bia Street, Williams Street and Nashua Street, and
the recent survey of the streets made under the
direction of the town was, with the exception of
Washington Street, in conformity with this plan.
In it is shown a solution of what, to the residents of
to-day, appears to be not only inconvenient but mean-
ingless, namely : the sudden termination of Columbia
Street and William Street at their junction. The
clear purpose of the owners of this tract was to avoid
coming in contact with the land of Silan Nutting,
and thus opening it to the market, with an advan-
tage equal to that of the land owned by the parties
making the survey. By this arrangement, some of
the most valuable and sightly land in our village has
been, for years, entirely shut out, and until the recent
extension of Williams Street has been entirely in-
accessible to the public. Had not the obstacles cre-
ated by this survey existed, Newton Street would
probably have long since been extended to the old
656
HISTORY OP MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
road near John Flannigaa'a, and the town would
have received the benefit accruing from a material
enhancement to the value of our taxable property.
This id not the only instance in our village that
illustrates the necessity for highways being located by
a public authority, having in view the general wel-
fare of the community, and not solely the particular
gain to the private investor. An interesting feature
of the Hovey & Merriam plan is that it shows the lo-
cation and approximate size of all the buildings then
standing in our village ; also the location and number
of railroad tracks, and is really a photograph of the
village in 1849. The buildings then consisted of the
present blacksmith-shop, on the easterly side of Co-
lumbia Street. The site of the three brick buildings
of the Stony Brook Railroad Company was then oc-
cupied by three wooden structures, the engine-house
nearly on the site of the present one, and just west of,
and connected with it, was a wooden shed, that was
subsequently extended nearly to Columbia Street.
Nearly on the site of the present car-house wab a
wooden structure of about the same size, then used
for a similar purpose. A wooden freight-house stood
nearly where the present brick one now is. These
three buildings were sold at auction in 1869, the first
two purchased by Samuel Reed, and from them
was constructed what is now known as the Adams
house. The wooden freight-house was purchased by
John B. Alley & Company, and is now used for a
store-house at the tannery. Besides these was the
brick school-house then standing on Fillebrown's lot,
a dwelling-house subsequently known as the Park
house, occupied the lot where the present Spaulding
Block stands. At the corner of Newton and Washing-
ton Streets was the house of Andrew J. Gardner. On
the corner of Washington and Main Streets was a
small wooden building, for years occupied by George
W. Stuart as a dwelling-house aud country store.
Near the corner of Washington and Pleasant Streets
was a dwelling-house owned by William S. Nutting,
who, at that time, resided where William U. Sherwin
now lives, his barn then being in the centre of what is
now Pleasant Street, and faced south. Between Main
Street and the railroad was the old engine and freight-
house, torn down but a few years since.
January 11, 1849, William S. Nutting sold to Win-
throp E. Faulkner twelve acres, describing it as
meadow, pond and upland. It bounded easterly about
as far as the centre of Forest Street, southerly by
Nonaicoicus Brook, and westerly and northerly by
the railroads. Faulkner sold to Stephen Dow the
land since known as the tannery property. The re-
mainder of the land purchased of Nutting was di-
vided into house-lots, the survey being made and the
plan drawn by Parker, Stearns & Sanborn, civil
engineers of Charlestown. Mr. Stearns, the second
member of the firm, was William S. Stearns, after-
wards superintendent and president of the Fitchburg
Railroad. This plan was knowu as the Winthrop
Faulkner plan. It is laid out into twenty-one house-
lots, the boundaries of which, as shown in that survey,
prevail substantially to-day. The engineering firm
of Parker, Stearns & Sanborn also made for the firm
of Thayer & Lackey a survey and plan of a large
part of the land between Union Street and Nonaicoi-
cus Brook, locating the streets now on that tract.
The easterly half of the southerly portion of Forest
Street was on the land of Silas Nutting, the street
being a joint contribution of Nutting and Faulkner.
Rufus Brooks, who at that time owned the Wheeler
place, was unwilling to contribute anything for the
maintenance of a street, and a strip of land one foot
wide was left between him and the street.
John Bligh purcha.sed of Mr. Faulkner four lots,
and located what has since been known as Bligh
Street. That portion of William S. Nutting's farm
west of the Hovey & Merriam tract was surveyed
and lotted by Cyrus A. Latham, civil engineer.
Nearly all these lots were sold by Mr. Nutting in his
life-time. The balance of William S. Nutting's farm,
lying on the northerly side of Main Street, was sold
at auction by him at ditferent times. Prior to 18G0
nearly the whole of the original farm of William S.
Nutting had been sold and built upon. It thus com-
ing readily into market, materially assisted the growth
of our village, and if the owners of other farms had
maniffr^ted a like disposition to have disposed of their
land, rather than hold it to wait a fabulous rise, that
they believed would result from a land famine, the
size and prosperity of our town would have been
greatly enhanced, and they would have received their
share of the benefit thus resulting.
The remainder of the Phineas Nutting farm,
namely, that part held by Silas Nutting, was, so far
as sold by him, disposed of in small lots. It was sur-
veyed in three sections, the principal survey being
that of Parker. Stearns & Sanborn in 1852, of which
Grove, Prospect, Elm and part of School Streets are
a part. Other surveys were made by Cyrus Latham
and Horace C. Hovey, a larger part, however, in area
of the farm is now owned by Mr. Nutting's heirs.
The principal part of the John Mills farm was pur-
chased by Harvey A. Woods, and in accordance with
the survey made by Josiah K. Bennett, Esq., has all
been sold in house-lots.
But a small part of the Nathaniel Stone farm, lying
north of the railroads, has yet been sold. That part
however, lying west of Nonaicoicus Brook, known
as the Acre, has all been disposed of and built upon.
The Park farm remains to-day practically as it was
fifty years ago, since which time there has been but
one house built upon it.
AYER.
657
CHAPTER LII.
A TER—( Continued).
Canal— BailroadM—Pott-OJIice—TeU^aph—TeUphoiie.
Had railroads never been conceived of, it is proba-
ble that the site of our village would have long since
been upon the line of a great through canal. The
advantages that the Erie Canal gave to New York
City by connectiug it with the rapidly developing
grain fields of the West, did not escape the attention
of those interested in sustaining Boston's commercial
pre-eminence. About 1835 Loammi Baldwin, a noted
civil engineer of that period, madea survey for a canal
from Boston to the Connecticut River, and proposed
an extension from its western terminus to the Hudson
River, with a tunnel under Hoosac Mountain. There
was an engraved plan of the survey made by Annin
& Smith, of Boston, which showed its exact route.
It is to be found at the end of a " Report of the Com-
missioners of the State of Massachusetts, on the
routes of canals from Boston Harbour to Connecticut
and Hudson Rivers."
The plan is entitled •' Plan of a Survey for a Canal
from Boston to Connecticut River, with a sketch of a
proposed Route to the Hudson, made under the direc-
tion of the Commmissioners by L. Baldwin, en-
gineer."
It is interesting to note the fact that this canal fol-
lowed substantially the present line of the Hoosac
Tunnel route. Beginning with Charles River, it
passed through Cambridge, Watertown, Waltham,
Lincoln, Concord, Acton, Littleton, Groton, Shirley,
Lunenburg and Fitchburg, and from this place it
went through Ashburnham and Winchendon, and
then, as the Fitchburg now does, down Miller's River
to the Connecticut, then up the Deerfield River to
the mountain ; thence under the mountain by tunnel ;
then down the Hoosac River to the Hudson.
Mr. Baldwin was at one time a law student in the
office of Hon. Timothy Bigelow, of Groton, and while
so engaged he made, in 1802, the fire-engine that is
now stationed at West Groton. This machine, after
eighty-eight years of service, continues to do good
work.
The canal commissioners, in their report (page 57),
say, —
"Tlie ronte from the Nashua contioues over plaioa, on qnite level
land, without any very great impediments, through the southern part
of Groton to the Cuttecoonemugkeag, the outlet of Sandy Pond ; thence
along the southern side of that pond to Spectacle Poud, situated between
Groton and Littleton. These ponds can be used as reservoirs."
The commissioners evidently confounded the out-
let of Sandy Pond with the river in Shirley of a sim-
ilar name. Mr. Baldwin in his report, (page 112),
says, —
" From Sandy P,.nd in Groton near the school house No. 11, the water
may be turned with great ease to Spectacle Pond, into which falls
42-ii
Shaker's brook. The stream from Spectacle Pond paaus through Forge
Pond In Westford, from which it is called Stony Brook until it drops
into the Merrimack River in Chelmsford. From information derived
from intelligent gentlemen, and from my own obaerration of part of
this section of the country, it will be qnite easy to open a commonlc*-
tion through the valleys of these ponds and brooks to the MIddleux
Canal in Chelmsford. Whether it would be expedient to carry the main
line of the proposed c%nal in that direction, or whether a branch only
should be taken off from it that way, are questions which It may be Im-
portant to have the means of settling. It will therefore add much to
the valuable hydrographic Information which theee surveys will furnish
to cause a level and examination to be made between the Nashua at
Staples' mills and the Uiddlessx canal."
The heights of certain points along the proposed
route of the canal are given in the report, and are
counted from low-water mark in Boston harbor. The
following are in Ayer :
Shaker's Brook, on line betwnn Littleton and Groton 220.28
Spectacle Pond, in Littleton and Groton 212.54
Sandy Pond, Groton 226.90
Top of under-pinning of school-honse Ko. 11, Groton, 237.64
Stone's Saw-mill Pond, on Sandy Pond Brook, " 223.89
Sandy Pond and Bear Hill Brook, " ..... 213.03
Stone at Comer of Nutting's barn, " 224.95
From the above data we have no difficulty in
tracing the line of this canal through our town.
Staples' Mills was the saw and grist-mill at Mitchell-
ville. They were then owned by Thomas Staples.
Nutting's barn was just westerly from where Charles C.
Bennett's dwelling-house now is. Stone's saw-mill
pond on Sandy Pond Brook is what we now know as
the Mill Pond or Flannigan's Pond. School-house
No. 11 is our Sandy Pond School. Shaker's Brook is
the same as now known as Bennett's Brook.
The rapid development of railroads gave a forever
quietus to canal-building in New England. However
beneficial such a water-highway may have been to
the public, it certainly could not have developed
South Groton into a separate municipality. We are,
in the truest sense, a railroad town ; notsimplya rail-
road centre, but an offspring of the iron-horse itself.
It was the magic touch of its wand that conjured our
promising and thrifty village from an unpromising
and almost stagnant country. At the advent of the
railroads the limits of our present village comprised
about a dozen farms of doubtful prosperity. The
dwelling-house occupied now by James Gilson had
but recently been erected, and was owned and occu-
pied by one Joseph Waugh. Just south of it, in the
triangle formed by the three highways, were the
three dwelling-houses now standing there. To the
south and nearer the Harvard line was the house of
Abel Stone, now owned by his son, Charles H. Stone.
At the pumping station was the saw-mill of Calvin
Fletcher, and across the road the old red house, so
called, since burned, and the house now owned by
Newell A. Spencer. The next dwelling-house was
that occupied by Joseph Barden, on the southerly
side of Main Street, opposite F. G. Lufkin's, and now
owned by Henry C. Sherwin. Silas Nutting's house,
on the northerly side of Main Street, opposite Elm
Street, was standing substantially as it now is. On
658
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the Wheeler lot on Tannery Street was the house of
Abijah Nutting. A little, square, hip-roof, brick
school-house stood on the Fillebrown lot. In the
fork of the roads stood the one-story dwelling-house,
formerly school-house, then occupied by Abigail
Cbapin. A stnall mill, owned by Abel Morse, then
occupied the site of Levi W. Phelps' present exten-
sive establishment. Across the brook, on the nor'h-
erly side of Shirley Street, was the dwelling-house of
Benjamin Morse. The next buildings to the west
were near the Lewis Bldod place, nearly a mile dis-
tant, and at that time they consisted of four dwelling
hou-tes, three of which have since been torn down.
There was then quite a little hamlet around the
factories at Mitchellville. On Park Street stood the
John Mills house, and just north of it the brick
dwelling-house of Nathaniel Stone. Acro^^s the street
and farther north was the Park house, all of which
are now standing. Oliver Blood lived where Charles I
G. Woods' dwelling-houi^e now stands. There was a '
small dwelling-house where John M. Raggett now I
lives. Our present Main Street, from the Littleton
line to the corner of .Shirley and Park Streets, was :
the principal highway. It was joined at Joseph
Waugh's by the Sandy Pond Road, and near Fletcher's ;
saw-mill by the Harvard Road. The old road to ;
Groton, ria Flannigan's Crossing, was traveled sub- !
stantially as now. Shirley Street was the only high- '
way west of Nonaicoicus Brook. Park Street was the
road to .Shirley and to Groton, by the way of Farmers'
Row. What wa.") later known as the old road to
Groton joined Park Street just south of the John
Mills place ; thence to Groton via Groton Street aud i
what is now Washington Street.
The Fitchburg Railroad was chartered in 1S43 and
is our oldest steam highway. The first, or what is
now the north track, was built to Shirley Village in
the fall of IS-H, and e.ttended to Fitchburg the fol- '
lowing year. The second, or south track, was built in !
1847. j
Before the Fitchburg Railroad had been built the !
question of the location of the station was considered [
by the citizens of Groton. In town-meeting February i
13, 1843, the following vote was pissed:
" Chose Elijah Whitton, James Farns worth, Artemas I
Wood, John Boyntou and Nathaniel P. Smith a com- I
mittee to confer with the authorities of the Boston & I
Fitchburg Co., in relation to the location of a depot
at the south part of the town, also to select the loca-
tion of a road thereto, from the centre of the town ;
also to make such surveys thereto as they may deem
necessary."
August 28, IS 14, the town voted and chose the
selectmen a committee to confer with the directors of
the Fitchburg Railroad; also instruct a committee to
advocate the location of a depot at the lower part of
the town, near the mill of Calvin Fletcher.
"Voted : To direct the selectmen to repair the road
as they may think proper."
In accordance with the request in the last vote, the
first Groton depot of the Fitchburg Railroad was
located at what is now known as Flannigan's Crossing.
The passenger station was built on the south side of the
railroad, and west side of the highway. The freight-
house was located just west of the passenger station.
On the north side of the track a large wood-shed was
built.
The location thus selected for the depot was occu-
j pied as such until the completion of the present
I Union Station in 1848.
j The old passenger station was purchased by John
Pingry and moved to the lot at the corner of Main
I and Church .Streets, where, with the exception of a
I change in color from a yeliowisn brown, and the ad-
dition of two ells, it presents to-day practically the
same external appearance as it did when it served
railroad purposes.
The wood-shed was torn down and the freight-house
moved on to what is now known as '.he Milk Stand
Lot, just east of the Main Street crossing, where,
with the addition of an extra story, added a few years
since, it now stands. While the present Union
Station was beinc built, a partially completed build-
ing that the Woods Brothers had moved Irom Woods
Village was leased by the Fitchburg Railroad Company
for a passenger depot. It stood between Main Street
and the railroad, nearly opposite Stone's Block. It
was subsequently purchased by Andrew J. Gardner,
who moved it on to the lot at the corner of Washing-
ton and Newton Streets, now occupied by the Uni-
tarian Church, and finished it as a dwelling house ;
and at the time it was burned in the great fire of 1872,
was owned and occupied by George H. Champney.
It waa iu this building, while owned by Mr. Gardner,
that the first religious society (Baptist; in South
Groton was organized.
After the Fitchburg Railroad was incorporated, but
before it was built, the Grotou Branch Railroad Com-
jjany was chartered to build a railroad from some
point on the Fitchburg Railroad in Groton to a point
on the highway from Pepperell to Dunstable, but
nothing was ever done toward its construction.
The Worcester and Nashua Railroad, as built, is a
consolidation of two railroad companies — the Groton
and Nashua Company, chartered by the New Hamp-
shire Legislature, December 24, 1S44, to build a rail-
road from the New Hampshire and Massachusetts
State line to Nashua, N. H., and the Worcester and
Nashua Railroad Company, chartered by the Massa-
chusetts Legislature, March 5, lS-t4, to build a rail-
road from Worcester to Massachusetts and New
Hampshire Stats line. The consolidation of these
two roads as the Worcester and Nashua Railroad
Company was authorized by the Legislatures of both
States. By a subsequent act of the Massachusetts
Legislature, this company consolidated with the
Nashua and Rochester Railroad Company, thus be-
coming the Worcester, Nashua and Rochester Rail-
AYER.
659
road Company, and in 1886 was leased to the Boston
and Maine Company. The construction of the road
was begun December 1, 184G. The section between
Ayer and Clinton was opened for travel July 3, 1848;
between Worcester and Clinton, November 22, 1848,
and between Ayer and Nashua, December, 18, 1848.
The Peterborough and Shirley Railroad Company,
as its name would indicate, was chartered to build a
railroad from Shirley, Massachusetts, to Peterbor-
ough, New Hampshire. Before the construction was
begun, the Worcester and Nashua route had been
surveyed, and the location of the new road was
changed, from a proposed terminus on the Fitchburg
Railroad in Shirley, to meet the other two roads at
the future railroad centre ofGroton Junction. It is
believed that the road was made to run through a
corner of Shirley to avoid a forfeiture of its charter.
The road was opened to West Townsend in February,
1848, and to Greenville in 1851. The promises of
traffic have never been such as to warrant the invest-
ment necessary to extend the road to Peterborough ;
consequently the road bears two towns as its apparent
termini, to neither of which it runs. Soon after the
road was opened to travel it was leased to the Fitch-
burg Railroad Company for the term of twelve years,
and purchased by the latter company in 1860 for
$132,660, realizing to the original stockholders fifty-
six per cent, of their investment. From the open-
ing of the road in December, 1848, until the aban-
donment of the depot at Flanagan's Crossing, that
station was their termini, — the new company running
over the Fitchburg track from Main Street to that
point.
The Peterborough and Shirley road originally
crossed the Worcester and Nashua road by switching
oc and off; and what is now the side-track past Spen-
cer's stone-yard was the original main-track of the
Peterborough and Shirley road. An inspection of it
is interesting, as it shows the great improvement in rail-
road iron since 1869. The Stony Brook road was built
by the corporation of that name in 1848, from North
Chelmsford to Groton Junction, It was soon leased
to the Nashua and Lowell for a term of years, and
was absorbed in the Boston and Maine system in
1887. The main building of our present Union
Station was erected in 1848. The arch on the south
of the Fitchburg tracks was designed for the Stony
Brook trains that at first crossed over the Fitchburg
road by switches, and the arch on the north side was in-
tended for the Peterborough and Shirley trains, but
this arrangement was, upon a short trial, demon-
strated to be inconvenient, and was abandoned for
the arrangement now in use. Originally the ticket-
office and waiting-room was in the northwest corner
of the main building, where the small waiting-room
and the telegraph offices now are. Where is now the
general freight office was a side-track. A waiting-
room and restaurant, the latter enclosed by aaf.hes,
to be raised and lowered similar to the restaurant in
the Causeway Street Station, Boston, was in the
southwest corner of the main building; while the
telegraph and freight office, baggage-room and a
waiting-room were in an ell, now used as Kelleran's
junk-shop, on Groton Street. The new ell and cov-
ered walk between the Boston and Maine tracks was
built in 1871, and that road straightened to the north
by taking out a large part of the hill on which Dr.
Willis' and E. H. Hayward's houses now are.
The iron pillars that, in a row each side of the
Fitchburg track, once assisted in sustaining the roof
of the station were replaced by the trusses in 1871,
and are now the roof supports of the upper story of
Spaulding'3 Block, at the corner of Main and Wash-
ington Streets. The main building of the station is
upon the land of the Fitchburg Company, while the
ell is upon the land of the Boston and Maine Com-
pany. The Worcester and Nashua freight-house was
built about 1848, and the color, a light slate, suggested
to President Swift, of the Fitchburg road, the like
color so long used on its local freight cars.
The centralizing here of these great railroad sys-
tems has thus afibrded direct and through service
with the four points of the compass. Di.stance to be
traveled is now measured in hours and minutes and
not in miles. We are less than an hour from Boston
on the through expresses, and have over fifteen trains
per day each way. Being on the Hoosac Tunnel
Route, we are, as a shipping point to all places west,
unsurpassed. The equipment of both railroads is un-
equaled; and we are afforded every railroad advantage
which the age can boast.
If we may be permitted to indulge in geometrical
figures we can say that we are at a common apex of
three practically equilateral triangles — Ayer, Fitch-
I burg, Nashua; Ayer, Nashua, Lowell; Ayer, Boston,
i Worcester.
I The first station agent of the Fitchburg Railroad
was Andrew J. Gardner, who served in that capacity
I until January 22, 1849, when David Chambers was
' appointed to that place. When the Union Station
was first opened Andrew Gardner, a son of Andrew J.
Gardner, was the agent of the Worcester and Nashua
Road. He was succeeded in 1851 by Mr. Snow. Mr.
Chambers was agent until August, 1854, when he re-
signed to accept a position on the Philadelphia, Wil-
mington and Baltimore Railroad, under S. N. Fenton,
the former superintendent of the Fitchburg RaUroad.
Mr. Cardner was one of the most prominent and active
citizens of our village, and during his short residence
here was always actively interested in everything of
a public nature. In 1851 he built a small store at the
corner of Main and Washington Streets, which for
two years was the only store in the village. He also
kept the restaurant in the depot. About the time of
his arrival here was the first accident at this station
of any considerable magnitude. Through a mis-
placed switch, several car-loads of iron were sent in
on the side-track in the arch on the southerly side of
660
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the station, and their momentum was so great that
they passed completely through the building, includ-
ing the restaurant, to the Worcester and Nashua
track.
There is probably no man living to-day whose con-
nections with the railroads of Massachusetts, particu-
larly of the Fitchburg, are so interesting as those
of David Chambers. He came to Boston from Wil-
mington, Delaware, early in the forties, with the en-
gine "Bunker Hill," for the Charlestown Branch
Railroad Company. This road, the location of which
from Block Island to Charlestown, is now the Fitch-
burg Railroad, was built exclusively for the transport-
ation of ice from Fresh and Spy Ponds to Tudor's
Wharf. He superintended the setting up of the
"Bunker Hill," which was the second engine owned
by the above company and afterwards ran her. May
5, 1843, he was conducting the train that, with the
engine "Tudor," ran oft' Long Bridge, between Som-
erville and Charlestown, into the river, and received
serious, and what for a long time were thought to be
fatal injuries. He, however, recovered, and Septem-
ber 1, 1843, entered the employ of the Fitchburg
Railroad, which at that time had been built from
Block Island to Hill's Crossing, and was the first en-
gineer ever employed by the Fitchburg Company.
He ran as engineer until January, 1849, when he as-
sumed the duties of station agent at Groton Junction.
He was the first engineer to run a passenger train
over every mile of the Fitchburg Railroad from Block
Island to Miller's Falls, then known as Grout's
Corner.
July 4, 1846, with the engine "Fitchburg" and a
baggage-car, he left C'uarlestown at 10 a.m. and
reached Fitchburg fifty-two minutes later. This run
was made in opposition to ihe Boston and Lowell
Railroad for Montreal mails, and is one of the most
remarkable railroad runs on record. On one portion
of the road the train ran eleven miles in nine min-
utes, Mr. Bigelow, afterwards superintendent of the
Fitchburg Railroad, holding the watch. The mails
via the Fitchburg reached Montreal at that time
about eight hours earlier than those that left via Bos-
ton and Lowell, both trains leaving Boston at the
game time.
Upon leaving here in 1854 he became the yard-mas-
ter, under Mr. Fenton, at Philadelphia, a position
that he still holds.
Mr. Snow succeeded Mr. Chambers as station agent
at Groton Junction, and became the agent for the
three roads. He continued to discharge the duties
of that position until the spring of 1858, when his
place was taken by a Mr. Harris, who was killed in
July of that year in the yard while shackling cars.
Edmund Dana Bancroft was the next agent at this
place. Mr. Bancroft's railroad experience began .is
clerk for Norman C. Munson while the latter was
constructing the Stony Brook Railroad. October
16, 1848, Mr. Bancroft was appointed station agent in
Shirley, where he remained until his removal to Gro-
ton Junction, where he served as station agent until
October 1, 1869.
Mr. Bancroft's successor was Charles E. Morrison,
who was formerly a clerk in Mr. Bancroft's employ.
Mr. Morrison was succeeded by Samuel Anderson,
who came here from Lancaster, assuming charge in
June, 1878. February 19, 1884, Mr. Anderson was
appointed agent at Fitchburg, and James M. Flem-
ming, of this town, became his successor. February
1, 1885, Mr. Fleraming resigned to accept a more lu-
crative position in the employ of the Fitchburg Com-
pany, and Clarence H. Kinuey, the present incum-
bent, formerly of Nashua, was appointed to his place.
Post-Office. — June 1, 1849, a post-office at South
Groton was established, and Andrew Boynton Gard-
ner was appointed postmaster. The ofiice was at first
in a small building on the northerly side of Main
Street, between West Street and the Boston and
Maine Railroad. Mr. Gardner subsequently moved the
office to the corner of Main and Washington Sts., in
the store ai'terwards owned by George W. Stuart.
Mr. Gardner served as postmaster until August 11,
1853, when he was succeeded by Harvey Alpheus
Woods, who moved the office into his new block,
now known as Cushing's Building, when completed,
where it was kept by him until December 30, 1861.
! George Henry Brown was appointed his successor.
By Mr. Brown the office was removed to his drug-
store, in the neriherly store of Union Hall Build-
ing, on Merchant's Row. Mr. Brown retained the
office less than a year, being succeeded, December
5, 1862, by William Holmes Harlow. Mr. Harlow
kept the office in Harvey A. Woods' store. Mr. Brown
became postmaster again in 1863, retaining the office
until July 18, 1868, when he was again succeeded by
Mr. Harlow, who moved it into Harlow's building,
between West Street and Boston and Maine Railroad.
After the great fire of April, 1872, Mr. Harlow
reopened the office in Newell & Balch's building,
between Main Street and the railroad, east of the
Milk-Stand. Leonard A. Buck became postmaster
March 31, 1873. He moved the office to the middle
store of Harvey A. Woods' building, on what is now
the Fillebrown lot, and subsequently to the easterly
store of Mead's Block, and finally to the westerly
store of the same block, where it now is. Mr. Buck,
becoming financially involved, changed his residence
to Florida, and during the balance of his unexpired
term the office was conducted by Rector T. Bartle'.t,
one of his bondsmen.
Edmund Dana Bancroft was appointed Mr. Buck's
successor, March 2, 1883. By him the office was
reconstructed, and, for the first time since its estab-
lishment, was conducted in a room used exclusively
for post-office purposes. With a method and system
characteristic of him, Mr. Bancroft made a model
postmaster. For political reasons he was succeeded,
March 3, 1887, by the present inoumbent, Patrick
AYER.
661
Doiilon, Jr., by whom the high Htaodard and effi-
ciency established by Mr. Bancroft has been main-
tained, and hij conduct of the office has given emi-
nent satisfaction to all its patrons.
The post office was established as South Groton.
March 1, 1862, the name was changed to Groton
Junction. Mr. Woods, the former postmaster, in-
formed me that the reason of the change was that the
Daoie was frequently confounded by the postal clerks
with South Gardner, which resulted in annoying mis-
sending of the mails. March 21, 1871, the name
was changed to that which it now bears.
Telegraph and Telephone. — The first line of
electric telegraph built to this village was from Low-
ell, and was owned by Jonathan Johnson. The of-
fice was in the old restaurant on the south side of the
depot, Benjamin Franklin Felcb being the operator.
The first message transmitted over the line was June
19, 1852, announcing the nomination of Winfield
Scott for President, by the Whig party.
Joseph W. Peck and Leonard A. Buck were the
first parties to whom the American Bell Telephone
Company granted a license to conduct telephone
business in this town under their patents. The first
line was built from Lowell to Fitchburg via Ayer,
and an office was established in the rear of the post-
office. This was in the summer of 1880.
Nellie Frances Kittridge was appointed manager
in February, 1881, an office she has held to the pres-
ent time. The uniform courtesy and the obliging
disposition she has ever manifested has made the
exchange most pleasant and useful to the patrons
and public. Shortly after her appointment the oflBce
was moved to its present quarters, in Spaulding's
Block.
Mr. Buck conveyed his interest to George G. Day
in 1882. In August, of the same year. Day conveyed
his one-half to Mr. Peck, by whom the corporation
known as the Ayer Telephone Exchange Cjmpany
was formed. The new corporation, however, man-
aged the business but a short time, selling out to the
New England Telegraph and Telephone Company,
bv whom the business has since been conducted.
CHAPTER Lin.
A Y£R— {Continued).
ScliooU — Librarij — Waier-works.
Schools and School-Houses. — Until some time
subsequent to 1734 it is supposed that the only school
in Groton was at the middle of the town. In 1741
the inhabitants voted to have the school kept in five
places, six weeks in eav:h place. In 1742 the number
of places was increased to seven, one of which is sup-
posed to be in our vicinity, though its location can-
not now be defined with any certainty. This public
extravagance, however, did not long continue, for, in
1745, a committee chosen to consider and report con-
cerning the schools, recommended that "all such as
live more than two miles, or thereabout [from the
middle of the town], shall be so tir ensed as to em-
body amongst themselves, and upon their employing
either a master or school-dame, shall draw the whole
of what they pay to the school rate in said town."
As this report was accepted and ordered to be re-
corded, it would seem that our vicinity was thus
deprived of the benefit of the public school. Whether
they did " embody amongst themselves" and employ
"either a master or a school-dame" cannot now be
ascertained. For several years, beginning 1758, the
grammar school was some time kept iu the south
part of the town. In 1760 the school-house in this
vicinity was burned, and I am unable to learn when
its successor was built, and whether it was upon the
site of the former building. It, however, seems cer-
tain that the new school-house was erected upon the
northerly side of Main Street, on the site of the
present Fillebrown building. It was a one-story
wooden building and was used as a school until about
1820, when a brick building was erected, of which
more is said hereafter. The old building was sold
and moved to near the present site of the hose-house
of the Alfred Page Hose Company, at the corner of
West Main and Park Streets, and just prior to the
advent of the railroads was occupied by Abigail,
belter known as " Nabby," Chapin. It was subse-
quently purchased by James Coughlin, who moved it
on to a lot back of Merchant's Row. It was the only
building left standing on the row in the big fire of
1870. It was subsequently moved on to the Acre and
is now standing on the southerly side of Shirley
Street, ju-t easterly of the dwelling-house of Michael
Murphy. It is undoubtedly one of the oldest build-
ings in our town.
A committee appointed by the inhabitants of Gro-
ton, April 2, 1792, "To consider how many districts
are necessary to be made and to ascertain the bound-
aries and see where the several houses shall be set,"
reported at the town-meeting held September 17th, of
the same year, that there ought to be twelve districts.
District No. 5, which included the limits of our vil-
lage, was as follows : "5. Mr. Jonas Stone's District
begins at the widow Sibil Stone's and includes Thos.
Woods, David Dwinell and all the Families to Har-
vard line and that the school-house be and remain
where it now stands." Jonas Stone owned what was
later the Calvin Fletcher farm and lived in the red
bouse, formerly standing opposite the site of the
pumping station. Sibil Stone lived on the farm now
owned by Asn S. Burgess, known as the Holden farm.
I am unable to say where Dwinell or Woods lived.
Two years previous to the last vote a census of the
children — males under twenty-one and females under
eighteen years of age — reported that there were
thirty-nine in Jonas Stone's district.
662
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
A new and what proved to be a permanent divi- I of his soap factory, which was then being built on
sion of the town into districts was made in 1S05, of ^ Tannery Street. About 1858 a building on the east-
which Nos. 11 and 12 appear to be in our town : i erly side of Columbia Street was used for a school-
"No.xi. Beginning at Snake Hill, BO culled, thonco ruDDiiiBaouth. ! room for a short time. The brick school-houseon Wash-
easterly aa the road goes, by Sandy pood, lill it. comes to the County j jngton Street was built aboUt 1859, and. Until itwas de-
road near Aaron Bigeiow's, tbenca ruDuiug westerly, aa said County i , i • .1 n f in-n • 1 ,
road goes, to a stnallhoase. where Oliver Blood (3d) now l.ves, tnclud- I *trnyed m the great fire of 18,2, was occupied by a
ing tlie laud which be DOW occupies, and running from said Bigelow'a J primary and intermediate school. A WOodeu build-
eaaterlT, aa the County road goes, to Littleton line, and running north- I i^g of [^^ rOOmS WaS buiit immediately after the fire,
erly from the school-house nt said County road, near where Caleb , ^i -^ j 1 1 j l * ■ ^ *i_
- ,. u V T-1 , \- . . n , I and the capacity doubled by an extension to the east
Symmes now lives, aa the town way goes by Elisba lonng a to Rockey 1 _ ^ •' -^
hill, 80 called, near Tobocco pipe plain : including all the inhabitants I 'D 1883. The present brick School building OH Main
on both sides of said roads and within said limits; and also including \ Street was built in 1867. During the summer and fall
the occupants of the farm lying easterly thereof, formerly owned by
Daniel Fun^'ell ; and also including all the inhabitants living southerly
of the County road aforesaid to Harvard line,"'
The road by Sandy Pond is what is now known as
the Snake Hiil Road. The County Road is the road
from Ayer to Pingryville via Sandy Pond. Aaron
Bigelow lived on "the road by Sandy Pond," between
of 1871 a school was kept in part of the old Catholic
Church. The Shirley Street building was erected in
1872. For a short time after the big fire a room in
Woods' Block, on Main Street, was occupied by the
primary school. In 1871 there was considerable agi-
tation about a new school-bouse, and the committee
the County Road and the railroads. Oliver Blood I chosen to select a site decided upon the lot of land
(3d) lived on the southerly side of the County Road,
about one-half way from Waugh's crossing to Sandy
Pond. Caleb Symmes lived near Sandy Pond Sta-
tion. Elisha Young's was the Levi S. Brigham
place. Rocky Hill and Tobacco Pipe Plain are just
beyond there. Daniel Farwell lived where George
Little now lives.
'* yo. XII. Beginning at the crotch of the roaila near Morgan place
so called, thence running southeaalerly, as the County road goea, by
Stone's aaw-niill, so called, to the toiall bouse, where Oliver Blood (3d)
now lives; nnd from said saw-mill southerly, as the County road goes, \ structure, erected by John Pingry. This latter was
to Harvard line ; including all the iiiliabilants ou both sides uf said • j .. a \ a l' . 1 oca 1 u-i 1 ■ 1 -i^
,, , I. , J , L. r u , ,„ . de&troved bv nre about 1850, and, while being rebuilt,
roads, and living southerly and westerly thereof to the linea of Harvaid t ' " o '
and Shirley; and also including all the inhabitants living on the road I the school was kept at what is now the Brigham
leading from the crotch of the roads south of John Fisk's house to i place. The present building was erected bv Levi S.
Stone-sunll, and on the road leading from the crotch of the roads ufore- j Brit'ham in 1870. The records of this district from
bald to John Park s house, and all within the liuiita aforesaid.*' { ^
ISOt) to 1809 are now in the possession of the Massa-
The Morgan place was near where Charles Woods 1 chusetts Historical Society, and are among the most
lives. John Fisk lived on what is now the Asa S. I complete in the Commonwealth, and I regret that this
at the easterly side of Pearl and southerly side of
Grnton Streets, but no further steps were taken than
this. Main Street brick school was built in 1SG7.
The first school building in District No. 11 was
erected in the latter part of the last century. It was
sold at auction in 1806. A new one was built in 1810
(size twenty-four by eighteen feet) and as it cost only
6198, it could not have been a very elaborate struc-
ture. It, however, served the purposes of the dis-
trict until about 1820, when it was replaced by a brick
Graves place.
The limits of the districts as thus established con-
tinued until the incorporation of the town of Ayer.
The brick school-house that stood on the northerly
side of Main Street was built in the early part of this
century to replace the wooden one before mentioned.
It was a square, one-story, hipped-roofed building,
whose prototype may be seen in the Prescott School,
between Groton and Ridge Hill. It was the only |
school building in District No. 12, till 1852, when |
the town erected on the present school-hcuse lot, on j
Main Street, a one-story wooden building, later known i
as the Grammar or White School. This building was |
moved, in 1865, to the town-lot, on the northerly side |
of Main Street, near the Milk Stand, and raised to i
the second story, the fire-engine and hook-and- \
ladder apparatus occupying the first fJoor, with the i
lock-up in the basement. Here the overflow I'rom the j
grammar school in Harmony Hall formed the nucleus I
of our first high school. '
The old brick school-house was sold at auction in i
1855, and purchased by Major Hiram P. Ross, who
usei the bricks in the coostiuctiua of the basement '
article will not permit a more extended quotation
than that of the first meeting :
" .Vt a School Meeting at the School-house in District No. 11 in the
Southerly part of Groton legally warned ii. assembled tbia 2o^ day ol
March 18 IG. The following Voles were passed. Viz.
" 1st. Voted k Choee M' Sam' Farnswortli Moderator.
*'^d. Voted ,ic Chose Caleb Symmes Clerk.
"3d. Voted It. Chose Capt Suiuaon Farnsworth a committee to hire a
School Mistress.
" l'**. Voted that the Slistress' board be put up to the lowest bidder —
M' Sani> Peirce being the lowest bidder the Mistress board was »<truck
off to hiui at Ninety Nine Cents a Week. •
"6^. Voted that the school begiu the first Monday in May next.
"G''', Voted that ('apt. Samson Farnsworth be a Committee to warn
the next School meeliug.
" T"'', Voted that four days at least shall be a legal warning; for next
School meeting.
'■ s>ti. Voted that ttie meeting be dissolved & it is dissolved accord-
ingly. Attest,
CiLEB SyililES, CTerk."
I have in my possession the records of District
No. 12 from March 1, 1838, to March 1, 1869.
Bound up with them are printed extracts from Chap-
ter XXIII. of the Revised Statutes, " together with
the By-laws of the town of Groton in relation to
schoulE." The town was at that time divided into lour-
AYER.
663
teen districts, of which No. 11 and 12 retained the
limits established in 1808.
At a meeting of District No. 12, held March
3, 1857, it was voted to divide the district int i
two parts : all that portion southerly of the Fitchburg
Railroad and easterly of the Worcester and Nashua
Railroad to constitute one district and the balance to
constitute the other part.
From 1860 to 1871 there was seldom a town-meeting
ntGroton in which there was not somekindof an appeal
for better school accommodations atGroton Junction.
The first effort to obtain a high school here was an
appeal made to the parent town, at a meeting of
School District No. 12, held March 2, 1863. Novem-
ber 6, 1866, the town voted to indefinitely postpone
an article in the warrant " to see if the town will
vote to have the Town High School kept at Groton
Junction a part of the year." A similar article was
indefinitely postponed April 1, 1867. April 6,
1868, a motion to appropriate five hundred dollars for
the support of a High School at Groton Junction was
lost. March 2, 1868, at a meeting of School District
No. 12, another appeal for a high school was made,
which likewise proved unavailing. In the meantime
a high grammar, sometimes incorrectly spoken of as
a high school, was beguu in the engine hall on the
town-lot on Main Street, and, on the completion of the
brick school-house on Main Street, was transferred to
the room now occupied by the high school.
It remained, however, for the new town to estab-
lish a high school, and the success they have attained
in this direction i.i due chiefly to James Powell, its
first principal. Mr. Powell came here from Danvers,
Mass. He was a graduate of the State Normal
School at Bridgewater, and entered upon his duties
here August 28, 1871. When he assumed the manage-
ment of the school everything was in a chaotic
state; and that he was able to establish a graded
school and graduate the first cI.tss in four years, la-
boring against the conservatism, not to say prejudice,
of many of the citizens, testify to the ability and un-
selfishness of the devotion that he brought to his
work. The High School is truly a monument to him,
for he gave to it the best years of his life. He ca;ne
here fresh from his alma uiater, and when he left us
to assume the position of principal of the High
School at Keene, N. H., his health had become so
shattered that he survived but two years. Since its
establishment our High School has graduated one
hundred and eleven. The growth of our public
school is interesting. In 1792 the number of children
in JonasStone's district, (males under twenty-cne and
females under eighteen) wiis thirty-nine. In 1830
the number in the same district was eighty-five.
The railroads found us in 1845 with one small school-
house. In 1859 there were over 300 scholars. To-
day t'lree school buildings and ten schools are barely
adequate to accommodate the 527 scholars who at-
tended school in 1 889, in what was formerly '' Jonas
Stone's District." We must further bear in mind
that the census, taken under the di^trict system, em-
braced all children, while the number now reported
by tbeSchooi Committee, includes only those actually
attending the schools. The growth in District No. 11
has not been so marked. In 1806 the census of
children (males under twenty-one and females
under eighteen) in District No. 11 was forty-two. The
average number of children now attending school
there in about twenty.
The cause of education in the village owes a debt
of gratitude to Doctor Benjamin H. Hartwell, who has
served upon the School Bjard almost continuously
since the incorporation of the town. In the days of
its infancy the cause of the High School always
found in him a faithful and fearless champion, and
he has the satisfaction, oft denied to others, of living
to see his views supersede the couservative opposition
of his opponents.
The Public Library. — The Groton Public Li-
brary, while free to the citizens of this village, was
located at too great a distance to be of any practical
advantage to them. There were various measures
looking toward the establishment of libraries in con-
nection with the district schools. In 1843 a commit-
tee of five was appointed by the citizens of Groton, at
their March meeting, to take into consideration the
feasibility of establishing libraries of ten volumes
each in the various school districts; but the idea was
too far in advance of the times, and nothing further
came of it. At a town-meeting held March 7tb,
1864, under an article " to see if the town wiil allow
a portion of the town library to be kept at Groton
Junction, or act in any way in relation to the same,"
the subject of the matter was referred to the follow-
ing committee : Abel Prescott, George W. Bancroft
and Rev. David Fosdick, Jr. This committee re-
ported at the adjourned April meeting, but as their re-
port is not on file, and the object sought did not come
to use, it is probable either that the report was un-
favorable or it- results suppressed.
April 2, 1866, the town voted to indefinitely post-
pone the article asking if the town would adopt any
measure to make the town library more available to
the citizens of Groton Junction and vicinity. At the
last town-meetins held while we were a part of the
parent town, it was voted " that the books of the
town library be divided, giving to the proposed new
town of Ayer their proportion according to valuation,
and that the selectmen be a committee to act with
the selectmen of the said new town to make said
division."
The action of this meeting never resulted in
any benefit to this town, as the subject of the matter
of the division of the town property was subsequently
arranged on a different basis.
We were, however, not entirely without a library
all these years. About 1862 there was established,
largely through private contributious, a library free
664
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
to all the inhabitanta of School District No. 12. The
books were at one time kept in the White School-
house ; afterwards, while George W. Stuart was li-
brarian, they were kept at his store, and subsequently
at the dwelling-bouse of Samuel K. Merrill.
The great difiSculty in perpetuating this library
was that it was altogether loo free, so much so that
the takers of books felt under no obligations to re-
turn them, and, for want of proper care, they all dis-
appeared within fifteen years from the foundation of
the library.
In 1869 an association known as the Musical and
Literary Club was formed in this village. They gave
a series of entertainments and sustained a course of
lectures, the proceeds of which were devoted to the
purchase of a library. About one hundred dollars
was raised and expended in books, the selection
being made by the following committee, chosen by
the club Feb. 7, 1870: Mifs Lottie E. Hartwell,
Mis. G. C. Brock, Mrs. E. H. Hayward, Mrs. Martha
E. Cooper and Mits Hattie Fletcher, to which was
aiterwaid added Mr. P. C. Lathrop and Benjamin H.
Hartwell. The committee thus chosen reported to
the club, March 28th, that they had performed the
duty assigned to them. March 28, 1871, the library
comuiittee of the club advised "that the club would,
at the town-meeting to be held on the first Monday
in April, present all the books now in its library to
the town, on condition that they would appropriate a
certain sum of money for the purpose of starting a
town library, and ftimish a suitable room and neces-
sary appurtenances for the same."
At a town-meeting held April 3, 1871, it was "voted
that the selectmen be a committee to receive books
thai may be presented to the town, and also to appro-
priate one hundred dollars for books to meet the pro-
posal ol the Literary Club, who have agreed to give
their library to the town of Ayer, it consisting of
about one hundred dollars' worth of books, on con-
dition that the eaid town appropriate the said sum of
one hundred dollars for the addition of books to said
library." Also, " voted that the following trustees be
chosen : Ebenezer C. Willard, three years ; Lewis
Blood, two years ; Oliver K. Pierce, one year." At
the same time Benjamin H. Hartwell gave to the town
for the benefit of the library the sum of $60, to be ex-
pended in the purchase of books.
The fiist librarian of the town was Levi Sherwin,
and the books were kept in his store. In the great
fire of April, 1872, the entire library, with the excep-
tion of such books as were then in circulation (being
about seventy-five in number), was destroyed. After
the fire 136 volumes were added, and the library was
re-opened in G. C. Brock's store, then on Merchant's
Eow. April 10, 1873, the number of volumes in the
library was 554. Mr. Brock acted as librarian for
about a year. He was succeeded by Edwin H. Hay-
wood, and the library was moved to his store in Page's
new brick block, where it was opened in April, 1873. '
He made to the town, in 1874, the first report of the
library, which is as follows:
" The whole number of books in the library, 555,
of which 200 volumes were added one year ago, just
previous of my receiving the books ; 10,444 applica-
tions for books have been made during ten and one-
half months, and those chiefly from a list of less than
100 books, subjecting the books to much wear and
tear ; 89 volumes have not been called for, and 181
less than three times ; have paid for repairing, re-
binding and material for covering. $10.87 ; have col-
lected as fines, $2.40 ; from outside parties, $2; bal-
ance, $6.49 ; received from Lyceum Committee, $40,
to be appropriated for the purchase of books.''
Sept. 23, 1874, Henry C. Rolf and George H. Allen
were appointed trustees. Feb. 20, 1875, the number
of volumes in the library was 681. JIarch, 1875,
Benjamin H. Hartwell was appointed a trustee of the
i library, an office that he has held continuously to the
I present time. In 1880 the number of volumes in the
j library was 1361. Leonard A. Buck was the next
librarian, and by him the library was moved to the
I post-office in Mead Block, where they remained until
I the summer of 1882, when they were transferred to the
; town-house. Aug. 28, 1884, Flora Lucy Bigelow was
1 appointed trustee and librarian. April 1, 1890, the
[ number of books in the library was 2769. The Ayer
I Lyceum has made contributions to the library fund
at different times.
The necessity which the library trustees have al-
ways felt for the necessary funds to equip it with
standard books has been generously met by Frederick
Fanning Ayer, Esq., of New York City, son of the
! late Dr. James Cook Ayer. April 23, 1890, the select-
I men received from Mr. Ayer the following letter:
" New York, April 21, ison.
*' To the Selrctmen of the Town of Aijer, Mttsa.:
"Gentleme.n: — [ desire to conimuuicate with someone who may
represent you or your town with reference to your Public Libmry. I
would like in some way to contribute to the Librar>', or Library Fund,
remembering when 1 was in Ayer that you were not very well supplied
with books. If you will seed some one to New York (at ray expense)
who will represent the interests of the Town in the matter, it w*ill affonl
me much gratification to confer with him.
" 1 bare the honor to remain, Gentlemen,
"Respectfully Yours,
•' V. F. AVEE."
In response to the request contained in the forego-
ing, Dr. Benjamin H. Hartwell, acting under the au-
thority of the selectmen and trustees, visited New York
City, and as the result of the conference wit;h Mr.
Ayer, the following letter was forwarded to the select-
men :
" New Y'oek, April 30, 1890.
" To 'Jte Selectmen of the town of Ayer, Ayer, jUajtBochutetlM :
"Gentlemen: — You are hereby authorized to draw OD me for an
amount not e.\ceeding live thousand dollars for the purchase of books
for^lhe Public Library of the Town of Ayer, a list, or lists of said books
having been first submitted to and approved by me in writing ; all of
buid iHjoks to become and remain the sole and exclusive property of the
Town of Ayer.
" Kespectfully yourB,
AYER.
665
In pursuance of these uegotiationg, the town voted
to transfer the librarj' from the room in the south-
west corner of the Town-House to the east side, taking
for a book-room what had formerly been the pantry,
and buildiDK another reom of equal size, from the
store-room, to be used as a public room for the patrons
of the librarj' ; and at the date of writing the trustees
have in preparation a list of books to be submitted to
Mr. Ayer for his approval.
This offer by Mr. Ayer, coming unexpected as it
did, very properly filled our citizens with gratitude
toward the generous donor. In pursuance of a call
issued by the selectmen, a mass-meeting was held in
the Town Hall, at which the following resolutions
were unanimously adopted:
" Whf-bfab, Frederick F. Ayer, Esq., of New York City, has given to
our towD the sum of S5,00U to be expended in the puicbafie of t>ookB for
the Public Librar}', a euDi that \vlll place it upon a par with that of auy
other town of our size iD the ComnioDWealth ; therefore l>e It
" Uesolced : that we, the Inhabitants of the town of Ayer, in public
meeting aeeeDibled, extend to Mr. Ayer the expression of our full
appreciation and heartfelt thanks for his handsome and timely remem-
brance.
" Rexohed: that for DO other purpose could there be expended a like
sum that would entail so enduringand widespread t>enefits to ourpeople,
nnd su enhance the future well-being and good name of our town.
** Unsolved: that th'S is a munificent act, and u noble and loving trib-
ute to the memory of him whose name our town bears
" Resolved : that it is the sense of this meeting that these resolutions
be spread upon the town records, nnd that a copy with the proceedings
of this meeting be sent to Mr. Ayer."
Water Works. — For a score of years the question
of a system of water works had been under discussion
by this town, but until the summer of 1886 failed to
attract any considerable shareof public attention. In
1877 there was a movement on the part of a committee
of citizens to utilize the pond hole on the town farm,
and September 5, 1877, the town appropriated the sum
of S250 for the purpose of testing its capacity and pur-
ity. In 1880 another move was made ; this time a com-
petent engineer was employed to make surveys and re-
port on the practicability, cost, etc., of a water sys-
tem. This move, however, resulted in nothing more
than the payment by the town of bills incurred
by the committee. In the summer of 1886 a firm of
contractors by the name of Turner, Dillaway & Raw-
son made to the town a proposition to construct
a system of water works in the town, the same to be
managed by them as a private corporation. The sub-
ject of their proposal was brought before the town at a
public meeting held August 26. 1886, an da committee, ,
composed of James R. Gray, Andrew Atwood, George
J. Burns, Leonard J. Spaulding, Edwin H. Hayward,
Ctiarles C. Bennett and Henry C. Sherwin, was
chosen, who reported at a subsequent meeting, recom-
mending that the town construct for itself a system
of water works, and the same committee were author-
ized to petition the Legislature of 1887 for authority
to build the works, and the act authorizing said build-
ing was passed, and approved April 5, 1887. The
act is interesting as being the third passed in this
Commonwealth, in which authority was granted to
take the water of a great pond without being liable
to pay any damages resulting therefrom, " other than
the Commonwealth itself would be legally liable to
pay." The town promptly accepted the provisions of
the act, and elected James R. Gray, Andrew Atwood
and Leonard J. Spauding water commissionerB, under
whose direction the construction of the works was
immediately begun.
In the fall preceding, anticipating the action of the
town, and fearing that there might be a disposition of
property, the gentlemen composing the town commit-
tee purchased, on their own responsibility, the Balch
mill site, which they subsequently conveyed to the
town at the price they paid for it. It was at first pro-
posed to conduct water from Sandy Pond to the vi-
cinity of this mill, by gravity, and from thence to
pump it on to the hill near the poor farm, where the
reservoir was to be constructed ; but these plans were
changed, and a Urge well dug on the Balch meadow
lot. The works were completed and water was start-
ed in the early fall of 1887, since which time the
town has ever congratulated itself on the happy move
It has made ; and the works are rapidly being placed
on a paying basis. The water-power owned by the
town fitrnishes, except in an extraordinary dry sea-
son, sufficient power to operate the pumps; an auxil-
iary steam plant has, however, been added. The water
is of remarkable purity and the natural bead amply
sufficient for fire purposes. Since its introduction the
use of the hand fire-engine has been abandoned, and
two elegant hose carriages purchased, and two hose
companies organized, the " Benjamin H. Hartwell
Hose Company," stationed at the town-house, and
the "Alfred Page Hose Company," stationed at what
was formerly the Hook-and-Ladder Company house,
at the corner of West Main and Park Streets.
CHAPTER LIV.
A YER-( Continued).
IndtutrUa — Ancient ilUU — ManufacUjria — Netetpapert,
As the early settlers of Groton were largely agri-
cultural, and their remoteness from the older settle-
ments so great, that the interchange of their raw pro-
ducts for wrought or manufactured articles was prac-
tically impossible, a public mill at which their corn
could be ground became indispensable. The advant-
ages afforded by the falls of the three brooks, now
within the limits of Ayer, were early appreciated, and
it is probable that mills were erected upon them at
an early day.
The following vote, partly illegible, passed at a
meeting of the proprietors of Groton, on July 21, 1665,
clearly refers to these sites :
"A by vutte d . . . Consent of the town y' noe . . . baue leberty
. . . to take vp any land by way of exchangeor other way vponSaodej
666
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
pond brooke, aod between y' and the raagore brooke and South brooke
till tiuch tim as the niilteB acomodations be layed out."
The pumping station is on SaniJy Pond Brook,
Phelps' Mill upon Major's Brook, and (he Shakers'
Mill and the sites of the old mills at Pingry Village
are upon South Brook.
It is probable that this vote is a reservation of these
lands for the mill purposes. After several attempts to
secure a corn-mill, the proprietors of Groton made an
agreement with John Prescott, of Lancaster, on Sep-
tember 29, 1667, which resulted in the erection of a
mill in the southerly part of the town, now within the
limits of Harvard, on what, from that mill, has since
been known as Mill Brook. The site of the original
mill has until recently been occupied by J. W. Bacon's
glue factory. The contract made with Prescott was
clearly to his advantage, and ihe provision, that his
should be the only public corn-miil within the limitn
of Groton for twenty years, was not calculated to
stimulate a healthy competition in that line of busi-
ness.
The reason for building the mill at iuch a distance
from the centre of the town, and thus rejecting other
equally good if not superior sitea nearer that settlement,
was undoubtedly to enable Pre'-cott to have the ad-
vantage of the patronage of both Groton and Lancas-
ter.
The mill being had, a highway to it became neces-
sary, and this, from its destination, was known as the
" Mill Highway." It subsequen;ly (1673) became the
new Lancaster highway, and is more particularly men-
tioned in another chapter. As the highway passed
near the falls upon Sandy Pond Brook, this site was
made eligible. When a mill was first erected here I
am unable to say. In the inventory of the estate of
John Page, who was the original proprietor of the
land on which the mill, until recently, stood, it ap-
pears that the dam for flowing the meadow, probably
for the purpose of power, was in existence iu 1712.
The first was a saw-mill and continued as such un-
til told by Harvey A. Woods to Joseph and Mehetable
Thompson, on February 25, 1864. The mill and site
were purchased in 1887 by the town of Aver to afford
power for water-works. A brick pumping-station was
erected and the old mili-building torn down. In the
deed of James Patterson to John Sollendine, dated
January 28, 1733, mention is made of a saw-mill on
Coycus Brook. This is the site now occupied by
Phelps' mill. In the deed of Henry Farwell to George
Pierce, dated April 11, 1758, of this property, two
mills are mentioned, and in the advertisement of sale of
Pierce's property, September 27, 1773 (see "Taverns")
one of these mills is described as a saw-mill " new
last year."
On the southeasterly side of the highway to Groton
via Park Street, and near the Groton line, may clearly
be seen the remains of a dam that once converted the
waters of James Brook into power. In the descrip-
tion of the lands of John Farnsworth (Early Records
of Groton, page 182) is "a piece of swamp land lye-
ing betwixt the pond at John Page's saw-mill and
the bridg that goes to Nonicoycus, bounded round by
the towns common land." This entry was made De-
cember 9, 1680, and furnishes undisputable evidence
of the existence of this mill at that early dale. In a
description of the same lands in a deed from John
Farnsworlh to Abraham Moor?, February 5, 1716,
mention is made of Mill Pond, "with three quarters
part of an old saw-mill thereon now standing.'" It
will be observed that it is here called "an old saw-
mill." This is the earliest unmistakable evidence of
a raiJl-site in this town. Upon Pine Meadow Brook
are to be seen the remains of an old dam, and William
Sawteil, who died at' Groton a few years since, has
told me that he could remember traces of the mill
itself. I can, however, find no mention of it in the
early deeds.
About the middle of the last century there was a
grist-mill at Pingry Village, the dam of which may
be seen on the south side of the pre.oent highway via
Rural Home. The mill itself stood on the north side
of South Brook, at the foot of Brown Hill, a short
distance west of the road to Sandy Pond School-house.
Very little is known of its history. It had been abaiid-
oned and was in ruins at the beginning of this cen-
tury. About 1820 Joseph Hartwell built a fulling .tnd
coloring mill on South Brook at I'ingry Vilhige, and
ran it as such about fourteen years, and sold the mill
to Lyman Whitcomb, who changed it into a wood-
working establishment, manufacturing lumber and
shingles, and did some cabinet work. About tive years
later Whitcomb sold the establishment to John
Pingry and Nathaniel Whitemore, who converted it
into a regular saw-mill. In 1852 they sold it to
Charles Snow, who manufactured pencils here until
about 1869, when Mr. Whitemore again became the
owner and subsequently sold it to Levi S. Brighara,
whose property it was when destroyed by fire July
15, 1872. When owned by Hartwell there was an
ell attached, which he occupied as a dwelling-house.
This was subsequently purchased by Phineas Nutting,
who moved it to a lot between there and the Shakers'
saw-mill, where it stood until destroyed by fire a few
years since.
All traces of mill-sites have now disappeared from
Pingrv Village. The dams have been broken down,
and the meadows, once covered by the waters of the
mill-pond, have been drained, and the land reclaimed
for agriculture.
The Shakers' saw-mill, also on South Brook, was
built by the United Society in 1808, and it is the only
mill-site in town still performing under the original
proprietors the work lor which it was originally
built.
The water-power of the Nashua River at Mitchel-
ville, was first utilized by Joshua Longley, of Shirley,
who built a dam here and erected a grist-mill in 1790.
1 The mill was near the highway and directly opposite
AYER.
667
the dwelling-house now owned by John and William
Chisholm. The canal above and below the mill was
constructed by plowing and flowing water over it.
Subsequently Longley built a saw-mill in connection
with the grist-mill. The original buildings were de-
stroyed by the fire at the time the Mitchell Shoddy-
mill was burned on August 4, 1S73. It was through
the influence of Joshua Locgley that the first bridge
was erected over the Nashua River at this point.
What is now the chief mill-sile and water-power at
Mitchellville was first utilized by Whitcomb, Edgar-
ton, Priest & Co., who built here a four-engiue paper-
mill in the early part of this century. This mill was
burned on June 15, 1837. Eli Page, the father of
Thomas H. and Alfred Page, bought the farm and
entire privilege in November, 1839. He rebuilt the
paper-mill in 1841 and 1842, and leased it to Carter
& Wilder, of Lancaster, for the term of twenty years.
Carter, just before he failed, sold the lease to Hollings-
worth, who sold to Stephen Roberts, by whom it was
run until the expiration of the lease, at which time
the mill had so far gone to decay that it had practi-
cally tumbled down. Mr. Page rebuilt the mill in
1862 and shortly after sold it, and the power con-
nected therewith, to John Roberts, by whom it was
operated until it was destroyed by fire on January
5, 1866. Roberts then sold it to a syndicate who
had conceived of the project of bringing the power
up hill into our village. For philosophical reasons
the scheme did not work. In 1871 the privilege was
sold to William Mitchell, who built a handsome,
three-story, brick mill, and engaged in the manufac-
ture of wool-shoddies. The plant was destroyed by
fire on August 4, 1S73. Since that time the privi-
lege has been idle. Had it not been for innumerable
and narrow-minded " ifs," the valuable power that for
seventeen years has run to waste, would have been
utilized for industries that would have added materi-
ally to our prosperity. The mill is now being con-
structed by a firm who propose to manufacture rubber
goods.
The grist and saw-mill was sold by Longley to
Thomas Staples, a noted stage-driver of this section,
who operated there but a short time, and sold to
Whitcomb, Edgarton, Priest & Co. They leased the
power at the grist and saw-mill to Henry P. Howe,
who erected there a machine-shop and manufactured
paper fire-dryers, employing about thirty hands. Mr.
Howe's machine was considered as a great invention,
until superseded by steam drying. Howe remained
here about three years, going from here to Worcester.
The first dam was built by lyongley. This was rebuilt
by Eli Page in 1840, and by the Chisholms a few years
since.
About 1848 Levi Woods purchased the lot of land
now bounded easterly by Union Street, northerly by
West Main and southerly by Shirley Street and built
a bulkhead, preparatory to erecting a mill on Waste
Brook, but the mill was never constructed.
As before stated, the power on Nonaicoicus Brook
was utilized at an early day. Until, however, it was
purchased by the Woods Brothers, the right to flow
the meadows extended only from September to April.
The site was originally used for a saw-mill ; subse-
quently a grist-mill was added. About fifty years
ago it was known as Morse Mill. William W. Ed-
garton at one time manufactured cotton batting here.
But its career was somewhat erratic until purchased
by Woods Brothers. It was then a small building
standing on Shirley Street. In about 1863 a horse-
shoe nail factory was built in conuection with this
mill. This enterprise did not, however, prove a suc-
cess and was soon abandoned. About 1870 Phelps and
Woods erected two large mills extending from Shir-
ley to Main Streets. The mills soon after passed
into the hands of Alfred Page. The northerly mill
was destroyed by fire December 20, 1880, and tbe
southerly half was consumed by the same element
February 25, 1881. The present structure was erected
soon after.
The Stevens Brothers (George and Josiah G.) had
invented what was considered valuable improvements
in turbine water-wheels and barrel and stave machin-
ery, and in 1867 a corporation known as the Stevens
Machine Company was formed here, the stock being
principally taken by local capital. The company
purchased of Harvey A. Woods the lot of land
bounded by Worcester and Nashua Railroad, Groton
and Park Streets, and the land of the Park heirs, and
erected the brick building now a part of the Union
Furniture Company shop. The company, however,
never manufactured, legal objections and contro-
versies arose and after a few years the establishment
was leased to Washington Whitney, who manufac-
tured chairs here for several years, but finally suc-
cumbed to financial embarrassment. He was suc-
ceeded by John Batchelder, who operated the estab-
lishment a short time longer. It was finally closed
as a chair factory in 1871, the machinery and balance
of stock being removed by Phelps & Woods to
their mill. It then remained unoccupied until 1877,
when the establishment was leased to William Smith-
i field Moses, who manufactured chamber furniture
there. It finally passed into the hands of Elijah B.
DolloflT, by whom it was organized as the Union Fur-
niture Company, which was formed with a capital of
$20,000, and by this company it is operated at the
present time.
Plow Shop. — I am indebted to Benjamin F. Taft
for the complete record of this establishment, which
I regret to say has passed into history. It wa^ the
first large manufacturing establishment of our town.
It brought here the most of the first citizens, the men
who shaped whatever destiny we were fortunate
enough to receive. The idea which culminated in
this factory was conceived by Benjamin Martin, who
was born in the village called Quabbin, in the town
of Sutton, where, as a young man, he engaged in the
668
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
manufacture of plow-handles for Buggies, Jfourse &
Mason, of Worcester. These handles were made by
hand, and after the Blanchards, of Warren, Mass., had
invented a machine for turning irregular forms, they
were able to manufacture plow- handles at a much
lower price than Mr. Martin. Mr. Martin was thus
compelled to give up the business in which he had
been engaged, and purchasing of Nourse, of Worces-
ter, and Mason, of Boston, a few plow patterns, he
engaged in the manufacture of plows in Quabbin. He
soon outgrew his facilities in that place and moved
to Blackstone, Mass., where Mr. Farnum, a large
woolen manufacturer, built for him a shop, and here
Martin engaged in the general manufacture of agri-
cultural implements. Here, as at Quabbin, the busi-
ness outgrew the facilities, and looking about for a
place of settlement, he fixed upon Groton Junction
as possessing the desirable facilities for his business.
Abouc that time he a'sociated with Walter Lackey,
of Northbridge. Isaac N. Stone, of Harvard, and the
Fitchburg Railroad Company gave to them a deed of
about ten acres of land, and they employed Morey
Lapham, who designed and built their first shop,
which was 200 feet by 70 feet and two stories high,
with an engine-house, boiler-house, and a forge-shop
100 feet by 50 feet. These buildings were a lasting
monument to the gcod judgment and workmanship
of Mr. Lapham, while they stood. This was in 1850.
After about four years' struggle against the heavy
debts contracted in the construction of their shop,
the general depression of business, and the refusal of
the assistance which Mr. Martin had been promised
when induced to leave Blackstone and locate here,
they suspended, and the property was purchased bv
Mr. H. O. Bean.
Personally, Mr. Martin was a very large man,
weighing from 250 to 300 pounds; always kind,
obliging and seldom without a smile and a kind word
for every one. He and his family were members of
the Baptist Church.
He was a very rapid penman, and his ability in that
direction was only equaled by the utter illegibility of
his correspondence when completed. A 6tory is told
that he wrote to a firm in South Carolina, who sub-
sequently became large customers of his, soliciting
their trade. In due course of mail, his letter was re-
turned with the statement that, judging from the
printed heading of Mr. Martin's letter, they had no
doubt but what they would be able to make arrange-
ments with him for selling his goods, but they were
compelled to depend entirely upon the printed head-
ing, ^ the letter itself was to them entirely unintel-
ligible.
Bean ran the factory until the latter part of 1855,
and made money, but sold to Nourse, Mason &, Com-
pany. This firm, who manufactured plows princi-
pally under the patents of Joel Nourse, who was the
pioneer in the manufacture of cast-iron plows, failed,
and in 1864 the property was sold to Oliver .Vmes
and son, who formed a corporation known as the
Ames Plow Company, by whom the business was
conducted until the removal of the works to Worces-
ter, where it is now being conducted. Nourse, Mason
& Company enlarged the plant by the erection of a
store-house, which was burned in 1871, and what was
subsequently known as the foundry, a building be-
tween the original shop of Thayer & Lackey and the
pond. As its name indicated, this building was con-
structed to be used as a foundry, and was so med for
several years, but this department did not prove
financially successful, and the foundry business was,
after a few years of trial, abandoned. The building
was subsequently occupied by A. H. Caryl, of Groton,
during 1859 and 1860, who here manufactured caloric
engines under Erickson's patents.
In 1874 and 1875, to the great loss of our town, the
company resolved to move their plant to Worcester,
and consolidate it with their shop then in operation at
that place. The first superintendent of the Ames
Plow Company was Aaron Howe, who was succeeded
by Benjamin F. Taft, who remained in charge until
1867, and was succeeded by Joel Garfield.
The business conducted by the company here was
very extensive, a larger part of their manufactured
goods being exported to foreign countries, princi-
pally to Africa. The goods they manufactured were
of a superior order, and the workmen engaged in the
factories were good citizens and skilled mechanics.
In 1863, while under Mr. Taft's management, the
company constructed for the Government the twenty-
three buildings known as Camp Stevens. These were
built ready for occupancy in twelve days from receiv-
ing the order from the government for their construc-
tion— a feat which reflected to the credit of the man-
agement and res'iurces of the company. From the
time that the works were moved to Worcester until
the latter part of 1885 this extensive plant remained
idle ; at the latter date it was hired by the William A.
Beader Glue Company, who equipped it with ma-
chinery and apparatus for the manufacture of bone
glue. The factory, however, did not prove a me-
chanical success and the business proved a decided
nuisance to the citizens of the village.
But there came a lamentable conclusion on the
night of Dec. 2, 1886, when the entire plant, with the
exception of two buildings, was destroyed by fire.
The property has recently been purchased by Levi
W. Phelps, and from him we have reason to believe
that it has a future before it, both of advantage to the
purchaser and to the town.
Tannery.— March 26, 1854, Stephen Dow, of Wo-
burn, purchased of Winthrop E. Faulkner about
eight and one-half acres of land bounded southerly
by Nonaicoicus Brook, easterly by land of Silas Nut-
ting, westerly by the land of the Worcester & Nasliui
Railroad Company, and erected thereupon a small
two-story tannery building at the we^-terly end of
what is now the yard, and with Nathan W. Frye en-
AYER.
669
gaged in busiotss under the style of Dow & Frye.
For the first two years the firm did tanning only. At
the end of that time Charles N. Lund became a part-
ner, and the second floor of Ihe building was occu-
pied as a currying and finishing shop. About a year
later the new currying shop, 110 feet by 40, with an
ell 30 by 40 feet, three stories high, was erected just
north of the original building. About 1859 Stephen
Dow sold his i merest in the business and property to
John B. Alley, who has been identified with the busi-
ness ever since. Mr. Frye conveyed his interest in
the business to his partners in the fall of 1863. April
20, 1867, the currying .'shop, with the principal part of
its contents, and the westerly end of the yard build-
ing, was destroyed by fire. It was immediately re-
built, and in 1882 its capacity and size nearly doubled.
A few years ago Mr. Lund sold his interest in the
business to Griffin Place. It is the oldest and best
established industry in our town, employing at the
present time upwards of one hundred men. Its career
has been so uniformly upward and prosperous that
there is little that can be written about it.
The foundry business was first conducted in this
town by Mr. Nichols, of the firm of Cole & Nichols,
of Lowell, in the building now occupied by Doherty
Brothers, on the easterly side of Tannery Street.
The business not proving successful, operations were
suspended in a few years, and the building remained
unoccupied until it was purchased by David Henius,
who conveyed it to W. R. Hanks, April 3, 1867. Mr.
Hanks operated the business for a short time on a
small scale, the property being conveyed to Calvin D.
Reed in the latter part of 1869. In the fall of 1870
the firm of Briggs & Kelley took possession, and
operated it as partners until their death. While
owned by Briggs & Kelley the capacity of the plant
was more than doubled. Doherty Brothers pur-
chased the property and business of 5Ir. Kelley in
18G7. just before his decease, and in their hands it has
been put upon a paying basis, that it never before
occupied, and it is now one of the best established as
well as best paying industries of our town.
Oneof our best factories is that of the Ayer Furniture
Co., who occupy the northerly half of Phelps' Mill. It
is a corporation, the stock being principally owned by
the workmen, who are nearly all skilled cabinet-mak-
ers. Most of their goods are from their own designs.
They make a specialty of chamber furniture, but do
considerable general store and office furniture work.
Printing Offices and Newspapers.— In the
year 1842 George Henry Brown moved to Groton
Centre from East Bridgewater, Massachusetts, and
opened a printing office in the building occupied on
the first floor by Walter Shattuck, grocery store, and
for awhile was associated in business with Mr. Shat-
tuck. In the fall of 1853 Mr. Brown removed his
printing office to the Junction, and occupied the
room in the northeast corner of the second floor of
what is now Cushing's Block. A short time after-
wards he moved his establishment to Bartlett's Build-
ing, at the south end of Merchant's Row. While in
Groton Mr. Brown began, in June, 1851, the publica-
tion of a monthly paper known as the Oroton Mer-
cury. After coming to the Junction the name was
changed to the Railroad Mercury, and subsequently
to Brown's Railroad Mercury, the first publication
of that paper in this village being number 9, volume
3, and is dated June 2, 1854. The last number of
this publication appeared on June 27, 1857. During
the Fremont campaign, in 1856, Mr. Brown published
three numbers of a campaign paper entitled, Oive 'em
Jessie. General Fremont's wife's name was Jessie,
and the name of the paper and the expression of its
title, which, by the way, is not an uncommon exple-
tive at the present day, took its name from the first
Republican candidate's wife. From September 15,
1859, to September 26, 1861, Mr. Brown published
here the Railroad Mercury, a weekly journal. It is
to be regretted that it gave so little space to local
events. Its columns were generally filled with clip-
pings and reading matter of the magazine order. Its
editorials, however were spicy, fearless and patriotic.
Published, as it was, during the stormy and trying
scenes of 1860 and 1861, its voice was always on the
side of the Union and supported the good cause. Its
advertising columns were exceedingly interesting,
giving us, as they did, a picture of the business of the
village as then carried on.
April 6, 1867, was issued the first number of The Mid-
dlesex Worker, a weekly paper, 34 by 24 inches. It
was edited by Lewis H. Hildreth, whose editorial
rooms were in the northwest corner of the second
floor of Cushing's Block. Like its predecessor, it de-
voted but little space to items of local interest, the
columns being filled with general reading matter.
The paper was printed by Stone & Hewes, in Lowell,
and not proving a financial success it was disposed of
to its printers, and by them merged into the Lowell
Journal, which publication was sent to the subscribers
for the last half of the subscription year.
On May 13, 1869, John Henry Turner, son-in-law
and successor, in the printing business, to Mr. Brown,
began the publication of the Public Spirit. It was
but 11 by 16 inches in size, and contained 12 columns
of reading and advertising matter. It was at first
published for free distribution. After the fifth num-
ber it was called the Weekly Public Spirit, and its size
was increased to 13J by 20 inches, with 16 columns.
With the first number of volume 3 the size was in-
creased to 19 by 27 inches, with 20 columns, and it
was called Groton Public Spirit. Volume 6 saw its
size again increased, this time to 24 columns, with
the title. Turner's Public Spirit, which it still bears.
With volume 11 it became a 28 column paper, and has
lately been enlarged to 32 columns. On August 23,
1884, Mr. Turner began to issue a series of papers,
bearing the names of difierent towns in the north-
western part of Middlesex and the eastern part of
C70
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTr, MASSACHUSETTS.
■Worcester Counties, made up of the same matter as
his Public Spirit, but with different headings. Mr.
Turner's paper has rapidly increased in circulation.
The publication of the Public Spirit began in a
room in the rear on the first floor of Union Hall
Building. In July, 1871, Mr. Turner purchased of
Baker his present building, which at that time was
standing on what is now the vacant lot between the
Hildreth Block and the American House Building,
on Merchant's Row. In April, 1878, the building
was moved on to its presenL lot, on Main Street.
With the exception of two interruptions by fire, Mr.
Turner's paper has appeared regularly since its
birth.
In 1879 William M. Sargent began the publication
of The Ayer Sentinel. He at that time occupied the
second floor of Prescott'.i Building, then standing in
Railroad Square, just west of the brick freight-house.
This paper was published about three years. In 1880
Mr. Sargent removed his printing office to Fitchburg,
and from that time until its publication was discon-
tinued The Ayer Sentinel was printed in that place.
Mr. Sargent subsequently purchased the book-bindery
business of W. B. Lewis, of this town, and is now en-
gaged in an extensive business here.
In 1885 we were honored, if honor it be, by the
presence of another editor's sanctum, this time the
Junction Journal, published by Clough & Shepard,
whose ofiice was at first on the third floor of Spauld-
ing's Block, subsequently in Stone's Block. The life
of this journal, however, was brief, and it expired
before reaching its first birthday.
Several publications of local papers have given us
the credit of issuing a special edition of their publi-
cations bearing our name, the most prominent of
which is the Ayer Express, published by Pratt \
Brothers, of Marlborough. It is still in existence and i
devotes considerable space to the discussion of Ayer j
local event.?.
CHAPTER LV.
A YER—( Continued).
Beligioug Socittiea — BapUilt-^Unitarian — Caiholic — CoitgregativnalUt —
Methodist.
The first organized religious meetings in South
Groton of which we have any knowledge were those
of the Advents, who, under the leadership of a some-
what erratic character, held semi-occasional meetings
in the little brick school-house on Main Street. At
the outset they gave promise of great as well as dis-
astrous things in the future, among which was to be
the publication of a periodical devoted to the ad-
vocacy of that particular creed. Several numbers of
this paper were printed at Brattleboro', Vt., and
distributed from this village. The successes of the
organization did not materialize. Its last meetings
were held about 1850. There were several attempted
revivals since that time. In the summer of 1871 a
tent was pitched on the circus grounds on Main
Street, where preaching was had for two weeks. In
the fall of the same year there was occasional preach-
ing in Jenkins and Wright's Hall, on West Street.
Of the existing religious societies, the Baptists are
entitled to the credit of being the first to organize.
Until recently it has been the general belief that the
South Groton Christian Union, subsequently the
Unitarian Society, was the pioneer in that field.
September 13, 1863, Rev. George H. Allen, then
pastor of the Baptist Church, in an address before
the Wachusett Baptist Association in South Gardner,
gave a historical sketch of his church, that is so com-
plete that I have here made liberal abstracts from it.
The following is the preface to the church records :
'* Soiitli Groron, June 10,1851. GikJ, in bi« Providence, having
opened a duor fv>r Biiptist preacliin^ in Soutti Groton. the meetingij have
been well attended, a good degree of interest manifested and the pros-
pect u[ future usfuine^s under the divine blessing, cncuurnpiog : the
bretliren and sigtere desiring to see the btandard of tlie cross perma-
nently erected, met at the house of brother Audrew Gardner, on Tues-
day, June loth, to take into consideration tiie forniing of u churcli iu
tbia place."
The church was organized the following week
on the historic 17th of June, by the joint ac-
ceptance of statements of doctrine in harmony with
Baptist views, and a covenant, and was publicly rec-
ognized July 2d by an ecclesiastical council con-
sisting of delegates from the Baptist Churches in
Groton, Harvard and Littleton. The following is a
list of the constituent members : John Pingry,
Eunice Pingry, Andrew Gardner, Eliza Gardner,
Oliver Pierce, Elizabeth Pierce, Joseph Barden, Anna
.-Vmes, L. Felch, Sarah T. Nutting, Andrew W. Felch,
Mary A. Pingry, David A. Smith, Eliza A. Pingry,
Mercy Blauey.
At first they met at such places as afforded them
an open door. As we have seen, they organized iu
the house of Andrew B. Gardner, which at that time
was at the corner of Main and Newton Streets, where
the Unitarian Church edifice now stands. Subse-
quently they worshiped in the railroad depot, and
with the permission of the town of Groton, they, for
a short time, occupied the brick school-house. Later,
Deacon John Pingry moved from Littleton the build-
ing which formed the nucleus of the present Union
House. The second floor was finished into a hall, and
here the society worshiped for a considerable time.
The present church edifice, which was built by Morey
Lapham, was dedicated in the spring of 1856. In
the spring of 1878 an addition was made to the build-
ing to provide suitable rooms for social meetings. The
meeting-house was dedicated during the pastorate of
Rev. J. .M. Chick, who was instrumental in securing
a part of the funds therefor. Deacon John Pingry
contributed largely, the lot of land upon which the
building was erected being his gift. The bell was
ATER.
671
put in the belfry in the summer of 1872. The first
clert was David A. Smith.
The following have been deacons in the church
since its organization : John Pingry, Divici A.Smith,
Samuel A. Childs, Walter Wright and Robert N.
Kendall, the two latter being now in office. Before
the formation of the church Rev. Amasa Sanderson,
then pastor of the Baptiat Church in Groton, preached
here quite regularly.
The first pastor, Rev. Jonathan Guild, was called
January 13,1852, and was ordained on the 29th of the
following September, and resigned May 15th of the
next year. Shortly after. Rev. G. D. Crocker began
his labors, and, although no formp.l call appears on the
records of the church, he did the work of a pastor for
about a year. He was succeeded by Rev. J. M. Chick
who accepted a call October 1, 1854, entering at once
upon his labors and continuing them until June 7,
1857. At ihe time the church was dedicated it had
an indebtedness of about $1900, which was secured
by a mortgage on the property. After about a year
Rev. George B. Gow, from Newton Theological Semi-
nary, accepted a call and was ordained September 28,
1858. His pastorate terminated in July, 1861. In
March, 1862, Rev. Frank Rogers Morse assumed the
pastorate and was ordained on the 6th day of July
following, and June 20th of the following year he re-
signed. For an interim of about nine months
between this and the succeeding pastorate. Rev.
James B. Donovan and Rev. Eleazer Robbins offici-
ated. In January, 1865, Rev. C. A. Skinner became
pastor, with the understanding that he would also
become agent for the liquidation of their indebted-
ness. This seems to have been accomplished shortly,
as under the date of June 27th, following, a vote of
thanks to Mr. Skinner is recorded as having been
passed on account of this service. Ou the last day of
this year (1865) a call was extended to Rev. W. P.
Upham, who began his labors and served until June
27, 1867. Then after a lapse of more than a year.
Rev. E. H. Page began his labors. He came August
16, 1868, and his resignation is dated May 12, 1870,
October 31, 1870, Rev. J. S. Harradon became the
pastor and officiated until May 1, 1873. Reverend
George H. Allen was the next pastor. Hit service
was the longest in the history of the church, as he
officiated until the fall of 1885. During his service
he was one of our most prominent and respected citi-
zens. Since Mr. Allen, Rev. Enoch Sweet and S. P.
Everett, the present incumbent, have been pastors.
Unitaeiak Society. — February 1, 1885, Rev.
Lyman Ciark, then pastor of the First Unitarian
Parish of this town, delivered before the society a
historical discourse so complete in its details and cor-
rect in its narrative of events that I have here
depended largely upon it for the following sketch of
this society.
September 28, 1853, a circular sheet was issued in
behalf of an association formed to erect a chapel for
worship, and from this circular we learn that Rev. J.
Cooper had issued a call for a meeting " for the pur-
pose of taking into conBideration the subject of build-
ing a meeting-house or chapel, and attending to other
business mentioned in the call." Articles of associa-
tion were adopted, the preamble to which declares
that " This meeting, being desirous of promoting the
glory of God and the spiritual interest of our feUow-
men, we deem it expedient to erect a meetiog-house
at South Groton, to be known by the name of the
South Groton Chapel, for which purpose this meeting
has been called together, and the following resolutions
or Articles had been prepared, and are now submitted
for its consideration." After the adoption of the
preamble and articles of building association, Nathan-
iel Stone, Calvin Fletcher, Robert Woods, David
Chambers and Walter Lackey were chosen a com-
mittee to procure a site; Rev. J. Cooper, Calvin
Fletcher, Robert Woods, David Chambers and Ebe-
nezer Willis were chosen a building committee; Ben-
jamin Felch was chosen collector and CalviU Fletcher
treasurer.
Rev. J. Cooper came to this village as a Methodist,
but sought and obtained recognition as a Trinitarian
Congregationalist. His labors came to an early
close. But the movement in favor of a chapel went
forward, and it was finished in the spring of 1855. A
church organization was effected on the 12th of the
following August, by the adoption of the covenant
of the "South Groton Christian Union," which was
written by Rev. David Fosdick, who preached here
after the departure of Mr. Cooper. The chapel built,
church society organized, a formal dedication of the
house of worship took place on the 5th of September,
1855. This chapel, which was known as the W^hite
Church, stood upon the easterly half of what is now
the town-house lot. For a more particular descrip-
tion of its appearance, reference is hereby had to the
fires. Mr. Fosdick was chosen pastor of the Union
Society on August 27, 1855, and his ministry con-
tinued until July 1, 1860. He was succeeded by Rev.
William A. Start, a graduate of Tufts College, in the
class of 1862, who took charge of this society March
1, 1861, and was ordained and installed on September
4, 1862. Mr. Start resigned April 30, 1863. Rev. Mr.
Wtiitney officiated for a time. He was followed by
Rev. Josiah K. Waite, who was installed on May 24,
1865. In the year 1867, owing to a refusal of the
church to settle a colleague, Mr. Waite resigned. The
fourth pastor was Rev. Crawford Nightingale, who
was born at Providence, R. I., November 3, 1816, be-
ing a son of Samuel Nightingale and Elizabeth Kin-
nicutt Nightingale, nie Tompson. He attended a pri-
vate school at Providence, entered Krown University
September, 1830, graduating in 1834 ; prepared for
the ministry at Cambridge, 1835-38. He was ordained
at Providence, November, 1838. He subsequently
served in the ministry at Charlemont, Heath, Shel-
burne and Greenfield, Mass., followed by service as
672
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
minister-at-large at Lowell, and pastorates at Chico-
pee and Athol. Mr. Nightingale was invited to the
pastorate by a vote of the society, October 12, 1867,
and was installed April 8, 1868, and it was during his
pastorate that the church edifice was destroyed in the
great fire of March, 1872.
A meeting of the society was called Saturday even-
ing, March 2, 1872. The chief item of business
appears to have been, — " to take into consideration
repairing, remodeling and enlarging the church, the
building of a vestry room and any other rooms that
may be thought desirable for the benefit and conve-
nience of the society." The meeting adjourned until
April 13th. A committee was then chosen to consider
and report upon the necessary repairs. The commit-
tee apparently not ready to report, further adjourn-
ment was ordered for two weeks. Before the light of
another morning the building, with forty others in the
village, were in ashes. With liberal courtesy, the Or-
thodox Congregational Society offered the use of their
church. Supt. C. L. Heywood, in behalf of the Fitch-
burg Railroad Company, offered the use of the restau-
rant, where an informal meeting was held Saturday
evening after the fire. Thanks of the society for cour-
tesy received were duly expressed, and a committee
chosen to solicit aid in building a new church. That
committee consisted of Rev. Crawford Nightingale,
Robert P. Woods, Abel Prescott, Pembroke S. Rich,
Abel L. Lawton and Henry A. Woods. The offer for
the use of the refreshment-room for religious pur-
poses was accepted, and one service maintained ; this,
apparently, being the beginning of one preaching
service on Sunday instead of two. A committee on
location and plan of building, consisting of Rev. Craw-
ft)rd Nightingale, Levi W. Phelps and Abel L. Lawton,
was chosen. This meeting being informal, a second
one was called in due form to ratify the action taken,
the notice being posted up on an oak tree, which re-
mained upon the lot near where the church stood, and
upon the door of the refreshment-room at the station
where the society worshiped. Subsequently the so-
ciety worshiped in a hall in the new building of
Harvey A. Woods, on Main Street, on site of
Filiebrown building. In due time the stately
and beautiful church edifice, designed by Messrs.
Earle & Fuller, of Worcester, architects, and built by
Messrs. Henry C. Sherwin and Charles F. William-
son, was erected on land purchased of Mary A. W.
Champney and George H. Champney. The vestry
was first occupied for worship, the auditorium being
without pews or organ, which were provided later,
largely through the efficient labors of John E. Hos-
mer. The church was dedicated September 1, 1875.
Mr. Nightingale tendered his resignation, to take
effect April 1, 1878, having served as minister of the
society for ten years. His pastorate, the longest of
this society, was a tribute to hia ability and courteous
disposition which won a large measure of friendship,
which is still felt by people of the parish and town.
Rev. Alfred Everett Goodnough, the fifth pastor,
was born at Moatpelier, Vermont, April 10, 1855, and
graduated from the Meadville Theological School in
1878, subsequently taking a post-graduate course at
the Harvard Divinity School. Mr. Goodnough as-
sumed the charge of the church June, 1878, and was
ordained as pastor on September 11th of that year.
His pastorate closed in July, 1879.
The sixth pastor was Rev. Rushton D. Burr. His
labors began April 1, 1880, and continued two years.
Rev. Lyman Clark was the seventh pastor. He
was bora December .30, 1838, near the town of Bu-
channon, Upshur County, West Virginia. He was
the son of Cornelius Clark, born at Bridgewater,
Massachusetts, and Abagail Clark, n^e Wright, born
at Westford, Massachusetts. He attended private
schools in West Virginia, and after the removal of the
family to Illinois he enlisted in the Fifth Illinois
Volunteer Cavalry in 1861, serving mo'e than four
years in the successive grades of sergeant, second lieu-
tenant and captain. He entered the Meadville The-
ological School in 1865, graduating in 1869. On June
11, 1872, he married Isabel Clough at Bethel, Maine.
He began his pastoral labors in Aver on the first
Sunday of September, 1882. The installation ser-
vice was delayed, for the purpose of first removing the
indebtedness of the society on account of the church
edifice, until March 7, 1884.
The Unitarian name was first taken November 1,
1864, the form of the name having been altered sev-
eral times. It was first the "South Groton Christian
Union," this name being taken in 1855. In 1862 the
name " Union Society " was chosen. Two years later
the name " Unitarian Society" was taken, which was
further amended in 1867 so as to read " The First Con-
gregational Unitarian Society," the name at the pres-
ent time being the "' First Unitarian Parish of Ayer."
By act of Legislature pa3sed in the year 1886, the
latter name was ratified, and all acts and proceedings
of the society under the former names were con-
firmed.
The church organization within the parish began
with the pastorate of Rev. Rushton D. Burr, previous
to that time one organization representing both church
and parish. The records of the Sunday-school are
found to begin with the year 1862.
Catholics.— A Cif hoi ic -Mission was first established
in this village about 1855, and was supplied by priests
from the Fitchburg Parish, of which it formed a part.
At first services were held in private houses, princi-
pally in that of Bartholomew MaCarty, on the wes-
terly side of Washington Street, and occasionally in
the house of John McGuane, on the southerly side of
the old Shirley road, now owned by Michael Shea.
The Mission at several limes worshiped in the grove
on the south side of the Fitchburg Railroad, near
Scully's Crossing, and several times in the woods in
the vicinity of what is now the Catholic Cemetery.
Subsequently the Mission occupied, for about a year.
ATER.
673
Pingry's Hall, now the Union House. This was their
first established place of worship.
The first priests were two brothers, Edward and
and Timothy Turpin. of the Fitchburg Parish. The
first church edifice was erected by Thomas H. and
Alfred Page in 1858, on the lot on the southerly side
of West Main Street, now occupied by the jjarochial
school buildine. It was a small, plain structure, and
was subsequently moved on to the church loi on Shir-
ley Street, where it is now occupied as the stable of
the parsonage. Charles Foley was the first settled
priest of the Parish of St. Mary, which included with
Ayer the towns of Groton, Pepperell, Townseud, Lit-
tlet<jn, Harvard and Shirley. Father Foley was suc-
ceeded by Father Moran.
In December, 1SG7, Joseph Nicholas Barrata came
here from Richmond, Virginia, where had been set-
tled during the War of the Rebellion, and was or-
dained priest. He was a native of Italy, and a man
of great energy and superior business tact. He imme-
The church was organized by an ecclesiastical
council, September 5, 1861, under the name of the
"South Groton Orthodox Congregational Church."
It was subsequently called the " First Congregational
Church of Ayer." Until recently it was, like other
churches, connected with the parish, which took for
its name " The Union Orthodox Congregational So-
ciety of Groton Junction," In 18G7 the parish voted
that the word " Union " be dropped from its name.
In 1887 the parish voted to transfer its property to
the church. These changes in its name being with-
out any legal authority, the Legislature of 1887 was
appealed to to legalize its doings under a different
name, and to confirm the name which it then bore, and
a special act was passed for its relief.
The preliminary steps which resulted in the organ-
ization of this church were taken in the spring of
IStU. Of the meetings, one of the early, if not the
earliest meetings, the parish record states, that
about April 1, 1861, the members of the Congrega-
dialely set about to erect a more commodious church i tional and other Christian Churches, also individuals
edifice. He purchased of A. H. FullertheShirley Street favorable and desirous of establishing a Church and
lot, and built thereon the second church building ol Society of Congregational sentiments and belief in
the parish, which was completed and dedicated on this place, invited the Rev. Mr. Mann to preach to
Sunday, December 4, 1870, Archbishop Williams offi-
ciating. He also erected the present parsonage.
The second church edifice stood where the new
church now is, and faced east. It is now the paro-
chial school building on West Main Street. During
them a few Sabbaths to ascertain the feelings of the
community in regard to the above object."
The encouragement seems to have been good, for at
a meeting held at Union Hall, May 6, 1861, a com-
mittee was appointed to prepare Articles of Agree-
Father Baratta's pastorate the parish was increased to j ment that should govern this new company of wor
3000. He also built a new church at Pepperell (St. i shipers. The form proposed and approved and the
Joseph's), which was dedicated December 4, 1870, and i signatures affixed areas follows:
took steps to erect another in Townsend, imrchasing „ , , , , u . , • . ■■
a lot of land there for that purpose. The increased j ,o,|,,ucietj, to UBCHM,rdtiioSuiitii croion orthodox ikjncregoiioniii s>-
labor was so great that Father Baratta was obliged to ' citty, for lUe suppurt or public «orehip id Souiii Groi.iD, so caiie.i, uu<i
ask leave of absence, when he visited Europe to '^ ''" »"" f"''""" "" »>»t.er, a„d tu.np, Mec«Kar.v .nd pro^r for a
recuperate his health. During his absence, Michael
J. McCall, now located at Cnncord, Massachusetts,
occupied his position. December 12, 1870, Arch-
bishop Williams appointed Joseph .Mohan to the past-
orate, with Rev. ^Viiliam F. Riordan, assistant pas-
tor, who remained here until January, 1879. In
April, lS8ti, Henry J. Madden was ap[iointed to the
pastorate, and while it was under his charge the
beautil'ul clnircli edifice, that is such a commanding
object in the westerly part of our village, was built.
Father Madden left here to take charge of the Parish
at Pepperell, which uji to that time had been a mis-
sion, where he is now settled. He was succeeded by
John H. Flemming, who officiated until June, 189(i.
The present i>astor is Patrick J. Sheedy, recently of
Bridgewater.
CoNGKF.GATluNAL SOCIETY. — The fourth religious
society organized in this town was the Congregational.
In 1.S87 Rev. Alfred S. Hudson, then its pastor, com-
piled a pamphlet of lo6 pages, which was published
bv the church, containing a very interesting history
of that organization. With the author's permission,
I have largely followed it in these pages.
43-ii
I Relitiioui^ society, until weelmll Iwcoiue organized ati u repulai 'orpor-
I ate Sticiety.
\ "lu wltn«w< wLereof ue hnve bereunto r«t our bnoilp. ttui^Eixth day
I of May, in tbi- year of our Lord one tbousund eiRlil liundred audbixty-
j one, —
'■.lease Whiting, .leliiel Todd, Daniel Li^ermfl^e. I'aiiiel (,. Waters,
; WilJiaui I. Goulding, Nathan W. Frye.B. V. Taft, Williani H. Harlow,
' Levi Wall.ice, J. H. Gibsou, F.d«iu \V. Taft. T. H. Heald, E. H. Saw-
I tell. 1. C. Liti-hfield, Joel Garlield, N. G. Pierce, B. L. Howe, Charles
I Liveiuiore. Blowrr Laphaui, Sylveater P. Cutler."
But three of the original members are now linng
! in Ayer. Shortly after this the organization of the
: church was eflected. At the time of the organization
twenty members united, of whom but three are present
resident members. The following have served as dea-
cons of the church : Daniel Livermore, Jehiel Todd,
Simeon Burt, John F. Robbins, Charles Brown, Isaac
Hovey, Harrison Dexter Ewins, Edwin Hobart Hay-
ward and Henry McGreggor. Nine persons have
acted as pastors of the church : Rev. E. P. Tenney,
acting |)astor, began service November I, 1801 ; Rev.
Daniel M. Bean, installed July 23, 1863, dismissed
1804 ; Rev. E. C. St«bbins, installed October 25, 1804,
dismissed April 10, 1867 ; Rev. Daniel Phillips, acting
pastor, 1860 to December 31, 1868 ; Rev. Samuel Bell,
674
HISTORY OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, :\IAPSACHUSETTS.
installed September 1, 1869, dismissed October 4,
1870 ; Rev. F. J. Fairbanks, installed January 1. 1872,
dismissed January 1, 1874; Rev. Horace Parker, act-
ing pastor, January 25, 1874, to May 6, 1877; Rev.
De Forest B. Dodge, acting pastor, February, 1878, to
July 31,1878 (closed his labors on account oC ill-health):
Rev. Henry M. Holmes, acting pastor, December 8,
1878, to 1882; Rev. A. S. Hudson, acting pastor, No-
vember 1, 1882, still officiating.
Since the formation of the church nearly two hun-
dred members have belonged to it, the greatest acces-
sion at any one time being twenty. Formerly two
sermons were preached on the Sabbath, but latterly
there has been but one.
The first services of this .society were held in Union
Hall, then standing at the southerly end of Merchant's
Row, where the American House now is. An early
movement was made for the erection of a house of
worship. November 8, 1864, a committee was ap-
pointed to procure a building lot, and they purchased
the one on which the present church edifice stands.
April 2, 18(i6, a building committee was constituted,
as follows: JohnSpaulding, Daniel G. Waters, Simeon
Burt, Joel Garfield. The corner-stone of the new
edifice was laid April 16, 1867, by the Middlesex
Union Conference. Rev. Dr. Hooker, secretary of the
Massachusetts Home Missionary Society, assisting in
the service. The house was built by Daniel G.
Waters, and cost, with its furnishings, about sSOOO.
The house was dedicated September 1, 1867. The
pews came from the Universalist Church at Harvard.
Its bell has an interesting history ; it was purchased
in 1872 of a society in Fitchburg, who worshiped in
the building now used as the post-office. From the
inscription upon it and the rumors connected with it
at the time it was purchased, it was supposed that at
onetime it had done service upon some plantation in
the South, and in consequence the following letter was
sent to the Xew Orleans Picayune and copied quite
extensively in the papers in the South:
".\VER, Mi6S., July 15, ISS7.
" Mr. Editor : — The late coDtroversy between General Butler .luii the
W*i^hi»gton Pott respecting tbe New Orleans bell8, calls to my atlentiuu.
tbat on each Sabbath morning there peals forth in our quiet New Eng
land village the eunorous tones of one of tlieae relics of our late uu-
pleasantness. Coining anions us at a time when there was a satiety of
thingB militant, it setlletl into its new resting-place without exciting a
curiosity as to its early history. But aa we recede from that i;reftt drama
every act and thing associated with it iiiomenlai'ily growR in interest.
"Tbe bell in question weighs aUmt eight hundred [joiinds. tpunone
side in relief are the words " D. D. Beaviti, Plains. Miss., 18-'>6," and
around tbe top, " Cast by G. W. Cortin .C Co., Buckeye Foundry, i 'in-
cinnatt, 1856."
'* It may interest its former owners aud aote.belluni ai-quaititaiices to
know its present resting-place, m it would the writer to know its earlv
history. (;eo. J. Bt'Rss."
In a short time a pleasant correspandence was
opened with the Beavin family, of which two mem-
bers are now still residing upon the old homestead.
Mr. Beavin, whose name is inscribed upon the bell,
went to Mississippi from Maryland in 1840 and was
employed by the proprietor of Plains Plantation,
Mr. David Hunt, as manager. In 1854 he became
its owner. It was named the Plains probably on ac-
count of the level character of its land. It contained
about 1400 acres, and at the breaking out of the war
had in the neighborhood of one hundred and twenty-
five slaves. Mr. Beavin died a short time after the
breaking out of the Rebellion. During the war the
plantation, being off the traveled road, sutiered little
molestation. When there came a demand for ma-
terial from which to cast cannon for the use of the
Confederacy, the executors of Mr. Beavin's estate,
without any legal authority forso doing, sent the bell
to New Orleans, and with others, collected from difl'er-
ent places, it was in the public square, preparatory to
being sent to the foundry. At that time the city fell
into the hands of the National forces, and General
Butler confiscated the bells and sent them north,
where they were disposed of in different parts of tbe
ciiuntry. The hell was teamed from the plantation
to the river lauding by au nld slave, Uncle John Hed-
deri, who continued to reside in the family until the
time of his death, September 24. ISsVi.
.Methodist SoiiETY. — The Methodist people were
among the first tn hold religious services at Groton
Junction. Rev. J. (Jooper. at the time of his advent
in this village, proclaimed himself of this denomina-
tion. On May 28, 186',i, Rev. Abraham D. Sargent
colleited < lliver B. Kichardson, Abbie W. Swan,
.fennie L. Barber, jirobationers ; and Jabez Bigelow,
.Mary Johnson, Abbie A. Farrier, Luke Farnsworth
and George Little, members, and organized them into
the Ayer Alethodist Episcopal (.'hurch.
Since that time ninety-nine probationers have given
their names to the church, and 232 have been re-
ceived in full connection. The following have been
pastors of the church at difi'erent times, but I regret
that I am unable to give the dates between which
each of them served: Abraham D. Sargent, G. W.
H. Clark, ^Ir. Hannah, William E. Baird, Erastus
Burlingham, Mr. Canney, N. F. Penney, Nathan D.
George, George E. Sanderson, Samuel N. Noon,
Increase B. Bigelow, Ichabod Marsey, Herbert <.t.
Buckingham, Albert R. Archibald, Frederick W.
Hart, Albert H. Bennett, Edward P. F. Dearborn,
Cassius C. Whidden.
Like several other religious societies, the first ser-
vices were held in private houses of the members.
For a short time the society worshiped in the engine-
house hall on the northerly side of Main Street, which
was destroyed in the tire of October '31, 1869. They
afterward worshiped in Union Hall, and subse-
quently in Page's Hall. In 1676-77 the society oc-
cupied the District Court room as a place of worship
and afterward the lower Town Hall.
Moves looking towards the erection of a house of
worship were made at different times. At one time
the lot of S. Wilson Smith, at the comer of Main and
School Streets, was under consideration for a site.
In 1886 these efforts culminated in success. A lot at
AYER.
675
the corner of Newton and Columbia streets, at the
rear of the Town House, was secured, and Tuesday
evening, May 17, 1887, the corner-stone of the new
edifice was laid. The exercises were conducted in
the Town Hall, at which prominent citizens and the
pastors of the difi'erent churches participated. The
address was delivered by G. S. Chadbourne, D.D., at
the close of which the audience and speakers repaired
to the church site, and amidst impressive ceremonies
the corner-stone of the new edifice was laid. The
new house of worship was constructed under the per-
sonal supervision of Otis S. Flanders, of Martha's
Vineyard, the architect of the building, the cost of
which was rising of five thousand dollars. The new
house w:is completed in October, 1887, and dedicated
on October 12th, Lewis B. Butts, D.D., officiating. It
is built with a basement containing a convenient
vestry and other accommodations for the Sunday-
school and social work. The audience-room is fur-
nished with comfortable j)ews and carpeted through-
out and With its stained windows presents a very at-
tractive appearance.
CHAPTER LVI.
AYER— i Coil linuedt.
f'li-ft. <ifi'( Fir- O'Hiftonte'.
Believin<; it is the duty of the historian to record
his observations and recollections a.s well as to
research, I will ofl'er no apology for whatever there
may be in these pages within the recollection of the
reader. I believe there is nothing that has a more
proper place iu the history of a community than the
conflagrations by which its physical appearance is
changed and oftentimes the whole channel of its ex-
istence is diverted. I have here given place to only
such tires us have resulted in substantial destruction
of property, and have purposely omitted many where
the damage resulting was slight.
AVe are nothing if not combustible. The first con-
flagration of which we have any information was the
burning <>( the girrison-house of Major Simon Willard
by the Indians in 167C. As has been elsewhere
stated, this building stood u|ion what is now known
as " The Plains,'' west of the Boston and Maine Rail-
road and near the Harvard line. It was the first
Groton house destroyed in King Philip's War.
In 17(50 a school-house in the southerly part of
Groton was burned. I am unable to state where it
stood or whether it was in the limits of our village.
In the sjtring of IS'M Jesse Stone's tavern, then
standing where James Gilson's dwelling house now is,
was burned. For further particulars concerning this
building and its history, see " Taverns."
June 15, 1837, the paper-mill of Edgarton, Priest
and Company, on the Nashua River, at what is now
known as Mitchellville, was destroyed by fire with
all its contents, including several tons of finished
paper. John M. Sberwin, one of the operatives in
i the mill, fell a victim to the conflagration.
I About 1850 the school-house in Sandy Pond Dis-
trict was burned. It was a brick building, and when
rebuilt the following season, the original walls were
used. This building was torn down in 1870 to give
place to the present structure.
At November meeting, 1855, Stuart J. Park, Luther
Page, Samuel W. Rowe, Hibbard P. Ross, Oliver
Wentworth and Ezra Farnsworth were chosen a com-
mittee to take into consideration the advisability of
purchasing a fire-engine to be stationed at Groton
Junction, but, like the majority of such references, it
came to naught.
At March meeting, 1858, the attempt was repeated.
A new committee was chosen, of which Marshall
Frye and Hibbard P. Ross were members, but, like
its predecessors, was unable to accomplish its object.
At November meeting, 1859, another attempt was
made, but the article was indefinitely postponed.
January 5, 1860, a fire caught around the chimney
in the attic of the Haynes house, on the easterly side
of Washington Street, now owned by George V. Bar-
rett. It was extinguished with pails, the principal
damage being by water. At this time there was no
organized Fire Department in town, and to this fire is
due the agitation which resulted in our first Fire De-
partment, and ultimately in the procuring of a fire-
engine. The Rnilroad Mercury is authority for the
statement that the Haynes fire was the first con-
flagration in our village. It is, however, claimed by
some that the house owned by Hiram P. Ross, then
standing on the westerly side of Forrest Street, and
at the time of its destruction occupied by Warren
Eastman, was the first fire in the village. It is
certain that this and the Haynes fire occurred about
the same time.
At March meeting, 1880. a motion to appropriate
S600 for a fire-engine at Groton Junction was lost,
and the same fate met an attempt to get an ap-
propriation of S800 at the April meeting.
The first considerable fire in our village was the
burning of Alden Lawrence's stable, in the spring of
18*51. This building stood in the rear of what is now
Page's Block, between Washington and Pleasant
Streets, and was built by David Chambers, and at the
time it was burned it was owned by Thomas H. and
Alfred Page, and occupied by Alden Lawrence.
Seven horses were burnt in this fire.
About this time the first Fire Department was
organized, of which Morey Lapham was fire-warden.
As perseverance conquers all things, the town of
Groton was finally induced to make an appropriation
for a fire-engine for the junction, the committee ap-
pointed being N. W. Frye, C. H. Waters and B. F.
Taft. The first fire-engine stationed at this village
was the " Massasoit," that had seen all the service it
676
HISTOKr OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 5IASSACHUSETTS.
was capable of performing, before being purchased
by the town of Groton. It was ii cumbersome, un-
wieldy tub, and utterly incapable of coping with a
fire of any magnitude. It was first stationed in ;i
building erected for it on the south side of Main
Street, on the lot now owned by Leonard J. Spauld-
ing, and subsequently, with the Hook and Ladder
truck, occupied the first floor of the town-building
opposite, the original building being purchased by
Charles J. Frye and moved on to his lot on the west
side of tiehool Street, between Prospect and Grove
Streets, where it was for several years used as a junk-
shop.
In the winter of 1860-i)l Albert Worcester built,
at the corner of West Main and Shirley Streets, a
building first used as a liquor otore, and subsei|uentiy
changed by him into a hotel, which became pofiu-
larly known as the " Break o'Day House." There
was a stable in the rear that had formerly stood
where Mead's Block now is. The store was at one
time occupied by Brigham & Worcester, aiitl the
hall overhead was occupied by a temperance society
and Caleb Butler Lodge of Masons. In 18i)4 Worces-
ter sold the building and land to Reed & Cliunli,
and while owned by them, it was, on the evening of
April 9, 1864, destroyed by fire. It would probably
have been saved, had it not been for an accident
caused by a stone getting into the suction-hose of the
fire-engine, which utterly disabled it for use during
the fire. At the same time an attempt was made to
burn the mill of Phelps & Woods.
Cam[) Stevens ceaised to be used by the Govern-
ment in the fall of 186.3, and the ne.'ct season several
of the buildings were destroyed by fire.
In the late fall or early winter of IHi'A the large
livery stable standing ou what is now the Jlead lot,
on the northerly side of Main Street, was burned,
with its contents, consisting of nine horses, a large
number of carriages, harnesses and a quantity of hay.
This building was originally erected by a Mr. Brig-
ham, and was, at one time, owntd and occupied as a
livery stable by Albert Worcester. It stood back
from the street about fifteen or twenty feet farther
than the present line of buildings, and was large and
well-constructed. Opposite it was the Hag-stafl' of
the Democratic Club, erected during the Douglas
campaign of 1860. The large flag was flown from
the statf to a pole at the rear of the stable. At the
time the stablewas destroyed it was owned by one
Austin Bacon. Just west of the stable was the meat
and provision market of Andrew W. Felch, which
was also destroyed, with most of its contents.
January 5, 1866, the paper-mill of John N. Rob-
erta at Mitchellville was burned. Relief was sent
from this village ; but, on account of the excessive
cold weather and high winds, the etforts of the fire-
men were entirely unavailing.
April 20, 1867, the large currying-shop and part of
the yard buildings of the extensive establishment of
J. B. Alley & Co. were destroyed. Very little was
.-.aved from this fire. The present currying-shop was
built upon the site of the burned one immediately
after. At the time of this fire there was also burned
a dwelling-house, just northerly of the shop, owned
by freorge H. Champney and occupied by John Sul-
livan ; also the wood-shed of the Worcester and
Nashua Railroad Company, on the westerly side of
their road, and just south of the present tank-house.
A --hort time after this one of the tan-houses of J. B.
.illey it Co. was partly destroyed.
The following winter the buildings on the southerly
side of the Fitchburg Railroad at Flannigan's Cross-
ing, that were erected by Calvin Fletcher and John
Blanchard a." a brewery about ten years previously,
were entirely deslnpycd. At the time of the tire they
were owned by Lecmard A. Spaulding and Thomas
H. Page, and were occupied as a saw and stave-mill
and cooper-shop. In this fire Mr. Spaulding nearly
lost his life in attempting to save the books of the
firm.
October 27, 1861), a fire broke out over the engine
and boiler-rooms of the Ames Plow Company, but
through the prompt and courageous action of the
company's employees, with the assistance of the Fire
Department of the village, the fire was subdued, after
a loss ol from one to two thousand dollars.
The first of what might be designated as our three
}.'reat fires wa> discovered October -31, 1869, in the
pop-corn and confectionery factory of Bacon & Rock-
wood, in what was at that time known as the Har-
mony Hall Buildiug, standing between Main Street
and the Fitchburg Railroad, easterly of the Milk
Stand. We were at that time practically without a fire
apparatu>, the " Ma8.sasoil'' being practically useless.
The need of better facilities for extinguishing fire in
this village had for a long time been recognized by
the parent town, and a committee had been appointed
to procure for us a new fire-engine, but, with a laxity
that generally {prevails with such a body, had failed to
attend to their duty, a neglect that resulted in a se-
rious loss to our village. This fire spread from the
building in which it originated to those adjoining,
and before it could be checked three were laid in
ashes. Harmony Hall Building was a two-story,
pitch roof, wooden structure, erected by Jephtha R.
Hall, of Groton, about 1858. The upper floor was
finished into a hall, which gave the name to the
building, and in the early part of the war was occu-
pied as a rendezvous for the soldiers quartered in this
village. The first floor was divided into two stores,
and was originally occupied by John Brown as a har-
ness manufactory, Mr. Brown being also (he lessee of
thehall. Charles Livermore atone timekept agrocery-
store in the westerly side, and subsequently Charles
Frye occupied the entire lower floor as a furniture
and undertaking establishment, removing to it from
the basement of Union Hall Building, where he first
begun business in this village. Mr. Frye was sue-
AVER.
677
ceeded by Walter Wright, who removed to the
Waters Building, at the corner of Main and West
Streets. Latterly the Harmony Hall Building passed
into the hands of Newell & Balch, who occupied the
first floor as a grain-store, leasing Harmony Hall to
the town as a grammar school-room, and excavated
the cellar, which they used as a cheese manufactory.
Henrj' C. Rolfe succeeded Newell A Balch in the
grain business. He remained in the Harmony Hall
Buil(!ing until the summer of 1869, when he moved
to what is now known as the Gushing Building, on Main
Street.
Next to the west of Harmony Hall stood what was
then known as the Town Building. It was the wooden
school-house that was built on the Main Street lot in
1850, and moved on to this lot in 1865. It had been
raised to a second story, and a fire-engine-room and
hook-and-ladder truck occupied the first floor. The
second floor, or school building |iro|>er, was used for a
fireman's room and band-room, until, in 1866, it was
converted into a grammar school. The entrance to
the upper hall was by a covered stairway on the east
side. The southerly half of the basement was fur-
nished for a lockup, having four cells, while the east-
erly half was let for general purposes, being occupied
principally as a paint-shop. Between the Town
Building and Harmony Hall was a ramshackled
structure of a shed. East of Harmony Hall, and on
the site of the present cheese-factory building, was a
dwelling-house, for many years occupied by Solomon
Keyes. At the time of the fire it was occupied by
Noah Lee. In 1850 Ebenezer Willis occupied this
building with the first store ever kept in this village.
Immediately following the fire Newell & Balch pur-
chased the town lot, and we had bright promises of
a large brick block being erected thereupon. These
promises, unfortunately, did not materialize, and the
larger part of the territory has remained unoccupied
for twenty years. The agitation on account of this
fire was sufficient to stir up the Fire-Engine Commit-
tee, and April 27, 1870, the new hand-engine, named
in honor of our distinguished townsman. Colonel
Daniel Needham, arrived here, and in January fol-
lowing the new engine and hook-and-ladder house in
the rear of the Unitarian Church was completed
ready for occupancy. The house was formally dedi-
cated April 1, 1870.
On the afternoon of July 15, 1870, a fire broke out
in the hotel stable in the rear of Merchant's Row,
owned by Mark W. Ray, of Fitchburg, and occupied
at the time by Samuel Reed. In an incredible short
space of time the entire row, with the exception of
the dwelling-house of Mr. Coughlin, was destroyed.
It was fortunate that the fire occurred in the daytime,
for, had it been in the night, there certainly would have
beeu loss of life ; as it was, there were many narrow
escapes. The railroad depot was on fire several
times, but was saved through the exertion of the rail-
road employes. A steamer was sent from Fitchburg,
but did not reach here until the fire had burnt itself
out. The total loss was estimated at about $25,000,
which was partly covered by insurance.
Merchant's Row was originally rightly named, for
upon it nearly all of the business of the village at one
lime was conducted ; but the fire scattered the mer-
chants in other directions, and very little of the orig-
inal business returned, and to-day it scarcely deserves
its original name, which, in fact, is rapidly fading
from the tongue and memory. With the exception
of the stable-lot in the rear, in which the fire origi-
nated, the row stood upon land leased of the Worces-
ter and Nashua Railroad Company.
The first building erected was Bartlett's block. It
stood at the southerly end, on the present site of the
Adams house. Mr. Bartlett moved here from Town-
shend, and succeeded Mark W. Ray, who was our first
merchant tailor. Mr. Ray afterwards occupied a part
of the Bartlett building as a hotel, and erected in the
rear an addition which he connected with his stable.
Mr. Bartlett's clothing and gents' furnishing store
and tailoring shop was ou the southerly half of the
ground-floor, and over his store was the printing-
office of George H. Brown, who moved it here from
Harvey A. Woods' (now Cushing's) building. Mr.
Bartlett's business is now conducted by Sampson &
Brown. A Mr. Gibson, a manufacturer of melodeons,
occupied the upper part of the building. W. B.
Lewis kept a stock of blank-books for sale here, and
it was as agent for Mr. Lewis that Levi Sherwin first
came here from Townsend in 1859. In 1861 Mr.
Sherwin, who had become the owner, moved to the
Union Hall building. Bartlett's Block was a two-
story, pitch-roof, wooden building, with the end to-
wards the railroad. Mr. Bartlett occupied it until
the fire. The printing-office had been purchased by
John H. Turner, and by him, in 1865, moved into a
room in the Union Hall building, in the rear of the
stores. At the time of the fire the hotel business was
conducted by Samuel Reed.
The next building to the north was owned by
James Gerriah, Esq., of Shirley, and known as Ger-
rish's Block. The original building was a barn,
moved here by Mr. Gerrish, and remodeled into the
block. Day's building now occupying the site, is as
near a fac nimih of the Gerrish building as the build-
ers could produce. The southerly half of the first
floor was originally occupied by Stevens' bread store,
commonly then called " the bakery," although no
baking was ever done there. The other store was orig-
inally occupied by A. A. Hutchinson as a shoe-store.
Mr. Hutchinson sold his shoe-store to James C. Ten-
ney, who moved it into the Warren building, where
he, at that time, kept a clothing store. George G.
Day, who had been with Mark W. Ray, hired the store
vacated by Mr. Tenney for a refreshment saloon, and
a short time afterwards bought the building of Mr.
Gerrish. Mr. Gerrish had his office on the second
floor, and subsequently Abel L. Lawton, real estate
G78
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
agent, and George E. Underwood, insurance agent,
occupied the rooms witli Mr. Gerrish. There was also
a barber shop on the same Hoor. On the third floor
was Moses G. Giipatrick's daguerreotype gallery.
Probably no character was better and more popularly
known in this village thirty years ago than Mr. Gil-
patrick. His gallery was the first one ever eatab-
taurant, and afterwards by John H. Turner, who suc-
ceeded George H. Brown in the jiriiiting busine.-<s,
and it was in this room that the J'ali/ic .'</tiri/ was first
printed. <3n the second lloor of fhe buildipg was
Union Hall, the largest public hall in the village, and
here the Congregational Society held its religious
meetings previous to the erection of their church on
lished here, and his camera was faced by nearly every j Washington Street, in 1S(J7. The third floor of Union
person connected with our early history.
Nest north of the Gerrish building was what was
known as the Warren Block, erected and owned by
Ralph Warren, of West Townsend. It was also the
third block built upon the Row — a large white struc-
ture, and one of the most pretentious then known in
the village. The southerly part of the store was first
occupied by a Mr. Randall, clothier, who sold out to
a Mr. Heald, and he to James C. Teuney, who moved
his stock of shoes from the Gerrish building, and thus
laid the foundation of the business that is to-dav
Hall building was a banquet hall. The Union Hall
building was purchased by Thomas H. and Alfred
Page in 18li8, and by them moved to their lot at the
corner of Washington and Pleasant Streets, thus es-
caping the fire of 1870, to be destroyed in the great
conflagration of 1872. The lot between Union Hall
and the Warren building wiis unoccupied until a
short time before the fire, when William A. Baker
erected thereon a one-story building, a part of which
was occupied by him an a harness manufactory and
repair shop, and the rest by George Leavens as a
conducted bv Fletcher i Stone. The other store in i saloon.
the Warren Block was occupied by A. D. Simmonds,
millinery goods. In the northeasterly corner of the
second floor were the dental rooms of Dr. James Deu-
nis Brown, who came here in 1S59; and in the
.-southeasterly corner were ditlerent lawyers' ortices,
among thera John Spauldiugand Joshua IC. Bennett.
The rear of this floor was occupied by Horace C. Ho-
vey, watchmaker, jeweler and machinist. On the
third floor of the Warren building was a hall occu-
pied by the various societies. It was here that the
Knights of Malta organized and caroused. Various
temperance societies also occupied this hall, and at
the time of the Are it was occupied jointly by the
Good Templars and Post 48, Grand Army Republic,
both of which societies lost all their property.
The Union Hall building stood where the Ameri-
can House now is. At the time of its erection this j
building was considered the largest and best store and '■
business block in South Groton. It was beguu by i
Henry C. Haynes in 1860, and February lOih of that j
year, when the frame was in the course of erec- ,
The buildings now standing upon Merchant's Ron-
were erected immediately after the tire. The Publir
Spirit building, now standing at the corner of West
and Main .^treet-^, was built by Mr. Baker, i>[i the site
of his former building, and purch:isedby Mr. lurtier,
and moved from its former location in 187S.
August 10, 1870, about nine o'clock in the evening,
a fire was discovered in the rear of the market in the
basement of Harlow's post-ofljce building, at the cor-
ner of Main and West Streets, but was e.xtinguished,
the principal loss being from water and smoke. The
market at that time was occupied by .V. A. Jenkins.
June 8, 1S71, a fire broke out in the building used by
Ames Plow Company a.s the paini-shop and store-
house, which was totally destroyed with its contents,
together with the large shed filled with hay-tedders,
which were also a total loss. The tire communicated
to the main building, but was checked before any ser-
ious damage was done. Benjamin Lincoln Howe, who
was fire-ward at that time, contracted at the fire a
severe cold which developed into pneumonia, and re-
tion, it was blown down and destroyed by a heavy i suited in his death June 24th. .Mr. Howe was
wind. Mr. Haynes then sold his interest to E. S. ; one of our most prominent citizens, and in his death
Clark, by whom the building was erected and com- i the villiige met with a severe loss, he was born at
pleied. The northerly store in the Union Hall Block i Shrewsbury, Massachusetts, in 1810, and came to this
was first occupied by George H. Brown as a drug- ' village in 1855, and entered the employ of Nourse,
store. This business was subsequently conducted by 1 Mason and Company. He succeeded Eusebius S.
his son, George P. Brown, on a more extensive scale, ! Clark as deputy sherifl", .=erving three terms, and was
and subsequently by Doctor Babcock. One side of ' also a member of the State constabulary force.
the drug-store was occupied by Ed. Tafr., jeweler, who
sold out to A. F. Colburn. Subsequently G. C. Brock
bought out both the drug-store and the jewelry busi-
ness. Mr. Brock subsequently took as a partner
James R. Gray, to whom he afterwards sold his inter-
est in the busine.ss. The southerly aide of Union Hall
was first occupied by Levi Sherwin as a book-store,
which became the nucleus of the extensive business
now conducted by his sons. In the rear of the stores
was a room first occupied by Edwin Sanders as a rea-
November 28, 1871, the livery stable building be-
longing to Phelps it Woods, and until the fire oc-
cupied by Burgess Taylor, was entirely consumed.
Mr. Taylor saved his hoise>, carriages and harnesses.
This building stood in the rear of Merchant's Row,
almost directly back of what is now the American
House, and faced south. It was originally the barn
at Silas Nutting's place. For several years it was the
only livery stable in this village.
Between half-past eleven Saturday night, April 14,
AYER.
679
1872, and aix o'clock the next morning, there raged
in this village a fire that, Svhen the percentage of our
valuation is considered and the proportion of business
industries destoyed, is second in its resulus to no fire
in New England. Within a period of scarcely more
than six hours was destroyed more than forty build-
ings, comprising nearly all the business portion of
tbe village, entailing a net loss of over §100,000. The
fire originated on the second fioor of a three-story,
brick front, wooden building, midway between Pleas-
ant and West Streets, and, fanned by a strong westerly
wind, was soon beyond the power of our feeble Fire
Department to check it. In fact, it simply burnt it-
self out. The territory on the northerly side of Main
Street, extending from Columbia Street to the Wor-
cester & Nashua Railroad, and bounded northerly by
Newton Street and land of Dennis McCarty, Harvey
Wadsworth, Jason Hill and Levi W. Phelps, that, at
sundown Saturday evening, contained nearly half of
the wealth of our village,wasatract of smoking ruins
Sunday morning. The origin of the fire is unknown.
The great amount of loss sustained excited the public
to sources of investigations and prosecutions, that in
the end proved entirely groundles.s and utterly insuf-
ficient to warrant the jury before whom the case was
tried, in returning other than a verdict of not guilty,
without even requiring the defendants to introduce
any evidence in their behalf.
If the village of Ayer should be pictured, the por-
trait must be her main street, and the change in the
character and description of the buildings which were
erected after this fire have been so great that there
is nothing that one only acquainted with it as it was
before could now recognize.
The lot at tbe corner of Main Street and the Wor-
cester & Nashua Railroad, now owned by Washburn
& Woodward, was, prior to the fire, ()ccu|)ied by what
was known as Phelps & Harlow's building. This
block was erected in 1858 by Levi W. Phelps, William
H. Har'ow and Charles C. Tarbell. This lot wa.*-;
fo/merly covered by a large gravel bank, an extension
of the one on which Doctor Ebenezer Willis' and E.
H. Hayward'.-( houses now stand. A large part of the
gravel taken from this lot was r.sed in filling in be-
tween Main Street and the Fitchburg Railroad, prin-
cipally in the vicinity of what is now Cushing's build-
ing. The first building that ever stood upon this lot
was a small structure erected by the Peterboro' and
Shirley Railroad Company, near what is now known as
Camp Stevens, and used for a short time as the
Wood's Village station on that road. On account of
its fantastic color, the clap-boards being painted alter-
nately red and white, it was dubbed " the striped
pig," and in this Andrew B. Gardiner kept the post-
ofBce when it was first established at South Groton.
Subsequently this building was purchased by David
Chambers and moved to the easterly part of tbe vil-
lage, and is now an ell of the dwelling-house occupied
by James Gilson. The Phelps & Harlow building
was at first occupied on the first floor, first by a grain
store and afterwards William H. Harlow, then Har-
low & Bennett, and later Harlow & Stuart, as a gro-
cery store. The westerly half of the basement was
occupied as a market which was kept by various par-
ties.
On the second floor, at the time of the fire, was the
ofiice of John E. Parsons, M.D., and the oflSce and
dwelling of W. H. H. Hines, dentist. On the third
floor was the hall occupied by the Caleb Butler Lodge
of Masons, of Ayer, and the St. Paul Lodge of
Masons, of Groton. The mystic symbol of these
lodges upon a gable glass window was one of the
most conspicuous objects of the building. In the rear
of the Felch & Harlow building was the lumber-shed
of Phelps & Woods, of about the same size and ap-
pearance as the one now standing there. On the other
corner of West and Main Streets was the building of
Thomas H. Page, occupied at the time of the fire by
C. W. Mason, dry-goods, and W. Wright & Son, fur-
niture. The store then owned by Mason was formerly
owned by W. H. Sherman, and previous to that by
Jehiel Todd.
Next easterly of Page's building was that in which
the fire itself originated. This building was con-
structed of what, at Camp Stevens, was the restaurant of
Charles J. Frye and William B. Fenner. It had been
raised to a second story and a brick front added. At
the time of the fire the first floor was occupied by J.
F. Boynton, stoves, tin and hardware. Mr. Boynton
had succeeded Samuel Reed, who in turn had suc-
ceeded Reed & Whitney, the pioneers of that business
in this village. The third and a part of the second
floor was occupied by L. B. Tuttle, furniture and un-
dertaking establishment. The larger part of the sec-
ond floor had formerly been a saloon, but, on account
of the prohibitory legislation and vigorous prosecu-
tion of the State constabulory, wastbec closed to busi-
ness.
Tbe next building to the east was Mrs. E. M. Nut-
ting's block, which stood at the corner of Main and
Pleasant Streets. It was a two-atory frame building
with basement, with a broad flight of steps in front.
In the basement was Franklin G. Lufkin's fish mar-
ket, the entrance to which was upon Pleasant Street.
The first floor was occupied by Mrs. Nutting's millin-
ery parlors, her family occupying the rest of the build-
ing as a residence. In this store the once well-known
Workingmen's Union Store was conducted.
On the easterly side of West Street, in the rear of
Thomas H. Page's block, was the confectionery store,
restaurant and dwelling-house of Abbott A. Jenkins,
over which was Jenkins & Wright's Hall. In the
rear of this, facing Pleasant Street, was a two-story
tenement-house, then occupied by two families, Lu-
ther Osborn on the second floor, and Mrs. Rebecca K.
Bigelow, now Mrs. Leonard J. Spaulding, on the first
floor. This latter building was erected as a carriage
and paint-shop, and subsequently the first floor was
680
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
occupied by Taft & Rich's tag factory, and afterwards
as a boot and shoe repair shop. Subsequently the
whole building was finished as a tenement-house.
The site of this building is now occupied by the resi-
dence of Daniel W. Fletcher. Between West and
Pleasant Streets, where the residence of William U.
Sherwin now is, was the dwelling-house then occupied
by Mrs. Sewall Gates, formerly Mrs. William S. Nut-
ting. This was one of the oldest buildings in the vil-
lage. At the comer of Main and Pleasant Streets
was the Union Hall building. At that time the west
half of first floor was occupied by L. Sherwin, Yankee
notions and books. The other store had been occu-
pied by Jamea C. Tenney since the August previous,
.1. C. Brock having moved into the new brick block.
Adjoining Union Hall building was the large brick
block of four stories that was erected by Thomas H.
and Alfred Page in 1S70. It w:i3 thought that the
conflagration could be stopped here, but as the cov-
ings were of wood they soon caught fire and all eiiorts
to save it proved unavailing. In this block J. C.
Brock occupied two connecting stores as apothecary
and jeweler, having removed there from the Union
Hall building; ue.xt to him was the shoe-ntore of John
S. Fernald, and adjoining th.it the hair-dressing saloon
of Joseph St. Catriua. The upper part of this build-
ing was constructed for a hotel, but at the time of the
fire had not been occupied.
.Vt the corner of Washington and Jlaiii Streets, ad-
joining Page's Block, was the handsome three-i-tory
building of George W. Stuart. Mr. .Stuart occupied
the principal part of the first floor with his general
store. The balance of that floor was occupied by
Doctor Ebenezer \Villis, apothecary and town liiiuor
agent, and E. A. Markham, watchmaker and jeweler.
The site of Mr. Stewart's building was that occupied
by the two first stores ever conducted in this villnge.
The original building was twenty-two by thirty, with
a room in the rear fourteen by eighteen, and was oc-
cupied by Joseph H. Gardner for store and post-office.
Subsequently the premises were purchased by David
Chambers, who, for a time, conducted the only sttire
in South Groton. This building soon after passed
into the hands of Levi Goss, of West Boylston, who
leased it to Harvey .\. Woods, by whom it was occu-
pied while the building opposite, now known as
Cusliing's Block, was being erected. Mr. Woods
moved into his new building July 5, 18.3:i, and Mr.
Fanning occupied the site vacated by Mr. Woods a
short time. In January, 1855, George \V. Stuart
came from Worcester, and located where Mr. Fanning
had left. He raised the building, making a basement
and attached an ell for a tenement, and converted the
whole front of the building to store purposes. In the
basement thus formed was located one of our earliest
markets in the village. This building was moved to
the rear when the new block was erected.
Immediately in the rear of Union Hall building
was a dwelling-bouae that formerly had stood at the
corner of Pleasant and Main .Streets, built by ^V'm. S.
Nutting, and subsequently owned by David Chambers,
and beyond that the hand.some residence of George
G. Day, and farther north, on the same .street, the
large two tenement dwelling-house of Levi Sherwin,
which at the time of the fire was occupied by Mr.
Sherwiu and John Burns. Immediatel/ in the rear
of the brick block was a large barn of Thomas H.
Page's, and near it on Washington Street was a dwell-
ing-house owned by him. It may be interesting lo
here note that the lot occupied by this latter building
was the one from which the dwelling-hduse on the
westerly side of West Street, in the rear of Mr.
Phelps', was moved one night in 18tiO, on nccouut of
some legal controversy betweeu the owner of the
building and the owner of the land.
Just north of this lot, on Washington Street, was
the large dwelling-house and barn of Stephen Bar-
rett, and next north of that the tivo-story brick school-
house, occupied by a primary and the intermediate
schools. On the opposite corner of Main and Wash-
ington ."Streets was the yellow cottage-house formerly
owned by .fohn Park, an<l occupied at the time of ihe
lire by olKces, the principal of which were those of
Doctor B. H. Hartwell and John Spauldiiig, Esq. In
the rear of the Park house was a barn, and beyond
this the dwelling-house owned by Samuel W. Dick-
inson, and on the corner of W.ashington and Newton
Streets the dwelling-house of Mary A. N. Champney.
Next east of the Park house on Main .Street was
the cottage-house owned by .Vndrew W. Felch.
The site of the present Meade Block was then occu-
pied by a large building, the first story of which was
brick, and occupied by Wheeler & Brown, who were
the successors to Robbins A Ames, who immediately
succeeded Harvey A. Woods' general store. The
upper part of the Mead building was occupied by
Asher Peabody aa a boarding-house. This building
was built in 18G7 by Woods Brothers, principally from
the material of the Universalist meeting-house of
Harvard. The Mead lot was originally occupied by
.Vlbert Worcester's stable, so called, which was de-
stroyed by fire in 18(J4.
Where the Fillebrown building now stands was a
two-story jjitch-roof wooden building, owned by
Harvey A. Woods, and at the time of the fire occu-
pied on the first floor by A. D. Simmons, dry .and
fancy goods, and J. M. Bruce, musical instruments.
On the second floor was the office of F. A. Worcester,
Esq., dental rooms of J. D. Brown and tailoring es-
tablishment of E. A. Flagg and Horace C. Hovey,
watchmaker ; the hall overhead being occupied by the
Odd-Fellows and Post 48, Grand .\rmy Republic.
It was upon this lot that the old brick school-house
formerly stood, and at the southeast corner, for a long
time, was the dwelling-house occupied by John
Toughey, that to make place for Woods' block, Mr.
Woods moved <m the " Flat-Iron Square," .so called, now
occupied by the hose-house of the Alfred Page Hose
AYER.
681
Company, a spot that has always been a favorite for
squatters. The Toughey house remained there long
enough to be a repeated source of complaint from the
public, and was finally moved on to the lot on the
west side of the Peterboro' and Shirley Railroad,
where it now stands, and afterwards passed into
the hands of Mrs. James Hosley, the present owner.
In the rear of Woods' Block at the time of the fire,
there stood a two tenement block, that was originally
built for a shoe shop. C>n the lot next west of Harvey
A. Wood's Block, was the dwelling-house of Nahum
Sawyer. This building stood well back from the
street. Upon the southwest corner of the Sawyer
lot there stood for many years a small building oc-
cupied as a boot and shoe repair shop. This building
was moveil across the railroad a short time before
the fire, and thus escaped the conflagration. It now
forms a part of George (i. Day's dwelling-house, on
Forest Street. Next east of the Sawyer lot was the
Unitarian, or, as it wa.« sometimes called, the White
Chuich, the first church edifice erected in the village.
It was quite a handsome structure, faced south, and ap-
proached by a broad fiight of steps. In its belfry was
the only bell of the village, whose notes pealed forth
until a few moment* before the spire fell. In the
rear of the church was the new engine and hnok-and-
ladder house, erected by the town of Groton in 1870,
to take the place of the town building destroyed in
the fire of November, lS(j!). In the second story of
this building was Colonel Needhaui Hall, used by
the engine company for their meetings. At the cor-
ner of Columbia and Newton .streets was a two-story,
French roof dwelling-house of.Ioel E. Fletcher, the
first structure of the kind erected in this village. In
the rear of Mr. Fletcher's, facing Newton Street, was
the cottage- house of Henry H. Bliss. The fire cro8.sed
Columbia .Street and there destroyed a two-story
dwelling-house owned by Joel E. Fletcher, and a
long building that was erected for Bacon \- Rock-
wood, candy ui.inufacturirs, after they were burnt
out in the fire of 18i)9. At the time of the great fire
this latter building was used principally as a harnes*
shop. A stable of Mr. Fletc'her's was also burned.
The amount of property destroyed by this fire was in
the vicinity of $250,000.
The first jierson to begin business upon the burnt
district was .\lonzo 1), Simmons, who purchased from
the Stevens Machine Company a small building, for
a time used as an office by the chair company. He
moved this building on to the Andrew W. Felch lot,
and W&.S ready for business before the embers of the
burnt territory had done smouldering. This build-
ing has recently been moved on to the Rufus Brock |
lot, on the esslerly side of the old road to Groton. I
Tlie first new building erected upon the burnt terri- |
tory was Harvey A. Woods' three-story, mansard-
roof block, which was finished ready for occupancy ,
in the early fall. I
This block of Mr. Woods' also had the distinction
of being the first new building to be destroyed by fire.
It was burned Monday morning, June 9, 1879, the lot
remaining vacant until the next year, when Abel
Prescott's building, that formerly stood in the square
west of the brick freight house, was moved on to it.
In 1880 Mr. Fillebrown erected the three-story build-
ing now occupying that site.
At the present day there are only two lota made
vacant by the great fire upon which buildings have
not been erected, and they are the Samuel W. Dick-
inson on Washington Street and the George G. Day
lot on Pleasant Street, both of which remain to-day as
they were the morning following the fire.
Immediate steps were taken to rebuild. Besides Mr.
Woods' block. Mead's brick block, the brick block of
Thomas H. and Alfred Page and that of Mrs. E. M.
Nutting were completed the following fall. The last
lot to become occupied was that of Thomas H. Page,
at the corner of Main and West Streets, onto which,
in April, 1878, Mr. Turner moved the Public Spirit
building from Merchant's Row. Immediately follow-
ing the fire there was a great demand for locations in
which merchants could establish themselves. The
Fitchburg Railroad Company generously gave the use
of the brick freight-house, andfor a while it seemed as
though Merchant's Row was destined once more to
come to the front as a business centre, but upon the
rebuilding of Main Street the former occupants re-
turned.
Monday afternoon following the fire, a citizens'
meeting, presided over by Henry C. Rolfe, was held
at the brick depot, and the following committee were
appointed to solicit aid for those who liad suflTered by
the fire : Thomas H. Page, Calvin D. Reed, Harvey
A. Woods, James C. Tenney, Leonard J. Spaulding,
Rector T. Bartlett, Abel L. Lawton, Oliver K. Pierce
and Charles Brown. By this committee the sum of
S2-t29 was raised and distributed to those who sus-
tained losses in the fire, proportionately. Beside this
a large sura of money was raised and distributed by
private parties. The same meeting authorized the
above committee to petition the selectmen to call a
town-meeting, and draw up a statement of the extent
of the disaster, and to send circulars to all the reli-
gious societies in the surrounding towns, with the re-
quest that collections be taken in all the churches, for
the benefit of the homeless sufl^'erers, who, in many iu-
tances, had lost all their possessions. It was also voted
that as soon as all the losses were ascertained, the
Legislature be petitioned to ask an abatement of
the State and County taxes for the present year.
The first relief sent was by several of the Harvard
Shakers, who contributed seventy-five dollars in mo-
ney and a lot of provisions and cooked food. They
also kindly volunteered the use of their teams to any
one needing them, and canceled a number of bills due
them by parties who had sufl^ered by the fire. At this
same meeting was also considered a plan of extending
Main Street farther to the north. It is to be regretted
G82
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
that this latter plan did not materialize, as the street
would thu3 have had two sides practical for buiklinc;^
and the value of the property upon it be greatly
enhanced.
July 15, 1872, the .saw-mill formerly the pencil fac-
tory of Uharlesi Snow, of Pingry Village, was burned.
May 3, 1873, Prescott's building in Railroad Square
was almost entirely destroyed. The basement was
occupied by a Mr. Penato, shoe-shop, confectionery
and fruit. On the first floor were Prescott & Hill,
grain, and B. H. Graves' meat market. The second
floor was occupied by Mr. Mudgett, photographer.
August 4, 1873, the brick mill of William Mitchell,
at Mitchellville, occupied by him as a shoddy manu-
facturing establishment, was entirely destroyed,
throwing about fifty employees out of employment.
It was believed that the building would soon be re-
built and the business resumed. The plant has re-
cently been purchased for a rubber factory, and will
soon enter upon a new era of its history.
January 14, 1874, a fire caught in the cellar of
Mead's Block on .Main Street, occupied by Brown &
Kittridge, who also occupied the easterly half nf the
first floor, where the National and Savings Banks now
are. The fire was confined to the cellar, the chief
damage being from smoke and water.
June 18, 1874, a spark from their furnace set fire to
the roof of the pattern-shop of Briggs & Kelley. The
roof was burned otl", and the contents, consisting of
valuable patterns, were considerably damaged.
October 25, 1874, the barn of Michael Barry, near
bis dwelling-house on the northerly side of Shirley
Street was, entirely consumed, and the fire also com-
municated to the dwelling-hou.'e, to which it did but
slight damage. I
February 4, 1875, a fire was discovered under the
floor of Wood's Block, on what is now the Fillebrowii
lot on Main Street. There was no cellar under this
part of the building, and the origin of the fire was i
unquestionably incendiary. It communicated to the '
central part of the store, then occupied by the post-
otfice and E. H. Hayward, insurance agent and musi-
cal inslruraents. The damage was slight.
February ti, 1875, as the result of storing hot ashes
in the hall-way, the Haynes house, on Washington
Street, at that time owned by Simeon Burt and occu-
pied by John S. Clark, was .again visited by the fiery
fiend. The damage was slight, being principally con-
fined to the attic.
About 1876 a barn on the easterly side of West
Street, occupied by William Parsons was totally con-
sumed with its contents. This barn had formerlv ■
stood on Pleasant Street and was a part of the home
place of William S. Xutting.
May 27, 1876, the building known as the Stoue Hall,
situated on the northerly side of West Main Street, a
short distance from Waste Brook, was totally ,
destroyed. i
May 8, 1877, a building standing where George H.
Hands' house now is, at the corner of Pine and Main
Streets, and occupied by Albert F. Fletcher as a
grocery- store, was destroyed by a fire which was prob-
ably of an incendiary origiu.
July 27, 1877 a fire caught in the clothing and boot
and shoe store of J. C. Tenney, in Page's Block, now
occupied by Fletcher & Stone. Had it not been dis-
covered seasonably, we would again have been visited
by a serious conflagration, certainly by the loss of this
building ; as it was, it was only through prompt and
courageous action that the flames were subdued.
October 18, 1877, the marble-cutting shop of N. A.
Spencer, situated near his dwelling-house, on the
Harvard road, was burned with its contents.
July 6, 1878, the dwelling-house of Mrs. Michael
Hart, situated oppo>ite the Catholic Cemetery, and on
the westerly side of the Peterboro' >S: Shirley Railroad,
W.I* burned.
.Viigust 4, 1878, a fire destroyed the bam of Wil-
liam McHiigh, on the westerly side of the Peterboro'
& Shirley Railroad.
A|)ril 1, 1879, the large barn at the corner of Gro-
tonand Pleasant Streets, on the site now occupied by
Thomas Donahue's dwelling-house, was entirely con-
sumed with its contents, consisting of hay, wagons,
harnesses and two horses owned by Charles Blood.
June !i, 18711, the three-story mansard-roof building
known as Wood's Block, then owned by .Alfred Page,
standing on Fillebrnwn's lot, was totally consumed.
The fire was of mysterious origin, many circumstances
tending to show that it was incendiary. At the time
it was occupied by J. F. Boynton, hardware, tinware,
stoves, etc., and F. P. Carlton, grocer, on the first
tloor. On the second floor were the law-otfices of
Frederick A. Worcester, James Gerish and George J.
Burns, Henry Stone, dentist, and \Villiam H. Lane,
photographer, and Horace C. Hovey, civil engineer,
who also oocupied a room on the third floor. The
(tOdd Templars and the Ancient Urder of Hibernians
occupied the halls in the upper story. Great credit is
due to the firemen, through whose erlbrts the fire was
confined to the building in which it originated.
Mead's Block was considerably damaged.
March 25, 1880, the town lost one of its best known
and most interesting landmarks by the destruction of
the Calvin Fletcher red house, so called. This build-
ing was nearly opposite the pumping station, on the
Harvard road. Xt the time of the fire it was owned
by .Fames McCarty. This budding was over 100 years
old at the time it was destroyed.
March 27, 1880, a fire started in the wood-shed of
the dwelling-house then owned and occupied by R. N.
Kendall, situated on the southerly side of Prospect
Street, and now owned by Augustine A. Farr and
occupied by William A. Wright. The fire communi-
cated to the house, the ell was nearly consumed and
the roof of the main house burned oH'.
May 10, 1880, about two o'clock in the afternoon, a
fire was discovered upon the roof of what at that time
AYER.
683
was known as Duffy's Hotel, an establishment that
bad previously been known as the Luke House, and
prior to that time as the Ross House. This building
stood on the easterly side of Tannery Street, where
Chandler's machine-shop now is. The building was
practically totally consumed. It was occupied at the
time of the fire by John Duffy, dealer in ardents.
May 17, 1880, the house of George Little, situated
on the northerly side of the Stony Brook Railroad,
near Lewis Lapoint's, was entirely consumed, the fam-
ily barely escaping with their lives.
September 4, 1880, the cottage-house of Catherine
Barry, between the road from Ayer to Wood's Vil-
lage and the Peterboro' & Shirley Railroad, was en-
tirely consumed.
December 20, 1880, the northerly of Alfred Page's
two mills was totally destroyed by fire. At the time
of its loss it was occupied by the Union Heel Com-
pany and Aaron Patten, manufacturer of cabinet
work, neither of which again returned business in
this town.
This was followed February 25, 1881, by the de-
struction of the southerly mill, thus completely wip-
ing out that extensive plant. At the time of the fire
fire, George Stevens, machinist, occupied about one-
tliird of the first floor, and his loss was a very serious
one to him, as he had no insurance at the time and
much of his machinery was very valuable.
April 16, 1881, a large farm barn at Mitchellville,
owned by Mary Page Heath, was destroyed by fire.
February 7, 1S82, the two buildings standing on the
northerly side of Main Street, between Nutting's
block and the Publir Spirit building, were destroyed
by a fire that originated in the restaurant of William
Parsons. These were two one-story buildinge, the
easterly of which was owned by Rector T. Bartlett,
and at the time of the fire occupied by John D.Shaw,
stoves and tinware. These two buildings stood upon
the site of the Reed building, in which originated the
great fire of April, 1872.
May 4, 1882, the barn of John B. Baggin, on the
northerly side of Sandy Pond and easterly side of Snake
Hill road, was destroyed with several head of cattle.
June 25, 1882, the wooden bridge of the Peterboro'
& Shirley Railroad across the Nashua River near
Wood's Village was entirely consumed. This bridge
was erected about twenty years previous at a cost of
about ten thousand dollars. It was a Howe truss
covered bridge. The fire took place Sunday morn-
ing. A foot-bridge was put across the river during
the day, and on Tuesday a pile-bridge was completed
to admit the passage of trains, which continued in use
until the present iron structure was put in place. Mon-
day forenoon the construction train, loaded with
piling for the bridge, was run into by the Worcester
& Nashua freight near the Main Street crossing, and
the two roads were thus blockaded for several hours.
October 14, 1882, the building formerly occupied by
Phineas Nutting near Pingry Village was destroyed.
The large building erected by Andrew Atwood on
the easterly side of Columbia Street in the fall of
1876 as a boot manufactory, and at the time of the
fire used as a storehouse and skating rink, was entirely
consumed by fire on the night of January 20, 1884.
September 13, 1885, the dwelling-house of Alex-
ander Falconer at Sandy Pond, where Benjamin F.
Taft's handsome summer cottage now stands, was en-
tirely destroyed. The building was unoccupied at
the time.
April 12, 1886, the story -and-a-half two tenement
house on the southerly side of Main Street, known as
the Ann Park house, was entirely destroyed.
May 7, 1886, the Fire Department was called dur-
ing the night to two fires, in what is known as the
Fuller property, owned by Oliver Pierce, on the
southerly side of Main Street, and occupied by Gard-
ner W. Randlett as a dwelling-house and livery stable.
The first call was at 1.30 a.m., for a fire in the ell of
the dwelling-house, which was promptly extinguished.
At 3.30 the department was again summoned, this
time to a fire in the stable. This time the fire had
gained such headway that the firemen were unable to
cope with it in that quarter, and turned their atten-
tion to saving the dwelling-house, and with their
usual good judgment and indomitable pluck accom-
plished wonders with the facilities that they had in
hand. The principal part of the dwelling-house was
saved. In this fire several horses were burned, and
quite a number of carriages and harnesses.
December 2, 1886, about twelve hours before the
time that Dr. Abbott, of the Health Department of
Massachusetts, was expected to visit Ayer, with re-
spect to the alleged nuisance of the Beader Glue Com-
pany that occupied the Ames Plow Company build-
ing, their buildings were discovered to be on fire, and
the flames had gained such headway that the depart-
ment directed their efforts to the saving of the sur-
rounding buildings. While the loss of the business
then conducted was not serious, still our village, by
the loss of that extensive plant, sustained a serious
blow.
May 12, 1887, the unoccupied cooper-shop of Au-
gustus Lovejoy, between Main Street and the Fitch-
burg Railroad, near his dwelling-house, was entirely
consumed. It is claimed that the fire originated from
the locomotive of the Fitchburg Railroad.
July 4, 1887, the bam of Fred. B. Felch, on Cam-
bridge Street, was burned with a stock of carriages
and harnesses that were stored therein.
May 27, 1888, the cottage-house of Mary Quarry, on
the northerly side of West Main Street, was entirely
consumed. The fire also communicated to the two
tenement house just westerly, where it was checked
after considerable damage to the building. These
buildings were among the oldest erected in that part
of our village, the material for which was brought
from Groton from a building that at one time stood
on Main Street.
684
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, aiaSSACHUSETTS.
November 5, 1888, a fire was discovered in the
suspender factory of James R. Gray, on the south-
erly side of Fletcher Street, which, however, was
extinguished after having burned through the north-
easterly corner of the building and damagin<r the
contents largely from smoke and water.
December 30th, following, this building again took
fire, this time the loss being total.
October, 1889, the dwelling-house of William Mc-
Hugh, on the westerly side of the Peterboro' and Shir-
ley Railroad, was entirely consumed by fire.
CHAPTER LVII.
AVER— Continued).
StiC Toicn — AgilatiOn j'^r Sil'Oj' — Innrj'vratkn.
The agitation that resulted in the set-off from the
towns of Groton and Shirley of the territory incor-
porated by the Legislature of 1871, as the town of
Ayer, was the result of a desire for separate muni-
cipal existence, that from the first settlement of the
village always lay near to the surface, and required
but little agitation to make prominent.
The South Groton Literary Association, organized
October 5, 1855, and which was, doubtless, the
earliest organization of the kind at South Groton, at
a meeting held December 14, 1855, discussed the
following question : " Would it be good policy for the
inhabitants at South Groton to petition the Legis-
lature, the coming winter, to be incorporated as a new
town ? " Afiirmative, Nathan W. Frye and Hibbard
P. Ross; negative, Benjamin F. Felch and Ebenezer
Willis. After a somewhat spirited debate, the ques-
tion was decided on its merits in the affirmative, with
but two " dissenting votes." It was then voted to ap-
point a committee of five to take the matter of the
division of the town into consideration, and report at
an adjourned meeting two weeks hence. The chair
appointed as that committee Silas Nutting, Deacon
John Pingry, Calvin Fletcher, Benjamin F. Felch
and Abel Prescott. December 26, 1855, the com-
mittee reported "' what progress they had made, and
on motion were granted further time to make final
report." I am unable to learn from the records
whether a final report was ever made, or just what
progress the committee reported. At about this time
a petition was prepared and extensively signed for
the incorporation of a new town, but it was never
presented to the Legislature. February 2, 1859, the
same society agitated the following: "Besolued:
that it is not expedient for the inhabitants of South
Groton and vicinity to petition, or in any way attempt
to obtain an act of incorporation as a distinct town."
Affirmative, B. F. Felch and Charles Jacobs, Esq. ;
negative, Ebenezer Willis and Abel Prescott. The
affirmative question prevailed. For the next ten years
the " new town '' project always remained to us an in-
teresting topic, finding abundant supporters. There
always existed a feeling that the people in the south
part of the town were never remembered impartially
in any respect, except, perhaps, in the question of
taxes. It was easy to induce our people to believe
that we did not receive the full measure of the benefit
resulting from the town patronage. The erection
here, in 1867, of an entirely inadequate school build-
ing, at a cost of seventy-five hundred dollars, believed
to be grudgingly appropriated, and the immediate
building of an unnecessary thirty thousand dollar
high school building at the Centre, did not, in any
sense, appease the rising spirit of dissatisfaction. The
distance from the town centre was a source of impedi-
ment to our citizens who desired to attend town-
! meeting. We keenly felt the want of a high school,
' public library, public building, side-walks, street-
lamps and other common perquisites of a town cen-
;tre.
j The particular agitation that resulted in our muni-
I cipai birth may be traced directly to the following
communication printed in an edition of the Public
' Spirit under date of August o, 1S*>9. The initials
signed to it can be readily translated into Edmund
Dana Bancroft.
"A Plea of SECESsruN.— It seerag toooe of your reaJerstliat thetime
I haa rirhved when tite citizens uf this pan ut tbe towu of Grotoo nbould
' agitate the subject of eeparatioo from our good old grandparents at
' the Centre. Any one who has observed the progress of events in our
I village for years past can but have seen that it waa '"•nly a. question of
time when there should be u final dissolution.
, " A diversity of interests, the distance fruin one village to the other,
I are constant reminders that we are not suited to each other, and that a
I divorce must be decreed. Let us enumerate some of the disadvantHgea
I uf the present situation. A citizen c>f this village is obliged to go fuur
I miles to deposit a ballut, and from past experience we know that it n*
impossible to get euough voters to travel that distance and properly
I represent our interests. It ie very well known that, numerically, we of
, this village are a majority of the town, but from the aforesaid cause we
I are never represented by more thau 'loe selectman, and sometimes not
even one.
"It is very evident, therefore, thai th^ popular idea of the town offi-
ficers representing the people of the town is a fallacious one, so far aa
we are concerned.
"(Hir streets need attending to ; sidewalks ought to t* built ; in fact, we
are sufferiug for many of those conveniences and improvements which
we could and should have were It not for the ominous two to one majority
on the board ff selectmen. Again, nearly a year ago a cummittee of
five were appointed to procure a new fire-engine for the use of their vil-
lage. Four out of the five were carefully selected from the centre,
I and the result i? uo action can be had from that committee. The
[ chairman never has even calle<l the members tugetber for cunsultation.
, Is there not enough ' public spirit ' in this village to set the ball in mo-
tion, and secure our Just rights or a final separation ?
■'E.D. B."
As voicing the becoming general wish for a new
\ town, the Public Spirit^ in its edition of November 10,
' 1870, says, editorially : ** We understand that there is
' a growing desire Avith the citizens of this village to
I have this place set off and made a new town. The
columns of this paper would be a proper place to dis-
i cuss it, and we should like to hear from the people
here on this important point."
AYER.
685
In the next edition of the paper appeared the fol- j
lowing communication : j
'* Mr. Editor —The riRht name for tlie Dew town is a matter of more '
than usual importance here. Grotou JuDction Is one of the most iin- j
portaot railroad ceotree in the countiy ; as such it lt> known far and
wide. Its Guccees as a place of population and business is owing to the
fact of its being a railroad centre ; that is, It is Groton Junction. Wliy
not call tbH new town Grotoo Junction tlien ^ That wilt keep the old I
name, with an addition that uieanu Hometlnng. Tbib nieauH the very ,
thing which bat given the place an existence, and upon which tbi- j
growth and prosperitv of the new Ii.wn will depend. To chance U
would be to make a great deal of trouble and uncertainty in railroad i
coonectioDB. Unless a change for the better can be made, will it not be .
best to let well enough alone ^
(Signed^ "PlllLO."
The number of inhabitants in this village as fur-
nished by the census marshal in 1870 was 1600.
Before the Legislature of 1871 convened, the senti-
ment in favor of the new town had assumed such
proportions that a petition was prepared, which re-
ceived the signatures of 270 of the citizens residing i
within the limits of the proposed new town. Thib ,
petition, which was presented in the House by Albert j
Leighton, of Pepperell, asked that the territory be set i
off and incorporated under the name of Groton Junc-
tion. The following is the full text of the petition ;
"To the Honorable Senate and House of RepreaentativeBof tlie Com
monwealtb of Blassacbuaelts in l.enenil (.'ourt Awpeuibled : We the un
dersigned legal voters of Groton, Sliirley and Littleton, represent thai
the public exigenc.T requires that we, with the other inliabitsntt* of tin-
territory hereinafter described, be incorporated intoatuwii by the niiiii'-
of Groton Jiincliou, comprising h part of each id the towns aliov,-
named, and to be bounded and described as follow>. namely Beginiiili(:
at the northwesterly corner of said territory at the mouth of .lanieh
Brook, s«;' called, in said Grotou and ruuniiig thence southerly by the
Nashua River, until it comes to the town line of Harvard , thence eastei-
Iv by Buid Harvard towu line, until it comew to the Littleton town Iin-' .
thence northeasterly in a straight line to a stake in stones, at a poini
where the southerly side of the County road lerfding from s;ud Grotou
by the Kidge Hill Tavern, so called, to Littleton Old Common, so called,
intersects the northweoterly t"Wii line of said Littleton; thence wester-
ly in a straight line to the point of beginning.
"And your petitioneis respectfully re'piest that the said town of t.roloii
Junction be incorporated In law, with the territMry above described.
" Groton Jmi'lioti, November lo, ll»7n.'"
Harvey A. Woods had the distinction of lieing the
first signer.
" At a meeting of the inhabitants of Groton, held
January 3, 1871, to take such action as may be deem-
ed expedient in relatitjn to the proposed division ol
the town. It was voted : not to oppose the division
of the town ; also voted that ;t committee of three
persons be selected from that part of the town not
embraced in the territory whioh is proposed for the
new town, to be joined to the selectmen for the pur-
pose of considering, in connection with a committee
of the petitioners for the new town, all questions
that are involved in the petition, and that they be
requested to report at an adjourned meeting of the
town, and Henry A. Bancroft, John Gilson and Wil-
lard A. Torrey were chosen said committee to be
joined to the selectmen.''
A meeting of the citizens of Groton Junction was
held, and the following committee choseu to take the
census of the proposed new town : Peter Tarbell,
Bufus R. Fletcher and Benjamin L. Howe, and at an
adjourned meeting they reported the following fig-
ures : from Shirly, 90; Littleton, 31; Groton,
1890 ; total, 2003. In speaking of this report the
Public Spirit of January 0, 1871, says: "The
new town will then have more inhabitants to start
with than any town adjoining it now has, with a
much better chance for growth. The valuation of the
district to be set off is about one-quarter of that of
the towu of Groton, and it is estimated that the new
owe the old about S10,000 towards the town debt."
At an adjourned town-meeting held at Groton,
January 24, 1871, the committee chosen January 3d
reported as follows:
The committee chosen uuder Article III., January
3, 1871, offered their report, which was read upon mo-
lion by Abel Prescott, and voted that the town do
not oppose the petitioners: 191 yeas, 123 nays. V")ted :
to adjourn and meet at Union Hall, Groton Junc-
tion, three weeks from this day, February 13th, at
one o'clock : 168 yeas, 138 nays.
It would be seen that the original petition prayed
that the new town be named Groton Junction. This,
however, did not meet with entire approval, as there
were some objections on the part of the citizens of
the old town tu having the new town retain the name
of Groton as a part of its title, and many of the citi-
zens of the village believed that our material prosper-
ity would be advanced by assuming a name entirely
new, in order that we might be distinguished as a town
from the village which was formerly known only as
a part of Groton. January 26th, a correspondent in
the Publir Spirit suggested the name of "Ayer as
easy to spell and speak; not likely to be confounded
with anv other town in the s^tate ; a-ssociated in the
minds of every one in the sweet strains of Robert
Burns," and relieved the citizens of the old town of
their objection^ to having the new town keeping the
name of Groton Junction.
A hearing before the Legislative Committee on
Towns was had January 27th, and at that time the
petitioners who were represented by their committee
and John Spaulding, Esq., their counsel, presented a
bill which he had previously prepared. It followed,
j practically, the terms of the description in the peti.
] tion. excepting that the easterly line did not include
! any part of the town of Littleton. George S. Gates,
ihairman of the Board of Selectmen of Groton, rep-
' resented that town at the hearing, but did not raise
any serious objections to granting the prayer of the
petitioners. The towu of Shirley, at a town-meeting,
i consented to the division, making the middle of
Nashua River the dividing line, on condition that
the new town pay to the town of Shirley $500, as its
share of the town debt, and to secure the payment of
that sum, Abel L. Lawton and Robert P. Woods gave
' to the town of Shirley their personal bond. The objec-
' tion on the part of the town of Grotou to the petitioners'
line was due largely to a misapprehension as to its loca-
686
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY. :MASSACHr SETTS.
tion. At a meeting of the citizens of Groton, held
January 16th, the expression of those present would
seem to indicate that they believed that the new line
would embrace the farm of Nathan C. Culver within
the new town. February 1st, a meeting of the peti-
tiocers was held in the Washington Street School-
house, and they unanimously voted that the name o<
our new town be Ayer. The action of this meeting
was communicated to the Committee on Towns, and
the name of Groton Junction, wherever it occurred
in the bill, was struck out and the name of Ayer in-
serted. There being some objections raised to the
new name, February 8th another meeting of the pe-
titioners was held in the Washington Street School-
house and was largely attended, the purpose being to
come to a clear understanding about the name that
the new town should assume, and the following reso-
lution to put a quietus upon all opposition to the
name of Ayer was unanimously adopted :
"Rksolved: TbKt wo learn witli rt-giet tliat some of uiir ciTizeiip ;ire
making elforts tu still re iiin the Qanie ot Groton .Timctloo for our new
town ; that we look upon all biii:li etforte as iniurioiis anJ 'liiertly ■')>•
poded to the best lutereets of our propo^e-l nfw town, ami to ttie interest
of H lar^e innionty of ovir petitioner!*."
The name of Ayer thus adopted by the new town,
however dear it may be on account of its a.s.~ociation
with the " sweet strains of Robert Burns,' was not,
however, intended to honor the Scottish river, but
was in compliment to Doctor James Cook Ayer, a
prominent and esteemed citizen of the city of Lowell.
The action of the meeting of the petitioners held
February Ist was duly communicated to him and ac-
knowledged by him, as appears by the following
letter :
" L...WELL, '''111 Ffljniury, Ij-Tl.
*' AuEL Prescott, Esy., for the committee of petitioners, etc., tiroton
,innction, ^lusMctiusettfl :
" DeaT Sit : — I liave the honor to receive J\iur laTor of tite 2tl inst.,
intnnniui; ine of tlie actions of your fellow-citl/cns in the adoption of
my name, ' Ayer,' ua tlie name of your new town, witJi 3Ir. Felcb's cer-
tificate aa clerk of tlie meeting.
" I ptBy yon, Sir, to convey to your fetlow-citizens my appteciatioo
and acknowledgment of the liigh honor they seek to confer upon iiie
and my sincere hope thot the future will present no occasion to regret
the choice which they have made.
" I should be insensible to the iiiduenceB that ^o\ern men, if the par-
tiality ot your citizens did not awaken in lue an interest in the well-
being of ' Ayer,' and I afisure you. Sir, that I f hall wait with readilles^
to aid therein lu opportunity or occasion may arise.
"With sentiments of personal esteem, I have the honor to remain,
*' Your obedient servant,
" J.VME* i'. .\VEIt."
Doctor Ayer had stated, when the subject of the
town's adopting his name was first proposed to
him, that he knew what was due from him in ca.se
such an honor should be conferred upon him wliile
living. Subsequently he stated to some gentlemen of
the petitioners' committee, that he thought it beat,
in view of the fact that they had reason to expect
some contribution from him, when the matter in
which they are engaged should be accomplished,
and in consequence of what he had previously said,
he wished to define the sum eariv, lest some rumors i
of widely different amounts circulating in the com-
munity might, in the future, leave him in a false po-
sition. He believed that public niiiior, if left to it-
self, would be liable to give very large, a.s well as very
.small -ums, and he would, therefore, in order to be
subjected to uo importunities, name his views to the
committee, which he did. He stated further that, in
view of the uncertainty of life ulid thought, and wish-
ing to make what he said secure, he submitted to
ihem a document to that end, but protested against
either favor being its a consideration or trade.
ijii the 14lh of February, an Act of Incorporation
was passed by the Legislature, and received the .sig-
nature of ( iovernor Clatlin the succeeding day.
In accordance with the provisions of the Act of
Incorporation of February "Jlst, John Spaulding
E-q., issued to Peter Tarbell his warrant, calling a
meeting of the inhabitants of the new town to be
liehl at I'nion Hall, Monday, the sixth day of March,
at ten o'rlock in the forenoon : " To choose all such
tiiwn nfficeis for the year ensuing, as towns are l)y the
law authorized and required to choose to their annual
meeting." This first town-meeting was well-attended,
and great interest was manifeated in the town's orga-
nization. Eilmunil Dana Banciott uad the distinction
of being chosen our tirst moderator. Divine blesaing
was invoked by Rev. .1. .•*. Haradoii, pastor nf the
Baptist Church. .Vndrew W. Felch was elected town
clerk ; Ebenezer C. Willard, tirst selectman. The
meeting then adjourned to Tuesday morning, at which
time the balance "f the town otfiers were elected as
follows : selectmen, Lewis Blood, (Miver K. Pierce ;
assessors, tiibsou Smith. Joel E. Fletcher, .Vlfred
Page; town treas-urer, George W. i?tuart : road agent,
Nathaniel Uolden, with Emerson Hazzard and
Thomas H. Page, assir^taiits ; constables, Peter Tar-
bell, Emerson Hazzard, Calvin D. Reed : school com-
mittee, Charles Brown for three years; Edwin H.
Hayward, two years; Benjamin H. Hartwell, one year.
Xi a caucus of the citizens of the town, held .some
time prior, the following committee of iirrangements
having in charge the e.xercises commemorating the
incorporation of the new town was elected : .\bel
Piescott, Harvey -V. Woods, .\bel L. Lawton, Pem-
broke S. Rich, Leonard J. Spaulding, Jesse J. .\ngell,
Benjamin F. Felch, E. Dana Bancrolt, Thomas H.
Page, Levi W. Phelps, Ebeneezer Wi'lis, Henry A.
Brown, .\ndrew \V. Felch.
The exercises celebrating the birth and organiza-
tion of the new town were held in Union Hall, Mon-
day afternoon and evening, March lith. The invited
guests were met at the station by the committee of ar-
rangements and escorted to the Neeilham (now Union)
House, where dinner was had. They then [)rocceded
to Union Hall. The hall was elaborately decorated
with laurel and evergreen, hung with pictures and
draped with Hags, and mottoes were displayed— on
one side of the entrance being the words, " United
in All That is Right," and on the other, " Opposition
u^->^^^
'^. 6 a^A
^.i/il^U / '^^^^c^
AYER.
G87
to Any License of Wrong." On the left of the hall,
in large letters of evergreen was the word " AYER,"
and the words, " Organieed March 6, 1871." The
Aver Band furuished excellent music, and a choir of
home talent gave some fine singing during the exer-
cises. Abel Prescott presided. The address was
given by Dr. Ayer, and opeeches were made by Col.
Daniel Needham, of Groton, Col. Charles H. Taylor,
private secretary to his excellency, Governor Clatliu,
Rev. Crawford Nightingale, of Groton, Adjutant-
General Cunningham, Charles Cowley, Esq., Hon.
Tappan Wentworth and Rev. B. F. Clark, of Chelms-
ford. A poem was read by Hon. George A. Harden,
of Lowell. The celebration extended into the night.
In the evening there was a grand banquet, in which
addresses were made by Abel Prescott, Nathan W.
Frye, Ambrose Lawrence and D. D. Gove. A ball
closed the festivities of the day in a most enjoyable
manner.
As an extended sketch of the life of Dr. Ayer and
his son Frederick Fanning Ayer, are given in another
part of this publication, I can do no more than refer
the reader to them, for life of the man whose name
we bear, except to say that it is interesting to note
that Dr. Ayer was born in the town of Ledyard, Conn.,
that was set ofl" from Groton in that state, the year
(1836), that Dr. Ayer first came to Lowell, which was
to be the scene of his business life, and where he was
to accumulate his fortune.
September 26, 1871, in accordance with a wish ol
the citizens, Dr. Ayer forwarded to the selectmen a
letter, in which he expressed his desire that the town
should choose three trustees to receive and invest the
sum of SlOjoOO, the interest to be expended in pro
moting the education of youth in the town. This pro-
position not being entirely acceptable, on October 21.
1871, he addressed another letter to E. Dana Bancroft,
in which he submitted his readine.-is " to pay over the
amount to the selectmen of the town, or any person
authorized by them, upon call, for the benefit of the
town, its schools or whatever its people shall direct."
October 25th, the town voted to accept the money
and authorized the selectmen to instruct the treasurer
to receive it. There was a feeling on the part of the
citizens that a town-house was needed, and thai the
money invested in such a building would be a more
satisfactory investment. To this Dr. Ayer acceded,
and offered to join with the town in buiiding one,
making use of the amount already given to the town.
In accordance with Dr. Ayer's modified proposal
the town building was erected. It was completed in
the autumn of 1876, and dedicated on the 1st day of
November of that year. Dr. Ayer having deceased
in the mean time, the keys of the edifice were deliv-
ered by his sou, Frederick F. Ayer, accompanied by
an eloquent address. The oration of the day was de-
livered by Colonel Daniel Needham,
The new town started upon its municipal career,
accompanied by the well wishes of all, and congratu-
lations upon the bright future which all signs seemed
to indicate that it had before it.
Thoma!? H. and Alfkep Page. — The business
and social lives of Thoma.s H. and Alfred Page,
whose portraits appear herewith, are so inseparably
associated that it is practically impossible to write
the life of one without dealing extensively with the
acts of the other. As has hereinbefore been stated,
one of the principal original proprietors of land in
the southerly part of Groton was John Page, of Wat-
ertown, from whom has descended nearly all who
bear that name in this vicinity. He seems to have
disposed of the principal part of his Groton property
to his children, by deeds, a few years prior to his
death. The principal part of his lands in this vicinity
were conveyed to his son, Jonathan, who married
Mary Farnsworth, of Lunenburg, on November 8,
1728, and died on October 10, 1751, at the age of
seventy-four years. Among Jonathan's sons was
John, who married Mary Parker, of Groton, on Sep-
tember 12, 1733. They had eight children, of whom
Phineas, born March 24, 17-15, was the fifth. He
married Hannah Stone, daughter of Simon Stone, of
Groton, on F"ebruary 2, 1769, and resided in the
westerly part of Shirley, on the farm now owned by
John Holden. When the British troops marched on
Concord and Lexington, April 19, 1775, he was one
of the volunteers, who, as minute-men, were called
out for the defence of the Colonies.
Eli, the seventh of his eight children, was born at
Shirley, September 19, 1784, and married Clarissa
Harkncss, of Lunenburg, June 19, 1810. A short
time after his marriage Eli moved to Lunenburg, on
to a farm that formerly belonged to his wife's father,
where he resided for eight years; and it was here
that his two sons, Thomas H. and Alfred, were born,
— the former September S, 1811, and the latter on
December 28. 1S17. In 1818 Mr. Page moved with
his family to what was then known as the Brook's
farm, situated about a mile north of Lunenburg Cen-
tre. Here he remained seventeen years. From 1335
to 1839 he resided at Lunenburg Centre, and from
March, 1839, to January 8, 1840, he resided on the
Holden farm in Shirley. November 19, 1839, he
purchased of the assignees of Edgarton, Priest &
Comjjany the water-power and mill-privilege on the
Nashua River, at what has since become known as
Mitchellville. This purchase also included a farm
of about 215 acres. The paper-mill formerly standing
here had burned June 15, 1837, and was in ruins
when Mr. Page purchased the property. With an
energy that has always characterized him and his
two sons, he immediately set about to reconstruct the
mills, putting in a four-engine plant and a Fordnier
machine. He rented the i)aper-mills to Carlton and
Wilder for the term of twenty years, at an annual
rental of $400, but continued to own and operate the
saw and grist-niil' until he sold them to his two
sons.
688 HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, JIASSACHUSETTS.
I
Mrs. Page died at Shirley on October tj, 1858, and | 8«>'l3"niof nrteen tUnnbani cJollarti in safe and i.rodnctivo securities or
Mr. Page on December 19, 1862. i "'^■'''' ""■"»«"'"'' p") » >■''>>■ <>'" .uteres.* no.i ina.me ti.ereor to
_,, rr 1 4 w J <• 3 1 ■ .. ■ "'*' di'liglilfr. .Miirv E. rage, diiriiic; ber liiitiira: life ; and in .nse iiiv
Thomas H. and Alfred formed a co-partnership tor , «,id ,,,.„g|.,er .l.all le»ve nucl.ild urch.ldren h>, ns at her .le. ease, then
the transaction of general business as early as 1843, | I unler tlie .raid .\llred ..r hia succe»sur m «id lni:-t, to pay the "aid
— a relation that was continued until Thomas's de- ! 1'""<^^'p^i »'""■ f '■"'•■"''"■""'"J ''"ii-'r^io-'iiJ >hiid or children ot.-m.i
j >[arY, living at lier death, and i>-.iie ot anv devt-aned diildren of -ard
OP&S6
I Mary by (i^ht ul reprenentatiuu. but in cas*? my said dani;hter phall
Their first venture was the purchase of a wood-lot ! die without leaviui,- any . Iiil.l oi iB.-ne of any d.ceased children Icvini: at
of fourteen acres near Charles Dodge's. During the her death, then I order and diiect the said .\llred or hi>>ucie«<ir in sanl
construction of the Fitchburg Railroad he furnished i ';'•*^'-■ i»> ■•-"!'''*""' ""';«" 'i-"^»n;i'';ii-;-. «'''^^
*=" t ^'i"'V to the town id Aver in the i.innlvof .Middle-?ex, to be held turever
that corporation with large amounts of lumber and i l.y «id towuof .\yer and interest and .ncome theieof to be expended
material that entered into the original construction i annually by said town, fur the uao and beucni .f the common schools in
of the road and its station buildings. About 1861 the ; ""'' '""" '""""■
original lease of the paper-mill having expired, and j Alfred was married to Sally Maria Felt, daughter
the mill gone considerably to decay, they rebuilt it, ! o( John and Huldah Holiart (Ciinant) Felt, Dec. 2{>,
and leased it to Stephen Roberts, furnishing him 1S62. Mrs. Page nan bitrn at Stow, September 7,
wilh the capital with which to efjuip and run it. , ISiS. Their son, John Eli. was born ^Iiiy S, 1*^64,
Shortly after this, Mr. Roberts died, and the plant ' and died August '>, 181)4. They have one diiughter.
was purchased by John N. Roberts, of Waltham. i Clara, born November 24, IS6i!, who married Edwiiid
There is scarcely a branch of business that has ' .V. Richardson, November 24, 1nS8. .^.Ifred contiii-
been conducted in this vicinity in the last half cen- ued to reside on ihe home-farm until it was sidd to
tury with which Page Brothers were not identitii-d. [ William Mitchell, in 1871. He then moved to Sbir-
They were large contractors and builders, having ley village, where he resided until he came to this
erected in this town, alone, over twenty-five buildinsrs, village, in 1874.
many of them being large manufacturing planis. ! He is entitled to the honor nt' being, of all citizens
Their credit and financial means have always been in the tf>wns in which ho Iki> resided, the one most
large, and the success that they have attained bus I trusted in the public 'iltiic^ at their comninnil. Fmin
been due to liberal and shrewd business sagacity. ; 18-58 to 1871) he served dlniost coiitiiiuou-ly in town
ThomHs H. was married to Emily Longley, daugh- ' offices in Shirley, lieing a member nf the boiird of
ter of Asa and Stirah (Hazen) Longley, on December selectmen during the war. He was a member of the
2'J, 1842. Mrs. Page was born January 10, 1819, and | first board of assessors in llii- town, and for the pa-l
died on September 19, 1850, leaving one child, Mary ; fifteen years has .serveil alnmst continuously upon the
Emily, who married Jlessena Morris Heath, Decem- board of selectmen. Besides these he has held vari-
ber 5, 1876, and is now living. Jlr. Page marrie<l ous importiiiit otlites. He lias been identified with
for a second wife Mary Amelia Jacobs, daughter ol nearly all nf our busiiie.-s jndiisirics, always willing
Sylvester Jacobs of Groton, November 1, 18-3o. The to lend Lis money, credit and active interested assint-
second Mrs. Page died March 1, 1871. ; aiice to any cummeudable undertaking in the town
In 1856 Page Brothers purchased of David Cham- 1 anil whose assistence can alwtiys be counted upon in
bers the lot of land now owned by Alfred Page, on ; tiny worthy objict. Many ni our citizens remember
the northerly side of Main Street, between Pleasant ! nitb gratitude the jissintauce that ilr. Page gave
Street and Washington Street, with the exceptions of ] them when they began a business life,
a small lot in the southeasterly corner, since known j \ few years since he presented to thi.s town the
as the Stuart lot. In 1868 Thomas moved from the i e.tteiisive farm lying at the summit of the hill on
Mitchellville farm to this village, where he continued j which our village is l)uilt, and a lew years later
to reside until the lime of his decease, August 20, j erected upon ii, and presented to the towii, the cx-
1873. He was inHueutial in the incorporation of the : tensive Imililings wh(i;.e location is one of the most
new town, and always had a strong belief in its i pleasant and sightly in the country, the only condi-
future prosperity. He was a man of public spirit, tion annexed to the gilt being that the town main-
keen business insight, and of liberal though very tain thereupon a town-farm, which would forever be
very positive opinions. His affection for the new a home for the needy and [loor in our midst,
town is manifested by the following clanse in his. When we coujider the various branches of business
will : I with which .Mr. Page has been idi-ntihed, we can but,
■•r/o,d.-l u-ive. devise and bequeath unto my brother, Alfred Page. ! *''°"<^*''' ''''' '^''^ ^re^'' *^'.''^>' "''''''' ''"- ^'^ibled him to
the Hiini uf fifteen thuuBan'l (loltnm in tniKT, for the fulluwinc unes :ind i Ul^ke tbeill all iiUCCeSblul.
purpo6t!ti, ntiuiely : I urJer and direct Ibe said Alfred tu sately iuveut the I
WESTFORD.
689
CHAPTER LVIII.
\ WESTFORD.
BY REV. C. H. ROWLEY, PH.D., F.R.M.S.. ASSISTED BY HIS
WIFE.
To write history, as well as to thoroughly under-
stand it in the redding, one needs to conceive the
events of the past as actually transpiring before his
very eyes — the actors of the olden time as living in
the present. If it is easier for the writer or reader,
let him, in imagination, transport himself backward
to the time when the events occurred, and consider
himself one of the very people of whom he writes or
reads. Thus the scenes shall become real, and the
people living actors in life's moving drama.
As far as possible, let the reader do this, as scan-
ning these pages, he shall read of the past. Those
who lived, breathed and made history were of mold
like ourselves who write and read to-day. They were
not mere mental and spiritual essences floating
through the air, but actualities, bone, flesh and blood,
like ourselves, and, like ourselves, too, were making
history. There is in people an innate desire to trace
descent from some noble ancestry — we love to be of a
stock that age stamps with dignity ; heraldic devices
are something, but power and character more. In
order to understand Westford people aright, it must
be borne in mind that, in common with the early
settlers of New England, they had a fortunate birth.
Ages had wrought to build the character of our Puri-
tan fathers ; they were men of heroic mold, moved
by thoughts that live and burn in the bosom of the
In6nite. The "Mayflower " was manned by men of
" defiant courage, shaped by the keen edge of disci-
pline, steel-hardened, who faced alike storms, starva-
tion and the savage."
There was the iron of age in their blood ; they were
men of battles, and grasped this continent for freedom
and for God ; they came here to hold this land and
make it the rallyiug-place for the noble souls escap-
ing from the tyranny of the Old World. Their sharp-
cut virtues cut their way westward even across the
continent to the milder shores of the Pacific coast, —
everywhere planting the church and the school-house
by its side. Faults they had, it is true, but the prin-
ciple that guided them, allegiance to God as the law
of life, was sublime. They stamped their children
with their own courage and progressive spirit till, so
soon after the day of small beginnings, we see a.nation
ranking among the first in the world.
The people of Westford sprang from that stock, and
while there is now no ringing war-whoop to summon
them to arms, nor perils of wilderness to be encoun-
tered or to call forth deeds of daring and endurance,
yet the blood of heroes courses through the veins of
the descendants, producing characters solid, symmet-
rical, beautiful. How was it possible that the settle-
44-ii
ment of Westford could be other than a success and
its prosperity assured when men came here to do or
to die, to hew their way in the New World as they cut
the timber for their cabins, to make a highway for
commerce as they blazed their path through the for-
est?
Men are influenced everywhere by their surround-
ings, and here our fathers found everything without
harmonizing with everything within. That which
made Westford the favorite hunting-grounds of the
Indian, on account of its picturesqueness (the nest-
ling valleys, the smiling landscape, the stony brook,
the quiet pond, the conical hills), made it also a
charm to the settler, calling forth in him the softer
beauty of his life, as well as the rugged strength of
purpose and will. The settler knew well that what
was in such harmony with himself would be an aid
in keeping his posterity loyal to the principles he
loved so well. Westford has fully its share of wood-
land and meadow, ponds, brooks, dale and hill, caus-
ing it to be loved by every one who makee it his home,
as well as by all who visit its attractive scenes. Few
of our townships have seven ponds within their limits
of the size and beauty of ours, and each of the^e has
a charm of its own. Nabanussuck Pond, situated
near Brookside, with its area of 123 acres, is fre-
quented inore than any other in the vicinity ; it has
much to call forth the admiration of every beholder,
and tempt him to linger in the groves that skirt its
waters. One realizes that there is much in nature
akin to himself as he reclines on the mossy bank and
feels the quieting influence of the silent life around
him. This stillness is vocal, and speaks in cadences
of love to all. A boat-house has been erected at a
point easy of access from the railroad, where a goodly
number of boats are kept in readiness for the use of
the many pleasure-parties that come here from Low-
ell and the towns about. The other ponds are: Long-
sought-for Pond, with its area of 107 acres ; Keyes
Pond, 40 acres; Flushing, 20 acres ; Burges, 25 acres ;
Grassy, 18. acres, and Ford Pond, though only a part
of the latter is included within the limits of our town-
ship, viz., 104 acres.
This pond has an important industry upon it,
which will be described further on. It is noted also
as a favorite " fishing-ground " for the people in the
vicinity, thus furnishing amusement as well as pleas-
ant food for the table to all who enjoy the angling
sport. Many of the people of Westford not only
train themselves in handling the rifle like their
fathers, but also the rod and line ; concerning the fas-
cination of the latter the following anecdote will il-
lustrate : "A minister, very fond of fishing, when
away on his vacation often tried to persuade his wife
to join him in a day's sport, but without success.
She could see no pleasure in it. At last one day, to
please him, she went. He prepared for her a rod
and line and a carefully-baited hook. She bad not
held the rod long before it began to shake and bend,
690
HISTORY OF 31IDDLESEX COUNTY, .MASSACHUSETTS.
and with great escitement she landed a pickerel
weighing five and three-quarter pounds. The minis-
ter says that since that time it has been adiflBcult
task for him to find time to go fishing often enough
to satisfy his wife."
The hills of Westford constitute a part of its diver-
sified scenery, though a fevr of them are slight eleva-
tions only. These are Fletcher Hill, Nashoba Hill,
Snate-Meadow Hill, Conscience, Spaulding, Oak,
Flushing, Milestone, Kissacook, Cowdry, Providence
and Francis Hills. The largest of all is situated near
the centre of the township, and is more than 300 feet
above the Stony Brook valley. The Indian name
was Tadmuck Hill, which was aAerwards changed to
Prospect Hill, the view from its summit fully justify-
ing the name, for, standing upon its highest point,
the eye sweeps the whole horizon in a radius of
twenty or thirty miles. The village of Westford is
situated on the highland, just at the foot of the still
higher elevation of Prospect Hill.
" The Central Village is beautiful 'for situation,' be-
ing built on a commanding eminence, the northern
terrace of Tadmuck Hill, which is 238 feet above the
level of the railroad at Westford Station. The view
of the distant mountains in clear weather is espe-
cially attractive and inspiring. The stretch of the
western horizon is broken into wavy lines by the
summits of Wachusett, Watatic.Monadnock, the Tem-
ple Hills, Kearsarge, Joe English Hill and the Un-
canooDueks. The White Mountains of New Hamp-
shire can be seen in favorable times- Its elevated po-
sition and picturesque scenery entitle it to rank
among the loveliest villages of Northern Middlesex.
Here are the church edifices of the First Parish and
of the Union Congregational Society, the Academy
and the Town-House, a large building, two stories
high, and furnished with modern conveniences for
the town offices, a fire-proof vault and room for the
town library ; also a large hall for public meetings
and armory for the Westford Squad of Company F,
Massachusetts Cavalry. The Common is a gem of
rural beauty, not large in extent, but fringed with a
double row of evergreen and deciduous trees. Here
in the twilight of pleasant summer evenings the
young and the old do sometimes gather to listen to
sweet magic, or in the spell of the witching moonlight
the light-hearted sit and while the gladsome hours
away. The main street is shaded with elms and
maples, and the ample sidewalks tempt to evening
promenades amid the perfumes of June or the golden
sheen of October. To those who know there is a lane
that leads to ' paradise,' where green mosses deck the
border of the spring, and birds ' sing love on every
spray.' Prospect Hill is within easy reach of the ad-
venturous foot, and is often visited by those who wish
to see the ' lovely and the wild mingled in harmony on
nature's face.' The general intelligfnce and social re-
finement of the people, the good influence of the
Academy, and the healthfiilnesa and general thrift
that are apparent, together with the neatness and
tidiness of dwellings, gaidens and enclosures, all
conspire to make this a desirable place of residence
for all who seek a home far from the mills and shops
and counting-rooms of care-worn men."
The following description of the view from the bel-
fry of the Unitarian Church has been kindly furnished
by Mr. Leonard Wheeler, to whom credit is here
given :
"The landscape visible from Westford Hill is al-
ways praised by those whose tastes incline them to
appreciate the beauties of nature. The undulating
hills and valleys, the forest areas of mingled ever-
green and deciduous trees, alternating with cleared
tracts dotted with fertile farms, the peaceful New
England villages perched on hill-top or built beside
never-failing streams, turning the wheels of busy fac-
tories; pond and quarries, blue peaks of mountains
in the background, with fleecy clouds of fantastic
shape overhesd, form a picture to be cherished in the
memory of the beholder.
" The two most favorable points of observation are
the top of Prospect Hill, a rise of land on the south-
west part of Westford Hill proper, and the belfry of
the Unitarian Church. The view southward from
the belfry is obstructed by Prospect Hill and shade
trees in the village; otherwise the belfry setms to the
writer the better point of observation.
" Looking south from either point, one sees, within
the town limits. Bear Cathead and Nashoba Hills.
Westward is Forge Village, at the foot of Forge Pond.
Here can be seen T. Hittinger's ice-houses and mills of
the Abbot Worsted Company. Turning toward the
north, the town farm at the foot of a high hill can be
seen. Northwest is Graniteville, with Snake Meadow
Hill, dotted with granite quarries, behind. Plainly
visible here are C. G. Sargent's Sons' Machine Shops
and theoriginal mills of the Abbot Worsted Company.
North, about one and one-fourth miles, is Wet-tford
depot and the mill-pond used by Heyward and Bur-
beck for their saw and grist-mills. At the far north
extremity of the town is Oak Hill, on which are quar-
ries of granite. Northeast is Brookside, close besido
West Chelmsford, where the ruins of the Eagle Mills
are painful reminders of what has been. Turning
eastward, Francis Hill covered with apple orchards,
holds the eye. A little nearer repose many of our
former citizens who have been gathered to their
fathers. Farther east is Providence Hill, from whose
foot Tadmuck Swamp stretches toward Bear Hill,
our starting-point.
"The trains on the Stony Brook Railroad may be
followed by the smoke neariy their whole route from
Ayer to Lowell. The smoke of locomotives may also
be seen on the Nashua and Acton ('Red Line'),
Framingham and Lowell, Boston and Lowell (main
line and Lexington branch) ; Fitchburg and Worces-
ter and Nashua Railroads.
"Summer mornings patches of fog betray the course
WESTFORD.
691
of the Merrimack and Nashua Rivers, and, within
the town, Stony Brook and the location of several
ponds.
" Acton Centre (not visible from the belfry), Little-
ton Common, Princeton, Aver, church spires in Lu-
nenburg and Groton, Ashby (a New Hampshire vil-
lage that could not be identified by the writer),
Tyngsboro', West, North, South and Centre Chelms-
ford, Lowell, a bit of Lawrence, Tewksbury, Billerica
and Bedford are visible.
"At night the reflection on the clouds of electric
lights in Boston, Lynn, Salem, Lowell, Lawrence,
Nashua, Fitchburg, Clinton and Waltham can be
Been.
"Round hill, in Ayer, Gibbett hill, in Groton, and
Robin hill, in Chelmsford, are the principal elevations
of land visible in adjoining towns.
"Looking now at more distant hills westward,
Wachusett, in Princeton, is plainly visible. As the
observer turns toward the north he may note succes-
sively the highest points in Shirley, Lunenburg and
Ashburnham, Watatic mountain, in Ashby, Monad-
nock, in JaflTrey, N. H., then a range of mountains
extending from New Ipswich to Francestown, com-
prising Barrett and Kidder in New Ipswich, Spofford
in Temple, separated from the preceding by Spofford's
gap, Temple, Pack Monadnock in Peterborough, Pin-
nacle in Lyndeborough and Crochet in Francestown.
Next are two peaks, visible from the belfry only, and
in fine weather, Bald Mt. in Antrim and Knight'd
hil! in Bradford. Joe English, in New Boston, is
easily identified, as it is a solitary dome-shaped hill.
Next are Black and Kearsarge mountains in Warner,
then come the twin Uncanoonucksin GofTstown. Di-
rectly north at times of extreme visibility, preceding
a storm, Mts. Jefferson and Washington can be seen.
A little eastward Strafford hills are visible. Resting
the eye for a moment on the forest-clad hills in Pel-
ham, we leave the rugged New Hampshire moun-
tains and turn toward the more level tract of Essex
County in the Bay State. The most noticeable point
here is the Insane Asylum in Danvers. Due south
of the observer i-s Fay's Mt. in Westborough."
Granitevclle. — Tbis villaje takes Its name from
the quantities of granite quarried there. It is com-
paratively a new village, for, while there were but few
houses and some quarrying done prior to 1854, it was
during that year that Mr. C. G. Sargent settled there,
and from that time the development of the place has
been rapid, its population outnumbering, at the pres-
ent writing, that of the Central Village. Eighty-five
years ago there were but two saw-mills, one grist-mill
and but three dwelling-houses in the place, occupied
by Messrs. John Reed, Jacob Abbot and Robert Wil-
kinson. Forty-two years ago the Stony Brook Rail-
road was built, while forty years ago there were but
eight houses in the place. In one decade, ending in
1880, over sixty buildings were erected, including a
church, school -house and depots, since which time
the place has continued its growth. The village was
called "Stone Quarry" till about 1856, when the
name was changed at the suggestion of Mr. Sargent.
It is situated on both sides of Stony Brook, in the
valley between Snake Meadow Hill and the high-
lands of the Centre. Standing upon these highlands
and looking down upon it, we see it nestling in the
basin between the swelling eminences. The neat
chapel church and new school-house are seen stand-
ing prominently out in the foreground, while beyond
are the long buildings of the manufactories and
dwellings on the terraces of Snake Meadow Hill. In
the early evening the light in the long rows of win-
dows in the manufactories ehine out in the darkness,
telling us of the busy hands engaged in the important
industries in the place.
The site is picturesque, and Graniteville is a vil-
lage attractive to the workingmen and their families
and to all others who have made it their home. Be-
sides the buildings already noted, there are two rail-
road stations, a tin-shop, club-house, post-office, mil-
liner's shop, machine-shop, worsted-mill and a few
stores.
Forge Village. — This is a pleasant place, situated
on the margin of Forge Pond, and contains a rail-
road-station, a school-house, an ice-house, post-office,
store and Abbot & Co.'s large woolen-mill.
Captain David Prescott Lawrence furnished Mr.
Hodgman these items, which we quote :
** 'On the west side of Beaver Brook near the bridge was located a
bouse, koowD as the Cogswell place. It was afterward occupied by Cal-
vin Green, and later bj Charles Bead. It was once a hospital for small-
pox patients, it i>eing cnstomar>' at that time for people to go there and
be Taccinated for small-pox. Following the road to the village we find the
next house, called the Kent place, at the comer of the road leading to
Westford Centre, where was also a blacksmith shop. Witliin my re-
membrance there lived in the ho'ise one Isaac Durant, a revolntionary
soldier, who was blind and was guided about the Tillage by a little
grandson Afterward it w-as owned by Ebenezer Blood, who was noted
for telling very improbable stories. Next It was owned by Charles
Miner, who was a soldier in the last war and never returned. Some
years ago the buildings were burned by an incendiary, and the place is
now owned by D. P. Lawrence. Next was the Patch house, occupied
by Isaac Patch and Eiisha Kent. The latter bad two wives and five
children ; the last wife being a sister of Asa Wright. The booae where
George Wright now lives was built and occupied by Amos Heywood,
who married Lydia Buck. The bouse nearly opposite was built and
occupied by Eben Prescott, who had three wives and a large family.
The next house was owned by Col. David Goodhue, the father of Imla
Goodhue, who married a sister of Judge Locke, of Lowell. The house
nearly oppoelte was owned by Eben Prescott, but was occupied by Elea-
zer Wright, a blacksmith, and after by one Pushee, and still later by
Horatio Clark, a blacksmith. The next dwelling-house was the " garri-
son bouse," so called on account of its being bnilt for defence ag&lnsC
the attacks of the Indians, having a brick wall between the woodwork.
The bouse was occupied successively by four generations of the name of
Et>enezer Prescott, the last being an uncle of Lutber Prescott, and who
died where Mr. Sprague now lives. The next house stood where
George Henry Prescott's house now stands, and was occupied by Joseph
Prescott (a son of Eben Prescott), who was father of several children,
one of whom was Avery Prescott, who built the house where Edward
Prescott now lives at Westford Centre ; and another son built the bouse
where Samuel Blodgett died, now demolished. The next house we find
at the extreme west end of the village, occupied by Jooas Prescott,
great-grandfather of Oliver Prescott, who also lived there and who mar-
ried Betbiah Underwood. Ue bad four sons and eight daughters; was
farmer and inn-keeper. At that time Ann Lee had founded a society of
Shakers at Harvard, Massachusetts. Through her inlloence the mother
692
HISTOKY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
And fire dRnfihtere were joduced to leave home and join them. This
circumstance su wrought upon the mind of the deserted buttband and
father that he became demented, and continued so to the end uf hia
life. Three of the daujthters lived and died with the Shakers. The
others left at different tiniea and htid families. The eldest son removed
to Jaffrey, New Iltimpehtre, irherv he bad a large family. The second
eon went to Whitestown, now New Hartford, New York, vfhen that
country waga wilderness; be also bod a lai^e family, llie third son,
Abmm, remained at home, and in the years 1808-'9 built the brick
house near Ibe site of the old one. Hia Qrst wife was Polly Fletcher, of
Westford ; the second Olive Adams, of Chelmsford. He was captain of
a military company ; was a representative to the General Court several
yeArB in succession ; was adeacoa uf the First Church, town clerk, and
held various civil officer
** * Retracing our ittepa through the village we come to the bouse where
Levi Prescott recently died, now occupied by his son, Nelson L. Pres-
cott. Here was formerly a bouse Inhabited by Jonas Prescott, great*
grandfather of Levi. He bad three wives and nine children. Passing
toward Graniteville, at the railroad crossing was the old scbool-bouse of
the village. Where the poor bouse now stands was an old house owned
and occupied by Dea. John Prescott, son of Jona?, above named, who
exchanged property with John Read, and Rend sold it to the town.
Next was an old house at David Heed's, owned by Timothy Prescott,
also son of the above Jonas, and altcrward occupied by bis iwo sous,
Isainb and Amos.
" ' About tifiy five yesrs ago Forge Village was in a very prosperous
condition. It had a store, hotel, three iron forges, two blacksmith's
shops, two wool-Lurding macbineD, one clothier s ntill, a grii^t-mill, and
a wheelwright's shop, all located near the new wurBtedniill.'
" To these interesting stuteinenis uf Captain Lawrence, it is pertinent
to add (hut this village is situated on one ot the great thoroughfares of
travel from Vermont to Boston. The great rond, as it was called, from
Bellows Falls to Boston, passed through Groton to Grotuo Ridges, where
there was a choice of routes to Boston, one road leading through Forge
Village, Carlisle, Bedford and Lexington, the other through Littleton,
Acton and Conrord. As all merchandise was then transported in heavy
wagons drawn by horses or oxen, the amount of tmvel on both roads
was very great. One man now living says he has counted seventy tcftois
in a line on the road through Forge Village; and another affirms that
he bus seen a hundred teams on the road in the south part uf the
town.
"There were numerous taverns in town to flccommodate the wayfarers,
five orsixin all. They preferred the route on which they found the
best entertainment. In winter, when the snow was deep, the people,
encouraged and rewarded (with plenty of the 'good creature,' it is said),
turned out to make a piilh fur the teams ; and there was a strong com*
petition between the people living on the two routes fur the travel.
Sometimes the paity from Westford wuu'd reach the tavern at Groton
Ridges by da> break, and thus tempttbe snowbound teamsters through
this town. Taverns were kept at Forge VillMge, at the house now occu-
pied by Cupt. Jacob Smith, at George Yapp's house, Henry P. Ruggles'
house and at Dupee's Corner. Among the landlords, whoee names are
remembered, are Willard Reed, who was at Capt. Smith's, and after him
Joseph Bailey; Seth Reed at Mr. Yapp'p, and Timothy Uanwell, who
came from Concord, and was the last one in the business there. He
sold to Leonard L. Gibson. John Rjiymond and Josiah Hayward, who
came from Concord, were on the Ruggles place ; and Solomon Woods,
Samuel Wright, Josiuh Boynton, Samuel Lancy and William Dupee
tfrom Dedham) were at Dupees Corner. These are only a few of the
men who were in that business. A living witness testifies that he has
known seventy or seventy-five teams to 'put up' for the night at the
three taverns severally called Reed's, Raymond's and Hartwell's. The
times are changed, and the wayside inn is rapidly becoming a thing of
the past in this Commonwealth."
In looking over some old records at Forge Village
the iollowin^ papers were found, which are, perhaps,
of sufficient interest to be recorded here. One reads
thus:
" Province of the Mnesachusetts Bay. In the House of Representa-
tives, Sept. lu"", 173*1 :— A Petition of Jonas Prescott, Ebenezer Prescott,
Abner Kent, and Ebenezer Townsend. Inhabitants of the Town of Gro-
ton, Praying that they and their Ehtatee contained in the following
Boundaries, viz., Beginning at the Nonh West Comer of Stoney Brook
Pond, from thence extending to Iho North West Comer of Wesiford
: commonly called Tyng's Corner, & bounded Souiberlyby said Pond,
J may be set off to the Town ol Westford for their greater convenience in
! attL-nding the publick Worship. Read A Ordered with the Petition
j within named with their Estates, according to the bounds rncited. be
I and hereby are to all intents and purposes set off from the Town of Groton
' and annexed to the Tuwn of Wesiford. True Extract from the Eecoids
of the Geni Court. Attest,
'* John Aveby, D. SecC
Another paper reads:
"At a Town-meetiug Nov. 191*, 1673. By the agreement of the Town,
Jonas Prescott is to grind the Towu Corn for the Town every second day
and every sixth day in every week. A true Copy from the book uf Re-
cords for Groton.
•'Attest Olivee Pbescott, Toini Clerk.'*
[Of course this was the set off.]
Other papers read aa follows :
".\t a general Town-meeting at Groton June 13'^ KBl. Then grant-
ed to Jonas Prescott Liberiy to set up his Corn Mill, at Stoney Brook on
the side next Concord in any place betwixt the Spring and the Bridge
and to liave Liberty to make up of so much and no uiure uf the water as
may eutticiently .serve for (be taid mill, provided that what damage
thereby may be to the Town's highwiiy, the s^ Prescott shall at bis own
Charge couFttantly make good, a true Copy from Groton old Book &.c.
" Attest Oliveh PurscuTT, Toicn Clerk."
" June 25'i» 1083. An agreement made between Jonas Prescott and
the town of Groton, that he the s^ Joiuis Prescott have liberty to set up
a Saw-mill at Stoney Brook, and to have the use uf the stream upon
conditions as follouetb, first, that he shall acronimodaie the Town with
merchantable Boards at eix pence a hundred cheaper than are sawed at
any other Saw-mills and for the Town* pay, and that the Town bball be
supplied befurc any other persons, and he is to have this privilege unlill
there may appear something that may be of greater adxanlai^e for the
Town whether by Iron Work or any other ways, always provided the
Saw-mill do not binder the Curn Mill, and the said Prescott is to have
the use of tlie Tuwn* Timber for his own use, and the &<* Prescott is to
make and maintain a sufficient Cart Bridge from time to time, a true
Copy from the old town Book ^c
"Attest Olivee PaESCOTT, Town Clerk.''
A long deed difficult to decipher ends in this way :
'* I have set too my band a"d sele this eleventh-day of february and in
the year of our lord God one thousand seven hundred and nine 17(j8 : y
in the seventh year of the rain of our suver'n Lady Anne of England
Scotland France and Ireland Queen &c.
hia
"Daniel ^ poweks
mark
" Sined Seled and delivered in the presence of us.
" TUOUAS BOLUN8
" GE&SUOU aiux
bir
" XABT -f PAGE
mark
" Charleatown Decemb'" the Vl'^ : 1711. Rec"* and accordingly Entered
on the Regestry of Deeds Ac for Middlesex. Feb ; 13° — pag : 570, 571,
By Sam" Phipps Reg'."
Brookside is a little village in the eastern part of
the town, near West Chelmsford. Here the first full-
ing-mill was built, which has given place to another
important industry. In the year 1857 Mr. Theodore
H. Hamblet bought a combined grist-mill and saw-
mill of "Davis and Kidder," who, with iheir other
work, manufactured a patent magneto-electric ma-
chine. Mr. Hamblet put in a flouring-mill, and kept
the grist-mill for custom work. In 1S62 he sold out
to the Moore Brothers, and soon the large worsted-
yai n mill was started, which will be described later on,
Parkerville is a well-settled school district in
WESTFORD.
693
the southern part of the town, composed of thriving
farmers.
Nashoba, in the extreme southern part, is the
name of a p<)St-Qffice situated on the Framingham
and Lowell Railroad.
Tne township is the central one in the county, and
is the largest. It ha4 Tyngsborough on the north,
Carlisle and Acton on the 80ulh, Chelnnford on the
east, Groton on the west, and Littleton on the south-
west.
Railroads. — There are three that pass through the
township in such direction that access to other towns
and communication with the surrounding cities is
easy. Stony Brook Railroad connects with the Fitch-
burg Road at Ayer, and with the Boston and Nashua
Road at Lowell, and, as there are four stations on the
road — Brookside, Westford, Granlteville and Forge
Village — the convenience of the road is manifest.
The Framingham and Lowell Railroad passes
through the southern part of the town, having one
station, called the Carlisle Station. The Nashua,
Acton aud Boston Railroad pa'.ses through the west-
em part of the township, having three stations —
Granlteville, Westford and East Littleton.
Nearly all the present township of Westford was
foraierly a part of Chelmsford and continued thus
till September 23, 1729, when a bill before the Gen-
eral Court, 'For erecting the West Precinct of the
town of Chelmsford into a Township by the name of
Westford," was passed to the third reading and the char-
ter was granted. The act was " passed to be enacted "
sixteen years after the struggle for a separate esist-
ense began. A small triangular part of the town-
ship, having for its base Forge Pond and its northern
apex resting on Millstone Hill, was set off from the
town of Groton and annexed to Westford by an act
of the " Council, read and concurred September 10,
1730," since which date the boundary has remained
intact.
In'DIANS. — Like all the other parts of the coun-
try, Westford was the home of the Indian. The Paw-
tuckets or Wamesitsaod the Na^hobas hunted here, and
on the banks of Forge Pond held their council-fires.
" On the eastern margin two places are shown where
the encampments«or lodges were fixed, which are in-
dicated by slight excavations and the finding of ar-
row-heads." On the hill east of Eli Tower's there is
a flat rock where, it is said, the " squaws kindled i
their fires and baked Indian cake in the best style of
Indian cookery." Not only in the vicinity of Forge j
Pond, but at other places in the town, there are occa-
sionally found, even now, stone implements and flints
of their handiwork. The writer has seen their
hatchets and other tools, and he has in his possession
a large pestle, a chisel and several arrow-heads. Is
it surprising that the heart of the red man is sad-
dened, as he thinks that his beautiful hunting-grounds
are in the possession of the pale-faces, that the young
brave shall no longer woo the dusky majden at some
trystiug spot, that his defiant war-whoop shall do
longer ring out on the yielding air and be echoed
from hillside to hillside, that he shall no more wildly
ride his pony in the chase, oor hunt the bear, nor
challenge his foe to mortal combat? all the life his
fathers loved shall be his no more. While we glory
in the achievement of the haroic Puritan, let us not
forget that the red man, though a savage, had a heart
in his breast as well as the pale-face.
Cemeteries. — We have not a Greenwood nor a
Sleepy Hollow, in which lie the classical dead or the
honored of the ages, yet we have places where we lay
our loved ones, who sleep until the resurrection.
"It is a fact worthy to be mentioned, that the first
burying-place in Westford was not near the meeting-
house. It was the custom to lay out a lot around or
very near the sanctuary. In Westford the oldest
burial-ground is a mile east of the meeting-house,
and is not, therefore, a cAarcA-yard. Indeed, the
early settlers never used the word church to desigoate
the house of worship or the place of burial. Inas-
much as the eastern portion of the town was first set-
tled, the spot was selected long before the precinct or
town was formed. The oldest bead-stone bears this
inscription : ' Abram Wright, died 1702.' But bur-
ials may have taken place before this; and as the
records of Chelmsford give no information about
it, it is perhaps impossible to fix the time when the
first grave was made there. There are two other cem-
eteries in town."
Post -Offices. — There are five post-offices in town,
one at each of the following places : Nashoba, West-
ford, Cold Spring, Granlteville and Forge Village.
The following list of postmasters of the Westford
office is here given, with the date of their appoint-
ment. It will be noticed that the date of establish*
mem wao Mu.^.. _^, i803.
Postmasters. — John Abbot, appointed March 29,
1803; John W. P. Abbot, August 2i, 1831 ; Samuel
Fletcher, October 4, 1839; Sherman D. Fletcher,
May 23, 1849; David C. Butterfield, June 10, 1833;
Samuel Fletcher, March 3, 1856 ; John B. Fletcher,
Mirch 1, 1860; Sherman D. Fletcher, April 22,
1861; FrancisL. Fletcher, September 24, 1866; John
B. Fletcher, September 20, 1857 ; Sherman D.
Fletcher, August 12, 1869; John M. Fletcher, Octo-
ber 26, 1885; Sherman H. Fletcher, April 22, 1889.
Attention is called to the above list of names, on
account of the fact that, out of thirteen appointments
ten of the men were Fletchers.
Farm Products. — The general products of agri-
culture are such as are usually raised in New Eng-
land, though more fruit is produced in Massachmetts
than in the northern States and more in this town
than in many others. Vegetables are raised for city
markets by many farmers. Apples are grown in
great abundance and in many varieties, from the
many orchards throughout the town, early apples as
well as the winter Baldwin.; «nd during the beafiog
694
HISTOE!f OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
year thousanda of barrels are sometimea shipped to
Europe. Occasionally they are shipped by rail at
Westford or Acton, but more commonly, carriad by
heavily-loaded teams to Boston. Several large vine-
yards are in the town, and tons of grapes are raised,
making this one of the most important products of
the soil. Of late years the peach crop has been
abundant, the yield being large and the fruit the equal
of any in New England, at least. It is generally con-
ceded that the peaches, sometimes received in Boston
from our town, are the largest and best flavored of
any received there. Small fruits are also successfully
raised, such as strawberries and blackberries ; thou-
sands of crates of these are marketed every year. In
short, Westford is widely noted for raising a large
variety of as excellent fruit as is produced anywhere
in New England.
Some idea of the healthfulness of the town can be
obtained by considering the ages of some of our peo-
ple now living, as well as of some recently deceased.
There are now living probably twelve people who are
over eighty years old ; two are ninety-one ; and one
person, ninety-four. Mrs. Hildrelh died in August,
1884, aged one hundred and one years and one day.
Military History. — Little can be learned from
the early records of the town in regard to the action
taken during the French and Indian War. From
other sources we find the Westford people were not
wanting in this time of peril ; but that the town gave
her share of brave men for the defence of the Colonies.
One muster-roll of a company under the command
of Jonas Prescott gives the names of sixteen men
from Westford. This company started for the relief
of Fort William Henry, but, hearing of its surrender,
went only as far as Springfield.
The spirit of independence early manifested itself,
and from the beginniugof the Revolutionary struggle
until its triumphant conclusion the people were out-
spoken in their indignation of the conduct of the
British Parliament ; and showed their determination
to withstand such oppression. They were alive and
full of interest in the thought of the possible freedom
from the bondage which the mother country was im-
posing upon them. Their hearts were stirred to the
depths when the news of the Stamp Act reached their
ears, and they took immediate action to express their
disapprobation. Soon they procured fire-arms and
prepared for defence, as they saw the difficulties could
be settled by no amicable means.
In March, 1774, Dr. Fletcher drew up a paper ex-
pressing the sentiments of the people in the following
forcible manner: "In faithfulness to our country,
ourselvej and posterity, we hold ourselves obligated,
according to the utmost of our abilities, to make re-
peated oppositions against repeated attempts to ex-
tinguish the just rights and liberties of this people,
or every attempt to annihilate our freedom, the price
of which was no less than the price of blood, even
the precious blood of our worthy ancestors."
When there came the call <o ar7n»/ the people of
the town did not hesitate, but were among the first to
leave their homes to enter the bloody conflict, which
lasted long, but which, eventually, secured glorious
liberty and equal rights to our great " American Com-
monwealth," now the most honored and beloved na-
tion in the world.
On April 19, 1775, iff Concord, on the North Bridge,
the British troops were met and driven back by the
brave and toil-worn yeomen of this new country, the
character of whom is most ably pictured to our pres-
ent generation in the stalwart arm and expressive
features of the " minute-man," now standing as a
monument of this first decisive strike for liberty.
Rev. Dr. Ripley, in his account of this struggle, says :
" A company from Westford had just entered the
bounds of Concord when the fight took place. But in-
dividuals from that town were present and engaged in
the battle, among whom was the brave Col. Robinson."
He also says further on in his narrative : " The situa-
tion of Major Buttrick, as it was more dangerous and
important, has gained hira distinguished celebrity and
honor. But this ought never to operate as an eclipse
upon any other otiicer on that occasion. There is
satisfaccory evidence that on the march to meet the
enemy. Major Buttrick requested Co!. Robinson to act
as his superior, he being an older man and of higher
rank in another regiment; but he modestly declined,
and consented to march at the right hand and be con-
sidered a volunteer. The late Col. John Buttrick,
then a nfer, repeatedly affirmed that he was present
and heard the conversation between his father and
Col. Robinson. . . . The Americans commenced
their march in double file. ... In a minute or
two the .\mericans being, in quick motion and with-
in ten or fifteen rods of the bridge, a single gun was
fired by a British soldier, which marked its way, pass-
ing under Col. Robinson's arm and slightly wounding
the side of Luther Blanchard, a fifer in ihe Acton
company." Rev. Joseph Thaxter, then preaching at
Westford, in connection with William Emerson, were
the first chaplains of the Revolution. Mr. Thaxter
afterwards went with a company of Westford soldiers
to Lake George and Ticonderoga ; he oflTered prayer
at the laying of the corner-stone of the Bunker Hill
monument.
In Colonel William Prescott's regiment of minute-
men were twelve officers and fifty eight privates from
the town of Westford — Timothy Underwood, captain.
In the regiment commanded by James Prtscott, Esq.,
there were nine officers and thirty-six privates — Oli-
ver Bates, captain. In Captain Joseph Minot's com-
pany, under Col. James Prescott, Esq., there were
eleven officers and thirty-six privates.
" Peb&onal Testimony.
"Mrs. JoDathan Prescott, a graod-daugfater of Colooel RobiusoD,
who died in this town, .\pril 14, 1876, at the great age of DiDetyHioe
years, diotmctly remembered the culoDel, being tweoty yell's old at the
time of biB death, in 1SQ6. She te£tiAbd'to the compiler of thin work
WESTFORD.
695
that when the alarm came on the night of the 18th of April, he stood
not on the order of his going, but mounted bis borso and hurried to
Concord, leaving orders to his hired man to follow with provisions. She
said, likeivise, that he wua invited to take the command, and the tradi-
tion in her family has always been that be did aasume it and ordered the
troops to fire. Her recollection accorded with the inscription on his
gravestone which afhrma that he commanded the Boldiere at the
Bridge." (" History of Westfurd," page 109 )
It is stated that Captain Oliver Bateit died from the
effects of a wound received as they were driving the
British from Concord to Lexiflgton. Col. RobinsonV
bravery was also shown in the battle of Bunker Hill,
The death of a colored man from Westford is also re-
corded in the returns from this battle.
The War of 1812 being unpopular in Massachu-
Bett->, there was no very enthusiastic response to the
call for troops; there were, however, a few men from
Westford engaged in this war.
When there catne the call for men to protect our
beloved natioo when a dissolution of our United
States was threatened, military enthusiasm revived.
It was not a struggle for enlargement of power or for
personal aggrandizement, but to preserve entire one
Republic, and the free institutions that had been the
pride of our countrymen ever since that memorable
Independence Day, July 4, 1775, which brought to us
our liberty and the right to a national govern nent.
It was to our Northern men a war that called forth
every patriotic feeling. Rev. Mr. Hodgman says :
" It involved the question whether might makes
right; whether liberty is the birthright of every hu-
man soul, however lowly ; whether the all-embracing
air and the vivifying sun in the heavens are God's
free gifts to all His creatures; whether every man,
while submitting to the requirements of just law, has
a right to himself, to the ownership of his own facul-
ties of body and mind — the right, which is inalienable
and untransferable, to liberty and the pursuit of hap-
piness."
Although before the war there were two parties in
the North, differing with each other in regard to the
question whether it was best or right to force their
Southern brethren to give up their slaves, — when it
became a question of union or dissolution, there was
nearly a unanimous response to the call to help pre-
serve our Union. The large calls for men were met
with such wonderful alacrity that other countries
looked on with wonder at an army so easily raised
without compulsion.
The result of the war shows that not only were our
States still united, but that all the above vexed ques-
tions were settled, we trust, permanently so far as
our own country is concerned; and henceforth all
American-born children, whether black or white,
shall have the rights of citizenship.
The first enlistment of men from Westford occurred
immediately after the disgraceful shooting of the
troops of the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment while
passing through Baltimore. Our men were filled with
indignation and were eager to help' in the repression
of a rebellion that had caused their 'comrades to be
shot down like brutes in cold blood. Twenty-one
men from Westford were then enrolled and were in
Company C, Sixteenth Massachusetts Regiment of
Volunteers. Five of these men never returned to
their homes, but gave their lives to their country.
This company, under their captain, L. G. King,
were present at the raising of the flag-staff on the
Common and took part in the exercises. This flag-
staff was cut by Mr. Abijah Fletcher, from a tree near
Cold Spring ; the flag was bought of Col. Williaai
Beale for sixty dollars.
"aftit/lS, 1861. — Saturday foraoooD. All things being ready, the
flag-staff was raiaed by Samuel Fletcher, of GraoiteviUe, aided by miuj
citizens of the village and other parts of the town. At two o'clock the
stars and stripes were run up, amid the cheen) and hurrahs of a large
collection of men, women and children from all parts of the town, who
had assembled to witness the patriotic scene. The chairman of the
commit-ee then called for a song, and ' Tlie Flag of Our Union' was
sung with a will. An appropriate and patriotic address was given by
the chairman, and then the assembly went into the hall under the First
Parish Church. The chairman again called the meeting to order, and
prayer was offered by Eev. Edwin B. H Klginao. Speeches were mide
by fievB. Leonard Luce, George M. Eice and Eiwin B H tdgcnao ; also
by Col. George F. Sawtelle, of Lowell, and Lutber Proscott, Esq., of
Forge Tilloce, and after singing another patriotic song the assembly
returned to the common, aud. gathering around the flag-staff, with the
flag flying aloft, pledged themwives anew to stand by their country and
government through weal or woe in the struggle Just commenced, and
then separated, after giving twelve hearty and rousing cheers for th»
vhoU Union, J. W. P. Abbot, Chn. Selectmen."
The patriotic feelings here expressed were after-
wards carried out in actions. The town was prompt
to act, liberal with her means, and her zeal and enthu-
siasm did not flag during the entire contest. The
record in regard to the number of men and the money
expended is most honorable. The twenty-one men in
Company C, Sixteenth Massachusetts Volunteers,
were the first to enlist, and others soon followed. Our
soldiers were in the thickest of the fight, were in the
battle of Gettysburg, in the battle of the Wilderness,
at Spottsylvania Court-House and at Petersburg.
i The first man from Westford who died for his
country was John L. Taylor. He died in the hos-
pital at Baltimore, November 8, 1861. The first man
from Westford killed in battle was William Dane,
killed at Winchester, Virginia, May 25, 1862. The
names of thirty-three more brave men, who died for
their country, are inscril>ed on a marble tablet in the
Town Hall, making thirty-five upon the Roll of
Honor from Westford.
The " History of Massachusetts in the Civil War"
speaks of the town of Westford in the following words :
" It was not behind any town of its size and wealth in
the Commonwealth in fulfilling every obligation de-
manded of it by the State or nation during the entire
period of the Rebellion. It furnished 172 men for
the war, which was a surplus of fifteen men over and
above all demands. Four were commissioned officers.
The whole amount of money raised and expended by
the town on account of soldiers' families aud repaid
by the State wai $10,525." Two ladies went from
696
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Westford aod were employed as nurses in a hospital
at Alexandria, Virginia, — Miss Emma D. Southwick
and Miss Eliza M. Weeks. Miss Southwick was after-
wards a teacher among the freedmen of South Car-
olina, and during the Centennial Exhibition at Phil-
adelphia was connected with the famous " Log Cabin."
For a fuller account of Miss Southwick see biograph-
ical sketch. Miss Sarah E. Keyes also went from
Westford as a teacher to the freedmen in October,
1866. She encountered the opposition so common to
all who firft went to teach that benighted race, but
continued to teach until her death at Kingston, North
Carolina, June 5, 1866. The ladies of Westford did
a noble work for the soldiers, in furnishing clothing,
delicacies, etc., which were sent to the Sanitary Com-
mission.
One of the finest military organizations in the
State is the Spaulding Light Cavalry. It is the only
unattached cavalry company in the Commonwealth,
and when recently the State militia was reorganized,
and some companies were disbanded, the Westford
company was retained on account of its soldierly
bearing, its efficiency in drill, its good financial condi-
tion and the pride the men take in the organization.
Though squads are stationed in other towns as well as
in ours, and many men recruited from those places,
yet, because the armory and headquaiters are here,
and also because Captain Fletcher has done so much
to bring up the company to its high state of efficiency,
it seems proper that its history should be connected
with our town. On September 5, 1889, the company,
officially known as Troop F, Cavalry, First Brigade,
Massachusetts Volunteer Militia, celebrated the
twenty-fifth anniversary of its organization, in Nab-
nasset Grove. Many men eminent in civil and mil-
itary life were present, and from the " toasts " and re-
plies, as well as the addresses given, it was clearly
seen that the troop is a favorite in the military cir-
cles of the Commonwealth, and has a high position
in the State militia.
The troop held its first encampment at Westford in
1865. Colonel Joseph W. Gelray, United States
Army, was detailed as the inspecting officer, and Dr.
Samuel L. Dutton, now of Boston, who had just re-
turned from the army, acted as medical officer at the
request of the adjutant-general.
Among the men active in raising the troop was
Deacon Otis Adams, of Chelmsford, who, in his
younger days, had commanded the Old Chelmsford
Troopers. Although he had passed the age of .seventy
years, his martial enthusiasm was so great that he 1
became an active member antl served in the ranks at |
several encampments of the troop. I
The troop has always maintained a high reputation
for efficiency, is in splendid condition financially, and '
that harmony has prevailed in its midst is shown in i
the few changes in the roster of its officers, the fol- |
lowing being the names of all the past officers of the |
troop ; ... . .. '
Capt. ChriBtopher Roby, ChelmBford ; Capt.SbermaD H. Fletcher,
Westford; Lieut. AlleD Cameron, Westford ; Lieut. A. 31. Clement,
Boston ; Lieut B. F Day, Weetford ; Lieut. James A. Davjp, Dunstable;
Lieut. N. B. I.apham, Cheimslcrd ; Lieut. W. L, Ritlredge, Weftlord;
Lieut. E. C. Williams, Groton ; Aebt. Surg. Levi Howard, M.D., Chelms.
ford; Aest. Surg. Joeepli B. Heald, JI.D., Pefptrell ; Asst. Surg. W. F.
Leigbton, M.D., Lowell.
The composition of the troop of to-day is as follows:
Capt. Horace W. Wilson, Carlisle; First Lieut. Elieha H. Shaw,
North Chelmfford ; Second Lieut. Amos K. Leighton, Westford ; Atit.
Surg., Firat Lieut .\masa Howard, M.I)., Cbelmhioid ; Hcfpiinl Stew-
ard Charles H. Bealls, Lowell ; First Sergt. Daniel H. Bobbins, Carlisle ;
Quartermaster Sergt. John Feeney, Westford ; Sergt. George V. Her-
rig, Pepperell ; Sergt. Charles J. Hall, Groton ; Sergt. William J. Qnig-
ley, North Chelmsford; Sergt Sidney A. Bull, Carlisle; Corp. D. E.
Weston, Pepperell ; Corp. E. H. Kejes, Westford ; Corp. H. V. Hil-
dreth, Westford ; Corp. Charles F. Srrlbner, Xorlh Chelmsford ; Guidon
P. J. Httyes, Pepperell ; Bugler J. 3. Gilchrist, Lunenburg ; Bugler E.
S. Tnidu, Ayer.
Captain Christopher Roby, the father and first com-
mander of the troop, is a hale and hearty gentleman
of seventy-five years. He was born in Dunstable,
Mass., October 18, 1814.
Captain Sherman H. Fletcher was born in West-
ford December 24, 1846, and was educated at West-
ford Academy. He enlisted in Troop F, December
9,1864; appointed corporal Apr il 1,1871; sergeant
May 1, 1871 ; first sergeant August 9, 1873; commis-
sioned second lieutenant May 27, 1874, and captain
May 14, 1877. He resigned December 1, 1888, and
retired from active service with a record of which
any officer may be proud.
Captain Horace W. Wilson, the present commander
of the troop, was born in Billerica, Mass., and resides
in Carlisle.
The company has taken two State prizes for the
best carbine-shooting, and Corporal E. H. Keyes, of
the Westford squad, has taken the prize for the best
individual shooting with the carbine in the State.
Ecclesiastical History. — In the year 1727 ihe
inhabitants of the " West Precinct" of the town of
Chelmsford, the part of the town now Westford,
assembled to choose a minister of the Gospel ; and at
that meeting voted a certain amount of money as a
salary, and appointed a committee of three to confer
with the Reverend Willard Hall in regard to a settle-
ment.
Mr. Hall accepted the call, and his answer shows
that the human nature of the divines in that age was
very like that of ministers now. There was a clause
in the call, namely, " Voted that they agree with him
that his Sallary shall rise and fall according to the
valine of money," which proved a bone of contention
for many years. It was easier to diminish his sal.nry
when silver was high than to raise it when silver was
low.
The reverend did not think that fair play, and in
1739 entered a complaint to that effect, which came
before the town in form of a vote for and against rais-
ing his salary. This vote was decided in the nega-
tive, and Mr. Hall appealed to the courts of justice.
How it was settled is not recorded, but we conclude
WESTFORD.
697
peaceably, as Mr. Hall remained with his people as
their pastor until aged asd infirm.
During the Kevolutionary period he was a Tory,
feeling it his duty to be loyal to King George. This
caused much feeling among his people and he was
not allowed to preach for a time, and it eventually
led to his final dismicsal from the church, but not
until after he had given up active pastoral work and
a colleague had been appointed. His ministry ex-
tended over forty-eight years. Mr. Hall had his avo-
cation as well as his vocation : he was an excellent
farmer and his garden was the admiration of many ;
he also acted as a physician when such serrices were
needed.
The church records state that Mr. Hall was or-
dained and a church organized November 27, 1727,
with the following members:
" Willard Hall, John Comings, William Fletcher,
Joseph Underwood, Joshua Fletcher, Aquila Under-
wood, Jona« Prescott, Jonathan Hildreth, Andrew
Spalding, Jacob Wright, Samuel Chamberlin, Samuel
Fletcher, Aaron Parker, John Proctor, Jonas Fletcher,
Nathaniel Boynton, Benjamin his X mark Robbins,
Josiah Whitney."— 18.
We find no record of any female signers ; perhaps
husband and wife were considered one in a very lit-
eral tense; but what became of the maiden ladies?
During Mr. Hall's ministry there seemed to be a
" half-way covenant," granting certain privileges,
such as the baptism of infants, but cot giving them
the right to partake of the communion at the Lord's
table; reminding the writer of the associate members
of our modern Christian Endeavor Societies, who
have some of the privileges, but not the spirit of the
active members.
The church discipline of those days was an actual
thing, not a dead-letter ; for we read that in 17-15 sev-
eral were disciplined on the part of the church for
" frequently absenting themselves from public worship
and from communion at the Lord's table." The ques-
tion is suggested whether it would not be better if the
present generation had more of the disciplinary over-
sight of its church-members which these early Chris-
tians possessed. For possibly it might result in se-
curing a larger attendance upon our church services.
It is evident that these early disciples would not have
been in sympathy with Mr. Moody's school of lay-
workers at Mt. Hermon. For another instance is re-
corded in this same church, and in the same year,
when several were censured for " attending a private
meeting under the ministration of a lay-exhorter in
time of public worship on the Lord's day." The
name of this lay-exhorter was Paine, sometimes
spelled Pain, which suggests something of the subse-
quent feelings on the part of those who had attended
his ministrations.
After Mr. Hall's dismissal from the church they
were some time without a pastor, there being rival
factions in the church, the political condition of
the country being such that it was bard to find har-
mony anywhere.
Finally, after hearing many candidates, the charch
voted to extend a call to Bev. Matthew Scribner, and
chose a committee of five " to inform Mr. Scribner of
the proceedings of the church, and, also, to inform
the selectmen of the town that the town may act
thereon as they think proper." It seems that the
church could not act independently of the town in
choosing a minister, for the salary was decided by a
vote of the town. This was the order of things until
February, 1828, when, the town and church not agree-
ing, a change was made, the church having the power
to call a minister, but the town still voted to raise a
certain sum toward the salary.
Mr. Scribner's pastorate is spoken of as being a
short one of ten years, and that a pleasant feeling did
not exiiit between him and some of the inhabitants of
the town. After Mr. Scribner's dismissal from the
church in Westford he spent the remainder of his
days on a farm in Tyngsboro.
The succeeding ministers were as follows : Rev.
Caleb Blake, Rev. Ephraim Randall, Rev. Ephraim
Abbot, Rev. Jonathan Farr, Rev. Luther Wilson, Rev.
Claudius Bradford, Rev. Edward Capen, Rev. Her-
mon Snow, Rev. John B. Willard, Eev. Stillman
Clark, Rev. George M. Rice, Rev. George H. Young,
Rev. William A. Cram, Rev. Joseph B. Moulton and
Rev. E. B. Maglathlin. Many of these preached but
a short time, and during this time there were many
candidates, whose names are not here given. Mr.
Maglathlin remained about two years, beginning his
work May 1, 1887. He was educated in the Boston
schools. State Normal School, at Bridgewater, Antioch
College, and the divinity school at Harvard Univer-
sity. After graduating from the univeri-ity he taught
six years in the Partridge Academy, Duxbury. He
taught also in the Cambridge High School. During
hia pastorate the church was revived, the communion
service re-instituted, and the rite of baptism solem-
nized for the first time in many years. It was also
during his pastorate that the church was repaired out-
side and within, costing about $1500. He remained
here till May 31, 1889, resigning his pastorate to take
the superintendency of schools in the district formed
by the union of Easthampton, Southampton and
Westhampton.
Mrs. Maglathlin is an elocutionist.
During Mr. Blake's ministry they expended money
for the purchase of books for a Sabbath-school libra-
ry ; and during his ministry, also, we have the first
account of the conflict of theological opinions. He
took a decided stand against Unitarianism, but in a
few years retired to private life and spent the remain-
der of his years on a farm. He was dismissed Feb.
28, 1826, and on December 25, 1828, the Union Con-
gregational Church was organized. It was composed
of those who withdrew from the First Church on ac-
count of difference of opinion in regard to the funda-
698
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
mental doctrines of belief, and of others who removed
their connection from churches in other towns.
The original membership numbered 75. On Jan.
29, 1829, by unanimous vote of the church, Mr. Leo-
nard Luce was called to be their pastor, and remained
until July 1852.
The following pastors were: Rev. Thomas Wilson,
Rev. David 0. Allen, Rev. John Whitney, Rev. Ed-
win R.Hodgman,' Rev. GeorgeT. Stanton, Rev. James
Fletcher, Rev. Edwin A. Spence, Rev. Henry D.
Woodworth, Rev. Nathan R. Nichols, Rev. Henry
H. Hamilton, Rev. Rufus C. Flagg, Rev. Charles H.
Rowley, who is still with the church.
Methodist Church. — The first regular services of this
church held in Westford were by Rev. John Naylor,
in 1856.
In 1860 Rev. L. Luce conducted worship in the
school-house during the warm months. Early in the
spring of 1863 the services of Rev. Mr. Howarth, a
•Methodist preacher from Lowell, were secured, and
he labored through the summer. During the summer
of 1864 Rev. George M. Rice held services in the
school-house at 4 o'clock p.m. In the winter of 1866-
67 Rev. E. A. Spence preached in the schoul-house
several times on Sabbath evenings.
In 1869 Mr. Charles S. Graves, lor many years the
conductor on the Stony Brook Railroad, took meas-
ures to secure the establishment of a Methodist Epis-
copal Society in Graniteville. Mr. Minor H. A. Ev-
ans preached in the old school-house, July 4, 1869.
The congregation filled the room to its utmost capac-
ity, and many stood in the ante-room and around the
windows. Mr. Evans, the nest morning, drew up a
subscription paper for funds to build a church edifice.
Mr. Charles G. Sargent promptly headed the list with
$2000 and site. Another SIOOO, in smaller sums, was
added during the day. July 12th, Mr. Evans was ap-
pointed preacher in charge by the presiding elder.
July 18th the congregation being unusually large, a
platform was erected and seati arranged in the grove
in the rear of Mr. Samuel Fletcher's house, and there
the services were held for the remainder of the sum-
mer. July 20th a class was formed, consisting of
twenty members, and Arthur Wright was appointed
class-leader. August 3d a Quarterly Conference was
held, at which Mr. Evans, the preacher in charge,
Mr. Wright, the class-leader, and Mr. J. K. Proctor,
the Sabbalh-school superintendent, were present, and
the following persons were chosen trustees: Arthur
Wright, Charles G. Sargent, Cyrus Hosmer, William
Reed, Samuel Fletcher, Lyman A. Smith and Josiah
K. Proctor; stewards, Cyrus Hosmer. Arthur Wright
and J. K. Proctor.
August 13ih the Board of Trustees was organized
' From June 26, 1859, to July 3, 1864, he waa acting pastor of tba
cbarcti in Weatford, Mawachuaatta. During hia reaidenre in Weatford
he gave several addresses on public oc-caaiuus and some of them were
printed. lie also compiled the history of that town, a volume of about
lUO pages, publiahed in llitU.
by the choice of Charles G. Sargent, president, and
Arthur Wright, secretary and treasurer. A Building
Committee was elected, consisting of Messrs. Sargent,
Wright and Smith, who were duly authorized to build
a church. Soon after, the site given by Mr. Sargent
was conveyed by deed ; a design by S. S. Woodcock,
architect, was adopted, and the coutract for building
was made with Messrs. Mead, Mason & Co., of Con-
cord, N. H., to build the edifice, above the founda-
tion, for §8900.
In March, 1870, Mr. Evans was ordained deacon
and appointed to Graniteville. The church edifice
was dedicated March 22, 1871.
Mr. Charles G. Sargent, the chief financial patron of
the church, diel July 16, 1878. He hud contributed
about S5000 and the site to the church, and he left a
further pledge of $1000.
The official board passed the following preamble
and resolution :
" Whereas, Divine Providence has removed from this life Charles G.
Sargent, chairman of our Board of Trustees,
"fle89/o«d, Tlwt theofficial board expresses iti prof.iuod esteem for the
life and clianicter of Mr. Sar^eat, and its symp.itiiy witti the family
and the society, which have lost a devoted friend uod faithful couu-
sellor."
Since the death of Mr. Sargent the debt incurred
by building the church has been entirely extinguished,
partly by the efforts of the society and partly by the
generosity of Mr. Sargent's heirs, who paid the last
installment of $2400.
A medallion of Mr. Sargent has been placed in the
church by Rev. M. H. A. Evans, the first pastor.
The following is a list of pastors : Revs. Minor H.
A. Evans, Nathaniel B. Fisk, James F. Mears, Minor
H. A. Evans (second pastorate), Alfred Woods, W. D.
Marsh, S. C. Cary, W. C. Townsend, J. H. Emerson,
J. H. Tompson, and Alfred Woods (second pastorate).
Educational History.— The town of Westford
early felt the need of education for her children, and
favored the idea of public schools. The early advan-
tages of education were necessarily very meagre, in
comparison with the educational advantages now af-
forded by the town. In those early days the children
enjoyed school privileges but a few weeks in the year,
and the school was held in a private house. There
are now in the town fifteen schools and ten scbool-
hou^es, and the children attend school 165 days in
the year. As we look back over the records, in regard
to the action taken concerning schools, in the begin-
ning of the history of our town, we notice the peculiar
spelling, and conclude that either our fathers must
have been adepts in the phonetic art, or that the need
of schools must have been apparent. We quote :
" March 4, 1733-'34, voted to chose four men for a
Commity to provide a schule-mastre for the insuing
yeer. Voted, Ensign Jonathan Hartwell, Joseph Un-
derwood, Ensign Joseph Keyes, and Joseph Hildreth,
Jr., Comt. to provide a scool for insuing year."
" March 3, 1734-'35, voted to raise twenty pounds
money to pay ye scool-masler." " December 4, 1738,
WESTFORD.
699
voted to choos a commity to higher a schooll master
for keeping schooll this winter." " £40 for the scholl
and the rest for town debts or county ratio or taxes
and squirlsand burds. The selectmen have liberty to
dra money out of the treasury for these squirls and
burds as the law diricts."
The first teacher of whom we have any knowledge
was Joseph Underwood, Jr., a graduate of Harvard.
The first female teacher was Mrs. Edward Bates ; she
taught in 1740 and for several years afterwards. The
first record of a school building occurs in 1787. At
that time the town voted to build a school-house in
each school squadron, and for this purpose voted to
raise £145. There may have been school-houses be-
fore this, but no record is found of such. In 1647
there was a law requiring every town having within
its limits 100 families, to have at least one school in
which the scholarscould befitted for college. Later, io
compliance with this law, a college graduate was em'
ployed as teacher in one school in the town, and it
was called a " Grammar School." This college grad-
uate did not teach all the time in one school, but
went from one school to another, in a partial degree
meeting the demands for a higher education.
"The sum appropriated to the support of schools in
those early days will not suffer in point of generosity
or liberality when compared with the amount now
granted. Wealth had not then accumulated, and to
many of the people it was a hard struggle to live in
any way ; but education was not neglected.
" In due time the lines of the several districts were
defined. The term squadron ceased to be used abou'
1798. That known as Stony Brook was divided in
1795, and that known as the Southeast was separated
from the South soon after.
" In 1808 the town voted to ' give to the southeast
district (now No. 6) fifty dollars toward erecting a
school-house.' This was the first school-house in the
district. In 1809, voted 'to choose a committee to
regulate the several schools in their inspection the
year ensuing.' This looks like a veritable School
Committee, but the law of the State requiring the elec-
tion of such a committee was not enacted until 1827-
This town plainly anticipated the enactment. The
men to whom belongs the credit of being the first
School Committee of Westford were John Abbot, Esq.)
Colonel Benjamin Osgood, Reuben Leighton, Levi
Wright, Nathaniel Hildreth, Jonathan Prescott, Amos
Read and Bill W. Stevens. This appointment was not
exceptional, but continued to be made year by year.
" In 1822 the territory of the town was divided into
eight school districts. These were the Centre, Stony
Brook, Forge, the Southwest, the South {No. 5), the
Southeast (No. 6), the Northeast (No. 7), and the North
(No. 8 and No. 9). In 1826 the North District was di-
vided, and one part called the Northwest. In 1851 the
Forge District was divided. Some time previous to
this division the school-house of that district stood
near the poor-house.
" April 6, 1835, ' Voted that the scholare in the sev-
eral districts shall be numbered by the committee on
the first Monday or Tuesday of November, with the
names of the beads of families.'
" March 7, 1836, the selectmen were made a commit-
tee to number the school-houses, and then the present
numbers were given.
"In 1851 Graniteville became No. 10. The houses;
with one exception, have all been built since the re-
peal in 1869 of the law relating to school districts."
In 1882, in consequence of the resignation of Rev.
E. R. Hodgman as superintendent of the scboolsi
Rev. J. Sidney Moulton was chosen in his place, and
has been retained as a member of the School Board
and superintendent to the present time. Since his
connection with the schools four new ones have been
opened— one at Forge Village, one at the Centre and
two at Graniteville. The large graded school build-
ing at Graniteville was completed and opened in the
autumn of 1886. It has four rooms, and there are
four grades of classes in the building ; it cost about
$6500. The new Long-aought-for School-house was
built the year following. The school-houses are all
in good repair and are of the most improved con-
struction. Mr. Moulton favors the normal method of
teaching, and has striven to employ teachers who
could use it. He has given the teachers such instruc-
tion as he could and has recommended books for them
to read on the subject, so that they could inform them-
selves as to the methods, and use them as far as pos-
sible. A few of the teachers only are, as yet, cap-
able of thoroughly teaching them; but where they are
used, it is claimed, excellent results have followed.
He is convinced that it is the only proper way of
teaching, and says the new inptruction makes the
child more independent, so that he will know what to
do rather than to follow a rule in the book — he will
get the rule later. The schools have certainly im-
proved since Mr. Moulton took charge of them. There
is a better grade of scholarship ; he has marked out a
course of study for the children and has planned
work also for the teachers, so that they know just
what they are to accomplish each year; thus a system
is followed and greater efficiency is attained. The
teachers are required to have examinations every
month, and Mr. Moulton has always given an exam-
ination himself every month — generally a written
one — and has also given oral work every time he has
visited a school. He visits them oftener than the
law requires — as often as every two weeks, sometimes
oftener — and he thinks much better work could be
done if a superintendent could be engaged who could
give his whole time to it. He needs to be in the
school often, to see that the teachers do as required
and that the methods arranged are properly carried
out, and also to see where the children are in their
studies all the time. He is conscientious in his work,
enjoys it, is liked by the teachers, and has brought
the schools up to a standard, at least, as high as in
700
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTF, MASSACHUSETTS.
any of the towns surrounding. He visits schools in
various cities and towns, and strives to ascertain all
the improved methods of instruction. There are very
few truants in the schools, only six or eight during
the year, and when it is considered that there are six
schools in two manufacturing villages in the town,
this number cannot be large. People wish their
children educated ; they keep them in school, hoping
they will secure a better education than their parents.
Mr. Moulton was born in Plainfleld, New Hampshire,
April 12, 1852. He graduated at Kimball Union
Academy, jn his native town, June, 1869, and at Dart-
mouth College in 1873. He studied theology at the
Cambridge Divinity School, graduating in 1876. He
was ordained here, June 12, 1878, having preached
here nearly two years before his ordination, as acting
pastor of the Unitarian Society. He resigned his
pastorate in 1885, when he began preaching in Stow,
Massachusetts, whrre he is still the acting pastor and
the superintendent of their schools, giving them about
one-third of his time — the remainder he spends in
Westford.
The Academy. — In 1792 several gentlemen met to-
gether and ''agreed to form themselves into a society
by the name and institution of the Westford Acade-
my.'' Articles of agreement and subscription were
then drawn up and signed by (ilty-four persons; and
at the head of the list stand '.he names of Zaccheus
Wright, John Abbot and Abel Boynton, each of
whom subscribed £30. The town also contributed to
the original fund and became entitled to its benefits.
August 3, 1792, the proprietors adopted certain
rules and by-laws for the regulation and government
of the school; and among other things it was pro-
vided, " that the English, Latin and Greek languages,
together with writing, arithmetic and the art of .speak-
ing, should be taught, and, if desired, practical geom-
etry, logic, geography and music; that the school
should be free to any nation, age or sex, provided
that no one should be admitted a member of the
school unless able to read in the Bible readily with-
out spelling."
The act of incorporation was passed September 28,
1793. It recites that over £1000 had been given by
various parties for the establishment of the academy;
but the records of the early meetings of the subscrib-
ers specify only the gifts before mentioned. In the
meantime, however, these may have been increased
by additional subscriptions.
The first meeting of the trustees under the act of
incorporation was held on the 2d of April, 1794, at
the house of Mr. Joe! Abbot, and was continued by
several adjournments to the 21st of July following.
At this meeting the arrangements seem to have been
completed, or nearly so, for the orderly working of
the institution. At this meeting Mr. Levi Hedge was
requested to have a public exhibition on the 4th of
July. This is the first intimation on record of his
being in office as teacher or preceptor.
Public exhibitions seem to have been continued for
' many years, and tradition says that they were attend-
I ed -vith great interest. Academies were rare then,
and the attendance fi'om other towns and from con-
j siderable distances was much larger than it n.'jw is.
I First among the early friends and promoters of
this institution stands the name of Zaccheus Wright.
I His interest in it is evinced by the liberality of his
gifts; and the estimation in which he was held is
apparent from the fact that he was elected the first
I president of the board of trustees, and was aocually
j re-elected to that office till ISOS, when he declined
I further service.
John Abbot, eldest son of John Abbot, was born in
j Westford, January 27, 1777, and died .April 30, 1354,
at the age of seventy-seven. He graduated at Har-
vard University in 179S, in a class distinguished for
i talent, in which he took a high collegiate rank. He
i immediately became preceptor of this academy and
; held that place two years. He then studied law and
t opened an office in Westford, and about tae.same time
I he was chosen a trustee. Oil the deceiise of Jona-
than Carver in 1805, he was chosen treasurer of the
, academy, which office he held by successive annual
! elections till his death, a period of fifty years, less
1 three or four months. To his careful management
I and prudent foresight the institution is chiefly indebt-
! ed for its present funds. During his long administra-
j tion they increased nearly or quite threefold. The
; academy had no wealthy patrons like its neighbor at
j Groton, but depended for the incre.ase of its means on
j small but carefully husbanded accumulations. It was
i the aim of the treasurer to save something from the
annual interest of the funds to be added to the prin-
cipal; and almost every year's report showed some
increase in their amount. The trustees had implicit
confidence in his integrity, fidelity and skill, and rare-
ly, if ever, interfered with his plans. During this
long period his services were rendered gratuitously to
I the inhtitution whose welfare he had so much at heart,
j and he will always be remembered as one of its
I stanchest friends. Mr. Abbot was also held in high
respect by his fellow-townsmen, being often chosen to
j places of trust. He was regarded as a sound lawyer,
and a faithful and reliable legal adviser. He served
one term as a Senator in the State Legislature, and
was a member of the convention for reviling the
State Constitution in 1820. He was al.so a distin-
guished member of the Masonic Order. He was twice
Grand Master of the Royal Arch Chapter of the
Free Masons of Massachusetts, and in that capacity
laid the corner-stone of the monument on Bunker
Hill in 1825, General Lafayette being present and as-
sisting in that ceremony.
He was succeeded in the office of treasurer by his
son, John William Pilt Abbot, who held it till his
death, in 1872. The latter, like his father, gave his
services gratuitously, being animated by the same de-
sire to further its prosperity. He was born .April 27,
WESTFORD.
701
1806, in Hampton, ConnecUcut, the early borne of his
mother, Sophia Moseley, a daughter of Ebenezer
Moseley, Esq., of Hampton. He was chiefly fitted for
college at this academy and graduated at Cambridge
in 1827. After studying law in the Law School at
Cambridge he entered his father's office, the business
of which was not long after transferred entirely to him.
He was a member of the House of Eepresentatives in
18G2, and of the State Senate in 1866 ; and was select-
man and town clerk for many years. During the late
war his services as a town officer were invaluable.
He was particularly interested in the affairs of the
First Parish, and for a long time was entrusted with
the management of them. In all these relations he
was trusted as an able and faithful counselor and
public servant, and he was universally regarded with
esteem and affection for his urbanity, benevolence
and generosity.
Levi Hedge, the first preceptor, graduated at Har-
vard University in 1792, a. distinguished member in
a distinguished class. He came directly to Westford
with a high reputation as a scholar, and left two years
after with an equally high reputation as a teacher.
He returned to Cambridge to take the place of a tutor
in the college, and after several years was promoted to
a professorship of logic and metaphysics.
Miss Susan Prescott, daughter of Hon. James Pres-
cott, president of the board of trustees, was the first
female assistant employed, and her instructions were
confined solely to the classes of young ladies. She was
justly regarded as an accomplished teacher, but she
held that position only for two successive seasons in
summer.
Rev. Ephraim Abbot took charge of the school in
1828, and was the preceptor for nine years. He was
born in New Castle, Maine, September 28, 1779, and
was the son of Benjamin and Sarah (Brown) Abbot.
He graduated at Harvard College in 1806, and at
Andover Theological Seminary in 1810, in the first
class that left that institution. His name stands at
the head of the list of graduates. He was ordained
pastor of the Congregational Church in Greenland,
New Hampshire, October 27, 1813, and was dismissed
on account of ill health October 27, 1828. While in
Greenland he was for a time the principal of the I
Brackett Academy in that place. During his residence
at Westford he represented the town in the State Leg-
islature in 1839. He was aland surveyor and justice
of the peace, and was a very useful and philanthropic
man and an earnest and devout Christian. He was
a true friend of the academy, and never ceased to
take an interest in its prosperity. He died in West-
ford July 21, 1870, aged 90 years, 9 months and 23
days.
Hon. John Davis Long, late Governor of the Com-
monwealth, was born in Buckfield, Maine ; graduated
at Harvard in 1857, and came at once to Westford,
where he remained two years. The school under his
management was very prosperous. The number of
pupils was unusually large, and the enthusiasm of
both teacher and scholars was high-toned and abun-
dant. Mr. Long, during his preceptorship, started a
literary society in which debates were held and a pa-
per, called the Literary Oaiherer, was edited by the
members. The versatility of Mr. Long's gifts was
shown in his contributions to that paper, and his
ready tact in the discussions. The society was kept
up for several years after he left. He is remembered
with affection and esteem by his pupils and associates,
and such of them as yet reside here welcome him to
their homes as one whom they honor and love. His
honorable career as a lawyer and statesman have won
for him golden opinions which many may emulate but
which few attain.
C. 0. Whitman, Ph.D. — ^The immediate predecessor
of Mr. William E. Frost, as preceptor of the academy,
was Dr. Whitman. After leaving Westford he held
the position of sub-master in the English High
School, Boston, three years, then studied three years
in Leipzic, where he took the degree of Doctor of
Philosophy. Returning to America, he taught an-
other year in the English High School, then accepted
a Professorship of Zoology in the Imperial University
of Japan, remaining there two years. He returned
home through Europe, spending six months in study
at the Naples Zoological Station, on the way. He
then went to IJarvard University for three years and
finally published — ^jointly with Alexander Agassiz —
"Embryology of Fishes." From Cambridge he went
to Milwaukee, accepting the directorship of the Lake
Laboratory, established there by Mr. E. P. AUis. He
is at present Iro.essor of Animal Morphology in
Clark University, Worcester, Mass. He is also the
editor of the Journal of Morphology, and director of
the Marine Biological Laboratory at Wood's HoU,
Mass. His appointment to the professorship at the
university was made in August, 1889.
The place of preceptor is now filled by Mr. William
Edwin Frost, a native of Norway, Maine. He was
born December 6, 1842 ; graduated at Bowdoin Col-
lege in 1870, and took charge of this academy, April
26, 1872, being the thirty-sixth in the line of pre-
ceptors. He is a very carelul and thorough teacher,
and a most efficient disciplinarian. His work in the
school has been excellent, and for seventeen years it
has secured the just and hearty praise of all who
have been familiar with his methods and witnesses of
his achievements.
Previous to Mr. Frost's taking charge of the school,
the only examinations of the classes were oral ones
at the close of each term ; and as these were limited
to one day's session, some of the classes were not ex-
amined at all. The first change made in this matter
was to have the oral examinations include all the
classes, two and sometimes three days being devo'.ed
to this purpose. In order to secure greater care and
thoroughness in the preparation of lessons, a system
of written examinations was soon introduced in addi-
702
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tion to the oral ones, three being held each term at
regular intervals. The rank of each student and
class is impartially made up from these examinations
and kept on record. This judicious system of exam-
ining and ranking the students has proved to be a
strong incentive to faithful study, and has greatly im-
proved the quality of the work done in the school.
No small acknowledgment of meed is due Mr.
Frost as an educator, from the fact that, while he has
sent quite a number of young men to college, every
one he has fitted to enter such an institution has
been received without a single condition, every one
has passed successfully through the difficult and pro-
tracted examinations.
Mrs. Helen Keith Frost, the wife of the preceptor,
is a direct lineal descendant of Rev. James Keith,
the first settled minister at Bridgewater, Mass. She
is a graduate of the Maine Wesleyan College at
Kent's Hill, Maine ; is interested in literary pursuits, I
and consequently assists the educational interests of 1
the community and stimulates its literary activity. j
The present lady assistant teacher is Miss Nettie !
M. Stevens, of Westford. She graduated at the i
academy in 1880 ; taught school a year in Lebanon, I
N. H. ; went from there to Westfield, Mass., and
entered the Normal School, taking the four years'
course in one and one-half years, and receiving her
diploma.
She then taught for a year or two, and in January,
1885, entered upon her work as teacher in the
academy from which she had graduated five years be-
fore. In 1877 she took the French course at the
Amherst Summer School of Languages.
She is specially interested in botany. She has re-
cently purchased a compound microscope, and is be-
coming proficient in the preparation of slides, by
which she studies the biology of animal as well as
plant life.
List of Geaduates, 1872-1889.
College Preparalory Cburic. — Oscar BriDkerhofT, Forge Village, 1873 ;
Edward H. Chauibfrlain, Westford. 1877; John 0. Cumingn,' West-
ford, 1873 ; Fredenck A. Fisher, Westford, 1877 ; Francis A. Frost,
Westford, 1889 ; Ida E. Leighton, Westford, 1877 ; Heury L. McClnsky,
Westford, 1889 ; Charles 0. Prescott, Westford, 1873 ; Arthur G. Rob-
bins, Carlisle, 1882 ; Nettie M. Stevens, Westford, 1880 ; Emma J.
Stevens, Westford, 1882 ; Leaoald W. Wheeler, Westford, 1882 ; Henry
M. Wright, Westford, 1880.
Engliih and Clauical Courte. — Lillle B. Atwood, Westford, 1877 ; Carrie
L. Adams, Chelmsford, 1887 ; Emma S. Abbot, Westford, 1882 ; Lucy K.
Abbot, Westford, 1887; George G. Drew,' Westford, 1879; Edea J.
Drew, Westford, 1882 ; A. Mabel Drew, Westford, 1887 ; Addie il.
Fisher, Westford, 1879 ; Clara A. Fisher, Westford, 1882 ; Lenie H.
Fletcher, Weulford, 1387 ; Julia E. Hall, Westford, 18S9 ; Herbert V.
Hildreth, Westford, 168U ; M. Luella Hutchins, North Billerica, 1887 ;
Bosina Koyes, Westford, 1877 ; James L. Kimball, Westford, 1880 ; De-
lia Martin, Westford, 1878 ; Abby M. Pond. Dedhara, 1873; Issie A.
Parker, West Chelmsford, 1381 ; .\lbert E. Prescott, Westford, 1881 ;
Carrie E. Read, Westford, 1879 ; Stella E. Reed, Graniteville, 1880;
Carrie M. Bobbins, Cailisle, 1882; M. Dora Spaldii.g, Westford, 1882;
Minnie A. Wortlen, North Chelmsford, 1882 ; M. Ella Wiley,' Westford,
1882.
Engluk Ctourie.— John C. .^bbot, Westford, 1888 ; Willie F. Blodgett,
Dunstable, 1888 ; .Arthur D. ButterBeld, Dunstable, 1888 ; Ella Bennett,
Westfotrl, 1883 ; Charloa A. Cliamberlln, Westford, 1889 ; John Fisher,
Weatfonl, 188T ; Luaaoa W. FleUber, Westford, 1883 ; Harrlaoo C.
Hall, Westford, 1887 ; Charles D. Howard, Westford, 1839 ; An?usta G .
Hutcbius, Chelmsford, 1889; M. Belle Parkhurst, West Chelmsford,
1881 ; Rena E. Prescott, Forge Village, 1S8S ; Cliarles G. Sargent,
Graniteville, 1388 ; Edith E. Wolker.' Burlington, 1879 ; Boy B.
Wheeler, Westford, 1888; Clarence W. Whidden, Westford, 1881;
Annie E Wilson, Westford, 1888 ; J. Florence Wilson, Westford, 1888;
S. Eva Worthen, Chelmsford, 1382 ; Walter C. Wright, GrauiteviUe,
1883.
Many of the above graduates have taught in the
schools of our town, or of other towns. We speak of
a few of the graduates whose homes were in Westford :
Frederic A. Fisher graduated from the academy in
1877, afterwards graduated at Bowdoin College,
Maine, and acted as tutor there. He studied law as
a profession, and is at present a successful lawyer in
Lowell, but keeps up his interest in Westford. He is
on the School Board, one of the Town Library Com-
mittee, one of the committee for obtaining a pulpit
supply in the Unitarian Society, and his influence for
good is felt in many ways. Charles O. Prescott, a
graduate of the academy in 1873, graduated at the
institute of Technology, receiving the title of B.S. ;
afterwards took a post-graduate course of three years ;
then taught at Plymouth, at Knapp's School, for some
years. He then went abroad, going nearly around
the world, spending some time in Australia and the
Old World ; he brought back much valuable informa-
tion and many curiosities and works of art. Mr.
Leonard Wheeler, Miss Emma J. Stevens, Miss Lillie
B. Atwood, Miss Clara Fisher, Miss Rosina Keyes,
Miss De'ia Martin, Miss Carrie E. Read, Miss Dora
Spaulding, Miss Ella Wiley, Miss Ella Bennet, Miss
Luanna Fletcher, Miss Annie Wilson, graduates from
the academy, have all taught in our town schools,
and some are teaching at the present time.
James L. Kimball graduated in the class of 1880,
and after studying one year at Bryant & Stratton's
Commercial College, Lowell, entered the Institute of
Technology, Boston, remaining three years. Choosing
electricity as his specialty, he began working with
"Thomson-Houston Electric Company" in 1886,
and has been with the company most of the time
since then. He has studied all branches of the work,
and has been sent out by the company to oversee the
planting of electric lines in different parts of the
country. He is now in the Railway Department of
the city office, Boston. He has invented an accessory
for the electric-lighting apparatus, which is used
quite extensively.
Henry M. Wright, another Westford boy, graduated
from the academy in 1880, went to Bowdoin College,
Maine, graduated from there in 1884, taught school
in Wilmington, Vt., in the fall of 1884, then returned
to Bowdoin and took a post-graduate course in chem-
istry. After that he went to Hingham, Mass., as the
principal of the High School, where he is still a suc-
cessful teacher.
Albert E. Prescott, a graduate in 1881, has devoted
his life to music. He is still taking lessons of the
WESTFORD.
703
best masters in Boston, and is himself teaching
scholars in all the surrounding cities. He kindly
shows bis interest in his old home by doing all be can
to advance the musical intertst here, whenever he
can find time to do so, among so many urgent and
pressing calls elsewhere.
Edward H. Chamberlin, a graduate in 1877, is a
successful practicing physician in Chelmsford, Mass.
Miss Nettie M. Stevens, a graduate in 1880, is now the
assistant principal in the academy. Some of the later
graduates are now pursuing courses of study in col-
lege : Francis A. Frost is in Bowdoin, Maine ; John
C. Abbot and Charles G. Sargent in the School of
Technology, in Boston, Mass. ; Lucy Abbot in Smith's
College, Northampton, Mass. ; Julia E. Hall in Mt.
Holyoke College, South Hadley, Mass. ; Mabel A.
Drew in the Normal School, Bridgewater, Mass. ; Boy
Wheeler in the Ccmmercial College, Lowell, Mass.
Harrison C. Hall with the firm of N. Boynton & Co.,
manufacturers and dealers in cotton, duck and cord-
age, Boston, Mass., is becoming a successful business
man. Others are successful in other occupations ;
and all these graduates, whether from Westford or
other townf — sc far as we can learn — have become
honorable men and women, worthy of their alma
mater.
Microscopy. — In this connection, it may not be
wholly inappropriate for the writer of this historical
sketch to speak of a course of study in which he has
been specially interested, viz., microscopy. As it has
befn his purpose to write of any such thing concern-
ing others, he takes the liberty of speaking of this
most fascinating field of scientific research. And as
this history will probably be read by some who are
not acquainted with the microscope or the many uses
to which it is applied, it may be well to state that
magnifying glasses have been used for hundreds of
years, even as far back as the philosophers of Greece.
Valuable discoveries were made by using only a
drop of water as a magnifier; but it has been only
within the last fifty or sixty years— since the con-
struction of the achromatic lenses — that the instru-
ment has been of scientific importance.
The compound microscope is now an instrument of
the highest optical perfection, and has bf en brought
up to its present efficiency by the united labors of
men who have given their lives to its improvement.
Devised in its compound form about 200 years ago,
it was long considered an ingenious toy ; and though
it gave wonderful revelations to the scientist when-
ever used, it was generally considered a thing to
amuse his leisure hours and not of any practical
utility. The past few years have changed all that,
and the time has gone by for it to be considered a
" plaything "' alone, as it is now conceded that even a
moderate knowledge of any one of the physicalsciences
is possible only by its aid. What the telescope is to
the heavens, the microscope is to the earth, with this
difference, however : that where the telescope reveals
one fact the microscope reveals a thousand. It is but
a truism, now, to say, that a good microscopical outfit
is of the utmost importance in scientific inTeiitigations,
for in many of them it has proven it«elf of the greatest
utility. Some of our sciences have been made possi-
ble only by its aid, — e. g., biology would never have
been known without it ; for it was by the glass that
the cellular structure of the plantand theanimal were
discovered, as well as the "streaming of the proto-
plasm.'' The latter can be seen only by an excellent
objective, and not even then without careful manipu-
lation. No student, now, expects to attain even a
moderate excellence in botany, without some kind of .
a magnifier, while the biological study of plants can
be carried on by a good compound microscope.
Biological investigation is now one of the most fas-
cinating of scientific pursuits, and it must look to the
compound instrument for whatever triumph it expects
to achieve in the future. The microscope furnishes
men with a second sight, and whoever uses it acquires
a double power over nature. The geologist, the
chemist, the mineralogist, the anatomist and the
botanist have all found the microscope necessary to
any complete knowledge of their all-absorbing re-
searches. It is applied now in forensic medicine, and
has aided in determining the guilty as well as in lib-
erating the innocent. The germ theory of disease is
a result of careful microscopical investigation and ex-
periment, and has been placed among the verities of
science. To the teacher, the glass has proved itself, in
many circumstances, a valuable aid in fixing the at-
tention of the pupils upon the wonders of the invisi-
ble world, which has been proven larger, eveu, than the
world we can see with the unaided eye. The results
of its use has surpassed the widest stretch of imagina-
tion,— no one twenty-five years ago would have deemed
it possible to discover all that is well known to-day.
It is said that, " No one, who possesses even a pocket
microscope of the most limited powers, chn fail to
find amusement and instruction even though he was
in the midst of the Sahara itself. There is this great
advantage in the microscope, that no one need feel
in want of objects as long as he possesses his instru-
ment and a sufficiency of light." By its aid, new
lives have been discovered in the sand beneath our
feet, in the drop of water from a stagnant pool, and
in the very air we breathe ; and every one of these
lives is a link in the chain of existence. By the
multiplicity of lives discovered a new " classification "
has been made imperative, several times, in natural
history.
Not long has it been since the hydrozoa and polyzoa
were classified, while the diatoms are yet causing
much discussion. But one of the great benefits re-
sulting from its use comes from the relaxation it
gives to the tired men of business, to the teacher
weary from the school-room, and to people who are
ill and confined to the chamber — relaxation, rest and
material for after-thought as well. What more help-
704
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
fill occupation to the aged one who is " tenting on
the beach," awaiting the summons from the other
shore, than studying the works (as well as the Word)
of Him who made all things, and which he may be
permitted to study with better facilities by and by.
Surely, in the word and works of God we have
enough to enlist all our powers in eternity as well as
in time.
The writer has received such stimulus and instruc-
tion from this study that he, without any reserve, can
recommend it to the attention of all. Very few are
80 poor that they cannot possess some kind of a mag-
nifying power, and by its use knowledge shall be dis-
covered everywhere it is sought, and often where it is
least expected. The writer has endeavored to follow
the trail of investigation as well as to find some new
beauties and truths of his own, and he has not been
disappointed. With 1800 microscopical slides, cover-
ing pretty well the different fields of research, he is
never at a loss for instruction and amusement, for
such a recreation enlarges the armamentarium of the
mind and increases the furniture of the soul. He has
thirty different species and varieties of fresh-water
sponges, as well as a good collection of insects
mounted by himself, and by exchange he has received
400 histological and pathological slides, illus{rating
nearly every appearance the normal and abnormal
tissues of the human body assumes. The work is not
difiScult, and he knows of no branch of science that
will give such large returns for the time employed, as
microscopy.
Social and Public Library. — "It is now eighty-five
years since the establishment of a library in this town.
It was at first the effort of a few benevolent men to
secure a wider diffusion of knowledge among the peo-
ple by means of good books ; but that early inception
has widened into a large and useful public library.
Evidently these men took a just view of the needs of
society, and it is gratifying to be able to point to the
result of their wise forecast and philanthropy. The
following document makes known their purpose in
their own words :
" * Westford, 14th February, 1797.
" ' We the nbscrlbera, Inhabitanta of the Town of Westford, feeling
ODnelTes williDg to promote Literature and useful knowledge among
onrselTes and our families, think it for the t)enefit of us. and for the
Town in general to establish a SocL-il Library to be put under such mles
and regulations as shall appear to be the most beneScial to the subscribers ;
and it is proposed that two dollars shall constitute a share to each mem-
ber that shall subscribe that sum, and so in proportion to those that
shall tutMchba for a greater sum ; and we pledge oureeWes each of us
sererally and Individually to pay all the monies that we subscribe for,
on the first Monday in April next eosuiog, when there shall be a gen-
eral meetlngof the subscribers at the house of Mr, Samuel Wood at 6
o'clock afternoon, at which time there will be appointed a Committee
to receive the subscription money and to purchase such Books as shall
be most likely to subserve the purposes aforesaid, and to act upon all
other matters that shall come before us.'
"According to agreement the subscribers held a meet-
ing at Mr. Wood's tavern, April 3, 1797, at which
Zaccheus Wright was chosen moderator, and Caleb
Blake clerk. Rev. Caleb Blake, Col. Zaccheus
Wright, James Prescott, Jr., Francis Leighton and
Ebenezer Prescott were appointed ' to draw up rules
and laws for the intended Library in Westford.' At
an adjourned meeting held at Mr. Samuel Adams',
May 8tb, the subscribers ' voted to accept the Rules
and Regulations that have been drawn up by the
committee ; ' and elected James Prescott, Jr., Rev.
Caleb Blake and Dr. Charles Proctor, directors ; and
Richard Kneeland, librarian and treasurer. The
' preamble' to the code of laws recites that ' the sub-
scribers, being desirous of increasing their own infor-
mation and promoting useful knowledge in the com-
munity, especially among the rising generation, agree
to form themselves into a society under the name of
the Westford Library Company ; ' and the ruleti state
that ' the Library shall consist of fifty shares at least,
and shall always be kept in the town of Westford.'
"The first assessment was paid by thirty-six persona
on forty-nine shares; and the second by thirty-one
persons on forty-one shares. The first book, on the
list was Ferguson's ' Roman Republic,' in three vol-
umes. A printed catalogue, issued in 1816, gives the
titles of 102 books in 179 volumes. In 1801 a vote
was passed 'that the members of said Company shall
be hereafter called and known by the name and style
of "the proprietors of the social library in the town
of Westford."' With the exception of the year 1800,
Zaccheus Wright was president down to the year
1806, when Francis Leighton was chosen, who died
the same year and was succeeded by Issachar Keyes.
"In 1853 the town chose a committee 'to report a
plan for establishing a Town Library and ascertain-
ing at what price the Social Library can be purchased.'
There is no hint on the town records of any report
from that committee. The matter was again brought
before the town in 1858, November 2d, when a com-
mittee was appointed 'to see if any measures can be
adopted by which a Town Library can be established
and the Proprietors' Library merged in the same.'
March 7, 1859, this committee made report as follows:
*' ' Your committee met the committee chosen by the Proprietors on
the 4th of February. 1359, and after an interchange of views on the
subject-matter, received from said committee the following propositions :
"Mat. Said Inhabitants shall annually expend in the purchase of books
for said Library a sum of money not less than thirty dollars.
'* ' 2nd. Said Inhabitants shall provide, furnish and keep in good order
a suitable room in the middle of said Westford where said Library shall
be kept under the charge of a suitable Librarian.
'"3rd. Said Inhabitants shall make suitable and proper regulations
respecting the preserving, keeping in repair, and loaoing the bouka io
said Library.
" *4th. Whenever said Inhabitants shall refuse to make the appropria-
tion before mentioned, said Library shall revert back to said propnetora
or their heirs.
" ' .\nd yonr committee recommend the acceptance of the above propo-
sitions.
"'Thomas Richardsos,
"'D. C. Bl-TTEBFIELT,
*" p. Chamberlin.'
"On the same day the town voted to accept the re-
port, and chose Leonard Luce, Sherman D. Fletcher
and Elbridge G. Parker to carry the vote into efiect.
Upon these conditions the Social Library came into
WESTFOBD.
705
the poBsessiou of the town as a gift, and became in
fact and of right a town library.
"About thirty-two years ago a collection of books
was made, called the Agricultural Library, consisting
of one hundred volumes. The funds were obtained
by subscription, each pers3n paying three dollars.
This also passed into the hands of the town gome ten
years ago, and was merged in the Public Library.
This library is now kept in a commodious apartment
in the Town Hall. Three directors, chosen annually,
have the entire management of it."
The annual appropriation of the town for new
books is about three hundred dollars. The number
of volumes at present is 6150. In 1886 the library
was enriched by a legacy of $1000 from Mr. Stephen
S. Stone, a native of Westford, but for many years a
resident of Revere, Massachusetts. In 1887 the li-
brary received another legacy of f 1000 by the will of
the late Augustus K. Fletcher, of Chippewa Falls,
Wisconsin, a native of Westford. Owing to some in-
formality in the execution of the will on presentation
for probate it was declared void. But the legacy was
paid from her own share of the estate by Mrs.
Fletcher, out of respect for the wish of her husband,
and in full sympathy with his purpose.
Town-House. — The present town-house was
erected in the autumn of 1870, and on " February
4, 1871, the town appropriated six hundred dollars
for furnishing the town-house. The house was dedi-
cated March 3, 1871, at which time the address was
given by Rev. George H. Young, then minister of
the First Parish. Prayer was offered by Rev. E. R.
Hodgman. The chairman of the building commit-
tee presented the keys, after a brief speech, to the
chairman of the Board of Selectmen, who responded,'
and the building passed into the possession and under
the control of the town."
In 1880 the building was remodeled at a cost of
$3663. A new front and tower were put upon the
building; a gallery was made over the front entrance,
and fifteen feet were added to the rear. There are
four ante-rooms, and the edifice is now very con-
venient for all the purposes required by the town.
One of the large lower rooms has been used by the
Town Library.
" It was deemed fitting that the completion of the
remodeled and renovated building should receive
some public recognition, and accordingly a celebra-
tion was arranged for Thursday, December 9, 1880,
which was largely attended by the citizens of West-
ford and of the adjoining towns. Governor Long
was invited to be present, and an address was deliv-
ered by Rev. Edwin R. Hodgman, by invitation of
the committee of arrangements. The address related
to the early history of the town. Governor Long, in
his address on the occasion, recalled the remark of
John Adams, that ' the four corner-stones of the
Commonwealth are the town, the church, the school
and the militia,' and said that all were fittingly rep-
45-ii
resented in this celebration. He congratulated the
citizens of the town on the evidences of growth and
improvement, not only in material things, bat in
culture and refinement, and be called attention to
this wonderful growth all over our country. But
while we congratulate ourselves on the progress we
are making in tangible things, he said the best pro-
gress is, after all, in those principles which have
been referred to in the address as possessing and
animating those who founded our New England
municipalities. Brief addresses were also made by
George A. Marden, of Lowell, and Allan Cameron,
of Westford. Music was furnished by the Dunstable
Comet Band."
Industries. — "The first concernment of the early
settlers was to provide for the three urgent necessities
of human existence — food, clothing and shelter. They
had no luxuries, and they resolutely set their faces
against all ' foreign superfluities.' Their chief
business was to till the soil. It was no easy task to
cut down the forests, dig out the stumps and atones
and get the ground ready for the seed. In the early
years little else wasdone, and the work required much
hardship and self-denial. Yet there was a real joy in
it, such as the pioneer feels when he starts out to
make a home for himself with all its endearments
and pleasures. Their houses were built for protec-
tion, not for show ; their food was plain, but nutri-
tious; their garments were homespun, but neat; their
hearts were true and their minds elastic and cheer-
ful. Gradually, as the settlement went on, they gave
attention to the manufacturing of such articles as
they needed. The peripatetic cordwainer, or cobbler,
with his supply of tools, made his annual visit to the
scattered houses, at which ti me the ' rising genera-
tion ' were appropriately shod.
" In 1669 the town of Chelmsford granted to Thomas
Henchman, William Fletcher and Josiah Richardson
a parcel of land to encourage the erection of another
saw-mill. This was a tract of land now principally
in Westford, but partly in West Chelmsford. In in-
cluded the mill-site, now unused, on the tributary of
Stony Brook, at Westford corner. The brook is the
outlet of Nubanussuck Pond, and is called Saw-mill
Meadow Brook in the old deeds. This was the first
mill of any kind within the limits of Westford, and
the second saw-mill in Chelmsford, the first standing
on River Meadow Brook, in the southeast part.
Neither of them were on Stony Brook. On this
stream, from Forge Pond to its mouth, there are at
least seven mill-sites, with a height of fall varying
from eight to twenty-two feet, but not one of them
had been used at this date, 1669. The water-power
at Forge Village, then in Groton, was first used about
1680, and this was the first point at which a mill was
built on the brook.
"Nearly all fabrics for garments were spun and
woven at home on the hand-loom. The early deeds
jhow that men were often weavers by trade. The
706
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
cloth, after it was taken from the loom, must be
dressed by the clothier. The first fulling-mill was at
Brookside. The first tannery was built on the east
side of the town by Zaccheus Wright. Col. Wright,
having no children, gave up his property and busi-
ness by sale or will to Benjamin Osgood, who carried
it on at the same place for many years. Another tan-
nery was situated near the centre of the town, on
Heywood Street. The first proprietor was Col. Abel
Boynton. After him was John Osgood, then Ira G.
Richardson. It is now many years since both of
these were abandoned."
Thus early did the colonists begin to think of sup-
plying their own wants, that they might be measur-
ably independent of the Old World. As their wants
increased they devised means of satisfying them, and
thus grew up steadily and surely the various indus-
tries of our country, including those of Westford.
They did not wish to live in log-houses always, and
soon began to cut timber in the various saw-mills
erected, with which they built their framed and
boarded dwellings, more roomy and healthful than
thoie so hastily put together. Then, after the inde-
pendence of the Colonies was assured, they began to
see still more clearly that they must depend, to a great
degree, upon themselves for the comforts and neces-
saries of life, and hence an additional stimulus to in-
dustrial pursuits was given ; and as the wants of a
growing nation enlarged, the people realized that they
could exchange commodities with other countries,
and thus, by the medium of barter or sale, secure
other things not so easily manufactured in a new com-
monwealth. Thus steadily and rapidly grew up the
vast industries which have made us not only self-sup-
porting, but one of the most powerful nations in the
world. Little did our fathers think, even in their
wildest imagination, when they "moored their bark
on the wild New England shore," that the land to
which they had self-exiled themselves would grow to
be what we see to-day. Many things have been ac-
complished which would have seemed to them impos-
sibilities. The progress of our nation has been a
wonder to itself, while its progress in the arts, in lit-
erature and in science has astounded the Old World.
Think of our labor-saving machines and how much
they have done for us. Who would have thought of
all this 100 years ago? Think of the art of photog-
raphy, and that of printing; think of the schools,
colleges and the associations formed for the advance-
ment of science ; think of our railroads, steamboats
and telegraohs ; think of the vast area of our culti-
vated lands ; of our cities, villages, schools and
churches ; the products of our mines and quarries ;
the progress in trade and -commerce, which now, by
the ocean cable (carried to success by an American),
brings the whole world to our doors.
The continent blooms with its gardens, shines with
its cities, roars with its wheels of labor, sings with its
joyful congratulations, and throbs with its 65,000,000
hearts. Such has been the progress of the descend-
i ants of the early colonists, and Westford has had its
j full share in it all, as, let the various industries of the
town attest. Some of the industries that were early
started were given up after a time for others more re-
munerative.
" Brick-making. — This was early begun in the south
part. The clay-hills on the farms of George H.
Elliott and John Wilson furnished the materials for
the purpose. The business was carried on by Aaron
Parker and his successors, and by Captain Jonathan
Minot and his sons. The last men who were con-
cerned in it were Addison Parker and David Whit-
ney. The old house, torn down not long since by
George Hutchins, and the house now occupied by
Wayland F. Balcb, were built of brick burnt near by.
The last kiln was burnt by Samuel Wiley.
'' Coopering. — This has been done here, but never
on a large scale. The town annually goes through
the form of choosing a ' culler of hoops and staves.'
" Pottery. — There was once a yard for this in the
rear of the residences of Nathan S.Hamblin and John
W. Abbot. The clay was dug for a while on the
north side of Prospect Hill, where the pit is still to be
seen. As '.his did not prove to be of good quality, clay
was afterward brought from another source. Mr.
,Iames Burns was the first and perhaps the only pro-
prietor. He lived, it is said, on the farm lately owned
by Samuel N. Burbeck, and died at a very advanced
age. Fragments of pottery have been found on the
site of the old yard.
" Lime-burning. — This has been practiced on a very
limited scale. Lirastoue is found in Chelmsford and
Carlisle, and perhaps occasionally crops out in the
'south part of this town. The ruins of a lime-kiln are
to be seen near the so-called Carter place.
" Carpet-weaving. — The house at Westford Corner,
lately occupied by Frederic Parker, was once used
for this purpose. This was before the invention of
power-looms, when all weaving was done by hand.
" Potash. — A building with its necessary append-
ages for the manufacture of potash stood on the old
road from Asaph B. Cutter's to George Yapp's house,
which was once a tavern-stand, at the junction of the
two roads."
In 1680 tbe water-power at Forge Village was first
utilized. Hon. Caleb Butler, in his " History of
Groton," says:
" After King Philip's War and the resettlement of
the town, Jonas Prescott built a mill at Stony Brook,
near its issue from Forge Pond, now in Westford.
Previous to the erection of Prescott's mill, an Indian
by the name of Andrew sold his weir at Stony Brook,
as appears by the following record: 'The twenty
shillings due to andrew, the Indian, from the town
for his iraT-re at Stony Brook, assigned by said Indian
to Richard Blood, the said Richard Blood assigns it
over to Jame:) Parker.' Prior to 1730, Jonas Prescott
had ' greatly enlarged and improved the works on
WESTFORD.
707
Stony Brook by erecting fcyges for manufacturiDg
iron from the ore, as well as other purposes.'
" It is difficult to fix the precise date of the build-
ing of the forges, but it was perhaps as early as 1710.
This enterprise of working iron was the fourth or fifth
of the kind in New England. The ore used was the
variety known as bog-iron, and was procured in Gro-
ton. The ' Groton iron,' produced at the forge, was
not of very good quality, being brittle, and it was not
extensively used. The business was carried on until
the year 1865, when the Forge Company ceased to ex-
ist. It was not exclusively the process of smelting,
but of manufkcturing forks and other implements.
During this long period of 150 or 160 years the Pres-
cotta, descendants of Jonas of Groton, held a control-
ling interest in the company and managed its affairs,
except during the last few years of its existence.
Jonas, who died in 1870, five years after the forging
ceased, was the owner of forty shares in 1863, and was
the last who worked at the business.
"The Forge Village Horse-Nail Co. was formed
January 5, 1865. It succeeded to the franchises of
the Forge Company, used the water-power and build-
ings of that comp&ny, and put in machinery for mak-
ing nails. The capital stock was $30,000, with the
right to increase it to $100,000. The officers were
John T. Daly, president; John F. Haskins, secretary,
and Alexander H. Caryl, treasurer. The capital was
increased to $100,000 in 1868. The business was pros-
perous and remunerative for some time, but it gradu-
ally declined until 1877, when it came to an end."
Granite Quarrying. — Of the several villages in the
town of Westford, Graniteville leads as a manufactur-
ing centre ; its very name suggests one of its earliest
industries. There are several quarries in town, and
three of them are in Graniteville. The business of
quarrying granite began in 1826 or '27 ; ledges were
not worked at first, but the large granite rocks in the
north part of the town, already on the surface, were
first used.
" The granite pillars of the Market-House in Bos-
ton were hewn of huge boulders left ages ago on a
lot of land lying northwest of the old school-house in
district number seven, on the old stage road from
North Chelmsford to Groton, and were hauled !
through the centre of the town by twenty yoke of
oxen. They were obtained by Charles Hollis.
" Isaac Carkin was the first man to open the ledge
on Oak Hiil. The quarrying began there fifty-five or
fifty-six years ago, that is, in 1826 or '27. After Mr.
Carkin, Major Jesse Colburn carried on the business
for many years, and more recently George W. Merrill.
Much of the stone from this source is drawn to the
stone-yard at North Chelmsford, but some id hauled
into Lowell."
'■ The first quarrying from the ledges on Snake
Meadow Hill was done by Benjamin Palmer, a native
of Camden, Maine. In the summer of 1847 the rail-
road bridge across the brook was begun, and there
was a demand for split stone on the spot," and it was
furnished by several parties. "Benjamin Palmer came
to thio town in March, 1817. At first he worked on
boulders or cobbles, as the quarrymen call them, and
his stone was drawn by team to Lowell. He soon be-
gan to work on the ledges," quarrying the granite in
large quantities. He died May 19, 1888, but his son,
Lewis Palmer, carries on the business, furnishing
about the same quantity of stone as his father. About
twenty men are employed, also four horses and a yoke
of oxen. Some stone is furnished to private parties
by filling small orders for people in the vicinity, but
the greater part is furnished to railroads and corpora-
tions. Stone is sent " to numerous cities and towns
of this Commonwealth, which make the chief demand
for it; but it is sometimes sent to New York, New
Orleans and Chicago. It is used for paving, for en-
gine-beds, foundations for buildings, street curbing,
flagging for city sidewalks, windows and door-cape,
door-sills and caps, bridge-building and various other
purposes. Being free from mineral substances, it
holds its color for a long time, and seldom shows any
rust or stain ; but being hard to bring to an edge, it
is not much used for monuments, although it is often
prepared for edge-stones around lots in cemeteries.
The traffic is an important source of income to the
town.'
Mr. Palmer has furnished stone to the Hamilton
Mills, Lowell ; caps and sills to the Lawrence corpora-
tion, as well as underpinning. He furnished founda-
tion stones for the Stevens Central Block, Lowell ;
also for the locks and canals, and for the Hamilton
corporation.
" In 1848 Samuel Fletcher, a native of Groton, en-
gaged in the business and hired a ledge on the hill.
During the summer of that year be drew a large
quantity of stone to the landing near the railroad,
and had it all ready for transportation when the rail-
road was opened. It was carried to Lawrence and
used in the construction of the dam across the Merri-
mack River at that place. Mr. Fletcher now owns a
quarry on the hill, and two quarries elsewhere. He
employs fifteen or twenty men, and the amount of his
annual sales is $10,000.
" March 1, 1853, William Reed (Ist), a native of Ac-
ton, bought of Thomas Hutchins sixty-one acres of
land on Snake Meadow Hill, and, in connection with
his brother, David Reed, began the business of quar-
rying. The. lot lies on the crest of the hill, and is
long and narrow. In a year or two the lot was di-
vided between the brothers, William taking the por-
tion on the top of the hill, and David the western
part, toward and including some part of Cowdry Hill."
Mr. David Reed died on February 5, 1885, but Mr.
Samuel Fletcher works his ledge, having liired it for
a term of five years.
Mr. William Reed still continues to do an increasing
business ; it has been larger this year than for the
two years past. He furnishes cut stone for founda-
708
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
tioDS, dams, bridge?, uoderpicniDg, sills, etc., as well
as all kinds of rough-hammered work. Before the
Civil War he furnished stone for the pavement of the
streets in New Orleans, La., much of which General
Butler took up aud made his fortifications with it.
He furnished the first paving-stone ever laid in Wor-
cester, Mass. Stone has been purchased of him, by
the city of Lowell, for foundations of bridges, also
edge-stone for the sidewalks. The corporations of
Lowell have bought of him underpinning, window-
sills, door-caps, edge-stone and dimension-stone. In
1888, $1200 worth of stone was sent to Leominster to
be used aa underpinning, steps and large paving-
blocks. Headers and covering-stfne was sent to
Chesham, wall-stone to Belchertown, dimension-stone
to Marlboro', headers to East Harrisville, pinners to
Winchester, foundation-stone for the water-tank at
Portsmouth, N. H., and junk-.-itone to Hardwick, Mass.
In Amherst Mr. Reed built a large drainage-ditch,
having the walls three feet wide, and covered by stone
five feet in width. Recently, edge-stone haa been
furnished to Arlington, and also underpinning for
the new hospital of the State almshouse in Tewks-
bury, also caps and sills for Lexington and Revere,
rubble for Amherst and Winter Hill, edge-stone for
Harvard, stone for the dam in Nashua, N. H., catch-
basina and bound-stone for Stoneham, bound and
covering-stone for Weston, and underpinning for the
Fairchild Paper Company, of East Pepperell. He
has furnished stone to the railroads for the repairs of
the wall at West Chelmsford, the cost of which was
$585.49. Even his chips have been sold for ballast.
Mr. Reed employs about twenty men, and uses six
horses and a yoke of oxen. His sales have recently
amounted to about $10,000 or $12,000 annually. The
competition has been so sharp recently that more
stone was furnished for the above compensation than
formerly. Once the price of the stone per yard was
$3, while now it is only $1.25. One of the reasons
why Mr. Reed has been able to compete with other
companies is that his quarry is near the railroad, ne-
cessitating the drawing of the stone only about a
third of a mile.
This granite ledge is lai^e enough to give employ-
ment to seventy-five or one hundred men — it is not
yet half uncovered. As it is in a hill, the drainage
is easy, and an engine is not necessary for the hand-
ling of the stone — a simple hand-derrick is all that is
required for the purpose. It is easily seen that such
an industry ia an important one to the town, and must
continue to be for a long time to come.
N. P. Prescott & Son have been quarrying granite
in Westford since 1871, about nineteen years. They
worked in the north part of the town till 1882, when
th^ey began to obtain the stone from Oak Hill, where
they now have a atone-yard, shipping their work from
Brookside, two and one-half miles from the hill.
They employ fourteen men and use four horses ; their
sales amount to about $9500 per year. They quarry
mostly rough, hammered work, selling edge, bridge
and paving-stone. The larger part is sold to the
cities and corporations, going to Lowell, Worcester,
Lawrence, Boston, Brockton, Newton and Taunton.
They furnish caps, sills and underpinning. Teams
from Lowell sometimes come out for the chips and
grout. The granite at Oak Hill can be cut to a finer
edge than that from Snake Meadow Hill; but even
this cannot be cut into any monumental work, as it
"flies," or chips as soon as a sharp edge is cut.
Fifteen years ago it sold for fifty cents per foot, now
for only thirty cents. When Mr. Noah Prescott
began quarrying he did the whole of the work him-
self and without derricks — everything was hand-work.
He then hired two or three hands, and the work has
gradually grown to its present proportions. He has
cut down into the hill about twenty-five feet, and
drains it by a siphon. The granite in the hill is
practically unlimited, and the firm of Sweat & Davis
are working a different part of it.
Sweat & Davis have worked here for twelve or fif-
teen years and have got out more stone than Mr.
Prescott, selling not only cap, sills and paving-stones,
but also building material. They have a "yard"' in
Lowell, where they ihip a part of their stone and cut
it in the city instead of at the quarry. They employ
twenty men and use four horses and two yoke of oxen.
They have a steam-engine with which they operate
their derricks and drills. They get out many large
atones — some pieces weighing as much as ten tons.
Warsted-Mills.—" The Ahhot Worsted-Mills began
business in 1855, with John W. Abbot as managing
partner, and John W. P. Abbot and Charles G. Sar-
gent as special partners. At first they manufactured
fine worsted yarns for the making of braids and up-
holstery goods, employing about twenty hands. In
1857 Mr. Sargent retired from the firm, and Mr. Allen
Cameron became an active partner," purchasing the
interest of Mr. J. W. P. Abbot. " On December 5,
1858, their works, as well aa those of Mr. Sargent,
were entirely destroyed by fire ; but in January, 1860,
they again began business in one-half of a large stone
mill, built by Mr. Sargent about one-eighth of a mile
below the former site. These premises they have
continued to occupy to the present time, with fre-
quent additions to give increased facilities for
production. When they started anew they began the
manufacture of worsted yarns used in making carpets."
In 1873 Mr. Abial J. Abbot was admitted as a part-
ner to the firm. " In 1878 Abbot & Company leased
the part of the mill formerly occupied by Sargent &
Sons, and also built a stone addition to the mill occu-
pied by themselves, sixty feet long and two stories
high, and proceeded to fill it with machinery. Find-
ing this still insufficient to meet the growing wants of
their customers, they purchased, in October, 1879, the
buildings and water-power at Forge Village, formerly
occupied by the Forge Village Horse-Nail Company,
and filled the buildings with improved machinery.
WESTFORD.
709
They now employ at Forge Village 200 hands, and
make 1,200,000 pounds of worsted yarn per annum.
About the same number of hands are employed at
the mill in GraniteTille, and about the same quantity
of yarn is produced, — making at both of the mills
2,400,000 pounds of yarn annually, using for the same
5,000,000 pounds of wool. About fifteen years ago
they began using camel's hair, making it into yarn
and mixing it with the wool for carpets and other
worsted goods ; they did this to supply orders from
some of their customers who wished that kind of
yarn. They are using now about 80,000 pounds of
camel's hair each month, or 960,000 pounds a year.
They were the first in the country to use this hair
for worsted yarns, and they used it for three years be-
fore any of the other manufacturers ascertained the
fact. The wages paid the employes amount, collec-
tively, to $100,000 each year; and $100,000 is also
paid the United States Government for duties on the
wool. The price of the wool averages fifteen cents
per pound, thus making the total cost of the wool
used in both mills to be $750,000. It is evident that
a large amount of machinery is required for the run-
ning of these two mills, and it is all of the most im-
proved and recent manufacture ; if they hear of any-
thing new and highly recommended they immedi-
ately try it, and if found satisfactory it is bought at
once. All of the machinery needs renewing every
twenty years. They use two engines at Graniteville —
one of sixty, and the other of 175 horse-power; one is
used at Forge Village, which is 650 horse-power.
Their markets are in Massachusetts, Connecticut
and New Jersey, but chiefly in Philadelphia; they
sell to the weavers, and always by wholesale. These
yarns are not shipped lo foreign countries, but are
mostly kept here in our own country, and used for
the manufacture of ingrain carpets, Wiltons, Brus-
sels and tapestry. Only foreign wool is used, and is
purchased in nearly every wool-growing country in
the world. Their agents are the wool brokers at
Liverpool, Marseilles, Russia (near the Black Sea),
Smyrna, Palestine, Buenos Ayres, Scotland, Valpa-
raiso, Bagdad, Mossoul and even in the old Mesopo-
tamia of the Scriptures, — well named from "mesos"
and " potamos," between the rivers, viz. : Tigris and
Euphrates. Mr. J. W. Abbot attends principally to
the mill at Forge Village, and Mr. A. J. Abbot to
the one at Graniteville, while Mr. Cameron attends
to the buying, selling and the finances. Nearly
every day cablegrams are received from Liverpool,
giving the firm the market prices of the world, so far
as wool is concerned; their business is much facili-
tated by this means, as the following incident will
show. A few years ago they gave their broker in
Liverpool orders to buy wool for them at a given
limit; the auction sale opened above that limit, and
the broker cabled to know if they would advance it;
they concluded to do it, and so informed him, and the
wool was bought before the closing of the sale, prob-
ably within two hours. Abbot & Co. take a personal
interest in all their employ^, and do their utmost to
promote their welfare. A club-house has been built
near each mill expressly for the help. Libraries are
connected with them ; lectures are given and dra-
matic entertainments are held, — the actors composed
of the hands in the mills. Every man with a family
is encouraged to own his own house, and he is as-
sisted financially to that end ; many do own them,
and some of them own other houses than their own
and have become quite wealthy. There are no labor
strikes in these mills. Let any one, who wishes to
study the relation of capital to labor, and learn how
to settle difierences between them, come to Westford
and find out what has made the relationship exist-
ing between the company and the help so pleasant
and profitable to all concerned. For the reasons
given above, as well as others that might be stated,
the men find it more profitable to follow the plans of
the company than any directions given by officers of
league or labor organizations. Educated, skilled
labor-hands generally know what is for their interests
financially, and these men never join in labor-strikes.
They feel that they have an interest in the success of
the company's business, well knowing that the com-
pany's success means their own advancement; they,
therefore, become trusted workers and earnest men .
Some of them have been in the employ of the com-
pany for twenty or twenty-five years. It should be
stated that before the new school law came into ef-
fect prohibiting children working in the mill during
the school term, the company employed children of
fourteen years of age and nnder, allowing them to
work half of the day and attend school the other half.
The State police, visiting the mills during the time
the children were thus employed, for the purpose of
seeing that they attended school, and learning that
they complied with the law as it then was (attending
school every day, though but half the time), and after
talking with the teachers, came, it is said, to this con-
clusion: that the children learned as easily as those
who attended the whole day, and kept up evenly with
their classes. The inference has been drawn that the
plan devised by the company for the children to help
themselves and the families to which they belonged,
was a better one than is now in operation throughout
the State, and that this company is the only one
which tried the plan and found it a success and had it
indorsed by the State authorities.
Moore'i Woolen- Yam Mill. — It has been already
stated that in 1862, Mr. Hamblet sold his flouring-
mill to the Moore Brothers, — they were Messrs. Seth
and John Moore, — and they immediately changed the
flouring-mill into one for the manufacturing of wor-
sted yarns. In 1881 Mr. George C. Moore, a nephew
of the brothers, purchased the mill of them and has
continued the manufacturing of yarn till the present
time. Mr. Edward A. Moore, a brother of the owner
of the mill, is the overseer of it. They have manu
710
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, iMASSACHUSETTS.
factured worsted carpet yarns, and of about the same
quality as the jam sold by Abbot & Company. They
have foreign machinery in the drawing department
and home machinery in the spinning-rooms. They
employ 65 bands and their sales amount to about
$156,000 per year. They use both steam and water-
power. They are using mostly camel's hair for their
yarn, making the yam entirely of it. Most of it is
bought in the New York market, and such quantities
do they use, that, a few years since, they were compel-
led to send to China for much of their supply, having
already purchased two thirds of all the hair that came
to this country. They have increased their working
capacity very much from the beginning ; for they
used only two machines al first and now eighteen, and
they intend to soon build a two-story stone addi-
tion, 197 feet long by 52 feet wide, the foundation
of which is already laid. It will be more than twice
the size of the present mill, and they will then also
employ two or three times as many hands.
They have no strikes connected with their industry.
They take an interesc in their help, as can be readily
seen from the fact that, with the exception of one or
two, all have been with them for ten years or longer ;
some have remained all the time since the present
mill was started. The help are paid well, so that
they are satisfied, and thus all strikes are avoided. The
writer visited the mill and brought home some of the
camel's hair that was in process of preparation for
the looms; it is fine and silky, and makes — it is claim-
ed by them — the best carpets in the world. The yam
is sold to the commission merchants in Philadelphia,
who sell in turn to the weavers. There is evidently
a good market for the yarn, as the firm sell all they
can make, and larger quantities will soon be produced
on account of the increased facilities for manufacture,
soon to be in operation. They have a chimney that
lacks an inch or two only of being 125 feet high, 10
feet square at the base, with a six-foot flue ; 105,000
b ricks were used in its construction. The writer was
specially interested in a manikin made by Mr. E. A.
Moore's father ; it was in the position of the front
wheel of a trycicle, and when the crank was turned,
its legs and feet would all move in regular order and
as naturally as life. It was of life-size, with internal
machinery, which moved accurately every part. The
elder Moore haa made also a horse manikiu(?), which
moves forwards or backwards and as perfectly its the
former. Much study must have been required to
make so perfectly all the adjustments. Both are cu-
riosities. It remains to be seen whether they can be
applied to any useful purpose, — they show at least
mechanical skill and an inventive turn of mind.
Sargenf» Machine-Shop. — Charles G. Sargent was
born in the town of Hillnborough, N. H., in that part
called Hillsborough Upper Village, July 17, 1819.
He worked on neighboring farms, and his schooling
was obtained in the meantime. At the age of four-
teen he began as an apprentice the trade of cabinet-
maker, but his employer sold out before the expira-
tion of his apprentice.-hip, and he then entered the
services of a clock-maker, with whom he remained
one year and a half. He then went to Lowell, Mass.,
where he obtained service with a job contractor of
the Lowell Machine-Shop for three years as an ap-
prentice. Having mastered the machinist's trade, he
engaged to do machine repairs for a worsted-mill at
West Chelmsford, where he stayed four years, em-
ploying his spare time in learning the details of the
manufacture of worsted yarns, in which he became
proficient.
In about the year 1841 he entered the service of
the Lowell Manufacturing Company, and the next
year was made an overseer. It was while connected
with this compsny that he invented a valuable burr-
ing-machine. In about the year 1850 Mr. Sargent
resolved to enter into business lor himself, and,
although being offered good inducements to remain
with the Lowell Manufacturing Company, he gave up
his position and hired a small shop on Market Street,
and began the manufacture and sale of wool-burriug
and other machines; afterwards he took in company
with him a partner. A few years after he entered
into co-partnership with Marvel & Lane, and the
firm erected a large stone shop on Fletcher Street,
which is now used as a worsted-mill, where they car-
ried on the machine business. He sold out his interest
in this company to Marvel & Lane, and a short time
after he again went into the business of manufactur-
ing worsted yarn in a small stone mill on Broadway,
near the corner of Fletcher Street, Lowell, which he
continued for several years, but, owing to ill health,
he was forced to relinquish it.
On October 17, 1854, Mr. Sargent and Francis A.
Calvert bought the mill property and land connected
therewith belonging to Asahel Davis, formerly be-
longing to Thomas Richardson. This property, situ-
ated in Graniteville, then called Stone Quarry, con-
sisted of a saw-mill and grist-mill. Forming a part-
nership January 8, 1855, and converting these mills
iuto shops for the manufacture of wool machinery,
they engaged in that industry. Mr. Sargent moved
with his family to Graniteville in the spring of 1855.
During the same year (1855) Mr. Sargent entered
alone into partnership with the Abbots, retiring from
the firm in 1857, when Mr. Cameron took his place.
These buildings (Calvert and Sargent's) were
burned December 5, 1858, and then what is now Mill
No. 1, a two-story building, 185 x52 feet, with a con-
necting L, 32x40 feet, was erected. Meanwhile the
business was pursued in a rented shop at Lowell.
They moved into Mill No. 1 in the fall of 1859; two
years later they built Mill No. 2, a two-and-one-half-
story wooden building. Mr. Sargent bought his
partner's interest January 1, 1863.
Between the years 1864 and 1865 he erected Mill No.
3, on the other side of the dam. This building was
occupied at first by Frank Calvert, Jr., and F. G.
WESTFORD.
711
Sargent, for the manufacture of carded worsted
waste, in which they continued for several years.
This partnership being dissolved, Mr. F. G. Sargent
entered into partnership with C. G. Sargent January
1, 1873, the firm's name being C. G. Sargent & Son.
In the same year Mr. Sargent started the manufacture
of hosiery in mill No. 3. In the year 1874 he took
Mr. M. H. A. Evans into the firm, the name of the
firm being Chauncy Hosiery Mills.
In 1877 Mr. Sargent commenced building the new
machine-shop, which was completed in 1878. His
death occurred July 16, 1878, a short time after. In
March 1, 1880, A. C. Sargent became a partner with
his brother, F. G. S., under the firm-name of C. G.
Sargent's Sons. About April, 1884, Mr. Evans re-
linquished the hosiery business, and the building was
taken by C. G. Sargent's Sons. Their business hsis
been very prosperous, averaging about $85,000 yearly
sales of machinery.
These machines are the Wool-Duster, Washer,
Dryer, Burr-Picker, Crabber and various others ; also
waste cards and all kinds of wire and steel cylinders.
They say in their catalogue concerning their Wool-
Washers: "Through the several styles of machines
now made by us, embodying our latest improvements,
we think we can justly claim to have invented the
bes: systems that have ever yet been devised for
scouring the various kinds of wool. We believe that
our machines will thoroughly scour more wool in a
given time, at a less cost in material and power, and
render the wool in better condition, than has ever be-
fore been attained. Our machines are built in a
most substantial manner, with parts interchangeable,
and duplicable, and are capable of enduring the
strain of severe use, and even abuse, to which latter
wool-washing machines are too often subjected." The
dates of the patents on these machines are given,
thirty-five in number, from 1873 to 1886. These ma-
chines have been purchased by 151 parties, who are
u^ing them in their mills for the cleansing of wool.
Their Automatic Wool -Dryer has been patented
nine times, and there are twenty-seven parties using
it in the preparation of wool for the loom.
Their Wool-Duster is used for opening and dusting
wool before the process of washing and burr-picking,
and for cleaning card-waste, noils, etc.
Their Burr-Picker is made in two styles, with
slight modifications in details to suit the character of
the stock operated upon. It is claimed to be " the
leading machine for burring wool and for removing
all dust, burrs and loose foreign matter from wool and
other textile fiber. Many improvements have been
recently made, and the machine differs from any
other offered to manufacturers in many important
particulars." It is used in 174 different manufactories.
An Improved Metallic Waste-Card is used for work-
ing or reducing worsted and woolen yarns, waste of
flannel and knit goods to their original fiber state.
It requires less than a two horse-power to run it.
Single and double Crabbing-Machines are made
and sold. " They are used for scouring, rinsing or
crabbing worsted cloth, also for bringing out and pro-
ducing a finished face on the cloth as is produced on
ordinary woolen goods by the fulling-mill."
An Atomizing Wool-Oiler is made, which oils at
the feed-rolls on breaker cards and has many advan-
tages. " By oiling at the feed the oil is completely
broken into fine particles like mist, and precipitated
with force into the evenly spread wool ; and as the
wool passes the feeding-rolls, the oil and wool are
thoroughly mixed."
Sargent's Sons are prepared to furnish the Beat
Steel Burr and Licker-in Wire ; they have now a
" Patented wire which is made with parallel sides,
sharpened the same as a steel ring cylinder and is
made stronger than the beveled wire."
Improved Rotary Pumps are made for pumping
scouring liquor from the bowl up to the showering
device. These are also made for general purposes,
where the draught is not too high.
They make also an Improved Blower or Suction
Fan;, it is made to fit in the side of the automatic
screen dryer, and the wall of dye-houses or other
rooms, from which air is to be exhausted or into which
air is to be driven. It would pay any one who is in-
terested in machinery, and can do so, to visit the
shop and see the machine and the machine that
makes it !
Haywood & Burbeck't Orist-Mill. — It is not known
just when this mill was first started, though it was
the third one erected on Stony Brook. The first man
who is now known to have owned it was John Cum-
mings. Levi T.Fletcher owned it sixty-eight years ago.
Then it was owned by Otheo Fletcher, a brother of
John B. Fletcher. L. Haywood purchased it in 1842.
It was then owned by T. H. Hamblet. S. P. & F.
Wright owned it about 1846-47. George W. Hey-
wood and Luke L. Fletcher bought it in 1862, and
Mr. Heywood purchased Mr. Fletcher's interest in
the mill in 1863. In 1864, Mr. Heywood sold a half
interest to Charles H. Fletcher, who, in the spring of
1867, sold his half to W. H. H. Burbeck and Henry
Chamberlain. In 1869, Mr. Heywood bought out
Mr. Chamberlain, and the firm has been Heywood &
Burbeck ever since.
The business of the mill has increased with
the years. A comparison is here given of the amount
of grain sold the first year Mr. Heywood became a
share-owner of the mill, and the amount sold during
the past year, 1889. In 1862, Mr. Heywood and hia
partner bought and sold but one car-load of com, and
this was theonly kind of grain sold till 1869, when they
began to sell oats. In 1889 they sold 14,059 bushels of
corn, 7874 bushels of oats, 60,000 pounds of middlings,
81,000 pounds of shorts, 37,900 pounds of gluten,
38,500 pounds of cotton seed, 4 tons of hen feed, 12
tons of phosphates. About thirty-five car-loads of
grain were bought and sold the past year.
712
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Hey wood & Burbeck trade chiefly with their towns-
men and have given good satisfaction, as their amount
of business clearly shows. Their mill is the only one
of the kind in town and is well patronized. They use
but one run of stone, but that is kept running much
of the time. A new run of stone has recently been
put in ; the old one was put in by L. T. Fletcher fifty-
eight years ago. The old stones were granite and were
purchased in Peabody ; they were drawn by four yoke
of oxen and were only two days on the way. The
new stone is also of granite, though burr-stone is gen-
erally used, imported from France — " French Burr."
Water-power is used for running the mill, as the
little river, Stony Brook, furnishes all that is needful.
In 1874 the firm found that their business had
increased to such proportions that elevating machin-
ery was needed, and it wiis accordingly purchased. The
grain is bought mostly from the West and of the com-
mission dealers.
The Saw-Mill. — In connection with their water-
power, Heywood & Burbeck run a saw-mill. It was
erected about the time of the grist-mill, and is on the
opposite side of the dam. The same parties have
owned it that owned the grist-mill ; the two mills have
always been bought and sold together. At first, in
common with all early sawmills, the upright saw was
used, but in 1875 it was exchanged for a circular one,
which does more and better work. At the same time
the firm put in Swain's improved turbine wheel, of
twenty-five horse-power. Since these improvements,
theamountof lumber sawed has averaged 300,000 feet
each year. The logs drawn there are mostly pine,
and the work is custom work.
Wheelvrrighta. — Westford has two wheelwright-
shops, — one at the centre, and one in the eastern
part of the town. The one at the centre is carried
on by Mr. Nelson L. Tuttle, who came to town in
December, 1872, and immediately began working at
his trade in a shop put up for him, the autumn be-
fore, by his father, who died September 19, 1886.
Mr. Tuttle began the manufacturing of express and
farm wagons, also carts and sleds, and has kept to
that line of work pretty much till the present time.
He has made a few sleighs, but has done mostly
heavy work. He has usually worked alone, and has
had all he could do, some of the time being driven
with work. He has used a horse-power in his shop
for all his sawing, and connected with the power is a
planing-macbine, circular saw, gig-saw .'ind turning-
lathe. He has recently put in a six horse-power
steam-engine, fully capable of running all the ma-
chinery and heating the fhop as well. Most of his
lumber is purchased in town, which is always of the
best, and is kept seasoning for three years before it
is used; and when shaped and strongly put together,
in the form of wagons and sleds, lasts (hyperboli-
cally) till the whole gives out, like the "One-Horse
Shay." His work remains mostly in Westford,
though some of it has gone into the surrounding
towns, and even to Pennsylvania. He does fully as
much repairing as building.
Mr. James A. Walkden settled in the eastern part
of the town in 1875, and immediately opened a
wheelwright's shop ; he still carries on the business,
generally employing help. He not only repairs, but
makes market and farm wagons, sleds and sleighs.
He has a six horse-power engine, and with it runs a
band-saw, planer, circular saw and boring-machine.
He does good work, and has all he can do. He sells
his work in the town as well as in the surrounding
towns, and sends some of it quite a distance away.
He is a pleasant man to deal with, and strives to
please his customers. The writer saw him at work
in his shop upon the frame of a market-wagon,
which was strong and neatly put together, and he
thought that any one ought to be perfectly satisfied
with such work.
Westford supports the utual number of black-
smith-shops, and they are a credit to the place.
Satisfactory work is done, and much of it.
Mr. John Feeney came here on February 12, 1887,
and built a saddler's shop, and from the first has had
all the business he could attend to. He sells all the
harnesses he can make, and some of them go to the
towns surrounding.
Stores.— In 1839 the present store of Wright &
Fletcher was built and occupied by Sherman D.
Fletcher and his father-in-law, Sherman, under the
firm-name of S. k S. D. Fletcher. They continued to
do business together till the death of Sherman,
which occurred in the year 1860. Mr. S. D. Fletcher
then carried on the business alone till 1873, when
his son, Sherman H. Fletcher, and Nahum H.
Wright bought out his interests and are occu-
pying it at the present writing, under the name
of Wright & Fletcher. They keep a general coun-
try store, which is supposed to contain nearly every-
thing! Situated so near the cities, it could not be
expected that they would keep all the finer goods
found there ; but all the essentials are here sold,
such as groceries, dry-goods, boots and shoes, paints,
oils, seeds, farming-tools, fertilizers, grain, some kinds
of clothing, some hardware, patent medicines, candy-
nuts, the inevitable tobacco, a few fancy articles,
etc., etc. Their sales amount, upon the average, to
about $21,000 per year. They keep a good line of
good goods, dealing only in first-class artftles. The
writer has been assured by them that they had
rather their customers would find fault with the
prices charged than with the goods themselves,
while it is their endeavor to have no fault found
with either. Their large trade, and the general
confidence shown by the community in the firm,
testify to their business integrity.
They are courteous and obliging to all, and, it
is believed, conduct their business upon strictly
honest principles. They evidently believe that " hon-
esty is the best policy," and they seem to carry it
WESTFORD.
713
out in all their transactions. It is assuring to
know that when one goes there to buy an article
he can depend upon the statement made concern-
ing it by either of the firm. Such dealing pros-
pers in the long run, and this store haa stood for
this kind of dealing for fifty years. It is often said
DOW that business cannot succeed that is carried on
in a strictly honest way, but this store is a strong
protest to all knavery and trickery. Next to the
church and the school-house, an honest country
store exercises a civilizing influence in the com-
munity.
Mr. H. B. Hall came to town in 1882, and opened
a city grocery store, hiring the old store building
that Miss Clara Wiley owns. He remained there
about five years, when he moved his goods to the
rooms he had fitted up out of a shed and the L
part of his house. He uses a part of the barn and
cellar of the house for storage. Mr. Hall was a
successful business man in Boston, but was over-
worked, and desired to move to some healthful
country village where he could sell a city class of
goods and educate his children. He " prospected "
all through the western part of the State, as well as
the eastern, and finally settled here; for he found
on Westford Hill what he desired — good air, water
and schools. He wished to settle in the most
healthful village in New England, and now, after a
residence here of eight years, is better pleased than
ever with the place. He was very delicate in health
when he came here, but now says he is perfectly
well and works hard.
He has what is termed an "order trade," keeps
two horses and has plenty of work for both of them
to do. He carries goods to Parkerville, Granite-
ville, Forge Village, West Chelmsford, North Chelms-
ford and to farmers living between the diflferent vil-
lages he visits. On Monday, Tuesday and Friday
he receives orders for goods and delivers them the
same day ; on Wednesday he obtains oilers and
delivers on Thursday; on Saturday he goes to Bos-
ton, or draws goods from the depot, or puts up
packages in the store.
Mr. Arthur Wright, having associated himself with
Mr. N. Harwood Wright, commenced the general
merchandise busiuess in Graniteville February 1,
1868, under the firm-name of Wright & Co., and con-
tinued until 1875, when Arthur Wright bought his
partner's interest and continued the business alone
until February 1, 1882. He then formed a co-part-
nership with Mr. Henry S. Bemis, of Lawrence, Mass.,
under the name of Wright & Bemia, which has con-
tinued until the present time.
In 1883, owing to the steady increase in the busi-
ness, the firm secured the Music Hall building, classi-
fied their business and opened a new store of dry
goods, fancy goods, boots, shoes, etc., etc. At the old
stand they carry a full line of groceries, flour and
general merchandise. They have a large trade, and
the firm is respected by all who know them. Mr.
Wfight holds an ofiBcial position in the Methodist
Church at Graniteville, and his business affairs are
conducted in accordance therewith. In 1887 he rep-
resented the district in the Legislature of the State.
Board of Overseers. — With the exception of
four years Mr. Eklward Prescott has been overseer of
the poor since 1862, and has striven to care alike for
the interests of the town and the well-being of the
unfortunate people committed to his charge. He has
the first account-book ever kept by the board, and it
is more interesting to look it over than to read many
others which contain simple statements of business
transactions ; for here we find continual changes in
the number and character of the inmates of the poor-
house as well as the cost to the town of maintaining
them.
On April 5, 1824, the town voted to purchase John
Read's farm for the sum of $2500; and in 1831 or
1832 the brick house known as the Alms-house was
built. A committee had previously been appointed
to devise the best means of maintaining the poor, and
upon their recommendation the farm was purchased
and stocked. Power was given them to receive pro-
posals for a Master and Mistress to take charge of the
farm, and the poor living upon it; and also, to devise
the most proper regulations of caring for the inmates.
It seems that formerly the unfortunate poor, in many
places, were "farmed out" or "sold to the lowest
bidder," i.e., they were taken in charge by men who
were to receive the smallest amount from the town as
payment for their support. Of course, such men
would endeavor to make something from the transac-
tion and would, therefore, keep the poor as cheaply
as possible, often making them work beyond their
strength ; so that it came to be looked upon as a cruel
way of caring for them. A growing spirit of hu-
manity finally brought a change, and by-laws were
enacted in Westford whereby the master of the alms-
house must be " a man of temperance, prudence and
good moral character.". "The use of all spirituous
liquors and any liquor, part of which is spirituous, is
strictly prohibited, except when ordered by a physi-
cian, overseer or master." The overseers are required
to look after the wants of the poor, and to see that
the instructions of the town are all carried out by the
master. Notice has come to the writer, recently, of
several towns in New Hampshire, that have given up
the farm system and have returned to the older way
of caring for the paupers: letting them out to people
who will keep them the cheapest. They are made to
work and thus to pay for their keeping as far as pos-
sible. Some towns in Massachusetts do not have a
town -farm, but hire other towns to care for their poor,
finding the expense less than to have a farm-house of
their own. And it is true, that it would be leas ex-
pensive for Westford to "hire out" her poor; but the
town had rather be at a little more cost in the matter,
and have the satisfaction that everything possible has
714
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
been done for their comfort, health and happiness.
The expense of the poor has vari:d with the yesrs:
in 1862 the Board of Overseers drew $350 from the
town treasury for their support; in 1863 only $150;
in 1864 the amount was $350 again, while recently
the board has drawn as high as $3000.
In 1820 there were thirty paupers cared for by the
town, while at the present writing there are only four
at the alms-house, and only one of them is considered
a pauper — the other three being indigent soldiers,
who can live here easier than anywhere else, and
who receive aid from the State. The number of in-
sane has increased in the town — seven are reported
now, though the town cares for only two of theje.
The poor at the alms-house are mostly aged people and
seem to enjoy their town-home and the good care they
receive; and their kind treatment by the overseer has
not served to put a premium upon idleness nor in-
crease the number of paupers; for even the unfortu-
nate do not really care to go " Over the hill to the
poor-house," however well cared for they shall be
while there. There are men in the cities who will
sometimes in the autumn commit a petty crime, in or-
der to be sentenced to prison, where they will have
shelter and food for the winter, and but little work to
do ; but Westford is not troubled by men who allow
themselves to become indigent for the sake of a winter
at the poor-house!
Occasionally, people are aided by the town who are
still living in their own homes, which makes the ex-
pense less for the town and it is also more pleasant
for the families. There has not been a pauper at the
farm for the past ten years who has been able to
do much towards his own support. The farm is car-
ried on quite like any other one, and its expense to
the town has been lessened by connecting with it
the repairing of the roads. The teams are owned by
the town as the property of the alms-house ; the mas-
ter has charge of them and hires the help. Previous
to the meeting of the last Legislature the repairing of
the roadd was under the control of the selectmen ; but
a bill was then enacted that every town should ap-
point a road commissioner, who should have this in
charge. Mr. Prescott is that commissioner, and as
he employs the teams and help of the " farm," some-
thing is saved thereby, making the expense of the
farm somewhat less to the town, — so that the sup-
port of the poor is made easier by this means. When
there has been a prosperous year at the poor-house,
the cost of maintaining it is not very much. The sal-
ary of the overseer is but $10.00 per year, so that there
is not much money connected with the office, nor
" honor," even, unless it be the honor the overseer has
of trying to do as he would be done by. It has been
found that the old saying " blood will tell," is
true sometimes respecting the paupers of our towns ;
for there comes to be, occasionally, a race of paupers
— the children are taught to get much of their living
from others, and are brought up to work as little as
possible, so that it happens the children of paupers
are now and then found in the poor-house. In our
Federal Republic each town is allowed to manage its
own affairs — when nothing is done to conflict with
the public interests of other towns, the county or the
State — and this liberty hasrejultedin a careful guard-
ing its financial concerns, and each one endeavors
to keep its public expenses as low as po-isible. One
of the means by which this is accomplished is in
having but few paupers to support, and while each
town by common consent and in the interests of hu-
manity cares for its own poor, it does not wish to care
for more than is necessary, nor to support any that
have a "settlement" in other towns. Thus towns
early watched each other and sought to prevent the
gaining a settlement on the part of poor people,
who came from other towns and cities surrounding.
For it might happen that a poor family, living in a
city and becoming dissatisfied with the life there,
would remove to a neighboring town and soon call
for aid in its own support. To prevent this extra ex-
pense, and to have the poor maintained where 'hey
had a settlemeot, the " Province" enacted a law, in
1092-93, whereby it was necessary to warn all strang-
ers who came to town to leave it. They might return
to the city or to whatever place they belonged ; but
must not be allowed to obtain a settlement in the
town to which they had come. If a, person was not
" warned out " within three months, he was then re-
garded as an inhabitant of the town, and if he became
poor and unable to support himself, the town was
then obliged to help him. That the towns were care-
ful to obey this law is clearly shown by the recorded
names of people who had been duly warned. If, alter
fourteen days, a person had not complied with the
warning, he was conducted by the constable or his
deputy beyond the limits of the town, but what be-
came of him afterwards is not stated. It would seem
a hard lot for an indigent person to be driven from
place ta place and not be able to find a home any-
where, though it is probable that such people really
had a settlement in some place where the authorities
were obliged to aid them. A selectman's report of
the early times in Boston has recently been seen, in
which occurs a sentence that explains their conduct,
and gives a reason why even men of means were also
warned out whenever they moved to another town.
It stated that complaints had been made that even
wealthy people, who wished to settle in the town, had
been warned, and the selectmen, in justification of
their conduct, replied in their " report :" " Whereas,
some did put on the appearance of wealth that were
really poor and eventually became town charges, the
town voted to warn out ail who came, without regard
to appearance." It is, however, recorded that — " In
many cases the persons so warned remained and be-
came useful citizens ;" so that there was no real injus-
tice done, for people who were really wealthy and
were desirous of settling in a new place were able ere
WESTFORD.
•15
long to prove their financial condition to the satisfac-
tion of all, and were gladly allowed to remain.
Dk. Benjamin Osgood. — No history of Westford
can be complete without mention of the prominent
men who lived and worked among her beautiful hills
and valleys, and surely, for fifty years, no one knew
better than this faithful and beloved physician the
highways and by-ways, and no one was more inti-
mately acquainted with the homes of the people,
their joys and their sorrows.
Dr. Osgood was born April 25, 1781, in Westford.
His early years were passed here. In 1804 he went
into the family of Amos Bancroft, M.D., of Groton,
to study medicine under his care. After finishing
his studie.s with Dr. Bancroft he practiced for a time
in Littleton, but at the earnest solicitation of friends
finally returned to his native town, where he resided
until his death, February 1, 1863. He was twice
married, his first wife being Miss Nancy Cumminga ;
the second, Miss Eliza Cummings, of Westford. Dr.
0:<good was a very unassuming man ; his opinions
and convictiocs were strong, and he held them firmly,
but did not obtrude them. He never sought publicity,
but quietly pursued the even tenor of his way so
acceptably to the people that, only when bowed with
the weight of years and of sorrow he was glad to rest,
could he, without remonstrance from old and young,
resign to hands fresher from the schools the service
he had so long performed. He was a member of the
Massachusetts Medical Society, he was interested and
active in works of reform and educational efforts, a
trustee of Westford Academy, and lor many years
secretary of the board. He was a deacon of the Uni-
tarian Church. He was a successful physician, a
good citizen, a kind friend, affectionate and beloved
in, his own house. He was highly esteemed by his
professional brethren, respected by his neighbors and
beloved by his patients. His life was quiet and un-
ostentatious, but many are those who hold him in
grateful remembrance.
Dk. Edward C. Atwood. — When the last history
of Westford was written Drs. Edward C. Atwood and
Joseph B. Heald were practicing medicine in town.
Dr. Atwood was a Westford boy ; he graduated at
Dartmouth College in 1871, and at the Long Island
College Hospital, Brooklyn, N. Y., in 1874, when, find-
ing that there was an "opening" at his old home, he
came here and settled down to the practice of his chosen
profession. He soon had all the business he could
do, but remained only ten years ; for in 1884 he sold
his practice to Dr. Walter J. Sleeper and removed to
Daytona. Florida, on account of the health of his
wife. There he built a drug-store, and, answering a
few sick-calis, he soon had all the patients he cared
to attend. One of his brothers accompanied him to
Florida, and together they bought land, set out
orange-trees and have now a large "grove," which
furnishes oranges — he says — of the "Unequaled Hal-
ifax River variety."
Dr. Walter J. Sleeper. — Juat before Dr. At-
wood went away Dr. Sleeper took his place and is a
successful practitioner here now. He graduated at
the Dartmouth Medical College in 1881. After grad-
uation he took hospital work and courses in surgery^
the skin, heart, lungs, eye and ear, in the hospitals of
Boston, New York and Chicago. He then spent a
year in traveling through the West, and finally re-
turned to his home, in Manchester, New Hampshire,
where he practiced till he came here, in 1884. Taking
Dr. Atwood's place, he had much to do from the very
first, and has proved himself to be a doctor worthy of
the confidence of the public. He bought a " lot" in
the centre of the village and built a fine residence,
and is making his grounds attractive.
Dr. Joseph B. Hela.ld. — The doctor graduated at
the Long Island College Hospital, Brooklyn, New
York. His first settlement was in Paris, Stark County.
Ohio, where he remained about three years — remov-
ing to Westford in February, 1878. In 1887 he left a
good practice to accept the offer of a partnership with
his brother. Dr. W. F. Heald, in Pepperell, removing
to that place in April of that year. He is still there,
and reports reach us that he is well liked as a physi-
cian. Some of his old patients in town occasionally
send for him now, when they require a doctor's ser-
vices. Dr. Heald was our town clerk at the time of
his removal to Pepperell, and his work in that office
was satisfactory to all concerned. He was kind to the
poor, occasionally helping one in need from his own
parse and charging nothing for his attendance.
Dr. James F. Smith. — Dr. Smith took the place of
Dr. Heald when he went away in February, 1887.
He graduated at the College of Physicians and Sur-
geons, New York, May 14, 1882. He took special
courses in Orthopaedic Surgery, in diseases of the
throat and nose, of the eye, ear, skin and cheat — be-
sides general hospital practice. He received diplomas
for several of these courses. He practiced medicine
for two years, then in the State of Maine for the same
time. He has a growing practice and is making a
specialty of treating the eye, ear and nose.
Official. — The census of 1885 gives 2193 as the
population at that date. Comparing this number with
that given in 1880, viz., 2148, there will be found a
little gain. The number of persons assessed on prop-
erty is 420, the number for poll tax only 250. Total
number of polls assessed, 528. Tax on each poll,
$2.00. The value of the assessed personal estate,
excluding bank stock, is $209,660 ; value of assessed
real estate, buildings, excluding land, $490,689 ; value
of assessed land, excluding buildings, $374,401. Num-
ber of acres of land assessed, 18,000 ; assessed tax on
property per $1000, $12.60, for the year 1889. The
tax of State, county, city or town purposes, includ-
ing overlayings — on personal estate, $2676.62 ; on
real estate, $10,900.13 ; on polls, $1056.
There have been but two changes in the Board of
Selectmen since the former history ; that history gives
716
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
for the year 1882 the following names : George T.
Day, Arthur Wright, Albert P. Richardson. In 1886
Isaac W. Carkin took the place of Arthur Wright,
and in 1890 William L. Kittredge took the place of
Isaac W. Carkin. Oilman J. Wright is the present
town clerk; he succeeded Dr. Joseph B. Heald in 1887.
The representatives elected from our town or district
since 1881 were as follows :
1882, CharlM H. Miller, of Pepparell ; 1883, Moses P. Palmer, of Gro-
ton; 1884, Noah Preecott, of Westford ; 1885, Frank Leighton, of Pep-
peroll ; 1886, George S. Graves, of Groton ; 1887, Arthnr Wright, of
Westford; 1888, John O. Beonett, of Pepperell ; 1889, James M. Swal-
low, of Dunstable.
A few changes in the former history are here ap-
pended : In 1863 John W. P. Abbot, Edward Pres-
cott and George W. Dupee were elected as the Board
of Selectmen. In 1864 the same board was re-elected.
In 1857 Robert P. Woods and Eliel Shumway, both
of Groton, were elected representatives; in 1861
David Porter, of Shirley, and John W. P. Abbot, of
Westford ; in 1862 Albert Leighton, of Pepperell, and
Isaac O. Taylor, of Dunstable.
The People. — The writer has lived with the people
of Westford for ten years and has found that, as a
whole, they adhere to the principles bequeathed them
by their fathers and are living examples of characters
those principles can produce. Benjamin Franklin
attributed all his success among men to the character
he established for himself, and not to any brilliancy
of intellect; and Westford has stood well among the
surrounding towns for the charactesistics it has pos-
sessed. Emerson said that the characters of men
make the conscience of society in which they live,
and on account of this fact Westford has long been
known as a place where it is a pleasure to reside.
" The virtue and intelligence of the people, their cul-
ture and social refinement, and their regard for edu-
cation and all humanizing influences will insure for
them the praise of every honorable mind and the es-
teem of the good. Rising every year to a higher grade
of morality and piety, they will take the sure road
to a genuine prosperity, and make the closing century
a happy introduction to the achievements of the
next." Many of the people are graduates of the
academy, and are interested in every educational re-
form and in the progress of the sciences and arts.
Strangers, occupying our pulpits, often speak of the
average intelligence of the congregations. A paint-
ing-class, composed of quite a number of the young
people of the place, has been a permanent institution
for several years, and the paintings that adorn their
homes attest the artistic taste that produced them.
Courses of lectures have been maintained, and
scarcely a winter passes without one or more of them.
Quite a number have read through the four years'
course of the Chautauqua Reading Circle and receiv-
ed their diplomas. Several other reading clubs or
circles have been organized from time to time, and
large numbers have attended some of them, for ex-
ample, the Unity Club, held one year ago. Miss Kate
Hamlin is, at present, giving a course of parlor lec-
tures upon the Euglish language and literature. She
writei in a very pleasing and attractive manner, and
her lectures are filled with the results of careful study
of the periods of English literature, as well as the
philosophy of the history itself. She is away from
Westford nearly all the time during the winter, read-
ing her lectures to circles of cultivated ladies in the
cities and towns about and in other States as well.
Westford has also a Village Improvement Association,
which shows a commendable public spirit on the
part of the many who are members of it. Public
spirit shows itself here in striving to make the place
a thriving, energetic, healthful and attractive one. It
introduces fine stock and improved methods. It
has replaced ''The old hut on a barren pasture corner,
that served for a primitive school-house, with the
modern structure, well-warmed and ventilated and
with attractive surroundings." It maintains good
walks and roads, and lights its streets. The public
spirit of Westford makes the village, which it con-
trols, as comfortable, healthful, moral and beautiful
as possible. Our people are pleasant, neighborly
and good-natured ; they especially care for those who
are ill or have misfortune ; there is a peaceful atmos-
phere hereof an unselfish, self-sacrificing community.
Our people are readers, are refined and cultivated,
and have that cheerfulness which is the aroma of life.
They have " June natures — rare, sunshiny ! " Such
natures carry a pleasant wholesomeness with them all
the time — a " well-spring of cheer that never seems
to run low." The writer has been to places where the
people looked as though they had never seen the sun,
or had just passed through a hard winter; the past
seemed gloomy, and the future a thing of dread and
foreboding. It is not so here, but the nature of the
people so harmonizes with the natural life about
them in the spring or early summer that one thinks
of the low-land meadows, the murmuring brooks, the
singing of birds, the air blowing from the sweet
South as though coming from a bank of roses, and
the sun shining warm over all. Such natures, where
ever existing, are cultured, refined, beautiful.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
CHARLES G. SARGENT.
Mr. Charles G. Sargent was born in Hillsborough,
N. H., July 17, 1819, and died in Graniteville, July
16, 1878, aged 58 years and 364 days. At fourteen
years of age he was apprenticed to a cabinet-maker,
afterwards to a clock-maker and then entered the
Lowell Machine-Shop, where he mastered the machin-
ist's trade. While in the employ of the Lowell Man-
ufacturing Co. he invented a valuable burring ma-
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c.a<^
WAKEFIELD
717
chine and ever after continued to invent and manu-
facture machinery. He was a natural machinist, as
his various inventions very clearly attest.
From 1850 to 1854 Mr. Sargent remained in Low-
ell in business for himself, then removed to Granite-
ville and built up the large industry which his sons
are now carrying on. He was a public-spirited and
benevolent man, giving largely toward the establish-
ment and support of the Methodist Church in this
place.
ALLEN CAMERON.
Mr. Allen Cameron was born on the 30th of Au-
gust, 1823, at AUness, Roashire, Scotland. He belongs
to the Lundavra House of the Cameron Clan, and
among his ancestry, traceable for over five hundred
years, are many distinguished in military and political
affairs. His father, Alexander Cameron, was an ex-
tensive sheep farmer, and Mr. Cameron's early life
was passed upon the farm, which was managed by
his mother after his father's death. He attended the
public schools at AUness and also the higher grades
at Dingwall. On the 12th of August, 1843, at the age
of twenty, he sailed from Liverpool on a packet ship
for New York, which place was reached after a voy-
age of thirty-two days. He immediately went to
Boston, where he found employment in a cotton and
wool commission-house, 28 Lewis Wharf, — Fairbanks
& Cameron.
Mr. Cameron of the firm was an elder brother, lo-
cated iu this country for some time previous. He re-
mained with the firm for two years, and then eugag.
ed as book-keeper for a wall-paper concern — Hurlburt
& Gregory. After four years' service here he went to
New York and entered the employment of Coates &
Co., bankers. In about eighteen months the firm was
dissolved, and for a while he acted as agent in this
country for a carpet commissiou-house in Manchester
England, and also did business for the wool firm o/
Kipley & Co. In 1851 he went to Norwich, Conn.,
and for three years was agent for the Greenfield
Worsted Co. For several years he was interested in
various branches of worsted and carpet manufacturing
and dyeing, until the year 1858, when he came to
Westford and bought Mr. Sargent's interest in the
Abbott Worsted Co., forming a partnership with John
W. Abbott, which has continued to the present time.
On the 12th of September, 1860, he married Eleanor
Francis, daughter of Levi Flint, of Charlestown.
Mr. Cameron is the financier of the firm and attends
to the buying and selling.
The clan to which he belongs has always been an
influential one. The present chief is a member of
Parliament, and the representative of the clan in
Westford clearly shows the influence a race of such
men must have in their native land.
J. HENEY READ.'
Joseph Henry Read, son of Zaccbeus and Mary
(Heywood) Reed, was born in Westfield, Middlesex
County, Aug. 5, 1835. After securing a common -
school education in the public schools of his native
town be availed himself of a course of study in
Springfield English and classical schools, and after-
wards at Westford Academy. He chose farming for
a calling, and Ijas made no change since.
Mr. Read was married in Westford, Jan. 13, 1857,
to Mary Eleanor, daughter of Daniel and Mary Ann
(Beede) Falls. Of this union were six children — M.
Alice, Carrie E., Nellie A., Abbie M., Henry B. and
Florence H. Read. He has held the various town
offices, such as selectman, overseer of the poor. School
Committee, auditor, etc. He has been a director and
secretary of the Westford Mutual Fire Insurance
Company since 1876. Mr. Read was a representative
to the General Court in 1872-73, and has been a com-
missioner of Middlesex County since January, 1876.
CHAPTER LIX.
WAKEFIELD.
BY CHESTER W. EATON.
The town of Wakefield, with its fresh, cheery
name, its elegant public buildings and modern dwell-
ing-bouses, its smiling lakes and well-kept parks, its
hum of business and air of prosperity, might well
seem to the casual visitor as a place of recent growth.
One need not look far, however, to correct his first im-
pressions. Once out of the immediate region of
depots, stores and factories, a glance at the mossy
slabs in the old burying-ground, or the glimpse of an
ancient domicile sheltered by a venerable elm or but-
tonwood, will bring to the senses of the thoughtful
observer the genuine flavor of antiquity.
Wakefield began to be settled by white men in
1639. Its territory was then claimed as part of the
domain of the Saugus tribe of Indians, whose Sachem
had his lodges by the sea, in what is now the city of
Lynn, then called Saugus, the township of Lynn then
iucluding the present towns of Saugus and Lynnfield.
Sundry iuhabitants of Lynn petitioned the Colony
Court for a place for an inland habitation at the head
of their bounds, and in 1639 the Court granted the
petition, and gave the town of Lynn " four miles
square at the head of their bounds, or so much thereof
as the place could afford, upon condition that the pe-
titioners shall within two years make some good pro-
ceeding in planting, so as it may be a village, fit to
contain a convenient number of inhabitants, which
may in due time hav» a church there, and so as such
1 From Raod'b " Doe iu One Tboaaand."
718
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
as shall remove to inhabit there, shall not withal
keep their accommodations in Lynn after their re-
moval to the said village, upon pain to forfeit their
interest in one of them at their election." Thereupon
the settlement began in earnest, the region taking the
name of Lynn Village, and in 1644 was duly incor-
porated as the town of " Redding." The locations of
the early settlers were mostly on what is now the cen-
tre of Wakefield, between or near the lakes, and on
the slopes of the adjacent highlands. The fore-
fathers, having erected their humble dwellings and
built a church and ^ mill, had laid in faith and
works the foundation of a municipality which should
grow better aud handsomer with age, and last while
towns endure.
The title to the lands within the townships of Read-
ing and Lynn was confirmed to the inhabitants thereof
by a deed from the Indian owners, dated September 4,
1686, in which the consideration named is £10 16.?.,
the deed being recorded at Salem, and signed by
David Kunkshamooshaw, grandson to old Sagamore
Oeorge >Ji)-Ni>-e, alia-i Wenepawweekin, sometime of
Runiney Marsh, and sometime at or about Chelm.s-
ford, sometime here and sometime there, but de-
ceased and Abigail Kunkshamooshaw, wife of David,
and Cicely alias Su George, ye reputed daughter of
said old Saeamore George, and .James Quonophit, of
Natick, alias Rumney Marsh, and Mary, his wife. It
is a matter of congratulation among present residents
of Wakefield, that a peaceable and record tills to
their territory can be pointed at.
While these sturdy Puritans, who, a few short years
before, had forsaken their English homes for con-
science' sake, were in these Indian solitudes humbly
doing their part in working out some of the greatest
problems of the human race, their kinsmen and
brothers in the faith were on the home soil of Eng-
land, under Oliver Cromwell and John Hampden
waging successful war against King, church and
aristocracy, fighting and preaching for the same great
principles of civil and religious liberty as their
brothers in the American wilderness. The first set-
tlers of this town were all Englishmen, and of the
same stern stuff and stock that fought at Naseby and
Marston Moor, made Cromwell Protector of England
and who later put away the sword for " the truer
work of building up a kingdom of righteousness in
the hearts and consciences of men."
The names of these first citizens of the old town
reveal their English origin, and are still borne by
many leading families of the region, and are as
follows :
Nicholas Brown, Thomas Clark, John Damon,
William Cowdrey, George Davis, Robert Duntou,
Samuel Dunton, Josiah Dustin, Jonas Eaton, William
Eaton, Zachary Fitch, Isaac Hart, Thomas Harts-
horne, William Hooper, Thomas Kendall, John Lau-
kin, Thomas Marshall, William Martin, John Pearson,
John Poole, Thomas Parker, Francis Smith, John
Smith, .leremy Swayne, Thomas Taylor, Edward Tay-
lor, Richard Walker, Samuel Walker and Juhn
Wiley.
The town, as first incorporated, included what is
now Wakefield and Reading. In 1651 a second grant
of two miles square was made to the town of Reading,
and included, substantially, what is now North Read-
ing. In 171." the inhabitants of the last-named
territory, " having become of sufficient and competent
numbers to call, settle and maintain a godly, learned,
orthodox minister," were incorporated as a distinct
parish by the name of the North Precinct of Read-
ing, the remaining portion of the town being known
as the Fir^t Parish. In 1760 the northwesterly part
of the First Parish, the part then called Woodend,
was incorpiirated by the name of the West Parish of
Reading, forming the nucleus of the present town of
Reading. In 1812 the old town was divided, and the
First or South Parish, then commonly known as the '
Old Parish, including the present territory of Wake-
field, w.ns incorporated as a new town, with the name
of South Reading. This separation, by which the
()ld Parish lost the birthright of its original name,
was due to political causes. The North and West
Parishes were strongly Federalists and opposed to the
impending war with Great Britain, while the people
of the Old Parish were nearly all Republicans and
enthusiastic for the war. The Old Parish was the
largest of the three in population and voters, but not
equal to the two others. Party feeling ran high, and
as a consequence the citizens of the South Parish
found themselves without offices or influence in the
administration of town affairs. This was not a pleas-
ant state of affairs and induced hasty action, for, tak-
ing advantage of an opportunity when the Republi-
cans were in power in the General Court, the Old
Parish obtained a charter for a distinct town and
South Reading was born. The new town began with
12.5 dwelling-houses, a population of 800, and a valua-
tion of $100,000.
From this point the town took a new departure in
steady growth and prosperous development, until, in
1S44, it had nearly doubled the number of its inhabit-
ants and the value of its property. Dr. .lohn Hart,
the local magistrate, a physician of skill, and an ex-
tensive land-owner, was a leading man of the town
during this last-named period.
On the 29th of May, 1844, occurred an historical
episode worthy of notice. The people of the three
towns included within the limits of ancient Reading,
putting away all jealousies and heart-burnings,
united in a grand celebration of the bi-centennial
anniversary of the incorporation of the olrl town.
The exercises were held in the village of the West
Parish, and included a brilliant military and civic
display, with an e.'ccellent address by Rev. Dr. Janie.s
Flint, a gifted son of the North Parish, an appropriate
poem by Hon. Lilley Eaton, of the South Parish, re-
plete with sparkling humor, racy anecdote and his-
WAKEFIELD.
719
torical reminiscence, and concluding with a bounti-
ful banquet in a spacious pavilion erected for the
purpose. It was a day to be remembered for its
cloudless beauty, the glad enthusiasm of the people,
and the complete success of the celebration. This
year (1844) was remarkable also for the location and
construction of the Boston and Maine Railroad
through the west centre of the town, displacing the
old Boston stage that had for so many years supplied
the wants of the " traveling public ; " but now, after
nearly half a century of rapid transit, it is likely that
electric street cars will soon be running over the same
route to Boston formerly traversed by Flanders' tally-
ho.
Following the opening of the steam railroad, the
town rapidly advanced in material prosperity. There
came large additions of business, wealth and good
citizens. Old industries, like the boot and shoe manu-
facture and otherH, felt a fresh impulse and expansion,
while new business enterprises, natably the iion foun-
dry and the rattan work.s, were soon launched, and
under sagacious management steadily grew unto as-
sured success. Gas for lighting streets and houses
was introduced in town in 1860, by the Citizens' Gas-
Light Company, and its pipes extended also to Stone-
ham and Reading; and this company, as also other
corporations, are now asking for authority to locate
poles and string wires for the supply of electricity
for lighting and power purposes.
In 1861 this course of peaceful prosperity was inter-
rupted by the greet Rebellion, in which the sons and
daughters of South Reading nobly bore their part in
sacrifices of property, lacerated hearts, and the best
blood of many of their number.
The years succeeding the war was a period of won-
derful growth and progress. All the industries
flourished, people flocked to the town, real estate ad-
vanced in price, graceful dwellings and business
structures rose on every hand. The population in
1865 was 324-'>; in 1875, 5349. The valuation in 1865
was $1,778,786 ; in 1875, 84,706,056.
In 1868 the town changed its name. The inhab-
itants had long felt the desire for a name more simple
and euphonious, an identity more clear and distinc-
tive.
In 1846 a special and almost successful effort had
been made in this direction. The subject was agita-
ted in earnest, a town-meeting was called to consider
and act on the proposition for a change of municipal
name, and a clear majority voted in favor of a new
departure. Favorite names, having a local or his-
torical significance, were presented and advocated by
different citizens, and the decisive ballot is given as
follows :
Winthrop, Tl
Florence, 6
Culuis, 5
South Beading 35
Shavmnt, 5
Lakeflide, 4
Greenville, 1
Pursuant to this vote of the town, a municipal
petition was forwarded to the Legislature asking for
the name of " Winthrop ;" but for reasons best known
to the legislative Solons of that day the petitioners
were given leave to withdraw, and the people's inter-
est in the matter subsided, to be revived with almost
universal favor in 1868.
At this time the late Cyrus Wakefield, Sr., a liberal
citizen of the town, descended from one of its older
families, came forward and unconditionally offered
the town the princely gift of a new and costly town
hall. A town-meeting was called, and in accepting
this opportune donation, the voters resolved that the
time bad come to change the name of the town, and
with unanimity and acclamation, voted in bo doing to
honor the name of their friend and benefactor. The
authority of the General Court was invoked, and by its
aid, on the 1st of July, 1868, the town exchanged its
endeared name of South Reading for the new and
significant name of Wakefield. The inaugural exer-
cises were held on the 4th of July, 1868. The day
was an occasion of double celebration. Bells rang in
the day, cannon awoke patriotic echoes, fluttering
flags, wreathed mottoes and decorated arches ap-
pealed to eye and memory ; band concerts tempered
and refined enthusiasm with the rhythm and melody
of music ; a long procession gave nearly every one
active participation in the celebration ; an historical
address eloquently blended the stirring memories of
the past and present; a sparkling poem added the
blossoms and fragrance of wit and fancy to the occa-
sion :
" With joyful voices join, to greet
This birtbdny of the free ;
Each glad return, more dear and sweet, —
The Nation's Jubilee.
*' On all the windii her banner playa,
Star-gemmed with folds of light ;
A nation's hopes are in its rays.
The red, the blue, the white.
' Here, on this bright, rejoicing day
Such hopeful omens crown,
We come, a pleasant word to say
For our dear, natiTe town.
' Fair town, whose legends, strangu and old,
Wrought from her bending bowere.
By nobler bard have been enrolled,
In fairer lines tbau ours.
' From ont the shadowy haunts of eld,
From ancient roofs, moes.growii,
Arise the forms those years befaeld,
And swells aerial tone ;
* Forms, lost to ngbt, to memory dear,
Thuse mystic cbamtwrs flit,
Tones loet to earth, from pnrer sphere
Oor waiting spirits thrill !
* As tfae fond lovers linger long,
Nor haste to say farewells,
As the swan'd sad expiring song
In sweetest cadence swells, —
' So on memories fond, intent.
We linger with the past ;
720
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
And the fair name, with childhood blent
Seems sweetest at the lust !
" Dear name, farewell ! Our task is o'er :
The coming glories see !
South Reading, henceforth, nevermore, —
And Wakefield let It be I "
The grand celebration dinner in the mammoth tent
upon the Common, made brilliant by the flash of wit
and sentiment, was a notable feature of the occasion.
The excessive heat that prevailed was the only draw-
back to the full enjoyment of the festivities of the
day. Kaces upon the lake aflbrded pleasurable ex-
citement, and the day was closed by the roar of artil-
lery and the explosion of fireworks.
The promised Town Hall was erected in due time,
and, with a suitable lot of land, was presented to the
town, with impressive dedicatory exercises, on the
22d of February, 1871, and is the same splendid edi-
fice now used by the town for municipal purposes,
and located at the corner of Main and Water Streets.
Until comparatively recent years the town was en-
tirely without any adequate printed history of itself.
In 1865 such a work was projected. By invitation of
many prominent gentlemen, supplemented by a vote
of the town, the late Hon. Lilley Eaton was induced
to undertake the congenial service. This labor of
love grew upon his hands, as his design for the book
enlarged, to embrace in its scope the whole territory
and people of ancient Reading. His sudden death
in January, 1872, left the work nearly but not fully
completed. A committee, of which John S. Eaton,
Esq., was the efficient chairman, acting under author-
ity of the town, carried forward the work to its proper
end, and in 1874 was printed, at the town's expense,
the "Genealogical History of the Town of Reading,
Mass., including the Present Towns of Wakefield,
Reading and North Reading, with Chronological and
Historical Sketches from 1639 to 1874." This vol-
ume is octavo in size, contains 815 pages, embellished
with fifty portraits and engravings.
The matter of a public water supply has greatly in-
terested the people of Wakefield in recent years. On
May 4, 1872, the Quannapowitt Water Company was
incorporated for furnishing Wakefield and Stoneham
with water for fire and domestic purposes, from Crys-
tal and Quannapowitt Lakes. The name was subse-
quently changed to Wakefield Water Company. This
corporation slumbered for about nine years, but iu
1881 it made a proposition to the town of Wakefield
to supply its inhabitants with water to be taken from
Crystal Lake. After much discussion, some equity
suits in the Supreme Court, and many town-meetings,
the town and water company made a water contract,
and before the close of the year 1883 an aqueduct
system, having its source in the pure waters of Crys-
tal Lake, was in successful operation in Wakefield
and Stoneham.
In former years the boundary line between Wake-
field and Stoneham was within a stone's throw of the
upper depot of the Boston and Maine Railroad ;
and on petition to the Legislature a considerable
tract of the territory of Stoneham, in this region
— including one hundred and ninety acres — was
in 1856 set off and annexed to Wakefield, with
general acquiescence. As years passed by, Wakefield
grew largely toward the west, and quite a number of
houses were found to be over the line, in Stoneham,
but occupied by people whose interests and affilia-
tions were mostly on the Wakefield side, their homes
being much nearer the schools, churches, stores, post-
office and depots of Wakefield than those of Stone-
ham. Therefore, on petition of these residents of the
border land, the General Court, in 1889, set off to
Wakefield another strip of land, containing 142 acres,
from the easterly portion of Stoneham, not, however,
without opposition from the last-named town. The
territory thus annexed included sixty-two inhabitants
and eighteen houses, with a real estate valuation of
S40,000.
Topography and Situation. — Wakefield pos-
sesses rare charms in natural scenery, and a location
especially favorable and convenient. Her territory
contains 4568 acres, with a surface romantically di-
versified by hill and valley, groves and lakes. The
central village occupies a plain between two lakes,
and running up the gentle slopes of Shingle Hill, on
the east, and Cowdrey's Hill and Cedar Hill on the
west. The larger lake — Quannapowitt — is a beauti-
ful sheet of water, containing 264 acres, extending
northerly to the borders of Reading, and much en-
joyed for its yachting and fishing privileges. Its out-
let is Saugus River, forming the boundary between
Wakefield and Lynnfield, and flows southeasterly to
the sea, emptying its waters into Lynn harbor. Crys-
tal Lake, just south of the centre, contains, by esti-
mation, sixty-four acres, but is remarkably deep, and
its waters not excelled in purity by any lake-source
of water supply in the State. The outlet is a small
stream, flowing eastwardly to Saugus River, and in
other years has been found sufficient to furnish water-
power for grist-mills and saw-mills. On this little
"Mill River" was built the first corn-mill of the
town, at the very place cow occupied by the Wake-
field Rattan Works. Following along the valley of
this stream, about a mile southeasterly from Wake-
field, it expands into a fertile and peopled plain,
forming the pleasant outlying village and school dis-
trict of Woodville. The central valley of the town
extends southerly below Crystal Lake, and there is
discovered Wakefield's most flourishing suburb, the
village of Greenwood, with depot, chapel and schools.
The highlands to the west of the centre are very at-
tractive for residences, furnishing many prospects of
picturesque beauty. Along the easterly border
of Lake Quannapowitt are home sites not less delight-
ful, and there are to be seen many tasteful and ele-
gant dwellings. On the eastern plains, toward Lynn-
field, is the thriving village of Montrose, with a
WAKEFIELD.
721
school, chapel, engine-house and niilroad station.
Mention should not be omitted of the spacious and
beautiful public park of the town, with its rows of
noble elms, beginning at the frowning Rockery, where
the dusty ways meet, and extending, in its verdant
beauty, to the shores of Quannapowitt, and still
northerly along the easterly margin of the lake. The
park is indeed the pride of the town, and under fos-
tering care grows more charming eacli year.
Johnson, the quaint Woburn liistoriaii, writing in
1051, remarked that " Heading hath her habitation in
the very centre of the country,'' meaning, it is pre-
sumed, that its location was in the centre of that por-
tion of New England which was then settled. Even
now it may be truly said that Wakefield occupies a
position remarkably central in respect to other import-
ant municipalities. Within a radius of fifteen miles
of her central park are grouped about Wakefield, like
mighty protectors, the cities of Boston, Clielsea, Mai-
den, Lynn, Salem, Lawrence, Lowell, Woburn and
Cambridge. These, with the towns that fill the spaces
between, contain a population of (jOO.OOO persons.
AKilCMl WAKKKIKl.li LAKE.--.
in JOHN 6. KATUN.
Wliere an. ieul KeHJiiig'i, tiUipi-j of ;:rfeli
UiitKprertii lifi' lovely lakef iK-twcoii, —
Od Ifvel jilaili and tiiirtj IYl-sIi cruwtl
siAnilfi Wttkefielil's fair, histuric town.
llcr shiniiiK liikcB ! culm, blue nnJ clL>ai-,
A^ ill thul fur, pniiiovul your.
When, nilii"uied liri;:lit, tlicy luy iiiifitirtcd,
Save by llic wins ^^ wmidlaiul hjnl.
Or wlieu, iKTclmnce, iruni slinrc to sborc,
Willi Muiiting plniiic iiud tl.iBluug oar,
Sonic liiUiun warriorn light cauue
.X'Toc-* their Biinlit waters Hew.
ller irVKlul lakes 1 sail-flecked and bine
.Anil fair, a< those the red men knew,
\\ illi aided charms on emerald rim
\Vuuld make their UDcient b<>nli*i> dun.
Now, — (.lately spire ornate apjK'ars, —
And all the garnered weallli of years,
Tollelied by the MlO'*cl-S|ieurs of gold,
Sln>ws Wakr'ticld'» treasures niiinifobl.
Among the ancient towns of Middlesex, one, con-
spicuous for beauty of situation ami for its romantic
environment, nor lacking a record of historic achieve-
ment, will be found where, beside sparkling waters,
the progressive municipality of Wakefield ofl'ers it'*
pleasant home,^ to home-lovers.
The lakes, between which the town shows its cen-
tral location, with their sloping, sandy shores and
wealth of forest foliage, must have seemed admirable
even in their original wildness and solitude; and it
is worthy of remark that a world-wide traveler and
poet, while viewing Crystal Lake, is said to have de-
clared its accessories of beauty to be unsurpassed by
any similar waters that he had seen shining below
Swiss or Italian summits.
The unlearned and those whose vocations are of |
the most prosaic nature, s^em, unconsciously, to be- I
come admirersof the beautiful and the picturesque,
4G-ii
and we may easily believe that the Indian chieftain
(of whom this territory was originally purchased) and
his tawny tribe found attractive charms, as well as
abundant food, on the borders of these quiet lakes
On their fertile and now cultivated shores the plow oc-
casionally turns up flinty arrow-head or spear-point —
the only reminders of the rude, red warriors who,
wrought and used them around these waters, where
even their burial-places are unknown.
The native charms of these village lakes, scarcely
diminished through the lapse of years, are still al-
luring, while their peopled shores are rich in the
added beauties that situation, artistic adornment and
centuries have given them. Encircled originally, we
may suppose, by woodlands redolent with spicy odors
of the pines, and by meadow-lands brilliant with
flowers, its wooded shores undulating in curves and
|)romontories, its waters gleaming in sunlight or rush-
ing with the winds to break in miniature surf on the
beach, Lake Quannapowitt still retains (on its north-
ern border) characteristic features of these distant
years. Leaving the town's business centre, and
crossing its old-time training-field (remembered also
as a youthful skating-field), now smooth, secure and
shadowy, beneath elms massive with fifty years of
growth, the visitor may reach a point from whence,
o'er lawn and lake and waving woodlands, a land-
scape of remarkable extent and attractiveness
stretches away to the distant purple hills.
Viewed from this position, soft, velvety and green,
sweeps the Park's crescent curve around the lake's
southern sands; then, clasping ita winding eastern
shore as with an emerald belt, with here a pebbly
beach and there a fringe of ferns, it meets and joins
the level, grassy meadows on the north.
But the lake's crowning embellishment and the
day's supreme moment will be found at the summer
sunset hour, when a flood of crimson splendor over-
spreads the unrippled surface; when all surrounding
objects are mellowed by ita glory and suflTused with a
warm, unwonted, golden glow; when sky and lake
and lawn, forest and meadow, hill-slope and shelving
shore, form a picture of vivid colors and enticing
loveliness.
Who that has there witnessed such a sunset can
forget its opulent beauty?
As faded the Indians' leafy trails along these wave-
washed forest borders, the first white settlers opened
broader and smoother thoroughfares on shore and
summit (this pleasant region being one that early at-
tracted the sturdy English emigrants); who brought
hither and exemplified the simple and economic
tastes, the quiet, temperate and virtuous lives, which
were prominent characteristics of that period. We
have abundant evidence that the original settlers in
this territory were intelligent, industrious, patriotic
and religious citizens ; that the church and school-
house arose almost simultaneously with the falling of
the forest pines, and that the rugged inhabitants, strug-
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
gling with difficulties quite unknown to their de-
scendants, here laid firm foundations for the nation's
future growth and grandeur.
True it may be that the hardy, economic and suc-
cessful pioneers in these New England settlements
cared less for the artistic than for the useful, less for
the picturesque than for the practical, sometimes re-
garding BEAUTY as undesirable (if not sinful), "not
remembering that to some minds a relish for what is
lovely in fancy and in art is as native as color to the
violet, fragrance to the rose, or song to the biid ; that
God's own mind must eternally teem with beauty,
since he lines with it the tiny sea-shell, and tints tlie
fish and tones the hidden fibres of trees, and flashes
it on breast and crest of flying birds, and breaks the
tumbling avalanche into a myriad feathery crys-
tals, and builds the skies in a splendor which no
thought can match.''
This ancient town, planted on historic soil and con-
.splcuous in Revolutionary annals, has never lacked
heroic defenders, from the distant year when from
his lake-shore farm went forth the brave commander
of the Colonial forces, until those recent and
memorable years, when, on Southern tields, her sons
gave their lives for the preservation of the Union.
As the years have passed (two and a half centuries
from its settlement), and as ihe town has advanced to
a prominent and prosperous position among other
municipalities, generation after generation of its resi-
dents has vanished from the scene, and on the mar-
gin of the lake, beside which they had lived and loved
and labored, on mossy and crumbling tombstones
may be read the records of their departures. Beside
gently-lapsing waters, where overarching, breeze-
swept branches sound a perpetual requiem, —
" Kacli in IiiB narruw cell forever liiiti,
The rutle forefatht^re of Ihe hunilet nleep,"'
while on the lake's sunset-shore, in ground conse-
crated aud flower-embellished, other and later gener-
ations have found aud will find tender and tearful
sepulture.
Beautiful Lakeside ! sacred, shadowy, serene I
Above its silent sleepers are the summer's garnered
freshness and flowers ; bee aud butterfly, bringing the
sweet splendors of the sunshine, wing their joyous
flight over its grassy mounds ; its bird-songs have
never a note of sadness, and the waves that meet its
shores bear the lilies' fragrant and stainless blossoms
to these pleasant portals of the tomb.
Pre-historic Sigx.s.— Though the axe and the
ploughshare of the English settlers, pushing out
from Lynn to " the head of their bounds," were
first seen in the wilds of this town in 1639, evi-
dences abound that for centuries before, the Amer-
ican red men of the Saugus tribe found in this
region their favorite haunts. The water privileges
of this region, in later times so highly prized,
were also irresistible attractions to the dusky men of
the early days. The great ponds now known as Lake
Quannapowitt and Crystal I>ake, and the small
streams, now dignified with the names of Saugus River
and Mill River, were like magnets to draw the red
men to their banks, where even now the intelligent
searcher may any day find abundant traces of the
aborigines only a few inches beneath the soil, in the
shape of hatchets, arrow-heads, knives, pestles, ham-
mers, remnants of pottery, aud various implements
of stone and bone, fashioned with the curious skill
of a lost art.
Enthusiastic .ind patient explorers beneath the
surface of things have been rewarded by the discovery
of numerous specimens of the rude skill of a pre-
historic race, and in Wakefield may be found many
large and valuable collections of these durable
memorials. .V comparison oi' results from these in-
vestigations artbrds satisfactory proof that in what is
now the centre of Wakefield were located, perhaps
for centuries, the villages of Indians, who hunted
deer and trapped rabbits in the adjacent forests, and
in our brooks and lakes fished for trout, pickerel and
bass without fear of fish committee or statute law.
Evidences are conclusive that the wigwams nf Indian
homes were once thickly placed on the solid land be-
tween Quannapowitt and Crystal Lakes, and the
plain westerly of the new upper station of the Boston
& Maine Railroad, on the sloi)e of Cowdrey's Hill,
and near Barehill Brook at the northwest, on the
banks of Saugus River on the east, aud on the plaius
of Greenwood, near the Pitman estate at the south.
A Wakefield bard "to the manner born" has looked
back through the centuries and given wings to his
imagination in the following lines :
" The native ludian, iliiU and riidf.
Threading the forest wild.
Beside luir lakes enrliniited stoo^l,
Where the Great Spirit smiled.
** His wigwam's abield alont; ihese streaniti
Id rustic heauty sprang ;
Here in the twilight's shadowy glt-ams.
His dusky daughters sang.
" And, later, here our ancient sires,
By the same waters cheered.
Over the Indians' smouldering tires
Their scanty dwellings reared ;
" Fought for their title to the soil
With hungry wolf and bear;
And where the savage sought hid spoil.
Erected house of prayer.
" All honor to those nigsed men.
The coming needs foresaw,
.\Dd laid foundations tinuly then
Of liLierty aud law."
Our forefathers, erecting here their log cabins two
and a half centuries ago, came not to unpeopled soli-
tudes, but occupied the places and hunting-grounds
of a race possessing many noble qualities and char-
acteristics, but yet essentially a barbarous people, and
WAKEFIELD.
723
entirely wanting in the graces, the humanities and
the culture of a Christian civilization. To the honor,
however, of the early settlers of Lynn and Reading,
be it said, that they obtained by peaceable negotiation
from the former Indian possefsora a good and regular
deed of the land included within the grants of the
two towns, duly signed and acknowledged by the
chief men and women of the tribe. This deed was
dated May 31, 1687, and is recorded with Essex So.
Dist. Deeds, at Salem.
ErcLESlASTlCAL. — A meetiug-housc of bumble
appearance and dimensions was among the first
buildings erected by the settlers of Reading, and
stood near where is now the Wakefield Po.st Office.
This small house served the purposes of a church
building until 1688, when it was sold for twenty-five
shillings and a " watch-house frame," and the money
obtained appropriated for the school. The second
meeting-house was erected in 1688, a little north-
westerly of the site of the stone structure now being
erected in the easterly part of what is now known as
" the old burial-ground." This edifice was enlarged
in 1727, a steeple built upon it, and furnished with
:\ bell. The third church edifice was erected in 1768,
and for the times was a commodious and handsome
structure. It was turned aro<ind and essentially re-
modeled in 1850, receiving a new steeple, new bell
and tower-clock ; but the frame remained unchanged
until the edifice was finally demolished in June,
1800, to make way for the stately and graceful house
of enduring granite, not yet completed, to be sup-
plied with every modern ap|)liance and convenience,
its tower and turrets pointing toward heaven. The
new stone church is being built of Monson granite
in two colors of gray, and is in style a simple, har-
monious development of the Byzantine-Romanesque,
in which form and color, rather than elaborate de-
tail, are relied upon for architectural effect. The
auditorium has 6.J<> sittings ; bul the number can be
easily increased to lOfiO by moving the sliding sashes
which separate the audieuce-room from the Sunday-
school apartment on the same floor. The cost of the
edifice and furnishings will be about $78,000. This
church was organized in 1644 or 1645, was Congrega-
tional in its faith and government, and was the
twenty-fourth church founded in the Massachusetts
Colony.
The successive ministers of the church have been
as follows : Rev. Henry Green, Rev. Samuel Haugh,
Rev. John Brock, Rev. Jonathan Pierpont, Rev.
Richard Brown, Rev. William Hobby, Rev. Caleb
I'reutice, Rev. Reuben Emerson, Rev. Alfred Emer-
son, Rev. Jo8ei>h D. Hull, Rev. Joseph B. Johnson,
Rev. Charles R. Bliss, Rev. David N. Beach, Rev.
William H. Brodhead and Rev. Robert W. Wallace.
This old church has been the mother of noble and
vigorous daughters. In 1720 she sent forth colonies
at North Reading and Lynnfield. In 1729 she helped
form the church at Stoneham, in 1733, the church
in Wilmington, and in 1770 parted regretfully with
some of her best blood in the incorporation of the
Third or West Parish and the formation of the
church at " Woodend," or what is now the town of
Reading. The "old church" has ever contended
with sturdy zeal for " the faith which was once for
all delivered unto the saints," and is still stroog,
progressive and influential.
The Baptist Society was formed in 1797, its first
meeting-house erected on Balem Street in 1800, and
the church organized in 1804. In 1820 the church
edifice was removed to a more central location at the
corner of Main and Crescent Streets, and in 1835 it
was destroyed by fire. A new house of worship was
erected forthwith on the same site, and this was
burned to the ground in 1871. In re-building, the
society secured a larger lot at the corner of Main and
Lafayette Streets, and erected thereon, in the Roman-
esque style, a commodious and splendid house of
worship, which still stands with lofty spire and
graceful proportions, — a beautiful temple of the Lord,
and a worthy ornament of the town.
This strong and active church has been and is a
power in the community, and has been served by a
succession of earnest and devoted ministers, as fol-
lows:
Rev. Ebenezer Nelson in 1804, followed by Rev. Gus-
tavus F. Davis, Rev. Joseph A. Warne, Rev. James
Huckins, Rev. Isaac Sawyer, Rev. Charles Miller,
Rev. Larkin B. Cole, Rev. Charles Evans, Rev. Paul
S. Adams, Rev. Dr. Daniel W. Phillips, Rev. Dr.
George BuUen, Rev. Dr. James W. Willmarth, Rev.
Richard M. Nott, Rev. Dr. Charles Keyser, Rev. Dr.
Rudolph R. Riddell, Rev. Roland D. Grant and Rev.
Noah R. Everts.
The Universalist Church was organized in 1813, but
its first settled pastor was not installed until 1833, ancL
its first house of worship not erected until 1839. This
edifice, finely located on the easterly side of Main
Street, and originally simple and unpretending in
architecture, was, in 1859, remodeled and enlarged,
and received the addition of a steeple and tower clock,
and is now one of the most graceful structures on the
street. The society is active and prosperous, and fur-
nishes a centre around which gathers and radiates
the more liberal, religious sentiment of the commun-
ity. Its ministers have been Rev. John C. Newell,
Rev. H. W. Morse, Rev. Henry Jewell, Rev. Henry
Lyon, Rev. Stillman Barden, Rev. John H. Willis,
Rev. AJexander Hichbom, Rev. John H. Moore, Rev.
Benton Smith, Rev. Edwin A. Eaton, Rev. William
W. Hayward, Rev. William F. Potter, Rev. Quincy
Whitney, Rev. William H. Morrison, Rev. William
E. Gaskin, and Rev. L. L. Greene.
St. Joseph's Catholic Society is the largest in Wake-
field. Their first church edifice was erected in 1854,
though many Masses had been said in halls and
private houses of the town in preceding years.
To accommodate the growing needs of the society
r24
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
a larger church was built in 1871, and this proving
inadequate, an extensive addition was made in
1889, including a handsome spire. The church is
situated on Albion Street, near the Upper Depot of
the Boston and Maine Railroad, and is a promi-
nent and pleasing feature of the region. Under the
efficient and devoted spiritual guidance and ministra-
tions of Rev. Father Millerick, assisted by his
curate, the Rev. D. H. Reardon, an important work is
being done in caring for the highest interests of the
Catholic population of the town. The first regular
officiating pastor was Rev. Thomas Shahan in 1854,
followed by Rev. John Ryan, Rev. John McCarthy,
Rev. Thomas Scully, Rev. John McShane, Rev. M.
Z. Carroll, Rev. Thomas Gleason, Rev. William H.
Fitzpatrick, Rev. M. F. Flatley, Rev. Patrick J.
Hally and Rev. Jeremiah E. Millerick. The pastors
have been resident in Wakefield since 1873.
The Methodist Episcopal Church was organized in
1865, and for .several years worshiped in the vestry of
the Universalist Church. In 1869 the society pur-
chased the Albion Hall building, but after a few years'
use it was deemed too small, and Feb. 24, 1874, a
handsome new church on Albion Street, coating S25,-
•500, was dedicated with fitting ceremonies. The struc-
ture was Gothic in outline, with Swiss treatment of
detail. It was a time of business depression, and a
heavy debt hung like a leaden weight about the neck
of the society, until in 1885 the terrible burden was
entirely removed by contributions mostly obtained by
the personal labors of the pastor, nt that time the Rev.
T. C. Martin, and now, in a church redeemed, the peo-
ple of this society are earnest and successful workers
in the vineyard of the Lord. The succession of pas-
tors has been as follows : Rev. Thomas C. Potter,
Rev. Andrew Gray, Rev. Daniel Atkins, Rev. Dr. M.
,B. Chapman, Rev. C. L. McCurdy, Rev. John Peter-
son, Rev. E. A. Howard, Rev. Gilbert C. Osgood, Rev.
E. A. Manning, Rev. Daniel Richards, Rev. Thomas
C. Martin, Rev. D. S. Coles and Rev. W. F. Cook.
The Emmanuel Society was organized in 1869, as a
Mission of the Protestant Episcopal Church. This
society was not large, but has had the encouragement
of a gradual increase in numbers and in spiritual
prosperity. Its first church edifice was erected in
1881, on the southerly side of Water Street nearly op-
posite Crescent Street. The rectors of this society
have been Rev. Samuel R.SIack,Rev. George Walker,
Rev. Samuel Hodgkiss, Rev. Frederick Luson, Rev.
William H. Williams and Rev. Irving Spencer.
The first Congregational Society of Greenwood was
formed in 1873, and in 1884 a tasteful and convenient
chapel was erected on Oak Street, near the Green-
wood School-house, where regular services are held
every Sunday, but no permanent pastor is ever en-
gaged.
The Montrose Chapel Society was organized in
1877, and in 1886 dedicated an elegant little chapel to
religious use, where Sunday-school and preaching
services are held every week, but, like Greenwood, the
society is not able to support a regular pastor.
Educ.\tioxai.. — The New England Puritans were
not slow to appreciate the value of education, and, ac-
cording to their means, provided ample opportunities
for the acquisition of knowledge and the training of
the mental powers. The early settlers of Wakefield
were true scions of the stock, and good common
schools have been found in town since the early years.
The first known teacher of the free school was Nich-
olas Lynde, of Charlestown, a graduate of Harvard
College in 1690. Several of the " old masters '' of the
town were men of thorough classical attainments. It
is not known wliere the tirst school-bouse, as such,
was erected, but it is recorded that in 1707 the select-
men were asked to consider whether the school-house
should be removed. This building was a small aftiiir,
and stood upon what is now the public park, a little
northeasterly of the Congregational I'hurch. lu 1693
and for some years succeeding, Mxster Lynde was the
only teacher in the whole town, and taught in differ-
ent parts of the town, .as the selectmen directed.
Three months were given to wlmt is now Wakefield,
two months to wh?t is now Reading, and one mouth
to what is now North Heading.
During the eighteenth century, before the Revolu-
tionary War, the amount of money annually appro-
priated for schools averaged about ill!". Following tl\e
Revolution the school appropriations gradually in-
creased, educational privileges were expanded, until,
in Wakefield alone, the aunual api)ropriation for
support of schools is ?20,0(iO, which is distributed
among twenty-four schools, in which instruction is
given by thirty-one teachers to 1200 pupils, in ten
large and well-appointed school edifices. The High
School was established in 184o, and is now one of the
most highly prized and cherished institutions of the
town, occupying a handsome edifice at the corner of
Main and Lafayette Streets, on the site of the old-
time parsonage of the First Parish. Wakefield has
obtained a worthy distinction among the people of the
Commonwealth for the excellence of her public
schools.
Long before the establishment of the High School,
there was erected, in 1S29, on the pleasant elevation
easterly of Crescent Street, the South Reading Acad-
emy, under Baptist auspices. It wiia for many years
a flourishing institution of learning and exerted a
valuable and elevating influence on the rising gener-
ation of the town, and hastened the coming of the
High School. The academy was discontinued about
1845, and the town, in 1847, purchased the building
for the use of the High School. Another institution,
the Greenwood Seminary, was established about the
year 1855, in Greenwood Village, by Rev. Windsor
B. Wait, under Universalist influences, and was for
a decade a favorite resort for young ladies seeking a
finished educatiou.
Libraries. — There have been in other days libra-
WAKEFIELD.
725
ries of note in the town, including the "Social,"
"Franklin," "Prescott" and "Agricultural " Libra-
ries, but all have been overshadowed and practically
superseded, except churcb and school libraries, by the
Public Library, instituted in 1856, by the public-
spirited eflbrts of leading citizens of the town, includ-
ing Benjamin Franklin Tweed, Lilley Eaton, Paul
H. Sweetser, Edward Mansfield, Franklin Poole,
James M. Evans and John S. Eaton. A large num-
ber of books was collected by private enterprise and
donation and presented to the town. This germ of
the library was taken under the paternal wing of the
town, and, receiving generous nourishment and kindly
care, has grown and expanded into the present extensive
collection of books, which includes about 10,000 vol-
umes, and is regarded as a beneficent and almost indis-
pensable institution of the town. Its name was changed
in 1868 to " Beebe Town Librarj'," in honor of the late
Lucius Beebe, Esq., a liberal contributor to its funds.
Other generous gifts have been made to the institu-
tion by Mrs. Harriet N. Flint, the late Dr. Francis
P. Hurd and the late Cyrus Wakefield, the younger.
A public reading-room contiguous to the library, well
supplied with the be.st papers and magazines of the
day, is much used and appreciated by the people of
the town.
As a means of popular education, supplementary to
the schools and public library, there should be men-
tioned the work of the Wakefield Lecture Associa-
tion, which has for many years provided winter
courses of excellent literary, scientific and musical
entertainments in the town-hall to large audiences
for a very reasonable price. There was also estab-
lished in 188ii the "ttweetaer Fund Lectures," and
placed upon a secure financial foundation by the be-
quest in trust to the town of $10,000, under the will
of Cornelius Sweetser, a native of Wakefield, " for the
improvement and elevation of the public mind."
Under wise management the annual series of superior
lectures provided from this fund have grown in popu-
lar favor and appreciation, and become a prized insti-
tution of the town. A small admission fee is charged,
as required by the terms of the will, and the surplus
of income distributed among the worthy poor of the
town.
Newspapers. — The first attempt to furnish regular
news in printed form to the inhabitants of this town
was in 1854, through the medium of a South Beading
Department in the Middlesex Journal, a weekly paper
published in Woburn. Invited by a "combination of
gentlemen," the editorial duties of the department
soon devolved upon Edward Mansfield, Esq., who for
many years continued to furnish items for the South
Reading column, with generous public spirit and
signal success.
In 1858 was begun the publication of the South
Reading Oazetle, by Mr. William H. Hutchinson, from
Boston, which paper for about five years was a wel-
come visitor in home circles. In 1868 Mr. A.
Augustus Foster, established the Wakefield Banner,
which, in 1872, was merged in the Wakefield Citizen.
At this time Mr. William H. Twombly launched the
Wakefield Advocate, but soon after picked up the dis-
carded name of " Banner," and for nearly two years
there was again published the Wakefield Banner. In
1874 Mr. Twombly porchased the Citizen, which he
consolidated with the Banner, and then was begun
the prosperous career of The Wakefield Citizen and
Banner, which has become the leading journal of the
community and found in nearly every home in Wake-
field. Mr. Twombly, in 1880, sold his interest in the
paper to Mr. Chester W. Eaton, who is still the pub-
lisher and editor of this progressive sheet. An ex-
tensive job printing department is successfully car-
ried on in connection with the newspaper office.
The Wakefield Bulletin was established in 1881 by
Mr. W. H. Twombly, then proprietor of the Reading
Chronicle. The Wakefield Record was started in 1886
by Mr. Frederick W. Young, who, in 1887, purchased
the Bulletin, and has since successfully conducted the
Wakefield Record and Bulletin. Other ephemeral
ventures in newspaperdom have been made in the
town, but are hardly worthy of mention.
Military. — The military record of the town is one
of honor and renown. The first corps was organized
in 1644, called the Reading Infantry Company, and
commanded by Richard Walker, a noted Indian
fighter. It is recorded of him :
'* or BaadlDg traiD.band be was first
Who held the Captain's loft; tnist ;
A man of faitb and courage great.
To fight the battles of the Bute.
And tbua we find that with his men,
He went to Sangua, now called Lynn,
And fought the eastern Indiana there,
Whoee poisoned arrows filled the air,
And two of which these savage foeo
Lodgedaafely in old Walker's clothes."
This famous company was cherished and sustained
until its disbandment, in 1840. The Washington
Rifle Greens were organized in 1812, became the re-
nowned company of the region, and went out of ex-
istence in 1850.
The Richardson Light Guard, so named in honor
of the late Dr. Solon 0. Richardson, a generous friend
of the company, as is also his son, the present Dr. S.
O. Richardson, was organized in 1851. Thrice was
this gallant corps called into the service of the Union
during the recent Rebellion — as Company E, Fifth
Regiment, as Company E, Fiftieth Raiment, and as
Company E, Eighth Regiment Massachusetts Volun-
teers, and always acquitted itself with honor. It
still enjoys high distinction under Capt. Clinton H.
Steams, as Company A, Sixth Regiment Massachu-
setts Volunteer Militia.
In the French and Indian Wars of last century the
First Parish of the old town of Reading nobly bore
her part, her sons sharing in the glory of the capture
of Louisburg, and fought under Wolfe on the Plains
r26
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of Abraham. Wheu the tocsin sounded for the
opening of the Revolutionary War the whole town of
Reading burned with patriotic ardor. Several com-
panies of minute-men had been secretly organized
for the anticipated crisis, and on the memorable 19th
of April, 1775, the train-band, or "alarm-list "of the
First Parish was, by express, ordered to Lexington,
and they departed very early, accompanied by the
minister, Rev. Caleb Prentiss, and met the British
troops returning from Concord at Merriam's Corner,
and, with the men of the Third Parish and others,
were among the first to engage the enemy in what
might be called the first battle of the Revolution, the
Reading men being commanded in this encounter by
Capt. John Brooks, afterward Governor of the Com-
monwealth. The British regulars in their retreat
along the Boston turnpike were constantly and fatally
harassed by the Provincials, and their retreat be-
came a rout until they met Lord Percy, with rein-
forcements.
Among the First Parish men who joined in the ex-
citing chase was Reuben Eaton, whose home was
where the elegant uiansion-house erected by the late
Cyrus Wakefield now stands. Eaton was then younsr,
a skillful hunter, and a sure marksman. He didn't
start for Lexington with the body of the '' alarm-list,"
but stopped to clean his gun, supply the lock with a
new flint, and till his powder-horn and bullet-poucli,
as if to hunt ducks or deer, and, when fully equipped,
followed with all speed. Having reached Jlerriams'
Corner in season to take part in the bloody fight, lie
followed the retreating foe toward Lexington, popping
otf the red-coata from behind stone wall, fence or
building, lu occasion permitted, with great delibera-
tion and success ; but staying longer than he ought,
to get another, one wore shot, he was captured — almost
— by the enemy's flanking guard. He then started
to run for dear life.
" Tbe Britiflb shot caDie whizziDg on
To bring thia saucy rebel down.
But be the flosb perceives and fallij,
And u'er bim paM tbe baniileBa balla ;
Tben upringiDg up be ouward runa ;
Again crack off the Brititib guud,
Again he dropa upon bid (ace,
linburt amid tbe dangerotu cliaae.
Tbe fue, Huppoeing tbey hml sluiu
The man, marched on, and be again
Sprang to his feet, and thus got clear ;
But not until be beard them swear
'That twice they'd pierced that Yankee's liver,
Bui still he'd run as fa^ as ever.' "
At Merriam's Corner, too, was Thomas Emerson,
of the Old Parish, of honored memory, and grand-
father of Thomas Emerson, Esq., and Capt. James F.
Emerson, of the leading shoe manufacturing firm of
Wakefield. Young Emerson, then eighteen years of
age, was full of courage and enthusiasm, stood bravely
in the ranks, and had liere his first shot at a red-coat.
He later obtained distinction in the war, and knew
the horrors of Dartmoor Prison. Young Emerson
used to relate an incident of the memorable day en-
acted betbre his eyes, that was terribly impressive :
A patriot, turning the corner of a house, suddenly
met a regular. Both leveled their pieces and fired at
the same moment, and both fell dead together.
The town of Reading sent into the army during
the Revolutionary War over 400 men, not including
minute-men and privateersmen, and there were con-
stantly in the field an average of 100 men from the
town. Perhaps tbe most noted of the fighting pa-
triots of the Old Parish was General Benjamin Brown,
whose homestead was on the easterly side of Lake
Quannapowitt, where lately dwell Liuiua Beebe,
Esq., deceased.
In the War of ]S12,andthe Mexican War, the sons
of South Reading were not wanting to defeiul the
nation's honor on land and sea.
Wahjiehl in the I?ebellioii.— Upon a countrj- free,
proud and prosperous, pressing with confident step to
the van of the great nations of the world, there sud-
denly liuist, in isiil. the black iloud of rebellion, in
war and blood, and the soiiN of men and women were
tried and stirred as never before siine llie d.iys when
the nation struggled into existence. An insiilled
Hag, slavery's arrogant demands, and the foundations
of our government undermined, aroused at last the
slumbering patriotism of our people, and the old town
that had sent her yeomen to Concord, Bunker Hill
and Ticonderoga glowed with the fervor of patriotic
indignation. The young men responded with ready
courage and high enthusiasm, while the old men
buckled on the .armor of their sons with grave faces
and tear-dimmed eyes, as they realized more truly
than the young men what was the import of the ter-
rible sounds in the air, in sacrifice and suffering to
come.
On the doubly memorable I!>tli of April, ISOl, the
orders came from the commander-in-chief to the
Richardson Light Guard, Wakefield's own gallant
corps, to march at once to the defence of the govern-
ment. At 12 o'clock, noon, the old town-bell, a cen-
tury old. rang out such peals as had summoned the
minute-men in 1775. All understood the clanging
signal. The whole town was stirred with martial
excitement, and thrilled with new and strange emo-
tions, never to be forgotten by those who experienced
them.
The soldiers of the Guard rallied to their armory,
and, at two o'clock, led by Captain John W. Locke,
were proudly marching down Main Street to the
music of drum and fife, to take the train for Boston.
At the depot was gathered the population of the
town. Words of encouragement, hope and sympa-
thy were publicly spoken by leading citizens of the
town ; fervent prayers were oti'ered by the clergymen,
while the assembly was freshly electrified by the
news, just then flashed over the wires, that tbe blood
of Massachusetts soldiers had that very day been
shed in the streets of Baltimore by the enemies of
WAKEFIELD.
727
their country. And so, with tears and prayers, with
indignation and huzza, with farewell and 6od-apeed>
the first volunteers of Wakefield left for the seat of
war, and rendered valuable service in the defence of
Washington, and fought with honor in the first battle
of Bull Run, where some were wounded and three
men taken prisoners: Sergeant George W. Aborn,
Jame;. H. Griggs and Frank L. Tibbetts. These true
patriots, after languishing many months in Southern
dungeons and prison-pens, were released alive, and on
the 14th of June, 18G2, at South Reading, were ac-
corded a public reception, with procession, feast and
oration.
Meantime, as the carefully-matured and appalling
scheme of secession was developed, and the deter-
mined purpose of the Southern leaders became under-
stood, the people of the loyal North shuddered as they
perceived that the Rebellion was not to be of weeks
or months but of unknown years, and braced them-
selves for the terrible conflict.
The North thundered out with the indignant voice
of outraged justice : " The Union must and shall be
preserved, and traitors must lay down their arms or
die. Freedom is national and of God ; Slavery is
sectional and wrong." The South shouted back: "Go
we will, peaceably if we can, forcibly if we must, and
any Yankees who interfere with us or our peculiar
institutions will be welcomed with bloody hands to
hospitable graves." With grim resolve and heroic
spirit loyal men and women met the awful exigency,
and, like the fathers of seventy-six, pledged " their
lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor " for the
principles of freedom and righteousness. The Presi-
dent's proclamation for " 300,000 more " found an en-
thusiastic response from the people of the North, and
the most gigantic war of modern times was rapidly
niountiug to its awful proportions.
In this crisis of the nation South Reading was true
to her patriotic traditions and her ancient fame.
Major John Wiley, (2d), a brave man of the town,
with martial instincts, who had been an efiicient offi-
cer in the State militia, was authorized to recruit a
company of three-years men in South Reading and
vicinity, which having done he was commissioned as
captain of the company, with James R. Darracot, and
James Oliver as lieutenants. It was attached to the
Sixteenth Regiment of ^Massachusetts Volunteers, as
Company E, and left for the seat of war, August 17,
1861. This company served in the Army of the Po-
tomac, and participated in most of the bloody battles
of that famous old army, and met with terrible losses.
It ever sustained a high character for courage and he-
roic endurance, and is entitled to lasting gratitude and
honor. In the summer of 1862 another company was
recruited in the town, the Richardson Light Guard
forming the nucleus for the same, and in September
was enlisted for nine months' service as Company E,
Fiftieth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers, with
Captain Samuel F. Littlefield commanding, and Hor-
ace M. Warren and James D. Draper as lieutenants.
The former captain of the company, John W. Locke,
was commissioned and served as lieutenant-colonel
of the Fiftieth Regiment. This regiment left the State
in October and was attached to Banks' expedition to
Louisiana, and participated in the campaign that re-
sulted in the fall of Port Hudson. This company lost
many men, principally by disease, and were mustered
out in August, 1863.
The Richardson Light Guard again responded in
1864 for a service of one hundred days, and as Com-
pany B, Eighth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers,
was stationed at Baltimore to protect that city from
threatened raids of the enemy. Many other sons of
the town enlisted in varioos companies and regiments
of the Union Army in the different branches of the
service, and in the navy of the United States, and
patriotic ladies, too, were not wanting to perform
woman's blessed work in the same sacred cause. Dur-
ing the progress of the struggle, as call after call
issued from the President for more men, the town
nobly and promptly responded, and well sustained
her part in the time of the nation's exigency, and
points with glowing pride to the record of 505 men
sent into the military and naval service of the Re-
public, of whom more than sixty gave up their lives
in the sacred cause. The deeds of these gallant sol-
diers cannot be described nor even mentioned. From
Pennsylvania to Texas, from the Atlantic to the
Rocky Mountains, they wet the soil with blood ; on
ocean, gulf and rivers they upheld with daring
achievement the ancient renown of American sea-
men, they languished in hospitals, and, worst of all,
were murdered in rebel prisons. Their names are all
inscribed on Wakefield's Roll of Honor, and will
ever be held by the people of the town in grateful
and affectionate remembrance.
Without invidious discrimination, in addition to
those already named, there may be mentioned a few
heroes of this town who fought their way to distinc-
tion on many a bloody field. First in the list should
be named Horace M. Warren, who had in him the
true, undaunted spirit of the soldier. Barely twenty
years old when the war broke out, he enlisted
at once in the local corps, which became Company E
of the Fifth Regiment of Massachusetts Volunteers.
After his three months' service in this company he
enlisted for three years in Company E, Twentieth
Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers, and was made a
sergeant. At the bloody and disastrous battle of
Ball's Bluff, October 21, 1861, he was severely wounded
in the arm, body and leg, and came home entirely
disabled. After a few months, his wounds having
nearly healed, he became impatient to be again in
the field, and in August, 1862, re-enlisted in Company
E, Fiftieth Regiment Massachusetts Volunteers, and
was commissioned first lieutenant. After efficient
service of about a yeai' in the Department of the
Gulf, this being a nine months' regiment, he came home
728
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUXTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
and was discharged by reason of expiration of ser-
vice. Not content witli inactivity at such a time, lie
soon after, in 1863, accepted a new commission as
first lieutenant and adjutant of the Fifty-ninth
Begiment Massachusetts Volunteers, and found active
service in Virginia under General Grant. For eflB-
ciency and bravery he was promoted to be major,
and was mortally wounded in the battle of Weldon
Railroad, Virginia, August 19, 18G-1, and died a few
days later, August 27th. Thus early perished a brave
young spirit, who laughed at danger and hardship,
the memory of whose gallant deeds is tenderly cher-
ished in the town of his home, and when Post 12, G.
A. R., was organized, no more fitting name could be
thought of by which to designate a Post of veterans.
Major Warren, was the son of Rev. Edwin R. and Mary
H. Warren, and born in Topsham, Maine, July S, 1841.
Another veteran of the war, well worthy of special
mention, was James F. Mansfield. He joined Company
E, Sixteenth Regiment, in July, 1861, and was appoint-
ed sergeant. He was promoted first lieutenant Febru-
ary 14, 1864, and transferred to the Eleventh Regi-
ment ; promoted to captain October 9, 1864, to be
major June 16, 1865, and lieutenant-colonel July 11,
1860.
Colonel Mansfield served with faithfulness and
bravery throughout the war, and earned his promo-
tions by brave deeds and faithful service in those ter-
rible Virginia campaigns where there was so much
weary marching and so much hard fighting, and came
out at the end without a serious wound. Colonel
Mansfield was the eldest son of James J. and Martha
B. Mansfield, and born in South Reading in l.S,36.
.\nother brave man from this town was Thomas A[.
McKay, son of John and Elizabeth M. McKay, born
in Boston, December 5, 1836. He served three
months in Company E, Fifth Regiment, re-enlisted for
three years in Company G, Twentieth Regiment, was
appointed sergeant, and was in the awful dis;xster at
Ball's Bluff, where his brother was killed. For gal-
lantry and efficiency he was promoted, September 5,
1862, to be second lieutenant, and July, 1863, to be
captain. He was killed by a shot from a conscript
October 5, 1863, while in camp at Culpeper, Vir-
ginia.
No braver man went into the war from South Read-
ing than George W. Townsend, though he attained
no high distinction in rank. He was the son of Jacob
and Nancy Townsend, born in South Reading in 1829.
He was among the first to volunteer, and served three
months as sergeant in Company E, Fifth Regiment,
and was at Bull Run. He re-enlisted December,
1861, for three years in Company E, Twenty-fourth
liegiment, as corporal. He was in Burnside's expedi-
tion to North Carolina, and, in the hotly contested
battle of Newberne, lost two fingers of his right hand,
and was discharged on account of his serious wounds.
He re-enlisted in Company C, of the Fifty-ninth Reg-
iment, in December, 1863, and was made color ser-
geant, and bore himself with conspicuous courage in
the carnage days of 1864, in the battles of the Wilder-
ness, Spottsylvania, North Anna, Cold Harbor, Peters-
burg, Weldon Railroad and Fort Steadman. He was
in for the war and saw the end of the Confederacy
before he furled the tattered colors of his devotion that
had often been carried in the thickest of the fight, and
never yielded to a foe. A friend and townsman see-
ing Townsend with Warren, and the gallant Fifty-
ninth marching through Baltimore, as they were
hurrying to the front, was moved to heroic verse :
" Our Fifly-ninth, (I.mI sliield lliMu all.
As ilauiitless tu Ilie TiitDt llicv pti-ss
I-'iu' corillirt ill tliu Wildeini'is.
WliM hi.ljs their Ijultle llni; • Il-^lal■i,.| g..|il
Are liorno l»y uur uwn Towns.-ti(l Imlil.
Ami who i9 uurtliier to hear than he.
With stiattere>l hnlicl, tlie hantier of the Tree ?
He followed it when lain of life hlooij v\el
I >til Ihuiiioke ami Xewhenic'^ parapet.
riosiiig tlie -hilling rear hiale \Vall<-ii Iliere,
Uii iliitvN liathwRV r-.ile serene uml fair,
I'llheeilini,' h'fe, uli into war's retl /.one
To tierier < oUtlict..| than he \el haj kin'Wn.''
William H. Walker is the name of another soldier-
son who has conferred honor on the town by faithliil
service in camp and on the inarch, and bright deeds
on the field of battle. His first service was as a private
in Company E, Fifth Regiment, in which were trained
so many martial and patriotic spirit", and he re-enlisted
in Company <i. Twentieth Repinient. He carried
himself bravely on many a hanl-t'onsrht battle-field
tVoin Ball's Blutr to Ciettysbiirg, and was rapidly pro-
moted to secfitid lieutenant, rir.<t lientenant" and
company commander, receiving bin commission a.s
Captain August 29, 1863. He was severely woundefl
in the thigh at the battle of Gettysburg, and wils dis-
charged by reason of his wounds April 26, 1864.
Captain Walker was born in .S)utli Reading in 1837,
son of Levi and Laura Walker, and grandson of Cap-
tain Noah Smith.
Space would fail to tell of all the heroic men who
went out from this town into the Rebellion .and de-
served well of their country for gallant service with
gun or sword. There were daughters, too, of the old
town who went forth as ministering angels and ren-
dered priceless and perilous service to the sick,
wounded and dying, on bloody field and in fever-
smitten hospital.
During the progress of the terrible struggle the
soldiers' friends at home were watching and working
with anxious sympathy for their sons, brothers and
fathers in the field, and various .agencies were em-
ployed through which to express their affectionate
interest in tangible forms. One of these agencies w.as
the South Reading Union Soldiers' Relief Association ,
organized in 1863 to obtain cash, clothing, food and
medicine, and other necessaries, and distribute the
same to the Union soldiers and their families, and es-
pecially to such as belonged to South Reading. Many
WABLEFIELD.
729
articles were contributed and much money raised by
subscription, fairs, lectures and social gatherings, and
devoted with blessed results pursuant to the object of
the Association, the first officers of which were
Charles R. Bliss, president; Samuel Kingman, vice-
president; Edward Mansfield, treasurer, and C. W.
Eaton, secretary.
The worthy dead are represented to the eyes of the
present generation in the membership of the Grand
Army of the Republic, of which a flourishing Post,
known as H. M. Warren Post, No. 12, is located in
Wakefield, and assists in keeping green the memory
of their comrades-in-arms, and in relieving the neces-
sities of their families and of disabled survivors. The
ladies of the H. M. Warren Relief Corps are efficient
auxiliaries in the work of humanity and love. A
camp of Sons of Veterans has also been lately organ-
ized in the town.
A xoom in the Town-House has been tastefully and
beautifully fitted up for a Memorial Hall, as a tribute
of municipal remembrance of the living to the dead.
This room is also devoted in part to the practical uses
of a Public Reading-Room. The veterans of Post 12
have projected a tine, large edifice to be located on
Albion Street, and to be known as " Memorial Hall,"
as a more worthy and enduring monument to departed
comrades, the foundation walls for the contemplated
structure being already laid.
Buriai.-Grounds. — The burial-places of a town
are in a certain sense the most interesting and signifi-
cant memorials of a vanished race. One of the great-
est marvels and disappointments to the zealous ex-
plorer who seeks new lessons among the dead things
of a by-gone age, is his failure to find in all this region
any graves or sepulchral monuments of the red
aborigine.
The characters, the habits and condition of the
early fathers and mothers of a city or town can to
some extent be truthfully inferred from a careful in-
spection and study of the inscriptions upon the grave-
stones of the pioneers. Wakefield is rich in such
mementos and helps to the antiquarian. For many
years after the coming of the first settlers, the " Com-
mon," so called, extended northerly from its present
southerly limits to the " Great Pond," and included
all of that territory that lies west of Main Street and
northerly of Church Street as far west as the home-
stead late of Colonel James Hartshorn, deceased.
This tract included what the present generation, with
admiring and artistic eyes, perceive to be the most
lovely and picturesque portion of the town, or of
many towns ; but the forefathers had little leisure for
the indulgence of a poetic taste or for admiring the
softer beauties of nature. They had to face with grim
courage and fortitude stern and practical duties, amid
perils and hardships we know not of. They had an
eve for the useful, and what seemedto them of imme-
diate necessity or importance, and so, like the first in-
habitants of Boston, they buried their dead near the
heart of the town. The earliest grave-yard of ancient
Reading was in that portion of Wakefield's new park
where formerly stood the old town hall and the brick
engine-house of the Lucius Beebe Steamer, No. 1.
Here for more than fifty years was the only place of
interment for the first and second generations of set-
tlers. Many of these first graves, it is presumed, were
without slabs or monuments, and as the ground was
for a long time un fenced, many of the oldest grave-
stones were broken down and destroyed. The land
around the graves was subsequently sold by the Parish,
the purchaser being bounded by the graves. In pro-
cess of time, therefore, the portion of land devoted to
interments was reduced to qtiite contracted dimen-
sions, and much of the soil occupied by the dust of
ancestors was disturbed by the plough of the agricul-
turist. Upon the erection of a Town-House in 1834,
the town purchased of the First Parish what was left
of the old grave-yard, took up the old slabs of slate,
many of which were broken and defaced, and placed
them in a continuous row on the easterly side of the
lot, and in thetruthful languageof our local historian,
" If the particular dust which they memorialized did
not lie beneath them, it is certainly true that the stoiiea
did lie above them."
When the new park was purchased by the town in
1871, and the old Town Hall was sold and removed
Lo smooth the way for the systematic grading and im-
provement of the new acquisition, these sacred relics
of departed worthies were again transplanted, and
this time to the " Old Burial Ground," so called, being
the second burial-ynrd of the town, and placed in a
row near Powder House Point, with a front as erect
and regular as a battalion on parade. When the
ruthless hand of progress will next seize these stem-
faced monitors of the pa«t, and where it will finally
ileposit them, can only be sadly conjectured by the
shocked and reverent antiquarian.
The inscriptions on these ancient stones have be-
come nearly illegible, yet a kindly solicitude and
vigilance have preserved most of them in private
archives.
Following are some of them :
" Memento te esse mortalem.
Fiigit flora. Vive meinor Iffithi. Fugithora.
C. ye 2d.
Here lyes tlie body of Capt. Jonatban Poole, who deceased in the 44<^
year of his age. 1G78.
FrieDdfl sure would prove too far nokiod
If oDt of sight they leave bun out of mind.
And now be lyee transfonn'd to oaUve dost
In earth's cold womb as other mortals most.
It's strange his matchless worth intomb'd shoold lye.
Or that his fame should in oblivion dye."
KoTC. — This stone contains the oldest date and the most artistic and
elaljorat« work of any of the old monuments in this yard representing in
relief swords, hour-glass, coffin, spade, pick-axe, cmes-bones, etc.
" Memento Mori. Fugit bota.
Ilere iyeth within this arched place the body of Deacon Tbomss Par-
ker, who was won of the fuundaUon of the church, who dyed the 12u> of
August 1683, aged about 74."
730
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
*' Memento te esse niortateiu.
Tugit here. Vive memor Iwthi. Fugit horn. Here lyes the body of
John PeraoD Senor. Aged 64 years. Deceased .\pril 17, 1G79.
Soon after the erection of the second church edifice
in Reading, the settlers began about 1690 to use their
second burial-ground, on the territory contiguous to
their church, and here for more than one hundred and
fifty years was the principal place of sepulture for the
inhabitants of the First Parish, and has long been
known as the Old Burial-Ground of Wakefield. Here
rest the ashes of the greater portion of her former in-
habitants, and it consequently possesses a most lively
and mournful interest to the descendants of the
fathers. Its location is beautiful, on the southerly
borders of Lake Quannapowitt, and, though several
times enlarged, is now full of graves and tombs. The
earliest date upon any stone in the yard is in memory
of Lieut. Thomas Bancroft, who died Aug. 19, 1691,
aged sixty-nine. The first three ministers of the town
were buried away from Reading, probably among
their relatives at Watertown and Boston. We tran-
scribe some of the more notable of the inscriptions
and epitaphs from stones in this yard :
"TUe Rev, Mr. Jooathan Pierpout, late pastor of the church uf Chriai
iu Reddiug for the space of twenty years. A^ceil 44 yeara, who departed
this life June ■!, 1709.
\ fruitful Chriatian pastor, who
Did good to all, and lov'd all good to do,
A tender husband and a parent kind,
A faithful friend which who, oh who, can find.
Of rules he preached, the souls of men to save,
\ Pierpont, all of this, here leaves his dust.
And wails the resurrectiou of the just."
"Here lies interr'd ye body of ye Rev. Richard lirown, ordained Pus-
tor of ye 1st church in Reding, June li, 1712. His character bespeaks
him faithful in in bis preaching, impartial iu his <liscipline and e.toni-
plary in his conversation ; a nmn greatly boloveil iu his life and much
lamented at his death, which was Oct, 20, 1732. .\ged 57 vears."
" In this Sepulchre is reposited the mortal part of the Rev. .Mr. Wil-
liam Hobby, A.3I., late pastor (the si.tth in the order of succession) of
the hnit church iu the town of Reading, learned, vigilant and faithful.
He was a preacher of the word of r.od, deservedly commended for his
pure evangelical doctrine, replenished with erudition imd piety, to-
gether with solid judgment and eloquence, being at length worn out
with studies and labors and mo,« acute pains of long continuauce,
calmly resigning to the will of his Almighty Father, and earnestly as-
piring after the Heavenly Habitation and Rest, he breathed out his soul
into the hamis of his Savior Juue 1«, Anno Christl 17U.'). .Etat .'j8 years.
He loft, to profit bis bereaved niK:k,a written muunineul of sage advice,
in which, though dead, bespeaks in solemn strains."
".Sacred to the memory of Rev. Caleb Pienllss, late pasb.r of the first
church in this town, who passed into the world of spirits Keb. 7, Ism:; iu
the i7th year of his age, and 34th of his ministry. Faith, piety and
benevolence, with a kindred assemblage of Christian graces and moral
virtue adorned his public and private character, endeared his memory
to » bereaved family, a mourning rtock, bis brethren in ollict, and all
acquainted with his merita.
He tried each art, repror'd each doll delay,
Allur'd to brighter worlds and led the way ;
Though gone, he is not dead ; no good man dies.
But, like the day-star, only seta to rise."
"Here lies ye body of Major Jeremiah Sweyen, Esq., who departed.
this life Aug. 13, ITIO, in ye li'jth year of his age.
The memory of the just is blessed."
"Here reeU what was mortal of Lieut. John Pool, who deceased Nov.
22, 1721. Aged 50.
An humble Christian, useful and sincere.
Much given to hospitality, lies here.
Rich in alms to the poor, and in distress
Tlie widow's friend, father of the fatherless,
.\ loving husband and a parent kind,
.\ neighbor good and a most useful friend.
.\ll this he was, and more but now at rest.
The memory of the righteous man is blest."
" Hero lyes ye body of Mrs. Abigail Daucroft, wife .if Mr. Raham
Bancroft, who ilieil 3Iar. 26, 172S. Aged 40.
A prudent, pleasant wife was she,
An helpmate like the laboriug l>ee.
Kind parent ; virtue's graces tell
That she in tllose did most excel ;
Full ripe for heaven, assured of bliss,
Long'd to depart to happiness.
If men forget to speak her worth.
This stone to ages sets it forth."'
" In memory of Joseph Walton, sou of Lieut. Timolliy Walton, who
was drowned iu Lynn, .Sept. 17, 17a2, iu his 23nl year.
£>eath, thou bast conqueroti mo,
I, by thy dart am slain.
Out Christ has conquered thee,
I shall rise again."
" In memory of .Sophia Plentisi, daughter of the lale Rev Cilebi'
Mrs. Pamela Prentiss, wlio died Oct. 12, 1SU7, Aet. 2''
"Tusle, Fancy, Virtue, Piety iroinbiuecl.
Eularg'd, improv'd her heaven-born nund.
To pale disease she gave her early breath.
Hut cm ((-d more Hutu /tro.'d the approach of death."
In 1840 the necessity for a new place of sepulture
became urgent, to accommodate the increasing popu-
lation. Public-spirited citizens of the town united to
form a corporation called " the Proprietors of Lake-
side Cemetery," and having purchased au e.xtensive
tract of land on the westerly shores of Lake Quanna-
powitt, proceeded to lay out the same with avenues,
paths, lots and bowers, from well-considered designs.
The original lots, about fourliundred in number, were
oflered for .sale October 15, 1S46, and on the same day
the grounds were consecrated, with jniblic exercises at
the cemetery, including an address by the Rev. Caleb
.Stetson, then of Medford, with hymns, prayers and
remarks by the resident clergy and leading citizens.
Following may be taken as a taste of the original
hymns composed for and sung on the occasion.
"-\nd here as oft iu coming years
Our children's children tread.
Glad thoughts will rise lo quell their fears.
Among the silent ilead.
tth ! hallowed spot I .\ cherisheit grave.
Beneath the fiowery 8o<l !
The /orm shall rest by sparkling wave
The »i.iri( with its lioil."
" When all life's cares witli us are gone.
And we have reached our journey's bourne
With woes distressed, w ith age oppressed,
-And longing for a place of rest.
How sweet 'twill be to find a home.
Where we can lay the weary frame,
'Mid fragrant flowers and vine-wrought bovvers.
On this dear Lake Side seat of ours."
The original enclosure has been greatly enlarged
by purchases of {idjoining lands, and the hand of
taste has transformed an unfertile plain, by the ad-
dition of graceful trees, blossoming shrubbery and
WAKEFIELD.
731
pleasant arbors, along well-kept paths and ave-
nues, into one of the most romantic and beautiful
cemeteries in the country. Added to these features, a
multitude of marble shrines and costly monuments
make the scene wonderfully and mournfully impres-
sive to the appreciative visitor. On the annual re-
currence of Decoration Day, the H. M. Warren Post,
No. 12, G. A. R., witb solemn strains of martial
music, escorted by the Richardson Light Guard, and
attended by a reverent throng of sympathizing spec-
tators, fill this sacred enclosure, and lay fragrant
tributes upon the graves of fallen heroes, and around
the Soldiers' Lot, guarded by cannon, hold impressive
memorial rites.
The Israelites of Boston have also sought the shores
of this same lovely lake by which to locate a burial-
ground, which is verj- near Lakeside Cemetery,
though a much smaller enclosure. It is known as the
Jewish Cemetery, and is attractive for its beauty of
situation and the numerous splendid monuments and
other costly memorials of the dead therein contained.
Railroad Facilities. — The first regular public
conveyance between this town and Boston was estab-
lished in 1817 in the shape of a lumbering stage, and
such means of passenger transportation continued
until steam-cars began to run about 1846. The ex-
tension of the Boston and Maine Railroad from Wil-
mingion to Boston through South Reading, was opened
1845, and gave a fresh impulse to the growth and ex-
pansion of the town. As an inducement to lay out the
railroad it was predicted by an enthusiastic promoter
that South Reading would furnish thirty daily passen-
gers to Boston by rail. This Utopian prediction
was more than realized, and now there are at least |
1500 daily passengers on numerous trains between j
WakefieM and Boston. At a later date the Danvers
Railroad was constructed through the town, effecting
hereajunction with the Boston and MaineTrunk Line.
This road connected with the Newburyport Railroad,
running from Danvers to Newburyport, both of which
have long been leased and operated by the Boston and
Maine Railroad. The South Reading Branch Railroad,
to Salem, was also opened, and thus the advantages of
three railroad lines running through the domain of
Wakefield afford ample and unusual facilities for
transportation and communication, with easy and di-
rect access to the great centres of Boston, Salem,
Newburyport, Lawrence, Haverhill and Lowell.
There are six depots within the town, and about forty
trains running daily to and from Boston.
A street railroad to Stoneham is soon to be con-
structed by a company already incorporated, and it is
contemplated that electric cars will run ere long over
a circuit road connecting the towns of Wakefield,
Reading and Stoneham, and the tracks be extended
through Greenwood to Melrose.
Streets. — One hundred streets in Wakefield, cov-
ering about fifty miles in length, afl'ord ample facili-
ties for people to get out of town and return, and for
inter-communication. About $10,000 are annually
appropriated by the town for new and old highways,
which are illumined at night by gas-lights and oil-
lamps, and wisely cared for under modern Byetems
and appliances. With such a pleasing variety of
scenery in the region, of hill and vale, grove and
lake, these ways of Wakefield furnish opportunitiee
for delightful walks and drives, which inhabitants
and visitors are not slow to improve.
Public and Private Buildings. — The most im-
portant public buildings of Wakefield are the town
hall, churches, school-houses and depots. The town
hall, with the lot of land on which it stands, was the
munificent gift to the town of the late Cyrus Wake-
field, and is an imposing and elegant structure of
brick, metropolitan in style and finish. It was for-
mally presented to the town and dedicated with fit-
ting ceremonies on the 22d of February, 1871. On
the lower floor are apartments for the various town
officers, the Public Library, Memorial Hall, and Pub-
lic Reading-Room. On the second floor is the spa-
cious auditorium, with its 1200 sittings and conveni-
ent ante-rooms. The third floor, with its large
accommodations, is waiting, as it were, in abeyance,
for future uses.
The Baptist Church, beautiful and stately, already
alluded to, and the new Congregational Church whose
walls of granite, msssive and symmetrical, are even
now rising toward the sky, may be mentioned as con-
spicuous and significant adornments of the central
landscape. The St. Joseph's Church, the Universal-
ist Church, the Methodist Church and the modest
Episcopal Chapel are also worthy and handsome
specimens of church architecture.
Among the institutions of learning in Wakefield
the High School crowns them all with its carefully
chosen curriculum and fine equipment, and has a fit-
ting home in the elegant temple of education fronting
the old park, at the corner of Common and Lafayette
Streets. In this edifice there is a blending at seve-
ral points of various styles of architecture, the por-
ticoes and their ornamentation being beautiful speci-
mens of the Ionic order, while there are delightful
croppings out here and thereof the Gothic and other
ancient divisions, with expressions of the modernized
lines. Its construction is of wood, in burrowed
sheathing, with granite base. It is a splendid speci-
men of exterior architecture, and its interior finish
and appointments are in fitting correspondence, and
well adapted to its uses, there being a commodious
school-rijom and other apartments on each of its three
floors. The High School building was erected in
1872, at an expense of about $75,000, and was dedi-
cated with appropriate ceremonies Oct. 10, 1872.
The Hamilton School building was erected in 1883,
on the southerly side of Albion Street, near the cross-
ing of the Boston and Maine Railroad to provide
accommodation for the rapidly increasing rising gener-
ation west of the railroad, and received its name by vote
732
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of the town in honor of S. K. Hamilton, Esq., then the
efficient chairman of the School Committee, and al-
ways the zealouB and liberal friend of education. It
is a brick edifice with granite trimmings, of hand-
some architectural design, and has four commodious
school-rooms. Its cost, including land, grading, fur-
nishings and extras, was nearly $20,000, and promises
to be a lasting and practical memorial of municipal
liberality in the cause of education.
The gramma'- school-houses in the centre, the
Franklin School building at the Junction village, and
the school buildings of the outer districts are also
structures of no mean appearance.
The Boston and Maine Railroad has juat completed,
.it its upper station on the main line, .in elegant and
commodious structure of brick and granite, located on
the westerly side of the tracks, between Albion and
Chestnut Streets, to take the place of the old depot, that
has stood nearly opposite on the easterly side of the
railroad location for forty-four years. The company
has recently obtained, by purchase, a large lot of land
adjoining the new depot, aflbrding ample opportuni-
ties for embellishment and public accommodation, to
be used and appreciated by the present inhabitants,
and adapted to the needs of the coming city of Wake-
field. The railroad has other tasteful depots — on
Water Street, called the Centre Depot, at the Junction,
Greenwood, Montrose and Lowell Street.
The notable buildings for business erected by pri-
vate enterprise are Wakefield's Block, Miller's Block.
Gould Building, Kingman's Block, Perkins' Block,
Connell & Curley's Block, the Bank building and the
extensive factories of the Wakefield Rattan Com-
pany.
Wakefield contains numerous elegant and Uisteful
private residences that are homes of refinement and
affluence. Many of these are on or near Main Street,
by fai^ Lakeside, among which may be named the
residence of the family of the late Lucius Beebe, and
those of Albert J. Wright, John G. Aborn, Peter S.
Roberts, George O. Carpenter, Frank A. Clapp,
G. H. Maddock, E. C. Miller, Thomas Emerson and
E. E. Emerson. Farther south may be mentioned
(on Park Street) the house of R. P. Buzzell, on Cres-
cent Street, that of Mrs. Nancy Taylor, erected by
the late Daniel Allen, and of Mrs. Sarah Y. Morton ;
on Lafayette St. the homes of Mrs. E. Perkins, J. G.
Morrill, E. Sawyer, J. W. Grace and W. V. Taylor;
on Yale Avenue, the residences of C. H. Stearns, E.
A. Rich, W. C. Jordan, C. O. Anderson, T. E. Balcli,
S. K. Hamilton and L. H. Day ; on Avon Street,
those of D. H. Darling, S. A. Clough and A. G. Wal-
ton; on Chestnut Street, the estates of Mrs. H. S,
Brown, Ira Atkinson, B. A. Osgood, F. O. Clark and
John A. Tompson ; on the western highlands, the
residences of Rufus Merrill, J. S. Merrill and Dr.
Charles Jordan ; and on Main Street, the palatial
mansion erected by the late Cyrus Wakefield, Sr.,
and now owned by the children of his nephew.
There are in Wakefield many dwelling-houses his-
toric in their age and associations, but their number
is every year growing less. Among these ancient
dwellings is one on Cowdrey's Hill, erected consider-
ably over two centuries ago, and known to the pres-
ent generation as the Leslie place. It was the home-
stead of the early settler, Sergt. John Parker, and of
his son, Kendall Parker, Esq., whose daughter mar-
ried Captain John (Joodwin, whose daughter mar-
ried .Tames Nichols, and thus the estate passed into
the bands of the Nichols family, the late Matthew F.
Leslie marrying a daughter of the family and residing
there until his recent death. Another old dwelling
i.'i the Hartshorne house, on Elm Street, where lived
Thomas llartshorrie in the e.arly days, and which re-
mained in the Hartshorne family until )>urchased a
few years since by D. G. Walton and G. W. Aborn.
Other ancient houses still standing are the Swain
house, on Vernon Street, lately owned liy David
Batchelder, .ind the one near it now of M. P. Parker,
formerly, in 1740. of.Toseph Underwood. There may
also be named the house on Elm Street, formerly of
Deacon Francis .Smith, and still earlier of Thomas
Hay, now owned by W. .V. (.'arlton ; the Eiistis pla<e.
corner of F.lm and Prospect .'"trefts, a portion of
which house is very old, and formerly of Captain
John Goodwin; the "Colonel Hartshorne" place, on
Church Street, now owned by .lohn Rayner; the
"Leonard Wiley" house, at corner of \\'ater and
Crescent Streets, formerly the homestead of the Pnole
family ; the remodeled house, now of Mr. Thomas
Martin, on Main Street by the lake, formerly the
homestead of.lolin Drown, Esq., who was born in
10-34; the s(pacious old domicile on >rain Street, op-
posite the lake, now owneil by Miss Nancy White
and Mrs. Mary E. Aborn, formerly of Timothy Nichols,
and later of Thomas Evans ; and the house on Main
Street, in Greenwood, late of P. H. SweeLser, tbrmerly
of the Green family, now owne<l by L. Perry. Many of
these ancient mansions, and others that have departed
have been sketched and painted in oil by Fr.anklin
Poole, Esq., a resident artist, now over four-score
years of age. By the thoughtful generosity of Mr.
Poole, in whose veins runs some of the best blood of
the early settlers, most of these invaluable paintings
now embellish the walls of the Historical Society's
room in the town hall, Mr. Poole being in earnest
sympathy with the objects of this society.
Population. — The population and valuation of
the town since its separation and incorpor.ation as
South Reading, in 1812, have steadily increa.sed,
starting out with about 800 inhabitants and SIOO.OOO
worth of real and personal estate. Following are in-
teresting statistics in this connection :
.4,11, |...l'(iI.\TlilV, VALI'^TIoN.
1«12 'SK)i Stuii,(piNi:
IB.Ii IIHJOI 192,i;3.')'
Ii!3U 1311 247,004
1 Estimated.
WAKEFIELD.
733
1840.
1850.
1860.
1870.
1880 .
1885 .
1317
279,409
2407
756,010
S207
1,801,310
4135
2,544,523
5547
3,435,205
60<i0
3,726,800
7CI0O'
4,7l«,00O'
l^Oil 7CI0O'
Industries. — The manufacture of boots and shoes
has long been an important branch of industrial ac-
tivity in Wakefield. As long ago as 1677 the town
assigned to Jonas Eaton " the privilege of wood and
herbage on a tract of land on condition that he re-
mained in town and followed the trade of a shoe-
maker." He remained, and many of his descendants
and successors, from that year to this, have exercised
that honorable handicraft, but the manner of carry-
ing on the business has greatly changed within the
last few years. Formerly, neatly every shoemaker
was his own " boss," — that is, " he worked his own
stock ;" he cut, his wife and daughters bound, and
his Bon.H and apprentices, with sometimes a few
journeymen, finished up the work. His principal
market was Boston, to which place, sometimes in
saddle-bags and on horseback, and sometimes in a shoe-
cart, he transported and peddled from store to store
his goods. But times are not iis once they were, and
the boot and shoe business has been revolutionized by
the introduction of labor-saving machinery and the
establishment of large manufactories. The leading
firm in Wakefield is Thomas Emerson's Sons, and is
one of the oldest in the shoe business in this country.
It was established by Cai)tain Thomas Emerson in
180j, when only twenty years of age, and at first in
a very small way ; but gradually increasing, it has
been carried on by himself, his sons and grandson
to the present time. The firm has now a very exten-
sive business, and a reputation of the best kind,
throughout the United States, fairly earned by firdt
(jualily work and honorable dealing.
In 1837 a son of the original proprietor, Thomas
Emerson, Jr., was admitted a partner, and the firm-
name became Thomas Emerson & Son. In 1851
another sou was admitted, and " Son '' became" Sons "
in firm-name. In 1804 the senior member retired, and
ihe name was changed to Thomas Emerson's Sons,
which has been ever since maintained, though a grand-
son, Edwin E. Emerson, was admitted in 186G. Be-
fore the war the firm sold principally at the South,
and especially at Charleston and New Orleans, and
sustained large losses by reason of the war. In later
vears the firm have sold more to the retail trade, and
extended their sales to the Pacific coast, and now
their goods are sold in a large majority of the States
of the Union, and some are sent to foreign countries.
It was in their establishment that the McKay sewer
was first most successfully operated. They claim to
be the leaders in gentlemen's fine shoes, and are orig-
inators and patentees of several unique and popular
designs, among which are the " Petiole " Congress,
the " Leo " Congress, and the back buckle gaiter.
All their work is of the finest quality, and finds a
ready sale among the leading retail houses throughout
the country. The Emersons' factory occupies a cen-
tral site on Main Street, and is the same building, much
enlarged, that was formerly Burrage Yale's famous
tin-shop. The shoe business is also extensively and
successfully carried on in town by Henry Haskell,
successor of John G. Aborn & Co., by Harvey B.
Evans, under name of " L. B. Evans' Son," Isaac F.
Eaton, and E. H. Walton & Co., but the relative im-
portance of the business in the town is much less than
formerly.
The manufacture of cane or rattan into many forms
of beauty, elegance and utility is now, and has been
for many years, the chief industry of the town. Its
factories are located on Water Street, by the small
stream from Crystal Lake, called Mill Eiver, at the
same place where John Pool, in 1644, ran the first
corn-mill of Reading. The late Cyrus Wakefield, Sr.,
originated this important industry in 1856. A small
building on Water St. was the scene of his humble be-
ginniugSjhis first venture being in the making of reeds
for hoop-skirtfi, when rattan for that purpose was much
in vogue. When these went out of fashion Mr.
Wakefield turned his attention to the manufacture of
chair-seatings, carpets and furniture. He imported
the raw material from the East Indies in many
ships, and became the leading dealer in rattans in
America. Under the impulse of his intelligent ener-
gy and perseverance the business rapidly assumed
proportions of magnitude and importance, and new
factories were one after another erected. He discov-
ered new ways of utilizing the whole of the rattan —
outside, pith and shavings — and procured the inven-
tion of new machinery to serve his purposes. A de-
mand for the tasteful and durable manufactured fab-
rics grew up all over the country, and Mr. Wakefield
found himself a rich man. The scope and volume of
the business were constantly expanding, until 1000
men and women found remunerative employment at
the great factories, which contained many acres of
flooring, and the monthly pay-roll exceeded $26,000.
Just before the sudden death of Mr. Wakefield, iu
1873, with singular foresight he caused to be organ-
ized the Wakefield Rattan Company, to which cor-
poration he transferred the whofe of his vast rattan
business and property, and of which he became the
president and principal stockholder ; and so, notwith-
standing the death of Mr. Wakefield and the compli-
cations attending the settlement of his estate, the af-
fairs of the Wakefield Rattan Company moved on
with undisturbed regularity, while a second Cyrus
Wakefield was called from the antipodes to take the
place of his uncle at the head of the great corpora-
tion, and maintain the prestige of an honored name.
A disastrous fire in 1881 destroyed some of the prin-
cipal factory buildings, including the lofty brick ma-
734
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
chine-shop, filled with costly machinery, difficult to
replace. The energy and resources of the company
were not, however, seriously impaired, and soon new
and better buildings arose from the ashes of the old,
and the company's prosperous career hiis continued,
and its business still further expanded, to the pre-
sent time. Though in Wakefield some departments
of work have been contracted, by reason of other fac-
tories having been established by the company in
Chicago and San Francisco, more work than ever is
done in other departments, and there are now
employed at the Wakefield works 900 hands, of
whom about one-third are females. There are many
buildings in the enclosed lot of the corporation, which
contains eleven acres of land. The company owns a
one-half interest in the American Rattan Company of
Toronto, Ont. The beautiful and useful productions
of the company include chair-cane, reeds, cocoa and
rattan, mats and matting, rugs and carpets, umbrelia-
rib.s, tables, baskets and chairs in almost infinite va-
riety, work-stands, car-seats, cradles, cribs, ti'teH-trlcs,
sofas, children'.s carriages, carriage-mouldings, burial-
caskets, flower-stands, window-shades, bni'ims,
brushes, table-mats, wall-screens, fire-screens, wall-
pockets, slipper-holders, clothes-beaters, wooil-hokl-
era, etc., etc.
The headquarters of the company, with counting-
rooms and store, are at ll.") Washington Street, Bos-
ton, with branch stores in New York, Chicago and
San Francisco. Captain Joseph B. Thomas is presi-
dent, Mr. Charles H. Lang, Jr., treasurer, and Mr.
John S. Murray, clerk of the corporation. The di-
rectors are J. B. Thomas, Aretas Blood, N. .r. Rust,
Temple R. Fay and C. H. Lang, Jr.
Mr. Amos W. Chapman is superintendent of the
works at Wakefield, and Mr. (^harles W. Trow the
master mechanic. The capital of the comjiany is
.?1,000,000, and the value of goods annually manufac-
tured at Wakefield is «1, 500,000. The weekly pay-roll
in Wakefield is about ^000, in Chicago about $'2000,
and in San Francisco about $500 i>er week.
The tasteful productions of the company may now
be found in nearly every business resort, church and
home of refinement from the Atlantic to the Pacific,
and a growing trade exists with Mexico, the States ol
South America and other foreign countries.
The Wakefield Reed and Chair Company does a
comparatively small business in the manufacture of
rattan goods at the " i?kating Rink " building, located
between Main and Crescent Streets, in the centre of
the town.
The extensive iron foundry by the side of the Boston
and Maine Railroad, between Albion Street and Crys-
tal Lake, now successfully operatpd by the Smith and
Anthony Stove Co., was started in 1S54 by Blanchard,
Tarbell & Co., who soon after organized as a stock
company under the name of the Boston and Maine
Foundry Company, which became one of the most
important industrial institutions of the town. After
the lapse of years, disastrous fires and other losses
cri|)p!ed the resource.^ «f the company, and in 1S71 it
was obliged to stop business, and was succeeded by
the "Franklin Foundry," which, however, was not
notably flourishing, and in 1879 the foundry was j)ur-
chased by the .'^mith and Anthony Stove Company,
organized for the purpose, and under its wise and en-
terprising administration the business has success-
fully developed and been largely extended. The
capital of the company is •i'100,000, and its officers
are Wm. E. Smith, president; E. W. Anthony, treas-
urer; J. R. Prescott, secretary. This industry has
been of great advantage to the town, as the works
have been run constantly for the i)iist ten years, em-
ploying about two hundred men. The productions
of the foundry have been cooking ranges, furnace",
heating-stoves, together with a full line of hotel cook-
ing appliances. The company also has a tine brass
plant, and foundry, and brass finishing rooms, where
an extensive business is carrietl on in the manufac-
ture of plumbers' brass goods and general brass cast-
ings. The company's oflices and stores are at 4S, .jo,
'>i and .'14 Union ."^treet, nnd .'{?, 39 and 41 Friend
•Street, Boston. The salesrooms and offices occupy
two entire floors of this store, and tlie remaining
floors are used for workshops, and for the storage of
goods. The trade of the company extends through-
out America and to some foreign countries. The com-
pany h:i3 jobbing agencies in New York City, (^hicago
and San Francisco, for the sale of their stoves and
ranges, while on their plumbing goods the trade is
equally extensive, and they have distinct branches in
New York City and Chicago for the distribution of
the Sanitas specialties manufactured and controlled
by them, which have a large -^ale, and are the very
bighest grade of plumb-ng made. The policy of the
Smith Si .\nihoiiy Stove Company has always been to
manufacture a high grade of goods, and thus attract
the best trade of the country'.
The lakes of Wakefield, located so conveniently
near the centre of the town, and contiguous to the
Boston and Maine Railroad, oflier unusual facilities
for the cutting, storage and transportation of ice, and
these opportunities have been well improved duriiig
the last forty years. Not only have local consumers
been amply supplied from these sources during the
summer season, but immense quantities of the com-
modity have annually been shipped to the various
cities of our Union, and have supplied cold comfort to
multitudes of dwellers in torrid climes. This busi-
ness is must extensively engaged in by the Boston
Ice Company, whose store-houses by Lake Quanna-
powitt are generally filled every winter to the capac-
ity of 75,000 tons. By the same lake are the ice-
houses of the People's Ice Company, with a capacity
of about 7000 tons, and the houses of the popular
home-dealer, John G. Morrill, holding about 5000
tons. At Crystal Lake the only firm now doing bus-
iness is that of Greenough & Harrington, from whose
"WAKEFIELD.
735
houses, with a storage capacity of nearly 2000 tons,
are supplied Wakefield conBumers, dividing the local
trade with Mr. Morrill.
The manufacturing establishment of the Henry F.
Miller & Sons Piano Company is in Wakefield. This
business was founded by Henry F. Miller in 1863,
and upon his decease, in 1884, the present com-
pany was incorporated under Massachusetts laws
with a paid-in capital of $150,000. It gives employ-
ment to a large number of skillful mechanics, who
reside in the town, and many of whom have built for
themselves beautiful homes and are highly prized
citizens. The business is now mostly managed by
the sons of the founder, one of whom, Mr. Edwin C.
Aliller, is a public-spirited resident of the town, and
is much interested io its affairs. At the present time
the sales of the Henry F. Miller piano-fortes exceed
one thousand per annum, and extend each year all
over the United States, while some have been sent to
Canada, London, Japan, Honolulu, British Columbia
and other quarteri' of the world. This company man
ufaclures all the various styles of piano-fortes, and
is one of the few establishments which have succeed-
ed in commanding a large trade in the style known
as grand piano-fortes. The excellence of the Miller
grand piano-fortes, often used in the leading or-
chestral concerts of the country, has made them
among the most prominent, and many of the leading
pianists give them their unqualified preference. The
business is permanently established in Wakefield and
is still growing. The company has its main business
office in Boston, and also a branch office and ware-
room at Philadelphia. Henry F. Miller, sou of the
founder, is president of the company, and James C.
Miller, treasurer, assisted by a Board of Directors.
The company removed its manufacturing business to
Wakefield in 1882, and occupy the spacious six-story
brick block on Water Street, near the Town Hall,
erected for business purposes by the late Cyrus Wake-
field, Sr.
The fame of Richardson's Sherry Wine Bitters
first prepared by the late Dr. Nathan Richardson,
was largely extended over the country with profitable
returns, by the late liberal-miuded and public-spirited
Dr. Solon O. Richardson, and the manufacture of this
valued medicine, which has stood the test of time, is
still carried on by the worthy son of an honored father
and grandfather. Dr. Solon O. Richardson, the second
of that name.
The Wakefield Steam Laundry, Cox & Cheever,
proprietors, is an industry which in recent years has
attained no small dimensions. Started in 1885, in its
present form in Wakefield's Block, it has rapidly ex-
panded, and now employs twenty-five men and women,
and disburses over $1000 a mouth ; 50,000 cuffs and
collars and 8000 shirts being here treated in the best
styleof the art, every month, without use of chemicals,
and customers come from Wakefield, Boston, Lynn, and
most of the cities and towns within a radius of ten
miles of the laundry; and even from without the
state. Other laundries of humbler pretensions,
manipulated by " celestials " of dusky hue, may also
be found in the town.
The printing business is carried on in all its
branches by Mr. C. W. Eaton at the Citizen and Ban-
tier office, from which are constantly issuing abundant
specimens of the " art preservative," from the small
label to a large poster or book. Mr. A. W. Brownell
lias also a smaller but well-equipped job printing-
office in Wakefield's Block. «
An industry new to Wakefield is that of the Har-
vard Knitting-Mill, on the third floor of Wakefield's
Block, owned by Miss Elizabeth E. Boit and Mr.
Charles N. Winship, under the firm-name of Win-
ship, Boil & Co. A very active business is done by
this firm, which came to this place from Cambridge
in 1890. They knit thirty dozen gents' half-hose per
day, but ladies' Jersey underwear is their specialty,
of which they produce forty dozen per day. The
value of goods sold in a year is about $20,000. Thirty-
eight girls are employed at the factory, and aboat
thirty girls outside at their homes.
At the old and reputable establishment of James
F. Woodward & Sou, on Albion Street, have been
for many years, and still are, manufactured McKay
sewing-machine needles, awls of all descriptions and
shoe tools in great variety.
Mr. Joshua Whittemore manufacttires and sells
crutches that are in great favor all over the United
States, especially with soldiers who- have lost their
limbs. Mr. Stillman J. Putney is doing an important
and increasing business in his boot and shoe-heeling
specialty.
The Citizens' Gas-Light Company, organized as a
corporation in 1860, has long been a shining light
among the institutions of the town, and from the ex-
tensive works on Railroad Street supplies with illu-
minating gas the towns of Wakefield, Stoneham and
Reading. It has lately been granted additional pow-
ers in the privilege of furnishing electric lights, and
proposes to cast into the shade all its previous efforts
in the illuminating way. The People's Electric
Light Company and the Wakefield Electric Light
Company are also knocking at the municipal doors
for privileges and franchises in supplying electric
light and power in Wakefield and adjoining towns.
The Wakefield Real Estate and Building Associa-
tion is a corporation that has since 1870 largely as-
sisted in the development and business expansion of
the town in the building of houses, and selling, leas-
ing and improving real estate.
The Wakefield Water Company, with its splendid
plant of pumping machinery and collateral appli-
ances at its works, on the northerly shores of Crystal
Lake, and the annual extension of street pipes, fur-
nishes employment to many men in the course of
each year.
An extensive lumber business is carried on by S.
736
HISTORr OF JIIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
C Hamilton, Jr., at his largely-stocked yard near the
upper depot.
The leading carpenters of Wakefield are A. C. Per-
kins, I. A. Parsons, Moses Staples, G. H. Teague, E.
I. Purington, J. M. Shaw, Roger Howard, Clark &
Lee, F. M. Pendleton, W. and L. D. Darling and A.
Turnbull.
The painters are Franklin Poole, Z. F. Fairbanks,
J. M. Fairbanks, S. Merchant, D. P. Rolfe, J. Cavi-
naro and Seabury & Moran.
TJhe masons are W. K. Perkins, C. A. Evan.^, W.
J. Moulton, Dennis Greany,T. D. Locke, N. H. Dow.
J. B. Wiley and Hugh Morgan.
The blacksmiths are G. M. Keiley, G. W. Kendall,
Sederquest & Wanamake, G. K. Walton, J. acd ??.
Winship and A. B. Woodman.
The principal hardware dealers and plumbers are
S. F. Littlefield & Co. and George H. Taylor: the
jewelry and watch repairing business by Lucas iV:
Ijee, D. N.Chadsey and E. S. Sweetser ; livery stables,
by G. H. Hathaway and A. Bessey ; furniture busi-
ness, by John Flanley.
The retail grocery trade is rei)resented by X. E.
Cutler, under name of Cutler Bros., by Everett W.
Eaton, A. S. Atherton, W. A. Cutter, A. .1. Hutchin-
son, I. -Atkinson, Keiley Bros., (Jeorge W. Eaton,
Block & Gate, W. W. Chesley and 5L E. Reid.
Large dry -goods stores are carried on by E. G. Daland,
C. O. Anderson, Bowser & Co., and J. W. Poland i^
Co.; tailoring establishments, by W. B. Jones and Mrs.
J. JI. Cate; clothing stores, by 51 rs. Gate and by A.
E. Cox at the People's Clothing Store.
Richard Britton leads in the retail boot ami shoe
trade, followed by Hugh Connell and Frank H. Em-
erson.
The apothecaries are Dr. J. D. .^Lln3tield, Jordan
& O.xley and S. E. Ryder.
Meat and provisions are sold by W. D. Deadnian,
J. W. Jenkins, W. V. Taylor, S. H. Cowing and A.
Bush & Co.
Fish markets are kept by W. H. Godfrey and F.
H. Sweetser.
The bakers are Mrs. H. L. Day and C. P. Curtis.
The coal and wood dealers are G. P. Haley, Wake-
field Coal Co., A. L. Mansfield and Denis Greany.
The following industrial statistics re.«pecting Wake-
field are gleaned from the census reports of 1SS5 :
iDduBtrial corporationa 5
Capital Block SI.ICO.^cK)
PriTate Arms ,-,;(
Total value of 6tock used aonually « -jtu jiiy
Total value of goods nmde unDually :; iH6 147
PERHUN8 Employed:
Males between 13 aod 21 yeare 114
Males over 20 yeara of age 824
Fetnales between 13 and 21 yeara ,^0
Femalea over20 yeareof age o^jj
Aggregate number l^n
Number of industrial establiHhmeots fm
Salaried persons employed thereat 21
Wage earaen employed thereat 1259
Amount paid in sal.-iries, 1 }par .
Amount paid in wages ....
S 32,I2.S
o3.'.,41fi
Ban-king Lv.stititiox.s. — The earliest savings
bank in the town was incorporated in 1S33, with a
capital of $10,0110, and called the South Reading Me-
chanic and Agricultural Institution. The late Capt.
Thomas Emerson and the late Hon. Lilley Eaton
were active in its formation, and as president and
treasurer, respectively, remained as such for nearly
I forty years, until their deaths. Hon. Thomas Win-
I ship succeeded Mr. Eaton as treasurer, having filled
the office for nearly twenty years, and Mr. Thomas
; Emerson, the younger, is now the president of the
institution, which is still nourishing and safe.
! The >^outh Reading Bank was incorporated as a
i State bank in 1854. Mr. ( leorge O. (-"arpentcr was
[ very active and efficient in its organization. Its first
I oflicers were Capl. Thomas Emersou, president, and
: Hon. Lilley Eaton, cashier, and Thomas Emerson,
: Lucius Beebe, George ( ). Carpenter, Samuel Gardner,
I E. Mansfield and C. Wakefield, directors. Thi.s bank
was reorganized under United States laws as the Na-
tional Bank of .South Reading, in IS6'>, with the .same
officers as before. The president, cashier and most of
the directors reraiiined at their jiosts until death tjjok
them, Maj. Geo. O. Carpenter and Edward Mansfield
being the only survivors.
The present ofiicers of this stanch and im|)ortant
institution of Wakefield are Cyrus G. Beebe, [>resi-
deut ; Thora.os Winship, cashier (succeeding Mr.
Eaton); Frank .V. Winship, assistant cashier, and C.
G. Beebe, George O. < arpenter, Thomas Emerson,
James F. Emerson and Daniel G. Walton, directors.
The Wakefield Savings Bank was incorporated by
the Legislature in ISH'J, Cyrus Wakefield becoming
the first president, and Daniel Allen the first treas-
urer. It has had a prosperous career until the pres-
ent time, and is now one of the most solid and useful
of \\'akeficld's institutions. It holds deposits of ^'222,-
OOo. The principal officers are Solon O. Richardson,
president; Jacob C. Hart-shorne and Thomas J.
Skinner, vice-presidents; Richard Britton, treasurer
and clerk.
The Wakefield Co-operative Bank was organized
as a corporation under the Public Statutes of the
Commonwealth, January 19, 1.S87, and began busi-
ness March .'j, 1887, with an authorized capital of
si, 000,000. Its iletiositors became shareholders in
the bank, the plan being to make small monthly pay-
ments on their shares, and are thoroughly protected
by statute regulations and carefully-devised bv-laws.
Its loans are principally on real estate security. The
bank has become quite popular in the town, its
attairs having been intelligently and wisely adminis-
tered by the managers, with the spirit of accommo-
dation toward borrowers, and a constant regard for
the safety of investments. Its principal officers,
which have not been changed since the organization
of the bank, are Thomas J. Skinner, president ; Arlon
WAKEFIELD.
TST
S. Atherton, vice-president, and Harry Foster, treas-
urer and secretary.
MuN'ICIPAl,. — The town government has been ad-
ministered by the operation of simple machinery and
according to forms handed down from the days of
the last war with Great Britain, with slight varia-
tions, and such administration has been attended by
the prosperous development of the town, and should
be spoken of with due respect and appreciation.
Appropriations for necessary and worthy purposes
have been liberal without extravagance, and ex-
pended with slight loss or waste. No treasurer, col-
lector or trusted official has escaped to Canada or
South America with pockets filled with the funds of
the town. The general reputation of the town for
soundness, public spirit and common sense is not
surpassed among the municipalities of the Common-
wealth.
There is, however, a growing feeling that the filly
harness that held in order the frisky colt in 1812,
though improved, added to and strengthened at va-
rious times, is yet all too small and old-fashioned to re-
strain and guide the strong-limbed steed of 1890. It
is, indeed, freely whispered, one with another, that
long ere the nineteenth century shall have been
numbered with the dead, the Mayor, Aldermen and
Common Council of the city of Wakefield will direct
its Diuuicii)al affairs with true metropolitan style and
e.xpense. The principal executive officers of the town
are now three selectmen, as in the early days of the
seventeenth century. Other important departments
of municipal affairs are managed respectively by
three itssessors, three overseeri of the poor, six school
committee, three road commissioners, three Board of
Health, three park conimissiouers, three auditors,
nine trustees of Public Library and Beading Eoom,
lieside town treasurer, town clerk and collector of
taxes. The Police Department is efficiently organ-
ized, with a chief of police and subordinate officers,
with constables and night-watchmen, well maintain-
ing the peace of the community.
Ill former days, when the aid of the law was in-
voked to obtain justice or inflict penalties on wrong-
doers, resort was had, ordinarily, through selectmen
or constable, to the County Court at Charlestown or
('ambridge; but, in later years, justices of the peace
and trial justices held local courts in the town for the
trial and disposition of small cases, both civil and
criminal ; and any causes and offences of magnitude
were taken to the higher courts. This system seemed
to satisfy the people's cravings for justice until quite
recent times. In 1.S75. was established the First Dis-
trict Court of Eastern Middlesex, with sessions on
Wednesdays and Thursdays at Wakefield, and on
other days at Maiden. Hon. John W. Pettengill, of
iMalden, has been justice of the Court since its estab-
lishment, and William N. Tyler, Esq., of Wakefield,
clerk of the same nearly as long. Its jurisdiction for
the consideration of all criminal complaints and the
47-ii
trial of civil actions, where the alleged damages do
not exceed S300, includes the city of "Maiden and the
towns of Wakefield, Reading, North Reading, Wil-
mington, Melrose, Everett and Medford. The quiet,
but eflfectual administration of justice prevails in
Wakefield under its local officers, and it must be a
novelty and a marvel to the transatlantic visitor, or
the adopted citizen, coming to us from some " pater-
nal " government of Europe, to find in such a town
as this, as in most of our large towns, the only repre-
sentative of the central power to be the courteous
postmaster, and the only insignia of government the
loved flag of the Republic.
The principal post-office of Wakefield is in the im-
mediate centre of the town, while the outlying districts
at the south and east are accommodated by the smaller
post-offices at Greenwood and Montrose.
The Fire Department of Wakefield has a very effi-
cient organization and has been constantly supported
with liberal outlay and pardonable pride by the citi-
zens of the town. The first engine was purchased
near the beginning of the present century, and called
the "Republican Extinguisher." Its home was in
the small engine-house that stood in the ancient bur-
ial-ground a little westerly of the present location of
the brick engine-house of the Beebe steamer. It was
a small but ambitious machine and faithfully served
the community in its day and generation during about
twenty-five years of usefulness.
" At length the town grown wiser, richer.
Procured a tub of fame ;
A strong, dark, homely, savage creature —
' Black Hawk * itfl proper name."
This engine became noted in its day. It found con-
genial quarters in the dark basement of the old town
hall, from which humid den it often issued forth for a
practice squirt, or rushed out like a mad war-horse to
some scene of fiery danger. By many deeds of use-
fulness and daring, in spite of its unlovely appearance,
it pumped its way to fame and honor. Manned by a
fearless and stalwart crew —
" This tub had many buildingB washed,
Whene'er the fire bad caught *em ;
And though its former glory's quashed,
It stands upon Its bottom."
In 1852, by vote of the town, came a handsome,
new, double-decker fire-engine, resplendent in finish of
rosewood and trimmings of polished brass, and poor
ofd " Black Hawk " went into a decline, and seldom
came out of its hole again. The new machine was
from Jeffers' works at Pawtucket, R. I., and was
named " Yale Engine, No. 1," in grateful recognition
of a large gift to the engine company from the famous
tin manufacturer of South Reading, Burrage Yale,
Esq., whose tin peddler's carts were, for many years,
known all over New England. An observer of that
day remarked in rhyme:
** A suction-tub — four streams 'twill Iplaj
From orifices Id It ;
738
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
High )d the air 'tvill throw Its epraj,
Foot hogaheadfl in a minute.
" The rich are comiug with their tin
To omameot the same,
And with their Damei to help It win
X great and lasting fame."
The " Yale " distinguished herself in many fields, and
saved much property from destruction. She is still
retained by the town, though occupying a second
place, and regarded with respect and appreciation.
Occasionally even now the veteran fire-fighters of
other days pull out the machine with strong and
kindly hands, and bring home the "old Yale"
decked with first prize from some firemen's muster.
With this powerful machine, two lakes near the cen-
tre, reservoirs in all parts of the town, a well-equipped
hook-and-ladder company, several volunteer or-
ganizations, and, later, the addition of a chemical ex-
tinguisher, with an enthusiastic body of firemen, the
community seemed to be reasonably well protected
against the devouring element. The town, however
was rapidly growing ; houses of wood were rising on
every hand ; a large fire had occurred at the rattan
works, and new and weightier means for controlling
fire were being discovered and applied, and so it came
to pass that in 1882 the town purchased a new steam
fire-engine of the Silsby Manufacturing Company, of
Seneca Falls, N. Y. In the same year the Wakefield
Water Company laid its pipes through the streets of
Wakefield, and a contract was made with the com-
pany to furnish for the town's use sixty fire-hydrants
in desired locations, and this number has since been
increased to eighty-five. In 1882 also was organized
the Home Fire Protective Association, which advo-
cated and put in practice the principle of " prompt-
ness with small appliances." This association, of
whom the leading spirit was Mr. Rufus Kendrick, so
demonstrated its value and usefulness that the towu
soon adopted its principles and methods, and pur-
chased fifty Johnson pumps, which number was later
increased to sixty-eight, which small machines, with
rubber hose attached, and fire-buckets and cans, were
located in houses all over the town, and now, when
sounds the fire-alarm, the soldiers of the Johnson
pump battalion, quicker than the minute-men of the
Revolution, act upon the second, and, seizing pump
and bucket, are generally first at the point of dan-
ger, and often subdue and extinguish the enemy be-
fore the heavy artillery of the department arrive upon
the scene. Under recent statutes forest fire-wards are
annually appointed, who render important service in
the prevention and extinguishment of forest fires.
Hose companies are organized, with headquarters at
difierent points, for service on the fire-hydrants. The
Fountain Company, with a hand-engine, and Hose
Company No. 2 are volunteer organizations that ren-
der enthusiastic and valuable service against the com-
mon enemy. There is in successful operation in the
town an electric fire-alarm telegraph, with ten miles
of wire, an electric clock, five fire-alarm boxes and
fire gongs. The present appliances and forces of the
Fire Department are the steamer Lucius Beebe, Y'ale
Engine, Washington Hook-and-Ladder Company, C.
Wakefield Chemical Engine, J. H. Carter Hose Com-
pany, and Greenwood Hose Company, and all under
the general charge of three fire engineers. There
have been very few serious conflagrations in the his-
tory of the town, the most disastrous of which oc-
curred in 1880, when was destroyed a po rtion of the
works of the Wakefield Rattan Company.
The town, since its incorporation as South Read-
ing in 1812, has generally been represented by men of
ability in the councils of the Commonwealth. Fol-
lowing are the names of those sent to both branches
of the Legislature :
Sebatoeb.— John Hart, 1815-19 . Lilley Eaton, 1838-33 , Thomas Em-
erson, 1846-t7: James lUiver, 1868, Kichoi-d Brittoo, 187S , Tbumas
Winship, 18RI-82.
REPREBENTiTlTES.— John Hart, 1812, 14. '20, "21, '23, '24 ; John
IJoHid, 1816 i Thomas Emerson, Jr., 1825, '30. '38, '39, '41 ; Lilley Ealon,
1831, '35, '45, 48; Lemuel .Sweetser, 1832-33 ; James Butler, 1835-36 .
Noah Smith, 1836-37; Benjamin Emerson, 1837, Jonas Evans. 1839;
Aaron Foster, Jr., 1840 : .loseph W. Vinton, 1840 ; Jacob Tutts, 1843 .
Jonas Cowdrey, 1844 ; Robert H. Raddin, 1846; Franklin Poole, 1847 ;
Samuel Kingman, 1850 ; Edward Mansfield, 1851 ; John B. .\t\vpll,
1852 ; James M. Sweetser, 18.'i5 ; .lames '»liTer, 18:6 : Madison Sweetser,
18 .7 ; John 8. Eaton, 1858 ; John Wiley (2d), 1860 ; William H. Atnell,
1862; Daniel .Ulen, 1864, '65; James F. Mansfield, 1867, '68; Benja-
min r. Packard, 1870; Edward H. Walton, 1871 , Richard Britlon,
1872, '74 ; Thomas Winship, 1876, '77 ; Solon Walton, 1878 ; Aiel Ames,
Jr, 1879 ; Lucius Beebe, 1880 ; Sofon 0. Richardson, 1881, '82 ; Arlon
S. Athorton, 188.3, '85 ; Robert BIyth. 1884, 86 ; Hiarles F. Woodward,
1887-89 ; William S. Greenough, 189U.
The town-farm and almshouse form an important
municipal institution. It includes nearly one hun-
dred acres of land, purchased of Capt. Thomas Emer-
son in 1826, and located in that section of the town
at the southeast, formerly called Little World, but
now known as Woodville. Here are convenient
buildings and accommodations furnishing a comfort-
able home for those who, by sickness, age or misfor-
tune, feel obliged to knock at the door of the town in
the blessed name of charity. There are ordinarily
six to ten inmates at the almshouse, though many
poor and destitute persons are assisted at their homes
or at hospitals, the town appropriating annually
$5000 or more for the support of the poor.
The Wakefield Historical Society was organized in
February, 1890, aud may be mentioned as a semi-mu-
nicipal institution, inasmuch aa it is granted a room
in the town-hall, and its objects are not for any private
advantage, but have in view the promotion of the
best interests of the town in general. In the spirit of
love and loyalty to and for the honor of the old town,
the membership of this society seek to shed some
light on the path of her progress through the trials
and perils, the hopes and fears of two and a half cen-
turies of existence, to the end that the present gene-
ration of citizens may more closely understand the
sources and growth of their municipal life and insti-
tutions, and have their feet more surely guided by
" the lamp of experience." The members are dili-
gently collecting mementos, relics, pictures, books
WAKEFIELD.
739
and writings, and placing the same in their room for
preservation, where they mav always be available for
examination and study, and represent for the instruc-
tion of a rushing and utilitarian age something of the
character and work of the fathers. This society in-
cludes also in its scope a department of Natural His-
tory, speciaily for the investigation of the fauna,
flora and geology of the region of Wakefield.
Men of Note. — Many distinguished citizens of
the Republic, living and dead, have traced their line-
age from worthy ancestors of this old town, whether
known as Reading, South Reading or Wakefield.
Among the brilliant names in American history, men
that can fairly be called son.= of the old town, may
be mentioned Hon. ^.ieorge Bancroft, the eminent
historian of his native land ; Gov. John Brooks, who
so gallantly led the minute-men of Reading at the
Battle of Merriam"s Corner, on the retreat of the
British troop> from Concord, April 19, 1775, and who,
after serving with distinction through the war, re-
moved to Medford and became Governor of Massa-
chusetts : Capt. John Parker, who commanded the
Lexington men on the same memorable day of April
19, 1770 ; Gen. John A. Dix, ex-Governor of New
Yi>rk, and United States Senator; Hon. George S.
Biiutwell, formerly Governor and Senator of Massa-
chusetts, and Secretary of the Treasury under Presi-
dent Grant: Hon. Timothy Boutelle, famed as a law-
yer ; Rev. Theodore Parker, eminent as a scholar and
Unitarian divine; Rev. John Pierpont, clergyman
and poet, formerly of Medford ; Rev. Dr. Samuel C.
Damon, late of Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands; Rev. Dr.
Brown Emerson, formerly of Salem ; Dr. Willard
Parker, of New York City ; Dr. Samuel Hart, of
Brooklyn, N. Y.; Gen. Joseph H. Eaton, of the
United States Army ; Rev. Dr. Phillips Brooks, of
Boston, the illustrious divine ; Prof B. F. Tweed, who
has had a just fame as an educator, and now, full of
years, is enjoying a well-earned rest at his home in
Cambridge; Dr. William Everett, of Quincy ; Rev.
Edwin C. Sweetser, of Philadelphia, an eloquent
preacher of the Universalist faith, and Hon. George
A. Walton, of Newton, author of Walton's Arithme-
tic, and now rendering conspicuous service on the
Massachusetts Board of Education. Of other gentle-
men who, after having chosen this town for a place of
residence, have attained to worthy dignities in the
councils of the nation, may be named Hon. Robert
Rantoul, Jr., Representative in Congress, who died
loo soon for the maturity of his fame, and Hon. Fred-
erick A. Sawyer, for many years the accomplished
principal of South Reading High School, and later
United States Senator from South Carolina, and As-
sistant Secretary of the United States Treasury.
These are all honored names, and give a hint of the
character of the original stock whence they sprung,
and it were a proud privilege for any town to be able
to claim them as its representatives upon the broad
arena of national life, and yet there rests upon the
loyal historian of his native town a charge more sacred
and emphatic, in which duty blends with gratitude,
to render fitting tribute to those true and faithful citi-
zens who have stood in their places at home, and, in
their day and generation done so much to make Wake-
field what it is. The early settlers of this fair domain
were men and women of no ordinary calibre, and
quick to respond to every call where courage, forti-
tude, perseverance or devotion to principle were re-
quired, and were own brothers to the Puritans of Eng-
land, whom Macaulay describes as " the most remark-
able body of men the world has ever produced."
They had their own peculiar faults and weaknesses,
which it were an ungracious task here to recapitulate,
and their descendants may safely accept the summing-
up of the great English historian just quoted : " But
after all we do not hesitate to pronounce them a
brave, a wise, an honest and a useful body." Space
would surely fail to record even the names of the local
heroes of the early days of the town who wielded pen
and sword, axe and gun, with readiness and effect, or
to mention all the noble men who in later days have
moulded the institutions of the town, and guided it in
the path to honor and prosperity. It must suffice
briefly to mention a few representative citizens along
the centuries of the town's existence, omitting cler-
gymen and others that have already had notice in
this sketch.
The first town clerk and conveyancer was Deacon
William Gowdrey, to whose handsome penmanship
and clerical skill many existing records and deeds
bear convincing testimony. The commander of the
first military company organized in 1645 was Capt.
Richard Walker, and the first inn-keeper Francis
Smith. Nicholas Brown and Peter Palfrey were ap-
pointed magistrates and were " much betrusted."
Deacon Thomas Kendall was a man of note in the
young settlement, and resided on what is known as
the James Emerson estate, at the corner of Prospect
and Cedar Streets. He had no sons, but eight
daughters, who, having married into the prominent
families of Boutwell, Eaton, Bryant, Parker, Dunton,
Nichols, Goodwin and Pearson, gave him a progeny
which is at the present day more numerous perhaps
than that of any other of the early settlers ; and there
was good blood, too, in this strain, for there are among
the descendants of Deacon Thomas Kendall names
eminent in every walk of life.
Other influential citizens from 1644 to 1700 were
Deacon Zachary Fitch, Deacon Thomas Parker, Robert
Burnap, Deacon John Pearson, Jonas Eaton, Richard
Nichols, Ralph Dix, Dr. James Stimpson, Lieut.
Hananiah Parker, John Brown, Esq., Timothy Wiley,
Lieutenant and Deacon Thomas Bancroft, Captain
Ephraim Savage, Deacon Francis Smith, Major Jere-
miah Swain, and Captain .Jonathan Pool — the last
two named men both brave Indian fighters.
During the century from 1700 to 1801 the leading
spirits were Colonel Ebenezer Nichols, Deacon
740
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Thomas Boutwell, Deacon Baham Bancroft, John I the town, with a mint'ling of new and healthy blood
Weston, Captain John Walton, William Bryant, , of much the same kind as the old.
Esq., Deacon Brown Emerson, Deacon John Good- ! Following are names of some of the recent and
win. Captain John Goodwin, Dr. ^Villiam Hay, Dr- present representatives of Wakefield, in its municipal
John Hay, Captain Thomas Nichols, Deacon Thomas ' affairs and general business : Thomas Emerson, Jr.,
Nichols, Deacon John Damon, Kendall Parker, Esq.,
Jonathan Pool, Esq., Benjamin Pool, Dr. Thomas
Stimpson, Dr. Thomas Stimpson, Jr., Dr. William
Stimpson, Ebenezer Wiley, Noah Eaton, Captain
Thomas Green, Captain Samuel Bancroft, Dr. Thomas
Swain, Captain John Walton, Captain James Ban-
croft, General Benjamin Brown of Revolutionary
fame, and Deacon Jacob Emerson.
Since the year 1800 the town has been assisted
in its progressive career by men of strong character
John G. Aborn, Daniel G. Walton, James F. Emer-
son, Thomas Wiuship, John S. Eaton, Richard Brit-
ton, Cyrus Wakefield (2d). Everett Hart, Solon i ).
Richardson, Jr., Willium F. Young, James H. Carter,
Hiram Eaton, John Winship, Dr. Samuel W. Abbott,
William K. Perkins, Captain Samuel F. LittlefieUl,
Edward X. Upton, Edward H. Walton. Cyrus N.
White, Joseph Coniiell. Col. J. F. Mansfield, Samuel
K. Hamilton, Maj. W. N. Tyier, Col. John W. Locke,
Mason S. Southwortli, George W. Aborn, Dr. Charles
and loyal spirit, the most active and prominent of | Jordan, David Perkins, Otis V. Waterman, A. W.
whom in the early years of the century were Dr. John
Hart, Colonel Amos Boardruan, Captain James Gould,
Joseph Cordis, Captain Thomas Emerson, Sr.,
Lilley Eaton, Jr., Deacon .facob Eaton, Paul Sweet-
ser, Sr., John Sweetser, John Gould, Jeremiah Green,
Adam Hawkes, Thomas Evans, Deacon David Smith,
John Rayner, Burrage Yale, Colonel James Harts-
horne. Major Suel Winn, Joshua Tweed, Jeremiah
Bryant, Captain Noah Smith, Dr. Nathan Richardson,
Timothy Poole, Deacon Aaron Bryant, Samuel Wiley,
Colouel Lemuel Sweetser, Dr. Thaddeus Spaulding
and Benjamin B. Wiley.
As the century approached and passed its central
point these grand men went off the stage of life or
irrew feeble with age, and the dignities and burdens
of the growing town were shifted to the heads and
shoulders of other citizens who held the municipal
standard " still full high advanced" and by the pres-
ent generation are held in grateful remembrance.
Chapman, B. B. Burbank, i 'barles F. Hartsliorne,
David H. Darling. Charles H. Davij. Everett W.
Eaton, Jacob C. Hartshorne. E. E. Emerson, Thomas
.r. Skinner, (ieorge H. Madilock, Juliu W. White,
Arlon S. Atherton, William S. (ireenougli. Alslead
W. Browneil, Theo.l.)re E. B^ikh, Dr. E. 1'. Colby.
I'ol. Charles F. Woodwanl, t!'yrus (t. Beebe, Maj.
John yi. ('ate, William D. Deadniaji, Selim S. \Vliite,
Freeman Emmons, \\ aldo E. Cowdrey, Willi:uu E.
Rogers, Henry H. Savage, .lame> W. ( irace, Robert
Blyth, Edwin C. Miller, Albert J. Wright, Peter S.
Roberts, William L. Coon, Dr. Preston Sheldon,
Dean Dudley, Harvey B. Evans, Kul'us Keudrick,
William (i. Strong, Lyman H. Tusker, Ashton H.
Thayer, Jacob S. Merrill, Henry Haskell, Naihanif 1
E. Cutler, Fred. B. Carpenter and Thomas Kernan.
Brief Kiographicul sketches of a tew of the repre-
sentative men of the town since il.-> incorporatiuii in
1812, who gave much of tlifmselves to the [iiililic
The forms and semblance of these true-hearted j service or tor the public benefit, and having made
workers seem to arise before the mind's eye and step
forth in bodily presence as their names are called —
these men who guided the affairs of the town and
kept its honor bright during the stirring and eventful
period between 1840 and 1870. Some, indeed, still
tarry on this side of the river, though with whitened
hair and faltering steps. Their names come sounding
like a benediction to the busy workers who are now
in the thickest of the fight: Captain Thomas Emer-
son, Dr. Solon O. Richardson, Lilley Eaton, Paul H.
Sweetser, John White, Cyrus Wakefield, Lucius
Beebe, Benjamin Franklin Tweed, Lemuel Sweetser,
Daniel Allen, Samuel Kingman, James M. Evans,
Franklin Poole, Samuel Gardner, Captain Aaron
Foster, James Eustis, Edward Maiisfield, Albert G.
Sweetser, Dr. J. D. Mansfield, George 0. Carpenter,
Philip C. Wheeler, James Oliver.
Of the trusted ofiBcers and leading men of Wake-
field since 1870, and those who have still their har-
ness on, it is not easy to speak in discriminating
language, but it seems fitting that some reference
should be made to these true and earnest workers,
among whom are well represented the old families of
their record, have passeil away, may not lie ina|ipio-
priate in this connection.
Dr. John H.\kt. — i)i\e of the most conspicuous
and infiuential figures in all the various activities of
municipal life from 17'J0 to ISSO was that of Dr. John
Hart, sometimes by his fellow-citizens called "the
king." Dr. Hart w;is a native of Ipswich, born in
1751, son of John Hart, Esq., a lawyer of Ipswich.
He married .Mary, daughter of Captain .Vbraham
Gould, of Stoneham. He first practised his profes-
sion in Georgetown (now Bath), Maine, but on the
breaking out of the War of the Revolution joined the
army as a surgeon and serve<l during the war. He
was first assigned xs surgeon to Colonel I'rescott's
regiment at Cambridge, before the battle of Bunker
Hill, and later was surgeon of the Second ALissachu-
setts Regiment, uuder Colonel Johu Bailey, and ac-
companied his regiment in every battle in which it
was engaged. He was one of the forty-one othcers
detailed by General Washington to attend the execu-
tion of Major Andre, and described it as the most
impressive and awful scene he ever witnessed. He
enjoyed some intimacy with General Washington,
WAKEFIELD.
741
and was at one time deputed to make a perilous
journey to Boston on horse-back and bring back $3000
in gold, which commission he safely accomplished.
After the war Dr. Hart settled in the First Parish of
Reading (now Wakefield), purchasing a residence,
formerly the homestead of the Smith family, on the
easterly borders of Smith's Pond, now known as Crys-
tal Lake, and here lie spent the remainder of his long
life. Dr. Hart was a skillful physician, giving con-
.scientious attention to a large practice. He was an
ardent patriot, n. member of the Society of Cincinnati,
constant in his attendance on its meetings, and for
many years its vice-president. He was the firm friend
and liberal supjiorter of religious, educational and
benevolent institutions, and embraced the faith of the
l^uritans, but was not sectarian in his opinions. He
became a large landed proprietor and was like an
English '.»f|uire to the community in which he lived.
He was chosen .selectman, school committee, repre-
sentative and ."enator; was appointed Justice of the
peace and of the quorum and justice of the Court of
Sessions. As a politician he was of the .Tetfersonian
school, ever earnest and decided. He was courageous
and firm, punctual and hone.st in all his dealings,
kind to the ]>oor, aomewhai arbitrary in his ways and
impatient of contradiction, generally moderator at
town-meetings, and exercised a controlling influence
over his fellow-citizens. His personal appearance
was striking and imposing — being of fair complexion,
Roman nose, high forehead and middle stature, but
of portly frame and stately mien. He was an accom-
plished horseman and alw.nys rode in the saddle, de-
spising a sulky. Dr. Hart died in IS.'iil, at the age of
eighty-five years. His children were: Mary, who
married Henry, son of Rev. Caleb Prentiss ; Abraham,
who died unmarried ; .Tolin, educated :ps a physician,
a young man of promise, who died at the age of
twenty-four; Sarali and Lucinda, who became the
first and second wives of Dr. Thaddeus .Spaulding;
Samuel, the youngest son. graduated at Harvard Col-
lege in 1S17, who became a jihysician highly esteemed
in liis life and profession, and settled in Brooklvn,
X. Y.
BuKl:.\<.r; Yale. — Mr. Yale was another promi-
nent figure of the South Reading days, coming here
to reside about ISIO, but his first entry into the town,
as he used to boast, was as a tin peddler, barefoot,
walking by the side of his cart. He became an ex-
tensive manufacturer of tin-ware, and gradually en-
larged his business until he was one of the heaviest
tin-ware dealers in the State, employing a hundred
peddlers and sending his wagons over New England.
His tin-shop was at what is now the corner of Main
Street and Yale Avenue, and was, on a smaller scale,
what is now the shoe factory of Thomas Emerson's
Sons. He was a man of shrewd business tact and
habits, and amassed a large estate. He wr.s honest,
prompt and exact in all his dealings, and had no pa-
tience and little mercy with those who were other- '
wise. He was unpopular with most of his townsmen
by reason of his lofty demeanor, his unrelenting en-
deavors to collect his dues, and annoying idiosyn-
crasies, but was respected for his unbending integrity,
his dignified bearing and his public gifts. He held
no public offices except those of town treasurer and
justice of the peace. Mr. Yale was bom in Meriden,
Connecticut, in 1781, and died in South Reading in
1860, aged seventy-nine years. He left three daugh-
ters, who married, and are all dead, and one son, Bur-
rage Buchanan Yale, Esq., of Stamford, Connecticut.
He made liberal gifts to the Yale Engine Company,
named in his honor. Mr. Yale left to trustees under
his will extensive lands and houses, Yale Avenue
having been laid out through his homestead estate.
Colonel Lemuel Sweetser. — Colonel Sweet-
ser was a man of strong native qualities, an
original thinker, an effective public speaker, possess-
ing courage, probity and judgment, and exercised
large influence in the councils of the town. He was
colonel of cavalry, school committee, justice of the
peace and representative, and his business was shoe
manufacturing. He was very fond of the military
organization, particularly the cavalry corps, and glor-
ied in a noble steed. He was a valued member of the
Baptist Society, of which he was a prominent founder
and life-long supporter. He was not himself a scholar,
but an active friend of the public schools and of edu-
cation in genera', and helped to found the South
Reading Academy. Colonel Sweetser purchased the
est.ate between Main Street and the Boston & Maine
Railroad, and there located his home. The estate is
now covered with handsome dwelling-houses, hi.s
heirs having laid out Avon Street through the same,
and sold house-lots thereon. Colonel Sweetser was the
son of Paul and Mary (Hart) Sweetser, and born in
the town in 1779. He married Hannah, daughter of
Lillcy and Sarah Eaton, and died of consumption in
183.J, leaving a worthy family of descendants.
De.a.. .\arox Bryant. — The town has had many
a representative more brilliant by far iu mental en-
dowments, and more ambitious for well-earned dis-
tinction, than good Deacon Bryant, but perhaps the
town has never been blest with a man more saintly
in character or more anxious to know and to do the
Lord's will on earth. He was privileged in his hum-
ble station to do a good work for his fellow-men, and
after a long life left a sweet and blessed memory. He
was the son of Edmund Bryant, and born in New
Ipswich, N. H., but was the grandson of Kendall
Bryant, of the Old Parish of Reading, and when
young came here for his life residence. He was
chosen deacon of the Congregational Church in 1815,
and sePyed faithfully in that capacity until his death,
in 1870, a period of fifty-five years. He was largely
instrumental in organizing the Congregational Sun-
day-school in 1818. Though modest and unassuming,
he possessed a well-stored mind, and was prized in
the commnnitv as a wise counselor and one of the
742
HISTORY OP MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
best of citizens. Deacon Bryant married Rebecca
Poole, the daughter of Benjamin and Elizabeth
Emerson, and left no children. His homestead was
at the corner of Main and Avon Streets, and his
house the same, though enlarged and improved,
owned by James Barrett in 1765, and later by Lieu-
tenant Nathan Eaton, a soldier of the Revolution.
Lieutenant Eaton was a man of great physical pro-
portions, so that it became a proverbial comparison
to say " as big as Nathan Eaton."
Captaxn Thomas Emeeson. — Another life-long
resident of the town, who, by force of character, great
industry and wise application of his powers, won his
way, without the help of the schools, to a foremost
place among the honored citizens of the town, was
Captain Thomas Emerson. Coming from an un-
tainted Puritan ancestry, among whom were clergy-
men, soldiers and leading citizens, he was himself a
notable illustration of the best qualities of his
lineage. He was born in this town in 1785, and was
the son of Captain Thomas Emerson, a soldier of
the Revolution, and a man of signal bravery and
resolution, who had experienced the miseries of
Dartmoor prison. Captain Emerson, Jr., was brought
up to habits of toil, and worked his way to being the
leading and most successful shoe manufacturer of the
town.
He waa elected by the votes of his fellow-citizens to
nearly every office in their gift. He was chosen as
Representative in the General Court eight years, and
Senator two years ; was selectman, school committee,
justice of the peace and captain of cavalry. He was
prominent in the formation of the South Reading
Mechanic and Agricultural Institution in 1833, which
is still flourishing, and in the organization of the
South Reading Bank (now the National Bank of
South Reading) in 1854, becoming its first president,
and holding the position until his death. Courteous
and sympathetic in his personal demeanor, with heart
and purse open to the cry of need, an oracle in
finance, and ever guided by Christian principles, he
was trusted and respected by all. In the Congrega-
tional Church he was truly a pillar by his generous
contributions to the support of the ministry and
charitable enterprises, his zealous interest in .spiritual
things, and his wise counsel in practical concerns. As
an employer of many workmen he obtained their re-
spect and confidence by fair dealing and prompt pay-
ments, and was the first in the region to abandon the
old system of barter to make cash payments to his
employees. As the disabilities of age came upon
him he transferred his business to his sons, and died
in 1871, at the good old age of eighty-six years. His
wife was Betsey, daughter of Deacon James Harts-
horne, who survived him two years. His sons are
Thomas and James F. Emerson. His daughters
were Mrs. Augusta Odiorne and Mrs. Sarah H. Bar-
nard, both now deceased, and Mrs. Maria J., wife of
Major George O. Carpenter. li was truly said of
Captain Emerson at his death: ''He was faithful,
earnest, liberal and devout."
LiLLEY Eaton. — In nearly every town of our
Commonwealth there may be found some citizen who,
more than any other, is concerned in the administra-
tion of its affairs, and familiar with its history and
institutions. Such a man in respect to Wakefield was
the late Lilley Eaton. Descended through an honor-
able ancestry from the first sturdy settlers of the town,
he has himself recorded that he delighted " to inquire
after the old paths and to walk therein."
Brought up in the village store of his father, who
was active in municipal affairs, the observant son be-
came early accustomed to the transac'ion of town
business, and absorbed the best traditions of the
elders. The house in which was this store was erect-
ed in 1804, and then the most imposing structure of
the village, and is still standing at the corner of Main
and Salem Streets. It became known as the " Pilgrim's
Hotel," as being the general resort of trausient clergy-
men and other brethren of the owner's faith, where
they always found a cordial welcome. On the third
floor of this mansion was the consecrated and spacious
"meeting chamber " used by the earnest members of
the young Baptist society, of which the senior Mr.
Eaton wasoneof the founders, for their religious, social
and conference meetings. In such an atmosphere
did Lilley Eaton, Jr., pass his boyhood, and his soul
grow strong. He fitted for college at Bradford .Vcad-
emy, but was called home by the sudden death of his
father in 1822, to assume the large respousibili'ies
which naturally devolved upon him as eldest son and
successor in business. As years and experience de-
veloped his powers, by his tastes and abilities and the
favor of his fellow-citizens, he filled nearly every offi-
cial position of the municipality. It is probable there
never was a citizen of the town who occupied so
many local offices for so long periods as did Mr.
Eaton, and he became perfectly familiar with every
detail of town affairs, and the application of the law
to the same. He was selectman twenty-five years, a
member of the School Board nearly as long, and gen-
erally chairman of each. He was town clerk twenty
years, Representative seven years, Senator two years,
trustee of Public Library from its establishment, just-
ice of peace thirty-eight years, and a member of the
Constitutional Convention in 1853. He was for many
years the principal writer of deeds and wills in the
town, transacted considerable probate business, and at-
tended, as administrator, executor and guardian, to
the settlement of many estates, and his probity and
faithfulness were never questioned. He was Treas-
urer of the South Reading Mechanic and Agricul-
tural Institution and cashier of the South Reading
Bank (afterward the National Bank of South Reading)
from their organization, respectively, until his death.
During his active business life of nearly half a century
there was hardly a movement or enterprise for the
honor or improvement of the town, but Mr. Eaton
WAKEFIELD.
743
had an influential part. In this connection might be
named the South Reading Academy, the Town House
of 1834, the South Reading Stage Company, the High
School, the South Reading Mechanic and Agricul-
tural Institution, the South Reading Lyceum, the
South Reading Bank, the Citizens' Gas-Light Com-
pany, the Public Library and Reading-Room, the
Lakeside Cemetery, and the change of the town's
name.
Mr. Eaton had a genuine love for his native town,
and was jealous for her just fame, and the crowning
evidence of this love, and the best monument of his
genius, may be found in the "History of Reading,"
including the present towns of Wakefield, Reading
and North Reading. To this work he gave years of
his best thought and labor. His lamp of life going
out before the later chronicles were quite completed,
the finishing touches and appropriate additions were
given by the accomplished hands of his brother, John
Sullivan Eaton, and the work printed in 1874. At
the Reading Bi-centennial celebration, in 1844, Mr.
Eaton was called to the honor of being poet of the
day, and his production delivered on that occasion
has become historic.
Mr. Eaton's personal traits were attractive, and his
bearing marked by a natural urbanity, a true index
to a kind heart. He was a constant attendant at the
Congregational Church, and accepted the truths of
the Gospel in their more direct and personal mean-
ing. Mr. Eaton was the son of Lilley Eaton, the
grandson of Lilley Eaton, and descended from the
early settler, Jonas Eaton. He was born January 13,
1802, and died January 10, 1872. He married Eliza
Nichols, of an old Reading family, and left four sons,
still surviving.
Dr. Solon O. Richardson.— One of the most
treasured names in the recent history of the town is
that of Dr. Solon Osmond Richardson, the generous
and public-spirited citizen, who scattered his bene-
factions with discriminating hand and kindly heart.
Dr. Richardson was born in North Reading, July 19,
1809, and was the son of Dr. Nathan Richardson,
formerly of South Reading, the good physician of
blessed memory. Dr. Nathan Richardson was skillful
and eminent as a physician, his practice extending
over New England, and his son, Solon O., vras edu-
cated to follow the same profession, and he early gave
evidence of possessing unusual skill and qualifica-
tions as a physician, and on his father's death, in
1837, there devolved upon him an extensive practice,
to which he gave his enthusiasm and best energies,
with strong hopes of usefulness and success in the
active and absorbing duties of a chosen profession.
Soon, however, his health gave way, and he was
forced to the resolution of abandoning his practice,
and to limit himself to the manufacture and sale of
the " Sherry Wine Bitters," which had already been
applied in his father's practice and his own, with re-
markable remedial results. At this time proprietary
medicines, and especially medicated bitters, prepared
for general sale, was a branch of trade unknown in
New England, and many new appliances and methods
had to be devised by a pioneer iu the business, such
as the shape and construction of bottles, designs for
wrappers, best means for transportation and a proper
system of advertising, involving many perplexities
and large expense. All obstacles were, however, sur-
mounted, and Richardson's Sherry Wine Bitters be-
came a pronounced success, and brought fame and
affluence to the persistent and enterprising proprie-
tor. Great wealth was not, however, an object with
Dr. Richardson, and finding himself possessed of an
ample competence, with an increasing income, he
yielded to the impulses of a generous nature and be-
came as noted for his liberality as for his bitters,
though most of his gifts were never made public. He
declined the burdens of local office, but had always a
lively interest in matters pertaining to the honor and
improvement of the town and the benefit of her citi-
zens. He was one of the original movers for the
compiling and publication of the history of the town,
and it was through his efforts and liberal contribu-
tions that the town became the owners of the valu-
able portraits of George Washington and Cyrus Wake-
field that now adorn the walls of the town hall.
When the local military company, now in the
front rank of the state militia in all soldierly quali-
ties, was organized in 1851, it was named the Rich-
ardson Light Guard, in honor of Dr. Richardson,
whose appreciation of the act was manifested through-
out his life by a constant and ardent interest in the
corps and by frequent and generous donations. He
was through life a valued member and substantial
supporter of the Universalist Society of South Read-
ing and Wakefield. Dr. Richardson was fatally
seized with apoplexy August 31, 1873, while making
a social call on his neighbor, Mr. Wakefieid, and
died in a few hours, leaving a fragrant memory.
His son and successor, the present Dr. S. O. Richard-
son, worthily wears the mantle of the father.
Cyrus Wakefield. — The gentleman who gave
his name to the town was cast in no ordinary mould.
Bom on a farm amid the rugged hills of New Hamp-
shire, in boyhood inured to toil, with scanty privileges
for obtaining an education, be yet had the mind and
the will to struggle out of the limited conditions of
his early life, and, by study, industry, perseverance
and the exercise of a rare judgment, to win a high
position among the merchant princes of the New
England metropolis, and to become one of the fore-
most citizens in the town of his adoption. He bad,
however, the advantages of good parentage, fixed
habits of temperance and economy, a stalwart frame,
robusthealthandgreatpowersof endurance, and these,
united with large mental capacity and an indomita-
ble will, brought him surely and in due time to the
goal of worldly success.
Cyrus Wakefield was the son of James and Hannah
744
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Heminway Wakefield, and was born in Roxbury,
N. H., February 14, 1811. His ambition to get away
from home and into the great world of trade was an
impelling force when only a boy. After several futile
attempts in that direction, he made the decisive step,
with his father's consent, at the age of fifteen, and
first found employment in the retail grocery store of
VVheeler & Bassett, on Washington Street, Boston.
His latent powers developed fast, and. having changed
to a firm on India Street, he was permitted to do a
small business outside his regular duties, and soon
accumulated $1000, all his own. In 1834 he was in
the grocery business for himself. He made only ordi-
nary progress until 1844, when one day, observing a
quantity of rattan-cane thrown outof a vessel as almost
worthless, he purchased the lot and sold it for chair-
seatings. On his active mind there then dawned a
glimpse of some of the possibilities of the future of rat-
tan, from the merchant's standpoint. Not long after
he changed his business to that of a jobbing trade in
rattans, and employed an agent at Canton, China,
and ere long his importations of Canton split rattan
were known throughout the United States.
Mr. Wakefield adopted the spelling "rattan," in-
stead of " ratan," the old way, for bis specialty, and
by his persistent use of that orthography brought at
last the standard dictionaries to recognize it as the
approved style.
In a few years Mr. Wakefield resolved to manufac-
ture the cane himself, and utilize, as far as possible,
the whole of the material — outside, pith and shav-
ings. Starting, in a small way, at Boston, iu 185(),
he removed his works to South Reading, having pur-
chased the mill-site on Water Street, improved for
a century by Thomaa Green and his descendants.
His first factory was very soon too small for his ex-
panding business, and building after building was
erected, until at the time of his death the manufac-
tories and stor^-houses of his succesapr — the Wake-
field Rattan Company — covered an area of ten acres
of flooring, and the variety of articles of beauty and
utility made from rattan was amazing.
Mr. Wakefield married, in 1841, Eliza A., daugbtur
of Captain Henry Bancroft, of Lynnfield, a retired
sea-captain, and, in 1851, purchased an estate in
South Reading, where he later erected his palatial
residence and spent the balance of his days. Mr.
Wakefield was greatly interested in the prosperity of
the town, and expended much money in the improve-
ment of the region near his residence and factories.
He was earnest and liberal in the encouragement of
all enterprises he thought were for the benefit of the
town. He was the moving spirit in the incorpora-
tion of the Wakefield Savings Bank, the Wakefield
Real Estate and Building Association, the Quanna-
powitt Water Company, the main supporter of a free
course of lectures, and was an infiueutial director and
large stockholder in the National Bank, the Citizens'
Graa-Light Company, the South Reading Ice Compa-
ny and the Boston and Maine Foundry Couipanv.
The munificent gift by Mr. Wakefield of a town
hall has been mentioned in another portion of this
sketch, with the circumstances attending the change
of the town's name from South Reading to Wakefield.
Following this notable event the interest and aflec-
tion of Mr. Wakefield for the town that had honored
his name was more than doubled, and he was con-
stantly giving of his thought and wealth to promote
its prosperity. He erected spacious brick blocks, near
the splendid town hall he had given the town, for the
accommodation of anticipated business ; he sought to
increase industrial activity not only at his own exten-
sive works, but by the attraction of new manufactur-
ing and business enterprises ; he offered homes for the
people on easy terms, he encouraged the addition of
commodious and elegant public buildings, he favored
park and street improvements, he lent a helping baud
to worthy young studenis struggling for an education,
he gave to the town an elegant diploma plate for
High School graduates, be instituted free scientific
lectures and projected the founding of a college in
Wakefield, where the children of the ]>(>or might en-
joy the privileges of superior training and a liberal
education. Without children, his hopes for tlie fu-
ture centred more and more on the town of his later
affections, and he hoped to live to .see it the city of
Wakefield, famed for its institutions of education and
charity, distinguished by the beauty of its scenery
and its architectural adornments, and notetl for the
I intelligence and enterprise of its people. Many
! things he began and acconiplislu-d, and many others
' had only taken shape in his own busy brain. Sud-
; denly he died, — one Sunday morning in the autumn
of 1873 — sitting in hi.s chair, and impre-thively re-
I minded us " what shadows we are and what -shadows
I we pursue." Tyken in connection with the great finan-
j cial depression then clouding the business world, this
1 event was a serious blow to the material prosperity
I of the town. The important raitan business was,
I however, continued without interruption by the
j Wakefield Rattan Company, while the homestead
1 estate passed to the widow of Mr. Wakefield, ami at
! her death, a few years later, and by her will, de-
I scended in fitting setiuence to Cyrus Wakefield (2d),
i a high-minded and liberal citizen, who died in his
i sleigh, as suddenly as his uncle, Januan,', 18S8.
I Lucius Beebe. — Mr. Beebe was a man whom any
I town might be proud to claim as a citizen. He was
I born in Hebron, Connecticut, March 2, 1810, and
was the son of Stuart and Sophia Beebe. His father
was a graduate of Williams College and a lawyer, but
financial reverses coming to him, the son, Lucius, at
the age of fifteen years, set out from home to seek his
fortune, and having a strong foundation of good
principles, sound health, a capacious mind and habits
of industry, he was able at the age of twenty-four to
go into business for himself, and, with his brothers,
successfully prosecuted North and South the business
WAKEFIELD.
745
of woodeD ware and cotton. Their store was in New
Orleans and the principal northern office at Boston in
the charge of Mr. Beebe. Extensive losses were sus-
tained during the Civil War, but Mr. Beebe amassed a
considerable fortune, which he disbursed with a liberal
band. Mr. Beebe came to Wakefield in 1862, pur-
chasing the beautiful " Forrester estate " on the
easterly shores of Lake Quannapowitt, which he oc-
cupied until his death.
Not by eloquence of speech nor by the graces of
polished rhetoric did Mr. Beebe attain the high place
he held iu the esteem and affections of his; fellow-
townsmen, for his voice was .seldom heard in the
public assembly, and his pen was used only for busi-
ness or correspondence. Of noble presence and dig-
nified mien, he wiis as courteous and unobtrusive a^
one among a thousand. The qualities which com-
manded universal respect and confidence were his
unswerving integrity, his sympathy with the unfor-
tunate, his unostentatious benevolence, his wisdom
as a counselor, and his readiness to assist any good
enterprise. He was an earnest and consistent friend
of temperance, education and religion, and cheerful-
ly bore the burdens of municipal office with con-
scientious fidelity. He served bis town many years
on the Boards of School Committee and Selectmen, on
important committees, and as a trustee of Beebe Town
Library, which last-named institution was named
in his honor, and received from him frequent and
substantial tokens of remembrance. The National
Bank owed much to him for his invaluable services
and counsels as director and president. The Wake-
field Savings Bank had also the benefit of bis advice
as one of its trustees. He was director and president
of the Wakefield Real Estate and Building Association,
while his interest in the Fire Department was recog-
nized by the bestowal of his name on the fine Silsby
steamer. He was a representative in the General
Court, and faithful to every trust.
He died April 15, 1884, of heart disease, sitting at
his desk, in his counting-room in Boston. The sor-
rowing citizens of Wakefield came together almost
spontaneously on receipt of the news, adopted an ap-
propriate testimonial, and asked of the family per-
mission to award their deceased friend the honors of
public obsequies. On the day of the funeral the re-
mains lay in state in the Town Hall, while the citi-
zens generally ceased for a time from labor and busi-
ness, and, gathering at the Congregational Church, lis-
tened to the impressive services conducted by the
Kev. Charles R. Bliss and Rev. David N. Beach.
Mr. Beebe had twelve children, of whom eight
survive, the six sons filling responsible and honored
places in the business world.
Paul H. Sweetser. — The name of Paul Hart
Sweetser is an honored one in the aunals of Wake-
field. He was the eldest son of Paul and Sarah
Sweetser, and came of the same blood as Dr. John
Hart. He was born in this town September 23, 1807,
and, like most of the boys of South Reading, he
learned the shoemaker's trade, at which he worked
during his minority. He embraced an opportunity to
enter the South Reading Academy, when that in-
stitution was opened in the town, proving himself an
apt scholar with strong mental powers. For a num-
ber of years he divided his time between teaching
district schools and attendance at the academy. He
proved himself to be an accomplished and popular
instructor, and easily secured an ushership in the pub-
lic schools of Boston, from which, in 1838, he was
promoted to be masterof Harvard School, in Charles-
town, where he remained until 1847. He was prom-
inent in the formation of the Massachusetts Teach-
ers' Association and the establishment of the Massa-
c/tusettt Teacher, as its organ, and for several years
was one of the editors of this journal.
The last twenty-five years of his life were worthily
spent in his native town, on his Greenwood home-
stead and farm, in active participation in municipal
affairs. He was ever the enthusiastic and influential
friend of education, serving many years as school
committee and trustee of Public Library, and often
writing the annual reports with signal ability. He was
often called to various town offices and especially as
moderator of town-meeting, the arduous duties of
which position he performed with remarkable effi-
ciency and promptness.
Mr. Sweetser was in high repute as a public speak-
er in behalf of anti-slaverj', temperance and other re-
forms, and much valued as a contributor to various
newspapers and magazines, and also wrote many hymns
and short poems of excellence. He was, for six years,
a county commissioner for Middlesex County, a jus-
tice of the peace and a trusted adviser to his fellow-
citizens. In politics he was an ardent Republican, in
religion a stanch Universalist. His sympathies were
intense in behalf of all efforts to benefit humanity.
He was justly regarded as one of the first citizens of
his town, and died June 11, 1872, greatly lamented.
Mr. Sweetser married Miss Louisa Foster, daughter
of Capt. Aaron Foster, of Dauvers, and has left a
family of sis children, who are doing good and strong
work in the world.
The foregoing sketches include but a few of the
choice men who have left upon Wakefield the im-
press of their love, their labors and their genius, and
there are still living able men who are even now doing
the same gracious work for the town of their love
and their pride, but it is too early to render unto
them the meed of praise they deserve. The people of
Wakefield are grateful to them ail, and will inscribe
their names upon the public record, on the printed
page, and cherish them in their heart of hearts. The
children, too, are coming on — a great troop — to take
the places of the fathers, and grasp the flag from
nerveless hands, and the hope and the prophecy may
be here recorded that never, in the old town with its
746
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
new name, ahall there be found wanting true men and
women, loyal in fibre and strong in soul, mind and
spirit, to stand before this people and lead them to
things better and grander than they have before at-
tained.
In 1894 will occur the 250th anniversary of the in-
corporation of ancient Beading, and it is probable
the three towns which now represent the original do-
main will again come together in cordial co-operation,
and jointly celebrate the historic event with fitting
observances. Wakefield certainly would not be back-
ward in such a movement. Her inhabitants feel a
pardonable pride in their beautiful town, favored by
nature with fairest scenery, adorned with many grace-
ful specimens of architecture and works of taste and
art, and equipped with all the institutions and im-
provements that make suburban life desirable.
Wakefield is not exclusive nor inhospitable, and
while to the glad reunions of her quarter-centennial
day, she will, with peculiar tenderness and motherly
pride, call her own sons from far and her daughters
from the ends of the earth, she stands ready every
day in the year to extend a cordial welcome and in-
vitation to good men and women, of every name and
race, to cast their iot within her borders, and help
make her more and more a centre of intelligence,
virtue and enterprise, a place of beauty, a city of
homes.
CHAPTER LX.
WINCHESTER.
liV W. R. ri HER.
1. CIVIL HISTORY PRI^VIOU.S TO LSfjO.
The town of Winchester was originally and prin-
cipally a part of the town of Woburn. It was the
southerly part of that town. After the Boston and
Lowell Railroad was opened in 1835, a village grew
up in that part, which was soon dignified by the name
of South Woburn. Previously there had been in
that quarter a number of scattered houses, such as
were common to a farming community, and there
were a (ew mills; but otherwise, there was little to
distinguish it from other parts of the old town. In
1860 it was large enough to become a town of itself,
and in that year it was incorporated aa a town, by
the name of Winchester. Its growth has been con-
stant and rapid, favored by its railroad facilities and
its superior natural attractions, and at the present
time it is one of the best known and influential towns
in the Slate, as a location for fine residences, and the
abode of cultured and influential people, many of
whom have business interests in Boston and else-
where, and reside here simply for a home. Such, in
brief, is its history.
The late Rev. and Prof. George Cooke, the histori-
I ographer of the Winchester Historical and Genea-
' logical Society, whose duty it should have been to
have prepared this sketch, left a scheme for the his-
j tory of Winchester which was published in the Win-
] Chester Directory for 1887. This the present writer
will attempt to amplify in accordance with the idea
that gentleman intended to carry out. The sources
' of Winchester history are, of course, to be obtained
■ in the history of the older town of Woburn, in the
sketch of which many matters relating to Winchester
have already been treated, and do not need repetition
here. One matter which has a particular relation to
Winchester territory, and which has been reserved
for especial mention in this place, is a description of
lands in Winchester of the date of 1692-99. This is
a particular description of the lands of the Converses,
who lived at Winchester Centre, and which is to be
found in the first volume, so called, of the Woburn
town records, and was entered in a description of
several Woburn estates to be found in the appendix
to those ancient records, commencing with the last
page of the volume and going backward, aa written,
towards the middle of the book.
WOBUBN RECORDS.
Vol. I : Appendix.
[The so.called inverted pa?e3 of tbe records.]
" [ix.*] 1692. SecordB of laods. in Woburn that belong to James
Cooverse, Sen.
1 ** /mpn'miB. To his homestead, about twenty acres upland and
meadow, bounded eaat by the [.Vberjona] River and Josiah Converse's
! land, soutliwest by Wni. Syoitnes, Dortliweat hy Wedge Poud ; together
j with thirty-four acres, more or less, on the east side of the River
1 bounded by the River west, Wni. Symnies »outh, the J"K) acres of wood-
i land southeast, Sam'l. Converse, his land northeast ; also twenty-two
I acres, more or less, at a place called the Indian Hills, bounded by land
! that was Wm. tireen's southeast, Josiah Converse's land northwest,
' Wni. Johnson northeast, and the woodland southwest ; [*] [year 'Olj
I i.'ranted, page J2, olherside the book.] .ilso hfteen acres, more or less,
' that the town was indebted to hira, and is laid out to him by tbe coni-
1 niittee in two parts, viz., twelve acres, more or less, near Shawshin, ad-
joining to tbe farm called the Church's Farm, bounded by Billerica line
north and northwest, and by tbe lots, southwest and southeast, in form
as upon the margin ljig.\ and the other three acres, more or less, by liis
son James Converse's barn, bounded by Winter Pond south, the high-
way by the Mountain northwest, and said James Converse, his own land
that ho purchased of Wm. Johnson northeast, and by a little valley lead-
ing from the highway to Winter Poud southwest, it being James Con-
verse's woodland on that side ; and this last piece was laid out to .Tames
Converse, Jr., by order of the committee, viz., Capt. John Carter, Dea-
con Josiah Converse and Sergeant Thomas Fierce, with the help of
Capt. Wm. Johnson, who was a surveyor to tbe committee ; and all
this fifteen acres was given in both pieces by James Convetse, Sen., to
his son, James lk>nverse, Jr.
"Also thirty-four acres, more or less, upon tbe plain, called the Great
Field, bounded by the land of Wni. Symnies southeast, Richard Gardner
northwest, Josiah Converse northeast, John Carter and Wm. Johnson
southwest; only four acres, part thereof lyeth at the west comer, out of
the square of the other, but it Just joins at the west comer, it being four
acres of that which was called Davidson's.
".\lso abont eight acres of meadow in the Mill Pond Meadow ; about
five acres thereof above Blind Bridge, upon the two brooks that come oat
of Horn Pond and M'edge Pond ; and tbe other three acres on the east
side of the way adjoining to Mr. Hale's meadow.
**.\lso a skirt of upland on the northwest and sootheast sides of Wedge
Pond, undivided with Josiah Converse.
• *•••«••«* •««
"[x*]. Reconls of Und belonging to James Converse, Jr. (1699), io
Woburn.
WINCHESTER.
747
" Imyriinui. Tn liit. liuDie6t«tul, twenty-Dve acres, niuro or le«i, that
wa£ Shepardflou'e lot, bounded by Jodab Converse eoutheofit, that nbicL
was Htfnry Brooks's northwest, Richard Gardner's southwest, John
Crowe's (tbat was) northeast.
"Also twenty eight acres, more or \em, part of that which was John
Crowe's bounded by Jaiaes i;onTer8e, that was Daniel Shepardson'ti
Bouthweat, JaniPB Fowle. the other part of Crowe's lot, northeast, Janieo
and Josiah Converse's land 6<)utheasr, nnd Thomas Bclknup's land north-
west.
"Also tive acreij of land, purchased of William Johnson, that was
Henry Biooks. at the northwest end of Shephardson'a lot, and adjoining
thereto ; and also four acres of land, more or lese, that Ite had of the
town, three acres thereof upon his father's account, and the other acre
given by the town, and it lyeth between the highway and Winter Pond,
adjoining to bis own land.
**Aleo about fifty ncres of upland and meadow land, purchased of
Wm. Hamlet, bounded by Horn Pond uorthwest, Thos. Belknap south-
east. Horn Pond Brook, northeast, and on thp southwest side, partly by
Sam'l. Pierce's and partly by the common.
"Also two acres, more or less, purchased of Wm. Hamlet, on the side
of the Mountain by Samuel Pierce's field.
"Also ten acres and a half of upland, more or less, bought of Wm.
Johnson, at a place called Powell's Lot, (he southeast end thereof,
hounded southeast by John Carter, northwest by the othei- part of the
spid lut, and by Richard Gardner'^ woodland eUewhere.
"Also fourteen acres of land in the thick woods, part of that which
was Capt. Carter's great lot, and it joins to Mni. Johnson 6 land, that
was John Seers.
"Also about one acre and half of land upon the pl.iin, adjoining to
thepardsnn's lot, that he had of Josiah Converse, and it lyeth at the
south comer of said lot,
**Also two tracts of uotHiland, one reaches from Sani'l. Pierce's or-
chard over the Slountain to Stony Lane ; thirty acres, more or less, and
about twenty acres more, adjoining to Stony Lane, on the sonthwesi
side thereof, aud reaches home to Hutchinson's lot.
"There is also twenty-four acres of Hutchinson's lot, given to hit
children, per Capt. Carter, tbat is not sold nor divided, at the datf
hereof."
*•*»**-■.••«•*»■«
[Editorial Note. — Consult map of the Waterfield lots in the II ««-
chefter litcvrd, vol. 2, for location of Shepardson's, John Crowe's-
Powell's and Huichinaon's lots fn 163?. Also description accompanying
for number of acres, etc. Davidson or Davison'd lot is evidently hu
ownership later than 1C:iS of another of these lots.
K. B — The description? of lands not located in the vicinity of Win
uhesler are generally those omitted in the above extracts.
— M'ubuni J..u>~nal, March 15, 188^^).
To tlie Converse description may be added others;
" [xiii*] Records of land belonging lo Richard Gaidner in the town
of Wohurn. entered in the year I67S.
" [The dwelling bouse ] One dwelling bouse and barn, with forty and
beven acres of amble laud adjoining to it, situate in Plain Street, near
Winter Pond, part of it being formerly a lot that was Seib Sweelzer's,
of Charle»towo, and part of it being part of u lot that wat> formerly
Edward Gibbons's, and part given by the town of Woburn, bounded hy
Ibe land of James Converse on the east, and on the southeast hy the
land of Josiah Converse and the land of James Converse, Sen., aud on
the south by the land of the said James Converse, and west by tbe laod
of Uatthew Johnsou, and northerly by Winter Pond and t)ie highway
to the meeting-house, and a Hue from the said highway to Winter
Poud.
"[Swamp at Simple Bridge. 6 [acres.] One parcel of land situate
near Matthew Johnson s and Simple Bridge, by estimation six acres, be
it more or less, bounded by the meadow land of William Johnson east, '
and the highway leading to the west end south, Horc Pood Hill lying
north of ii, and northwest by a line between the said land and the !
woodland of James Converse, part of it being swamp and all granted by
the town of Wobum. '
"[Bound Meadow, 10 acres.] One partel of meadow land, being at a
place commonly called Round Meadow, containing all the said meadow. ,
by esiimatioD ten acres, be It more or less, bounded by the land of Rob- '
ert Pierce north, and a highway southeast, and the woodland of the sixth j
diviflioD elsewhere." '
[N. B.— The above piece of meadow is supposed to bealboin Win-
chester.]
"[xv*]. Records of lands belonging to Richard Nevera lying in the
t>ounds of Woburn, entered in the year 1G74.
"(18. Lawrence's lot in Waterfield.] Imprimii, one lot that was for-
merly John Lawrence's, of Cbarlefltown, but now in the possession of
Richard Nevers, it lying in Waterfield, and is bounded by William
Johnson'b land east, and the land of Capt. Edward Johnson south, and
the woodland of the eighth division west, and the woodland of the sev-
enth division north, it being eighteen acres, more or less."
[EniTORUL Note,— Seth Sweetser's lot, near Winter Pond; Edward
GibtMn's lot ; John Lawrence's lot in Waterfield, are shown on the map
of the Waterfield lota of 1638, in Winchester Record, vol. 2. John
Lawrence's lot was then his father's, Henry Lawrence'a. The ranges or
divisions beyond the seventh appear to be based on the origiual survey,
as in the map of Waterfield, where seven divisions are shown.]
— Wi^burn Journal, March 22, 1889.
"[xviii*]. Records of lands belonging to William Johnson entered,
lying in the bounds of Woborn, lfi73.
" [Acres 00. Plain Street]. Imprimu : One dwelling-house, bam,
stables and out-houses, with fifty acres at^iolning thereunto, of arable
land and meadow, situate or being in a place commonly called Plain
Street, bounded by the land of John Green south, and the land of
Matthew Johnson and John Carter east, and the land of Josiah and
James Converse west, and the town Common north.
"[27. This was Hutchinaou'e lot.] One parcel of upland, by estima-
tion twenty and seven acres, more or less, situate In Waterfield, being
the better half of a lot that was formerly George Hutchinson's, bounded
hy the land of John Carter west, and the land of Edward Johnson north,
and the town Common east, and the land of Josiah Converse south.
" \JA). This was Hubbard's lot,] One parcel of land, by estimation,
tifty acres, more or less, situate In Waterfield, bounded by the land of
.Tohn Johnson north and east, and by the land of John Carter south,
and hy the land of Mr. Wade west.
i *' [2j. This was Isaac Cole's lot.] One parcel of land, hy ealimation,
twenty and five acres, more or less, situate in Waterfield, twunded by
I the lands of William Bachelder east, and Abraham Pratt west.
I ■* [\h. Abraham Pratt's lot.] One parcel of land, by estimation, forty-
five acres, more or less, bounded by William Locke's and John Carter's
' woodland west, by the land thai was Isaac Cole's east, but now in tbe
, pessesaion of William Johnson, and (o the land of Mr. \\'Hde north, and
; the land of William Johnson south.
'[45. Bachelder'a lot.] Oneparcel of land, by estimation, forty and
five acres, more or less, situate in Waterfield, bounded by the land of
I John Carter east, and by the land that was formerly Isaac Cole's west,
\ and hy the woodland of William Johnson south, and by the land of
j William Johnson north.
I "[15. Powell's lot.] One parcel of land, aitoate in Waterfield, by esti-
i Illation, fifteen acres, more or leati, bounded by the laud of James Con-
I verse south, by tbe woodland of Richard Gardner east, and by tbe wood-
I land of the said Gardner west."
I [Editobial Note. — William Johnson's laudh, here described, were in
■ the vicinity of '^Plaio Street," or the present Cambridge Street, in the
westerly part of the present town of Winchester, where his dwelling-
house, with other buildings, stood, "situate or being in a place com-
monly called Plain Street." George Hutchinson's lot, Hubbard'b lot,
' Isaac Cole s lot, Abraham Pratt's lot, Bachelder's lot and PoweH'e lot,
I all in Waterfield, are shown on the celebrated map of the "first pos-
sessions of civilized man " in the past and present limits of Woburn.
We state here, with confidence, that we consider tbe homestead of Wil-
liam Johnson to have been the estate latterly known as the Luke Reed
place, in Winchester, in former times occupied by the second Thomas
Belknap, and by Daniel Beed and others, and at present by Edward Rus-
sell].
Wobum Journal, March 29, 1889.
Thus we have in the above a description of lands
from the period of 1673 to 1699, in the limitaor on the
borders of the present town of Winchester, and all
originally in the bounds of Woburn. The familiar
names of localities, such as the Plain, where William
Johnson and Richard Gardner lived, and the names
of such objects as Horn Pond Hill, Horn Pond itaelf,
and Winter Pond, the Abeijoca River and Wedge
748
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS
Pond, Blind Bridge, etc., are readily recognized by all
who read those pages to-day, and thus a clue is given
to the locality of the various lots described 200 vears :
1
ago. 1
The Indian Hill referred to is in Winchester. On ',
July 30, 1850, there was a conveyance from Ruth j
Wyman to Gardner Symmes of 18i acres of the " In- j
dian Hill pasture" in Winchester. This plot was i
bounded north by land of Captain Edmund Parker, !
called the Great Pasture, west by land of heirs of Jo- ■
siah Locke, south by land of heirs of Elijah Pierce, '
and east by land of heirs of Daniel Wyman. {Midd. \
Beg. 588 : 306-7.) The height is evidently that to the ,
west of Cambridge Street, in rear of the estates of |
Ammi C. Winn, or in rear of what wa? formerly |
known as the Daniel Wyman estate, on Cambridge j
Street, later owned by Daniel W. Locke. The use of '
■the word Indian Hill for this same height is found in i
Edward Converse's Inventory, 1663. — Winchester ;
Record, ii. 61.' \
Winchester as a territory exhibits a number of '
local features, still more ancient than those just men-
tioned, which have been already noticed under the
history of Woburn. It was the greater part of the
tract known by the name of Waterfield (1638), at a i
period when the area of Woburn was included within .
that of the town of Charlestown. Here a large por-
tion of the lots laid out and granted to the inhabit-
ants of Charlestown, before the incorporation of
Woburn, were located. Here wiis the ancient Rock- i
field of 1638, named in those grants. Here were, at
least, the tirst to the fifth ranges of these Charlestown |
lots. Here were the farms of Symmes and Nowell, |
the tirst named the minister and the -iecond named ;
the mijgistrate of Charlestown, and a part of the res-
ervation for the Indians ne'ar the Mistick Pond. Here |
also were a part of the farms of John Harvard, the
minister from whom Harvard College was name<l,and j
of Thomas (iraves, the admiral, the original lots of ;
the Richardsons and of Edward Converge (1638) and i
others, afterward connected with the settlement of \
1 Mra. Martha iCutten <jar<inor, who ilied in Winchedter, May 0, 18r.2, '
ill the ninely-eiptith year of tier a!;e, wiis a widow for sixty veara, and
waa dfliitrliter "f .lohii < 'utter, who owned the estate of his fattier, Ji)hD
Cutter, Sr., later known as the Sheritt l-'IiHrles Kimball place, at the '
west 9ido of Winchester, on the corner of j.rcsent t'atiibridge and i
iliurcli street^. When she wan eleven yeara uM ?he viewed the con- :
tiagmtion of charlestown on the ilay of Bunker Mill battle, " from the
top of Indian Hill, n»ar her residence." For an "'bituary, containiii:;
all account ol her antecedents, her fainiU, herself, and her funeral,
bv Dr. Denjaniin I'uiter. see Wubn-n Livl't't Inr .^lav li;. l.HH:i, "Her
;;r.indfather, John C. wa.. esteenu-'l one ol ihe most iiprii;ht men of his
day , and living in tlie ttioe of Whiteheld, .iiid ].ailaking in the refor-
nintlon of the times iii 174". was called a .\ew Li^ht, Hid people within
the iiiemory of those now liviiiL' lii-.ve iiientioned the inlerest Ihev felt
when younu, in listening to his holy conversatious in the interval of
divine worship, when, from the didauce travelled, they were obliged to '
spend the Sabbath noon at or near the house ol worship in Woburn.'' j
This good mall die I in 17S8, and some of his descendants were aiDOiie
the early settlera ct Cincinnati, Ohio. There one of the family was
killed by the Indians, two others died of the smalt. pox, another was i
buried alive lu a well, and oue ol the principal streets is named Cutter
Street.
Woburn (1642). Here was the " River " (1638), later
called the Aberjona River (1641). Here w.is built the
first house in the town of Woburn and the first mill,
both by Edward Converse, and the first bridge (1641).
Here, it may reasonably be supposed, w.is the site of
'.he second bridge (1641), called in the early records
of Woburn the Long Bridge — from its length — and
whose construction was a work of difficulty. Here
was the scene of an early and lamentable accident,
the killing of Samuel Converse, son of Edward, by
the water-wheel of the mill, in February, 1669-70,
and here was the scene or locality of an Indian mas-
sacre during Philip's War — when a woman and two
children, members of the Richardson family, were
killed by a prowling band of hostile Indians, on April
10, 1676. This hostile party was pursued by the en-
raged townspeople, and one of them was killed, in
retaliation for the mischief they had done. Other in-
cidents, now unknown, may have occurred in the dis-
trict now called Winchester, before the beginning of
the eighteenth century, but these few are citeil, as
showing that this part of old AVoburn has had a his-
tory peculiar to itself and its own quarter, on which
we are here but able briefly to tiiiicb. In the matter
of neighborhood divisions in the older town, this part
of Woburn was designated, before 1700, as the " South
Eud." Richai'dsoni' Row was, in part, in the " East
End '' of the town, in these early designations. " The
Town '' signified, in accordance with the customs of
all towns at that date, the "Centre,'' or the centre vil-
lage of the commnniiy, set off as a separate town.
For 150 years these distinctions existed, in Woburn
with little change, and in 1792 the districts of "Rich-
ardsons' Row " and the " West Side'' are recogni/ed
in the public records, and remained much in their
original condition till 1831, and also with little
change, till 1845. In 1729 .Mr. Thomas Belknap's
house, known to be in the limits of Winchester, w:is
ii place for the movable grammar school to be kept.
In 1738 the same schuol was to he kept in (2) the
Richard.sons' and the Carters' "at the southerly part
of the town," and at the same period a station for the
school was established at the southerly part of iJic//-
ardsons' Row, " for them, the Richardsons and the
Carters." In 1742 the sixth and last quarter for the
school was the " Carters' quarter " in this section of
Woburn, in the " house of Mr. Ebenezer Converse,"
at present Winchester Centre, where the school was
to remain two months. These distinctions are very
patent to any one at all acquainted with the early
history of the section now known as Winchester.
Some interesting recollections of the Black Horse
\'illage in South Woburn, 1822-25, etc., are given
by Colonel William T. Grammer, of Woburn, in the
Winchester Record, ii. 81-83. In 1822 his father,
William Grammer, and his father's brother, Seth
Grammer, moved from Boston to that place, and lived
on the Swan farm, so called, opposite to the farm of
one Caleb French, whose wife was a Swan. The
WINCHESTER.
T49
brothers Grammer sold out soon to the Hon. William
C. Jarvis. whose successor was Isaac Shattuck on the
same premises. lu 1S2.J the Grammers built a store
near the junction of Main and Washingrlon Streets,
which, though not the hrst, was one of the early
stores at that place. It was on the west >ide of Main
Street, or the " Great Road," and opposite tn tlie
neighboring blacksmith-shop of F. and \. li. John-
son, well reuiemb<'red by the older citizens. The
store wii^ called in high phrase an " English and
West India Goods .Store," and li(|Uor. as wa.-> common
in the stores of that time, was one of its .stajile com-
modities. I>uring the stay of the I'Trammer family
on the Swan I'arm, a house opposite was burned on
the French estate, bef<jre mentioned, .\bout the
same period William Grammer, the father, erected a
lilierty-poie, or tlag-pole, as the younger generaiiou
of this day would term it. These starts were very
popular in the lountry at large at that time. The
pole stood at the junction of the two street^ near the
store, and its raider owned the Hag which wa.- dis-
played upon it.
Some idea of the jnjportance and ancient character
of the hostelry known a^ the Bhiok Horse Tavern, in
A\'inchester, ma\ be gained by the following allusions
to its former history. In ITiil ililes .Ue.xaiider sold
this housi- to Noah \\'yii)an, the house having formerly
been licensed tor an inn or tavern, ami Noah Wvman
immediately petitioned the (ieneral (,'i>iirt for an
inn-holder's license c)n the estate. In ITT-' the tavern
was on the upper .stage route. ..,u called, from lll>^ton
to Portsmouth in New Hampshire. Its keeper, ac-
cording to the almanac f'>r that year, wa> Wynian,
evidently the Noah Wynian above-mentioned. In
171':; the same road wa.s called the U])per road to C'ascu
H;;y, eastward, or to the present citv ol' PorllaDd,
Maine. The trave'er from JJoston came by way
of Medford, di>taiil lour miles from the starting-point,
and thence to Woburn. and afterwards lo Wilming-
li'D. when on this route. In 1813 a >till higher as-
piration was given lo the traveler on the (.'asco Bay
route, by calling his pathway through this section
" the road from Boston lo .Montreal," ai;d in the year
following " the road to Montre.il and (Quebec ! ' Al
thi? jieri'id one Hill appears to be the keeper of the
Black Hor-e Tavern.
Some interesting items regarding Winchester his-
tory are presented in some extracts from the diary of
John Swan (born 177ii, died 1804) and i>ublished in
the Winchester He'sord, ii. 4"i7-4.5n. A brief reference
to some of tjese items, of general interest, is here
made. Mr. Swan mowed and raked Blind Bridge
meadow, 1811, whence he brought two loads of hay.
He was at Blind Bridge meadow haying in 1S14, and
again in ISlo. He was engaged to teach school in
1811 and in 1817. He bought the Edward Gardner
estate in 181.^. On October ."0, 1814, being a Sunday
evening, his brother. Stephen Swan, returned home
from Dorchester Heights, and all the company of
light infantry, of which he was a member. The com-
; pany had been gone on that service seven weeks. In
181o the "great and important news of peace" arrived
at Boston from New York, in 32 hours, — 243 miles I
" It is said the man had S2l'"> for bringing the news."
In 1828 this same Stephen Swan " raised hie barn,"
40x60, and " had 4-5 men to supper and 11 boys."' In
1841 the barn of Mr. Collins was burned, G.30 evening.
There were fires at Baconville, in Winchester, in 185o
and 1858 — the latter a destructive one, cotton-batten-
ing factory burned. In 18.58 Luke Wyman's Pond
Plain lot was sold to e.x-Goveruor Edward Everett,
for $.">000, and in lSo9 the same purchaser bought
tifty-three acres of land north of Stephen Swan's farm,
from Dea. Luke Wy man, for S8000. The late Samuel
•Gardner's farm was sold in 18.58 for $i)')00 or .?7000.
The Wincheslfi- Kecord, published by the Winches-
ter Historical and Genealogical Society, contains an
abundance of facts regarding the earlier events con-
nected with the civil history and institutions of South
Wobiirn and Winchester, which we cannot reproduce
here. To that public.ition the historical student is
therefore directed for an account of many things
which do not find mention here.
X valuable original paper is a list of the children
attending a school in Richardsons' Row in the year
178<i, a description of which is given in the Wim-hes-
irr Record, i. 164-165. It was dated Woburn, March
2, 1786. and signed by Michael McDonnell, teaclo-r.
The family names represented are Richardson, Evans,
Parker, Eaton, Whittemore, Hadley, Watts, Miller,
Skinner, Wyman, Jaijuith, Mead, Symmes and <^Ion-
ver^e. Total number of scholars forty-six, — all chil-
dren belonging to families living in that quarter of
W'oliurn. A new school-house, so called, for Rich-
ardsons' Row was dedicated November 1, 1818.
The act to incorporate the town of Winchester in
the year 185<i is photographed, and a copy is pre-
sented in the Winchesler Record, vol. i. p. 41. By its
terms all the territory witbin the towns of Woburn,
Medford and West Cambridge, comjirised within the
limits stated, was thereby incorporated into a town,
hy the name of Winchester. For bounds, see copy of
the above act in the publication referred to. The
line stated between Woburn and Winchester to be
wa> half-way between the south sideof Woburn Com-
mon and the depot a1 South Woburn, as it was then
situated, and as Main Street then and now runs.
! Other provisions were imposed upon the town of
' Winchester, as was common in such cases. It was
passed April 30, 1850. The separation of this town
from the older towns was not accomplished without
very vigorous remonstrances on the part of those
towns whose territory was aH'ected, and a lively con-
test in the Legislature. An account of the whole
matter is to be found in the Winchester Record in an
article in vol. i. pp. 312-332. Measures for a separa-
tion were first taken by inhabitants of the section to
be set ofl^ in December, 1849. The first meeting of
750
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
these persons was held on December 17th. BenjamiD
F. Thompson and John A, Belles and ofher well-
known citizens were prominent in the project. A
second meeting was held on December 24th, when
the well-known name of Frederick O. Prince was
added to the others. At this meeting the following
names for the new town were proposed : Appleton,
Avon, Channing, Waterville, Winchester and Win-
throp. The name of Winchester was the one de-
cided upon, for the reason that a person of that name
had proffered aid in a financial way to the enterprise.
The petition for the incorporation of Winchester was
presented to the Legislature on January 19, 1850,
and the request was granted on its first application.
Hon. Albert H. Nelson, of Woburn, was engaged as
counsel for the petitioners, and his services and in-
fluence were very valuable in their behalf. " No
money was used by either side to gain influence, not
a dollar for lobby or a supper ; " and when the leg-
islative committee visited Winchester to examine the
ground, they were given a very plain collation, not
in a spirit of parsimony, but in accordance with the
requirements of the occasion ; indeed, had a more
expensive entertainment been presented, the cause
would undoubtedly have received injury. The citi-
zens paid their counsel two hundred and fifty dollars,
and Mr. Bolles, for his legal work, fifty dollars, also
all the necessary expenses, the town committee mak-
ing no charge for their services. Thus was the town
of Winchester started clear of debt. Her motto was,
" Economy and prompt payment." Her leading
town officers for the first year made no charge for
their services. " The service was itself of the best," says
one who well knew.'
Much the larger part of the territorj' was taken
from that of Woburn. (Of. map, mnchesier Becord,
ii. 417.) Thus, as has been already shown, the early
history of this town is chiefly to be found in that, al-
though the south part involves the history of the In-
dian reservation near Mistick Pond, and that of the
Symmes farm, originally the grant to Zachariah
Symmes, the minister of Charleslown, as early as
1638, when the section about Winchester was a wil-
derness and Woburn as a town had no existence.
(Cf. Winchester Recm-d, i. 20, 123.)
The choice of the name of Winchester, from Col-
onel William P. Winchester, was fortunate in one
respect, that it brought with its choice a welcome pe-
cuniary gift, in the form of the sum of ^000, to be
used in the erection of a town-hall, or any other
proper object of municipal expenditure. Colonel
Winchester was informed that the name was given to
the town, at the request of its inhabitants, out of
compliment to him, and he, not being content with a
mere verbal expression of his high appreciation of the
honor conferred on his name, begged leave to present
to the new town the sum of $3000 for the purposes
I before mentioned. The letter sent was dated at Bos-
ton, May 25, 1850. (Cf. Winch. Record, ii. 488-489.)
' The death of Colonel Winchester occurred August
6, 1S50, and the new town adopted resolutions of re-
spect and sympathy, which were communicated to
his family. Colonel Winchester died at the early age
of forty-nine years, at his residence in Watertown,
leaving a property estimated at $650,000.' He was
an accomplished scholar, it is said, in the French,
Spanish and Italian languages. The money presented
by Colonel Winchester was first expended on a new
' town cemetery. This fund was returned to the town
treasury in 188-i. Recently it has been transferred to
the town-hall account for a clock and bell, and other
matters connected with that building. On the bell in
the tower an inscription is cast, to the effect that this
j clock and bell commemorate the gift of William P.
; Winchester to the town which bears his name. The
lyceum hall was built Ijy a company as a private en-
terprise. Colonel Winchester was long a provision
dealer in Boston, and inherited a large fortune from
j his father.'
Some of the must valuable reminiscences of the
; village of South Woburn, 1834-36, are those of Oliver
R. Clark, published in the first volume of the Winches-
' tei- Record. The portion of the village near the cross-
1 iug of the Boston and Lowell Railroad by that great
artery of travel, Main Street — ancient as the first set-
tlement of the region — was called the " Woburn
Gates," because gates were closed at the railroad
crossing, when trains were passing the point. The
original scheme of the railway connecting Boston and
Lowell did not appear to contemplate any provision
I for business at this point, so the building first used as
a station was a small .shoemakers shop, about 10x15,
which answered every purpose till the increasing size
of the village rendered a larger building necessary.
This building or depot wasopposite the original town-
hall, or lyceum-hall, and it remained at this point
with changes of buildings only, till about 1872. For
two years after the opening of the railroad, says Mr.
Clark, but few changes were observed. But there was
a man whose eagle eye saw the advantages of that spot
as a good locality for business and the founding of a
' new town.
This was Mr. S. S. Richardson, so called, or Samuel
Steele Richardson, a large manufacturer of shoes in
Woburn, and then considered a rich man. He got
possession of the ancient Converse Mill site, now thft
Whitney Mill :rite, at Winchester Centre, and of a
large tract of land adjoining it, and repaired or en-
tirely rebuilt the old mill, and commenced and fin-
ished several houses, and among others a shoe-shop,
i where the lyceum hall afterwards stood. He soon
I afterwards purchased the Black Horse Farm, where
! the old tavern of that name stood, and the land on
> Hon. OliYer B. Clark, Winch. Beeord, i. 327.
iWiiichisUr Becord, ill. 70.
^"Ricb Men of Maaeachuwtta," (Boat. 1852J, p. 132.
WINCHESTER.
751
which most of the houses are built on that extensive
hill-side. In 1837, however, having speculated in
eastern lands too extensively, he became financially
embarrassed, and the interests of the new village suf-
fered. His place, however, was taken by a man of
still greater financial ability, and one of the mostefij-
cient agencies in forming the future prosperity and
distinctive character of Winchester. This was Benja-
man F. Thompson, brother of the well-known Gen-
eral Abijah Thompson, of Wobum, who had lived at
the Centre, and built a tannery there, and the house
occupied by the children of the late Walter Frost, on
Pleasant Street, corner of Lexington Street. Like
his brother Abijah, he had begun business in a small
way, which he had increased, removing to the South
Village in 1837 or 1838. Here he purchased the land
and built a tannery, lately Mr. Waldmeyer's. His ad-
vent was a promise of the future respectability and
morality of the town to be. In the older village at
the Centre he had been a well-established influence
for good. His garden in Woburn was beautiful, and
a special attraction of the town. His person and sur-
roundings were distinguished by a refined and culti-
vated taste, denoting attention to the proprietie.-; of a
thoughtful and discriminating habit of life, and in all
his business relation.- and transactions there was a
corresponding completeness of propriety and indis-
putable correctness. His word was considered by all
who knew him or dealt with him as good as his bond.
Such was the man who now joined his fortunes with
the village of South M'oburn,and latterly of the town
of Winchester.
Samuel S. Richardson was born in AVoburn, July
I'J, 1806, sou of Calvin and Sarah. His father was a
well-known citizen. The family were residents of
Richardsons' Row, in the locality now embraced iu
the limits of Winchester. He entered upon a Inisi-
ness life at an early age, and was at one time the
largest and most influential .shoe manufacturer in
AVoburu, giving employment to one hundred and
fifty persons at a time. He was active and smart in
whatever he undertook. His manner was inspiring,
and he gave life and vigor to all his undertakings.
His wife was Abigail Mead, of Bedford, Massachu-
setts, and by her he had two childran — a son and
a daughter. After her death he married a sec-
ood wife, Sophia Stanton, of Winchester. He
died, aged sixty-two, January 20, 1869. He possessed
some peculiarities. For instance : " From Portland
to New (Orleans he would travel often in advance of
railroads and steamboats, with his coat under his arm,
a shoe in his hand and a change of linen in his
pocket, never waiting for any one, yet always behind
in starting. Once on the Mississippi River he was
left at Memi)his, but before the boat got to the next
landing he was there, ready to spring aboard on its
arrival." " He was a man,'' writes one who well knew
him, ■' propelled by a mind intensely nervous and
surpassingly active." When he went to South Wo-
burn, in 1836, says the same writer, it was " a small
place with a blacksmith and wheelwright shop, and a
little grocery store; Cutters' mill was grinding corn
and beginning to saw mahogany. The old Abel Rich-
ardson mill was toppling over with age, the roof
fallen in. and the millstones sunk in the stream below.
The cars had been running two years." (Cf sketch of
S. S. Richardson, by Nathaniel A. Richardson, in
Woburn Journal, December 17, 1886.) Benjamin F.
Thompson is the subject of an extended notice in
another place in this sketch.
Mr. Oliver R. Clark says of the period of 1836-
1838, that there was but little business at that time in
Winchester. The streets were likewise few. Main
.Street, or the great road from Woburn to Medford,
was then very much as it now is. The houses also
were not numerous, and in his article he attempts a
dejcription of them and of the establishments for
business. One of the principal business establish-
ments was the old mahogany mill of the Messrs. Cut-
ter, one of the wonders of the boyhood of the present
writer. The original mill was burned in 1841, and
immediately rebuilt, and an important business be-
gun. The " Gates " made a strong impression on the
youthful mind. They were ponderous affairs to pro-
tect parlies from danger at the railroad crossing on
Main Street, and were swung open and closed by the
bystanders. At that time it was not uncommon for
persons to travel miles to see the steam monster, then
used as a locomotive. The trains, however, were few
and far between, the engines small, and the cars
much like the old-fashioned .>tage-coaches, with the
doors on the sides. The engineer was not protected,
as now, by a cab, and the conductor and brakeman
rode on the top of the cars. The speed of these
trains, according to the statement of Mr. Eli Cooper
one of the earliest locomotive engineers on this road,
was considerable, perhaps as great as many of the
trains now. The proceedings on stopping at stations
were those of the most approved English fashion of
that date. They are described quite minutely in the
Winchester Record, i. 57, by Mr. Abijah Thomp.son.
The early depot-masters were John Robinson, shoe
maker; John Donahoe, the first to make the position a
regular business ; and Captain Nathan Jaquith, the
successor of Donahoe. Captain Jaquith combined the
duties of depot-master, baggage-master and gate-ten-
der in one office. He was active and energetic, and
besides this started the livery business in the village.
He died February 16, 187.'5, at the advanced age of
ninety-three years, ten months and sixteen days. A
very interesting picture of the centre of Sooth W'o-
burn Village is given in a view from a painting by Dr.
R. U. Piper, of date 1840, a copy of which is pre-
sented in the Winchester Record, i. 59.
The village which had thus sprung up "just eight
miles from Boston," by railroad, was given a still
more positive character as an independent commu-
nity by the formation of a church parish in 1840.
752
HISTORY OF iMIDDLESEX COUNTY, JIASSACHUSETTS.
The history of this enterprise belongs to the ecclesias-
tical history in another part of this sketch. A house
of worship was dedicated December 30. 1840, and was
altered and enlarged in 1852, and destroyed by fire
on JIarch 20, 1853 ; and it^ successor was dedicated
the " Winchester fund " aided in the purchase of land
for a cemeterv, and her school-houses were not ex-
pensive aftairs. In 1855 the number of school.* in
Winchester was nine ; school-bouses, seven. The
town h,id never been divided into school district.s
October 11, 1854, being erected near the same site as and had no district or prudencial committees. The
the former. Behind this edifice, in 1844. the parish ' School Committee of the town had charge of all the
established a small burying-ground. This was after- j schools and school-houses, and one common and uiii-
wards given up, and on April 7, 1851, the town voted j form system of administration had been applied to
to choose a committee to purchase a lot for a ceme- | every school aud sihool division. - This arrangement
tery, which was named the Wildwood Cemetery.
On the site of the ancient mill purchased by S. S.
Richardson, a new one was built, in 1838-39. In
this later structure quite a variety of business was
would seem to be an improvement on the methods
then in vogue in other towns, though common enough
now. From the first year of its incorporation the
town had a Hi^h .'^chool in which it took a corn-
carried on — sash and blind-making, by Leonard Gil- j mendable pride, and its schools have always been the
son and others; veneer sawing, by Harrison Parker, : subjec* of an unusual interest. In 1859 the number
in 1843, Mr. Parker inventing a machine for cutting i of school-houses w.is eight, and a priv.nte school was
veneers, which was used in this building. This build-
ing was burned January 18, 1845, and soon rebuilt.
In the building burned Amos Whittemore put in one
of the first machines invented for pegging shoes. It
was his invention, and attracted much attention
when new. Further along, on the same street, near
the junction of Washington and Main Streets, was
the blacksmith shop of Major Francis Johnson and
Nathan B. Johnson, its owners at that period. It
was one of the most famous shops of the region, and
much work was done in it at this time for the Boston
and Lowell Railroad. In the evenings in winter the i
glowing fires were seen in full blast, and the air of !
enterprise about the place waa inspiring and invigor- i
atinir. The antiquity of this stand can be traced into 1
the former centurj', when horses were formerly shod 1
taught in the lower hall of the Lyceum Building.
The half-day session was at that time a feature of the
High School, and Thomas Emerson, a native of the
town, and eminent latterly as a school superintendent
and instructor, was its principal. The number of
families in the town did not then require the legal
maintenance of such a school, and it was, in fact, the
smallest town in the State that tlien sustained a High
School.
Seven new school-houses had been built between
1850 and I811O. Its whole taxable property at that
period was but little more than half a million dollars,
and its population numbered but eighteen hundred
and one. Among the towns and cities of Massachu-
setts its standing in the comparative amount of money
expended for education, was at that time the fifth,
I town library is first mentioned, and disbursements on
j its account are iriven. The first published report of
here, belonging to the ancient stage-coaches of j and again the second. In the published financial re-
tlie earlier date. Further on waa the old Black | port of the town for 18iiO, an appropriation for the
Horse tavern, with its ample stables and pleasant
grounds. At Symraes' Corner was another black-
smith shop, where considerable business was also I the trustees of that institution appeared in 1861. In
i November, IS'il. the teachers of the High School
j generously relinquished a part of their sal.iries, of
1 their own accord, in consideration of the pressure of
I the times, occasioned by the Civil War and the em-
I barrassed state of the treasury of the town. Disburse-
ments on account of the families of volunteers en-
listed in the service of the United States from Win-
chester in the prevailing war were first published in
the financial report for 18fi2, and the first printed
report of the selectmen was made in that year. The
list of military expenses waa very much increased in
the financial report for ISfiO, an appropriation hav-
ing been made of ^13,300 for that purpose. Its i|Uota
in July, 1S<!2, was twenty-rive men for three years,
which was promptly raised and mustered into the
service of the United States. The next call w.as for
nine-months' men, and the (|uota fixed was forty-
three. That number was furnished. .\ new appor-
tionment under this call increased the number to
done. (Cf. article in Winchester Record, by 0. R.
Clark, i. 12.5-29.)
t
II. CIVIL HI.STORY AFTER INCORPORATION, OR [
FROM 1850 TO THE PRESENT TIME.
Winchester had one advantage when incorporated |
as a town. It waa a new town, and could avail itself
of the experience of many generations. It could
avoid the errors of other and older municipalities,
and shape the institutions of the place after a more
perfect pattern. ' That the younger generation might
have a worthy inheritance, great attention was paid to
schools, and hence many of the early reports were
practically school reports. The town expenditure
was largely for this object. The town was obliged
from necessity to make a large outlay for bridges, but
her expenses, as a whole, were not extraordinary.
At the outset she had no expensive hall to erect, and
' See the enlar^ment of thia idea in the School Report of Wiocheiter
for 1860.
< See Rrport of School CmmiilUe for 1861-SS.
■WINCHESTER.
753
sixty, and twenty-two men were, by authority, ob-
tained from the town of Reading, by transfer to the
rredit of Winchester. One hundred and eight of the
town's citizens left their hotnes at this time to join
the nation's defenders. Fifty-three families of these
men were aided by the town at this period. Care-
fully prepared lists of the Winchester volunteers are
given in the jjublished annual reports for 1863 and
ISiiiK Later calls for men are mentioned in the
annual reports for 18iJ4 and 18(i5. From October 17,
ISii.'J, to December l."i, lSii4, the town was called upon
to furni>li, in all, one hundred and sixteen men as its
quota : having to their credit on the books of the
."^tate one hundred and nineteen men. \ short his-
tory of what the town did during the Civil War is
given in the annual report for the year ISCG. In this
it is said that the town under the calls of 1861 and
1862, furnished for three years >'r2 men, at an average
cost of ?4.'! per man. town bounty. In 1S62, tlO men
for 0 months were furiiishe'l, at an average cnst of
•^Si! per man, as town bounty, and an average sub-
scription bounty of .•^1:2 per mnn. In 186'), 1864 and
ise-o the town furnisheil 110 men for those years, and
12 men for one year, at an average town bounty of
>^1 1-'). 70, anil an average subscription bounty of 8-58
per man, i)tberwi>e 2-14 men. at a c<ist of ^^i'.i. -197.411.
T(i meet tlii- e.\pen-e. mmiey was hired fur a term of
years: by taxation, and by subscription, town officers
and other- givinir their -trvice> and expenses in the
business. r>iograpliical notice.-, ol those who died in
the -orvice are given in the same report. Their
names are the I'ollowin:::
1. f'.fMr;:'' W I, >.iitl-jrii.'Ii-l a' F-Ttie-j Mi'Drn.-, April !. l«'0,aged
24.
2. .\ar.'n 1'. WeM. piiyuia^^l^r iti tli- iijiv, rtiikniL: a^ captniD. l»iecl
f^n I'uiinl tlie -l^iiui-i •oci-ftii 0"^'*n- l'"iiii'l I'-t b"iii-, .hiii»r U, l>*ij,
uce<I i-.
:t. .I.'SimIi Str.i'l"ii. tT^HHiir, kill-I in Ii.iltlp L.-for** Ri'-hni.iii.l, .Inn.-
2'. 1<"")J, awl J.i
■). V'niDri8.\. Il.il'h. killHil 111 til- ImMIp iib;!! riil|K>p|.-r, \.i-, .-iUR. 1,
7 »••..', »(;e.l J-l.
■.. .lohii Fit7.i.T.ill. ■li'-l 111 Wx-liiii^l"ii. I'. C , Aug. 2, l-'''2, ou lii#
W.1.T t" tlie from.
ti. Joliiifi T. Laur-li'f, kill.-.l ill I'.iltle at AntiPlaui. Sfpt. 17, 1^6J.
ac-.l 21.
T. Ki-»nrii. li l>-l-ll, kill-.l in l.»nl» ii( i ■|iulircllur':i ille, \"a,,SIav3,
l*fil, aseil 21.
s. .l.'hll lioni-'ii, ilieU in liuspil.Tl iil Wnsliiuclon. 11. i'., - — , I.m'iJ.
'.*. .leff'-nmil Fonl, riipi.ii II, with tank iisacliii;: liiat^lL-r ami executive
uttir>T. Iiii'l at l'"'aiifoi-t. N. i'., .lime I>, I^iM,R:eil I'.l.
1" Ira Joli.»iin"tl, iiiO'I Otlober 2'i, I^'i'-.'i, yf tliwa^♦' i-ontr.ictf-d in the
R-rvi'-e, apeil 3ii.
The list of volunteers shows one niai'>r on staff;
one major, commissary ; one major, surgeon; one
major; four cajitains : one captain, commissary ; one
captain in navy ; one captain, paymaster in navy ;
one captain, acting master in navy; two lieuten-
ants; four hosjjjtal stewards ; one medical cadet: one
actiug assistant paymaster in navy ; three sergeants,
and two corporals.
The names of the above, in order of mention, are
as follows :
John A. Bolle.=, on staff of Gen. Dix ; Alfred Xor-
48-u
ton, William Ingalls, William E. Prince, Alonzo F.
Bacon, Jesse Richardson, Closes P. Richardson, J.
Otis Williams, Nathaniel Richardson, William F.
Spicer, Aaron D. Weld, Jeffersou Ford, D. C. B.
i Abrahams, Henry L. Hartshorn, commissioned offi-
j cers.
'. The non-commissioned officers were George H.
i Burnham, R. H. Fletcher, Charles H. Hazelton,
' Franklin S. Pierce, Charles E. Sanborn, Benjamin
Abrahams, Benjamin T. Livingstone, .losiah Stratton,
James W. Abrahams, N. D. Jaquith.
In the year 1865, the closing year of the war, the
town voted and appropriated S25,000 for erecting two
new school-houses. This was a fitting memorial of
the year which brought peace to the country. In the
following year a new high school house and a new
grammar school house were finished, the old high
school house sold, and another school house re-
moved and placed ou another lot. On Aug. 6, 1867,
the Common was purchased of Stephen Cutter and
S. S. Richardson. A large stone bridge over the
stream near the house of Mr. Sullivan Cutter was
recommended in the report of 1869, and the bridge
near the blacksmith shop in the same vicinity was
recommended to be discontinued. The location of
these bridges as they formerly appeared is shown in
a plan of the Abel Richardson farm at Winchester
Centre, of date 1835, noticed under the sketch of
^\'oburn in this work.
Again, in 1870, the School Committee in their report
take " a glance at the past." Twenty years had then
elapsed since Winchester was organized into a town.
When started it had only about 1300 population, 250
voters and 202 children of legal school age. A high
school was at once established, a school system
similar to those in the cities and larger towns of the
Stale was adopted, and five school-houses were im-
mediately erected. lu twenty years there had been
a considerable increase. The number of children had
increased from 202 to 556, and the appropriations
from ?1500 to $7411. The school- houses for the pri-
mary schools were quite uniform in construction,
about thirty by forty feet, with a cupola and neat ex-
terior. In 1872 the small-jiox appeared in the town,
the number of ca.ses being ten, deaths two. At this
time the disease was quite general in the vicinity.
A report of a committee to investigate the subject of
a water supply was made and published in April,
1873. This committee recommended the gravity plan
from the easterly source, or what was known as the
Turkey Swamp plan, a dam being constructed at the
outlet of the swamp for a store reservoir, an engine-
house, pumping engines, and dwelling-house and
three high reservoirs being furnished also. A supple-
mentary rejmrt on the same subject was issued by the
committee in June, 1873, in defence of the former
plan, and an act in addition to a previous act to supply
the town with pure water was passed to enable the
town of Winchester to collect the water from the
754
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
area lying along the easterly side of Winchester,
being in the towns of Winchester, Medford and Stone-
ham, etc. The first annual report of the water com-
missioners appeared in 1874. This report was mainly
an account of the progress of construction, and to
March 1, 1874, the sum of $26,917.24 had been ex-
pended on the work. The second annual report of the
water commissioners, in 1875, contains a history of
the introduction of water Into the town, and a further
account of the progress of the work. The dam and
the laying of the pipes were substantially finished
and the water from the reservoir was first introduced
into the principal main on Sept. 20, 1874. The work-
ing of the system and its features are explained by
the commissioners in the same report. There is also
accompauying it a full report of the engineer and
tables illustrating different details of the subject.
The report of a town committee to draft a code of
rules and regulations for the administration of the
water works was published in the annual report for
1876. In the water commissioners' report for that year
is a detailed account of the expenses of introducing
the water, making an expenditure for that object of
?162,'326.13. A plan for a high service is also men-
tioned in the same report. In 1876 is a report of the
committee on the Common. The said committee
having caused that plot to be graded and surrounded
with a substantial curb of hammered granite, causing
it to become a great ornament and advantage to the
town.
In 1878 the Mystic Valley sewer, built by the city
of Boston through the town, is mentioned. In con-
nection with this work the city of Boston built two
new spans, or openings, at the bridge on Main Street.
Concrete crossings and sidewalks are specially men-
tioned in this year, and so is that abortive enterprise,
the "Mystic Valley Railroad." In the same report
is introduced a brief history of the town, also a list
of the selectmen from the first, representatives to the
Legislature, a consolidated list of expenditures, a
statement of the town debt, and assessoi-s' statistics.
The town clerk's report is made more full by the pub-
lication of names, etc. A committee on the necessity
of building an additional school-house submit a
report in print. In the report for 1880, p. 126, is a
letter from the Hon. 0. R. Clark in relation to the
gift of a town clock by Ebenezer Smith, who made
a secret gift of a -SoOO bill for that purpose, in 1855,
A brief history of the town is again presented in the
report for 1881, and a list of the selectmen and repre-
sentatives, also statistics, and some facts about
municipal indebtedness. In the School Committee's
report for 1882, a sketch of the town in relation to its
educational institutions is given, from which a few
facts might be stated : —
There appears to have been no school-house in the
limits of the present town before 1790, and though a
public school was kept, it could be kept only in some
private house, and then only for a few weeks in the
year. Children sometimes were provided for then at
a private school at the cost of the parents, or by
travel to Woburn or Medford Centre, a distance of
two miles. At the incorporation of the town, in 1850,
there were only two school-houses in its limits, one
at the centre, or South Woburn, and the other on the
Medford Road, near Symmes Corner, formerly in
Medford. The town at its first meeting, May 7, 1850.
chose a committee of three citizens to build five
school-houses in different sections of the town, which
were built during the ensuing year. One school was
called the Giftbrd, for the Hon. S. N. Gifford, who, as
a member of the Legislature, was active in securing
the incorporation of the town. The Rumford was
named for t 'ount Rumford, the most eminent native
of the old town of Woburn; the Washington, from
the name of the street; the Mystic, from the Mistick
Pond, near by ; the Wyman, from the family of that
name ; the Hill, from its location. The High .School
was established at the outset in the old school-house
at the Centre. The number of the inhabitants did
not then require it, but it was established, notwith-
standing. The school system was thus inaugurated
on a very liberal plan, and was managed by the
whole town, and not by districts or by district com-
mittees, but by a School Committee in general charge
of the whole. The high school was kept ten months
and the other schools nine months of the year. In
1853 the Mystic school-house was built, to take the
place of the old one on Medford road. In 1S54 a
primary school-room was fitted up in the Gifford
School-house. In 1857 a school-house was erected
on Washington Street, and named the Adams, in
honor of .lohn Quincy Adams. This building was
enlarged in 1863. In 186"> a new high school house
was built, and a new grammar school house was
erected on Washington Street. The Gifford School-
house was moved. In 1875 the Adams School-house
was sold and a new school-house was erected on
Swanton Street, and named the Chapin School, in
honor of Alonzo Chapin, M.D., long a member of the
School Board. In 1878, a new school-house was built
on town land on Highland Avenue, and called the
Highland School, because of its location. Thus, in
1882, the town had ten school-houses, valued at
857,500. The sketch includes the names of the mem-
bers of the School Committee from 1850, and the
names of many of the teachers of the schools.
The annual report of the Water Board for 1882 de-
scribes the construction of the South Meadow Reser-
voir as a part of their system. The description is
also accompanied by a plan. While excavating for
this reservoir a deposit of mud from twelve to thirteen
feet in depth was found. It was an accumulation of
a vegetable nature and possibly of geological anti-
quity. It was yellow in color when first excavated,
but became black on exposure to air. Remains of
beaver-dams were found at a depth of six or seven
feet from the surface, the ends of the sticks showing
WINCHESTER.
755
the marks of the beavers' teeth diBtinclly, as well as
the grain of the wood, which was of ash, oak and
pine, etc.. any sticks found being readily crushed in
the hand. We state this fact as an interesting arch-
(eological feature of this particular locality. All of
the reports of the Winchester Water Board are inter-
esting reading, and the town itself has reason to be
proud of its water-works and the ability displayed in
the management and construction of them; the ori-
ginal Board of Commissioners who constructed the
works accepting nothing for their services of super-
vision, only the desire of being beneficial to their
fellow-townsmen of the present and future genera-
tions. It is this public spirit which has made the
good town of Winchester what she is to-day. In few
places have greater pains been taken to get always
the best of anything that can be procured for the in-
terests of the town. This careful policy and public
spirit has attracted many people to her precincts, to
locate their homes in a place where they believe that
the best policy without stint will always prevail.
Many towns might ropy after Winchester to advan-
tage in this respect alone. An impartial examination
of her annual reports from her separation as a town
shows this on every page. Each report is practically
the history of the town itself, and so fully expressed
that there is little need of going to the original writ-
ten records for information.
The school report for 188.T mentions the employ-
ment of a school sujieriutendent, and his first report
is given in that year ; also the report of a committee
charged with the duty of altering and enlarging the
grammar school house. In the report of the Water
Board for 18S3 plans for a high service are given. In
1884 the report of a committee on the Common is
presented, in which it is said the surface was re-grad-
ed and the curbstone re-set, the paths improved, also
a water-basin placed upon it, and trees and shrubbery
set out, a considerable sum being acquired by sub-
scription for the purpose. In 1885 the Historical and
Genealogical Society is first mentioned. Mial Cush-
man, collector of Uixe-s for twenty-four years, died on
November 27, 1884. A fountain and lamp-post in
the square in front of the Baptist Church was con-
tributed by citizens, and presented to the town
through a committee, .luly 4, 1884. The annual re-
port for 18.S5 contains a history of Wildwood Ceme-
tery, which is closely connected with the early history
of the town of Winchester. Allusion is made in the
sketch to the original land grant to Charlestown in
!ti40, — to the town of Woburn, incorporated 1G42, —
to Medford, whose history begins in 1630, — to West
Cambridge, (now .Arlington), incorporated 1807,— to the
Boston and I>oweil Railroad, incorporated 1830, and
opened for travel in 183.0 — toSouth Woburn Village,
well advanced in prosperity by 1840, — to its church
parish, the nucleus of the future town, — to the incor-
poration of Winchester, 1850, — and the gift of Col.
William I'. Winchester, — to the appropriation of that
gift to the cemetery, — to a statement of the " Win-
chester Fund " to April 19, 1884, — to the exercises at
the consecration of the cemetery on September 15,
1852, when Rev. R. T. Robinson delivered the invo-
cation, and an original hymn was written for the oc-
casion by Francis A. Durivage, a well-known writer
of the period; pra>er by Rev. N. A. Reed; original
hymn by Mrs. H. J. Lewis ; address by Rev. Rollin
H. Neale, D.D.; hymn, " Montgomerj' ; " prayer by Dr.
Neale, and the benediction. A plan was made of the
grounds by Amasa Farrier. A list of the permanent
funds for the care of lots is given, and also the names
of the persons who have served on the Cemetery Com-
mittee,— another example of the manner in which
Winchester keeps abreast of the times in matters of
history.
A freshet on February 13 and 14, 1886, did consid-
erable damage during its continuance. Bridges were
seriously injured. The stone bridge on Pleasant
Street was injured by the force of the water and
floating ice, aud nearly a third of it was broken
away. At Main Street a portion of one side of the
bridge was carried away. The Lake Street bridge
floated off its foundation, and was secured with diffi-
culty. The Cross Street bridge was under water for
a day and a night, but did not move from its position.
The Washington Street bridge was not injured. Cul-
verts were undermined and fell in. Streets were
gullied badly in places. A particular account of the
"Flood of February, 1886," is given in the Winchet-
ter Record, vol. ii. pp. 387-391. The water in the
streets, however, was not so high as in the flood of
February 16, 1855. Cellars were flooded over quite
an area in the centre village. Foundation walls
were injured, houses were partially submerged and
access to some was only by means of boats. In-
jury to the basement portions of some manufactories
was reported ; but the losses, after all, were not so
great as was at first feared.
In 1886 a new school-house was erected on Church
Street, and called the new Wyman School-house.
The report of the Water Board for 1886 contains an
account of the completion of a high service for the ben-
efit of the system of water-works already established.
This includes a reservoir and wind-mill for pumping
purposes. In September, 1886, cars commenced run-
ning over the street horse-railroad of the Woburn
Street Railway Company through Winchester. In
November, 1886, a petition for the further extension
of this road was presented, and, on December 4th, the
location was granted, and the extension was soon
completed. In 1886 a large and ornamental iron
fountain was placed in the basin on the Common,
being a gift to the town from many of her liberal cit-
izens, more than three hundred in number. On June
28, 1887, the corner-stone was laid for a new town-
hall with Masonic ceremonies. The Winchester
Electric Light Company commenced to light the
streets of Winchester by electricity July 1, 1888. The
756
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY. MASSACHUSETTS.
plant of this company waa transferred to Woburn.
A special report on the cost of the town-hall is given
in the annual report of the town for 1S89.
In 1888 the town library wa? transferred to the
library winp; of the new town-hall. The date of its
reopening in that place was September 8, 1S88. The
Winchester Histoiical and (Genealogical Society
jointly occupied a historical room in the same quar-
ters. In this room is an elegantly-carved oak cabi-
net, with table and chairs to match, given in com-
memoration of Edward Converse, the first settler, by
his descendant, Hon. E. S. Converse, of Maiden.
Edward Converse built the first house in the territory
now represented by Winchester in the year 1()40, near
this hall, on the present site of the Thompson [)lEce,
and the memorial furniture above mentioned was
manufactured and finished in Winchester on the same
site and by the same water-power that was used by
Edward Converse for his mill before li)49.
In the annual report for 1889 is a historical sketch
of the Winchester public library. The nucleus of
this library was .-i village library, founded in 1848-
About 18.")i> iin agricultural library was started, which
was soon merged into that of the village association.
In 1859 the association library was presented to the
town under certain conditions, which were accepted
by the town, and it at once became a public town li-
brary. In 1885 the trustees granted the use of a part
of their rooms to the historical society, and th.it or-
ganization has been an honored guest of the library
department siuce.
In the report for 1889 the Water Board mention
the addition of a permanent steam-pump to their
high service system. This was placed iu position for
use on August 20, 1888. In the annual report for
IS'JO there is a view of the town-hall and library. In
their report for the year the selectmen .say that there
had been an unusual amount of public business during
the year past, occasioned by the location and adjust-
ment of the electric light and telei)hone lines, the
numerous changes, improvements and rei)air8 upon
the town-hall property, the introduction of the Aus-
tralian ballot .system and other various special matter.
The year 1890 is also the two hundred and fiftieth
since the building of the first house withiu the limits
of what is now Winchester, and action is recom-
mended by the selectmen toward an appropriate and
fitting celebration of that eveut. A history of the
cemetery is repeated iu the report for 1890. The new
Gifford School-house was occupied for use December
2, 1889, and was formally accepted February Id, 1890.
A re])ort of the building committee of this school-
house is also presented in the town leport for 1890.
It is a four-room building, two rooms only being at
present finished.
Such is the civil history of Wiuchester as outlined
in her annual reports from 1850 to the present time.
It is true she carries a large amount of municipal in-
debtedness, and some of the enterprises on which she
has entered in her public capacity may have cost a
larger sum than some communities would be willing to
expend in a like manner. But, at the same time, she
has something handsome to show for it, with prospects
of a large future increase in population and wealth.
Our hearty wishes are extended to the good town of
Winchester for an era of prosperity and happiness in
the years to come, greater by far even than that she
has enjoyed in her now glorious past.
Note. — Some particulars regarding the U'iocheHter water-works are
liere presented from the ^fln^ual of Amerkatt n'ater-irorAe, 1S?8. Water
supply.— Surface water, by graAity from impounding reservoir; also
hich service for about ^'^ takers, by pumping with windmill to reservoir.
Rpsefvoii'B — .\n earthen ilani. with .stone ntasunry heart-wall, 30 ft.
high, and (Ji.K) ft. long is built iicp^s stream and forms impounding
I reservoir of ii.3 .icre^ .irea, and 2t"iO,(."«nj,Him gnl!ons capacity. l-Jl ft. above
I town. The high service reservoir is of stone and cement, with brick
I lining ; is 40 ft. in diameter, 10 ft. "lef|i, and has capacity of about luu,-
j (100 galloiifl. \u .idditioual leservoir will cover 144 acres and have a
I depth of :J7 ft. U'inil-mill and piiiiip. — Fniuier is 7."i ft. high, with Mi-
! foot wheel driving a .i-inili pump and lifting water ^7 ft. through
•■-inch wrought-iron and cement pipe. This is a more precise and scien-
j tihc stiilcineiil of Ihe teclmical cliai-acter ••( Winrhester's water-works
' than some of the statements that tia%e preceded.
Since the above was written, Winchester has celebrateil, on July I,
I IS'.lo, the J'l'iili aniiivei-sary of the first settlement in her burderu, or the
I erection of the bouse of Edward l.'unverse, lt'.4i>,— the hrst hous*' built
I in ilie limits of Woburn or Winchester. The celebration comprised a
I procession, oration, dinner with speeches, historical sketch, 'lecumtions,
fire-Works, etc. There were a number of invited guests. The oration
and historical sketch have ^ince been separately published.
CHAPTER LXI.
WINCHESTER-( Continued).
Er(LESI.\.'^TIC.VL HI.STORY.
BV REV. I.. rH"\irsoN.
The First CoxwKEi.ATroNAL Chikch in Win-
chester, originally the oouth ( 'ongregational Church
in Woburn, was organized Nov. 19, 18-10. For some
time previous to that date the population of the
South Village of the old town had rapidly incretJsed
as a consequence of the construction through the
heart of the settlement of the Boston & Lowell Rail-
road. Early in 1839, it having been ascertained that
about one-fourth of the members, including three of
the deacons of the First Church in U'oburn, were res-
idents in this rising community, a petition of these
members was presented to the church for dismission,
with the organization of a new church as the speci-
fied object in view. The petition was not then grant-
ed. The agitation of the subject, however, continued.
Many meetings were held, and there was much earn-
est discussion. A second petition was unsuccessfnl,
though with diminishedoppositiontoitsobject. Mean-
while, at a meeting held by prominent citizens in the
South Village May 12, 1840, it was decided to organ-
ize the South Woburn Congregational Society, and,
on the 1st day of June following, the organization
WINCHESTER.
757
was effected, and a Building Committee was appointed
to purchase a site and erect upon it a house of wor-
ship. The corner-stone of this edifice, which stood
near where the present church edifice stands, was
laid July 27, 184U.
At a meeting of the members of the church, held
in the vestry of thi^ unfinished building Oct. 11, 1840,
Rev. Reuben Emerson, of South Reading, was invit-
ed to preside, Sumner Richardson, one of the peti-
tioners, being secretary. Deacons Nathan B. John-
son, Benjamin F. Thompson and Marshall Wyman
were appointed to prepare another letter requesting
dismission from the First Church. This letter, dated
Nov. 2, 1840, and signed by one hundred, or, as one
record has it, '' one hundred and two persons,'' was
duly presented, and at once received a favorable
answer. The signers were dismissed on the same day
and recommended as in good and regular standiDg,
for the specified purpose of being organized into a
distinct church.
On the 19th of the same month a council was con-
vened. The letters of dismission and recommenda-
tion, together with a proposed Confession of Faith
and Covenant, were presented, duly considered and
declared so far satisfactory that the council proceed-
ed, in the usual way, to organize and recognize the
church, which was designated as the South Woburn
Congregational Church. P:ighty-six of the one hun-
dred persons who signed the petition for a dismissioc
were present and signified their assent to the Articles
of Faith and the Covenant, and " the moderator de-
clared them a regular established t'hurch of our Lord
and Saviour, Jesus Christ."
The public services of this interesting occasion were
held in the vestry of the yet unfinished house of wor-
ship, and were as follows :
Introductory Pmyer Kx!\. Sir. Dennis.
Consecratinp Prayer . . . Rbk .fa*;oli Coggiii, of Tewksbur>-.
Charge totlie C'hurcii, Rev. Keuben Einei-poo, of .South Heading.
Right Hand of Felloivslnp, U»v. AUijali R. Baker, of Medford.
Concluding Prayer Kev. Joseph Bennett, ol Woburn.
The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was then ad
ministered by the moderator. Rev. Reuben Emerson, j
assisted by the Rev. E. Cleveland and Rev. J. Ben-
nett. I
On the 30th of December following the orgauiza- I
tion of the church, the new sanctuary was dedicated '
to the worship of God, Kev. Daniel Crosby, of '
Charlestowu, preaching the sermon. j
The church, yet without a pastor, made an effort to '
obtain the services, in that office, of Rev. James ■
Boutwell, but he declined the invitation. In the i
spring of 1841 Mr. George P. Smith, of Salem, was
called to the pastoral office, and, having signified his
acceptance, was ordained June 17th, following. The
public exercises on the occasion were as follows :
Anthem *' How Sweetly Flowed the Gospel'a Sound."
Invocation and Scripture selections, Rev. T. P. Field, of Danvers
Introductory Prayer, Kev. Reubdn Emereon, of South Reading.
Original Hymn By Mre. Mary L.Bennett.
j Sermon Rev. Kehemiah Adanu, of Boston.
Ordaining Prayer Rev. J. Maon, of Salem.
I Original Hymn By Mrs. Mary L. Bennett.
Charge to the Pastor Rev. J. Towne, of Boston.
J Fellowship of the Cburcbee . . ReT. A. R. Baker, of Medford.
Address to the People . . . Rev. Joeeph Bennett, of Wobnm.
Concluding Prayer . . Rev. W, I. Budingtoii, of Charlestowu.
j In the mean time, Deacons Johnson, Thompson and
I Wyman, who had been ofhce-bearers in the First
, Church, and prominent in the effort to secure the or-
, ganization of a new church, were chosen the first
deacons of the South Church, and Dea. B. F. Thomp-
' son, who had been the superintendent of the Sabbath-
i school of the First, was elected to the same office in
! the new Sabbath -school.
I The ministry of Mr. Smith was brief, but vigorous,
I happy and useful. The church was active and pros-
perous with him as their pastor. It was, therefore,
only with great sorrow that they consented to yield to
1 his repeated request for a release from his position.
I Worn with care and heart-stricken by domestic
t bereavement, the young pastor felt under the sad ne-
cessity of a change, and he was accordingly dis-
missed March 11, 1845, and, during the same year,
was installed pastor of the First Church in Worcester.
I Rev. George Phillips Smith, son of George H. and
Mary fPrime) Smith, was born in Salem Feb. 11,
I 1814. At the early age of sixteen he entered Am-
herst College, from which he graduated in 1835.
After spending some time in teaching, be studied
theology at the Theological Seminary in Andover,
and was ordained, as before stated, June 17, 1841, as
the first pastor of the South Congregational Cliureh
in Woburn. He married, first, Ottavia A. Yale,
daughter of Burrage Yale, of South Reading, June
22, 1S42. She died March 21, 1.^44, leaving one
daughter, who. in 1803, married Rev. L. R. Eastman,
now of Fraraingham. Mr. Smitli married, second,
Margarette Elizabeth, daughter of John B. Osgood,
of Salem, May 6, 1851. Their son, Osgood Phillips,
died in his early manhood.
Mr. Smith died Sept. 3, 1852, from brain and ty-
phoid fever, brought upon him, it is believed, by
overwork. His funeral sermon was preached by Rev.
E. Smalley, of the Union Church in Worcester.
Mr. Smith was succeeded in the pastoral office at
Winchester by Rev. William Tappan Eustis, Jr., of
Boston, who was ordained and installed April 8, 1840.
Rev. R. S. Storrs, D.D., preached the ordination dis-
course. Mr. Eustis' pastorate continued less than two
years, being hardly long enough for any strong at-
tachments. Yet it was not without a fair measure of
prosperity and pleasant relations.
Mr. Eustis was born in Boston July 6, 1821, gradu-
ated from Yale College in 1841, and studied theology
in New Haven and Andover, leaving the last-named
place in 1845. After his dismission from the pastor-
ate at Winchester, Jan. 27, 1848, he was pastor of the
Chapel Street Church, New Haven, Conn., from 1848
to 1869. In 1869 he became pastor of the Memorial
758
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Church, in Springfield, Mass, where he died in oflSce
March 30, 1888.
In 1880 Mr. Eustia received the honorary degree of
Doctor of Divinity from Amherst College, and, during
the same year, he was chosen a member of the Board
of Visitors of Andover Theological Seminary, an
office which he retained till his death.
Mr. Eustia was succeeded in the pastoral office at
Winchester by Rev. John McClary Steele, who was
ordained August 10, 1848. Rev. Nathan Lord, D.D.,
president of Dartmouth College, preached the ordi-
nation sermon.
For a considerable time after the settlement of the
new pastor the church enjoyed a good degree of
prosperity. Mr. Steele was a man of acknowledged
ability and engaged in his work with a commendable
degree of zeal. In addition to his ordinary duties as
a pastor and preacher, he served for a coasiderable
time as a member of the School Committee, of which
he was chairman and in which he exhibited a rare
tact. Meanwhile, the place grew rapidly in popula-
tion and importance. In the summer of 1849, in
order to meet the growing need, the meeting-houae
was enlarged and thoroughly repaired. On the 3d of
April, 1850, the part of Woburn, which embraced the
South Parish, was incorporated as a separate munici-
pality, bearing its present name of Winchester, and
later on, during the year, there were various other
tokens of external prosperity.
But amid ail indications of outward life, there was
a painful sense of disquiet within. A strictly impar-
tial fidelity to the historical facts makes it sadly
necessary to say that between the pastor and a ma-
jority of the people there was a growing lack of har-
mony. On the one hand, Mr. Steele had warm
friends who believed in him and were ready to co-
operate with him. On the other, a much larger num-
ber, including the officers of the church, felt that he
was not adapted to his position, and that certain im-
prudent financial enterprises rendered it better both
for the church and for himself that he should retire
from the field. So, at length, at a meeting of the
parish, held December 22, 1851, they resolved, by
twenty-five votes in the affirmative to four in the
negative.
Mr. Steele, feeling that he could no longer be either
useful or happy amid such general disquiet, at length
resigned his pastoral office. A council was called,
and he. was dismissed February 11, 1852. Meanwhile
Deacons Johnson, Thompson and Wyman, who were
understood to favor his dismission, thought it best to
resign their office also. Though from the first day of
the existence of the church they had been the ac-
knowledged standard-beiirers of the enterprise, they
preferred to vacate their places for other and younger
men, and on March 17, 1853, they all laid down their
office together.
It is pleasant to add to this episode in the general
prosperity and harmony of the church, that its effects
were transient, and that, for many later years, hardly
a trace of it has remained. It is believed that kindly
feelings, on the part of the people, followed the de-
parting minister and that general gratification was
felt in view of his subsequent usefulness in other
fields.
Rev. John McClary Steele, the son of Jonathan
and Elizabeth (McClary) Steele, was born in Epsom,
N. H., September 3, 1823. In both the paternal and
maternal lines of his ancestry he descended from
men distinguished by the intellectual and sturdy
traits of character which contributed largely to Scot-
land's greatness.
In September, 1840, Mr. Steele entered Dartmouth
College, from which he graduated in 1844. with a
high reputation for scholarship. He pursued his
theological studies at Andover, where he held a high
rank as a stndent, and graduated ic 1847.
Mr. Steele married Annie E. Burnham, of Win-
chester, in August, 1852. Of his three children, two
died in infancy; the third, Frederick Lincoln Steele,
now resides in Cincinnati, Ohio.
After leaving Winchester, Mr. Steele was settled in
Stratham, New Hampshire, where he remained about
three years. In the autumn of 1856 he became the
pastor of the First Congregational Society in Colum-
bus, Ohio, but died April 5, 1857, while on a visit to
the city of New York.
The successor of Mr. Steele in Winchester was
Rev. Reuben T. Robinson, who was ordained October
27, 1852, the ordination sermon being preached by
Rev. E. N. Kirk, D.D., of Boston. His pastorate was
much longer than that of either of his predecessors
and was signally happy and useful. In less than six
months after the new relation was consummated the
house of worship, which had not long before been en-
larged and repaired, was entirely consumed by fire.
This disaster occurred March 20, 1853. In the
Woburn Journal of the subsequent week was given
the following account of it:
" On Sunday morning, the 20th inst.. at a little be-
fore eight o'clock, smoke was discovered issuing from
the unfinished basement of the Congregational
Church. It seemed to proceed either from the fur-
nace in the vestry, or from the smoke-pipe passing
through the partition. The bell-rope was in the loft
above the organ, and was reached with great difficulty
on account of the dense smoke that filled the house ;
consequently the usual alarm was not given for some
time. Many citizens, however, were speedily on the
spot, and exerted themselves to the utmost ; but their
efforts were unavailing, for, before the fire was extin-
guished in the basement, it was discovered to be burn-
ing in every direction between the partition; the
cushions, most of the hymn and singing-books, the
Sunday-School libraries, the movable settees, the
pulpit furniture, and one of the clocks were saved.
The house was entirely consumed ; it cost about
$12,000, and was insured for S5,000.
WiW CHESTER.
759
" A new organ, built by Simmons & Mclntire,
some four months ago, at a cost of $1,800, waa entirely
consumed, on which there was no insurance. On the
church was a clock, purchased about three years ago
by the ladies of Winchester for S400, which, with the
bell, was also entirely destroyed."
This unexpected calamity added not a little to the
cares of the young pastor. But, ble-ssed with the cor-
dial sympathies of the people who "had a mind to
work," he was equal to the demand, and every good
enterprise was steadily prosecuted. The congregation
having meanwhile accepted the invitation of the
Baptist Society to worship in Lyceum Hall, then oc-
cupied by them, the corner-stone of a new edifice was
laid September 5, 18.53, and its dedication occurred
October 11, 1854.
Mr. Robinson was a man of rare culture and rarer
wisdom. While he was able to labor, there was an
almost unbroken prosperity. In the single year of
1858 more than 130 persons were admitted members
of the church. But his health was frail and he was
compelled at length to cease from active labor. After
a long season of gradual decline, he died August 24,
1871, having had a pastorate of nearly nineteen
years.
The pastor of so many years and" so eminently suc-
cessful, deserves a special notice in a sketch of the
church he served.
Rev. Reuben Totraan Robinson, the son of Henry
and Sarah (Nye) Robinson, was born in Exeter,
Otsego County, New York, October 27, 1825. His
parents came to Massachusetts when he was between
two and three years old, living for six years in Boston
and then removing to Barre, Worcester County. Here
he attended the district school and became greatly at-
tached to books, caring but little for the usual out-
door sports of children. During the second year of
his residence in Barre, and when he was ten years of
age, he became deeply interested in personal religion
and united with the church in whose meetings, young
as he was, he often took part. After fitting for col-
lege in Monson Academy, he entered Hervard Uni-
versity in 1843, from which he graduated in 1847 with
the honors of being class poet. Even in those student
days his health was poor. Owing partly to his close
application to study and partly to the frugal style of
living which he felt to be necessary, but more proba-
bly to his natural aversion to active out-door exer-
cise, he was not able, after his graduation, to pursue,
as he had hoped, his professional studies. Hence, in-
stead of entering a theological school, he studied, as
he could, at home, taking, meanwhile, lessons in
Hebrew from Rev. Mr. Woodbridge, of Aubumdale.
In a little more than four years he had thus com-
pleted the course of theological study and occasion-
ally preached. After supplying, for a few months, a
pulpit in St. Louis, Missouri, where he was urgently
requested to remain, he returned to Massachusetts
and received calls to settle from both Framingham
and Winchester. Preferring Winchester, he accepted
the call from that place, and was, as already stated,
ordained October 27, 1852. One week previous to this
event he was married to Miss Clara Caldwell, of Ips-
wich. In December, 1869, the wife who had been
spared to him seventeen years and been a constant
helper, died after an illness from pneumonia of only
a week. This great bereavement bore heavily upon
his already enfeebled health, and, though he lived
between one and two years after it, he never really
rallied, and died August 24, 1871. Of bis nine chil-
dren, seven were living at the time of his death, though
the oldest daughter soon followed him. His bereaved
people, to whom he had been greatly endeared,
erected to his memory and that of his wife, a beauti-
ful monument, — a white marble shaft standing on a
granite base and surmounted by a veiled urn. The
expense of this token of affection, $400, was chiefly
defrayed by the Sabbath-School.
Rev. Edwin Cone Bissell was installed November
1, 1871, as Mr. Robinson's successor, Rev. Z. Eddy,
D.D. preaching the sermon. His pastorate of less
than two years was attended by a good measure of
I prosperity. In the one complete year that it em-
1 braced, he admitted about forty persons as members
j of the church, and he was personally highly respecttd
I for his scholarly ability and uniformly consistent
I Christian character. But the time of his service was
! too short to admit of such deeply-rooted mutual at-
tachments as characterized the long ministry of his
immediate predecessor. The people, however, have
ever cherished for him a sincere esteem since he
ceased to be their pastor and are happy to know that
he has, for many years, filled a position of eminent
usefulness as a professor in an important theological
seminary.
In the biographical record of graduates from Am-
herst College is found the following notice of Dr.
Bissell. in an account of the class of 1855 :
"Edwin Cone Bissell, A.M., D.D., aoo of George C. and Elizaltetli
(Wbite^ Biasell, wa£ boru at Schoharie, N. Y., Mar\;h 2, 1832; fitted fur
college at Moiisoo Acadetny ; teacher Willistnn Scniiaary, Ea^hatnptoD,
'55-66; Uuion Theo. Seni , '56-59 ; ordained at Wegthampton, Sept. 21,
1859. and paator, '61*-64 ; paator San Francisco. Cal., '54-69 ; stated sup-
ply, Honolulu, S. I., '69-70 ; pastor Winchester, '71-73 ; niiasiotiHrv of
A. B. C. F. BI., Gratz. Austria, '73-78 ; without charge, Boston, '78-80;
student at Leipsic, Ger., '80-81 ; profeasor. of the Hebrew language and
literature, Hartford, Ct., since '81 ; captjiin of Co. K., 52d Mass. \ols.,
'62-63 ; asaocLAte editor of Pacific (Cat), two and a half years, author of
'The Historic Origin of the Bible,' *The Apocrypha of the Old Tes-
tament,' Inaugural Address, * Propoeed Reconstruction of the Penta-
teuch ; ' D. D., Amher«, 1ST4 ; married, Sept. 6, 1859, Emil}-, daughter
of Oreo Pomeroy, of SomerB, Ct. ; one child."
Rev. Alfred Brooks Dascomb succeeded Dr. Bissell.
He was installed March 4, 1874 ; Rev. Dr. J. M. Man-
ning, of Boston, preached the sermon. Mr. Dascomb,
like his predecessor, was respected and beloved as an
able preacher and a faithful pastor. During the year
following his installation more than sixty persons
were admitted to membership in the church, and each
subsequent year had more or less distinctly the seal of
760
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
God'3 approval of his work. His health, however,
was not robust, and during the year 1878 he was so
seriously disabled that he felt under the necessity of
resigning his office as pastor. His connection with
the church was not, however, regularly dissolved till
October 30th of the next year. His many friends in
Winchester have ever held him and his wife in most
affectionate esteem, and in his subsequent bereave-
ment, by the death of Mrs. Dascomb, they felt the ten-
derest sympathy with him and his six motherless
children.
Mr. Dascomb graduated from Dartmouth College
in 1858, and studied theology, in connection with
teaching in private. Some time after leaving Win-
chester he was installed pastor of the Congregational
Church at Bellows Falls, Vt., where he still remains
greatly respected as a man and a minister of Christ.
Rev. Charles Rollin Seymour was installed <.)cto-
ber 30, 1879, as Mr. Dascomb's successor in Winches-
ter, by the same council that dismissed his predecessor.
Rev. Joseph .1. Duryea, D.D., of Boston, preached
the sermon, and the exercises generally were of rare
interest. During his pastorate of nine j'ears thechurcli
enjoyed gre.it prosperity, and he commanded the sin-
cere respect of the great mass of the people without as
well as within his own parish. The church, in vari-
ous ways, increased in benevolent effort and useful-
ness. In March, 1886, they adopted the method of
putting into permanent form in type the annual sta-
tistics embracing additions, dismissions, deaths, total
membership, biiptisms, benevolent contributions, etc.,
coi>ies at the close of the year to be distributed.
Ill April of the same year the church voted to give
a copy of the Bible to each baptized child of the
Church, on attaining the age of seven years, the pre-
sentation to occur on the second Monday in June.
In October following, a Young People's Society of
Christian Endeavor was formed.
In February, 1887, the " pledge card and envelope"
system of giving to benevolent objects was so far
adopted as greatly to increase the amount of offer-
ings.
In May, 1887, a series of special Union Evangelistic
services was held under the supervision of Rev. B.
Fay Mills, resulting in a positive expression of
faith on the part of many youth and the confirmation
in the truth of some adults.
In the midst of manifold tokens of divine accep-
tance, it was with great regret on the part of not a
few that Mr. Seymour felt constrained, April 15, 1888,
to resign his office .is pastor, the resignation to take
effect on the 6lh of May.
An Ecclesiiistical Council, convened October ytli
following, regularly dissolved the connection, with the
sincerest respect for the retiring pastorandhis family, i
and the most cordial sympathy with the destitute ;
church. I
Rev. Charles Rollins Seymour was born at Roots- |
town, Ohio, July 22, 1845 ; graduated from Western '
Reserve College in 1870, and from Andover Theolog-
ical Seminary in 1874. He was ordained and in-
stalled pastor of the North Church, Newburyport,
October 8, 1874, where he remained till 1879, when
he accepted a call to settle as pastor at Winchester.
.Since leaving Winchester, he has been happily set-
tled as pastor in Bennington, Vermont.
The Board of Officers in the church at Winchester
for 1889 ware Robert Cowdrey, Charles E. Conant,
Harrison Parker, (2d), Alfred C. X'inton, E. Lawrence
Barnard, and Frederic H. Page, deacons ; Rev. Edwin
B. Palmer, Sylvester G. Pierce, and the deacons,
standing committee.
Postscript. — Rev. Darius Augustine Newton was
happily settled as Mr. Seymour's successor in the
pastoral olHce, December 111, 18>;9, and, atlhe present
date (April, 18911) ha.s the promise of a very useful
ministry. The church and society seem to be very
pleasantly united in him. ami ready to co-operate
with him in the increaiingly interesting work to
which they called him.
Mr. Newton graduated from Amherst College in
1879, and from Andover Theological .rfeminary in
1882. Before coming to Winche^ter he had been
twice settled as pastor ; at Lancaster, Massachusetts,
1882-S.:), and at StSneham, Massachusetts, 1SS5-89.
First Baptist Church. — The First Baptist Church
in Winchester was organized August 18, 1852, by the
following-named constituent members:
BcDjitruiD .\brilmin9, Mips M<.-i'cy Ahi'iili;iin-, 31i-*. Aluiirii AuiJrewi,
yin. .\nDS. Chilli. iier, Mia^ L^li/A I'iinloner, "liii U", (JuriiiiH-r, >;iiiiiu'l u.
<;rafton. Natliao Ju-iuirli. .Jr., Sirs. N;i(h:iii .luiiuiiti, J.-liri Ilupley, I'.
Wyiiiiin Lofkc, Mra. Atlulinc LiM.ke. SIi-3. >I«rv Milntire. Itev. Ntitliiiii
A. Iiee.l, Mrs. sunih B. cj. UecJ, NkiIlud A. lined, .li , lliiti>il K. Muu-
ton, Aiiriin 0. WelU.
At the same meeting Rev. N. A. Reed w.is elected
pastor, and, two weeks later, A. D. Weld was elected
clerk.
The church was publicly recognized as a regular
Baptist Church by an ecclesi.istical council, of which
Rev. J. W. Parker, of Cambridge, was moderator,
and Rev. E. K. Fuller, of Medford, was clerk, on the
afternoon of Sept. 2, 1852. The Baptist Churches in
Maiden, Woburn, Medford, Cambridge, West Cam-
bridge, Charlestown, Le.\ington, together with the
First Baldwin Place and Bowdoin Scjuare Baptist
Churches, of Boston, were represented in the council.
The sermon was preached by Rev. Dr. Caldicott, and
the prayer of recognition was offered by Rev. Ira Le-
land, the hand of fellowship being given by the mod-
rator.
The first deacon, John Hopley, was elected Novem-
ber 3d of the same year; but he served alone in the
office for nearly two years, until, in August, 1854, A.
J. Bellows was elected to .serve with him.
Mr. Reed's pastorate came to a close .Vugust 1,
18.54, twenty-three persons havinsr been added to the
church during his brief ministry, nineteen of whom
came by letter from other churches.
An interval of fifteen months elapsed before the
WINCHESTER.
761
church was again favored with pastoral care. De-
cember 1, 1855, Rev. Edwin B. Eddy commenced his
labors, although he did not unite with the ohurch by
letter until June 14, IS-'iT. Daring his vigorous and
successful ministry there occurred the well-remem-
bered, wide-spread revival of '57 anc^ '58, when the
entire country, and especially the Korthern States,
were blessed by very extensive spiritual refreshings.
Before the pastorate of Mr. Eddy closed, upon the
last Sunday in Way, 18GU, ninety-five members had
been added to the church, of whom sixty-one united
by baptism and twenty-five by letter from other
churches.
The next pastor was Rev. Henr)- Hinckley, whose
ministry commenced witli his ordination to the work i
by au ecclesiastical couucil, called by the church,
September 4, 18H2; the sermon on this occasion being
preached by Rev. D. C. Eddy, D.D., and the ordain-
ing prayer offered by Rev. George JI. Preston.
have been received into membership, of whom eighty-
four have united by baptism, forty-six by letter, four
by experience and two by restoration. The present
membership is two hundred and twenty-one.
The following are the names of those who have
served as deacons during the thirty-seven years :
Jubn Hoploy ElectoJ November 3, 1852
A. J. Bellows •' Augmt 2, 1854
Jaa. U. Sandford,
H. K. Stanton, .
\Vin. H. Carleton,
F. S. RichanlaoD,
D. W. Locke, . .
Wm. H. Brewer, .
E. K. Whitney, .
December 2, 1857
January 11, 18G1
January 14, 1807
January 10, 1870
January 19, 1875
November 5, 1880
NoTemt>er 5, 1880
[The foregoing historical sketch of the Baptist
Church was kindley furnished by the pastor, Rev. J.
F. Fielden.]
UxiTARiAK Society.'— The first movement in re-
gard to a Unitarian Society in Winchester was in the
Up to this time the church had suffered the disad- 1 >'^^'' ^^^5< when a Sunday-school was organized by
vantages incident to worshiping in Lyceum Hall, i '■'"^ ^"'■'""' "'^ 'fa's sketch, and continued nearly four
Mr. Hinckley immediately set about raising money I years under his superintendence. Its meetings were
to build a meeting-house, and so successful wa.s he ! ^^Id, a portion of the time, in the Mystic School-
that June P, 1SC4, witnessed the dedication of a neat I bouse, and at other times in what is now Livingston
and convenient edifice, upon the corner of W.ishing- i Hall, and the house of Mrs. Mary Sharon, who cheer-
ton and Mt. Vernon Streets. I f""y ga.^e the use of her rooms, and was herself un-
Upou this interestinc occasion the sermon was | ''-''"S '" fa^"" ^^orts to make the school a success. This
preached by Rev. P. B. Haughwort, of Fall River ; j 8°°<^'*<^y <^'6d ""^"nday,January6, 1889,at theageof
the dedicatory prayer was offered by the former pastor, i eighty-eight years, ten months, retaining her interest
Rev. E. B. Eddy. ' in the .society to the last.
Mr. Hinckley's pastorate was also successful in | Funds for the support of the school were contribu-
increasing the membership of the church by the ad
dition of fifty-one new members, twenty-seven of
whom wert- received by baptism, twenty-one by letter
and three by e.xperieuce.
Mr. Hinckley finished his work in Winchester No-
vember 2, 186(j, and was succeeded the following
spring, March 1, ISlJT, by Rev. S. J. Bronson, under
whose ministry of a little more than two years four-
teen united with the church, five by baptism.
Rev. L. G. Barrett became pastor February 4, 1870,
and during a term of four years' service he was per-
ted by friends in this town, and by others in Medford,
Cambridgeport and Boston. The Rev. Charles
Brooks, of Medford, was very much interested in the
school, and donated to it some books for a library.
The Hon. Albert Fearing gave a large pulpit Bible.
The average attendance at first was about thirty
scholars, but toward the end it numbered fifty or sixty,
about one-half of whom were brought by Mrs. Sharon
from the Industrial School for Girls, which was then
located in this town, and of which she was the
matron. During that period evening meetings were
mitted to welcome to church membership thirty-eight ' ^eld in the Mystic School-house, at which the Rev.
by letter, twenty-eight by baptism and three by ex- I John F. W. Ware came up from Cambridgeport,
perience. Mr. Bqrrett closed his labors here with Charles Brooks and Theo. Tebbetts from Medford, B.
the month of January, 1874, and ia March following Frost from Concord, all of whom have passed from
the church called to the pastorate Rev. Horace F. | earth, John M. Masters from Woburn, and others of
Barnes, who commenced his ministry during the , '^e clergy who joined in this mission work and
same month, and continued it seven fruitful years, j preached before interested audiences. The Sunday-
thereby more than doubling in length of pastoral ' school and church services, however, were discon-
service the average of his predecessors.
During these seven years, sixty-six persons were
received into the fellowship of the church, of which
number forty-three were baptized and twenty-three
were admitted by letter.
Mr. Barnes' (lastorate closed March 1, 1881, and in
August following Joseph F. Fielden became his suc-
cessor. During the eight years which have elapsed I
since that date, one hundred and thirty-six members '
tinned in the spring of 1858.
Several years elapsed after that disbanding, when
^ By Edwin A. Wadleigh. This history wad completed only a few
weelu before the very sudden and lamented death of the writer, in
Boston. While walicio^ from theCausewaj Street Station of the B. &
L. Railroad to the Court-House, about half-past eight, on Friday morn-
ing, January- 10, 1890, and when near the Merrimac House ooMerrimac
Street, he wae instantly prostrated by an apoplectic stroke. He was
carried into the hotel and physicians were called, but he died in about
an hour. — L. T.
762
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the Rev. S. R. Calthrop came to spend a Sunday with
his Winchester friends. About twenty-five persona
who heard of his coming met in the parlor of Dr.
Winsor's house, and there, on Sunday, November 19,
1865, listened to a sermon on " Inspiration," which
inspired them with a determination to hear more of
the same gospel. Another service was accordingly
held in the lower Lyceum Hall on the following Sun-
day, at which more than eighty persons were as-
sembled.
As the interest increased, on November 29, 1865,
the following act of association was drawn up and
signed :
"We, the Bubscribers, cltizena of the town of Winchester and Com-
moDwealth of Massacbimetta, for the purpose of forming a corporation i
in accordance with the provisions of tlie thirty-second chapter of the
Revised Statutes of Massachusetts, hereby associate ourselves together
aa a religious society for religious purposes, in the town of Winchester
aforesaid, nader the corporate name of ' The Winchester Unitarian
Society.' "
The first meeting of the corporation was held on
Wednesday evening, December 5, 1865, at which
meeting C. J. Bishop was chosen moderator ; Charles
P. Curtis, clerk ; F. Windsor, treasurer ; C. J. Bishop,
T. P. Ayer, E. A. Wadleigh, F. O. Prince and Ed-
ward Shattuck, standing committee, in connection
with the clerk acd treasurer. A code of by-laws was
adopted, and the third religious society in Winchester
entered upon its corporate existence.
Lyceum Hall was engaged, and the Winchester
Unitarian Society held its first religious service on
Sunday, December .3, 1865, one hundred persons
being present. A Sunday-school was formed in the
afternoon, with Charles J. Bishop as its superin-
tendent, and fifty scholars came together as the
nucleus of the present school.
The pulpit, for the first six months, was occupied
by different clergymen. At a special meeting of the
society, May 18, 1866, it was voted to invite the Rev.
Richard Metcalf, of Providence, R. I., to become the
pastor. The call was accepted, and, on June 14,
1866, he was dulj installed. The order of services
was as follows :
Introductory prayer by the Rev, Eli Fay, of Woburn ; reading from
the Scriptures by the Rev John M. Masters, of North Cambridge ; orig-
inal hymn by the Rev. ii. G. Bulflnch, D. D., of Cambridge; sermon by
the Rev. James Freeman < 'lark, D.l>., of Boston ; installing prayer by
the Rev. S. J. Livermore, of Lexington ; charge by the Rev. Rufus
Ellis, D.D , of Boston ; right liaud of fellowship by the Rev. H. C.
Badger, of Cambridgeport ; address to the people by the Rev. 3. R. Cal-
throp, of Roxbury ; concluding prayer by the Rev. Thomas J. Uuni-
ford, of Dorchester; benediction by the pastor.
The anniversary of this occasion was observed
every year for fifteen years by a social gathering in
the vestries of the chiirch, where pastor and people
came together and rejoiced in the boud of union
which had been formed.
On June 26, 1866, William Everett, a son of Ed-
ward Everett, then a resident of the town and a wor-
shiper in the church, presented the society with a set
of communion vessels, consisting of four goblets, two
plates and a tankard.
After occupying Lyceum Hall for several years, it
was found to be insufficient for the purposes of the
society, and, in 1869, the incipient steps were taken
toward the purchase of land and the erection of a
house of worship.
In furtherance of this purpose it was deemed nec-
essary to newly organize the society. After important
preliminary steps, the associates for the building of a
house of worship in Winchester and for organizing
an incorporated religious society met, in pursuance
of a warrant, at the time and place appointed. The
meeting was called to order by George P. Brown,
Esq., and Charles P. Curtis was elected and sworn as
clerk. Thomas P. Ayer was chosen moderator. A
new code of by-laws was adopted. Edward Shattuck
was chosen treasurer and John B. Winslow, F. W.
Perry, Frederick Winsor, S. W. Twombly and S. R.
Symmes, standing committee in connection with the
clerk acd treasurer.
'To/erf.— That all the doings of the society, acting under the name of
the Winchester Unitarian Society be, and the same are hereby ratified,
confirmed and adopted by the society as now organized.
'Tdted; — That this Society, in accordance with the terms of the iSlh
Section of the 30th Chapter of the General btatutes, fix upon the s.um of
6fty thousand dollars as the value of the real and psrsonal estate which
it may hold in addition to its meeting-house."
Thomas P. Ayer and Franklin W. Perrj' were the
building committee. A lot of land, pleasantly located
on Main Street, near the centre of the town, was pur-
chased of Francis Johnson and others in May, 186!'.
The corner-stone of the present church edifice was
laid August 25, 1869, with appropriate ceremonies, in
the presence of a large gathering.
Thursday evening, March 17, 1870, the meeting-
house was dedicated to its sacred uses. The services
were of a simple character and were begun by the
Sunday-school children singing a hymn, after which
the chairman of the building committee made an ad-
dress and delivered the key of the house to the chair-
man of the standing committee, who made a proper
response. Next followed an appropriate sermon by
the pastor, after which select passages from Scripture
were read by the minister and congregation alter-
nately, and the services were concluded by singing a
doxology. The architect of the building was Thomas
W. Silloway, of Boston. The house is forty-six feet
wide in front and forty-two in the rear, the extreme
length being eighty-one feet. A tower on the front
right-hand corner is one hundred and ten feet high.
The auditorium contains seventy-two pews with seats
for three hundred and eighty persons, and room in
the gallery for fourteen pews. The cost of the land,
building and furniture was about $23,000, most of
which was met by the generous contributious of mem-
bers and friends of the society here and elsewhere.
Among the subscriptions outside of the limits of the
town were one of $1000 from Alexander Moseley, and
another of like amount from J. B. Winn, of Woburn.
WINCHESTER.
763
In 1873 the late Emmons Hamlin, a member of tbe
society, placed in the church a large chapel organ in
an alcove which had been left for that purpose. This
organ, since the decease of Mr. Hamlin, has been do-
nated to the society by his widow and daughter.
The year 1881 was made tenderly memorable by
the death of the beloved pastor.
Rev. Richard Metcalf. The son of Joel and Su-
sannah (Houghton) Metcalf, of Providence, R. I., he was
born in that city August 19, 1829. He received hi."!
early education in the public schools and had the repu-
tation ofgreatstudiousnessand fidelity. lu 18-13, on the
establishment of the Providence High School, he be-
came one of its hrst members, and, during his course
there, decided to enter college and prepare himself
for a professional career. Passing at length the ex-
aminations with the highest honors, he entered Brown
University in 1847. There he took the highest rank
among unusually able competitors from the very be-
ginning. He was not only first in his class through-
out, but was first in each separate study. At his
graduation, in 1851, he delivered the valedictory ad-
dress with an oration on " The True Fruits of Scholar-
ship." Declining an offer of an important place
among the offices of instruction in the university, he
immediately entered the Cambridge Divinity School,
from which he graduated in 1854, and at once took
charge of a young and struggling society in Bath,
Maine. Though very successful there, ill health
obliged him to relinquish his pulpit in 1857 and
return to Providence for rest. He was not, however,
idle, but, 80 far as his strength allowed, he still
preached from time to time, and for a year took
charge of the Unitarian pulpit in Detroit, Michigan,
very happily. A year later he was called to Mead-
ville, Pennsylvania, where he was settled January 30,
1860. While at Meadville he was married, August
19, 1861, to Miss Sarah Perley Loring, of Concord,
Massachusetts, a happy connection broken only by
her death in October, 1867.
Obliged by renewed illness to resign again, in 1865
the pastoral oflfice, Mr. Metcalf took refuge once more
in Providence. Meanwhile, with partially restored
health, he was induced to accept a very pleasing in-
vitation to resume the pastoral office in Winchester.
A happier union between pastor and people was rarely
formed. Though with still enfeebled health, he com-
pelled the bodily infirmities which hampered his ac-
tivity to augment and intensify his spiritual life.
Mr. Metcalf was married, September 20, 1870, to
Miss Ellen Eugenia Morse, of Winchester, from
whom, during the remainder of his life, he received
unfailing sympathy in his professional interests and
valuable help in his parish work.
In the spring of 1881 he was attacked while preach-
ing by a sudden spasmodic cough, which never after-
ward left him. His society at once offered him a
vacation, and he spent the month of April at the
South, but with only slight benefit. He preached a
few times after his return, but the fatal symptoms of
his disease showed themselves more and more unmis-
takably day by day. By Tuesday, June 28th, it was
plain that the end was near. Through Wednesday
night life was slowly ebbing, and on Thursday morn-
ing, June 30, 1881, at daybreak, he passed quietly
away.
The funeral sevices were held on Saturday, July 2,
1881. A private service at the house was conducted
by the Rev. Dr. Briggs, of Cambridge, with singing
by the members of the Sunday-school. Public ser-
vices were held in the church at one o'clock. The
bearers were the standing committee of the society,
and as they entered the church, carrying the coffin,
the whole congregation rose, while the Rev. C. A.
Staples, standing in the pulpit, recited some passages
from Scripture, and the organ played a soft under-
tone accompaniment. The exercises were as follows :
Chant, " Tbe Lord'e Prayer," Bang by four geDttemec of the pariah ;
Scripture reading by the Rev, C. A. Staples ; bynio, *' He Leodetb Me,"
Bung by tbe Sunday-Bchool ; addrese by tbe Kev. Dr. Briggs; byiDD,
" Father, Wbateer of Earthly Bliss," sung to the tune of " Naoioi," by
the eame male quartette ; readiDg of a poem by Dr. Windsor, written on
the death of Lady Augusta Stanley by Mrs. Charles, tbe author of the
" Schonberg-Colta Family : "
' ' 0 blesed life of service and of love I " etc.
After the reading of the poem, at the special request
of Mrs. Metcalf, the hymn, " Holy Spirit, Source of
Gladness," was read by the Rev. Mr. Barber, of Som-
erville, and sung by the congregation. Benediction
by the Rev. Dr. Briggs.
The final offices were performed at Wildwood Cem-
etery, where a lot had been selected on the slope of
the hill just southeast of the soldiers' monument.
The society erected a granite monument, in the
shape of a pulpit or reading-desk, bearing this in-
scription on the front :
In memory of Bev. Bicbard Bletcalf, for fifteen years the devoted and
beloved pastor of the Winche8t«r Unilaiian Society, this monument is
erected by his people.
" When tbe eye saw bim, then it blesBed him,
When the ear heard bim it rejoiced in bim."
Born in Providence August 19, 1829.
Settled in Winchester June 14, 18UG.
Died in Winchester June 30, 18S1.
On the top of the monument, which resembled an
open book, was an extract from an Easter sermon
by the deceased during the previous year.
The Ladies' Friendly Society also placed a bronze
tablet on the church wall on the left of the pulpit,
bearing this inscription :
1866. 1881.
Id .Memoiy of Rjcbard Metcalf, the first pastor of this Bociety, and In
grateful remembrance of his happy and devoted ministry of fifteen
years, this tablet is placed in the church which be dedicated "to tbe glad
woi-ship of God."
During the year following the decease of Mr. Met-
calf the pulpit of the society was supplied by differ-
ent clergymen. On July 10, 1882, a call was unani-
mously extended to Theodore Chickering Williams,
of Roxbury, a graduate of Harvard, who had
764
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
preached to the great acceptance of the society i become the pastor, and March 14, 1889, a letter of ac-
several times. Mr. Williams, in reply, expressed his ceptance was received from him, and his installation
willingness to accept until the society was better took place on Wednesday evening, May 29, 1889.
acquainted with him, and he with them, but was will-
ing to come and preach to them and perform all other
pastoral duties for three months from September 1,
1882. ThJs offer was accepted, and Mr. Williams
commenced his labors here September 1, 1882. At
the annual meeting of the society, November 9, 1882.
the invitation to Mr. Williams was renewed and
accepted by him, and he was ordained and in-
stalled on Friday evening, November 24, 1882. The
sermon was preached by the Rev. Edward Everett
Hale, D.D., of Boston, and the Revs. Henry H. Bar-
ber, Francis G. Peabody, William I. Nichols and Ed-
ward H. Hall were the other participants in the
service. 1
The pastorate of Mr. Williams, so happily formed,
was of short duration. After a single year of service
he received a call to the Church of .'\.ll Souls, in New i
York. This cpII, after mature reflection, and with
expressions of kindness and consent from his Win-
chester society, he accepted, and closed his labors
with the parish July 31, ISSy. i
On Dec. 3, 1882, J[r. Charles Albert Prince, son of :
Hon. F. O. Prince, generously offered to present to
the society a clock, to be placed on the gallery front
inside of the church edifice, as a memorial of his
deep interest in the society and regard for its late pas-
tor. The offer was accepted, and a handsome marble
clock put up in the place selected for it, with the
name of the donor inscribed thereon.
The pulpit was again supplied by various clergy- i
men until April 24, 1884, when an invitation was ex- ;
tended to the Rev. John Lewis JIarsh, of Northfield, ;
Mass. The invitation having been accepted, Mr. !
Marsh began his ministry June 1, 1884, in u very sim-
ple manner. The minister and the congregation j
united in responsive services, consisting of selections
from the Scriptures, singing and prayer. Dr. F. Win- i
sor, the chairman of the standing committee of the
society, gave a welcome to the new pastor, to which I
he responded in fitting words. An original hymn by !
the Rev. George W. Cooke was sung, followed by a j
sermon by the pastor, and the fellowship of the j
churches by the Rev. H. C. Delong, of Medford, and I
other exercises. ;
On May 27, 1888, Rev. J. L. Marsh sent in his res- '
ignatioD as pastor of the society, which was accepted :
at a parish meeting June 21, 188S, with the following ;
expression of opinion, unanimously adopted; ;
" Raohed, Th»t iD accepting ehe resiguation of our piutor, Rev. J. i
L. Marah, we a^iire him uf our he.irty ;jood wi^be^ for the future wel-
fare and happiness of himself miil his family, which can never he a mat-
ter of indilference to us, who have known and experienced hia kindli- I
neau, maDliness and Hincerity for four J-ears past." I
After having the pulpit supplied for several months '
by candidates, it was voted at a parish meeting, Feb.
27, 1889, to invite Rev. Herbert Mott, of Wayland, to
The order of services was as follows, viz. :
Invocation by Rev. J. B- Mott, of Salem.
... By Rev. H. C. Parker, of Woburn.
Organ Voluntary . .
Introductory Service .
.\ntheni.
Reading of Scriptures Rev. H. C. Delong, of Medford.
The Installation By H. A, Emei^on
(CbnimmD of Standing Committee).
Inatalling Prayer . . . Rev. C. C Everett, D.D., of Cambridge.
Anthem.
Charge to the Minister Rev BroolvHerford, of Boston.
.\ntbeni.
-\ddres3 to the People . . . Rev. T. C. Williams, of New Tork.
Original Hymn.
Benediction By the Pastor.
The present officers of the society (November, 1889)
are as follows :
Clerk, Samuel S. Symmes ; Treasurer, Marshall H.
Dutch ; Standing Committee in connection with the
Clerk and Treasurer, Henry A. Emerson, George H.
Eustis, Lewis Parkhurst, B. S. Briggs, F. W. Daniels.
There are also Committees on Social Meetings, Hos-
pitality, Home Charities, Church Edifice and Grounds
and Music appointed at the annual meeting of the
society, who serve one year and report at that time on
j their doings. The communion service is administered
at stated times during the year.
The operations of the sociefy outside of the church
services are carried on through the instrumentality of
the Sunday -School, the Ladies' Friendly Society,
the Good-Will Club and the AVomen's .\uxiliary.
The Sunday-School meets immediately after the
morning church service, excepting during the months
of July and .\ugust. At the present time (1S89) it
numbers 139 and is officered as follows: .Superin-
tendent, Samuel S. .Symmes ; Assistant .Superin-
tendent, Joseph J. Todd ; Librarian, Miss Alice F.
Symmes; Secretary, Herbert W. Dutch; Teachers,
Rev. Mr. Mott, J. H. Dwinell, .Mrs. H. Mott, S. F.
Gushing, J. T. Wilson, S. C. Bailey, L. .V. Br.adbury
and Misses E. A. Stevens, A. F. Symmes, Anna Fol-
som, M. E. Moseley, R. A. Holbiook and Delia Whit-
ney. It has its penny contributions every Sunday to
the support of the Children's Mission to the Children
of the Destitute and for other purposes. The collec-
tions for the year (1889) amounted to S44.17.
The Ladies' Friendly Society was organized February
14, 1866, to excite and foster a kindly interest among
its members and to raise funds for the church and
parish. " Not to be ministered unto, but to minister,"
is the motto upon which the society has acted since
its formation nearly twenty-four years ago. Its mem-
bers have worked harmoniously together, and from
their annual sales and in other ways have contributed
largely towards the current expenses of the society,
to the extinguishment of the church debt, and the
providing of the church edifice with many things use-
ful and necessary to make it pleasant and attractive to
the worshipers therein.
WINCHESTER.
765
Its meetings are held on the second and fourth
Thursdays of each month in the church parlor and
the society usually holds a sale of useful and fancy
articles made by the members yearly in the month ot
December. Its officers for the year 1889 are: Presi-
dent, Mrs. Henry A. Emerson ; Vice-President, Mrs.
George H. Eustis ; Treasurer, Mrs. B. S. Briggs ; Di-
rectors, Mrs. Joel H. Brown, Mrs. E. E. Metcalf, Mrs.
Thomas S. 8purr, Mrs. F. C. Manchester, Mrs. H. D.
Nash.
The Good-Will Club was organized March 17, 1871,
and meets on the third Tuesday of each month,
from October to April. Its object is " to do good
and get good." Its exercises are of a literary, mus-
ical, dramatic and social character. Any person at-
tending the church and Sunday-school may become
a member by signing the constitution of the club.
The club has, for several seasons, supported a
sewing-school for poor children and others: has
been well patronized, and in many other ways has
done good work.
A Flower Committee from thio club keeps the
pulpit of the church supplied with flowers for the
Sunday services during the year. Its present offi-
cers are: President, Rev. HeibertMott; Vice-Presi-
dent, Louis F. Cutter ; Treasurer, Jlr. Edgar \\.
Metcalf; Secretary, Miss <irace Brown.
The Women's AiiiAliari/ is composed of ladies ol
the society interested in the promotion of Unitarian
Christianity, and is intended to aid the American
Unitarian Association in its objects and aims.
Dr. Fredehick Winsor. — The history of this
society would be incomplete without a sketch of
one who was so intimately identified with it from
its formation, and who deceased early in the year
1889.
Frederick Winsor was born in Boston October 2,
1829, and was the son of Thomas Winsor. He grad-
uated from the Boston Latin School in 1847, and
from Harvard University in ISol, with honorable
distinction. Subsequently he took a course in the
Harvard Medical School, and graduated therefrom
in 1855. He first practiced at Salem, in this State;
wa.s in charge of the State Hospital on Rainsford
Island, in Boston Harbor, under Governor Andrew, in
1859; was surgeon of the Forty -ninth Massachusetts
Regiment, under Colonel (afterwards General) Bartlett,
in 1862 and 186^, and had two special assignments to
the front from State headquarters. He took up his
residence in Winchester in 1864. During his resi-
dence here of a quarter of a century. Dr. Winsor oc-
cupied numerous town offices of honor and trust, in
which he faithfully and acceptably served, among
which may be mentioned that upon the School Board
for four years, lSi'i4-67 ; a trustee of the Public Libra-
ry for many years; a member of the Board of Health
for several years ; medical examiner for this part of
Middlesex County for several years prior to his last
sickness.
In the various societies organized to advance Chris-
tianity, elevate the morals, promote the welfare and
prosperity of the town, the deceased, notwithstanding
his extensive practice, was actively interested, and
found time to give to them his earnest sympathies
and hearty support. He was one of the vice-presi-
dents and trustees of the Winchester Savings Bank
from its organization, in 1871, to the time of his
death ; was one of the early members of the Win-
chester Historical and Genealogical Society; a mem-
ber of the Village Improvement Association ; a mem-
ber of the Calumet Club, and surgeon of the D. Weld
Post, G. A. R.
Since the formation of this society the deceased
was its steadfast friend and supporter, having served
as chairman of its Standing Committee from its
organization until within a few years past. He has
been a superintendent or teacher in the Sunday-
school from its beginning up to the time of his last
sickness ; was president of the Good-Will Club in its
earliest years, and was one of the two whc administer-
ed the communion servire since its establishment, and
whatever movements were made in the church and
society, he was ready to do his part in their advance-
ment.
He became a member of Wm. Parkner Lodge,
F. & A. M., July 11, 1866. He fully exemplified in
his life his Masonic obligations, and his presence was
always welcomed among the brethren.
As a physician Dr. Winsor was well and widely
known, and commanded the respect and confidence
of his brethren, who thought highly of his opinions,
and relied upon his clear medical statements. His
medical practice of late years, during which he had
only rare opportunities for rest or recreation, had
weakened and sown the seeds of disease in his system,
and he was stricken down with a severe attack of
sickness. He recovered somewhat from the attack,
and it was thought that a sojourn of a few months in
the balmy air of the Bermudas would restore him to
comparative health. But these expectations were not
realized. After his arrival there he was again attack-
ed by the disease, and a slight chill on going out
brought on pneumonia, from which he died on Feb-
ruary 25, 1889. He was buried in the cemetery at
Bermuda ; the funeral services were conducted by
Rev. Howard N. Brown, of Brookline.
Dr. Winsor married a daughter of Rev. Henry
Ware, Jr., a minister of the Second Church in Boston
and a professor at Harvard, who survives him with
her seven children.
Memorial services were hel<f at the Unitarian
Church here, March 10, 1889, and were conducted by
Rev. E. H. Hall, of Cambridge, assisted by Rev. C.
F. Russell, of Weston, Rev. J. H. Allen, D.D., of
Cambridge, and Rev. J. L. Marsh, of Biddeford,
Maine, a former pastor of the society. A letter was
read from Rev. T. C. Williams, of New York, also a
former pastor of the society. The church was densely
766
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS
crowded with the friends of the deceased from this
and other towns, and the services were deeply
intffresting.
The Ladies' Friendly Society will soon place on
the walla of the church a memorial tablet to the
memory of the late Dr. Winsor.
Methodist Episcopal Church.' —The first pub-
lic meeting of the Methodists was held Thursday
evening, April 20, 1871, in Union Hall.
Rev. C. L. Eastman, of the Woburn Methodist
Episcopal Church, preached to an audience of sixty,
and afler the sermon conducted a general service of
prayer. At this time there were only four known
families of this denomination in the town, but be-
lieving that there was opportunity for their particular
work, and desiring to propagate the Kingdom of God
by the establishment of their own society,they arranged
for other services, and with the exception of a few
summer months in the first year of their history, they
continued in regular worship.
From the first the movement was successful, other
families soon joining, and the nucleus of a new
church appeared in the formation of a class, January
12, 1872.
So rapidly did the interest develop, that on Febru-
ary 21, 1872, a preliminary meeting was held at the
house of Mr. John C. Mason, at which officers of the
society were informally nominated, and other steps
taken for perfecting the organization.
The first Quarterly Conference was held at the
house of Mr. Ferdinand Scudder, April 25, 1872, by
Rev, David Sherman, D.D., the presiding elder, and
the following-named persons were formally elected
stewards, viz. ; Messrs. John C. Mason, George E.
Cobb, Ferdinand Scudder, Robert M. Armstrong,
.lamesS. Owen and Lewis Erskine ; Ferdinand Scud-
der was appointed class leader, and Robert Arm-
strong was confirmed superintendent of the Sabbath-
School, which had already been instituted, beginning
with forty members.
Rev. Charles W. Drees, who had been sent to the
field March 3, 1872, was now made preacher in
charge of the Winchester Methodist Episcopal Church.
The society worshipped at times in the several halls
of the town, and a few Sabbaths in the Unitarian
Church, the use of which was kindly offered. But
after four years it was apparent that the continued
growth of the society demanded a house of worship.
The necessity was urgent, but the way did not at once
open for the erection of a church edifice. Some steps
were taken, however, with this object in view, aud
Mr. John C. Masoi^purchased a lot of land on Pleas-
ant Street (where the church now stands), which he
designed for this purpose. In the summer of 1875
Miss Butman, a member of the Bromfield Street Meth-
odist Episcopal Church, Boston, made the first dona-
tion to the building enterprise. To this other funds
1 Bj KeT. George H. FerUaa.
were added, and the work commenced early in the
autumn of 1875. The house was completed in the
following spring, and dedicated June 1, 1876. The
dedicatory sermon was preached by Rev. R. R. Mere-
dith, of Boston.
The building committee were John C. Mason,
James S. Owen and George Gurnsey. In this work
the society was aided substantially by friends of other
local denominations, among whom was the late D. N.
Skillings, now held by this people in most respectful
memory for his large generosity.
The growth of the church has not been large in the
recent years, but hopeful and healthful. It has a
membership of 120, a Sunday-School of 123.
During the first years the pulpit was supplied by
pastors of neighboring Methodist Churches and stu-
dents from the School of Theology of Boston Univer-
sity. Since April, 1874, the following members of
the .\nnual Conference have served as pastors: Rev.
D. S. Coles, during whose ministry the church edifice
was built ; Rev. Geo. H. Cheney, Rev. W. H. Mere-
dith, Rev. .1. M. Leonard, Rev. J. H. Mansfield and
Rev. George H. Perkins.
The first thirteen names recorded were Cyrus
Houghton, Leonora Houghton, James S. Owen, Rob-
ert M. .\rmstrong, Samuel Armstrong, Elizabeth L.
Mason, Ferdinand Scudder, Jennie Scudder, Mary A.
Locke, Maud Sanborn, Jennie M. Brown, Nancy Rob-
inson and Elizabeth A. Oliver. They were earnest
and devoted people, believing in the possibility of
actual and present salvation of all mankind through
faith in Jesus Christ.
They knew the power of the (iospel by personal ex-
perience, and told the story of repentance and the
new birth so positively that they commanded atten-
tion, and persuaded many to join them in their dis-
tinctive faith.
While the society owes much to all these original
members, and to many others who united with them,
yet there are some whom we should remember with
more than passing mention.
Cyrus Houghton was the oldest member when the
church was organized, and with his noble wife took a
deep interest in the new enterprise. His death, April,
1884, was a great loss to the people. Mrs. Houghton
still remains (July, 1889), strong in the faith, and with
the golden sunset of a ripe old age crowning her life,
she looks forward confidently to a glorious immortal-
ity. Robert M. Armstrong, the first superintendent,
Ferdinand Scudder, the first class leader, and his de-
voted companion, were untiring workers, and with
great zeal helped on the cause.
Among those who will long be remembered as hold-
ing a prominent place in the early history of the
church, is William F. Fitch, for eleven years filling,
with rare talents for the oflSce, the superintendency
of the Sunday-School, and resigning, to the regret of
all, only when necessary absence from home com-
pelled it.
WINCHESTER.
767
Mr. Isaac N. Pierce, the present superiDtendent,
has won the highest confidence and respect of all by
his faithful and efficient service. He may be recorded
as one providentially sent to the school when a wise
leader and helper was greatly needed.
The names of Mr. and Mrs. John C. Mason are in-
separably connected with the history of this society.
Beginning, they continued with it in unceasing activ-
ity for more than fifteen years. Planning its most
liberal prosperity, bearing the heaviest burdens, and
caring for it as guardians of a sacred trust, they have
made themselves honor which all delight to recog-
nize.
Although Mr. Mason's failing health now incapac-
itates him for further service, and Mrs. Mason's in-
creasing care prevents to a degree her former promi-
nence in the life of the church, yet their work
remains, and coming generation^ will walk in their
light and share the result* of their labors, thanking
God for all the faithful men and women who laid the
foundations of the Winchester Methodist Episcopal
Church.
ORGANIZATION MA\ 1, 1PP9.
Potior. — Rev, George Henry Perkins.
Tt'utUu. — Uiraoi Newton Turner, president ; "William SpooDer Wal-
bniige, treasurer, Warren Lord Knox, clerk: William Augustus Bte-
venb, John Clark Masm, William Farrington Fitcli, .lohn North Maaon,
Frank Lyman Ripley.
Sleictirda. — Frank Lynian Kipley. cfaairman ; William Augustus Ste
vens, treasurer; M'illiam Farrington Fitch, secretary; Warren Lord
Knox, district ; Isaac Newton Pierce, Robert Mitchell Armstrong,
Frederick Orrin Snow, William Spooner Walhridge, George Bartol Tur-
ner, John North Mason.
•^upertiiUndfiit of Smtday'School. — Isaac Newton Pierce.
St. Mary's- Church (Roman Catholic).— This
church, organized in 1873, is on Washington Street.
Rev. AV'iUiam M. O'Brien, pastor : Rev. Dennis Lee,
assistant. Services every Sunday, first Mass at 8 a.m.,
second High Mass at 10.30 a.m., Sunday-school at
2.30 P.M., vespers, 3.3U p.m.
Church of the Epiphany.'— Early in the year
1882, through the interest and zealous labors of sev-
eral ladies, the services of the Protestant Episcopal
Church were started in Winchester.
The first service was held in Harmony Hall, on the
last Sunday in February (February 26, 1882), the
Rev. Charles P. Parker, of Cambridge, officiating.
Mr. Parker, although residing in Cambridge, and un-
able to do any pastoral work, continued in charge of
the mission services until October, 1S82, during that
time having the assistance of several other clergy-
men.
The work having been accepted by the Diocesan
Board of Missions, the Rev. Charles Morris Addison,
rector of Saint John's Church, Arlington, was ap-
pointed missionary in charge, officiating for the first
time October 1, 1S82. The attendance having in-
creased by November, the services were held in
the Methodist ("hurch, which was hired for Sunday
afternoons.
^By the Rev. Messrs. Charles M. Addison and John W, Suter.
A Sunday-school was organized in December, and
early in 1883 the Ladies' Guild was formed. About
this time the congregation was organized into a mis-
sion with the following committee :
The Rev. Charles Morris Addison, missionary; Mr.
Irving S. Palmer, warden ; Mr. Samuel W. McCall,
vestryman; Mr. Frank J. Wills, clerk: Mi. Charles
Gratiot Thompson, treasurer. Previous to th's Mr.
George B. Shepley was treasurer.
It was soon decided by the congregation that the
proper conduct of the services and the future growth
of the Episcopal Church in the town, called for a
church building.
By the beginning of the year 1884, subscriptions
were received for a small Episcopal Church ; the land
on which to place it having been generously offered
by Mr. D. Nelson Skillings. Plans were kindly made
by Mr. George D. Rand, and the prospect was so en-
couraging that work was begun in August, 1884.
The church was completed in January, 1885, and
the first service was held in it on January 25th.
The church having been fully paid for, it was con-
secrated by the Right Reverend Benjamin H. Paddock,
Bishop of the diocese, assisted by a large number of
the clergy, on Friday, May 29, 1885.
In the spring of 1885 the Rev. C. M. Addison re-
signed, and the Rev. John Wallace Suter, who was
ordained in June of the same year, was appointed
minister of the mission, taking charge the 1st of
July. At Easter, 1887, the aid heretofore given by
the Board of Missions wa.'; relinquished, and, April
10, 1888, an independent parish was organized and
incorporated, with the Rev. J. W. Suter as rector;
Messrs. C. Gratiot Thompson and Samuel Walker
McCall were chosen wardens; Mr. F. J. Wills, clerk;
Mr. C. G. Thompson, treasurer; and Messrs. C. W.
Bradstreet, F. W. Jenkins, J. Lynam, J. E. Lyon and
G. H. Richards, Jr., vestrymen.
An organ was procured for the church in the fall
of 1886, and was dedicated at a special service on
December 1st of that year.
At the time of writing, the church numbers 125
communicants and eighty children in the Sunday-
school. The receipts for parish expenses for the year
past were $1951.92, and the offerings for charitable,
missionary and other purposes $749.93. The ladies of
the church are organized in a Guild which is full of
good works, and the girls of the congregation also
have their working Guild.
During the few years of its existence, the church has
grown rapidly with the growth of the town, and
thankfully welcome the prospect of being obliged, in
the near future, to enlarge its accommodations for work
and worship.
HiGHLANii Bethany Society.'— The Highland
Bethany Society, of Winchester, was organized June
6, 1886, with twenty-nine members. Its object was
- By an officer of the Bethany Society.
768
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, 3IASSACHUSETTS.
to provide a Union Chapel for the purpose of main-
taining evangelical preaching, prayer meetings, Sun-
day-school and such other meetings as should sub-
serve the religious interests of the community.
Through the earnest efforts and generous co-oper-
ation of the Highland people, the chapel was com-
pleted and dedicated, free of debt, Sept. 5, 1887. The
total expenditures were $2700. Of this sum, the
largest subscription, $500, or nearly twenty per cent.,
was from Mrs. M. E. Bodge, whose money laid the
foundation of the enterprise ; sixteen per cent, from
the Ladies' Society ; fifteen per cent, from friends in
Boston ; ten per cent, from Woburn, and the balance
from Winchester. A week after the dedication a
Sunday-school of one hundred members was organ-
ized.
The running expenses of the chapel are met by the
weekly pledge system ; and all the children's collec-
tions in the Sunday-school go to benevolence.
The present officers (1889) of the Highland Bethany
Society are: J. Winslow Richardson, clerk ; Henry
Smalley, treasurer. Standing Committee: E.Law-
rence Barnard, Luther Richardson and wife, J. E.
Rice and wife. Miss Grace Lawrence, A. C. Bell.
The officers of the Sunday-school are : E. Law-
rence Barnard, superintendent; Walter Rice, sec-
retary ; George W. Richardson, treasurer.
The officers of the Ladies' Bethany Society are :
Mrs. J. S. Richardson, president ; Mrs. Henry
Smalley, treasurer.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
HEJfRY CUTTER.'
Henry Cutter was a descendant of Ric'uard Cutter,
who emigrated from England, and settled in Cam-
bridge, Massachusetts, about 1640. The ancestors of
Henry Cutter resided principally in Cambridge and
Medford. From Richard Cutter the line was through
Gershom', Gershom', Oershom,*, John'', John'', to Henri/.
He was born at Medford, May 27, 1805, where his par-
ents then resided. His father, .It)hn'' Cutter (1770-
1825), removed to Woburn in 1810, having purchased
themill property at Cutters Village (Winchester) afler-
• By W. a. Cutter.
i wards occupied by his sons; the latter occupied a
tide-mill in North Chelsea, built by their father in
1817, till 1830, when they sold the estate and removed
; to Winchester. Here, in 1830, the brothers, Stephen
and Henry, and uncles Samuel and Amos Cutter,
commenced the mahogany business under the firm of
S. Cutter & Co. Their mill was destroyed by fire,
March 20, 1840, and a new establishment was erected
on its site. The brother Stephen Cutter, born at Med-
ford, October 22, 1797, is yet living, greatly respected,
in his old home at Winchester, at the age of ninety-
two. Henry Cutter was engaged in the mahogany
business with his brother Stephen until about the
! year 1848, when he sold out and started anew under
the firm of H. Cutter & Co. He retired in 1864.
Afterwards he was treasurer of the old Middleboro'
: Marble Company. He had been also a director of
! the Blackstone National Bank in Boston since its
founding.
i At a special meeting of the directors of the Black-
stone National Bank of Boston the following resolu-
tions were passed :
" \>iiiEREiP, Ao all-wi9*^ Providenc** lias I'enioved from ufi one of uur
Dumber, who him, siucp the orgaiiizatiun of the baok. occupied a seat at
this board —
'^Retolied, That we realize thai by the 'Jeath of Henry i'litter we are
eeparaleil from one whose {genial pii-seiice was ever a delight to iia, and
■ whose faithful and couBcientioua oen ice wae; alwaya at our cuinniuDd.
"Reached, That the example of hia life, marked ;iS it was with kind-
oese, booesty and integrity in all its relations, will ever be worMiy of
imitation, and a precious legacy (o fho^ie who are left behind him. '
I Mr. Cutter was a man of sound business principles,
1 and after retiring from active participation in the
! mahogany concern, interested himself in banking
i and in the care of his own estate. He died suddenly
I of heart-di.'iease, in Winchester. August 4, 1S79, aged
I seventy-four.' Mr. Cutter married, in 1S27, Mrs.
Nancy (Wymani Cutter, the widow of hi.~ brother
William. She was the daughter of .Jesse and Susan-
na (Richardson) Wynian, of Woburn. She is still
living. The children of Heury ( utter were two
daughters : (1) Nancy W., the wife of Rev. Stephen
A. Holt, now a resident of Winchester; and (2) Ellen,
the wife of Thomas S. Holton, died 1858, aged nine-
teen.'
' Cf. Wt'burn Journal, .\iigimt '1, I>7'' ; Hofciirii .htverli'^er, August 7,
1879 ; iriiic*cs(er Ilicord, i. i'.7.
2 For fuller genealogical particulars regarding ,^lr. I.'iitter and family,
see Cutter's " Cutter Family of New England,** j>. 230, etc.
^^ ^H^^t^^tpf^^^r^
BOXBOROUGH.
769
CHAPTER LXII.
BOXBOROUGH.
BV LUClt C. HACER.
Some one has said, "Time, like distance, lends
enchantment to the view, :ind the pictures of the past,
seen through the melhnv light of centuries, become
soft and beautiful to the sight, like the shadowy out-
lines of far-otl' mountain peaks, whose purple head*,
half hide themselves l)ehiud a screen of cloud->.'' The
men and women who lived, and loved, and labored,
and reared their homes among these hills and in
these valleys, a hundred years as;u and more, had they
been interrogated, would doubtless have replied, as
did one of the present citizens when questioned with
regard to his ancestry, " • ih, no, we never did any-
thing remarkable, nothing worthy of r)otice." And
yet to us of the present day, as we gaze down the
vista of the departed years, their words and acts are
of very great interest and iuii)ortance, and the labors
and toils which to tliem may have seemed to bear
such meagre fruitage ari' to lis, after the lapse of
more than a century, invested, as it were, with a halo
of glory.
We look back .-^till farther into the i»ast, through
another century or more, and lol the red man is lord
of all these sunny slopes and vales ; and here, wild and
free as his own native hills, he made the forest his
hunting-ground. We are informed by early historians
that the Kev. John lOliot, ol Koxbuiy, visited this
region some time in the seventeenth century. He wa^
a philanthropic uiun and an earnest (Christian. With
him came tieneral I>aiiiel (-lookiii, the h'storian, who
had in charge at that time, as an agent of the Govern-
ment, all the Indian liibes iii Massachusetts. Here
they found 'he chief of the Xashoba Indians, John
Tokatawan, and the venerable Eliot preached and
prayed in the open air, and James Speen and his
Indian choir sang a psalm. But early in the eigh-
teenth century the white men sought a place in this
region where they might build their log huts, found
their homes, and rear their families. We of to-day
can scarcely realize through what dilHculties and
dangers the first permanent settlements were made.
Boxborough was formed by taking a portion from
three adjoining towns — the largest part from Stow, a
smaller portion from Littleton, and a piece of Har-
vard making up the town, whose outline is nearly a
square. Previous to 1750 the boundary line between
Stow and Littleton was near where the present town-
house stauds, running in a southeasterly direction
past the house now owned and occupied by Mr. E. B.
Cobleigh, which was then in Stow, and onward to a
heap of stones in a field in front of Mr. Furbusli's
dwelling, thence in the direction of Mr. Herbert
Blanchard's residence.
Boxborough, though the smallest town in Middle-
49-ii
sex County, is yet " beautiful for situation." From
her lofty hill-tops the true lover of nature is never
weary of gazing on the panorama of beauty which is
everywhere spread out before him. Whichever way
he turns — north, east, south or west — pictures of rare
rural loveliness greet his eye and delight his soul.
No wonder that her sons and daughters love and are
proud of their birth-place. Said one of her former
residents, as he came u[) to an annual gathering "in
the old meeting-house on the hill " (now the town
hall) ; "I always feel as if I was nearer heaven when
I come up to this hill," — words lightly spoken, doubt-
less, and yet they should be true, for surely when one
long since gone forth from his early home to active,
earnest life among men, returns again and feels his
feet pressing once more the soil of his own native
hills, hallowed by so many happy and sacred associa-
tions; when his eyes behold again, as in his youthful
days, the delightful scenery, so familiar grown ; when
his hand clasps the hand of neighbor and friend as
in early youth and his ears hear as of old the loved
voices of his childhood — he may feel more nearly
akin to the early days of free-hearted innocence and
happiness, and therefore "nearer Heaven."
The residents on the outskirts of the towns men-
tioned,— Stow, Littleton and Harvard, — drawn there
probably by the fertility of the soil, tilled their farms
and raised their crops, but found themselves subjected
to much inconvenience through their remoteness
from any i)lace of public worship. So they formed a
society among themselves, purchased the old meet-
ing-house in Harvard in 1775, and then petitioned
the < ieueral Court to be set off as a separate town.
The town is situated in the west central part of
Middlesex County, and is bounded north by Harvard
and Littleton, east by Littleton and Acton, south by
Stow and west by Harvard. From the assessors' re-
port of the present year (1889) we have the follow-
ing : G428 acres of land ; total valuation of assessed
estate, S246,70o; polls, 108; number of scholars in
the public schools, 63. According to the census of
1885 the population was 348 ; in 1850 it numbered
395; and in 1837 the number was 433. The number
of voters in 1889 was 7fi ; in 1834 the number was 99.
In 1847 the whole valuation was $268,913. The
amount of taxes for 1889 was $2840.71; in 1847 the
amount was S1299.08. In the town safe, in very
good condition, there is an outline map on parch-
ment by Silas Holman — scale, two hundred rods to an
inch. His survey was made in 1794, and the area
given is 7036 acres and one hundred rods. By a com-
parison of some of the foregoing figures, it would
seem that the town had been slowly losing ground
for at least a half-century. There seems to be good
reasons for this. It has been a farming community
from the first, but although smallest in population of
any town in Middlesex County, it yet ranks second
only in agriculture. The value of its agricultural
products in 1885 was $92,349. But it is situated at a
770
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
distance from market towns and main thoroughfares ;
though two busy streams, Stony Brook and the Assa-
bet River, have their source here, it has no water-
power of its own by which the many industries of the
present age are carried forward to so great extent in
other places; it has not the advantage of being a
railroad centre. The Fitchburg Railroad skirts its
eastern border, with stations at both Littleton and
Acton — none in Boxborough — and that is all ; it
was of later incorporation than any of the other
towns about us. As a farming town it began ita ex-
istence over a century ago, and as such it is destined
to remain. There is no employment other than
farming to call in those from without, and her own
sons and daughters are drawn away to other towns
and cities in the hope of enjoying their greater ad-
vantages. A good town for one's birth-place ; a
good place to begin the culture of those sterling qual-
ities which shall grow and increase and actuate in all
the affairs of after-life.
As I look at the materials before me for the mak-
ing of this history of Boxborough, gathered in many
different ways and brought together under various
heads and dates, I feel as though it would be, at least,
a saving of thought and labor, could one do, what
the "projector" in Gulliver's Travels was trying to
accomplish, viz., the writing of books in philosophy,
poetry, politics, laws, mathematics, theology and his-
tory (?) without any assistance whatever from
study or genius, by simply throwing upon a frame all
the words in his vocabulary, — in the " ordinary pro-
portion of verbs, participles, nouns," etc., and then
setting his pupils at the work of grinding out the
various tomes. But upon second thought it would be
better, doubtless, to classify and bring under the cor
rect dates and headings these facts and incidents of
early times.
As we have already remarked, it was for conveni-
ence of public worship, not the desire for a new town,
that first led the residents of these remote portions of
three other towns to band themselves together. The
purchase of a church building has also been alluded
to. In an ancient record purporting to be "The
Town Book for Births and Deaths and Strays and
Poor Persons for Boxborough," we find the follow-
ing :
" At a meeting Held on the 31 Day of January, 1775, By a Sartain
Society part Belonging to Stow and part of Littleton and part of Har-
Tard, at the bouse of En* Abel Fletcher, In order to Erect a meatting-
bouse for the publick worehip of God — lly. chose Mr. Coolldge Modera-
tor, 21y. Chose Mr. Bennet W«iod, of Littleton, and Mr. Joseph Stone,
of Stow, a Commit'tes for purchasing Harvani Old ineattinK-HouBe.
" A CoTenant to indemnify b^ Tommittee :
'*Ttai8 may certify that we the Huhscnbeis Do rovonant and engage
with Each other that we will pay our subscriptions as is hereafter set
Down towards purcbaang the Old tueatting bous of Harvard, for which
purpose we have chosen Mr. Bennet Wood of Littleton and Mr. Joseph
Stone of Stow to Represent and act for iia at a vandue in order for Sail
of 0^ House on the Second Day of February next and Do engage hereby
to fnlflU accortllng as tbey the e^ Bennett Wood and Joseph Stone Shall
bid or otherways agre at s^ vandue, in testimony thereof we Do herv-
unto wt our hands tbia 31 Day of January, 1775.
** Silas Wetherbee, one-qnarter part.
Edward Brown, one-sixteenth part.
£ «. d.
Joseph Stone 200
Samnel Wetherbee 300
Phinehaa Wetherbee 1 10 0
Abel Fletcher 200
Reuben Wetherbee 140
John Taylor 1 12 0
Epbraim Whitcomb 200
Oliver Taylor 0 18 0
Solomon Taylor 0 IS 0
Henry Cooledge 20 0
Levi Wetherbee 0 18 0
James Wbitcomb, Jun 0 18 0
Abel \Vhitcomb 200
Boston Draper 200
Lieut Daniel W*etherbee 1 10 0
Edward Wetherbee, 2000 of shingles. Sly. Voted to adjourn to
meating bous Spot."
Then the society met and voted to accept the Com-
mittee's report, and farther " voted to take down s''
Old meatting house and move it to the spot agreed
upon By s'' Society and Raise the Same." Mr. Silas
Wetherbee is recorded as making a present to the so-
ciety of three acres of land " for the use of a meat-
ting hous Lot." Record is also made of the pecuni-
ary aid rendered by each member of the new soci-
ety, and of the work performed upon the newly pur-
chased house of worship. November 25, 1776, the
society
" voted to Except of the Report of the Committee Chosen to Examine
accounts for work done which Is as followeth :
£ s. d. q.
Daniel Wetherbee 26 17 9 2
Abel Fletcher 17 12 1 2
Epbraim Whitcomb 25 13 1 2
Samuel Wetherbee 19 7 10 2
James Whitcomb, Jr 26 17 10 2
Abel Whitcomb 19 0 10 2
Phlnehas Wetherbee 12 12 1 2
Henry Cooledge 9 16 1 2
Bennett Wood 31 13 8 2
Oliver Taylor 21 19 7 2
Solomon Taylor 34112
Boston Draper II 16 7 2
old ten.
"We the snbscriberB Being appointed a Committee to Examine the ac.
counts of the Society of Stow, Littleton, and Harvard have accordingly
Examined the Same and we find Dun for Each man above Named to
pay the sum as set against his Name in the List above written."
In 1777, November 24th, the society again met and
" voted to chuse a Committee to Petition the General
Cort to Sett of s'' Society," and they accordingly
chose Mr. Silas Taylor, Mr. James Whitcomb and
Mr. Bennet Wood a committee for this purpose.
The new society seems to have been unsuccessful in
their efforts in this direction at the first, but commit-
tees were repeatedly chosen from among her citizens
to present the petition to the General Court, and June
14, 1779, they voted to apply to Mr. Francis Dana,
attorney, of whom Hon. Richard H. Dana was a
grandson, " to Carry on our Memorialist Petition
and Present it to the General Court, and voted SlOO
for that purpose." But the attorney's efforts, even,
must have failed, or the $100 was too small a sum to
BOXBOROUGH.
771
attract him to the cause for a sufficient length of time,
f.ir during the next four years the names of commit-
tees from among the citizens are often recorded. In
1780, when a committee was again chosen to apply to
the General Court to be set off, they also voted "to
chuse a committee to treat with the obstinate part of
Our Society in Littleton." The " obstinate party " is
referred to again a little later. It is not strange that
the towns called upon to yield up a part of their own
territory to form a new town should make objection,
but there is no record of any demur on the part ol
either Stow or Harvard. Littleton seems to have
been opposed to the transaction from the beginning.
Three times more — December, 1780, January, 1782,
and January 21, 1783— the same petition is presented
to the General Court, and at last, after a six years'
struggle, on the 24th of February, 1783, the petition
is granted. The following is a copy of the Act of In-
corporation :
"Coranionocaltb of MassachuMtu, In the .Tear of our Lord One thou-
snnd gevcu buodred and Eightv-threc \n act for Erecting a DiBtricl
in Ibf County of Middlesex bv tbe name of Bolborough. WberfaB a
number of InhubltantE In inp in the Extreme Part^ of the Towuisof
Stow, Harvard and Liltletou, Labour under niaiiv luconreiiiences b.v
Keat-jn of their jrate dislance flora any I'lare of Puldick Woriihip, and
bare Kequealed tbl^ Court that they Slay be Incorporated into a Dis-
trict with all ihe Privile|ie> of a town, that ..f sendinf u Represen-
tative to the (ieneral Court Excepted— lie ii therefore Enacted by tbe
Senate and Houw of Represenutlve. in lieoerul lourl .Assembled,
and by tbe aulhority of the Same, That a Part ..f Stow, a Part of
Harvard and a Part of Littleton, all which are Inrlnded within tbe
Boundarys following, \n. : Beginuiut: at the Koa.l Southerly of John
r.obin- Biiildinpi, and Running Southerly in -\cton line lo a Place
called Flau hill, being two miles, Ibree (Juarlers and ten rods to a heap
of Stones ; from Ibelice Westerly m Stow, Two miles and a rjuarter to a
Stake and Pillar of Stones in the Har\urd Line, then turning Northerly
through part of Harvard t.. a while oak tree by a rauBewa.T ; from
thence to the Place firsl Set "ul fnini, be and hereby is lucori«irated into
a liistrict by the Name of Bojiborongh. And all tbe Polls and Estates
that are Included within tbe said Boundaries shall belong to the «aid
Ilistiici, Except those of such of the Inhabitants of that Part Set off
from Littleton as Shall not, withiu the Term of twelve months from tbe
Passing of this act Return their Names into the olBce of Ibe Secretary of
this Commonwealth. Signifying their Desire to become Inhabitants of
the said District .\nd be it fui-tlier Enacted by Ibe authonty aforesaid
that the said Inseri. t be and hereby is invested with all the Powers,
Privileges and Imunities that Towns in this Commonwealth door may
Injoy, Except the Privilege of Sending a BepresenUtive to the General
Court, and the Inhahitanu of the said District Shall have leave, from
ume to time, to join with the Town of Stow in Choosing a BepresenU-
tive, and shall be notifieil of the Tune and Place of Election in Like
manner with the luhabiunls of the said Town of Stow by a Warrant
Irom the Selectmen of Ihe said Town to a Constable or Constables of the
said District, Reqiiiring him or them to warn the Inhabitants to at-
tend Ihe meeting at tlie time and Place appointed, which warrant shall
be Seasonably Keturne<l by tbe said Constable or Constables of the said
District, and the Representative may be Chosen Indifferently from the
said Town or DUIrict, the Payor allowance to be borne by the town
and District in proportion as they shall, from time to time, Pay lo the
.State Tax , and l>e it further Enacted that Jonathan 'Wood, Esq., of
Slow, be and hereby is unpowered to laaue this Warrant, directed to
some' Principal Inhabitant within the said District. Requiring him to
warn the Inhabitants of tbe said District, vfualiBed to vote in Town
affairs, to assemble at Fonie Suitable time and Place in the said DUtrict
tu Chuse Such officers as Towns and DiBtricto are required to Chose in
tbe month of March annually. Provided, Nevertheless, that tbe Inhabit-
ants of the said District Shall Pay their Pro|)orlionable Part of all Such
Town, County and State Taxes as are already assessed by Ihe said Re
epecti've Towns from which they are taken, and their proportionable
Ijarl of all Publick Debit Due from the sai.l Tow us, and also Provide for
the Support of all the Poor who were Inh»bll*nla within the laid Dl§-
trlcl before the pasaing of this Act, and Shall 1* Brought back for main-
tenance Hereafter. And whersaa it is lit and NeceMary that the whole
of the said DiatricI should belong to one and the same CooDtj-, be It
therefore further Enacted, by the authority aforesaid, that that Part
of the Said District which is set off from the Town of Harvartl, in the
County of Worceeter, shall be and hereby is annexed and aet to the
ConntT of Middlesex, and the line established by this act as the Boon -
daries betwixt the said Town of HarTard and the aald District, ahall
hereafter bo tbe boundary Line betwixt tbe said County of Uiddleaex
and the said County of Worcester."
This instrument bears the Bignatuiea of Samuel
.\dams, president of the Senate, and John Hancock,
Governor.
Accordingly, Jonathan Wood, justice of the peace,
jf Stow, issued the warrant — notifying and warning all
voters to assemble at the meeting-house that they
might perfect their organization by Iheelection of the
customary officers,— to Bennet Wood, one of the prin-
cipal inhabitants of the new District of Boxborough.
To the people of to-day the officers chosen and the
offices filled, on that 10th of March, 1783, may not
be without interest, and we give them entire. Jona-
than Wood, Esq., presided as moderator.
Capt. Silas Taylor was chosen clerk of district ; Capt. Silas Taylor,
Sir. Silas Wetlierbee, Ens. Abel Fletcher, Lieut. James Whitcomb,
Lieut. Ephraim Whiicomb. selectmen ; Capt. Pbinehas Taylor, treas-
urer ; Capt. Silas Taylor, Mr. .^bel Whitcomb, Lieut. Ephraim Whit-
comb, asseeBors; Mr. Joseph Bowe, Ueut. James \Vhitcomb, Mr. Ben-
net Wood, constables ; Mr, Benneti Wood, Mr. Paul Hayward, ward-
ens ; Mr. Judab Wetherhec, (JapL Eleazer Fletcher, tithingmen , Mr.
Oliver Meed, Mr Ephraim Taylor, Mr. Benuet Wood, Jlr. Oliver Tay-
lor, highway surveyors and collect^* ; Mr. Oliver Wood, sealer of
leather; Mr. Edward Brown, Mr. Thomas Lawrence, fish-reeves; Capt.
Phinehas Taylor, Lieut. Nehemi* Balchellor, deer-reeves; Mr. Joseph
Raymond. Mr. Boston Draper, bog-reeves; Mr. Richard Wetherbee,
Mr. Ebeneier Phillips, fence-viewers; Mr. Phinehas Wetherbec, Mr.
Ephraim Wetherbee, fire warda ; Mr. Jonathan Wetherbee, Mr. Joseph
Sawyer, field-drivers ; Sir. Edward Brown, Mr. Solomon Taylor, sur-
veyor of boards and shingles; Mr. Jonathan Wood, justice of the peace.
From time to time other officers were chosen, as
pound-keeper, surveyor of lumber, hoops and staves,
vendue master, sexton, etc.
The disinclination, on the partof Littleton, towards
the new district, was a difficulty which did not seem
to adjust itself in laten years, and down through the
century, even to the present time, tbe disagreement
may be traced. There was a great deal of trouble
about the boundaries, although they were described
and established by the letter of the act of incorpora-
tion already given. All the polls and estates within
the given limits were to belong to the new district
except those of such of the inhabitants set off from
Littleton as should not return their names to the
office of the secretary of the Commonwealth within a
year from the passing of the act. So, although the
boundary was designated between Littleton and Box-
borough, the people of the Littleton part were left to
go or come— as they chose — to pay their taxes to the
mother town as before, although residents of the new
district. The towns were continually in trouble over
the boundary line. It was at last referred to the
General Court, and an act fixing the boundary was
passed February 20, 179-1. This act also gave per-
772
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
missioa to those of Littleton who had not returned
their names, " their polls and their estates,'' who
still voted and were assessed in Littleton, " to be-
long to said Littleton " so long as this state ol
things continued ; that such persons might at any
time apply to said Boxborough to become member.-
thereof, and, upon vote of her inhabitants, be ac-
cepted as citizens of Boxborough, with their polls-
and estates.
In 1791 the district voted to invite all within the
bounds of Boxborough who had not joined with the
said town to become members of the same. And they
have come from time to time until there are ouly two
farms— those of H. T. Taylor and David Hall— which
are still assessed in Littleton. Edmund Lawrence's
estate was accepted .Vpril 6, 1807. Widow Rachel
Cobleigh's property. May 27, 1818, and George Jef-
fon's estate, A|)ril 2, 1821. In 1827 the town voted
to choose a committee to converse with all those who
still paid their taxes in Littleton, though within the
bounds of Boxborough, to see if they would not in
future attach themselves to their own town, and .\pril
24th of that year, five (the largest number at any one
time) signified their desire to become inhabitants ol
Boxborough, and were transferred to the said town.
viz: John Hoar, John Blanchard, tfimon Blanchard.
Mrs. Abigail Blanchard and Moses Whitcomb. Two
more, Carshena Wood and Mrs. Lucy Wood, came
May 23, 1831, and one more, Isaac Patch, April 2, 1838.
Measures are being taken at the present time to see ii
the taxes of the remaining two farms may not be re-
quired to revert to the town to which the estates belong.
The boundaries on the Harvard and Stow sides are
probably somewhat changed ; that toward Acton
seems to be the same, and the southeast corner, on
Flagg's Hill, appears to be unaltered. The boundary
on the Littleton side, as we have said, although the
source of much dispute and threatened prosecution,
was finally fixed by act of the Legislature, in 1794. No
definite descriptions of the corner bounds and bound-
ary lines are recorded whereby we can mark the ex-
act changes ; the bounds themselves — heaps of stones,
stakes, trees — are objects which the vicissitudes of a
hundred years might well render uncertain, and now
they cannot be determined with any degree of accu-
racy.
It is interesting to follow the working of the newly-
organized district and to note that which seemed
most to occupy their hands and hearts. So far as we
can judge from the records left us, after having thrown
in their lot together, each one worked for the com-
mon good. Destined never to become a large town, its
citizens gave to it, and found in it, whatever of active,
energetic enterprise it possessed. The warrants for
the early town-meetings are full of articles for action,
touching the church, the school and the highway, —
three of the most important factors in the common
town or State life ; for without religion at the outset,
the foundation must have been unstable ; without
education the future processes of self-government,
personal and general development in intelligence and
strength, must have halted ; and without communi-
cation with the outside world, common interchange
of ideas and methods, and also transportation, would
have been at a standstill. The citizens of the district
seem to have been much interested in these things at
the very first. The meeting-house was the place not
ouly for holding the religious gatherings of the peo-
ple, but also for all town-meetings until 1835, and in
April of that year they assembled at Bigelow's Hall,
situated directly opposite. Early this year they
" voted to build Town Hall under the contemplated
New meeting-house on the Common, and voted to
raise $250 to build the same," and then a reaction
came and they " voted to reconsider " their vote. In
March of the same year they voted to build a town-
house on the old Common and voted to raise $400 for
the same, and agaiti the reaction came and they re-
considered the vote, but later in the season a town
hall was built near the southern end of the Common
and opened for use in October, 1835. This remained
until 1874. Early in 1870 they voted to " examine
Town Hall," and also chose a committee to see if the
Universalist meeting-house " on the hill " could be
procured for a town hall. This was found by the
committee to be impracticable at that time, and ti.e
town voted to enlarge and thoroughly repair the old
hail. But in November of that year a committee
was again chosen to confer with regard to obtaining
the old church for town use and in December, 1870,
the town " voted to accept tlie Report of Committee,"
and " voted to accept the meeting-house as a gift from
a majority of the pew owners." They immediately
went to work to make the needed alterations and re-
pairs and to furnish in a neat and comfortable man-
ner for the transaction of town business. When the
old Puritan Church of one hundred years ago was
divided in 1829, the Universalist Society, as it was
thereafter called, retained possession of the old
church. This society after a time discontinued their
meetings, the house was closed, and in 1874, as be-
fore stated, was presented to the town for a town-
house. The old hall was sold at auction in 1874 to H.
E. Felch, and was subsequently torn down.
In the early part of Boxborough's history, there
seem to have been a great many extra meetings for
town, or district purposes rather, — the words town
and district being used interchangeably all through
the records — questions with regard to the church and
church property, schools, roads, disposition of poor,
boundaries, town buildings, town prosecutions and
the like. They discussed the questions and voted pro
and con, and considered and reconsidered these local
items as only men interested in the true welfare of the
town would have done. But they seem at times to
have arisen to that pitch of earnestness and enthusiasm
where their "No," was no; and their "Yes," yes.
irrevocably.
BOXBOROUGH.
773
A perusal of old writings brings some minor items
to light, like the following, which may interest the
rising generation if no other: — In 1789, " \Vm.
McKay, convicted of swearing one (or more) profain
oaths," paid a fine of six shillings, and such fines
were not infrequent. They were careful to guard
the morals of the young. An incident is told of an
old resident which illustrates this. He had been try-
ing to impress upon his son the importance of tem-
perance in speech, and at the close of the lesson, — "/
swear if you swear, I'll whip you," said the old man
emphatically. Unique auctioneer's licenses are re-
corded : — " We the Subscribers, Selectmen of the
Town of Boxborough, at a meeting holden for the
purpose, have licensed and do hereby Licence Major
Eph" Taylor of s'' Boxborough, to sell at public Ven-
due or Outcry any Goods or Chatties whatsoever,
pursuant to a law of the Commonwealth, passed June
the 16, 1795." Boys were often bound out to service
by vote of the town, for example : — In 1807 they
" voted to bind David Green to Christopher Page to
learn the carpenter's trade upon the same terms re-
specting clothing and schooling as though he staid
with his old master."
In 1837 the town "voted to allow a bounty of
twentv cents each on Crows young and old taken in
the limits of Boxborough between April and Novem-
ber," and granted one hundred dollars for the pur-
pose. It was voted in 1838 " to have the Bell rung at
nine o'clock in the evenings each day in the year
(Sundays excepted)6ve minutes at a time." Doubtless
in our forefathers' time this was a reminder to have
" all the children in." Nowadays such a note pealing
out over these hills and valleys would perhaps be
more likely to find the people of all ages just gather-
ing together.
The old town folk evinced a good deal of interest
in the highways, and roads were laid out here and
there and accepted from time to time ; but the vague
descriptions, vivid as they may have seemed then,
leave us in obscurity as to their exact trend. The
next year after the incorporation of the district, in
1784, several highways were laid out; in 1780 the
town voted (ifty pounds to repair highways, and the
following year an appropriation was also made. And
so on, down through her history, such items as the
laying out of roads, acceptance or rejection of them as
the case might demand, appropriations, setting up
guide posts or building walls, are frequent. In the
earlv days each poll worked out his highway tax ; in
1791 it was voted "that Every Ratiable Pole shall
work on the County Road one Day this year." Record
is made showing that some of the roads were mere
bridle-paths at the first ; in 1790 the town " voted to
accept the Bridle road," and in 1819 " Gave an order
to Prince J. Chester, it being in full for a road or
Bridle way through his land." Some were private or
half-private ways, as we find such entries as these;
1814. " Voted to shut up the road through D° Jacob
Fairbanks' land for one year if D" Jacob Fairbanks
will cause a road to be opened that will commode the
town as well." In 1815 "Committee report they
are dissatisfied with a road fenced out as it cuts them
off from water, but are willing that Mr. Sargent should
have a road with two gates, which they will agree to
support one." In 1814 a vote was passed " to keep
the Turnpike road in repair as far as it lies in Box-
borough for one year, provided the Corporation will
admit the inhabitants of said Boxborough passing the
sates toll free." This same " Boston Road," or " the
old turnpike," as it is now called, was laid out through
the southerly part of the town from Harvard to Acton,
;ind is the main thoroughfare. We find what answers
to the same road on Silas Holman's map of 1794, It
was accepted in 180G as the " Union Turnpike," by
the Court of General Sessions of the Peace, at its
.September term. In 1830 a petition was sent in to
the county commissioners, and April 7th of that
vear the Union Turnpike, so far as it lies iu the
county of Middlesex, was declared a public highway,
the town granting S300 for repairs. The road over
the hill, east of Guggins Brook, was discontinued in
18(i8.
The Fitchburg Railroad, which was opened in
1S45, skirts along the level northeastern border
of the town for quite a distance. Whether or
no this new invention was hailed by the farmers
with delight, or whether they considered it an intru-
sion on their sacred solitudes, and a trespass on their
farming rights, history tells us not. At any rate, no
mention is made of a desire for a station until a
special town-meeting in June, 1849, when they " voted-
to choose a committee to petition the President and
Directors of the Fitchburg Railroad for a depot or
stopping-place in the town of Boxborough, near the
bouse of Mr. John Hoar." The petition was not
granted. During the years of which we have been
speaking. West Acton had been growing up and had
become a thriving village. November 30, 1868, rec-
i ord is made of the adoption of the following resolu-
i tion : " Resolved that the town of Boxborough unite
i with that part of Acton called West Acton in the
I formation of a new town." The votes upon the
\ resolution stood 49 to 11, in favor of the new town,
' and a committee was chosen and instructed to use
! every effort in the annexation of Boxborough and
: West Acton, but the scheme planned to benefit both
town and village for some reason failed. In 1873
another petition was sent to the Fitchburg Railroad
Co. for a station, but this also failed. The station
for Boxborough is one with that of West Acton,
" West Acton and Boxborongh" being the name
given to it. West Acton is also the post-oflice, and
the nearest business point for Boxborough, although
for a small part of the town West Littleton is more
convenient.
The record of Presidential votes shows that, for
many years, the town was pretty evenly divided as to
774
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
its political sympathies, with a slight leaning to the
Democratic aide. In more recent years the lines di-
viding politics and religion have grown less marked,
until they have somewhat nearly coincided. The rec-
ords speak of Boxborough as both town and district
throughout the early years, and we have done the
same in order better to represent them ; but strictly
speaking, Boxborough was a district until May 1,
1836, when it became a town, not by any special act
of the Legislature, but under a clause of the Revised
Statutes of that year. But in the November following
it still voted with Stow for representative to the Gen-
eral Court, so that, if this date be the correct one, it
did not at once enter into its full privilege as a town.
In the more recent years of the representative union,
when sending two representatives, it was customarj'
to choose one from Stow and one from Boxborough.
Record of the votes was always made at Stow only.
Boxborough's military history must necessarily be
somewhat brief, as, not having been incorporated until
1783, she has no Colonial or Revolutionary record of
her own. But, like some other towns not having a
record of their own because not incorporated at the
time, and therefore swelling the record of some neigh-
boring town or towns, so Boxborough has a real
though not a separate record of the Revolution with
.■V.cton and the neighboring towns. In this connec-
tion we would pay a passing tribute to the memory of
Luther Blanchard, who, together with his brother
Calvin, joined the Acton compauy, and was the first
man to shed his blood at the fight at Concord Bridge.
The old homestead and the family estates were within
the limits of what is now Boxborough, and the de-
scendants still own and occupy them. I quote from
the centennial speech of a grandson of Calvin Blanch-
ard,— thfl late Joseph K. Blanchard, of this town :
"The neighboring town of Acton had formed a
company of Minute-men, to be ready at a minute's
notice to meet the British soldiers; Calvin and Lu-
ther Blanchard, of Boxborough, were members of this
company. These brothers inherited the spirit of pat-
riotism from their lather, who was killed at the
Heights of Quebec. This company of men had
pledged themselves to stand by each other in resist-
ing the British foe. On the morning of the Nine-
teenth of April, seventeen hundred and seventy-five,
word came to Acton that the British .soldiers werft en
route for Concord. This company of minute-men
were quickly assembled on the Acton Common, with
Calvin Blanchard for orderly sergeant, and Luther
Blanchard as fifer. As there was a little delay here,
and the soldiers were anxious to meet the enemy,
Luther Blanchard struck up ' The White Cockade,'
and then Capt. Davis started otT, saying to his men
that if any of them were afraid to follow him they
might go home. When they reached the old north
bridge, at Concord, the British were already on the
point of coming over to this side to destroy stores of
the Coloniats on this side the river.
"The officer in command asked for volunteers to
meet the foe. Capt. Davis, knowing his men, said,
' I have not a man who is afraid to go.' .\s they ad-
vance to meet the British, they receive their fire, and
Luther Blanchard is the first man wounded. The
Captain then asked if they fired bails. ' Yes,' was
the reply, ' for Luther Blanchard is wounded.' " He
went into the house of Mrs. Barrett, close by, to have
the wound dressed. " .\ little more and you'd have
been killed," said Mrs. Barrett mournfully. "Yes,
and a little more and it would not liave touched me,"
replied Blanchard brightly, and hastened to join his
comrades. The wound appeared slight, but he died
three days later iu consequence of it. His body was
brought to Littleton and laid in the old cemetery
there.
In 1787 the town voted to " Provide Stock of Pow-
der and Leds, also flint," which were kept in a maga-
zine, provided for the purpose, under the stairs in the
meeting-house ; and record is also made of muster-
days and the ordinary military organizations, but
nothing more of importance until Aug. IS, 1794, when
they called u special town-raeetiu!:, " to see what the
town will do about rai.sing the eight men, in compli-
ance with the request of Congress, and give any in-
structions to Capt. Whitconib about the same." They
voted " to give some incoragement to the men that
shall list as soldiers, and voted that each man that lists
IS a soldier agreeable to Resolvci of Congre-ss Shall
have the pubiick pay as wages ma<le u)) by the Town ;
to each man the sum of Two pounds, Eight shillings
|)r. month for the time they serve in the army ; and
■-hat they shall have six shillings in part of their pay
paid them when they do List and ingage if they do
not march out of Town, and the sum of eighteen
shillings more when they march in order to join the
army.'' Three years later, in October, 1797, at an-
other special meeting they " Voted to give theSoldieis
line Dollar each to engage, to give the men ten dol-
lars each at marching, and to make their wages equal
to laboring men the time they are in the service, in-
cluding the ten dollars above mentioned and Govern-
ment pay." In 18011 they voted "that Each soldier who
'^oes to the review at Concord and does his duty shall
have one dollar for the two days' service and t lb. of
powder for each soldier." The town was again called
on for men in 1812and 1814, and bounties were offered,
viz.: In 1812, " Voted to makeup the Soldiers $10 per
month when they are called into actual service, and
iwo dollars a day when called out of Town, and to re-
.•eive it before they march into actual Service or when
desmissed." In 1814, " Voted to make up the soldiers
Sis per month with the national pay and five dollars
bounty if they volunteer their services." The town
abated the taxes of her soldiers while in the service.
In 1832 it is recorded that the town " voted to author-
ize the Treasurer to pay the amount of their Poll
Taxes to each of the training Soldiers who kept them-
selves uniformed and equipped and performed all Mil-
BOXBOROUGH.
775
itary duty required of them." With the exception of
muster-days and militia-rolls, nothing further is re-
corded until the late War of the Rebellion.
There were no town-meetings held until July 23,
1862, when they " voted to pay bounty to five persons
that will volunteer to go to war, voted $100 to each of
the five, and immediately voted $5 each to those
who will enlist within three days and be accepted."
A.ug. 23d, " Voted town pay bounty of $100 to those
who will volunteer to fill town's quota of nine months'
men, to six or seven, whichever it may be." In Octo-
ber of the same year the town voted $150 to each
drafted man, and also to each volunteer, "enough to
fill our call," to be paid after they were mustered into
service. A month later the same bounty was extend-
ed to the substitutes of drafted men.
The highest bounty offered was Sept. 19, 1864, when
the town " Voted to pay $125 in Gold to each recruit
to fill the town's quota." The advance of gold was
from 85 to 165 during that month, so that, even at
the average, the bounty was a large one. The young
men of Boxborough responded willingly to their
country's call, and "five persons came forward and
enlisted " at one time. Of the fifty-one men — seven
more than required — furnished by the town, nonewere
commissioned officers. We quote the following from
Schouler's " Massachusetts in the Civil War:" "The
whole amount of the money appropriated and expend-
ed by the town for war purposes, exclusive of State
aid, was S7046.87. The amount of money raised and
expended by the town during the war for State aid to
soldiers' families, and which was repaid by the Com-
monwealth, was $1847.53. About $200 was raised by
the ladies of the town for the Cbrittian Commission."
We give below names of the soldiers who went
from Boxborough to take part in the War of the Re-
bellion, so far as we are able to give them :
Messrs. Samuel Burroughs, E. L. Battles, James Bryant. £. D Battles,
Mouroe Clemeut, George Draper, Wm. Edwards, Luther H. Ewioga,
Lucius Holden, Chas. Jeokiug!', A. A. Richardson, S. £. Smiley, Paul
Haynard, George Sargeut, Waldo LitlleSeld, John Fletcher, Peter W. H.
Perry, F. H. Stevens, Tim. L. Wood, Abraham Bodgets, A. W Wether
bee, James H. 'Whitcomb, John Griffiu, Joseph Moren, Wm. F. Stevens,
A. G. Whitcomb, Alonzo M. Woodward.
Of these, George Sargent was wounded ; Alonzo M.
Woodward died Oct. 6, 1862, at Suffolk, Va., of fever;
John Fletcher waa killed at the battle of Winchester,
Va., Sept. 19, 1864 ; and James H. Whitcomb died at
Cottou Wood Springs, Neb., of typhoid fever, Aug.
31, 1865.
We come now to the history of our public schools.
Boxborough has never enjoyed the advantages of
either an academy or high school within her own
boundaries, although her sons and daughters have
reaped the benefits of the higher iustitutions of
learning of other towns or cities near or far. The
town fathers evidently had the cause of education at
heart, for iu the town warrant, Sept. 22, 1783 — the
same year of her incorporation — we find this article :
"To see what the town will do about Providing School
this Present Year and act anything they Shall Think
Proper when met ;" and when legally met they "voted
to have four months' schooling this year and voted
that the Selectmen provide and proportion the same."
The " proportion " seems to refer not to different
sections of the town, but to the boys and girls who
appear to have been educated separately for some
time, £is in 1787 money was appropriated for " four
months of man's school and four months of Woman's
School."
At the 30th of August meeting, 1784, it was de-
cided not only to have " four months of Woman's
School," but also "to have a school-master six
months," the town thus charging themselves with de-
ciding as to whether a gentleman or lady should be
the instructor of their youth. But in 1794 they trans-
ferred the grave responsibility to the shoulders of a
committee, who should " provide & hire a school-
master or masters and mistress or mistresses as shall
be most convenient for the town's good." Also, this
year, the boys and girls shared equally in the ten
months' schooling, as appears from the vote for " five
months of man's school and five months of women's
school." From 1783 to 1794 the selectmen seem to
i have had charge of the schools. In that year a
special committee was appointed, but it was not until
a number of years later, in 1820, that the School
Committee's office became an established fact. In the
mean time the schools were often in charge of the
selectmen, as at the first.
Work in school, in the days of "auld lang syne,"
iu Boxborough, was evidently not as popular as in
many schools to-day, for, in 1794, action was taken to
the effect that " no work should be done in or at the
woman's school, as there usually hath bin ; but the
time to be spent in instructing the children to Read
and Wright." No special record is made of teachers'
wages in those early days. In 1783 there was " voted
and granted the Sum of 24 lbs. to pay town debts and
schooling;" and in 1787 the sum of fifteen pounds
was granted for " schooling " alone. A few entries
such as these would seem to indicate such wages as
would be no great temptation to the teacher of the
present day.
No doubt the pay of the Boxborough teachers com-
pared favorably with that of surrrounding towns, and
in some of these, one hundred years ago, the school-
master received $2 per week, where uow he requires
$10 or $20 for the same service. We do not know if
there was even a school-house in the new district at
the time of its incorporation, in 1783, although rumor
says there was such a building many years ago sit-
uated upon " Liberty Square," the common in front
of Mr. Henry T. Taylor's present residence. This
same Liberty Square is said to have been noted as a
gathering-place for amusement on the Fourth of July
and election days. Some seventy years ago the people
celebrated the national independence by raising a
liberty pole 100 feet high and providing a dinner free
776
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
for all. The voice of the canDon spoke of freedom
and independence to all around, and various amuse-
ments rendered the day pleasurable. But to return,
it is suggested that the children may have all come
together to one school until 1786, when it was voted
" to choose a committee to divide the town into quar-
ters, that each may build them a school-house if they
please." But the committee for some reason failed in
the performance of this duty, for in the latter part of
1790 a new committee was invested with power for
the work and inotructed to "accomplish the busi-
ness," which was done and the report made in March,
1791. The division of the town into quarters, as then
made, with slight variations, has always remained.
The number of districts has always remained the
same, although efforts were made in 1816, and
again in 1842, to reduce it to three. Convenience of
families and equalization of district taxes have caused
some slight changes in the boundaries. Unsucc«ssful
efforts have also been made, from time to time, as they
have grown smaller, to reduce the number of schools
to one or two.
No great difference is observable in the location of
school-buildings. The greatest change seems to be in
the Northeast or No. 3 District, whose building is now
more centrally situated at the intersection of several
roads. The Southeast or No. 4 house, has also under-
gone a slight change in location. A vote was passed
in 1790 to build a school-bouse or houses, and again
in 1791 tobuild three houses, and the sum of forty-five
pounds was granted for the purpose. It seems proba-
ble that the Southwest District, No. 1, had already
reared their educational structui-e, as only three
houses are spoken of at this juncture, for which the
sum of forty-five pounds was to be equally divided,
and as special provision was made that the First Dis-
trict should receive their part of the money. Refer-
ence is continually made to items of business in con- 1
nection with the building of these school-houses until 1
toward the close of the century, and it is probable that i
they were not all fully completed before that time. I
In 1807, an appropriation was made by the town ]
to build a school-house in the Northwest Quarter, No. j
2, in room of one burnt, and the next year the dis- I
trict itself voted a sum of money for the same pur- |
pose. There is no further record until 184.'}, when a I
house was built in No. 3 District. Separate .ichools |
for boys and girls are last mentioned in 1797. Beyond
a few items, such as the condition of the schools,
money appropriated each year, committees chosen, j
questions concerning re-districting the town, or set-
tlement of bounds requiring the occasional transfer of |
au estate, there is nothing more of interest until 1840. !
In 1813, '14, '16, '2.5, '29, '42, 116 and '77 various ap- ;
propriations are made for siuging-schools. j
A hundred years ago $<)0 was the amount paid for '
building a school-house ; now, twenty-five times that ,
sum would, perhaps, be deemed no more than suf- j
ficient. The methods of teaching have greatly
changed, also, since those early days. The essential
elements have always been the " three R's — Reading,
'Riting and 'Rithmetic," — but the metliods of instruc-
tion in these branches have widely changed. We
quote from the Centennial speech of Mr. George F.
Conant, a former superintendent of our public schools,
upon this subject : " Reading then meant a drawling
drill in the alphabet and its combinations, a-b, ab ;
e-b, eb ; o-b, ob, etc. ; our children are now inducted
at once into the reading of words, and led on, by easy
gradations, through selections from the best masters
of English prose and verse. Writing then involved
a long preliminary struggle with pot-hooks and tram-
mels; now the child is taught to read and write
script from the outset. Arithmetic was then a sealed
science beyond the Rule of Three — even the master
was not required to have explored farther ; now a
child of ten or twelve years is expected to have
reached that ultimatum. Mental arithmetic was a
thing unknown. Grammar was then a tedious task,
encumbered with the six Latin cases, and numberless
unintelligible rules. Our boys and girls, with their
' Language Lessons,' half work, half play, little know
what tbeir forefathers endured. Perhaps none of our
text-books have changed more than the geographies.
This is strikingly apparent in a comparison of maps of
ihe different dates. Central Asia was terra incognita.
Vfrica consisted of a narrow sti'ip along the shores?
surrounding the great unknown ; as for Australia and
the isles of the sea. tbey V7ere not : our own country
ivest of the Ohio wa.s an impenetrable forest and
bowling wilderness.'' Modes of discipline have also
..'hanged, and the famous " birchen-iod " is a thing of
the ))ast.
The first report of schools is recorded in 1840.
Kuniber of scholars, '.»2 in summer, 143 in winter.
Length of schools : in summer, 11 months; in winter,
lOj. " Number of teachers : in summer, 4 females ; in
winter, 4 males." Average wages per month, includ-
ing board : females, 19.50 ; males, s>24. The school
year was divided into two terms at this time, but
later, as the terms were lengthened, it became the cus-
tom to have three, which is the present arrangement.
The schools have now grown considerably smaller.
The district system, which had prevailed so long, was
:iboli»hed Feb. 28, 1867, by vote of the town. The
superintendingSchool Committee first received pay for
their services in 1842. Their recorded reports at this
lime are full of interest. \Ke give a sentence from
he report of 1842, earnest and to the point: " Young
men can parse or analyze sentences with a great deal
of skill when they leave school, but it is very
rare that you can find one that has confi-
ilence enough in his own abilities to compose
a piece of reasoning and recite it before an
audience." One report, in 1846, so brief we beg
leave to give it entire, is as follows : " Your commit-
tee would report that in their opinion the schools,
with one or two exceptions, have been wisely and ju-
BOXBOROUGH.
777
diciously managed the past year.'' The annual re-
port was first printed in 1853. In 1843 two school
libraries were established, and the following year a
sum of money was appropriated to carry on the good
work. In 1842 the work of erecting school-buildings
was again entered upon by the Northeast District,
which event called forth the following from the School
Committee: "Your committee hail with joy the
erection of a new school-house in town, after a lapse
of about half a century, a period when a school-
house might have some good claims to exemption
from further service." Some time later the other diP
tricts followed suit, and from that time forward the
houses have been rebuilt — Nos. 1 and 2 some time
from 1852 to 1857, No. 4 in 1868, and No. 3 in 187ii
— or repaired as was thought necessary, until at the
present time there is a comfortable school-building in
each of the four quarters of the town. Only four of
Boxborough's young men have received a college edu-
cation. Two sons of Rev. Joseph ^Villard, the first
pastor, graduated at Harvard in 1793 and 1800, Mr.
J. Quincy Hayward at Amherst in 1882, and Mr.
Charles H. Conant, Dartmouth, 1871, bar in 1873.
Mr. Conant has been a lawyer in Lowell for quite ^a
number of years.
As stated in our opening paragraph, the old Har-
vard meeting-house was purchased in 1770. Tiie old
volume, which contains all the account that is left to
us of these early days, bears on the fly-leaf this inscrip-
tion : "Record Book. The Gift of Bennet Wood to
the Society Building a Meeting-House in North-west-
erly part of Stow. Littleton, August 31, 177ij." Re-
ligion was the primary cause of the union of the peo-
ple on the outskirts of these three towns. They
banded themselves together for convenience in pub-
lic worship, and thus the " New Society '' was formed
which afterwards became, first, the district, :ind then
the town. The religious phase of her history is the
essential elemeutofa// her history; for religion was
the fundamental principle — the foundation — on which
the town was built. For almost half a century the
town and the parish were identical, and her history
in this connection is not only valuable to us who now
study it, but it is full of interest also. Our I'uritan
ancestors recognized theu, as we do now, in what the
true public good consisted, and they sought to place
on their hill, as their initial act, that in which all
their thoughts and deeds should centre — the church of
the living God. The town-meeting and the parish-
meeting were one for a long time, and for a still longer
period, more than half a century, even, after the sep-
aration of town and parish business, the town-meet-
ings were held in the meeting-house. Questions con-
cerning the church and church affairs were made the
annual business of the town.
In the warrant for the second meeting, held in April,
1783, was this article : " To see if the Town will grant
money to hire Preaching, or act anything Relating
the same they shall think Proper or choose a com-
mittee to do 80 ; " and they voted to hire preaching,
agreed upon the sum of forty pounds for that pur-
pose, and chose a committee of three to hire it, viz.,
j Bennet Wood, Oliver Taylor and Moses Whitcomb.
September 22, 1783, we read this unique article in
town warrant: "To see if the Town will Take any
measures for to Regulate Singing on the Lord's Day
or apoint Quiristers for the same." And they " voted
1 to choose four Quiristers as followeth : " And even
i seven years before, in 177C, the good people were not
' unmindful of this phase of public worship, for they
; " voted and chose Abel Fletcher, Abel Whitcomb
i and Jonathan Patch to tune the Psalms." In 1796
the town " voted that Dr. Belknap's Books should be
used in the Congregation of Boxborough in the
j Room of Dr. Watt's Books." It seems the town
I voted also where a person should sit in church, for,
the same year, it " voted and seated Ens. Samuel
[ Wetherbee in the fore-seat below, and Samuel Dra-
i per in the fore-seat of the side gallery ;" in 1792
\ " Voted that the Dr. sit in the fore-seat of the front ; "
j apparently as a mark of respect to those gentlemen.
' Deacon's seats were also provided. In 1798 the same
authority " Voted that the Methodist preacher may
^ preach in the meeting-house in said Boxborough on
I the week-days, during the town's pleasure, but not to
j molest or interrupt the Rev. Mr. Joseph Willard
when he shall apoint any lecture or time to preach
in said meeting-house at his pleasure." The town-
meeting voted the taxes for the payment of the min-
ister, for, a month later, that body " voted not to have
the persons that have dogs taxed for their dog's polls,
i and voted to tax all persons to the minister's Rate
' agreeable to the Constitution." Sometimes a person
wished to attend church out of town, and then he was
released from his minister's rate in town upon bring-
ing certificate from the clerk of the neighboring town,
stating that he worshiped with some other church,
i and paid his dues there. The towu corporate evi-
denced in all her proceedings her desire to do every-
thing according to righteousness and justice, and she
was no less careful to bring her citizens up to the
same standard.
It appears that the church was in an unGnished
i state at the time of the incorporation of the district,
for, October 27, 1783, it was voted "to sell the Pae
j ground in the meeting-house below, and take the
; money to finish the house." It took several town-
i meetings to settle the business, but it was finally de-
cided that " the persons that purchase the Pue ground
build the pews on their own cost, and take them for
I their Seates for themselves and families in the Meet-
i ing-house until they Sell or Dispose of the same."
I The ground-plan was for twenty-two pews, and when
they were sold it was " voted that the first twenty-two
highest payers have the first offer of the Pews as is
I Dignified and Prized according to their pay, and'
voted that the highest pew be offered unto the High-
' est Payer, giving him or them the choice of that or
778
HISTORr OF MIDDLKSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
any other Pew they or he Likes Better at the Same j
Price, and if the first twenty-two highest Refuse to
take the Pews, then they are to be offered to the next
twenty-two highest payers, and so on in proportion
till all have had the offer if Need be." Again, in
1786 and 1795, votes were passed " to seat meeting-
house according to age and pay." These items would
seem to show that deference to property is not con-
fined to onr own time, but was also a characteristic of
bygone days.
The church was organized the 29th of April, 1784,
and it was voted to have the house finished the fol- I
lowing November. The 18th of that month the town I
"voted to concur with the church of Boxborough in j
giving Mr. Joseph Willard a call to settle with them i
as a Gospel Minister in s^ town." They also discussed j
the subject of salary as to " what they should give j
the Rev. Mr. Willard for encouragement; " voted " to |
think about it," and, finally, after various meetings to j
settle the business, December 27th, they voted " not j
to give Rev; Mr. Willard half-pay so long as he in- \
dureth his natural life, but to pay the Rev. Mr. Jo- |
seph Willard £75 of money annually, in silver money, j
at six shillings, eight pence per ounce, and find twenty [
cords of wood for his fire annually, so long as the Rev. [
Mr. Willard shall supply the Pulpit in said town of |
Boxborough and no longer." The furnishing of the
wood was let out to the lowest bidder annually. An-
other quaintly-worded article in warrant this year ,
read as follows: "To see if the Town will Sell the
two hind Seats Below on the men's and women's Side J
and Let them be cut up for Pews, and get the outside 1
of the meeting-house Painted with the money." j
They voted to in.stall Mr. Willard, November 2, '
1785. Mr. Willard was born in Grafton, Massachu- ;
setts, and graduated at Harvard College in 17G5. He
was called to Bedford, April 19, 1769, w!iere he served i
as pastor for nearly fourteen years. Dec. 4. 1782, his !
connection with the .society was dissolved at his own j
request, by the unanimous advice of a council, on ac- '
count of the broken state of the society. He then re- '
ceived his call and was installed over the District of
Boxborough. The following eight churches were in-
vited to join in the installation services: Grafton,
Harvard, first and second churches Reading, Stow,
Northboro', Littleton and Acton. Rev. Jonathan
Newell, of Stow, offered the opening prayer ; Rev.
Caleb Prentiss, of the first church in Reading, preach-
ed the sermon from 2 Cor., Ist chapter, and 24th verse ;
Rev. Eben Grosvenor offered prayer; Rev. Eliab
Stone, of the second church in Reading, gave the
charge to the pastor ; Rev. Peter Whitney, of North-
boro', gave the charge to the people, and Rev. Moses
Adams, of Acton, offered the closing prayer. The
whole number of persons belonging to the church at its
organization, and admitted afterward during Mr. Wil-
lard's pastorate, was 144; number of persons bap-
tized, 265; number of marriages, 109; number of
deaths, 188. After a pastorate of nearly forty years,
by request of the people, in December, 1823, Mr.
Willard resigned his position as pastor of the church,
when just at the close of his eighty-second year. He
resided at the parsonage, the house now owned and
occupied by Mr. Jerome Priest, until his death, in
September, 1828.
We know but little of him who closed his earthly
career here more than sixty years ago. We judge
that he was a man of education and culture, — a grad-
uate of Harvard, — a faithful worker, leading and di-
recting the newly-organized church, revered, loved
.tW trusted by them for upwards of half a century,
and that his labors, though expended among these
country hills, were not in vain.
In 1815 the question of building a new meeting-
house or of repairing the old, began to agitate the
people. During the next three years many meetings
were held, at which various measures were suggested,
voted upon and then reconsidered. At length, in
May, 1816, a vote was p.issed "to leave it to a com-
mittee to determine whether the town shall repair
old meeting-house or build a new one, and if in the
opinion of said committee the Town shall build a
new Meeting-house, they shall appoint the place
where to set it." And they chose Augustus Tower,
Esq., of Stow, John Robins, Esq., of Acton, and
Jonathan Sawyer, a committee for that purpose.
The hill on which the old church stood was quite a
little distance west of the centre, and so the people
of the east part of the town wished not only to build
a new house, but to have it placed nearer the actual
centre- According to the records the controversy
grew stronger, for the said committee, having per-
formed their duty and brought in the report "that in
their opinion it would not be for the interest of the
town to repair the old, but to build new, and on
spot southerly of Mr. PhinebasWetherbee's dwelling-
house" — a site quite near to the actual centre, — it
was voted "not to accept the report," and "not to
reconsider the last vote to repair." At a November
meeting a petition was presented, signed by twenty-
three residents of the east part of the town, asking,
"First, for a new meeting-house; second, that it be
placed on or near site appointed by the committee of
reference; and if not, third, to see if the town will
vote that the subscribers be discharged trom Box-
borough that they may go to the original Towns from
which they were taken." The town was not ready
as a whole to yield the ground on the question of a
new meeting-house, nor did they wish to lose any of
their citizens, so they voted " lo pass over the arti-
cle." Efforts were made from time to time to bring
about a better state of feeling between the parties,
but the new house was not built until years after,
neither were there repairs made to any extent.
After Mr. Willard's resignation, when the Rev.
Aaron Picket came to be their next minister, the
manner of procedure was changed. The amendment
to the Constitution disconnecting Church and State
BOXBOROUGH.
779
was not parked uutil Kuvember, 183:^, but tlie tuwu-
meeting no longer granted the minister's salary, or
auctioned off his twenty cords of wood to the lowest
bidder. Mr. Picket came in 182C, upon a vote of the
town " to hire him for one year after the money that
is already raised is expended to preach for them in
Boxborough, provided be will stay and they can get
money enough to pay him." A division similar to
that which occurred in so many churches at about
this time was imminent now. In 1828 they " voted
to let each denomination have the meeting-houae
their proportionable part of the time according to the
valuation,'' and they chose a committee, in which
each denomination was represented, " to lay out the
money." But from later records it seems probable
that the money was raised not by assessment, but by
subscription.
The separation came at last in 1829, when the
church desired to call the Rev. James R. Gushing, of
the Theological Seminary, Bangor, Me., to the pas-
torate, to which action the parish raised opposition.
The ground of difference was in religious belief
And so. May 20th, the church met and voted, "That
having failed to secure the concurrence of the Ist
Parish in inviting Mr. Gushing to become our Relig-
ious Teacher we proceed to take the steps prescribed
by law to form a New Society whose members will
concur with us in faking the necessary measures to
secure to this church the pastoral labors of Mr. Gu.ah-
ing." Immediately the society called the " Evangel-
ical Congregational Society in the District of Box-
borough " was legally formed, and having ''con-
curred" with the church, a call was at once extended
to Mr. Gushing; and the "solemnities"' of ordination
were performed under an ancient elm near the old
meeting-house, August 12, 1829. They built their
church on its present site, at the junction of the
highways, where the Stow road crosses the old turn-
pike, a little southeast of the centre, near which a
comfortable parsonage now stands, a point convenient
of access from all parts of the town. It was "dedi-
cated to the worship of God " February C, 1833. A
sketch of those who have been connected with this
church as pastors may not be uninteresting Mr.
Gushing was dismissed at his own request, to become
agent for the American Bible and Tract Society, June
12, 1833. He was one of the Superintending School
Gommittee for three years.
January 13, 1834, the church and society voted
unanimously to give Rev. Joseph Warren Cross a
call to the pastorate. Mr. Cross accepted the call
and was ordained the 1st day of the following Octo-
ber. This connection of pastor and people was dis-
solved November 13, 1839. by his own request. He
served on the School Board in 1838. He is still liv-
ing— at the advanced age of eighty — in West Boyls-
ton, Mass. He retired from the ministry a number
of years ago. During his stay in Boxborough he
taught a private school in a building erected for the
purpose, nearly opposite the new church, and which
was also used as a vestry. The building is now a
part of Mr. Hayden'.s baro.
Rev. James D. Farnsworth accepted the pastoral
care of the church November 28, 1841, and was in-
stalled January G, 1842. This connection was severed
in 1847. He was a member of the Superintending
School Committee in 1842 and 1844, served as one of
the assessors for two consecutive years, and was active
in all that pertained to the well-being of the town.
A part of the time from 1847 to 18.31 the church was
supplied by Rev. Mr. Grossman, a young Wesleyan
divine, who, in connection with his pulpit duties, per-
formed those of teacher in No. 4 District for two con-
secutive winters. Rev. Mr. Gannett preached in
1851-52, and Rev. Leonard Luce became the acting
pastor from 1853 to 1858. During his ministrations
the greatest revival the church has ever known was
enjoyed. He died in Westford a number of years ago
I at the ripe age of eighty-five years.
I Rev. James H. Fitts, a young man ami a native of
New Hampshire, commenced his labors as acting
j pastor of the church September 5, 1858, and continued
! his connection with it for nearly four years; then,
' having received a call to the church in West Boyls-
ton, Mass., he preached hie farewell sermon July 27,
1862.
Rev. George N. Harden was ordained to the pas-
toral office October 2, 1862, and dissolved his relation-
ship with the church in April, 1865. He was a fine
scholar, as his sermons testified. He is now con-
nected with a college at Colorado Springs, Col.
The following November Rev. Amos Holbrook, of
Milford, Mass., commenced his labors as acting pastor
and closed them September 1, 1868. He had neither
seminary education nor theological training, but he
was a well-educated man, having held the position of
principal of a school in Milford previous to his pas-
torate in Boxborough. It was during his stay, and
owing partly to his influence, that the present parson-
■ age was built.
February 11, 1869, Rev. Daniel McClenning came,
but removed to Hanover, N. H., April 30, 1873. So-
cially he was a perfect gentleman and very agreeable
in manner, but his style of preaching was censorious
and severe. He was of Scotch ancestry and his birth-
place was in Littleton. He died three or four years
' ago.
Rev. John Wood supplied the pulpitrfrom October
' 26, 1873, until February 28, 1875. He was possessed
: of good preaching ability and quite a number of per-
\ sons were brought into the church in connection with
his labors. He was a resident of Wellesley, Mass.,
at this time, and came to his charge each week. He
is more than eighty years of age and is living in
Fitchburg, Mass., at the present time.
After the close of Mr. Wood's pastorate the church
I was supplied by Revs. Wood, Robie, Wells and others
' until the let of April, 1876, when Rev. Nathan
780
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Thompson began his labors in Boxborough, continu- |
ing them until August, 1881. During his pastorate,
in 1880, the church ^as thoroughly repaired, a vestry
placed beneath audience-room, and the whole fitted
up neatly and conveniently, so that, at the present
time, it is well adapted to the wants of the people.
Mr. Thompson took an active interest in town aflairs —
the Lyceum, the Farmers' Club, the schools, of which
he was superintendent. He was a man of lovely
character and very popular as a townsman. Previous
to coming to Boxborough he had been a home mis-
sionary in Colorado for ten years, and he left the
church here to become principal of Lawrence Acad-
emy, Groton, Mass. He is now principal of an .
academy in Elgin, Illinois. '
November 6, 1881, a call was extended to Rev.
William Leonard, who labored with the church until
April, 1884, when he removed to Barnstable, Mass.
He wa.s of English parentage. I quote a sentence
from his centennial speech which seems to be charac-
teristic of the man : " I preach what I believe and be-
lieve what I preach, and no man shall deprive me of
this libertv."
Rev. George Dustan, of Peterboro', N. H., came to
the church December 1, 1884, and severed his con-
nection with it the last of February, 1887, to take
charge of the Orphan Asylum, Hartford, Conn. He
had been pastor of the church in Peterboro' for a
period of twentj'-five years. He was interested in
town affairs, superintendent of schools, a member of
the Grange and a very good preacher.
Rev. George A. Perkins, the present pastor, began
his labors with the church in Boxborough April 1,
1S87. Mr. Perkins was a missionary in Turkey for a
number of years. He is a faithful pastor and preacher.
The First Parish continued their.Sabbath services
a part of the time for several years after the division
of 1829, and then they were discontinued, and the or-
ganization finally became extinct. Other things of
public interest, as the store, post-otfice, blacksmith
and wagon-shop, etc., have disappeared from their
wonted places on the hill, but the church, though in
a different location, — through the earnest, continued
efforts of her members, — still lives. Orthodox and
Umversalist meet and part and take each other by the
hand, yet the old differences seem not wholly forgot-
ten, the old scars not entirely obliterated. Time may
accomplish what willing hearts cannot, and in the not !
far distant future the Universal Church, within whose
fold all may work together in the service of our com-
mon Lord, may spread its wings joyfully over all
these peaceful hills and valleys. " May the Lord
hasten it in His time."
In passing, we would make mention of the Meth-
odist Church, which was situated in the southwest
part of the town something like eighty years ago, and
which existed until 1848. I say in southwest part of
town, but the building — although the intention was I
to build on Harvard ground — was really erected on I
the boundary line between Boxborough and Harvard,
owing to uncert.iinty with regard to the ex.act location
of said boundary. It was a small building, painted
red, and contiguous to it was a noble, spreading oak.
An amusing anecdote of this old house of worship is
related by one of the older residents, who remembers
the building well. A wayfarer passing along the
Boxborough highway one afternoon, inquired of a cit-
izen whom he met, the way to the old meeting-house.
'"Oh, go right along until you come to a little red
house tied to an oak tree; that's the Methodist
Church," replied the person accosted, with more celer-
ity than reverence. .\.lthough there was more or less
Wesleyan preaching for several years, there was no
preaching by appointment of the Conference after
1843. Some of the members transferred their church
relationship to Harvard, others to the Congregational
Church in Boxborough, and others to surrounding
towns; and finally, some years later, the church
building w.is burned. The old oak still stands to
mark the spot.
While the surface of the town is hilly and rocky,
and the soil not deep, yet hnr sunny slopes are very
productive. The bills are crowned with luxuriant
orchards, and the pastures and road-sides abound in
grapes and berries. Apples, pears, peaches, grapes,
berries and vegetables are extensively and successful-
ly cultivated for the Boston markets. Being only
about twenty-seven miles distant from that city, these
products can be shipped there, fiesh, daily. Most of
the farmers are engaged in the production of milk for
the Boston market. Limestone is found in quite large
quantities in the northeast part of the town, toward
Littleton, and some years ago the business of lime-
burning was made quite prominent. There are two
organizations in which the farmers are banded togeth-
er for improvement and discussion of matters of in-
terest— the Farmers' Club and the Grange. The
Farmers' Club has had its existence for something
less than twenty years ; the Grange has been organ-
ized only four years, yet it seems to be in successful
operation and doing a good work.
We quote a few items, interesting by comparison
with the present time, from "Statistical Information
relating to certain Branches of Industry in Massachu-
setts lor 1S.05,'' by the Secretary of the Common-
wealth, Francis De Witt : " Boxborough — Value of
railroad cars, etc., m'll., S-WO ; cap., SI 000. Boots of
all kinds m'd, 2o0 pairs ; shoes of all kinds m'd., 4,600
pairs ; value of boots and shoes, $4000. Charcoal
m'd., 3,500 bush. ; val. of same, j>o25. Butter, 13,G40
lbs. ; val. of butter, $3,410. Hops, 14i acres ; hops
per acre, 700 lbs. ; val., S2o56. Cranberries, 21 acres ;
val., .•?512." A report of this kind of the present date
would probably contain few or none of these items.
\o businfs?^ except that of ordinary farming has ob-
tained a foothold for a number of years. A city gen-
tleman was recently excusing himself to one of our
citizens on whom he made a business call, for his lack
BOXBOROUGH
781
of the knowledge of grammar. " I have a good, bus-
iness education, but I do not know much about gram-
mar," said he. " The people of Bnxburough mighi
just as well study grammar as not; there is uoLhiug
else 10 do," replied the ho>l. Perhaps thi.s anecdote
somewhat exaggerates the situation, but we can gain
an idea from it.
Boxborough celebrated her centennial anniversary
February 24, 1883, " in the old meeting-house on the
hill." The exercise.s throughout day and evening
were interesting and enjoyable. Mr. F. I'. Knowlton.
of Littleton, gave an address, " Remiaiscences," Rev.
Nathan Thom[>son a former pastor in the town, deliv-
ered the "Historical Address," and MrS. G. F. Con-
ant, the " Centennial Poem," .Mrs. M. E. Burrough>
contributed the " Closing Hymn." .■Vfter-dinner
speeches, full of the " early days," by present and
former townsmen, with readings by Mr. F. H. Pope,
of Leominster, aud music, made up the programme
An account of the proceedings of this " day of euuo-
bling retrospection and glad reunion," wa> afterward^
published in pamphlet lurm, by the town.
The following are the town ufticers for the pre.seu\
year. 188',5 ;
Ml E. B 'i.l.lcijli. A Liltl-hpM, l'. H Vh.isi., k-1h linen ; I' M
ful'l-'ipli, ireiuiur^t . '■,fuii:t I' Key^-is, t<t\vri clfrk : K. H. i^olilei-^li. .1
\V. flHvuHiit. i\ H. \»'.i-te, iiM>r«4<re ; .f. II. itiiKlorrl, nn<lii(ir; W H
Fiirbii-li. N. K. Wliitoiiili. V'.i<lii':tini ■ '■•Mi-i;:li. fi;ii] ^-•jiiiiiiii^-i-jiit'i- : < ' H
Rhiii'.hHnl. Lr«i- Ri< Inirileun, .1. BrtlJnaii. S, I". DilIki-. A. W. Welh
trbee. S. B. Haprr, Srlioul ('uiniuillre : A. W. Wi-ibi-rlic", oU|il i-l
scbuuld , v. 11. Flirliiisti, cniior.ilil- and tollfclui.
In this age, whei; not only the liislory of towns, bin
family history, is 'of such wide-spread and endur'n-;
interest, a short sketch of some of the older residents
may not be out of place. We notice, in the earl\
records of the town, the names of Cobleigh, Wether-
bee, Taylor, JNIead, Whitcunib, Hiiyward, Blauchard
Hager, ijtevens, Chester, Wood, Patch and Hoar,
whose descendants are still with us ; while others, a:-
Bigelow, Hazzard, Stone aud Conaut, although none
of these now remaiii, are of ecjuul interest.
The name of Mr. Bennet Wood is intimately asso-
ciated with the early history of the town. He wa>
the second son of Jeremiah and Dorathy (Beueij
Wood, the fifth of a family of ten children. Henrv
Champion, the grandfather of his mother, Dorathy.
was born in England in 1011, and came to New Eng
land as one of the first settlers of Lyme and Say-
brook, Connecticut. His father, Jeremiah Wood
was a weaver, a yeoman, gentleman, as shown by ac-
count-books and papers. He was constable and col-
lector, later selectman, aud for some years treasurer
of Littleton aud a member and supporter of the
church. He purchased his estate there January 1.3,
1717, a part of which is still in possession of his de-
scendants. He received the deed from the town of
Littleton, as explained by the deed itself, which is
still in possession of Isaac Wood, Boston, Massachu-
setts. Several generations of the Wood family have
been born there. " In uprightness of character, sta-
bility of purpose, sound judgment, and high regard
for family aud personal honor, the family of Jeremiah
and Dorathy Wood was no ordinary family. Jere-
miah Wood died July 15, 1730 ; Dorathy, his wife,
died July 17, 1752. Their graves Eire side by side in
Littleton, and near them are grouped the graves of
some of their children, grandchildren, great-grand-
children and great-great-grandchildren."
On an old weather-beaten slab of granite, in the
hill burying-ground in Boxborough, we may read this
inscription :
'■ In Memory of
Mr. Bennel Wuod
n bo iJepArted this life
Ape. -Jsih 1797
Id tbe 8Iet year ot
b 18 age,"
Beside it is erected another stone to the memory of
his second wife, Mrs. Isabel Wood, who died Decem-
ber 14, 1797, in the 84th year of her age (the first wife,
Lydia Law, of Acton, died February 27, 1765, aged
tifiy-ibur years, one month, thirteen days, and Is
buried among the Wood families in Littleton), and
near these lies a granddaughter, Lois Wood, who died
February 1, 17.S2. aged fifteen years, two months and
twenty-two days. Bennet Wood was a prominent
and enleriirising man, as all his transactions and bus-
iness connections with his fellow-townsmen plainly
testify. He did very much for the formation of the
church and afterward the town, in the early days, and
his energy and perseverance helped greatly to pave
the way to success.
Mr. Jonathan Wood, the ninth child of Jeremiah
and Dorathy, is mentioned as issuing the first town
warrant in Boxborough. He is spoken of as an hon-
ored citizen, aud prominent in both civil and miltary
affairs. Mr. John Wood, the sixth child of Jeremiah
and Dorathy, hits descendants still living iu this
town. He was twelve years old when his father died.
.A. large part of the real estate was apportioned to
him. Pie married Lydia Davis, of Harvard, Massa-
' chusetts, October 19, 1743. He was constable and
collector at the age of twenty-four, a prominent and
successful man, had pleasant surroundings for those
times, and had a promising young family ; but death
called him away April 8, 1758, at the early age of
forty. Lydia Wood remained a widow for several
years, and then married David Goodridge, of Fitch-
burg. John and Lydia Wood are both buried with
the Wood families, in Littleton. Deacon John Wood,
son of John and Lydia, the third of a family of
seven, was born in Littleton, September 3, 1747. He
married Lucy Martin iu 17G9, and settled upon the
home place, where, in 1790, he built himself a fine
residence.
The old homestead, recently in possession of
George F. Conant, and now owned and occupied by
Mr. Campbell, is still in an excellent state of preser-
vation. Deacon Wood was one of Littleton's trusted
I townsmen ; held various reeponsitle public positions,
782
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
and was deacon of the church for nearly thirty years, i
He died May 4, 1826, in his seventy-ninth year.
Upon his gravestone, in Littleton, is the following :
" Farewell, dear friend and children too, .
God has called me home ; I
Id a short time he'll call for you, •
Prepare yourselvea to come."
Lucy (Martin) Wood was born in Old Ipswich, ;
Massachusetts, and died in Littleton, February 20, ;
1836. The following is upon her gravestone : j
'* Farewell, my friendd, my children dear |
My Savior calls me home.
My Savior calls my children too, I
Prepare yonrwlves to come."
Captain Amariah Wood, sixth son of Deacon John
and Lucy Wood, says " My mother'^ name was Lucy
Martin. Her father, George Martin, lived in Old
Ipswich; moved from there to Lunenburg, Mass.
Her ancestor, Martin, was a weaver in England ; his
wife was one of the higher clafses; her parents were
opposed to her marrying a weaver, and they came to
America. My mother's great-grandfather's name was '
Dergy ; he was the King of England's cup-bearer."
Amariah Wood " thoroughly learned the trades of
tanner and currier, and carried oc that business
about a quarter of a century, in Bolton, Massachu-
setts. He married and had a large family of chil-
dren by his first wife; he had no children by his
second wife. He waa an honored citizen, having
held civil offices of trust. He held a commission as
lieutenant, given him by Governor Caleb Strong, of
Massachusetts, and a commission as captain. To the
former office he was elected November 27, 1812, and
the latter Jlay .3, 1814, and was captain of an inde-
pendent company later. He was a conscientious and
upright man, of marked ability and scholarly attain-
ments; was a peroistent student all his life, and was
always ready for research in science and metaphys-
ics ; was u close student of the Bible, and was guided
by it. He was skilled in musical composition, aud
took much pleasure in it. Selections from his man-
uscripts were published long after his decease. He
often had original music to use at the meetings of the
family. His conversations in later years were mas-
terly, having accurate knowledge and a clear, logical
mind thoroughly disciplined. In his last days he
purchased a home near Worcester, Mass., where
some of his children had settled. Here he and the
able and estimable wife of his early and maturer
years, and the mother of all his children, rested from
their labors. He was born in Littleton, Mass., Sep-
tember 9, 1785."
Martin Wood, I he oldest son of Dea. John Wood
and Lucy Martin Wood, was born Feb. 10, 1774, aud
died Dec. 27, 1853. He was twice married.
" Martin Wood was well posted in common histori-
cal subjects, and had a very complete knowledge of
the Bible. He was a deacon in the ihurch, and a
teacher of the Bible-class for men aud women in the
Sunday-school for many years. He was a man of
sterling integrity, thoroughly honest and earnest in
whatever engaged. He had quite a mechanical tal-
ent; was ingenious in making various implements
and instruments, was a good carpenter, blacksmith
and cooper. He built several of the school-houses in
Littleton. Several pieces of public roads were con-
tracted for and bnilt by him. He was a skUlfol sur-
veyor, and was often called upon to settle disputed
boundary lines, where other good surveyors could not
agree. He held at different times all the important
places of trust in his town, as committeeman, assessor,
selectman."
Carshena Wood, son of Dea. John Wood and Lucy
Martin Wood, the fourth child of a family of eleven,
was born Nov. 19, 1776. He married Betsey Lawrence
for his first wife, and, after her death, Trypheua
Lawrence. He died July 13, 1854.
" Carshena Wood was a man of ability, but had no
ambition for public display so far as he was concern-
ed, but avoided, if possible, every public office. He
was an ingenious man, learned the cooper's trade, but
was always a farmer. He first settled in Ashby, Mass.,
but upon the death of his brother, John, he sold his
estate there, and was settled upon the homestead of
his father, grandfather and great-grandfather, and
resided in the house budt for his brother John, near
the house of his father, the remainder of his life. He
never occupied the fiue residence of his father, al-
though it was long in his possession after his parents'
decease. He was a man of strict integrity ; was
puuctiliously exact in all his engagements, and dealt
honestly with every one ; was a good neighbor and
townsman, au early member and regular attendant of
his church." Eunice Martin, daughter of Carshena
and Trypliena Lawrence Wood, was 'born in Little-
ton, January 4, 1819, married Benj. W. Priest, and
resides in Littleton, not far from the Wood home-
stead. They had three children. The youngest child
and only daughter, Arabella Wood, was born June 30,
1841 ; married Mr. George F. Keyes, and, with her
husband, son and daughter, occupies at the present
time the house where Mr. Carshena Wood, grand-
father of Mrs. Keyes, formerly dwelt.
These estates are those recorded as having been
transferred from Littleton to Boxborough, May 23,
1831.
! Mr. Walter Abbott Wood, of Wood's Mowing-
: Machine fame, belongs to one branch of the Wood
family.'
The first of the Whitcombs came from England
sometime previous to 1633, and settled in Dorchester,
Mass. There seems to be a number of branches, so far
as we have been able to trace them. Ephraim Whit-
comb, .fr., w;iH born in Littleton about 1700, mar-
ried Parthias Wheeler, of Stow, in 1731, and settled
' Tlie .tuolntions in the previoufl pketrh are from Wm. S.
"lieuealogy of [he Wood Kuuiiiy."
BOXBOROUGH
783
in Nashoba — a part of Littleton. Ephraim Whit-
comb, Sr., aod Hannah, his wife, settled on the
farm of his brother Daniel — where Mr. Ephraim
Cobleigh now lives — and were the parents of nine
children: Moses, Reuben, Lucy, Ephraim, Hannah,
Samuel, Peter, Martha and Joel. Of these, Reuben
married and settled in Harvard; Hannah married
and went to Gardner to reside ; Samuel lived in Box-
borough for a number of years after his marriage and
three of his children were born here ; he then moved
to Littleton. Lucy married Mr. Paul Hayward, Jr.,
and settled on the place where Mr. N. E. Whitcomb
now lives. They had twelve children.
Ephraim — Captaiu or Lieutenant Ephraim Whit-
comb, both titles having been given to him — married
Katharine, daughter of Boaz Brown, and settled oo
the farm where his father-in-law, Boaz Brown, re-
sided, and afterwards built the brick house which
stands there at the present time. Mr. Benjamin S.
Hager now owns and occupies this estate. Of their
eight children, three — Ephraim, Joel and Joab — were
unmarried; Betsey married Mr. Benjamin Houghton,
and settled in Harvard. They wete the parents ol
three children — Henry, who died in early manhood ;
John, a provision dealer in West Acton ; and Ephraim,
a farmer in Harvard formerly, but now working at
the carpenter's trade. Hannah married Daniel Cdb-
leigh and settled on the old Cobleigh place, opjiosite
Mr. Wright's present residence. The old homestead
has long since gone to decay. Three sons — Ruel T.,
Daniel W. and Ephraim B. — are living in town at
the present time. Katherine married Oliver Russell
and went to Harvard. Edward married the daughter
of Jeremiah Tultle Sr., of Littleton. Martha mar-
ried Mr. Daniel Witcomb and settled in Boxborough.
on the place now occupied by Mr. J. A. Walker, who
married one of the daughters. There were six chil-
dren— James Henry, who lost his life iu the late war;
John, who married Maria Wetherbee and settled on
one of the old Wetherbee places in Boxborough;
Betsey, (Mrs. Walker) ; Sarah, who married Jacob
Priest and is now living in Harvard ; Anna Luella,
who married Marshall Wilder and resides in Clinton,
and Martha Jane, who died when quite young.
Martha or Patty Whitcomb, daughter of Ephraim
Whitcomb, Jr., married Ephraim Taylor and lived on
the Burroughs place. After the death of her hus-
band, she, with her four children, — Ephraim, Joel,
Reuben and Isaac, — went to New Vork to live.
Joel Whitcomb, son of Ephraim Whitcomb, Jr.,
married, and resided on Burroughs' place after
Ephraim Taylor. They buried several children. Joel
Whitcomb, Jr., is living at West Acton.
Moses Whitcomb, son of Ephraim Whitcomb, Jr.,
married Anna Hayward, of Boxborough. Of their
twelve children, several died in infancy. Of nine
who lived to mature years. Sally married and went to
Ashby ; Betsey married a Tenny and went away from
town ; Daniel, to whom we have before alluded,
ma.Tied Martha Whitcomb and settled on the present
Walker place ; Mary married Oliver Wetherbee
aod settled on the old Wetherbee place,
now W. H. Furbush's ; Lydia married Mr.
Peters, father of George L. Peters, of Stow, and
lived in Littleton ; they had three children. Moses
Jr., married Martha Cotton, of Boxborough, and
settled on the old Whitcomb homestead, where
Ephraim Cobleigh now resides. They buried several
children. There are five remaining — Edwin Whit-
comb, Mrj. Hannah Conant, Mrs. Caroline Hosmer
and Mrs. Maria Hendley, of Littleton, and Frank
Whitcomb, of West Acton. Annie married Mr. Harry
Hoar, of Littleton. Paul married Hann^ Bent, of
Stow, and went away from town ; they had two sons.
John — Col. John Whitcomb — married Maria Good-
win for his first wife; they had no children. He mar-
ried Sarah Emory for his second wife, and of their
five children, one died in infancy. Nathaniel Emory
Tiarried Abbie Blanchard and lives on the old Paul
Hayward place in Boxborough ; John married Nell'e
Rand and went to Fitchburg ; Maria married Charles
E. Smith and resides in Holden ; and James married
Edna, daughter of Mr. Granville Whitcomb, and re-
sides in Fitchburg. Col. John Whitcomb married
Mrs. Eliza A. Hayward for his third wife.
Peter, son of Ephraim Whitcomb, Jr., married
Sally Bachellor, and they were the parents of seven
children. Myra married a Raymond, and went to
Harvard; Peter died in early childhood; Stillman
married Adeline Priest, and their two children, a son
and daughter, went to the Sandwich Islands to live;
Sally married Samuel Hosmer, and went to Acton
first, afterward settled in Harvard; Peter, Jr., mar-
ried Betsey Mead, Jan. 2, 1839, and settled in Box-
borough. They buried their only child, Augustine
A.., about a year ago. His wife, a daughter of Mr.
William Moore, died some years before. Granville
married Caroline Hoar March 4, 1841, and settled in
Boxborough. They have nine children — A. Granville,
Elwyn, Edna, Carrie, Myra, Clarence, Frank, Eva and
Austin. They are all married but two, and one, Frank,
IS settled on the old Nathaniel Mead place, in Box-
borough. All of the children except two, are musi-
cians, and one daughter, Edna, has been a salaried
singer in the city of Fitchburg, where she resides.
.Austin teaches music in thesameplace. Merrill mar-
ried in Boxborough, went to Bedford, and afterwards
settled in Charlestown. One of his four children,
George, married May Wetherbee, of Boxborough, and
lives iu Charlestown.
Peter and Granville are the only representatives of
their family now living. Ephraim Whitcomb, the
grandfather of these two, served in town in various
position.^ of trust and responsibilitj'. He was one of
the selectmen when the district was incorporated in
1783, and held that position, at different times, for
many years. He also held the offices of town clerk,
treasurer, assessor, aud he was a prominent worker in
784
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the church and society when they were in their in-
fancy. Moses, Ephraim and Joel, sons of Ephraim
Whitcomb, Jr., also held office as selectmen for many
years. Moses Whitcomb, Jr., also his son Moses,
held this office ; the father was also superintending
school committee at one time. Peter Whitcomb, the
father of Granville and Peter, was town treasurer for
nine years, for which service he would take no com-
pensation. He also served the town in the capacity
of selectman. Mr. Granville Whitcomb has served
the town aa superintending school committee, town
clerk, selectman, assessor, constable and collector, and
auditor. He also had the honor of being sent repre-
sentative at one time, and his father and two of hia
father's brothers. Captain Ephraim and Joel, also held
this position for more than one year.
The ancestors of the first Mead families connected
with Boxborough settled in Harvard. Dea. Oliver
Mead, who was living here in 1783, and Anna, his
wife, were the parents of ten children — Sarah, Lucy,
Anna, Oliver, Jr., Abraham, Elizabeth, Nabby W.,
Samuel, Hannah (who died when eight years old)
and Nathaniel. Sarah, born Dec. 19, 1778, married
Levi Houghton, of Harvard. Lucy was unmarried.
Anna married William Stevens, father of (Jliver
Stevens, of Boxborough. Oliver, Jr., married Bet-
sey Taylor, who was an aunt of the late Capt. V;ir-
num Taylor, and was boru and brought up on the
Taylor place. Abraham married a Kimball, from
Littleton. Elizabeth married Reuben Houghton, nf
Harvard, brother of Levi, and after her death her
husband married the next younger daughter of the
family, Nabby W. Samuel married three times —
Betsey Stevens ;ind Mary SteveuH, of Boxborough,
and Lucinda Conant, of Harvard. Nathaniel married
Lucy Taylor.
Oliver, Jr., and Betsey, his wife, buried several
children. There are seven living: Betsey. Sally,
Oliver, Lyman, Emory, Walter and Anna. Betsey,
bcrn November 10, 1815, married Peter Whitcomb
and settled In town. Sally married George Hager,
settled in Boxborough, and afterwards removed to
West Acton, where they still reside; they have no
children. Oliver married Caroline Wetherbee, and
is settled in town; their only living child, Sadie A.
B., married Alfred Brown and resides at home. Ly-
man married Melissa Willis, of Harvard, and thev
have two children, Lyman Willis and Emma ; Willis
married Julia Littlefield, of Boxborough ; Emma mar-
ried Frank Priest, of Harvard, and they are both
living at West Acton. Emory married Eliza Clement,
of Vermont, and settled In town; their only liviu"-
child, Frances Annie, married Phili|( Ciinningliam,
and they are settled on the old .Stone place ; they
have four children. Walter married Eliza Jane
Chandler, of Maine, and is living on the Mead estate,
where his father and grandfatli"ir lived before him ;
they have three children ; two sons, — tlie lirni of 1
Charles H. Mead A Co. — are engaged in business in
West Acton ; aud the only daughter, Blanche, is at-
tending school at Lawrence Academy, Groton. Anna
married William Moore, and they reside at the centre
of the towu.
Samuel, who married Betsey Stevens, settled on the
estate now owned by Mr. Charles Brown. They had
three children : Mrs. Elizabeth Ives, of Natick ;
Franklin, who married Miss Nancy Morse, of Mason ;
and died in Lunenburg; and Benjamin Stevens, who
married Rebecca Louisa Burgess, of Harvard, and
settled in town ; they have two children : Edgar C,
who married Lucy H. Hayward, and is living in
Boxborough, and Minnie L., who married George F.
Kingsbury and resides at Ayer.
Samuel and Mary (Stevens), his second wife, had
only one child, Samuel, who died at the West.
Samuel and Lucinda (Conant) Mead were the
parents of six childreu : Lucinda, who married
David Howe, of Maine ; Albert, who married Alwilda
B. Crocker, of .Maine ; Alfred, who married Hannah
Maria Miles, of Stow ; Abby, who is unmarried ;
.\nna, who married Charles Harding, and lived only
a lew year** after her marriage ; and Mary, who died
young. Lucinda, Albert, Alfred and Abby all reside
iu Natick. Albert Mead has been an extensive shoe
manufacturer, and has acquired a large property, but
has now retired from (he business and is living upon
a farm. He went as representative from Natick last
year.
Nathaniel and Lucy (Taylor), his wife, settled on
the estate now owned by Mr. Frank Whitcomb.
They had eight children : Nathaniel (who had his
uame changed to Adelbert), ' >liver W., .Sarah, Maria,
-Mary, Auna, ^'arnum and Frances Adelaide. Adel-
bert married Almira Hoar, of Littleton, aud resides
at West Acton. <^)liver W. married three times ; his
first wife was Mary Hartwell, of Harvard; he is also
living at West .A.cton ; Sarah married Mr. Low, of
Fitchburg, and they had twelve children. After her
death her husband married again, and they were the
parents of five more, making a family of seventeen
children. Maria married Andrew Patch, of Littleton,
and went to Harvard ; of their four children only two
are living. Mr. Patch died about ten years ago, and
about a year ago his widow went to t "harlestown to
live with her son. Mary married a Lothrop, and
lived in California until the death of her husband, a
period uf over thirty j'ears; they had no children.
.VIrs. Lothrop is now living at West .-Vcton. Auna
married Mr. Charles Twitchell, of Fitchburg, and
they are now liviug at We.st Acton; they have one
son. Varnum married Miss Keyes for his first wife,
and lie, also, resides in the village of West Acton.
Frances Adelaide married Frank Stevens, of Stow,
and they have one son.
Deacon Oliver Mead was highway surveyor and
collector in 1783, and held at diflferent times for sev-
eral years the positions of selectman, treasurer and
town clerk. Oliver Jr., was selectman and assessor.
BOXBOROUGH.
785
Samuel Mead served the tovrn as school committee,
overseer of poor and selectman for several years.
BeLJaiuiu S. Mead held the otfice of assessor, and was
selectman for twelve years, and Walter Mead, also,
has served the town in this capacity. Adelbert,
Oliver W. and Varnum Mead carry on s large busi-
ness at 3d North Market, and 35 Clinton Streets,
Boston, under the firm-name of A. & O. VV. Mead
& Co. I quote the following from "Our Grange
Homes : " " The "location is considered one of the
best in the city. They have cold storage capacity of
1000 tons at West Acton, and they built the first large
cold storage house in Massachusetts for holding com-
mission goods. On the Boston premises is every nec-
essary appliance for the expeditious and efficient
handling of all goods included in the commission
trade, the utmost efficiency thus being secured.
" The ample opportunities given by the long period
this house has been established have been well im-
proved ; a steady reputation has thus been acquired.
The specialties are butler, poultry, eggs, cheese,
fruits, etc., selling to all cla.-^es of customers. Two-
thirds of the business comes from the West and prov-
inces.
"The business was established in 1S44, known as
A. (fc O. W. ^lead, taking iU i>re.'>ci\t title in Septem-
ber, 1866, by which date it will be seen that this is,
with a few exceptions, the oldest produce commission
house in Boston.
'"The early life of .\delbert was jiassed in agricul-
tural pursuits. Young ^fead was apprenticed to a
shoemaker, and learned the trade. In 1841 he began
tu sell shoes in Boston, and it became convenient to
his neighbors and tliuse along the route from Bex-
borough to entrust goods to him for sale on commis-
sion, and thus the present business was eventually
CRlablished, he taking as his partner his brother,
Oliver W. Mead. They at first had a large wagon,
with a stand outside Quiucy Markets, and the busi-
ness was conducted at the Market for nine j'ears. It
was then removed to -lO North Market Street, and to
the present site in ISGG. Mr. Mead is well known to
our merchants as a man of unimpeachable character
and high aims, and he owes his success in life to his
pluck, push and ability. He has done his part by
liberal and honorable methods lo place the house in
its present position in the trade. He is a member of
the Chamber of Commerce, and, with Mr. O. W.
Mead, also is a member of the Fruit Exchange. He
is interested with bis brothers in railroads, and also
in live stock in Wyoming Territory.
" Mr. O. W. I\Iead conducted the farm until twenty-
(me years of age, and at an early age he evinced
pleasure in intellectual pursuits, and on reaching his
majority taught school until twenty-three years of
age in Luufiiburgaud Littleton. He then connected
himself with his brother in the present busiue-ss. He
IS a first-class business man in every sense of the
word, and has always manifested mjrked financial
50-li
ability. As an executive he possesses great power,
and has carried system as near perfection as can be
obtainable. He has been called upon to fill positioDB
of trust, and is director in the First National Bank of
Ayer, and trustee in the North Middlesex Savjn>!B
Bank of the same town. He vras also a director in
the Chamber of Commerce, and was one of the char-
ter members of the Produce Exchange.
" Mr. Varnum B. Mead was bom on the farm ; his
life has been varied. When nineteen years old he
went to the Sandwich Islands, where he remained
five years; he then had a valuable business experience
in Fitchburg, Montreal and Acton, shipping from
Montreal and Acton to Boston, and mainly to his
brothers. He came to this city in 1866, and was one
vear on salary in his brother's firm, and in 1867 was
admitted to partnership, fie has a larf^e circle of
warm personal friends. Among other positions of
trust, he is president of the Franklin and Megantic
Railroad of Maine."
John Cobleigh came from ScoUand at an early
period, and purchased land here about 1707. He
was the ancestor of a large family, whose descendants
:ire still with us in the persons of Ruel T., Daniel W.
and Ephraim B. Cobleigh, sons of Daniel and Han-
■lah (Whitcomb) Cobleigh, and Ephraim, son of John
and Caroline (Hayward) Cobleigh. The grand-
parents of these were John and Rachel Cobleigh.
From the first Cobleigh who came from Scotland
down to Ephraim Cobleigh, one son has always borne
I he name of John. The little trunk covered with
liair and studded with brass nails, in which the first
.lohn Cobleigh kept his money and his sword, belong-
ing to the uniform which he wore on state occasions,
.ire in possession of a cousin of Ephraim B. Cobleigh,
who received them from his mother at her death,
about a year ago. They had been handed down from
one generation to another until she obtained posses-
sion of them. Daniel Cobleigh married Ann Perkins,
of Biddeford, Me., for his second wife, and she is now
living in the family of Mr. Ruel T. Cobleigh. The old
Cobleigh homestead formerly stood opposite Mi.
Wright's present residence.
Ruel T. Cobleigh married Lizzie Perkins. They
had three children, — Frank, who died young ; John
R., who married Sarah Withington, of Princeton, and
lives on the home-place, and Mida E., who married
Willard Burns, and resides in Fitchburg.
Daniel W. Cobleigh married Caroline Smith, of
Charlestown, for his first wife, and they had two
daughters, Hannah Maria and Carrie Etta. Hannah
Maria Cobleigh married Mr. Charles Veasie and set^
tied in Boxborough ; Carrie Etta Cobleigh is teaching
in Harvard. She is a fine musician. Daniel W.
Cobleigh married Mrs. Antoinette Barnard, daughter
of Mr. Varnum Taylor, for his second wife.
Ephraim B Cobleigh married Rosella Wetherbee
for his first wife, and for his second wife, Salinda
Holden, of Shirley. He has no children.
786
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY. MASSACHUSETTS.
John and Caroline (Haywaid) Oobleigh bud two
sona, Ephraim and Howard. Epbraiin iiiarrieO
Harriet Whitney, and they ha%e eight children :
Charles, Fred, Nelson, Jlelviu, Ora, Hattie, .\.lfreJ
and Herbert. Howard Cobleigh married Lucy .^^nn
Johnson, and resides in Fitchburg. They have two
daughters.
Ruel T. Cobleigh has been active in town atfairs,
having been selectman, assessor, constable and col-
lector, auditor, highway surveyor, etc., tor a. number '
of years. Daniel W. Cobleigh bus held the position
of town treasurer for the past twenty-six years, wa<
town clerk for six years, selectman lor seven years
continuously — eleven years in all — and has held
various other town otiices. Ephraim B. Cobleigh
served its town clerk tor twelve years continuously,
thirteen years as selectman, and has held various
positions of trust and responsibility. He has been
connected with town business lor twenty-seven years.
In a volume entitled "Genealogies of the Families
and Descendants of the Early Settlers of W'atertown,
Mass., inoludiug Waltham and Weston,'' isfouiul the
following: " H:igar : — In the church records Rev.
Mr. Angier wrute the name Agar. Perhaps it will
be ascertained that William Hagar, of Watertuwii,
was a son of that William Hagar that was admitted
freeman ilay 18, 1(331. Both names are found in
England and their arms may indicate some early
affinity, a lion beiug their chief characteristic' .Mr.
Daniel B. Hsgar, of the .Salem Normal School, who
is a great-grandson of Isaac Hagar, of Weston, says :
"The two nami's are probably the same, as they are
in the Bible. As the family was among the very
earliest settlers uf Watertown, it is undoubtedly of
English origin. I noticed in London a street named
' Agar.' I do not understand why the ditfereut
branches of the family should spell the name diH'er-
ently. .\s a scriptuie name it is always -ipelled in
one way so far as the last syllable i.s concerned."
The genealogy in the volume referred to runs thus:
William Hagar (Hager), married .Mar. 20, 1G44-45 ;
died Jan. 10, lUS:5-84. He had ten children. The
third one, Samuel, was born Nov. 20, lti47; died
Febr. 13, 1703-04. His fourth and hist child was
Isaac, of Weston, who was born .Vpr. 24, ITHl. He
married Prudence Allen, .Inly Itl, 1724. He had twelve
children, the tirst of whom was Isaac, who was born
May 5, 1725. This Isaac had tour children, — Phiiie-
has, Elizabeth, .Vbigail aud /ilpah. Phinehas — the
ancestor of the Hagers of Boxborough — married Su-
sanna Leadbetter. He died in Weston in Aug., 1817.
He had nine children,^Daniel, Nabby, Phinehas
(born July 21, I7S8), Charles, Helena, Darius, Maria,
George (who died in infancy) and George tJtis. Dan-
iel died when about seventeen years of age. Charles
lived to manhood and died at the West, Helena
married a Hersey, and Darius married Lucy Wright
and had eight children, of whom four died voung,
and the youngest daughter, Esther, married a Burn-
ham and died several years ago. <")f three who are
living, George is married aud resides in California,
and Augustus 1'. and Baron Stowe are both married
and settled in Littleton, Mass.
Maria Hagar married William Nottage, of Boston.
George Otis married Sarah Day, of the same city, and
they had (ive children, of whom only one lived to
mature vears. He — George Otis — was killed in one
of the last battles of the War of the Rebellion.
Phinehas Hager and Ruth Stowe, daughter of
Maniuiseh nud Mary (Whitcomb) Stowe, of Hills-
borough, N. H., were marrie<l November, ISU, in
Harvard, by Rev. Isaac Bonney, Methodist minister.
Ruth Stowe w.a.s born in Hillsborough, December S,
17SS, aud died at West Acton, May '.), 1S80, aged
ninety-one years and live months, lion's Herald,
date November 4, ISSO, give.' the following:
" Sister iliit^Hr. wlipn t"'. yeMr? "f age, iipou tlie deaili of tier parent?,
r.im« ro HarvanJ. Mna5 , [o lesiJe Willi relatives. Here elie became at-
•Iiianited with liie .^telll<»1lbli>, aiiil united with the church, to wbuKe
■ttittrines ami nb.i-.:es Hlie h.-canic r*troU2l.v .itlaLlxd. .\t the age *•( -S
-he married Philiehari Ilapar. ni Weston. .» man uf deep aud ardent
pietv. Her )uiiil>aiid died \i hen nhe vvaa hut 41, leaving her with raven
ohildien, the -lide^t heme but l'. veanj uld. >he waaa wumait uf lilrt^ng
• lim.icter. never \ieldiui; it |-uint "here >he « «>U(julered heiiell morallv
il^rUt. Hev clleerfulne=^ llii-i'iiglti'ilt her outire Ufe wad veiy marked.
MiMUt five 3cnn> previoue to her death ehe resided uitli a aun in Weet
Actun ; llere ~lie was near tlie ehnith and «:is a i-uliblaDI attendant,
lieili}; j'lenelK iiu<rning and aflernuOli in all aeallier. I'lie la£t five
tnonthd of her lilt- 'he wart imrtially paraly/e.j. hut to kindly cared fur
by her danchter antl s<»n, that she waa never known tu make a c-m-
(daint ; .ilMi>-r \vant$ were antici|iitted, :;::il tihe had only tu aubuer
aithaMuile. Thus ended the long life ul this Christian woDiaD aud
.ttTectiuuale mother."
Phinehas Hager died January 11, 1S30, at the
early age of forty-one. He was a member of the
Methodist Church referred to iu the history of the
town, aud wa:< a class-leader many years. He owned
a small farm in the southwest part of Boxborough,
but worked at the business of a shoemaker, haviug
learned that trade of Nathan Hagar, of Lincoln.
The homesteail was burned some years ago, but the
estate is still iu the bauds of George Hager. of West
.Vcton, one of the sons. Phinehas Hager and his
wife, Ruth (Stowe) Hager, are buried iii the old hill
burying-ground. They were the parents of seven
children, — Solomon, born March 2S, 1813, George,
Sarah, Phineba-s, Mary, Benjamin Stowe and Daniel.
Solomon Hager married Lucy Ann Fuller, of Ver-
mont, and they had three daughters, of whom one
dietl young. Helen R. married George W. Kimball
and went to St. Louis, where he was connected with
Simmons Hardware Company. Jlr. Kimball died
very suddenly in 18S9 while boarding inSwampscott,
Mass. Lucy Ann married John H. White, of Chi-
cago.
George Hager married Sally Mead, of Boxborough.
Sarah is unmarried and lives in town. Phinehas, who
took the name of Phinehas A., went to Oberlin, Ohio,
to attend fehool. He, with a number of others, went
out from I >berlin to found <)livet College, Michigan.
' He married Polly J. Edsell, of Olivet, for his first
BOXBOROUGH.
787
wife, and they had five children, all of whom died iu
childhood. His second wife was Mrs. Sabra White,
of Olsego, Michigan. He enlisted from Otsego, and
trntered Company B, Nineteenth Regiment Michigan
Infantry, in August, 1862. He w.is first sergeant of his
company and acted as captain for quite a long time.
He was in Libby Prison at one time, but was released
on paro'ie. He was killed August 7, 186-1, near Atlanta,
in Sherman's March from Atlanta to the Sea.
Mary Hager married Benjamin K. Barnard and set-
tled in Harvard. They had live children, of whom
three, John, Sarah and Mar)', are now living. John
married Nellie Green, and lives iu Worcester; Sarah
married William Pufi°cr, buried her husband, and re-
sides at home ; Mary married W. J. D. Ewart, and
iilso lives in Worcester. The oldest son, Charles, died
when ftbout a year old, and the youngest, Charles
Wesley, a student at Lawrence .Vcademy, Groton,
died wuen a little more than seventeen.
Benjamin Stowe Hager married Elizabeth Blanchard,
of Boxborough, and resides on the Captain Ephratoj
Whitcomb place. They had seven children : Phinehas,
who died when eight years of age ; Mary E., who re-
sides at home ; Simon B., George H., Benjamin O.,
John M. and Sarah C, whu died when a year and a
half old. Simon B. Hager married Lucie C Gilson,
of Littleton, and is settled on the Whitman ANether-
bee place. George H. Hager married Florence E-
Albee, of Clinton, and with his brother, Benjamin (.).
Hager, is engaged in the grocery business in Clinton ;
and John M. Hager married Mattie L. Cuan, of Som-
erville, and resides in that place.
Daniel Hager married Maria H. Is'oltage, of St4irk,
Maine, and went to Kansa.s, where they remained
eight years. They were the parents of five children,
of whom four are living. They are now settled iu
Wendell, Massachusetts.
The first Phinehas Hagar st-rved throughout the
Revolutionary War. He, with others, came up from
Weston, crossed the Concord Kiver in a boat, and
joined in the fight at Concord Bridge ; and he was
present at the surrender of Cornwallis, at Yorktown.
Mr. Solomon Hager served as Superintending School
t'oramittee in 183it, and was chosen represenuuive
from Bosborough in 1840 and 1841. Mr. George
Hager was selectman for a number of years, and
Benjamin S. has held that position, also that of town
treasurer for four years. Mr. Benjamin S. Hager is
deeply interested in the prosperity of the Congrega-
tional Church, and for years has labored earnestly
and faithfully for its advancement. His oldest son is
a deacon of that church.
I am indebted to Mr. Herbert Nelson Hayward, of
Watertowii, Massachusetts, formerly of Boxborough,
for information regarding the Hayward family, nearly
all ot which has been selected from the "(teneulogy of
the Hayward Family," which he is preparing at the
present time.
"George Heaward," or Hayward, aud liis wife
Mary (American aocestorB of the Boxborough Hay-
wards), were one of the '" about twelve families " that
Rev. Peter Bnlkeley, of Odell, England, and Simon
Willard, a merchant of Horsmonden, County of
Kent, brought with them, embarking from London
May 9, lG3o, in the ship " Susan and Ellen " (Captain
Edward Paine, of Wapping, England), and settled at
Musketaquid (Concord, Massachusetts) in the fall of
163d. He was one of the first settlers of Concord,
and had an allotment of land from the first division
of lands of the original grant, by the General Court,
of six miles of land square, where he built a house
and barn. In 1664 he built a saw-mill, afterward a
corn-mill, at what is still known as Hayward's Mills.
His full name has appeared in ancient records, in ad-
dition to that above, as Gog Heaward, Georg He-
ward, George Hey ward, Georg Hey ward, George Hei-
ward, George Heywood and Geo. Howard, but Savage
in his "Genealogical Dictionary " says, "he wrote his
name Heaward." Georg Heaward and wife are quite
likely a branch of the Hayward, alias Haw&rd, or
Howard family, that early settled on the Isle of Hart-
rey, in the northeast part of Kent County, England.
This Hayward family were a branch of the verj- an-
cient and original family of Havard or Hayward, a/ias
Havert, Hey ward, Haward, Howard, of AV ales, where
the earliest records of the Norman ancestor, who, it
is said, came in the eleventh centur)- from Havre de
Grace, the sea-port town of Normandy in the north-
ern part of France, are found to be.
" Joseph ; heaward," or hayward, as he signed his
name to his will, was the second son of Georg Hea-
ward, of Concord, Massachusetts. He was born in
lti4i!, and married for his first wife, Hannah Hosmer,
of Concord, and for the second, Elizabeth Treadway,
of Watertown ; Simeon hayward, of Concord, sixth
sou of Joseph and Elizabeth hayward, born in 1683,
married Rebecca Hartwell, of Concord, in 1705. Dea-
con Samuel Hayward, of Acton, second son of Sim-
eon-hayward, or Hayward, and Rebecca (Hartwell)
Hayward, of Concord, born in 1713, married, in 1739,
Mary Stevens. Paul Hayward, of Boxborough, Mass-
achusetts, second son of Deacon Samuel and Mary
(Stevens) Hayward, of Acton, born 1745, married
Anna White, of Acton, in 1768, and settled on the
farm now owned by Mrs. Eliza A. Hayward. He
died May 16, 1825, aged seventy-nine. They had a
family of ten children : Anna, Deacon Paul, Sarah,
Mather, Elizabeth, James, Susanna, Ebenezer, Mary
and Esquire Samuel Hayward. Anna married Moses
Whitcomb ; Deacon Paul married Lucy Whitcomb ;
Sarah married Reuben Graham ; Mather married
Lucy Page, of Bedford ; Elizabeth married (1) Gates
(2) Whitcomb, of Littleton; James married Eunice
Wood, of Boxborough ; Susanna married Moses Hart-
well, of Littleton ; Ebenezer married Polly Wether-
bee ; M.nry married (1) John Wood, (2) Jonathan
Nource, of Boxborough ; Esq. Samuel married Sophia
Stevens, of Marlborough.
TSS
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Deacon Paul and Lucy (Whitcomb) Hayward had
fourteen children : Paul, Lucy, Ephraim, Joel,
James, John, Stevens, Samuel, Hannah, Eliza Ann,
Joseph, and three who died young. Paul, Ephraim '
Joel, James, John, and Samuel all settled in Ashby,
Mass. : Lucy married John Kimball, of Littleton ;
Stevens married Harriet Johnson ; Hannah died at
the age of 24; Eliza A., married (1) Ebenezer W.
Hayward, (2) Col. John Whitcomb, both of Box-
borough ; and Deacon Joseph married (1) Catherine
W. Wellington, (2) Mrs. Ellen A. Bezanson, of
Chelsea.
James Hayward, who married Harriet Foster and
settled in Ashby, bad one son, Joel Foster, who mar-
ried Sarah E. Webber, of Ashby, by whom he had
eight children : Cornelia A., who married Granville
Veaaie, of Boiborough ; Cordelia E., who died young ;
James P. Stevens, Joel Foster, Minnie, Martha J.,
and Roland. Joel Foster Hayward, Sr., was bora in
Ashby, and previous to coming to Boxboroagh lived
in Acton, where for ten years he waa deacon of the
Congregational Church. He has served the town as
superintendent of schools, also as selectman.
Deacon Joseph and Catherine (Wellington) Hay-
ward had two children, Joseph Warren and Lucie
Helena. J. Warren married Margaret A. V. Hutch-
ins, of Carlisle, and Lucie H. married Edgar C.
Mead, of Boxborough. J. Warren Hayward has
served the town as selectman and asseiisor for several
years. His father, Joseph Hayward, was deacon ol
the Congregational Church in Boxborough for
twenty-six years. He died June 22, 1888.
James and Eunice (Wood) Hayward were the par-
ents of niue children : Eunice, Susannah, James
Wood, John (who died when twenty-six years of age),
Stevens, Lucy Anna, Paul (who died at the age of
twenty), and two who dieil in childhood. Eunice
married Emery Fairbanks ; Susannah married Sewell
Fairbanks ; James Wood married Hannah E. Conant,
of Acton, Mass. ; Stevens married Charlotte Conant,
of Acton, who was eighth in descent from Roger Con-
ant, who was first Colonial Grovernor of the Massa-
chusetts Bay Colony at Cape .\nn, in 1624 ; Lucy Anna
married Thomas Burbeck, of Acton, buried her hus-
band in 1870, and is now living with her brother, Ste-
vens Hayward, in Boxborough. " James Hayward,"
says William .S. Wood in his " Wood Genealogy,"
" was named for his uncle, James Hayward, of Acton,
Massachusetts, who fell at Lexington, April 19, 1775,
the day of the Concord fight." He was said to have
been an excellent man and universally esteemed by
those who knew him. He was for a number of years
selectman, assessor and highway surveyor of Box-
borough. Capt. James Wood Hayward, his son, re-
sides in West Acton, Massachusetts. He has been
active and enterprising, and is a prominent man in
his town.
Stevens and Charlotte (Conant) Hayward were the
parents of five children : Charles H., who died in
infancy ; Herbert N., J. Quincy, Clara S. and Lottie
M. Herbert married Sarah P. Baldwin, of Waltham,
and resides in Watertown, Massachusetts. J. Quincy,
a graduate of Amherst, class of 1882, is unmarried,
and is at present engaged on the staff of the Bunker
Hill Times, Boston. Clara S. married Charles L.
Woodward, of Landgrove, Vermont, and resides in
Boxborough, and Lottie M. married Charles V. Mc-
Clenathan, of West Rindge, New Hampshire. Stevens
Hayward received an academic education, taught
school in Boxborough and Acton, and finally settled
on his father's farm, where he has lived most of his
life. He was a member of the Boxborough Light In-
fantry Company when it existed, and has been school
committee and highway surveyor of Boxborough.
Ebenezer and Polly (Wetherbee) Hayward had
seven children : Ebenezer W., Dea. Albert, Mary,
Franklin, Susanna, Anna and Paul. Hon. Paul
i Hayward married Alice M. Balcom, of Sudbury,
Massachusetts, and they were the parents of four
children : Alice P. who died in infancy ; Florence M.,
Albert H., and Cally H. Florence M. married
Maurice G. Cochrane, of Melrose, Massachusetts.
Albert A. is master mechanic of the Thomson-Hous-
ton Electric Company, of all work on the West End
Street Railway System, Boston, aod he is also pur-
chasing agent for the sanle company. Hon. Paul
Hayward resided on his father's homestead for many
years. He was school committee and deacon of the
Congregational Church for a long time. He had the
honor of being sent representative from Boxborough
in 1871, andalie served in the late Civil War for nearly
two years. On account of the sickness and suffering
he experienced while in his country's sen'ice, he waa
granted in 1885 an invalid pension. He removed
from Boxborough to Reading, Massachusetts, in 1864,
thence to Melrose Highlands in 1879. In 1887 he
went to Los Angeles, California, and entered the
employ of the Los Angeles Electric Street Railway as
a conductor. He is now temporarily residing there.
Esquire Samuel Hayward and Sophia, his wife,
were the parents of five children. He lies in the
lower burying-ground in Boxborough, and his only,
son, Samuel Henry, is also bnried there.
Deacon AI. E. Wood, in hia centennial speech, said
of the six Hayward sons who removed to Ashby :
"They and their descendants exert a large influence
in all that pertains to the welfare of the town, both
agricultural and educational. In all the work of the
church they are generous sup porters ; one of them at
his death left a generous bequest, that these blessings
might be perpetuated." The obituary notice of their
mother is worthy of note : "This aged Christian was
a pattern of industry, kindness, meekness, patience
aud piety. For three-score and six years she was a
consistent member of the Congregational Church in
Boxborough; her eleven children joined the church
of their mother aud two of them became deacons in
it after their father."
BOXBOROUGfl.
r89
Thomas Blanchard and his son George, bom 1616, I
came from near Andover, England, in the year 1639, I
on the ship " Jonathan," and settled in Charlestown |
(now Maiden), Mass. Joseph, son of George Blan- |
chard, born 1G54, married Hannah Sliepard. Joseph,
»on of Joseph and Hannah (Shepard) Blanchard,
born May 7, 1686, married Elizabeth Whittemore,
and in 1717 or 1718 moved from Charlestown, i
" through the Indian paths," to Littleton, — that part
of Littleton which is now Boxborough, — and settled
on the John Blanchard farm. They had two chil-
dren, Jemima, born Dec. 21, 1721, and Simon, born
Oct. 6, 1728. Jemima was unmarried and died in 1790,
aged sixty-nine years. Simon married Sarah ,
and they were the parents of four children, among
whom were Calvin, born February 27, 1754, and Lu-
ther, born June 4, 1756, the brothers whose names
have become familiar to us through their participation
in the fight at the old North Bridge, Concord, in 1775.
Calvin married Abigail Reed, of Westford. The fore-
going information with regard to this branch of the
early Blanchards was obtained from Mr. George D.
Blanchard, of Maiden, Mass., who has been engaged
for several years in collecting genealogical records of
the Blanchard family.
Calvin and Abigail (Reed) Blanchard were the
parents of nine children, — Abigail, Calvin, Luther,
Simon, Jemima, who died in infancy, Joseph, Lucy,
John and Susannah. Abigail married Reuben Hart-
well, of Shirley ; Calvin married (1) Hannah Hoar,
(2) Nancy Warren, both of Littleton. Cnlvin and
Hannah (Hoar) Blanchard, had five children of whom
two died in infancy. Jemima, their oldest child,
married Mr. Parker, the father of James A. Parker,
formerly of Littleton. Luther Blanchard was unmar-
ried and resided with his brother John, at the old
homestead, until his death, at the age of seventy.
Simon married for his first wife Martha Shattuck, of
Littleton ; for his second, Mary Keyes, of Westford,
and for the third Mrs. Hannah Preston, of Box-
borough ; Joseph married Louisa Marshall, of Tewks-
bury ; Lucy married Amos Day, of Shirley ; John
married Margaret Burbeck, of Westford, and Susannah
married Abner Wheeler, of Acton ; they had eigh?
children. Mr. Wheeler died young, and his widow
afterward married Pelatiah Brooks, of Acton. They
had one child. Mrs. Brooks died in Shirley.
Simon Blanchard (1784-1867) and Martha Shat-
tuck, his wife, settled on the estate where Mr. Her-
bert Blanchard now lives, and were the parents of two
children, Simon and Martha. Simon married Eliza-
beth Dix Fletcher for his first wife, and they had
three children — William. Ellen Ann and Elizabeth
Fletcher. William married Nettie M. Stacy, of Stod-
dard, and after his death, she, with her two children,
Arthur W. and Gracie M., returned to her former
'home. Ellen Ann married Calviu N. Holbrook, and
they, with their three boys, reside in Littleton. They
buried one little girl in childhood. Elizabeth
Fletcher married Amasa Knowlton, of Acton, and,
with their three children, reside in that place. Simon
Blanchard married Susan Wheeler, daughter of Ab-
ner Wheeler, for his second wife.
Martha Blanchard married Samuel Sawin, of Stow,
and of their five children, one died in infancy ; Sam-
uel Dexter^ married Caroline Elizabeth Simonds, and
their only child, Charles Dexter, is a physician in
Charlestown ; John Travis married Sarah Whitney
Sa»vyer, of Bolton, and they had four children, of
whom two are living ; Martha Maria married Marcus
Morton Raymond, of Boxborough, and of their three
daughters, one, Nellie Morton, died young, and the
other two, Carrie' and Ella, reside in Somerville, the
present residence of their ikther, and the place where
their mother died. Simon Blanchard Sawin died at
the age of twenty-seven.
Simon Blanchard and Mary (Eeyes), his second
wife, were the parents of nine children : Joseph K.,
Sarah, Mary Ann, Luke, Elizabeth, Caroline, John,
and two who died in early childhood. Joseph K.
married Mary Culver, of Boston, and they had eight
children ; Mary Eliza, Phoebe Ann, and Joseph Her-
mon, who died in childhood, Emily Frances,
Caroline Augusta, Calvin Herbert and Willard and
Warren, .twins. Emily Frances married Ephraim
Raymond, and resides ia Somerville. They have
buried one child and have six living. The two old-
est children are married. Augusta Raymond married
Mr. William H. Forbush, and they, with their four
children, are settled on one of the old Wetherbee
places in Boxborough. The next daughter, Hattie,
married Ernest Bezanson, and resides in Charlestown-
Caroline Augusta Blanchard married Richard Y.
Nelson, and resides in town. They have buried one
little daughter, and have three children living. Cal-
vin Herbert married Sarah Lauder, and is settled ou
the old place where his father and grandfather lived
before him. Thev have buried one child, and have
four living. Willard Blanchard married Jennie
Furbush, of Maine, and they had three children, of
whom one died in infancy. Willard Blanchard has
been dead about eight years, and Jennie (Forbush)
Blanchard died about two years ago. Warren Blan-
chard married Nellie Webber, and of their five chil-
dren, only three are living. They reside in South-
boro'.
Sarah Blanchard married Leonard Chandler, of
Princeton, and of their six children, two died young.
The oldest daughter, Sarah Frances, married Henry
Hobbs, of Princeton ; Ella Jane is unmarried, and re-
sides in Cambridge ; Leonard married Hattie Stew-
art, and they, with their three children, reside in
Somerville; John is unmarried, and remains at home.
Mary Ann Blanchard married James Fisher Sawin,
and lives in Natick. Only four of their eight chil-
1 Samubl Dextar Sawio h%B died Bioce Uie wiitiDg of thiB history.
1 Carrie mairied Mr. Aloozo B. CushiDg, June 18, ISSO.
790
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX C0UXT7, MASSACHUSETTS.
dren are living : Simon Blanchard, Phares N., Mar-
tha and Lizzie Ida. Simon Blanchard Sawin mar-
ried Alice Leland, of Sherburne, and they have four
children. Phares N., Martha and Lizzie Ida remain
at home.
Luke Blanchard married Jerusha Voae, of Prince- i
ton. They buried two children in early childhood, and !
their youngest daughter, Mary Alice, when twenty- |
one years of age. Annie and Arthur re«^ide at home I
with their parents, in West Acton. !
Caroline Blanchard married Simeon Wetherbee, of i
Boxborongh, and they have eight children : M. Llew 1
ellyn, Allie V., Ellis, Burt L., Marj- K., Arthur H.,
Ella F. and Carrie B. Llewellyn is married and liv-
ing in Boston ; Allie married Morton Raymond, of
Somerville, and they have one son, John Raymond ;
Ellis married Annie R. Cowdrie, of Boxborongh, and
they, with their three children, reside in Harvard;
Burt L. is in business in Boston ; Mary K. married
George M. Whitomb, of Charlestown, and resides in
that place; Arthur H.' remains at home ; Ella F. is
teaching in Harvard, and Ciurie B. i? attending
school at Ashburnham.
John Blanchard married Anna JI. Snow, and thev
are settled in Lawrence. They have buried imo
child, and the remaining daughter, Lillian, la at home
preparing herself for a teacher.
Joseph and Louisa (Marshall) Blanchard settled on
the Reed farm, and were the parents of sevt-ii chil-
dren; Joseph, Marshall, Henilerson, Solon, Abbv
Ann, Mary Louisa and Calvin. Joseph, Henderson
and Mary Loui.sa are all married and living in the
West. Joseph is a physician. .Marshall married
Charlotte Reed, of West .\cton, and died in Califor-
nia. He left one child. Solon is married, aad liviii?
in Weymouth. Abby Ann niarried Eliab Reed, and
died on the Reed farm, leaving one child. Calvin is
unmarried, and live^ near Weymouth.
John and Margaret (Burbeck) Blanchanl had eight
children: Myron, Abbie, Charles, Clara, Etta, Lucy
A., George and Loui.sa M. Myron died in childhood ;
Abbie married Mr. N. E. Whitcorab, of Boxborongh,
and they have two sons, .\rthur M. and Waldo E. ;
Clara is living with an uncle in Salem ; Etta is en-
gaged in book-keeping in Charlestown ; Lucy .-l.
married .Mr. George H. Decosta, aud they, with their
two children, reside at West .A.cton ; Charles is mar-
ried, and settled in Eden, Dakota; George remains at
home, and Louisa M. is in Boston. Mr. John Blan-
chard died at the old homestead about a vear a^'o, at
the .advanced age of ninty-five years.
The first Calvin Blanchard was in the whole Revo-
lutionary War. He was at the battle of Bunker Hill
on the 17th of .Tune. 1775, and was in some other en-
gagements during the war. He was one of those who
helped to build the forts on Dorchester l{c'isht.s, the
' Arthur H. married Blitu Sfllie Meotzer, uf Harvard. September 21
1800, and IB settled on thp home farm in BoxborougU.
building of which caused the British troops to leave
Boston. He lived to return home and settle on a
farm, that is at the present time, and has always been,
in the pos-session of the Blanchards. He was killed
by the fall of a tree, January 2, 1800.
Joseph K. Bl.inchard has been interested in the
welfare of both the church aud the town. He served
as Superintending .School Committee, selectman, as-
seaaor aud auditor for several years, and was an earn-
est and efficient member of the Congregational
Chorch for over fifty years. He died in 1S88, aged
seventy-three. His wife, Mary (Culver) Bianchard
died about eight years ago.
Luke Blanchard was ctmstable for a good many
years. He settled in West .\ctoii, but does business
in Boston as a commisBion merchant. He is also
largely interested in real estate in different places.
His son, .\rthur Blanchard, is a butcher and cattle-
trader at West Acton.
■So far back .is we can trace them, there seems to
have been three Wetherbee families settled in town,
though jierliaps could we trace the line a little far-
ther, we should find. — what is supposed to be the
case, — that there were only (wo families originally,
and that the heads of these were brothers. Phinehas
Wetherbee. whose father, .Tolin Wetherbee, was here
as early as 1717 or 1727, settled on the farm where
Silas Hoar now lives, and w.ts ancestor of the line of
Silas, Simeon, Xorman ftud i)robably Charles Welli-
cri>ee. 'I'hi.s farm has been in possession of the
Wetherbee family from very early times, and descend-
ants of (lie eiirlith, ninth and tenth generations, in the
prrsons of .Mis. Liiiy (Wetherbee) Hoar, her daugh-
ter, Mrs. ^lercy (Hoar) Wetherbee, and the children
of .Mr. Charles T. Wetherbee and .Alercy (Hoar)
Wetherbee, are now occupying the old homestead.
The house now standing w.is built more than lo<>
years ago. There are fdd deeds and wills of the time
of t^neen Anne in possession of the present family. A
remote ancestor of the family, becoming alarmed lest
he should in some Way lose his wealth, is said to have
hidden a large sum of money upon the estate. The
story haibeeii handed down from one to another and
later generations have sought for the rumored wealth,
but, although at one time the sum of $30 or s40 was
found in a drill-hole in a rock, with a bullet placed
over it, nothing more has ever been discovered.
Sil.TS and Betty Wetherbee were the great-grand-
parents of Mrs. Lucy (Wetherbee) Hoar — wife of
Sil.as Hoar — who is the ohlest living repre.oentative
of this branch of the Wetherbee family now living in
town. Her grandparents were Simeon and Mary
(Kobbins) Wetherbee, and her parents Silas and
Mary Wetherbee. The first .Silas Wetherbee gave
the uieetiiig-house lot in 1775; he was mucii inter-
ested in both cliiircli and district, when they were in
their infancy. He was selectman in 17S3. Silas and
! Mary were the parents of fourteen children : Simeon,
' born November 4, 1800 ; Stillman, Andrew, Silas
BOXBOROUGH.
791
Whitman, born February Ki, 1800 ; Daniel, Emory,
Mary Ann, Susannah Lowell, 8olouion Taylor, who
died young; John Robbins, Lucy, born June 21,
1820, and Clari:*aa. her twin, who died in infancy.
Eliza June Brewer, and Mercy Randall. Simeon
married Persia Whitney ; Siillman married Elizabeth
Sargent, of Stow, and their only daughter married
Simeon Green, of Harvard ; Andrew married Mary
Sargent and settled in town. Of their eight children
only four are now living. Augustine resides in Acton,
and his widowed mother, Mrs. Jlary (Sargent) Weth-
erbbee, is living in Hubbardston, Mnssachasetts.
Silas Whitman married Mary Sargent, sis'er of Eliz:i-
beth, and went to Stow, afterwards settled in Box-
borough. He died about six years ago ; his wife died
several years before, and of their eight children only
two are now living, Mrs. Jane E. Tuttle and Stillman
Wetherbee, of Acton. Daniel married Nancy Bulk-
eley and had no children ; Emory married Hannah
Dyer, of Lowell. He died young, leaving no chil-
dren. She lived to the age of eighty years, and died
in the autumn of 1SS9. Mary Ann married George
Dolby and went away from town ; Susannah Lowell
married Thomas Johnston, of Boston, and they had
one child. Mr. Johnston died a few months ago.'
John Bobbins Wetherbee married Nancy Goodwin,
of Boxborough, and settled in Bolton. They have
eight children. Lucy married Mr. fiilas Hoar and
settled on the old homestead place where seven gen-
erations of the Wetherbee family had lived before her.
They have an only daughter, Mercy, who msrrieil
Charles T. Wetherbee — of another branch of the
Wetherbee family — and tliey have three children.
Eliza Jane Brewer married William Eaton, of Clin-
ton, and they have three children. Merry Randall
married Stillman Houghton, of Worcester. They
have one son.
Simeon and Persia (Whitney) Wetherbee were the
parents of seven children : .Vndrew, Simeon, Caroline,
Samuel Norman, Silas, Edward, who died in infancy,
and Edward. Andrew married Nancy Wheeler, ol
Littleton, settled in town, and removed to Stowe :
Simeon married Caroline Blanchard and settled in
town ; Caroline married Mr. Oliver Mead, of this
town ; Samuel Norman married Caroline Wheeler, ol
Stow, and settled on the farm where his father had
lived before him. They have two children living.
Silas married Mary Parmenter, of Marlborough, and
resides in that place ; Edward married Susan With-
ington, and they with (heir children, Persis and Al-
fred, are living in this town.
The ancestor of another branch of the Wetherbee
family settled on the farm where Mr. John H. Whit-
comb now lives, and one of the family, fir .it least four
generations, has borne the name of Samuel. Samuel,
who was the son of Samuel and Sarah Wetherbee,
and Betsy, his wife, were the parents of seven chil-
1 Mn. JohoBtoD bsE died sioce Uie vriliog of cbia Uialur;.
dreu: Charles, Betsey, Sally, Lucioda and Lucy,
Dolly, and Samuel (1807-72). Charles, Lucinda and
J..ucy died young. Betsey married Daniel Houghton,
of Harvard ; Sally married Ephraira Whitcomb, of
Littleton; Dolly married Joel Hay ward, of Ashby ;
and Samuel married Maria Fletcher, for his first wife,
and for the second, Naomi Chandler, of Maine. Sam-
uel and Naomi (Chandler) Wetherbee were the par-
ents of two children — Maria, who married John H.
Whitcomb and is settled on the old Wetherbee place
(their children are the sixth generation that have oc-
cupied it) and Charles T., who married Mercy Hoar.
Phinehas Wetherbee, the ancestor of a third branch
of the Wetherbee family, was quite an old man in
1770, and owned the farm where W. H. Fnrbuah now
lives. His son Phinehas owned the place in 1783.
The first house, of logs, was built in the second field
uorth of Mr. Parker's, the original grant of land con-
taining something more than 200 acres. Old deeds
I show that they were in quite good circumstances for
1 those times, owning not only this land, but making
; quite large money transactions. As an illustration
! may be mentioned the fact that the first Phinehas
I Wetherbee paid f 1000 to a man in Littleton as a sub-
stitute in the army, 1775-1778. They were active
, and interested in town and public affairs. The first
j deed describes the land as being in Littleton, in the
I Province of Massachusetts Bay, in the tenth year of
I the reign of George the Third. Mr. Augustus W.
■ Wetherbee, the last and only representative of this
branch in town, says, " I have heard my grandfather
speak of the first of the family, and how they often saw
the Indians looking into their windows at night." I
I quote also from his Centennial speech : "It is some-
thing more than a hundred and sixty years since ray
ancestors broke the soil and built their cabin in the
field just hack of the house now owned by Mr. Parker,
j and for one hundred and fifty-five years they lived
there and at the old homestead where Mr. Furbush
i now lives, and tilied those same acres ; and there was
' 1 born and here have I lived the most of my life. In
j yonder graveyard one of the first stones erected is to
the memory of one of my ancestors. Well do I re-
: member the stories of ray grandmother, of the early
I settlers' struggles with the Indian and wild beast, of
: how they used to go to the market on horse-back,
I with their saddle-bags on before and a carcass or two
1 of veal or mutton strapped on behind, the roads mere
I cart psths then ; of how they used to come up to wor-
I ship God on this very spot on which we now stand,
I on horseback, the husband riding before and the wife
I and two or three children on a pillion behind."
' Phinehas Wetherbee had seven children: John,
Daniel, Phinehas, Betty, Caty, Dolly and Hannah,
.lobn Wetherbee, born April 19, 1783, married Linda
, Wood, born May 17, 1784, and they had three chii-
' dren : Oliver, John and Lucinda. John Wetherbee,
I St., was very energetic and enterprising, huf at the
age of twenty-three, after over-exertion in fighting a
792
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
fire in the woods, took a severe cold, which resulted
in paralysis of his right side, so that for twenty-eiglit
years he could not walk a step, and for fifty-eight
years he was able io do bat very little. He acquired,
however, quite a property, owning half of the original
farm. He was town treasurer for qnite a number of
years, and was especially interested in church afiaira.
He died May 18, 1864; his \nfe, Linda, died March
2, 1863,
Oliver Wetherbee (1805-76) married Mary Whit-
comb, and they had three children : Jonathan Kim-
ball Wood, Martha M. and Marietta C. Mrs. Mary
(Whitcomb) Wetherbee is still living at the age of
eighty-two yeais, with her son Eimball, who married
Jane Tuttle, and resides at South Acton. Kimball
Wetherbee commenced work with the Tuttles at
South Acton as a clerk, and worked bis way up to
his present position, one of '.he firm of Tuttles, Jones
& Wetherbee. He has been much in town otiice .ind
has been several times a candidate for the General
Court. Martha M. Wetherbee (1839-65) is said
to have been " one of the best of women, active
everywhere, a splendid teacher and musician." Mari-
etta C. (1850-80), married Charles B. Stone, and
they have one daughter, who lives with her father at
West Acton.'
John Wetherbee (1807-74) married Louisa S.
Brown. They were the parents of two children ;
Francis Wood, who died in infancy, and Augustus
Winslow, who married Hattie Lane (1844-84), .and
settled in his native town. Jlr. A. W. Wetherbee is
interested in all that pertains to the town, and ba.M
held various positions of usefulness therein. He was
sent Representative in 1881. He is e-tpecially inter-
ested in church affairs and has held the positions of
chorister and clerk for many years. Mrs. Louisa S.
Wetherbee died several years ago.
Oliver Wetherbee commenced teaching when about
twenty years of age and became quite a noted teacher.
He was elected to town office soon after he was
twenty-one, and nearly all his life held office, either
aa selectman, assessor, town clerk or treasurer, often
more than once, and for many years was school super-
intendent. He and his brother John were early in-
terested in military afitiirs, both belonging to the
company in town as long as it existed, John holding
the rank of first lieutenant. They were both much
interested in music, playing together in church and
in private for nearly forty years, more than thirtv
years in church. Oliver Wetherbee was chorister
forty-four years and church clerft: eighteen years.
Both were active in political and public atfairs.
Lucinda Wetherbee (1821-8-2) married John W.
Phillips, a noted architect. He superintended the
erection of several fine buildings in Lowell, among
them the new jail. He was an Englishman by birth.
They are both dead, also John H., their second child ;
1 The daughter, Elma StoDO, hoa recently died.
the others, William \V., Jl^^ie and Charles, are living
in Jonesville, Wisconsin.
Phinehas Wetherbee, of West Acton, is the son of
Daniel Wetherbee, brother of the first John Wether-
bee.
Miss Sarah Hager, who was an inmate of the Stone
families for a period of thirty-five years, furnishes
most of the information with regard to this family.
Silas Stone built the house that Mr. Cunningham now
occupies, about the close of the last century. He
bad four sous and several daughters. One of the
daughters married Capt. Oliver Taylor, Jr., of Boi-
borough. His sou Phinheas went to New Hampshire
and married Miss Hannah Jones, of Ware, by whom
he had one daughter and seven sons, four of whom
are now living — Phinehas J. Stone, president of the
Charlestown Five Cent Savings Bank; Amos Stone,
treasurer of the said bank ; .Tasper Stone, jeweler, 45
Main Street, Charlestown, Mass.; and Jouatiian Stone,
landholder Revere, Ma-'s. While Phinehas Stone was
residing in New Hampshire lie was appointed colonel
in the army of the War of 1812. He was on duty
several months. He moved his family to Charles-
town about the year 1825. Phineha.* J. Stone has
held the pdsition of mayor of Charlestown and
.\mos Stone was county treasurer /or a number of
years.
Jasper Stone, son of f?iliis and Eunice Stone, re-
sided in Boston a few yea-rs. He married Mary Bab-
cook, of Wft-iton, Mass. Joseph Stone, son of Silas
and Eunice Stone, married .'■<arah W. Stowe, of Hills-
borough, N. H., and they resided with lii.s parents, ei-
pecting to see them tliniugh life, but be died when
thirty-seven years of as;e, in consequence of which
his brother Jasper returned to the homestead and
cared for bis parents the remainder of their lives.
They lived to be more than eighty years of age. Jas-
per Stone died when about seventy-si.x and his widow
lived to the age of ninety-three years. Both Jasper
and Joseph Stone have been sent as representative
from Boxborough.
A granddaughter of Silas Stone, Sally Mallory, who
was brought up from childhood in Boxborongh, mar-
ried Mr. Aaron Fiske, of Needham, March 29, 1831.
Time and space forbid a farther extension of these
family sketches, which are of so great interest, but I
cannot refrain a brief mention of a few names alike
worthy of record with those already given.
Christopher Page, a son of the Captain Christopher
Page of early times, at ill visits his native town and early
home (where Mr. Jerome Priest now resides) in sum-
mer, making his stay with Mr. and Mrs. Priest, both
of whom are descendants of old residents. Mrs.
Priest's maiden-name w;i3 Louisa Hoar, a daughter
of Mr. John Huar. Mr. Jerome Priest is a .son ot
Benjamin Priest, ubo, in his time, was actively en-
gaged in town affairs, having been selectman for sev-
eral years.
Tower Hazzard, whose father was a slave, was a
READING.
793
good mail uud much respected. Uis sou, Tower, is
living in Harvard at the present time.
The Silas Taylor family of one hundred years ago
have descendants living in Acton. Tliis family were
very active in all that pertained to the interest of the
town in early years, having served the town in many
positions of public trust. Several of the slabs in the
lower " burying-ground" bear the names of mem-
bers of this family.
The late Varnum Taylor was a grandson of Capt.
Oliver Taylor, who was highway surveyor and col-
lector when the district was incorporated, in 1783.
Capt. Oliver Taylor set out the elm tree in front of
the Taylor residence, bringing it from " W'oll Swamp"
on his shoulder wiieu but a sajiiing. A few years ago
the Taylor family and their friend^ held a pic-nic
beneath its wide-spreading shade. Capt. Oliver Tay-
lor took part in some of the battles of the- Revolu-
tionary War. Both Capt. LHiver Taylor, Jr., and
Varnum Taylor, his son, have held various positions
of trust and usefulness in their native town. Mary
Taylor, a daughter of Capt. Oliver Taylor, was a
teacher in town for many years, and is now living in
West Acton. Mrs. Varnum Taylor i'^ living with her
daughter, Mrs D. \V. Cobleigh ; but the Taylor estate
is still in the hands of the family.
Miss Josie M. Fletcher, of We-it .\ctou, is a daugh-
ter of Mr. John Fletcher, who was at one time select-
man of Boxborough for a number of years.
Mr. Oliver Steveus, who is the son of William Ste-
vens, is still living on the old Stt'vens estate, in the
southwest part of the town. William Stevens was
School Committee and selectman cjuite a long time.
Lyman Bigelow, the proprietor of the store "on
the hill," was town clerk for fouiteen years; select-
man, assessor and overseer of the poor for sever.il
years, and Superintending School Committee for sev-
eral years. He was universally respected. His son,
Lyman Waldo, also served the town as treasurer and
town clerk. 5Ir. and Mrs. Bigelow were very much
interested in the Universalist Church and its welfare
The Draper family dates back more than ahiindred
years. Their ancestor, Boston Draper, helped to pay
for the "old Harvard meeting-house,'' in 1775, and
from time to time the Draper name appears on record
in various responsible positions. Reuben Draper bu;lt
the house where B. S. Mead now lives. He was a
very ingenious man. Simon Whitney Draper built
the house which J. F. Hay ward now occupies.
Mr. Francis Conant, who for some years held im-
portant town office, has seven sons and three daugh-
ters, most of whom are settled near their native town.
Charles H. Conant is a lawyer, in Lowell; Albert F.
and Nelson B. are in business in Littleton, under the
firm-name of Conant & Co. John G. and Edwin H.
Conant — the firm of Conant Bros .& Co. — are in busi-
ness in Shirley ; George F. Conant is following the oc-
cupation of a civil engineer in Decatur, Alabama ;
Waldo E. Conant, of the firm of Conant, Houghton
& Co., is engaged in a suspender manufactory at
Littleton Common; Julia Conant is assistant matron
at Bradford Seminary ; Adelia M., who married Geo.
A. Parker, and buried her husband, is teaching in a
training-school at Bridgeport, Conn. ; and Lizzie S.
married Eugene B. Parker, of Littleton, and resides
in that place. All are honored and respected mem-
bers of society.
I Mr. Frank A. Patch, son of Jonathan, who was the
son of Isaac and Rachel (Cobleigh) Patch, has re-
cently erected a beautiful residence on the Ewings
place, the home of his mother and step-father, and
has made other improvements. Mr. Patch, who a
short time ago was doing business in Winchester, is
now proprietor of a furniture store on Washington
i Street, Boston. He resides in Boxborough. 0. K.
and B. Henry Patch, of South Acton, sons of Nathan
Patch, who was selectman, assessor and overseer of
poor for several years, are grandsons of Mr. Isaac
Patch, formerly of this town.
The name of Dr. D. Robins will doubtless arouse
pleasant memories in the hearts of many of the older
residents of the town. Here among these quiet hills
be followed the calling of a country doctor for many
vears, and made his home upon the place now owned
I and occupied by Mr. J. H. OrndorS". Dr. Robins was
he of whom, in 1792, the records said, " Voted that
the Dr. sit in the fore-seat of the front." He was
selectman and town clerk for several years. De-
scendants of this worthy man are about us still.
CHAPTER LXIII.
Tl FADING.
BV H'lRACE O. WAHLIN.
Reading, one of the oldest towns in the Common-
wealth, was settled in 1639 upon " an inland planta-
tion at the head of the bounds " of the township of
Lynn. Out of its ancient territory three towns have
been formed, the two other than itself being North
Reading and Wakefield, formerly called South Read-
ing, within whose precincts the foundation of the old
town was laid. The early history of Reading, there-
fore, is identical with that of the other towns men-
tioned.
The settlement of Reading followed close upon the
first migration to the Colonies. In December,
1620, the "Mayflower" reached Plymouth, bringing
her little company of families. Eight years were
spent in unremitting toil, in unceasing warfare witli
a rugged wilderness and unpropitious climate ; then
a company of Puritans, led by Endicott, settled at
Salem. At about this time William Blackstone. an
Episcopalian, moved by a desire to withdraw from as-
scciation with the F*uritans of the settlements, came
794
HISTORY OF :\ITT)DLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
to the peninsula which is now called Boston. In
1639, under a charter granted by Charles I., a .settle-
ment was made at Lynn. From Lynn a few fomilies
pushed on into the interior, and alter a day's journey
came to a little lake surrounded by the primeval for- I
est. To the south and west were low hills, and an-
other lake, whose bosom had, till then, borne only '
the canoe of the savage.
The country presented then, and presents now, '
no marked features, but its situation was favorable, j
It was well- watered and the soil was good. The j
hillsides sloping to the south were well adapted to the '
cultivation of small crops. To the northward the !
forest promised an abundant supply of timber for '
their dwellings. From the lakes, well stocked with ,
fish, the Saugus River flowed down to the parent set- j
tlement at Lynn, while on the other side the Ipswich ,
ran to the ocean, and around its mouth the planta-
tions at Ipswich had already been established. Not
too far away were the growing settlements at Salem
and Boston.
It is probable th.it some of these families came
from Reading, England, and, douDtless to |ireserve in
the wilderness the memory of their old home, they
called their settlement, made in iC>Z9. near the shores j
of Lake Quannapowitt, after its name. Four ye»rs
later the Colony Court incorporated the town, giving
it an area of four miles s(iuare. This did not iucludt-
the territory which afterward became North Reading, ,
this being added by a subsequent grant.
The antecedents and characteristics of the first set-
tlers were like those of all the founders of the Massa-
chusetts Bay Colony. They possessed indomitable
energy and untiring industry, and, more than all.
were inspired by a purpose, which had no small pari
in the successes they achieved. They faced discourage-
ment with unbending will and patient self-denial.
Their adherence to duty, their general integrity and
fidelity, formed the basis of those peculiar New Eng-
land traits of character, which have justly merited
the esteem of their descendants.
The need of food and shelter was immediate and
pressing. A mill for grinding corn and sawing lum-
ber was required. This want the early settlers at once
proceeded to satisfy. In 1(544, the year of incorpora-
tion, the town made a compact with John Poole, who
had settled on the river near the site now occupied
by the Wakefield Rattan Company, to guarantee him
certain mill privileges, in return for which he w;is to
grind the grists of the settlers ; and the privileges were
to be retained by him and his descendants as long as
he continued to maintain such a mill.
Besides this provision for their material needs other
things were not less important. A church must be es-
tablished, and — that good order might be maintained, ;
to the end that other families misrht be attracted
thither, and the town thus grow in numbers and im-
portance— a form of government must be adopted to
regulate the public affairs. Hence, we find that even '
previous to incorporation a rude meeting-house had
been built and a pastor was soon called — the twelfth
church in the Colony.
Two dangers threatened the inhabitants: one, as-
sault by Indians, the other the ravages of the wolves
and bears which filled the woods around them. To
meet the first, a military company was formed in the
town. This had been made obligatory upon every
settlement, by the action of the Colony Court.
Against the other, the town offered a bounty of twenty
shillings per head for every wolf killed; and a public
herdsman was appointed to guard the cattle from the
wolves by night, and to see that they might not " eat
up and destroy in the Somer, what should be for them
in the winter."
The first pastor, Rev. Mr. ("ireen, having died, Rev.
Mr. Haugli, a graduate of Harvard College, w.os called
to succeed him. The question of hard or soft money,
of currency or coin, did not trouble our fathers. It
was agreed that the new pastor's rates or salary should
be "payed him every quarter — one-half in wheat,
pease and barley, and the other half in rye and In-
dian." Even under this natural mode of payment it
appears that, as happens in our day, some were back-
ward in paying their allotment, for we read that
"George Davis and Tho. Clarke were chosen to gather
up that part of Mr. Haugh's rate that will not be
(reely pfiyed without constraint."
All persons were obliged to submit to a ta.x for the
support of the pulpit, though leaving town before the
vear was out. The pastor was the head of attkirs, and
his advice was sought upon all important subjects.
Notices of public meetings and proclamations of any
sort were then, as is frequently the case now, posted
at the church doors.
Attendance upon divine worship wa.s strictly en-
joined and enforced, and we read in the records that
"Henry Felch, being convicted of departing ihe pub-
liqve iissembly when the ordinance of Baptism was
about to be administered, was admonished by the
Court of his sin and ordered to pay costs . . . two
shillings." And, later, "Sanil. Dunton and wife were
summoned in Court to answer for not coming to the
piibligue worship of God on the Lord's day."
Equally zealous were they in the management of
civil affairs. The citizens were required to be present
at all town-meetings under penalty of fine: and on
one occasion " Geo. Davis was fined Is. liti. for ab-
sence." Not only was their attendance required, but
promptness was likewise enforced; for "Nicholas
Brown, Edward Taylor, Zackery Fitch and .Tonas
Eaton were fined tid. each for being late at town-
meeting," and in Ki'iT it was ordered " that there shall
be two general town-mettings in every year; . . .
and every inhabitant that absents himself from these
meetings shall pay 2s. t5<f. if he be not there by 9
o'clock in the morning."
Many of the laws which governed the town in its
infancy are curious and instructive, showing the strict
READING.
795
manner of life of the fathers. For instaDce, the
Colony Court enacted, " that if any young man at-
tempt to address a young woman without the con-
sent of her parents, or, in case of their absence; of
the Colony Court, he shall be fined £5 for the first of-
fence, £10 for the second, and imprisoned for the
third." Under this law Matthew Stanley, of Read-
ing, "for winning the aft'ections of John Tarbox'e
daughter, without her parents' consent, was fined £5.
with 2s. 6d. fees."
" Nicholas Pinion was fined for swearing," and, in
1649, three married women of Reading were fined
five shillings each for scolding. The ducking-stool
and stocks and the whipping-post were in common
use for the punishment of minor oft'ences, and a char-
acteristic incident is related by Drake wherein one
Edward Palmer, for asking an excessive price for a
pair of stocks, which he was hired to frame, had the
privilege of sitting in them an hour himself
Humorous as these old laws seem to us, they had
an important part in sustaining that purity of life
and character to secure which no sacrifice was too
great, no duty too hard.
During the first century of the settlement the In-
dians several times declared war upon the Colonists,
and the men of Reading were never backward in re-
sponding to the requisitions from the Colony Court
for aid in quelling the outbreaks. The most impor-
tant occasion for such service was the noted " King !
Philip's War," which began in 1675, and to which
Reading furnished its quota under Major Swayne.
This Major Swayue won high honors in tliese Indian ^
wars, and was afterward appointed conimander-in- |
chief of the Colony forces, despatched upon an ex- ,
pedition against the Kennebec Indians, and furnished
with ten pounds to fit himself for the undertaking. i
Toward the close of the century occurred the cele-
brated witchcraft delusion, numbering among its
victims many innocent persons who were put to death
under the excitement of the time. Four women of i
Reading were arrested and tried upon this charge,
at a time when to be suspected of such a crime was
usually followed by immediate conviction. Fortun- i
ately, they were subsequently released. |
In October, 1651, the territory now known as North j
Reading was added to the town. I
In 1673 the first mention of " Wood End," long a i
local name for that part of the old town which now i
forms the present Reading, occurs in the records. ,
In 1693 a public school was established, it being '
voted to assess " a rate of four pounds for a scoole in j
the iowne for three months, and if longer time, pro-
portionable— and two pounds for the west end of the
town (wood end) and one pound for those that live
on the north side of Ipswich river, if they set up a '
scoolt for reading and writing." And in 1697 we '
read that "the selectmen did agree with Jonathan ;
Poole for the keeping a scoole in this towne for to
tech the young people to wright, to read and to cast
up accounts, toe far as ye said Poole could, and they
capable to lame in the time."
The first school-houee within the present limits of
Reading, that is to say in the " west end " or " wood
end " of the old town, was built, so it is supposed, in
1708, near the corner of what are now Woburn and
Washington Streets. At this date the town voted to
maintain a school at Wood End one-quarter of the
time, and, that this section might receive representa-
tion, Ensign Nathaniel Parker was added to the
School Committee.
During the latter half of the first century of the
settlement many of its founders passed to their final
rest, the first cemetery was provided for, and the lit-
tle hamlet had experienced the three great events of
life, — " weddings, funerals and christenings." The
ties were rapidly forming to hold them to the new
world of which they had become a part, and slowly
the memories of the motherland were absorbed in the
past as, over the horizon, came, day by day, the fore-
shadowing of that great future which to them was a
sealed book.
The charter granted by Charles I. had given to the
Colony self-government and a great degree of liberty
in civil affairs. Under it progress had been steady
and uninterrupted ; educatiorf had been fostered. Each
town was by law required to maintain a grammar
school. The seaport towns were engaged in fishing.
The interior towns, like Reading, were farming com-
munities, Indian corn and flax being the staples.
The first iron works in the country had been estab-
lished at Saugus, where they had been a source o'
annoyance to the citizens of Reading, by stopping
the fish " from coming up to refresh and relieve the
people."
In the general progress Reading shared ; the life of
its people proceeded along uneventful lines, disturbed
only by an occasional Indian outbreak, to which
allusiou has been made. The buildings, though rude
and simple, were comfortable. Food, though plain,
was abundant. Clothing was of homespun, made by
the good wives of the households, from the flax
raised upon the farms ; the boots and shoes being of
home-tanned leather.
Three special points existed around which the
growth of the town proceeded. The first church had
been built at the most southerly point, now Wake-
field, and in 1696 the town had agreed that as soon as
the number of inhabitants upon the north side of the
Ipswich River should be snch as to call and maintain
a godly, learned, orthodox minister, they should be
set ofl^ as a separate parish. This condition was
reached in 1713, and the Second Parish {now north
Reading) was set ofl" at that time.
Meanwhile, Wood End had go increased that a de-
sire had several times been expressed for incorpora-
tion as the Third Parish of Reading. Any further
di visioh of the town was opposed by the First or South
Parish, and to prevent further agitation of the subject
796
HISTORY' OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
it waa voted in 1730 ttiat Wood End be allowed " the
sum of £17 a year for support of preaching among
them in the winter season, out of the parish rate or
treasury during the term of ten years, provided the
said Wood End do give the said Parish no trouble at
home or abroad, referring to a separation ; and also
the said Wood End do hereby oblige themselves to
tarry with us during said term of ten years."
Still other concessions were made, for we read that
the South Pariah voted in the following year " to
give the old pulpit cushion to the Wood End, which
they have asked for in a Christian and charitable
way."
For a time the Wood End people remained satisfied
with this condition of things, but the distance be-
tween the respective settlements made it desirable
that an independent church be established at the
West End, and in 1776 another petition was pre-
sented to the parish, asking for a separation. It was
refused.
More conciliatory measures followed in regard to
apportioning the parish funds. In 1767 the pariah
voted to build a new meeting-house. An effort was
made by the members from Wood End, among whom
appe&r the names of Temple, Bancroft and Parker, to
change the location of the site to a point half a mile
westward ; but this, like the petition, was unsuccessful.
Soon after an appeal waa made to the Colony Court to
interfere and divide the parish. Division was recom-
mended, but again the inhabitants of the south part
of the parish would not consent.
In 1769, however, the Colony Court ordered that
the parish be divided, aud substantially the ."ame ter-
ritory that forms the present town of Reading was in-
corporated as the Third Parish.
At this time, therefore, the town comprised three
pariahes. The First afterward became South Reading
and later, Wakefield. The Second consisted of that
part of the town on the north of the Ipswich River ;
territory, which, aa previously mentioned, had been
annexed in 1651, and which now forms the town of
North Beading. The Third Parish had been generally
known aa Wood End, and waa destined to retain the
name of Reading and to form the town existing at
the present day. The history of the First and Second
Parishes from 1769 down, is properly the history of
Wakefield and North Reading, and will not be fol-
lowed here except as it may be so interwoven with
that of the Third Parish as to require incidental
mention.
The first parish meeting in the third parish was
held August 9, 1769, the moderator being John Tem-
ple. Parish officers were chosen and measures taken
to provide materials and workmen to complete the
new meeting-house. This building, originally located
upon or near the Common, passed through many vicis-
situdes before its destruction by fire. It long stood
upon Union Street after passing into disuse as a church,
and was known to a later generation as Union Hall.
For many years, as the property of the town, it waa de-
voted to school purposes, being once partially burned,
then re-built and given a new lease of life. Superseded
in 1886 by the modern school building now occupying
its place, the old hall was sold, removed to Haveu
Street, neai' the railroad station, and there, with ex-
tensive additions, transformed into modern tenements
and stores. The whole structure was burned to the
ground in 1890.
At the date of its incorporation the Third Parish
contained at leaat fifty-five houses. Those of the first
settlers had given place to others more substantial, —
types of the well-known earlier colonial archi-
tecture. What true home comfort lingers about the
old stone door-steps and lilac-shaded windows of these
houses, some of which are still standing, their
weather beaten faces bearing the marks of the storms
and sunshine of more than a hundred years. Within
waa the great fire-place with its crane and and-
irons, and in the corner the quaint buffet with its load
of polished china, and mysterious cupboards — spicy
with the fragrance of old-fashioned herbs. Theie,
too, were the broad-backed settle and rush-bottomed
chairs; the higb-posted bedstead with patch-work
coverlid; the little round-topped stand, bearing the
well-worn family Bible; the high mantle finished with
delicate carving, and over it, the little ancient mii^ror,
rtanked by two tall candlesticks of silver. Outside
was the old-fashioned garden, with its formal rows of
hollyhocks and sunflowers, its marigolds and roses,
and perhaps, in a sheltered corner, a little bed of sage
and marjoram, of coriander, rosemary and rue. The
wide-gabled barns, filled in autumn with the ripened
harvests and sweet-scented hay, add to the picture of
a quiet, pastoral life, pursued under the benign infiu-
encea of peace.
One by one the old landmarks have disappeared,-
and of the houses in the Third Parish in 1769 but
few survive. Of these some of the best known are
the houses of Clifford P. Weston, and the Captain
George Bancroft house, so-called, on West Street ;
the Abram Temple house, on Fremont Street, now oc-
cupied by 3Ir. Batchelder ; the Sweefser house, on
Washington Street, near the railroad; the James
Davis house, on Ash Street; the Emory Bancroft
house, on Lowell Street ; the Aaron Parker house, on
Walnut Street, and the house of George Grouard, on
Woburn Street, near the Common, which was the
parsonage of the parish. It has, however, been ex-
tensively remodeled.
The Sweetser house has, perhaps, a more interest-
ing history, as it is certainly a more picturesque
structure than either of the others. In its present
condition it retains practically its original form. It
was probably built by Ephraim Parker about the
time of his marriage, in 1749; but this is uncertain.
He lived here, however, ten years later, and after his
death the estate fell to his son, Ephraim, known as
" Master Ephraim," who, in 1807, sold it to Thomas
READING.
T97
Sweetser. Esq., dow deceased, wlio was the father of
Kirke Sweetser, its present owner. In Revolutionary
days it was a tavern, and, indeed, had been a public-
house prior t(j that date. Tradition reports that cer-
tain British prisoners were quartered within it during
the war.
The Prescott house, on Summer Avenue, is one ot
the best preserved of the old houses. It was the
homestead of Joshua Prescott, an esteemed citizen
and well known lawyer of former days, and is now oc-
cupied by his daughters. Mr. Prescott married the
(laughter of Widow Abigail Eaton (afterwards the
wife of Colonel Nathan Parker). Mrs. Prescotl's great-
grandfather was Thomas Eaton, whose father, Joshua,
being one of the early settlers in this part of Read-
ing, lived on Summer Avenue, nearly opposite the
junction of Oak Street, where traces of a cellar still
remain. The Prescott house, being one of the second
series of bouses in the parish, must have been buill
since 1700, and was probably erected by Captain
Thomas Eaton, Jr., grandson of Joshua, at about the
time of his marriage, or IToG. His brother Joshua,
another grandson of Joshua, Sr., lived in the old
" Murray '' house, on Oak Street, long a landmark,
but recently removed, and this was probably buill by
him about the same time, as he was then married and
settled there. Hi.>i son. the third Jo.-.hua, was killed at
the battle of Saratoga, October 7, 1777.
A house jirobably older than either of those men-
tioned stood until a comparatively recent date at the
coruer of Washington and Woburn Streets, being
torn down to give place to the residence of Wendell
Bancroft. From an honorable origin, this house,
known in later years as the " Jaquith House," passed
through various stages of decadence uutil for a con-
siderable period antecedent to its removal it was
given up to cheap tenancy. The following tradition
relating to it is contained in Eaton's " History of
Reading : "
"It is notknown wljen thip oid house was built, but it \g truditiooal
that the Rev. Richard Brown, \tho died id 1732, used to come up from
the South Purieh and bold lueetiufzs iii it. ... It i\us supposed to be
haunted I-t evil spiriti; some forty or fifty years ago. Such nppanlions
were seen and noises heard that children were afraid to p.ts« directly by
11. and would go around tlirougli the fields. It is said that old Mr.
Paulel Bailf.v, on a certain occasion, came running at full speed into E.
Weston s store, about half a mile dtstatlt from the old house, badly
(ngbtened and much exhausted When he had v\i|ied the perspiration
from his face, and his nerves had become somewhat qnieted, and he had
r*-coTered sufficient breath to speak, he relateil his adventures as fol-
lows ; He said 'be did not intend to Im frightened at anything till he
saw it, and, as be was passing the Jaqnilh house, be thonghl, if the old
devil was at home, he would like to see him. He accordingly went up
to an open window to get a view of him. Whereupon the old apinning-
wheel began to go and to buzz, lu an instant bis hair stood on end and
raised hie hat, an that he had to hold it on as he ran.' "
The house on Franklin Street now owned by Henry
Cook, is one of the oldest, if not the oldest house, in
Reading. It was built about 172.'>. by John Parker,
who afterwards exchanged it with his brother for the
homestead of his father at the southern end of the
town. It remains practically unchanged in outward
form, and its internal arrangement and finish suffi-
ciently evidence its antiquity.
Notwithstanding their peaceful life the Colonists
were not untrained in war. The troubles with the
French and Indians, and the expeditions against
Canada, caused many calls to he made for troops. In
all these struggles the men of Reading were repre-
sented, and were thus preparing to take their proper
place in the more important contest that was to fol-
low. When, aftei" the gradual encroachments of the
English ministry, the obnoxious Stamp Act was
passed, the tuwn of Reading sent to Ebenezer
Nichols, its representative in the General Court, the
following instructions:
"That you cheerfully join in every proper measure that mav have
a tendency to a repeal of the Stamp .\ct, which imposeth such a griev-
Oll^ burden among the American Proviuces and Colonies, and that you
endeavor, by all possible means, consistent with our allegiance to the
King, and relation to Great Britain, to oppose the execution of it, until
the remonstrances, petitions, and cries ot these distressed colonies shall
reach the ean* of our Sovereign. And, Sir, we cannot think it advisa-
bl" to agree to any step for the protection of tlamped papers or ttarttp
ottices . we have ali-eady good and wholesome laws for the preservation
•>f peace and good order among his luajesty's subiects, and are not ap-
I>r(hensive ol any further tumults and disorder, to which we have a
steady aversion.
"Moreover, we must enjoin it upon you, that you use the strictest
care to prevent all uuconstitutionul drafts upon the Public Treaaury-, at
this time of uncommon dtfticulty and distress, but in all actings to
maintain our i-ights as/rf.^-l»orii EihjUshmat."
This document — the simple, straightforward ex-
pression of opinion sent by a little country town to
its political representative — carries on its face an
epitome of the time. Observe its character, note the
sturdy spirit it manifests, the disposition it implies to
obey all proper mandates of the King, but, at the same
time, the determination to protect their rights as free-
born citizens.
The Stamp Act was repealed, but the struggle was
only delayed, not averted. Steadily and surely the
day approached, and again the town instructs its Rep-
resentative :
"To use your utmost endeavor, in every constitutional way in the
General Court, to procure a redress of our grievances and a restora-
tion of that happy harmony which lately subsisted between Great
Britain and her colonies ; . . . but caution you against giving your
consent to nieasnres which may iu the least preclude us or our pos-
terity frt>Di asserting our just rights as men and British subjects."
And iu June, 1774, the town voted "to maintain their
Charter Rights in every constitutional way."
A Cougressional Commission was called to consider
the questions of the hour, to which the town sent as
deputies John Temple and Benjamin Brown ; also
voting \o adopt the sentiments of the Congress as
their own, and to adhere to them. Still no relief came,
and the following year the King declared that rebellion
existed in Massachusetts; and a force of armed men
was sent to Boston under General Grage.
The first resistance to British authority came, as is
well known, at the North Bridge, in Salem. The
English, under Leslie, marched from Marblehead
toward Danvers, to secure cannon and powder sup-
posed to be concealed there. The news spread like
798
HISTORY OF SriDDLESEX COUNTY. ^lAPSACHUSETTS."
wildfire through the country, and the company from j
Reading promptly moved toward Salem. After pro-
ceeding four miles, however, they were met by a i
courier, who informed them of the retirement of Lea- j
lie, and they returned home. i
The promptness then manifested never flagged j
during the war. The men of Reading were true de-
scendants of the hardy settlers who, years before, had j
braved danger and toil that they might maintain
sacred principles. When, on the 19th of April, 1775, j
the thunders of cannon from Lexington were heard j
over their peaceful farms, the minute-men of Reading [
engaged in that famous pursuit of the British that has i
been celebrated in song and story. Dr. John Brooks,
afterwards Governor of Massachusetts, was then a
young physician in practice in Reading, where he
married his wife, and he had organized a company, ■
being chosen its captain. During the night of April j
18, 1775, he received notice of the march of the Brit- |
ish. He was the Major Brooks referred to in the fol- j
lowing, from Hudson's " History of Lexington : '' j
"The Britisb commenced their retreat from Concoi-d about noon.
For the Qnt mile they were unniolebtetl, but when they arrived at 1
Merriam'fl Corner they encoiinteied a party of niinute-meD from Read- '
ing, under Major Brookb, Col. William Thonipiion, with a body of
Diilitia from Billerica an<l the vicinity, coming up al>out the same I
time. The Proxincials on the High grounds near the North Britlge, ;
seeing the British leaving the village, went acrons the great field to j
the Bedford road, and airived in liiue to support the troops brought j
lip by Brooks aud Thompson. Here may be said to have commenced |
the battle of the inth of .\pril." i
I
When a call was made for troops for the Conti- '
nental army, the citizens of Reading were ready, the
sturdy Parson Haven preaching to the men of the
Third Parish from the^e words of St. Luke: " .Vud ,
the soldiers likewise demanded of him, saying, And ]
what shall we do; and he said unto them, Do violence |
to no man, neither accuse any falsely, and be content j
with your wages." I
From Lexington forward, at Bunker Hill, Ticon- ;
deroga, and Valley Forge, to the day of Coruwallis' j
surrender, tiie soldiers from this town were at the post ,
of duty. More than four hundred men from Read- j
ing served in the War of the Revolution. Her quota
was always filled, and the familiar names of Brooks,
Bancroft, Parker, Nichols, Flint and Wakefield ap-
pear upon the honored list.
The names of many of these gallant men are lost.
Some never returned to their homes, others lie at rest
in the village cemetery. But the memory of their
deeds remains as one of the priceless heritage^ of the
town.
Not alone by troops did Reading aid in the war.
The records are full of accounts of stores furnished to
the militia — of beef, hay and fire-wood — they gave
freely of their produce to help the cause. Aid was
furnished to citizens of Boston, Charlestown, Salem
and Marblehead, who fled into the interior. Blankets
were collected from hou.ae to house to send to the
army, and through the whole seven years the town
never failed to respond to the calls of the Conti-
nental Congress for food and supplies.
After the war many grave political questions pre-
sented themselves for settlement. Two distinct po-
litical parties were formed, — Federalists and National
Republicans. The inhabitants of the First or South
Parish were mainly Republicans; those of the West
Parish, Federalists. Political differences, growing out
of this dissimilarity of party sentiment, soon caused a
division in the town, the South Parish being incor-
porated in 1812 as a separate town, under the name
of South Reading. In the same year war was again
declared against England. The Federalists, among
whom were most of the citizens of Reading, opposed
the war, believing that the existing difficulties might
be otherwise settled. Yet war having been declared,
the town, from fidelity to the Government, support-
ed it.
In 1844 both Reading and South Reading united
in celebrating the bi-centennial of the old town,
and, nine year.i after, North Reading was made a
separate municipality.
In accordance with the practice which existed
throughout the Colony, slaves were once held in
the town. An interesting document from the hand
of Samuel Bancroft, dated in .Vpril, 1776, reads as fol-
lows :
" Whereas I. the nubKcriber, have a negro man named Cato. who
liHtb requested that he may in r^ome lutiire time be made free, I
lieieby 'leclaie it to tie my purpose and design that if wild Cato con-
tinue aa obedient anil faithful servant fur the space of three yearn
next after the dale bereol. that, at the end of said term of three
years, *'iid fMt-mliftll b^' si^tfiee."
When the evil effects of shivery in the South became
apparent, it is recorded to their eternal honor that the
women of Reading formed the first female anti-
slavery society upon record. The officers of this so-
ciety were : President, Mrs. Sarah Reid ; Vice-Presi-
dent, Mrs. Sarah Parker ; Secretary, Mrs. Hepzibah
S. Temple; Treasurer, 3Irs. Esther Kingman; Coun-
selors, Mrs. Julia P. Eaton, Mrs. Susan S. Perkins,
Mrs. Sophionia Kingman, Mrs. Susan W. Peabody
and .Miss Lucy Parker. The first male society, aux-
iliary to the New England Anti-Slavery Society, was
also formed here, Dr. Horace P. Wakefield, long a
respected citizen, now deceased, being its secretary ;
and in the words of William Lloyd Garrison, '' for
some time Reading continued to be the banner town
in the anti-slavery conflict.''
When the War of the Rebellion began, again on
the KUh of -Vpril, as in the day.s of old, the men of
Reading were ready. Drill clubs had been formed
in preparation for emergency, and on the date named
the Richardson Light (juards left Wakefield for
Washington, having among their number seventeen
citizens of this town. Thecompaiiy performed guard
duty at Wa.shington and was present at the first bat-
tle of Bull Run. In the following year, 1862, a
Readins: company was enlisted under command of
Captain Josiah W. Coburn. This company per-
READING.
799
foroied nine months' service with the Fiftieth Massa-
chusetts Regiment, being with General Banks in
Louisiana and participating in tlie siege and capture
of Port Hudson.
Through all the dark daya of the war the record of
the town was honorable and worthy to be placed
beside that of the fathers. The War Committee was
Horace P. Wakefield, Sylvester Harnden, Edward M.
Horton, Gardner French, Benjamin M. Boyce, Still-
man E. Parker and William Proctor. Of these only
Messrs. Boyce and Parker survive. Thirty-four more
men than her allotted ipiota were furnished by the
town to the army. The total number, including re-
enlistmentH, was 411. Their record includes Fair
Oaks, Fredericksburg, Lookout Mountain, the Wil-
derness and other hard-fought fields. Fifteen men
were killed in battle and thirty-three o'hers died of
disease contracted in the service. To commemorate
these a marble monument was erected at the close of
the war upon a counpicuous elevation in the ceme-
tery. The suggestion that such a shaft be raised was
made by Abiel Holden, a prominent citizen, who, in
the early years of the war, proposed such action.
Mr. Holden died liefore the war closed, but in his
will directed that *.'>iiO be paid from his estate toward
defraying the cost of the monument. To this the
town added .SlOOo, and the monument was dedicated
October h, 18G.5.
While the men were in the field the women were
not idle. Sanitary meetings were frequently held,
and many packages of clothing and hospital stores
were forwarded from their hands. One of these wo-
men occupies a place of special prominence. While
some of the other ses around her, strong and able,
shrank from the conflict. Miss Emily lluggles being
debarred from that active work with which she fully
sympathized, furnished a representative recruit for
three years' service.
After the war, the town, in common with most of the
towns in Eastern Massachusetts, rapidly advanced in
prosperity. The population in 186.'i was iMyO. This
was less than in 1860, when it was 26(J2, the diminution
being entirely due to the war. It was only slightly
more than that of the old town, comprising South
and North Reading also, in 1810, the figures in that
year being 'X'l'lS. The valuation of the town taken in
■ 18H3 was $1,290,048.
The era of prosperity was marked by a rapid in-
crease in the number of houses. New building lots
were put upon the market, and many dwellings
erected. The large plain just west of the railroad
station then formed part of the Carter farm and con-
tained no houses. The same was true of the es'ale
just beyond it on Woburn Street, owned by the heirs
of Abiel Holden. Reading Highlands, both east and
west of the railroad, had but few dwellings. At pres-
est all this territory is covered. The growth in other
parts of the town has been considerable, although
perhaps not quite so great a.s iu the sections named.
' Woburn Street, at the close of the war, had but a sin-
gle sidewalk, and this not continuous. Opposite the
residence of William S. Richardson, which was not
then built, was a steep bank, rising precipitously
from the roadway and covered with brambles and
bushes. Washington Street, from Woburn Street to
the railroad, had but three or four houses, and was, in
fact, an ordinary country road, without sidewalks and
lined with a thick growth of wild cherry and birch.
The railway station was an old-fashioned structure,
spanning the track, and extending from it northward
along the line of High Street, was an extensive wood-
house open to the track and filled with fuel. This,
together with part of the station, was burned in 1868.
The present station was soon after built.
In comparatively recent years great improvements
have been made in the outward appearance of the
town. Roads have been improved, grades lowered
, and sidewalks built. The town, losing somewhat of
ii.- rural aspect, approaches more nearly the suburban
tyjte. The valuation is now §2,829,427 and the pop-
ulation about 4100. Many of its streets are lined
rt ith tree.-, and each year sees the erection of resi-
dences that add much to the attractiveness of the
town.
iNrn'sTRiES. — It is chiefly as a place of residence
that Reading is known, and its growth will probably
continue along that line rather than in the direction
of manufacturing. But while never important as a
manufacturing centre, the handiwork of her workmen
has gone over the entire country, and the boots and
shoes, cabinet-work and clocks from Reading have
been found in all the markets of the South and West.
Among the former industrial enterprises of the
town that of cabinet-making takes first rank. It has
now almost entirely passed away. The pioneer in
the business was Ambrose Kingman, long since de-
; ceased, aud he was followed by his brother Henry,
and nephew William, and by Luther Elliott, Ham-
mond Flint, Amos Sweetser, Charles Carter, Henry
F. Parker, J. W. Beers, S. T. Ruggles, John Cheney,
Gardner French, D. B. Lovejoy, D. G. Richardson,
James Davis, Charles Manning, Frederick Miller and
others, among whom Dinsmore & Grouard and Syl-
vester Harnden hold prominent place. Mr. Harnden
long conducted the old mill at the head of Haven
I .Street, which was burned in April, 1884.
! Dinsmore & Grouard owned the mill on Salem
Street, originally built about 1850 6y William Bad-
ger, and now, somewhat changed in form, carried on
by John Holman & Co., under the superintendence
of David Kendall.
In the days when the manufacture of tin-ware and
stove fittings was of considerable local importance,
Tristram Littlefield began the business in Reading,
coming hither from Wakefield in 1843. He still con-
! tinues, with the aid of his sons.
I The boot and shoe manufacture is one of the
' most ancient industries of the town. It appears to
800
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
have been begun, independent from the usual house-
hold manufacture, about 1758, by Lieuteuant Joseph
Bancroft. Early manufacturers, during the period of
the Revolution, were Ephraim Parker and Phineas
Sweetser. At a later day and upon a broader basis,
we find the names of Daniel Chute, 1792 ; Jonathan
Temple, 1794 ; David Pratt, 179*5 ; Silas Smith, 1796 ;
Ephraim Weston, 1804 ; Warren Perkins, 1807 ; Isaac
Upton, Lilly Eaton, Lorenzo Parker, H. G. Richard-
son, Wm. R. Perkins, John Adden, Abiel Holden, D.
Farmer Weston, Thomas H. Sweetser and others, all
of whom have passed away. Stillman E. Parker,
George E. Leathe, Joseph L. Pratt, Oilman C. Cog-
gin, Edwin Basselt, George A. Richardson, John Bur-
rill, James H. Bancroft and Roswell N. Temple have,
at various times, been connected with the industry,
and Messrs. Jason W. Richardson, George M. Coburn
(E. B. Richardson manager,) The Brown Shoe Com-
pany, Clifford P. Weston and Nathan Bancroft are
leading manufacturers at present.
The manufacture of hats was at one time an im-
portant branch of industry here. Nathan Weston
was the first who conducted it, beginning about 1812.
He is said to have been the inventor and first maker
of the silk hat. He was followed by Thomas Sweet-
ser and Warren Perkins.
In 1840 the manufacture of coach lace was begun
in Reading by William J. Wightman, who had a
shop on Main Street near his residence, and who con-
tinued the business until 1857.
The manufacture of clocks, conducted by Messrs.
Frost & Pratt, was, subsequent to 1832, of consider-
able local importance. Jonathan Frost began the
business, manufacturing the cases only, purchasing the
movements, and combining the finished article. Dan-
iel Pratt soon became associated with him, and after-
ward carried on the business alone in Reading and
Boston, where, after his death, his son Daniel and
son-in-law, Benj. M. Boyce, succeeded him. The
business in Reading was discontinued about 1859.
In thus briefly alluding to the former industries of
the town we must not omit the name of Thomas Ap-
pleton, one of the pioneer organ-builders of .\merica,
whose genial face, once familiar, has now passed
away ; a man whose reputation for integrity was un- I
spotted, and of whom it is said, " His organs were,
like himself, honest clear through." Mr. Appleton i
conducted the business of organ-making in a factory
on Prescott Street, west of the railroad, which, after- ,
wards removed a short distance, now forms part of '
the Howard Brush Factory.
The leading industri.'s of the present day, besides
the manufacture of boots and shoes, to which allu.sion
has been made, are organ-pipes, carried on by Samuel
Pierce, who founded the business in 1847, and by Mr. '
Griffiths ; neckties, founded by Messrs. Damon i*c '
Temple, in 1866, and others, and now carried on by '
Messrs. Joseph S. Temple, t'harles Damon and asso- j
ciatea; metallic brushes, Ibunded by J. H. Howard
and others, and now carried on by James H. Horton
and E. A. Hill : organs, carried on by George H.
Ryder and John H. Sole, and the works of the
Reading Rubber Mills and the Middlesex Rubber
Company. Besides these the manufacture of fire-
works is conducted by Hyde i Co., in factories upon
Lowell Street, and Messrs. Horton and Damon each
make considerable quantities of paper boxes.
The few industries of the town produce an annual
product far larger than many suppose, and although
the former leading employments have passed away yet
others have taken their place so quietly as to be almost
unnoticed. Many of the older citizens who remem-
ber the bustle and activity of the days before the war,
when Reading was a sort of metropolis to some of the
adjacent towns, lament the decline of the manufac-
turing interests which, it is supposed, has since oc-
curred. They point to the flourishing cabinet busi-
ness of that day, tliey remember the mercantile es-
tablishuienls conducted by Fletcher, Putnam and
others, and see nothing in the present condition of the
town to compensate for their loss. But, after all, this
decline is fancied, not real. When aggregate value of
product is considered, the industries of Reading were
never so important as at present.
In 18.").'i Reading had thirteen establishments man-
ufacturing chair and cabinet work, with an invested
capital of $68,000, employing 179 workmen and pro-
ducing annually furniture worth ?205,000. At the
same time the annual product of boots and shoes
tiiiiouuted to $191,511(1, the industry giving employ-
ment to 267 males and 156 females. These wtre the
leading indusiries of the town, and the war, cutting
off trade with the South, seriously affected their pros-
perity. Thus, in 186">, we find the annual product of
furniture to be worth but ^^49,618, and of boots and
shoes but ■*157,741, both values being estimated in
gold. It will be seen that the latter industry suffered
least.
But though these industries declined, two others
■ihowed a marked growth. The production of organ-
pipes and sawed lumber increased from an aggregate
value of §21,27-'; in 1855, to ^1,771, gold, in 1865. In
the building trades also an enlarged product was
shown, its value in 1865 being >=64,624, gold. These in-
creased values, however, were not sufficient to over-
come the decrea.se in lurniture and other products, so
that the total value of all manufactured goods showed
a decline of nearly 31 [ler cent, from that reported in
1855. That this was due to the war is plainly seen
from the statistics of the ne.xt decade. The cabinet
industry partially recovered the ground it had lost,
the value of products in 1S75 being S119,177. The
value of boots and shoes made advanced to S165,210.
These industries, indeed, still showed a decline when
compared with their position in 1855. This decline,
however, was more than compensated by the growth
of new iudustries, and by the e.xpansion in the man-
ufacture of organ-pipes, the annual product of which
READING.
801
rose from SIO.OOO ii> i855, to $20,339, both values be-
lli^ ill gold, ''i ue following table shows the growth
of the"" iodustries and their annual product, witli
c.ggregates for each of the periods so far compared.
The values for the years 18i).'> and 1875 have been re-
duced to a gold basis, so as to admit of jus"^ compari-
son with those of 1805 : j
The facts as brought out in 1880 are presented in the
following table :
iNDUSTRIEfi.
Coach lace, . . . .
FuTDiture
BootsandBhuee, . .
Orf^QD- pipes, . . .
TiDsiuitbiDg. . . .
ClothiDg, ni«ir£, .
OrguDg,
BuilJjut; trades,
Lumt)er, sawed, . .
Puups,
Neckties
Tallon, reodered. .
BruBb lldlldle€, . .
Bread, baken' . .
Cider
Product,
1S55.
I4,0>KI
2"o,l«Nl
mi, .500
lU.Ooii
io,(xxi
2,1101 »*
'JO.tlOO*
ii,-.;73
Totals, ti^%i
■ Estimated fi-om reliable ilutji.
Product,
16C6.
H'J.CIS
107,741
15,324
037
3,il'.7
«!«
54.024
ol,M7
44li
»:il4,7*.
Product,
lh7o.
$lla,177
160,210
20,33!i
4,4<i4
2,143
(12,357
750
49,107
44,C43
714
2,0711
i.J.'W
(H7:i,s3:;
Jiidneirica. ettablultmfnU.
Boots and slioes . . 15
BruBfaes I
Building 1
AVagoDB 2
Clolbing 3
Fireworks 1
Food preparations . 4
Furniture 3
Leatber 3
Metallic goods ... 5
Organ-pipes .... 1
Rubber goods ... 1
Tallow 1
Wooden goods ... 2
S'o. o/ tmplot/f's. CapitnL
ISO
40
3
113
17
7
42
5
10
14
23
7
21
Totals .
43
r24,450
5,00(1
2,500
1,500
10.424
10,000
0,400
4,000
1,900
7,500
13,000
8,000
6,000
2,000
1100,274
Protiuct.
8105,566
60,000
7,000
4,000
96,410
30,000
73,740
48,000
4,200
14,000
18,600
60,000
57,000
12,500
>593,010
No com*
In this comparison no account is made of certain
mechanical industries, cla.ssed in the State census
of !87."i as "related occupations,'" except tiiismithing
and certain building trades, it being impossible to
obtain statistics of the.se industries for previous yeare.
We also present a table showing the number of es-
tablishments in town at each period, together with
the number employed, capiial invested and value ol
product:
C/oiwinca/ioii. Ih.'i.'>. Ist..',. IST5.
Xuiiilierof establislinieills 41 '-il 47
NuiiiUr ».ui|tlo.ved. '.o4 4'."l 426
( upital iuvealf J S|iio,ui«i ^.j.-'-iii 120,357
Value <.f product 4i;o,2T3 .•il4,7>i; 47'.l,.'-33
In the number ol' establi.shments reported in l.'^^55
those mauufacturing boots and shoes are not included,
and the amount of capital returned for that year is
deficient as respects capital inve-sted in the building
trades. A minor portion of the capital invested in
1855 is estimated. All values are in gold.
Although the number of estabiishments, capital
and product increased between I8.'i5 and 1875, yet it is
an interesting fact, clearly brought out iu this table,
that the number of employes decreased thirty-five per
cent. In other words, 420 persons, working with
twenty per cent, more capital in 1875 produced
more goods measured iu value than G54 persons in
1855. This decrease it; number employed, while the
value of product increased, is partly due to the influ-
ence of machinery in certain industries and partly to
the change in the character of the industries them-
selves, as, for instance, the substitution of an employ-
ment like the rendering of tallow, in which the ratio
of employes to product is small, for a distinctly me-
chanical industry, like cabinet-making, in which
many workmen are required.
51-il
I The item "clothing" includes necktieB.
parison between industries, except in a few cases, can
be made with the years previously given, as the basis
of classification employed in the national differs from
that in the State censuses. The amount of capital
here returned is probably below that actually em-
ployed, and in other respects the statistics presented
in this table understate the facts. For instance, but
one establishment engaged in building, having but
three employes, is reported; but, notwithstanding
these deficiencies, the important fact appears that the
product has risen from $460,273 as shown in 1855, the
ante-bellum period, to $593,016, or nearly twenty-nine
per cent.; showing that the results of the industries
. in 1880, measured by the valueof what was produced,
considerably exceeded those of any i)revious time.
I Nor has there been any decline since. On the con-
; trary, the results of the latest State census, that of
I 1885, indicated further progre.88. The capital invested
I ill industrial enterprises was then $293,200, of which
I >;26,020 was credit capital; $7374, laud; $40,601,
: buildings and plant; $23,785, machinery; $14,020,
j tools, and the balance, $158,700, cash.
i There were nine establishments manufacturing
I boots and shoes, the oldest dating from 1847. Other
estiiblishmenls were the following: Building, eight;
clothing (including neckties), five; food preparations,
two; furniture, three; metallic goods, seven; musical
instruments and materials, two, and brushes, wagon-
making and repairing, fireworks, harnesses, lumber,
machines and machinery, printing and newspaper
publishing, rubber goods and wooden goods, one each.
The value of goods made was as follows: boots and
shoes, $115,506; building work, $34,700; clothing (in
eluding neckties), S130,003; food preparations, $5,224
metallic goods, $47,535; wooden goods, $7,272 wooden
and metallic goods, $14,300; other goods, $337,100
or a total product of $702,581. The persons employed
numbered 402.
The agricultural property of the town at the same
period was valued at $576,881, of which $313,229
represents land, and $213,244 buildings. The agri-
cultural product in 1885 was valued at $93,341, of
which $27,816 was the value of dairy products.
802
HISTORY OF iMlDDLESEX COUNTy, Ma^.'^ACHUSETT'S.
Reading contains one of tiie largest and best nurse-
ries of fruit and ornamental trees, shrubs and plants
to be found in the country. This was established by
its present proprietor, Jacob W. Manning, in 1854.
Mr. Manning has for many years been one of the
fruit committee of the Massachusetts Horticultural
Society, and he is also a member of the American
Pomological Society and of several other similar
organizations.
Buildings. — The public buildings of Reading,
while neither numerous nor particularly imposing,
deserve appropriate mention. Chief among these
should be placed the edifice known as Lyceum Hall.
This stands at the head of Haven Street, at the corner
opposite Main Street. It is a large, somewhat awk-
ward wooden structure, without architectural merit,
but within its walls have been held most of the im-
portant public meetings of the last thirty-sis years.
It has virtually been the town hall, and in it the an-
nual town-meetings take place, some of which have
been memorable in the local annals. Here, too,
occurred the patriotic mass-meetings in the early davs
of the late war, and the recruiting station was at one
time located in a room upon the second floor. Social
entertainments without number have been given here,
comprising amateur dramatic performances which,
under the auspices of the Reading Dramatic Associa-
tion, an organization long prosperous, but now dead,
achieved more than local notoriety ; balls, among
which those of the Old Assembly were in former
days conspicuous ; fairs and festivals of every sort.
Some of the religious societies now occupying more
appropriate quarters, began their existence in this
building, and if its walls had memory and voice they
might give back the eloquent words of Phillips, Em-
erson, Mrs. Livermore, Charles Bradlaugh and other
famous orators who have here appeared upon the
lecture platform. Being the only large public hall in
the town, its uses have been universal and varied.
The building was erected in 1854 by a stock com-
pany, Stephen Foster and Sylvester Harnden being
chiefly instrumental in raising the funds. The builder
was Edward Safford, and in 1871 thestructure was ex-
tensively remodeled and enlarged under his superin-
tendence. At this time the ceiling of the main hall was
raised and a gallery added. The first story has always
been devoted to trade, and has contained some of the
leading mercantile establishments of the town. The
Atkinson grocery .store is the lineal descendant of a
"Union Store '" or co-operative grocery, which was the
firstlessee at the time the building was completed. Miss
E. Ruggles has for many years carried on the dry-
goods business here. The corner store was for a long
time the only drug-store in the village, and for many
years was conducted by Captain Thomas Richardson,
now dead. Fletcher's dry-goods store, a noted estab-
lishment in other days, for a time occupied part of
the building, and altogether, the edifice, though
scarcely worthy of mention apart from its history, is
a notable one in the mercan^'le and civic annals of
the town.
The Pos^q^ce has for thirty years oi en located in
it, being removed thither from a position /art her up
Main Street, by Lewis Gleason at the time of his £.p-
poiutment as postmaster in 1861, and continued by
the present official, William I. Ruggles, who succeeded
Mr. Gleason in 1887. We may mention in passing,
that since the establishment of the post-office in
Reading in 1811, it has always been located near the
Common, except during a short time when it is said
to have been kept in the house of the postmaster at
' Hill End," so-called. The first postmaster was Col-
onel Nathan Parker, a man of note, who at the time
kept a tavern on the site of the present bank building.
The subsequent incumbents of the office, down to the
.ippointment of Mr. (tieason, were John Weston from
1815 to 1849, .Tohn P. Sherman, Thomas Richardson,
Horatio N. Cute and C. D. Brown.
The Blink BuHdiny, so-called, on Main Street, long
occupied by the town offices, was erected by the
Reading Agrinilfural and Jler/uinii- Association, a
loan aud fund institution which at one time did a
prosperous business as a bank of discount and de-
posit, but which was finally obliged to suspend,
without loss to its creditors, however. The officers of
the institution included Edmund Parker, Daniel
Pratt aud Thomas Sweetser, who successively held
the pojition of ["resident, and Cyrus Smith, Stephen
Foster and Jonathan Frost, successive treasurers.
.Fouathan Frost and his brother Jesse were well-
known citizens, who long 'carried on a dry-goods
-.tore in the building now occupied by Nathan D.
."^toodlcy and others, at the junction of Main and Ash
Streets.
In 1800 the Reading riavimj^ Bank was incorpor-
ated, and began business in the bank building, remain-
ing thereuntil the termination of its active business
in 1879.
Tlie Reading Cooperative Bank is now the only
banking institution in the town, and this holds its
monthly meetings in this bailding. It is one of the
most important adjuncts of the town's welfare. Or-
ganized in 1886, its assets May, 189<), were $58,710,
and its annual dividends to share-holders have never
been less than six, and usually six and one-half per
cent. A national bank is at present (1890) projected,
and is likely to be established soon.
The Public Library is located in the bank building,
and the upper story is devoted to the Masonic Lodge.
The Old South Church, at the head of the Common,
is the oldest, as from its location it is one of the most
prominent, of the public buildings of the town. It is
the second church edifice built by the original church
in the Third Parish, and was erected about 1818. It
is now owned and occupied by the Methodist Society.
The Congregational Church, on Woburn Street, is in
its present form practically a new structure. It was
remodeled in 1887, from the building known as the
READING.
803
Belhesda Church, which was erected in 1849, being
dedicated January 1, LS-jU. This Bethesda Church
was considered an imposing- building at the time it
was built, occupying an elevated site, and having its
main entrance through an open portico of classic de-
sign, approached by a broad flight of granite steps.
It was, however, of composite architecture, combining
traces of Grecian detail with the ordinary New Eng-
land spire or steeple. .\11 the irrominenl features of
the old liuilding have disajipeared in the remodel-
ing, and the entrance approach has been lowered to
the sidewalk level.
The Baptist Church building, on Woburn Street,
and the Christian Union Church (Unitarian), on
Main Street, are both modern structures, erected in
188(1 and 1871 respectively. The Church of ,'>t. Ag-
ues, (Catholic), on Washington .Street, is also of recent
date, erected in 1887.
The public buildings owm-il by the town includa the
Municipal Building of brick, on Pleasant Street, oc-
cupied by the tow:i offices and the Fire Department,
erected in 1873 : the new Union .Street School build-
ing, 188') : the Prospect ."^treet School-house, 1887,
and the High .School buihling, on the Common. The
school- hou.ses are mo<lern Ktruclure> ullhe be.st class,
every attention having been paid in their construc-
tion to the reipiirement.s of heating, lighting and
ventilation.
The High School building in it-^ present form suc-
ceeds the original structure whi-.-h was partiidly de-
stroyed by tire in 1887. No ch:inge wa.- niadr in the
re-building so far as tli? general exterior i.- concerned,
e.xcept in the rear, but the interior was entirely
changed.
.Scuuol..-^. — lieading has ;il\v;iys beeti noted for
the excellenci' of hcrM-hiMiU. After the incorpor;ition
of South Reading, the parent town consisted of two
parishes, the North and South, the latter (the present
town) in 1818 becoming an independent school dis-
trict. It then Contained two school-houses. In 1827,
the growth of the town having rendered a further divi-
sion desiralile, the single district was made three,
designated as the Centre, North and West Districts.
In 1834 the South District, comprising that part of the
town long known as " Hill End," wjis incorporatwl.
In 18'^ti the Lowell .Street District was formed, and in
1844 the North District was divided. These districts,
six in number, were each indeiiendeut of the others,
BO far as concerned the administration of school af-
fairs, and so remained until the abolishment of the
district system in 18(i4.
.Since 1864 the town has been liberal in its afipro-
priations for schools, and progressive in all things
that tend to their eBiciency. Its high school was es-
talilished in IS.^t;. the tirst regular graduation of a
class occurring in ISO:). The first principal was
Harry A. Littell, who was follov/ed by Philip C.
Porter, now of Berkley, Massachusetts. Mr. Porter
was succeeded by K. B. Clarke, who, in tiira, w.os fol-
lowed by Luther B. Pillsbury. After Mr. Pillsbury,
George L. Baxter, now of the Somerville High-
School ; Charles K. Brown, at present a physician in
Lynn, and George W. Adams successively had charge
of the school. Ekiward H. Peabody, now engaged in
journalistic work, followed Mr. Adams. Cyrus A.
Cole was appointed iirincipal in 1868 and continued
ontil 1880.
Since the resignation of Mr. Cole, George L. Perry,
Edward P. Fitz, John B. Giftbrd and the present prin-
ci|>al, Wilson R. Butler, have been in charge. Thepres-
ent assistants are Miss Olive A. Prescott, Miss Carrie
E. Berry and Miss Emma Slack.
LiRRARIES — -Among the educational influences of
the town, the public library is prominent. Like simi-
lar institutions in other New England towns, this is
the legitimate successor of the old school district
libraries, founded by aid of the Commonwealth, and
of private association libraries, which, to a degree,
filled the [dace the present library occupies.
The first of these association libraries bore the name
uf The F'-.dernl Library, and was controlled by an as-
sociation numbering sixty persons, formed September
■11, i7'.a.
This was merged in a corporation in 1817, with aa
increase in membership. In 1831 the corporation
was dissolved, the books being sold at auction. Ten
vears later, in 1841, an organization called the Frank-
lin Library Assoriatioii was formed, which supported
a library for circulation among its members until the
establishment of the town library in 1868.
In 1860 an Agricultural Library was established,
owned and controlled by an association interested in
the subjects to which it wa.s devoted.
In 1868 the present public library was established
by vole of the town, the books of the Franklin Li-
brary, 462 volumes, and of the Agricultural Library,
17i> volumes, being donated to it.
Dr. Horace P. Wakefield had, in 1867, offered the
sum of ?oOo to be devoted to the purchase of books
for such a library njjon condition that the town would
I approjiriatc an equal amouut. This sum, together
with *100, a legacy under the will of T. Ward Harts-
home, was now paid, and Loton Parker, Ekiward Ap-
plelon, Anna E. Appleton, Rev. William Barrows,
John P.. Lewis, Jr., and others interested in the move-
ment, made liberal donations of books. In March,
1871, the library contained 2475 volumes. It had
been opened in February, 1869, occupying a room in
the High School building. The first librarian was
Miss Mattie Appleton (now Mrs. Henry Brown), who
was followed by Miss Alice Temple, and later, by the
present librarian. Miss Lizzie Cox. The present as-
sistant librarian is Miss Jessie Grouard. From the
High School building the library was soon removed
to the Perkins btiiiding, Woburn Street, and now oc-
cupies convenient rooms in the Bank Building. The
present number of volumes is about 8000, and the
circulation, as reported for the year ending March,
804
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
1890. is 15,075. The books are carefully selected
and catalogued.
Churches. — In connection with the influence ot
the school and the library it is proper to consider
those of the Church. The mother of Reading
churches was the Church of the Third Parish (later
known as the old South Church), whose first paator
was Thomas Haven. Mr. Haven was succeeded by
Rev. Peter Sanborn, who, although dismissed iu 1820,
continued to reside in the town until his death, which
occurred in 1857. Pastor Sanborn was followed by
the Rev. Samuel Green, 1820-23 ; Ja red Reid, 1823-
33 ; Aaron Pickett, 1833-.')0 ; Lyman Whiting, 1S51-
55; William Barrows, 185t>-69; and others.
During the pastorate of Mr. Pickett a second Con -
gregationai society was organized, under the name
of the Bethesda Church, the 6rst pastor being Rev.
Edward W. Clark, who was followed by W. H.
Beecher, William H. Wilcox, W. B. Ely and thr
present pastor, Rev. Frank S. Ailams. In 18S6 a
union of the Old South and Bethesda Churches wa.-
ettected under the name of the Conyrrgational ('hiir'-/(
of Reading.
TTie Baptist Chun-h was formed in 1832. Prior tu
that date services had been held in dwellings and in
the West School-hou.-e, but the sect encountered much
opposition, owing to the prevailing intolerance of il>
peculiar tenets. Opposition seems to have strengthen-
ed the movement rather than to have discouraged il.
In 1837, a church having been built during the pre-
vious year, Rev. Henry Smith became the first
pastor. His successors have been Rev. i >. Cunningham.
J. Woodbury, John Upton, J. G. Townsend, John
Cookson, E. K. Fuller, A. M. Higgins, William R.
Davy, T. W. Urawley, H. P. Guilford, L. D. Hill, J.
K. Ewer, C. T. Douglass and O. T. Walker.
Preaching under the auspices of the MelUodM Epii-
copal Cliurck began in 18()6, with the missionary
movement conducted by Rev. A. D. Merrill. He wa.-i
followed by Rev. Andrew Gray, then settled in Wake-
field, who preached regularly for several months in
Lyceum Hall. After Mr. Gray came Rev. Daniel
Atkins, Stephen Cushiug and H. D. Weston. While
the church was in charge of Mr. Weston the build-
ing on Ash Street was erected and dedicated. Sub-
sequent pa.stora were the Rev. J. N. Short, W. H.
Hatch, J. L. Hanaford, James F. Mears, William
Silverthorne, Daniel Steele, J. H. Humphrey and the
present incumbent. Rev. Fred. N. Upham. The
Church now occupies the Old South edifice, having
purchased it from the Congregational Society after
the consolidation between the latter and the Bethesda
Church.
The Roman Catholic Clinrch of Si. Agnes now iu
charge of Rev. J. E. Millerick, of Wakefield, wa.s es-
tablished here in 1886. Prior to that date the Cath-
olics of Reading worshiped at the church in Wake-
field.
The Christian Union (Unitarian) Church is the de-
scendant of the Third Congregational Society, formed
in Reading, April 2, 1827, for the purpose " of pro-
moting pure aitd evangelical principles of pr.ictical
religion and morality." The original society num-
bered forty-sis, and a church building was erected in
1827, afterward transformed into a dwelling house,
still standing ne.xt to the house of the late Dr. F. F.
Brown.
The pastors who for longer or shorter periods had
charge of this early church were: Rev. Mr. Barbery,
Dr. Peabody, Mr. Robertson and Mr. Damon. In
May, 18M8, a Universalist Society was organized in
the town, and a union of the earlier church with this
was then tfi'ected under the ministration of Rev.
Charles Gallacar. He was followed by Rev. G, G.
Strickland and Rev. Mr. Waitt.
In Jlay, 1840, "The Libera/ Ladies' Benevolent Asw-
cifitioit " was formed, and when the liberal religious
movement flagged, they were earnest in their efforts
to keep it alive, until, in 185(>, a new society was
organized under the name of the /'('rs/ L'nirersn/isf
:'i(ii-ielij of /'fadiiii/. Rev. N. R. Wright was the rir.st
pastor, services being held in Lyceum Hall. He was
succeeded by L. M. Burrington, E. A. Eaton and W.
W. Hayward. Mr. Hayward resigned in 18ii7, and
the services of Rev. E. B. Fairchild, of Stoneham,
were secured lor afternoon preaching iu Ellsworth
(now -Masonic) Hall. Under Mr. Fairchild the society
was again organized under a new name, the "Chris-
tian Union " of Reading, a new church was erected
in 1871, and since then its prosperity has been con-
tinuous. It is MOW regularly connected with the Ini-
tarian denoniinution. After Mr. Fairchild's resigna-
tion. Rev. C. W. Heizer became ]>astor, followed by
Rev. C J. Staples, and the present incumbent. Rev.
Don C. Stevens.
(Jl.D F.V-Ml LIES.— Reading has felt but slightly the
elfect of the tide of immigration which has trans-
formed many Massachusetts towns. In 1885, when
the latest State Census was taken, out of a total popu-
lation of 3539 only 503 were of foreign birth, and
including these only 757 had both parents foreign
born. The conditions have not materially changed
since.
The town contains to-day many persons who are
direct descendants of the first or early settlers. Cer-
tain family names aie as familiar as household
words. Among these none are more prominent, or
have a more honorable lineage than the Bancrofts
and Parkers.
Lieutenant Thomas Bancroft, who was born in
England in lt)22, came to Lynn, and early purchased
land in Reading, although apparently he lived upon
it for but a short time. By his second wife, who was
Elizabeth .Metcalf, he had several children, the eldest,
Thomas, settling in Reading near what is now West
Street. Here, subsequent to 1673, he built the fourth
house in the parish, near the present residence of
' Mr. Batclieldcr. He was one of the parish deacons.
READING.
805
The great-grandson of Thoinas was Lieutenant I
Joseph Bancroft, who was the immediate paternal
ancestor of tlie existing familie.-) of that name. He
was born in 173."), and marrying Elizabeth Temple,
the daughter of a neighbi)r, settled u[)on a part of the
homestead, namely, in the Captain George Bancroft
house, so-called, where he lived at the time of the in-
corporation of the parish in 17G9. It was the day of
large families, and Lieutenant .loseph had five daugh-
ters and five sons. < tf the sons, Joseph was the
grandfather of John M. and Lewis H. Bancroft ; and
their cousins, Emory, Solon, Frederick and Alvin.
Lewis H. Bancroft has held the office of selectman,
representative to the General Court, and is now water
commissioner. Solon Bancroft, Esf|., is a leading
citizen, a member of the Middlesex bar, special justice
of the First District tlourt of Eastern Middlesex, and
has held various town oflices. Frederick, resident in
Keading, is engaged in the brokerage business in
Boston.
Tlie second son of Lieutenant Joseph was Timothy,
who was the grandfather of Newton, Charles, James, i
Nathan, Wendell and Moses. Of these Nathan is a
leading shoe manufacturer, and has already been
mentioned in that connection, Wendell, for a lon^'
time an extensive builder, is now engaged in the coal
and lumber business, while Moses carries on the sale
of sewing-machine^ in this an<l neighboring towns.
Timothy was also the father of John Hart Bancroft, '
and the grandfather, through ditferent lines, of Fran- '
cis J., and William Hazen — all of whom are still
living in Reading. Nelieniiah. the fourth son of
Lieutenant .loseph, was the father of .lames H., r.ow '
residing on High Street, and tlie grandfather of Jas.
A. Bancroft, land surveyor and formerly manufactur-
er of shoes, who has filled the positions of selectman
and town treasurer and other town offices.
Upon his maternal side PVancis J. Bancroft is alsn '
descended from Captain .las. Bancroft, of Revolution-
ary prominence, who was a grandson of Dea. 'J'homas,
the early settler. Captain James also settled upon a i
part of the old homestead, living at the time of the i
incorporatinn of the parish in a house which, about
178'.i, was succeeded by the i)resent residence of Fra)icis
J. A son of Deacon Thomas, Samuel, horn Kill.;,
succeeded to his father's house, and was living there
in 17('>9. His son was the father of Rtv. Aaron Ban- ;
croft, a learned and noted minister, settled in Wor-
cester in 1785, and whose son, George Bancroft, the
historian, is thus connected with the Reading line. |
The Parkers trace their descent from Thomas
Parker, an early settler and, like the ancestor of the i
Bancrofts, also a deacon in the parish. He was the
direct progenitor of the existing families. His fifth
son, Nathaniel, settled in the West Parish at about
the time of his marriage, in 1G77, building opposite
the Common, near the site of the Grouard mansion,
the first house in the present Reading. He, too, was '
the first person buried in the present cemetery. Na-
thaniel, known as Ensign Parker, was the grandfather
of Captain Nathan, who owned the Jaquith house,
iraditions of which we have mentioned, and also
■ ither houses and much land. To one of these houses,
long known as " Captain Parker's Red House," now
standing on Ash Street, and which we have previous-
ly lueulioned as the James Davis house, his son,
Colonel Nathan, succeeded, keeping there a tavern.
He afterward conducted a public-house on the site of
the present Bank Building. Colonel Nathan was in
his day an influential citizen, and the first postmaster.
His sons, Edmund and Rev. Nathan, were also prom-
inent, the first being for several terms a member of
he House of Representatives, and afterwards of the
Senate and Governor's Council. His brother. Rev.
Nathan, was a successful pastor for thirty years in
I'ortsinouth, N. H.
Sergeant John Parker, who was the brother of En-
sign Nathaniel, was the great-grandfather of Jonas,
born 172S. This Jonas was great-grandfather of
.feronie and Clarkson, and by difi'erent lines of Still-
man E., Henry F., Samuel, Wyman, Warren, Edward,
William C., William Strong, Solon A., Milton and
lialen Parker and others — names that include some of
the most well-known and respected citizens of the
town. Walter S. Parker, now chairman of the School
( 'ommittee, is the son of Henry F. The daughters
of the families descended from Jonas have carried
the Parker blood into divergent channels, the famil-
ies of Henry and Gilman D. Kingman, of Howard,
Wyman and Hartwell Nichols, and of F"rederick
and Rev. ^\'iliiam Wakefield being connected with
the line.
From Benjamin, who was an uncle of Jonas, are
■ lescended the families of Cephas, Tlieron and Wil-
liam Parker (long a well-known grocer), and also
[yoton, who died unmarried. In this line also came
Loea Parker,- Jr., who was the father of Gilman L.,
present secretary of the School Committee.
Another brothei' of Ensign Nathaniel was Lieuten-
ant Hananiah, who was the first son of Deacon
Thomas. His eldest son, John Parker, removed from
Reading to Lexington and was the ancestor of Cap-
tain Parker, whocommanded the Lexington company
in the fisht of April 19, 1776, and also of Rev. Theo-
dore Parker.
The name of Temple is also a familiar one in
Reading. The common ancestor of the family was
Richard Temple, a son of Robert, of Saco, Maine,
who was killed by the Indians there in 1676. Richard
married a daughter of Deacon Thomas Parker and
lived in the westerly part of the Third Parish.
He had several sons, — among them Jonathan (born
10S)!>) and John (born 1704). At the time of the
incorporation of the Third Parish Jonathan lived
on what is now the James W. Roberts place. Summer
Avenue, and John occupied the farm to the south-
ea.sl, now the residence of Jacob Roberts. From
Jonathan are descended Deacon William, residing at
806
HISTORY OF xMIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the corner of Woburn Street and Summer Avenue,
and Deacon Mark M. and Calvin, both deceased.
Calvin was long the station agent of the Boston A
Maine Railroad, and his son, Joseph S., was one of
the originators of the necktie manufacture here,
which he still carri&s on. From John Temple are
descended David C. Temple, the well-known builder,
Warren, Fred (now deceased) and R. Dexter Temple,
now of the selectmen, a position held by his ancestor
(Richard) in 1734 and 1735.
Other early settlers, whose descendants have been
numerous and more or less identified with the town,
are Joseph Wakefield, who came to Reading from
Bo.ston, and whose son Thomas, apprenticed to Tim-
othy Pratt, of Reading, whose dauf^hter he married,
was the father of Timothy, the ancestor of Deacon
Caleb, father of Dr. Horace P. Wakefield; John
Weston, who came to the southern part of Reading
in lGo2, and whose marriage to Sarah Fitch in the
following year appears to have been the first cele-
brated in the town ; and Richard Nichols, who also
settled in the tSouth Parish. By the marriage above-
mentioned John Weston had eight children. From
the first of these. John, born liitil, .spring the de-
scendants in the present Reading. His son .Stephen
settled on West Street, and here Stephen's son, Isiac,
was living when the Third Parish was incorporated,
on the Chas. Weston place. John, son of Isaac, lived
near by. John Weston, Jr., great-grand.son of the
original John, also Jonathan Westou, another great-
grandson, were living in otlier parts of the Third
Parish. Charles A. Weston, road commissioner, is a
direct descendant of I.saac.
Three of the sons of Richard Nichols — .fames, .lohn
and Richard — were represented by sons who, at the
incorporation of the Third Parish, were living in the
north part, near Franklin and Pearl Streets. Fioui
these have sprung a numerous progeny.
Timothy Pratt, Sr., sou of John Pratt, an early
settler, was the first of the Reading Pratts, the home-
stead being upon Wakefield Street, between Charles
and Haverhill Streets. From him and from his
brother Samuel, who lived upon the Herrick Batch-
elder place, on Haverhill btreet, descend many of the
name in Reading and elsewhere, among the number
being Joseph L. Pratt, formerly selectman and a
well-known citizen.
Of the men of the present century who have, by
their energy and public spirit, helped to make the
Reading of to-day, none are more conspicuous than
Stephen Foster, Sylvester Harnden, Horace Poole
Wakefield and William Proctor.
Stephen Foster was born in South Reading, De-
cember 8, 1808. In 1823 he entered the employ of
Abiel Holden, who was then carrying on shoe man-
ufacturing in Reading, and remained with him :is
clerk and manager until 1834, when he began busi-
ness on his own account, continuing it thereafter in
Reading and Boston for many years. He was con-
nected with the Reading Agricultural and Mechanics'
Association, as its treasurer, and was identified with
nearly everj' public improvement undertaken in the
town. With others, he was influential in causing the
Boston & Maine Railroad to carry its line through
the town in 1843, instead of by a diflerent route at
first proposed. This alone has been of great benefit
to Reading. Of his connection with the erection of
Lyceum Hall we have already spoken. To his pub-
lic spirit and persistency in assisting to raise the nec-
essary funds, the town is largely indebted for the
beautiful sh.ade-trees planted upon the Common and
elsewhere in 1845. Mr. Foster was a man of strict
integrity, and of liberal and progressive spirit. He
took a ileep interest in the public library, was one of
its early trustees and afterwards presiilent of the
board, an office which he continued to hold until his
death, October .30, 1S8!I. In l>i3r) he married Louisa,
daughter of Thaddeus B.Pratt. Mrs. Foster died in
18o2. In I8."i7 he married Harriet N. Fulliugton. of
Vermont, who survives him. By his first marriage
he had twi> daughters, niie of whom is deceased, and
by his second, a son and dauirliter, both of whom re-
side in reailing.
tiylvester Harnden was born in Wilmington in
1804, but he became a citi/en of Reading in 1823,
engaging in cabinet-makinii with Luther Elliott, and
afterwards with .Vmos Sweetser.
The factory occupied at that time was on Main
Street, between the stable now controlled by Rufus
Wright and the residence ol' the lale William R.
Perkins.
Mr. Harnden soon extended the business, and iniilt
a shop at the head of Haven ;."^treet. and in 1831 the
house next to the store <if M. .V. Stone. Between this
house and the shop a p.assage-way led to a lot in the
rear, which, in the gradual extension of the business,
w.as occupied with additional factory buildings — a dry-
house, varnish-shop and mill. Another building on
Haven Street, now the wheelwright, blacksmith and
paint-shop of Brown, Totten & Danforth, was part of
the establisiiment. Upwards of one hundred work-
men were at one time employed by Mr. Harnden.
During the years subsequent to 18.jt) the establish-
ment was mainly devoted to the manufacture of re-
frigerators.
Mr. Harnden "was actively connected with the pros-
perity of the town iu whose welfare he took a lively
interest. In his later years he occupiefl the residence
at the corner of Maine and Pleasant .Streets, now
owned and until recently occupied by his son-in-law,
Hon. Carroll D. Wright, commissioner of labor of
the United States. Here he died May 19, 1873, leav-
ing a widow and five children, the elder son, Freder-
ick, for a time continuing the business.
Horace Poole Wakefield, M.D., born January 4,
1809, w.as the son of Deacon Caleb Wakefield, him-
self a man of distinction, who had been honored by
election to the House of Representatives, besides
READING.
807
holding other responsible positions. Dr. Wakefield
graduated at Amhei-st College in 1832, and became a
physician, practicing first at Oakham, Mass., and
afterward at Reading. Alw.ays interested in public
aflairs, he was elected to the House of Representatives
for two terms while at Oakham, and afterward, while
at Reading, to tbe State Senate. Both at Oakham
and at Reading he was chosen to various town offices,
and entrusted with numerous public duties. He wa.*.
councilor of the Massachuset'^s .Medical Society, and
its vice-president; also president of tlie Middlesex
Ease District Medical Society. He assisted in the
formation of the American .Vnti-Slavery Society, and
his name stands next to that of John G. Whittier
among the signatures to its declaration of principles.
Later he became an inspector at the State Almshouse
at Tewksbury, and its resident physician, and after-
ward superintendent of the State institutidn at Mon-
son. Dr. Wakefield possessed untiring activity and a
strong will. He was always interested in agriculture,
and for nine years a member of the State Board.
After leaving Monson he retired to his farm at Lei-
cester, Massachusetts, where be died in 1883. He
was twice married, and a widow and one daughter
survive him.
William Proctor wa^ born in E)eptford, England
and, after service in the English army, came to Read-
ing in ISoy. He first engaged in the custom shoe
business in Boston, and after retiring from that pur-
chased a one-half interest in the wire-brush patents
of J. E. Howard, of Reading, and began the manu-
facture of these brushes on an extensive scale, under
the name of the Howard Brush Company. Tbi^^ was
the era of invention in metallic brushes, and the How-
ard company was subjected to considerable competi-
tion which Mr. Proctor finally overcame by other
purchases of patent-rights, and enlarged the business,
associating with himself a? manager Jlr. Jhs. H.
Horton, who conducts it since Mr. Proctor's death.
Mr. Proctor was an ardent Abolitionist, and a friend
of Garrison and Phillips. An original Republican
in politics, he represented the town in the House of
Repre.sentatives in ISijtJ. He was a liberal thinker in
religion and an active supporter of the Christian
Union (Unitarian) Church. He was also one of tbe
trustees of the Reading Savings Bank, and one of thp
original promoters and trustees of tbe public library.
He died in February, 1889, after a protracted illness,
leaving a widow and two children.
Other men, now deceased, who were prominent in
local aflairs within the last fifty years, were Reuben
Weston, an original Abolitionist; Daniel Pratt, town
clerk from 1831 to 1852, heretofore mentioned as a
manufacturer of clocks ; William J. Wightman, town
clerk from 18.53 to 1856 and from 1862 to 1874; Gil-
man C. Gleason, for many years undertaker and su-
perintendent of the cemetery, and Hiram Barrus.
Mr. Barrus was a native of Goshen, Mass., born
July 5, 1822, and became a resident of Reading Ln
1863. He was always interested in antiquarian re-
search, and collected much valuable material concern-
ing the history of the town, which found a place in
Eaton's " History of Reading " and in other publica-
tions. He also prepared and published a history of
his native town. Appointed to a position in the Cus-
tom-House in 1861, he afterward became assistant
cashier, which position he held until his death. He
was a member of tbe School Committee of Reading
for several years, and one of the trustees of the pub-
lic library. He died in March, 1883, leaving a widow
and three children.
Reading now contains many men who are fitly suc-
ceeding those who have passed away, and who are
doing their full share toward advancing the pros-
perity of the town. Of these in detail it is not our
province to speak ; their work has not yet passed into
history.
The town, from its position upon the main line of a
railway connecting it with Boston, is a desirable place
of residence for those who do business in the city. It
has an abundance of excellent building land, pure
air and beautiful scenery. Its moral tone is of tbe
highest, its schools of the best, and its future growth
as a place of homes for those who desire such advan-
tages is assured. Its debt is nominal and its tax rate
moderate. Its streets are well-cared for and lighted.
It is now introducing a system of public water sup-
ply, provided for at a meeting of the town held early
in the piesent year, and soon to be completed. It
possesses a first-class local paper, 77it Reading Chron-
icle, established in 1870 and now conducted by W. H.
Twonibly & Son, the senior editor being a veteran
journalist.
Among its social advantages it has the usual num-
ber of organizations and societies. A Veteran Asso-
ciation, formed of the survivors of the late war, be-
came, in 1889, Veteran Post, No. 194, of the Grand
Army of the Republic. There is also a Woman's
Relief Corps. Reading Lodge, No. 56(i, Knights of
Honor, was organized in 1877, and has seventy-three
members. What Cheer Colony, U. O. of Pilgrim
Fathers, received its charter January 26, 1881, and
has 110 members. Besides these, the Order of ^gis
is represented by Reading Lodge, No. 13.
^Masonry in Reading began with the formation of a
lodge which, in the excitement of the anti-Masonry
agitation, was allowed to decline. In October, 1871,
a new lodge was constituted under the old name, —
Good Samaritan Lodge, Free and Accepted Masons,
— undera charter granted September 13, 1871.
Odd Fellowship is represented by a lodge recently
formed, and the Improved Order of Bed Men by
Quannapowitt Tribe, No. 50. Besides these there are
several temperance organizations and an encampment
of the Sons of Veterans. Reading also possesses an
Athletic Club, organized in 1886, and occupying a
convenient and well-equipped club-house on Ash
Street.
808
HISTORY OP MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
In conclusion, we quote the following from tjie pen
of a citizen of Reading — Henry G. Kittredge, editor
of the Boston Journal of Commerce :
"RsadiDg hu a tradition, like all New Eaglanil towns, stinple, sturdy
and patriotic. Her society to-day poeaesses all tbe ennobling cliuracter-
iatics of its Puritanic origin. ^V^lat constitntea the l>eat town to live
in Jependa on the peculiar circumatam-es of him who eeeks .1 residence.
There are natural and artificial advantages belonging toe^ery town llmt
forcibly appeal to aome of the wants of men, and no one cno claim ex-
clusire juriadiction over all the gifts of nature or the privileges of so-
ciety. . . . Reading ia far enough from Boatou to have a sociability of
Its own, independent of city attractions."
To which we may add the hope that its future may,
like it3 past, be honorable, if not exciting; and, if
not particularly eventful, may .still be worthy of the
fathers who laid the foundations of the town.
CHAPTER LXIV.
NORTH READIXt;.
BY HORACE
WAIH.IN.
Skven years after the incorporation of Reading, in
October. 16'il, the Colony Court granted to its inhab-
itants additional territory on the north side of the
Ipsv/ich River, till then the northern boundary of the
town. This territory in time became the Second or
North P.arish of old Reading, and finally, at a com-
paratively recent date, the town of North Reading.
Formal confirmation of the grant was made by the
Court in lUOO, on the 2;5d "f May, in the following
language :
'' Wherea.9, the Hon<truble fienenil Court having lornierly grnnled t.»
the town of Re;iding a Tmrt of Land of two niilert, lying betwer-n their
u'raot of four miles and ^Ir BellinghaniV biruie iiutl the great ll)isvvi(-li>
river, and uieo ordered them ro have it laid out sometime befi.ie Iliij
( oiirt siite ; at tbe request of tbe Town that this Piatt of Land is laid
nut iind returned, Initted and bounded as followeth; running from a I'ine
tree at .\, north tiy the eompuas, si.x hundred rods, Joynes to the Town
ol Kcattiug laud unto B, to tbe lop of a rocky hill ; and from B. luiat two
hundred sixty-eigbt rods to au oak tree at C, marked R. B., and jovnes
the .\odover land; and from C, South South East 8 deg. »■ .10 — to E
five hundred seventy-six rods, this joynea upon the (iovernor's farme to
a black oak tree at D, marked R. B; and this line joyues upon ]\Ir.
Betlingliani's farme ; the fourth tine runafrom D, E. b. y., two hundred
tbiny^iix rods to a walnut tree at E, and joynea also on 3Mr. Belliug-
baui's farme ; the fifth line from E, South East aud by South, two hun-
dred and four rods to a black oak in Salem line at F, which joynes upon
the farme of Thomas Fuller; the sixth liue runs from K, west south
west, 2<* 3., four hundred and twenty rods to a black oak at G, the which
line tsSalem bounds. The Tth line from G., West by \ortli, 7* N'o.,five
hundred and sixty -eight rods to a pine tree at A (the place of beginning),
alongstthe river (Ipswich) side."
This return was made and signed by Elisha Hutch-
inson, and the Court allowed it, " provided it intrench
not on any former grant."
The early history of Reading, and indeed the entire
history of that town down to 1S.53, when North Read-
ing became independent, may properly be considered
the history of the latter town also ; but as this has
been sketched in connection with the parent town, it
will not be followed here, and we shall confine our
attention to the North Parish and to the present
town of North Reading since its incorporation.
Some years after the grant of territory had been
made the Colony Court ordered a second survey to
be made of it, and to defray the charges or costs of
such a survey the town gave to Shubael Walker, who
performed the work, a tract comprising some 300
acres. Th^ title to this land was afterward involved
in a legal contest, wherein Captain Ephraim Savage,
an infiueotial citizen, sued the town lor possession,
claiming it under right of his wife. His suit was
lost, however.
The limits of Reading now extended from the
point of orijrinal settlement below Lake t^uanna-
powitt, northward .some eight miles to the Andover
line, and the first church having been built in the
southern end of the town, the towns-people living on
the new grant had a long distance to travel for the
purpose of attending public wtirship. In ltj9t> the
parish formally recognized this in tlie.se words :
"The -lory of i;..d being the , hief eii.l lli;il .ill uieu'< .ictioiis ought
to aim .It, and tho pioiuoti tnd upbuldilig uf the public n>>rsliip of
Goil being one gre;(t part of our duty, we. Hie free-boldera and other
iiihabitaiils of IJeiuling, liav ing miisideri-il file L-reiit dintauce uf pucii
ill this bovii, iu* live I'U llie iiioTli ^iile uf Ipswirh river iind Bare
.Meadow, Iroiii the pjiiee .diiud'.i w oi>bip among iia, whereby I hey
many times labor, under great rlifliciilty iu couiiug to (loil's house,
uflentiiues t-aiinot come, and seldom can bring their < hildren, do there-
lore, at a geneml to« n-iiu-eting, held by Ihe proprietors and other in-
habitnuts, on the Jd of Miirch, liiM."i-in; ; we, for ourselves, our heirs
.mil .sui-cessoi-s, vote iiniinimoiisly, agree ami order, and be it hereby
i-iiacted, -udert-d and rouhiiiicd, Iloit all thai tract of land, in our towii-
'bip, lying ou the North side ..f the Ip.swicli river, so called, that is to
...tv : boiiuded westerly by Wnliiirn, by Alidoier uollherly, and by
Siileiil line easterly ; as al-o nil tli.it laud iu our tnwiiNliip, lyinil on the
north side of Riii-e .Meadow, i-oiiiniuuly c^ill.'d * Sadler's .Neck,' as it is
bounded by Lynn line of township « lib us, and so to river aforesaid ; —
we say that when, and as soon as that there is such a suitable and com-
l»eterit number of inliabitants seltletl ou llie tract of lanit aforesaid ;
Ibiil when they do call and settle and iiiaiulain a godly, learned, ortho-
dox niinister, that they shall be free Irotu paying to the minister or
-iiiiuistry iu tbe /ua-ii, ur on the South side of the aforesjiid river, and
that tor so long as they so do."
In 1711 the inhabitanta on the north side of the
Ipswich, believing that the time had come when the
intent of this vote should be carried out, petitioned
to be set off as an independent parish, but without
success.
The division was made, however, without opposition
in 171;!, and the new parish was styled the " North
Precinct," or Second Parish of Reading. The first
|)arish meeting was held November 27, 1713. At this
meeting Sergeant George Flint was chosen modera-
tor, John Harnden being clerk.
The settlement of the precinct had gone steadily
forward since the land had been granted by the Colony
Court. Six families were located there prior to 1(J80,
and before the close of the century many others were
added. These early settlers comprise the Uptons,
Flints, Mclntires — names still familiar in the town.
There were thirty-nine members of the church in
1720, and a house of worship having been undertaken,
concerning the location of which tbe advice of the
NORTH READING.
809
town had been asked and duly given, the new parish
extended a call to Rev. Daniel Putnam, of Danvers,
who was a graduate of Harvard, 1717, and who, no
doubt, was a "godly, learned ortliodox minister,"
such as had been contemplated in the original voie
passed antecedent to the incorporation of the parish.
At the date of Mr. Putnam's ordination there were
fifty-three tax-payers in the precinct.
As an inducement for Mr. Putnam to settle in the
parish, he had been given twenty acres of land, and
there had been built for him a house, " twenty-eight feet
long, nineteen feet wide, and fifteen feet stud." This
building was of the usual primitive type., having a
" lean-to " or kitchen extension on the rear, one-
story in height. It was to have three chimneys
from the ground, besides a chamber chimney, and
it was stipulated in the vote providing for its erection
that Mr. Putnam should find uails and glass for the
building.
The town having given to the parish £30 toward
the erection of the meeting-house and parsonage, a
request was also made that the common land in the
precinct be dedicated to parish uses. The form of
this request is characteristic of the time, and as far
removed as possible from the style that would be now
employed. After recognizing the goodness of the
Lord, who had inclined the hearts of the towns-people
towards the general gift of money, and formally re-
turning the thanks of the parish therefor, the peti-
tion proceeds as follows :
".Vnd if it Ulight please tbe Lord to incline your hearts, now in unr
beeiuDiup), to givtr us tht- comtnoii lam) that lyelh in oiu Precinct, near
uur nieeling-hoiise, for ministerial use, so we may be a bniltliii^' a niin-
ieter'e bouBe, we Bball readily accept it and account it an act of your
Cbliatian charity and conipa£:iion towards u^, who are and remain your
huiuble eerrante."
Notwithstanding the best intentions the parish
found it impossible to render Mr. Putnam the finan-
cial support he needed. Aid was from time to time
solicited and rendered by the First Parish, and in 1724
it was voted to apply to the Governor and Council in
relation to Mr. Putnam's troubles. In 1730, with the
intent of strengthening the parish, it has voted " to
petition the General Court for part of Reading, part of
Lynn, and part of Audover, to be sett to them to
help support the gospel in said Precinct." This
threatened encroachment was resisted by the First
Parish, which chose a committee to oppose the peti-
tion before the Court.
Other things than parish matters occasionally dis-
turbed the usual even current of events. In 1721
there was an alarming epidemic of small-pox, and on
the 29th of October, 1727, there began an earthquake
which, according to the parish record, " lasted at
times, three months, and at the end of three months,
very hard." There was then no local press to reg-
ister important events, and the church record often
bears items intended to perpetuate occurrences of
extraordinary interest.
In 1740 the parish contemplated the erection of a
uew church, but not till 1761 does it appear that an
effective vote to undertake it was passed, and the fol-
lowing year the building was raised. It was to be
forty-eight feet long and thirty-six feet wide, covered
with shingles.
Rev. Mr. Putnam died in 1759, and was succeeded
by Rev. Eliab Stone, who was ordained May 20, L761.
In 1771 there were sixty -six voters in the parish,
three more than in the Third Parish (now Reading),
and fourteen less than in the First Parish (now
Wakefield).
During the controversies with the mother country
which preceded the Revolution, the North Precinct
shared with the rest of the town the active duties of
the hour. When, in 1774, the town voted " to main-
tain their charter rights in every constitutional way,"
George Flint, David Damon and Benjamin Flint, res-
; idenis of the Third Parish, were joined to a committee
to draft a memorial that should fitly express the sen-
timent of the town respecting the grave questions
at issue. The report of the committee took strong
ground against the unjust taxation of the Colonies,
but deemed it inexpedient for the town to adopt any
particular measures for their future conduct in oppo-
sition to the action of Parliament until after the re-
port of a. congress of commissioners from all the
Colonies, then proposed, had been made.
During the previous session of the General Court
Deacon Daniel Putnam, of the North Precinct, had
reprtaented the town, and had received from his con-
stituents instructions which have been set forth in
the historical sketch of Reading, enjoining him to
be firm in resisting any encroachment upon the char-
tered rights of the Colonists, and cautioning him not
to give his consent to any measure that might limit
the liberty of the people.
Either in 1774 or in 1742 — the date is doubtful — a
burying-place and training-field had been set out in
the parish, and the committee appointed to perform
this duty also laid out five "needful and necessary
, public ways " or roads. One of these led from Flint's
mill to the Lynn line, and was a new alignment of an
older road ; another extended " from George Flint's
out to the ten-pole way before Samuel Dix's house,
near the corner of Jona. Flint's land." A third
ran from the saw-mill between the farms of Samuel
' Dix and Samuel Lues, Jr., to the road last mentioned.
i A fourth was a bridle-way from the road near Rich-
J ardsou bridge up to Samuel Hartshorn's, and from
thence up to a road leading from Jonathan Batch-
eller's to the meeting-house, and the last led (rem
: said Batcheller's to the ten-pole way by or near " Nod
] Mill."
All mere local or parish interests were subordi-
I nated to the struggle for independence that in 1774
enlisted the energies of the Colonists.
Reading North Precinct, although only a parish of
the town proper, was represented in every conference
of the citizens respecting the issues involved in the
810
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
war. The names of Benjamin Flint, Daniel Flint
and Benjamin Upton are prominent among the rest,
and Amoa Upton, another resident of the parish, is
said to have been in the battle of Bunker Hill, one of
the first men of the number furnished from this pre-
cinct toward the town's quota.
After the war the parish resumed the even tenor of
its way. The population was somewhat scattered and
devoted to agriculture, without manufactures, except
boot and shoe-making, which to a limited extent, has
been followed in later years.
In 1853 the precinct was incorporated as the town
of North Reading. The population of the town in
1855 was 1050. In 1860 it was 1103 and the valua-
tion of the town for purposes of taxation was then
$527,890. The years that have since passed have
brought little that was eventful, and the town pre-
serves much the same character that it possessed when
incorporated. To the War of the Rebellion the town
gave more than its share of patriotic men, the total
number being 137, or seven more than the required
quota.
The town, though small, has given birth to men of
inriuence in their day and generation, and whom any
community might claim with pride. Such a man was
Sergt. George Flint, the early settler, who has been
previously mentioned, and in the same line at a later
date, Benjamin Flint, 1746-1858, "noted for his great
firmness of purpose and determination of will, and
much respected for his blameless life and personal
worth;" Col. Daniel Flint, born 1(371, who "pos-
sessed in an uncommon degree, a strong and vigorous
intellect, with indomitable perseverance and great
native force of character;" Rev. Jacob Flint, 17t!8-
1835, "a good patriot, a well-read theologian, a faith-
ful minister and a pious Christian;" Rev. Jame.s
Flint, 1779-18')5, " as a scholar, a preacher, a poet
and a critic, eminent and distinguished ; " Rev. Tim-
othy Flint, died 1840, pastor of the Congregational
Church at Lunenburg " well known in America and
on the other side of the Atlantic as the author of va-
rious works that have given him a rank among the
most distinguished writers of the country," and be-
sides these Charles F. Flint, born 1808, died 1868,
who was one of the most enterprising citizens of the
town, and well known and highly esteemed outside
its limits. After his death his wife presented to the
town, as a memorial of her husband, the Flint Memo-
rial Hall, erected opposite the Common and contain-
ing the public library, to which Mrs. Flint also gave
flOOO. The hall contains memorial tablets to the
honor of the deceased soldiers and sailors of the town,
and the library comprises a well-selected collection of
books. The building was dedicated October 21,
1875.
Benjamin Upton, also a descendant of the early
settlers, was another citizen of .iterling intelligence
and worth whose name should be noted here.
The town takes an honest pride in its schools, and '
has voluntarily established and maintained a High
School, although not required to do so by the stat-
utes.
During the school year ending in 1880, the amount
raised by ta.xes for the support of schools, including
expenditures for all school purposes, was $2335, the
town ranking above the average lor the State in the
percentage of its taxable property applied to the sup-
port of schools.
The churches of the town are the Congregational
and Baptist.
The Congregational Church was the original church
of the parish, and its first meeting-house was built in
1717, as we have noted. This stood upon the Com-
mon until 1752, when the second church edifice took
its place. The third building was erected in 1829,
and was occupied until 1836, when a division occurred
in the parish, resuhing in certain members, who held
Universalist views, retaining the old building, and
the others erected in that year the church which is
still in u.se.
The old building became the present town-hall, al-
though religious services are occasionally held in it.
The Baptist .Society was organized in 1817. It en-
countered the usual opposition at that time mani-
fested toward those who held the doctrines of that
church. It gradually grew in strength, however, and
in 1828 erected a church building. The first pastor
was Rev. .1. M. Driver, who has been followed by
many others. The present church edifice was built
after the destruction of the former one by fire in 1860.
The manufacturing and mechanical industries of
the town are unimportant. Clas.sed as such in the
State Census of ISS-i are fourteen establishments,
having an invested capital of >''j2,760. The value of
goods made in that year was •'Sl05,997. The agricul-
tural products amounted to S103,269; the value of
farm property being 8483,943, of which $241,706 was
the value of agricultural land. The town is located
about four miles north of the central village of Read-
ing, with which it is connected by a stage line, run-
ning from the station upon the main line of the Bos-
ton and Maine Railroad. The Salem and Lowell
Railroad runs directly through the town. The pres-
ent population is about 850.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
CH.\RLES F. FLIXT.'
t)ne of the names that North Reading will ever
hold in grateful and honorable remembrance is that
of Charles F. Flint. Born of one of the old families
of the town, he loved its woods and streams, its lakes
and hills, and the people among whom he was nur-
tured, with uo common atl'ectiou.
> By Chester W. Eaton.
^' //^ ../
BEDFORD.
811
Charles Frederick Flint was the son of Peter and
Mary Flint, and traced his descent through captains
and deacons of the earlier days from .'^ergeant (ieorge
Flint, one of the leading citizens and pioneers of the
North Precinct of ancient Reading. Mr. Flint was
born at the old homestead of the fiiniily, in what is
now North Reading, January 18, 1S08, and obtained
his mental acqui.-iitions and training mostly in the
district schools of his native town.
By labor on the home acres, and under good influ-
ences, there developed in the young farmer a robust,
moral character, as well as strong physical health,
and a worthy ambition to mingle with busy men in
the great world, and do a man's part in his day and
generation.
He early became prominent in the artairs of his
town, where his influence was felt as that of a pro-
gressive, liberal and sagacious citizen. In occupa-
tion a farmer, he was noted fur his unwe:iried indus-
try and sound judgment, and favored with ample
returns. His restless mind, however, sought for larger
exercise than was afforded by the simple activities of
his native village, and found scope in real estate and
railroad enterprises in .Middlesex and Essex Counties,
and was especially interested in working for the suc-
cess of the iSalem and Lowell Railroad, which was
laid out through the town of North Reading. Com-
ing to the assistance of this enterprise when it greatly
needed help, he worked for it with all his energies
and all his means, and had at last the satisfaction ot
seeing the railroad a complete success and established
on a sure foumlaiioii. He was chosen a director of
this Railroad and president of the Company, and w:is
for years an inriuential director of the Wamesit Bank
in Lowell.
He died January l:', ISilS, at the age of sixty years,
after a brief illness, of congestioi; of the brain, result-
ing probably from a fall on the sidewalk in .'^alem.
His loss was deeply lamented in the business circles
in which he had moved, and was especially felt among
the people of North Reading, where his loyal and
generous public spirit had been freqently made mani-
fest to the advantage and improvement of the town of
his birth and his love.
Mr. Flint was married, in 1840, to Harriet N.
Evans, daughter of Thomas and Phebe Evans, of
South Reading. They had no children.
Mrs. Flint, deeply appreciating and sympathizing
with her husband's atfectiou for his native tnwn, and
desiring there should be some enduring memorial of
the same, caused to be erected in 1875 an elegant and
commodious edifice in the centre of North Reading at
a, cost of $20,000, adapted to the holding of town-
meetings, and with convenient apartments fjr the uses
of a public library and municipal officers, and ou.Oc-
tober '21, I87o, she presented the building and a suit-
able lot of land to the town, with fitting ceremonies of
dedication, the Hon. George B. Loring pronouncing
an eloquent oration on the notable occasion. This
building is appropriately known as the " Flint Me-
morial Hall." Mrs. Flint supplemented the noble
gift by the donation of a large and well-chosen selec-
tion of books, forming the nucleus of the present
public library of North Reading.
I Mrs. Flint now resides in Wakefield, and illustrates
the character of a liberal Christian lady by numerous
public and private benefactions.
CHAPTER LXV.
JBEDFORD.
BY ABR.\.\I E.VGLIiH BROWN.
Tlu Pureiit T'uvM -E^irlj GraiiU ■md Btltlemenli—The Tico Brolhtrs—
[li^i.hnr'je uf Ittdtan ClaiiTis — Gurrisoni — Im-orporalinn.
Bedford stands number twenty-five in the fifty-
nine townships thus far incorporated in Middlesex
County. It has a twin mate — Westford. They were
both incorporated by the General Court September
2:5, 1729.
Bedford was taken from Concord and Billerica, but
not until the parent towns had almost reached their
first centennial. It then appears that the early his-
tory of the territory known as Bedford is included
with that of the parental towns. That which may be
designated as the south and west part of the town
was taken from Concord, and the greater par^ of the
north and east w;is from Billerica.
For nearly a century this territory comprised the
outlying districts of Concord and Billerica.
It represents a part of the first inland town of
Massachusetts and includes portions of very early
grants.
A commendable pride prompts every true New
Englander to seek for Puritan descent, and to date
the settlement of his locality from the landing of
those grand worthies. Hence, in considering the
origin of Bedford, it may be admissible to repeat a
few familiar facts of history, with their dates.
The Pilgrim^ landed in the year 1620. The charter
of Massachusetts was granted in 1629, by King
Charles I. In 1630 came Winthrop and Dudley with
fifteen hundred passengers. September 2, 1635. Mus-
ketaquid (Concord) was granted to Mr. Buckley
(Rev. Peter Buckley) and Merchant (Major
Simon Willard), with other families.
November, 1637, the Court made grants to Gov-
ernor Winthrop and the deputy, Mr. Dudley. In the
following spring the grants were located, the original
having been somewhat enlarged.
In June, 1641, '' Shawshin is granted to Cambridge,
p'vided they make it a village."
The town of Bedford comprises a portion of the
Musketaquid grant, the whole of the Winthrop and
a portion of the Shawahine grant.
812
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
The first house occupied by English, within the
present limits of Bedford, alluded to in a report made
in 1642 as the "Shawshin house," proves that the
first settlement was made here within twenty-two
years after the landing of the Pilgrims.
The nature of the land included in the above
named grants is seen in reports and descriptions made
about that time. Hubbard describes the Concord
settlement as " right up in the woods," and Johnson
as " in desert depths where wolves and bears abide,"
and the journey to it he describes as " through watery
swamps, through thickets where the hands were forced
to make a way for the bodyes passage, and their
feete clambering over the crossed trees, which when
they missed, they sunk into an uncertaiue bottome in
water, and wade up to their knees, tumbling, some-
times higher and sometimes lower."
Of the grants made to the Governor and deputy
(lieutenant), the whole of the former is included in
the present limits of Bedford. Its western boundary
being Concord River. The grants were located
1638, May 2d, as follows :
" It was ordered by the p'sent Court that Johu Win-
thrope, Esq', the p'sent Governo', shall have 1200
acres of land whereof, 1000 was formerly granted
him. & Thomas Dudley, Esq', the Deputy Governo',
has 1000 acres granted to him by a former Courie,
both of them about 6 miles from Concord, north-
wards ; the said Governo' to have his 1200 acres on
the southerly side of two great stones standing neare
together, close by the ryver side that comes from Con-
cord."
The deputy's was north of it within the present
limits of Billerica. VVinthrop has given us an ac-
count of the location of these farms in his journal.
" Going down the river about four miles, they
made choice of a place for one thousand acres for
each of them. They otTered each other the fiist
choice, but because the deputy's was first granted,
and himself had store of land already, the Governor
yielded him the first choice. So, at the place where
the deputy's land was to begin there were two great
stones which they called the Two Brothers in re-
membrance that they were brothers by their chil-
drens marriage and did so brotherly agree, and for
that a little creek near those stones was to part their
lands."
k little later the Court added two hundred acres to
the Governor's part, and still later he received an
additional portion of sixty acres of meadow " within
a mile or two of his farme, beneath Concord, towards
the southeast of the said farme."
In 1636 Matthew Cradock expressed a desire to
obtain a grant of two thousand acres " at a place
called Shawe Shy nn," and in 1637, August, " Capt.
Jeanison & Leift. Willi: Spencer were appointed to
viewe Shawshin & to consider whether it be fit for a
plantation." The report was not made, however,
until after it had been granted to Cambridge. The
explorer's experience is thus described by Sewall as
taken from Woburn records: "As they were engaged
Nov. 9, 164U, shortly after their appointment, in ex-
ploring the land about the Shawshin river they
were overtaken and lost in a snow-storm, and in
this sad dilemma they were forced as night ap-
proached, for want of a better shelter, to lye under the
Rockes, whilst the Raine and snow did bediew their
Rockye beds." The following is the report of the
committee, which is not as valuable for accuracy as
it is helpful, in locating the .Shawshine house :
" Wee, whose Dames are underwritteu, beiiiR appoinleil to viewe
Sbawsbin A: to take notice of what fitness it was fur a village S: accoitl-
ingly to o' apprehensions make retiirne to the Ct ; wee therefore inuiii-
fest thus much : that for the >|UHntity it is suiticient, but fur the quality
in o» iLpprbeusiooa no way fit, the upliind iteini: ver)' barren i very little
inedovv there about, nor any good timber aliniwt fit for any use. Wee
went after we came to Shawshin house, by estimation. Some 14 tu \G
miles at the least, in compass ; from Shawshin lu«ii«e wee begun to no
Jowne the ryver 4 or o miles near East ; then we left that point A went
tieere upon north, came to Concotd R.\ ver, a little beluwe the falle,
about one mile or neare ; then wee went up the rj-ver some .5 miles
iintiU wee came to a place called the Two Brethren : and frouitlience it
is about two mites,!' ^ ., to Shawshin, X' the most ] art of all liie good
laud is given out already ; more land there is at the ^oiilh side of the
house, between the side of l.'oncord line A the liende of Caiiihridpe hue,
but littell medow, .t the upland of little worth : X and this is what we
•-'an say bearin.
" S^.MOs WiLL.^nn.
"En\v<* t'n.vvElls.''
The signers of the report were not the ones ap-
pointed for this exploration by the Courtin 1()37, but
the former, Willard was a prominent inhabitant of
Concord and Convers was of Woburn, iiiid as r.uch
may have had an eye to this territory for their own
advantage and hence were unconsciously influenced
in making their report, which is not an accurate de-
scription of the land. After receiving the report of
che exploring committee the General Court renewed
the grant to Catnbridge and specified the bounds:
■' All the land lying upon Shaweshin Ryver k between
that and Concord Ryver, and between that & Merri-
mack Ryver, not formerly granted by this Co't."
May 9, 1644. the Court " ordered that the ryver at
Shawshin shall be called by the name of Shawshin."'
By a vote of January 2, 1654, a second division of
land was made in Concord. '' It was voted to divide
the town into three parts or quarters ;" as the east
quarter, in part, fell to Bedford, it is to that division
that we confine our investigation. The report of the
committee to make the division is as follows: "The
east quarter by their familyes are from Henry Far-
weles all eastwards with Thomas Brookes, Ensign
Wheeler, Robert Meriam, George Meriam, John
Adames, Richard Rice."
In 1663 the town voted "that every man that hath
not his proportion of lands laid out too him, that is
due to him, shall gitt it laid out by an artis " before
> The spelliug of this as of many proper names of early coKinial days
is variable. Shattiick, iu bis history of 1S33, seems to prefer •' Shaw-
theen." Walcott in his recent work, " Concord in the Colonial Period,"
accepts Shawshine as the more apprived. - Tn follow ing his good judg.
ment we use the latter form.
BEDFORD.
813
1665; "and that each one should give to the town
clerk a description of their lands." Mr. Shattuek's
table, made from the records, is helpful in showing
some of the divisions that fall to Bedford: William
Hartwell had 241 acres; John Hartwell, 17; Wm.
Taylor, 117; Joseph Wheeler, 357; Caleb Brooks.
150 ; Thos. Pellet and Joseph Dean, 280 ; Eliphalet
Fox, 106 ; others are indicated as being in the east
rjuarter, but are omitted, as there is no reasonable cer-
tainty of their exact location. Each quarter had the
care of its own highways and had a board of overseer-
to look after its interests. Mr Shattucksays: "Regu-
lations "ere establishetl in each quarter, similar to
those in wards of a city. Each chose its own otBcers.
kept its own records, made its own taxes," etc. The
first overseers for the east quarter were Ensign
Wheeler and William Hartwell (without doubt Wil-
liam I.).
The Governor Winthrop grant remained intact,
and probably unoccupied until 1664, when it wa>
sold by Fitz John Winthrop to Job Lane for £230.
Mr. Lane was distinguished as an "artificer" and a
" house Wright." He paid for the NVinthrop farm by
erecting a mansion for Fitz John Winthrop at Nor-
wich, Connecticut, and he built one of the college
buildings at Cambridge. His skill and reputation
are acknowledged in being selected ^s an "able :in(i
honest artificer for erecting a bridge over Billerica
River." The contract made .January 11, lti67, shows
that he was lu receive for the work "seven score anil
five pounds starling;' "ten in cash, ten in wheal,
ten in malt, and the remainder in corn and cattle."
The discharge of obligations, of importance like the
two cited above, by the use of barter, suggests the
state of the currency at that time. The conveyance
of the Winthrop farm is made on vellum, now in the
[)ossessiou of the heirs of Mary Lane Cutler ; the deed
is in an excellent state of preservation, and after hav-
ing lain in folds 225 years and changed custodians
many times, can be read with comparative ease. It
begins as follows :
" This indenture, made the second day of August,
in the year of our Lord, one thousand six hundred
and sixty & four, in the sixteenth year of the reign ol
y' Sovereign Lord Charles the Second, by the grace
of Ood, of England, Scotland, France and Ireland,
King and defender of the faith. To wit: Between
Fitz John Winthrop, of Xew London, in the Colony
of Connecticut, in New England, Esq., on the one
part, and .lob Lane, of Maiden, in the County of Mid-
dlesex, in New England, carpenter, on the other part."
The purchaser of the Winthrop farm was from
Rickmansworth, in Hertfordshire, England, where he
inherited property from which he received an annual
income that he bequeathed to his son John.
Job Lane built a house very -soon after he came in
possession of the farm, 1664. The Hiram Button
house is supposed to mark the spot, if it is not in part
the original house. It was the only house in Biller-
ica south of Ralph Hill's at the time of King Philip's
War. Job Lane went to Maiden some years before
his death, which occurred in 1697. and established a
home. He gave by will, the Winthrop farm to three
of his heirs. They agreed to a division of the farm,
which was found, by survey, in 1706, to contain 1500
acres. Each had a portion of upland, meadow and
woodland, and many of the odd-shaped lots of land
of to-day are the result of that division. Capt. John
Lane had 750 acres, Samuel Fitch had 375 and Mat-
thew Whipple had 375. The former, Capt. John
Lane, was son of Job; Fitch and Whipple were
grandsons, who represented deceased daughters of
.lob Lane.'
There is no evidence that Whipple settled on his
portion, but the others did, and some of the lots are
held, in 1890, by their descendants, (the sixth genera-
tion).
The Shawshine grant included all of the remaining
land that was set otf to Bedford at the incorporation.
Two small accessions were made later. It does not
appear that Cambridge took action towards the settle-
i ment of Shawshine until .^pril 0, 1648. Only those
grants known to be in Bedford are mentioned here.
<>ookin (Gooking), had .500 acres ; it comprised the
northeast section of the present town of Bedford. The
grantee was Capt. Daniel Gookiu, and wai thus pub-
licly recognized as a valuable servant of the Colony.
He was a faithful friend of the natives and a co-
worker with the Apostle Eliot, and had a great influ-
ence with the Wamesit Indians. His name appears
as Magistrate in 1684, before whom depositions were
taken in regard to the Musketaquid purchSSe of
1636. Rev. Joseph Mitchell had .500 acres. This was
all purchased by Michael Bacon, in July, 1682, for
£200. Nathaniel Page bought a grant of Grimes, in
1687. It contained 500 acres. Edward (DaLes had a
grant of 300 acres, extending from the Page land
southward to "Concord Old Line." Thomas Oakes
had 150 acres, extending from the Bacon purchase to
Winthrop farm on the west. The Bedford Springs
covers this grant.
"The great meadows," east of the Poor Farm, in-
cluding sixty acres, constituted the last grant to Gover-
nor Winthrop. With the exception of the Winthrop
meadows, all of the land remaining between Thomas
<)akes, (Bedford Spring-) and " Concord Old Line,"
bounded on the east by Page and Edward Oakes, and
on the west by the Winthrop Farm, was known until
1708 as Billerica Commons, (the squadron sout^ of
Oakes farm) Bedford Village is included in this.
Dr. Page, in his " History of Cambridge," has the
following: "Michael Bacon, of Woburn, bought of
Rotlger Shaw a fami in the northwesterly part of
Cambridge (nc^w Bedford), including all the meadows
adjoining to the great .swamp near the east corner of
I The Iaw uf Mnwachusetta i^ve to the oldest sod a doable portion of a
{tareut'd eutate, which ruuj uccuiint Tor the uoe^iual dtvuioti.
814
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Concord bounds that falls to Cambridge. The Shaw-
shine River runs from this swamp."
This must have been a second purchase of land
in this town- by Mr. Bacon. There still remains about
700 acres of the Shawshine grant within the limits of
Bedford, the section east of the Page purchase and
the Rev. Joseph Mitchell grant. This must include
some minor grants, among which, doubtless, is that
of thirty acres to John Wilson, in 1685, " for encour-
agement towards his corn-mill.'' The Billerica Com-
mon lands or " Squadron South of Oakes farme," be-
fore mentioned as including the village of Bedford,
containing 600 acres, was divided in 1708. The al-
lotment, according to Hazen's Billerica, was as
follows : " It is agreed that Lt. John Stearns should
attend the laying out of the lots as fast as might be,
aud to carry the hind end of the chain, [onti/ as to his
own) and Daniel Hill or Henry Jefts to carry the
ch&in for said Stearns's lot."
" The first lot was granted to Lieutenant Samuel
Hill including seventy-six acres bounded two hun-
dred and forty rods on Concord, and sixty-four rods
on Winthrop Farm. The main street in Bedford wsm
afterwards located on the north line of this lot, aud
the ' old line ' of Concord is now to be traced sixty-
four rods south of that street and parallel with
it." ' The second lot of twenty-three acres was
Fassett's, " Patrick Fassett's," and became the prop-
erty of Israel Putnam, as did the third, granted to
Joseph Hill. The two included fiftv acres. The
fourth lot was ninety-one acres, laid out to Jonathan
Hill, next to Oakes Farm ; and others following
southerly were Nathaniel Hill, Joseph Farley, Daniel
Hill, John Stearns, Henry Jefts, .fohn Parker and
Job Lane, the last reaching Mr. Page's farm.
Indian Claim.s — Having obtained the Kiiglish
right to the territory the pioneers had an obligation
to their predecessors, the Indians, to discharge; this
may be regarded by some as only the demands of the
moral law, yet it has been gratifying to ail subse-
quent generations that it was faithfully discharged
and of benefit to those who participated as it doubt-
less prevented much anxiety and bloodshed.
The disease that had visited the Indians j)revious
to the coming of the Pilgrims, had reduced them in
New England from more than 18,000 warriors to about
as many hundred. Of the five tribes that were locat-
ed south of New Hampshire, the Massachusetts oc-
cupied the territory north of Charles River and west
of Massachusetts Bay, and was supposed to number
about 300. They were divided into villages of which
Musketaquid was one. Its limits were designated
by the act of the General Court juissed .'September l',
1635 : " It is ordered that there shall be a plantacon
alt Musketequid, A that there shall be 6 niyles of
1 This is practically currect, yet ft divergence wmthwepterly beKiuniog
a little west of the TriDltariaii nieetinghonse. la thoiiglit by C. W. Jenks,
u careful Btuilent of early UniDdH, to estitliligh the "old line" somewhat
difforoDt, in that vicioity of the tuwu.
'■ land square to belong to it." It embraced about two-
fifths of the present town of Bedford, besides Concord
and other lands. Of this tract of wilderness they ob-
tained a quit claim from the natives in the following
, year. According to depositions taken in 1684 it
appears that the deed from the natives was executed
by Squaw Sachem a widow, who represented her late
husband, Nanepashemet, Wappacowet, next in power
to the King, who had claimed the widowed Sachem
in marriage, and by others of the tribe. The Indian
title according to deponents was given in considera-
tion of " Wompompeag, Hatchetts, Hows, Knives,
Cotton Cloath & shirts with a new suit of cotton
cloath, a linnin band, a hat, shoes, stockins and a
great ( 'oat " for the new husband of squaw Sachem,
he was " the pow wow, priest, witcli, sorcerer or chir-
' urgeou " of the tribe. When considered in the light
of the present, the compensation was trifling, but it
i satisfied the natives and the treaty of purchase secur-
; ed frieiuUy relations.
The Indian settlement of the Shawshine Grant was
known as Wamesit or Weymesit, situated between
the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, being a favorable
location for securing sufficient food. There is but
1 slight evidence that the Bedford portion was fre-
quented liy the Indians of any village, although it is
probable lliat the broad open plains were annually
burnt over and rudely cultivated, while the birchen
canoe of the red man plied up and down the Sdaw-
shine and Concord. The long mound or breastwork
now seen on the east shore of the Concord River, in
' rreenwood'.i ( trove near Bedford line, is suggestive of
Indian origin and may have been built to aid in hunt-
ing.
All of the aboriginal claims to the Shawshine grant
were extinguished by the " Wamesick Purchase of
IG^.'i." Thus the entire territory of Bedford was
honorably obtained from the natives.
Billerica had thousaml.s of acres of common grounds
that were apportioned at different times among the
early settlers. Those who had come later bought of
the grantees and settled in the outlying district (now
Bedford). They had not shared in the allotments,
while they had paid their proportion of the charges.
They petitioned the General Court, and on Friday,
November 16, 1705, it was ordered "That Capt.
John Lane, Jonathan Bacon, John Wilson and other,
the Petitioners that are Freeholders & Inhabitants of
the sd. Town of Billerica, be Intitled to & have a
proportionable fhare with other the Commoners
Proprietors, & Inhabitants of the sd. Town in all fu-
ture Divisions of all undivided and waste Lands be-
longing to the sd. Town, according to their Propor-
tion to the Town charges for the space of seven years
past." The town in 1707-8, January 29, granted to
the purchasers of Cambridge Church Farm a ten-
acre right " to promote and maintain pests and quiet-
ness among us." Captain Lane and others who thus
secured a right, received their portion in the subse-
BEDFORD.
815
I
quent divisions of the common grounds. Their por- j Michael Bacon, who purchased the Mitchell grant
tions seem to have been west of Concord River. | must have been located on the estate before he be-
\n accession was made to the town on the extreme i came the possessor, as births of his children are re-
corded as eariy as lt)71. and if the first mil' was built
bv him he must have been there before 1663, and
then or verj- soon had neighbors as appears from the
following record in Billerica, showing the assignment
of families to garrison (" No. 10 ").
"13 6". •-■. {Kin).
" .\t a publick Towne Jleetio? —
*' The Towne, cousidering the providence of God at the p^sent calliog
us to lav »[-ido our ordinary occations in providing for uur creatures and
.t.i take special cure lor the p'serving of our lives .ind the lires of our
wives and children, the enemy heiui near .ind the warnings by gods
providence upon our neigbbora beios: very solemne and awtull, do there-
fore order \- agree joyntly to [I'pure a place of iafuty for women and
' hildren. and that all |«.'isons and trains shall atlend y" said worke
onrill it be flnished ; and .iccouni ol y' wholl charge being kept it shnll
be eriually divided upon the inhabitants with other To« ne charges."
\t a meeting of the selectmen and a committee of
the militia, held " 14. 8m. 167.3," a list of garrison-
shine which in itself furnished power for industry. I |,oujes is reported, in which is the following:
There are traces of ruads long since discontinued, i " xUu, Timothy Brookes house is allowed for garri-
Depressions on the surface of nejrlected tields uear , ^^^ j. ^^ entertain Michael B.icon's family, & to have
which may still be seen the purple lilac and the j j^^.g garrison soldiers to defend y' mill & himself y'
thorny pear. ' master of the garrison. (Timothy Brooks bought of
The Oeneral Court ordered in liiu5 that no new | (;;eorge Farley a part of the Oakes Grant in 1673)."
buildings should be erected more than half a mile | [„ tijg assignment of families to garrisons the
from the meeting-house "e-"icept iuillliou>e and i^gggrjig s,ijo„ tij^t "Also, Job Lai ne was allowed to for-
farm-house of such as had their dwelling-house i jjfy j,i^ r),vn owne house, and to have two soldiers for
in some town." This wa.s a precaution against the j ^rarrison-men to defend his house, in case y' country
northwest by which a small tract of the Dudley
Grant was obtained. This was the Edward Stearns
farm, set ofl'from Billerica in 17tj6. By this addition
the historic and enduring landmarks, "Two Broth-
era," or " Brother Rocks '' were secured to Bedford.
Evidence does not favor the supposition that the
original grantees of Shawshiue territory established
homes or began the .settlements included in this town
and perhaps never viewed their landed possessions.
'■ E-\tensive meadows bordering on rivers and lying
adjacent to upland plains have ever been favorite
spots to new settlers." .\ topographical survey shows
that this territory- offered attractions to settlers, and
there is unmistakable local evidence that early settlers
pushed out from the villages as soon as it was pru-
dent and established homes near the winding Shaw-
Indiana and lasted about eight years. Thi.s leads to
the conclusion that the settlements iu Bedford terri-
tory, previuus to 164'. were confined to the Shawshine
house. The "Corne mille" with its adjacent liuild-
ings, antedates King Philips war (1676), and accord-
ing to Billerica records the Bacmi, afterwards Fitch mill
was located before li'>6.>. It is meiition>-d thus : " 16 :
1 : ri:{. Will' Tay it George farley are .Vpnynted to
Lay uut a highway Iroiii the Towne, leading to Mr'.
Mitchell's farmc, and to y' land y' was Lay' out for
Mr'. Edward Oaks' fariue. on y south Kast i-nd of Mr.
Winthroii's great meadow, to be layd out four polls
wide.''
The Shawshine House was mie of the Indian truck-
ing houses which preceded the lirst settlements of
New England, where the natives bartered furs, etc.,
for English merchandise. And as appears by the
report of the exploring committee was within the
present limits of Bedford and possibly the Kenriik
dwelling marks the .site. The records of Billerica
furnish evidence that it was occupied by a family, as
Hannah, infant daughter of Henry JefU dietl " y'
first weeke of May, 160.3." This is the earliest event
could spare them.''
The settlements increased so that in 172.S an effort
was made to secure the formation of a new town.
Following the custom in forming a new township, pe-
titions were made to the inhabitants of Billerica, by
the settlers on that side of the proposed township, and
to Concord by the .settlers on the Concord side. The
petitions were substantially as follows :
•' To the gentlemen, the Selectmen and other iuliabitants of '"oncord.
in Lawful meeting assembled : the petition of sundry of the inhab-
itants of the northeasterly part of the town of Concord humbly
.ihoweth : That we, your humble petitioners, having, in conjunction
with the southerly part of ItiUerica, not without go<id .idvlce, and,
we hope, upon religious principles, aseembled in the winter paat, and
-upponed the preaching of Iho gospel among ua, cheerfully paying in
the iiicantime onr proportion to the ministry in our towni, have very
unanimously agreed to address our respective towns, to dismiss us and
«et us otf to l>e a distinct township or district, if the Great and Gen-
eral Court or aasembly shall favor such our constitution.
" We, therefore, the subsbcriber* hereunto, and your humble peti-
tioners, do tirst apply to you to lead us and set na forward in so good
.1 work, which, we trust, may Iw ranch for the glory of Christ and the
^pintunfc beuetit of ourselves and onr poatenty. Our distance from
your place of worship is s.) great that we labor under insupportable
■ lilTlciilties in attending constantly there, aa we desire to do. In the .
extreme ditticnlt seasons of heat and cold we were ready to say of
the Sabbath : ' Behold what a wearinesa is it.' The extraordinary ex-
noted in Billerica Records. The first birth recorded 1 P^nse. we are at.n transporting and refreshing ourselves and families
on the Sabbath luia added to our burlens. This we have endured from
was that of Samuel, son of (ieorge Farley, (March,
16.')4). The former, Henry .lefts, may be the sime
person who has been shown as having a portion of
the common lauds in 1708. and the surname of the
latter, Farley, we have seen in connection with a por-
tion of the same land.
vear to year with .v much patience .aa the nature of the case would
hear, but our increasing numliera now seem to plead an exemption;
and ;is it is in your power, so we hojie it will t>e in your grace to relieve
us. I ieiillemen, if uur seeking to draw off proceeiled from any disaffec-
tion to our present Itev. P.'utor, or the Chnstiau Society with whom we
have taken such sweet counsel together and walked unto the honaa of
God in company, thou hear 11s not to-.lay. But wo greatly desire, if God
816
HISTORY OF MIDDLRSEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
plMM, tobe eased of oar burdens OD the sabbacb, the travel and fatigue granted the risht to straighten the line between Lex-
thereof, that ths word of tjod luay be nigh to US. near to our houses and ■ , i r. i z' i i .1 i ^. . .1
J . .. . J , .„ .. , , ,, . inerton and Bedford, and the latter town then acquir-
in ourhearta, that we and our little ones tuHv berve the Lord, \\ebope ° t « v .^ . ux.vju.i
that God, who atirrwl up the spirit of Cyrus to set forward temple work, ed the dismal tiact known as "Farley Hole.' In
ha. Ktlrred uB up to ask, and wi.i stirr you up to grant the prayer of uur . I7ij(> Ebenezer Page's land was joined to Bedford ; this
petition, 90 shall your humble petitiouera ever pray, ;is in duty bound, ,„ 1 * , - 1 . ,l i- ii'i r^ ■
■^ ,. '^ was.done to straighteu the line. \V hen one. Grimes.
I petitioned to have hii land set oft' to Lexington the
The petition had seveuteen signatures, all from the j town voted in the negative, and also placed upon re-
Concord aide. As many more petitioned from the ! cord their willingness "to refer it to the wise and-ju-
Billerica side to their town. Concord granted her j dicious determination of His Excellency, the Gover-
consent without objection, but Billerica clung to her ! nor_ r^„^i the Honorable Court."
outlying acres with more tenacity. This may be ac- [ The forming of a new town occasioned expenses for
counted for by the fact that .she was being shorn ol ,vhich monev was needed, and land was called for on
lauds in other directions, and this new proposition, il | „.hich to erect the meeting-house and for other pur-
I poses. These needs had been anticipated as appears
by the records :
Bedford, January the iu'ti, 1730.
successful, was to take some of her most valuable citi
zens. Their remonstrance did not avail at the Court,
and the Act of Incorporation was passed September
23, 1729.
CHAPTER LXVI.
BEDFORD.— { Contitnud).
.Vuine — Boniuinritt — Beneioltm e — Rei-orria — First _l/c tiu'i-houi'e antl Mm
inter — Churches Fov)nti1 — To-iti — iwme Old Fumiliea an'l 5(/f".
'"Tliid id tUe account uf the uiuDey aDil lanu thai naa given to
incouragemcnt for the Town in the year 1729." ' Mr. Joseph Dean, Dea.
Israel Putnam. Mr. Josiah Fiistiett, Mr. John Whipple, Mr. Benjamin
Colburn, Mr. Samuel Men iaui each gave land, and the lulluwing men
are credited with gifts of money : Mr. .lauieu Lane, Cornet Nathaniel
Page, Lieut. .lob Lane, Mr. John Ljue, Dea. Nathaniel Merriam, Mr.
Job Lune, Mr. Joseph Bacon, 3lr. .John Hnrtwell, Mr. Jouathan Bacon.
Mr John t'itcli and .Mr. John Whituioie, of Medford." 'The wife vt'
Xaihaiiiel W hittecor, uf Coiiconl, gave fivt* jHiumls, old tenor.' '*
With the records of the town-meetiog of January
the 7'\ 17:*0-3O, appears the following :
" Mr. William Hnrtwell -ji\e tlve |»oui(dB and it waa delivered to the
f*electmen. and jn shillings tif ir went to pay .Mr. i 'liver Whilniure for
Right ID ilee.i.H and acknuhgiii of tlieiit hefor him. for the law Boak,
two pound ; foi i'>\\u hoak, im ahilmga, and the money Keiuaining is
one pound, eiglit Bhiling and iwu peut.t; in tht- hand of Mr Natbauiel
Merium. The law luok »«-* nrdered to he pawed about according to the
judgmeut of the -t-lfctnieu. With a eufticieiit tract of land and tGl in
the treasury the>e determined people began the work of building up
Why the petitioners prayed to have the new town
called Bedford, is chiefly a conjerture ; but we seem
to see in it an act of ^ever^nce for the memory of the
first minister of Concord, who was from Bedfordshire,
England. The pait which he had taken in moulding
the characterof the early settler*;, must have had an in-
fluence on the aupceedioggeneraiiona, as the language ' 'I'f' »«"'> lucorjKjrnted to«ii
of the petitioners for the new town .-^eems to imply, j '^^^^ records of the town open with the following:
The session of the General Court, which granted the ! '■^" ^■'"""-'' >ti'tt"'i"^r ji;, it."... wtou that M'. .K-uaiban Bacon, a
- . . u I 1 * n L • . 1 1 : principal Inliahiiauc of the Town ..f B'-dKud, bee and herebv is fiillv
act of incorporation, was held at CambrnJere, and be- i i..., .. . • , • i,: . ■ . ,,., ^- \ ,t^ .■'.... '
^ * o f ' "^ ] Inipowt-reil and Directed tip .ifr^eiiible the hrMehulDers and other Inhabi-
gaU August 28, 17:*9. The new town was vested with i taucf the Town toconxeut- asao..D ,« nmy be to electand chouse Town
all the "powers, privilegei* and immunities that the \ «'*ii;«?"t"Staua untill the ne.\t auniv«nwry met^tiug m March
inhabitants of any of the towns of this province are or
ought by law to be vested with : provided that the
said town of Bedford do, within the space of three
years from the publication of this act, erect, build
and finish, a suitable house for the public worship ol
God. and procure and settle a learned orthodox miiiis-
terofgood conversation; and make provision for his-
comfortable and honorable support, and likewise pro-
vide a school to instruct their youth in writing and
reading."
By subsequent divisions Lincoln and Carlisle were
taken from Concord, and Burlington from Woburn.
so that Bedford is bounded at present on the north
and northeast by Billerica, east by Burlington, south-
east by Lexington, south by Lincoln, southwest and
west by Concord, and northwest by Carlisle with Con-
cord River as a division between Bedford and westerly
towns. "The newe towne " known as " Xewtowne,'
1631; "Cambridge," 1638, and "Lexington,"' 171o,
cornered upon Bedford, and lafer gave up a small por-
tion to her. In the records of March, 17'>S, we s^ee
that Benjamin Farley and Joseph Fassett were
"Sent Down for C'oiicurence,
"J. WiLLARP, ,S«crf/.
" In the House of RepreefUiatived, September: Jtj, 172ft.
"UVINCV, Spkr.
" Read and coiinird.
" Consented to. W . Duminer,
"A true copy — LxuiiuutiJ, J. Willakd. Secru.'*
The officers elected under the above call were :
" .Alodenitor. Jonathan Bacon ; selectmen, ^^ainuel Fitcb, Nathaniel
Merriam, Jouuthau Bavoii, Nathaniel P.<ge and Daniel Davis; town
det k, '■auiuel Filch , coUftJibles, Israel Putnam and Stephen Davis ;
town treasurer, John Fae.6eti ; -iurveyors, Juh Lune and Sauuel Merri-
aui ; lithiiiginen, Daniel <.'heever and Joeiah Faswtt , fence-viewers
obeU .^blwjit and Beujaiiiiii C'olbui n ; Hug Kef.. James Wheeloraud Jon-
athan Bacon: sealei ^if heights and measures, John Lan« ; field "iriv-
el"», Thomas Woollt-y ;tud John \\ hippie.'"
1 The simple stat<>nieul of a uuiue does not iiluutify in some familiee,
hence vitf Uote in this couueciioii that Jonathan Bacon was a son of
^liciiaol purchaser of the Mitchell grant. Saiuuel Fitch was the head
of the laiiiily in town. Nathaoiel Merriam, dea., 17;tO, was first uf the
uumeiou» family in Bedford, w.m de^cendetj from Joseph, of Concord,
who died in I(i4ii. Nathaniel ditnl in 17:W. Nathaniel I'age was the
third of the name in Itedford. I'aniel Davis was stm of Samuel and
Mary (MwliiWK), Uirn, HiT^i. Israel I'litnani, • ousin of lieneral Israel
I'litnaiu, lioriL Uiyii, was deacon, ITOn ; married daughter of Jonatlian
Bacon. Stephen Davis was father of Deacon Stephen^ died 1738. John
Faetiett, treasurer, wad son of i'atrick died IT-lO. It is a coincidence id'
iniorest that his brother Samuel, was first treasurer of Westford (Bed-
fold's tvMU bister).
BEDFORD.
817
The meeting-house was so uearly completed before
the act of incorporation was passed that the first town-
meeting was held in it, and at a second meeting held
seven days later "The town excepted of tiie meting-
house, as the former commety had agreed with Joseph
Fitch, for four hundred and rfixty pounds." Like
the houses of worship of the early settlers of New
England, this otlered but few attractions, save a shel-
ter from the storms ; but the people made haste to
put it in a more attractive condition. At the same
meeting they chose a committee "To seethe meeting-
house parfected and finished," and also "provide a
miuiator." They voted to raise "Forty pound to
mantaiu preachin among us," and provided " for a
Reat of fifteen pound to defray the charges that shall
be or may a Ries in the Town." .\nother action of
the same meeting " was to chous this four men : .Mr.
John Fassett, Mr. Nathaniel Meriani, Co'. Nathaniel
Paige, Mr. Josiah Fassett to tacke dedes of the land
that is for the tow that is given or that is sold." In
January, 1730, it was voted " to lot out the pue
ground and seat the meting hous." The instructions
to the committee were, " The man and his wife to set
iu the pue (excepting deacons), ther shall be but one
poall to an esteat in seating the meting hous and
pues, and they are t(; have respect to them that are
fifty years of age or upward ; thos that are under fifty
years of age are to be seated in the meting hous ac-
ordiug to ther pay. The front foer seat in the gal-
eree to be equal with the third seat below in the body
of seats."
The progressive spirit of these early citizens of this
town is seen in their willingness to allow the sexes
eijual rights in the pews. " Men's stairs" and
" women's stairs '' are often referred to in the records,
but suggest the division among the singers. In the
absence of a tioor-plan the descriptive location of the
pews is as follows: "Stephen Davis' pue is at the East
Eud of the meeting-house, .south of the east door going
to the women's stayers." A committee was soon
chosen to "treat with Mr. Hancok and with Mr. Ru-
gels and Mr. Whiting in order to a fast, and thay
appointed a fast on the 22nd day of January, 1729-
;i()." The ministers of the neighboring towns assem-
bled and held a " fast," and a call was soon extended
to a young man who had been preaching for the peo-
ple. " Mr. Bowes was choas to be our minister."
The town agreed to give him "' ninety-five pounds the
first year, an hundred pounds the second year, and so
on annually : to give him five and twenty cords of
wood yearly ; that the money be all waye.« in propor-
tion to its present valuation and credit which is at
eighteen shillings per ounce, that his salary be paid
every half year." Mr. Bowes also had £200 as a set-
tlement fee, which was partly paid by a deed of six-
teen acres of land, at £8 per acre. Rev. Nicholas
Bowes was ordained as the first minister of Bedford,
July Id, 1730, and the church was organized on the
same day. Rev. John Hancock, of Lexington (father-
in-law of Mr. Bowes), was moderator of the council.
Rev. Mr. Appleton, of Cambridge had a part in the
service.
Some time before the church was organized "the
Brethren had met and proposed to form themselves
into a state of church relation. They had voted that
a person on entering the church should give in writ-
ing a confession of his faith which should be read in
public. There were twenty-four foundation members.
The foundation covenant was purely evangelical in
spirit and the government was strictly of the Congre-
gational order. The parent towns had equal repre-
sentation in the new church.
August 4, 1730, Israel Putnam and Nathaniel Mer-
riam were chosen deacons, and on the first Sabbath
of September following, the ordinance of the Lord's
Supper was first administered. At the first public
Thanksgiving service on November 12, 1730, a collec-
tion was taken for the use of the church amounting
to £G. "Thj good people of Concord increased the
sum and With the Consent of y° Brethren of y° C'',
The Deacons purchased 1 Table Cloth; 1 Napkin; 2
Dishes; 1 Fiaggon ; 2 Pewter Tankards; 1 Bason."
" Some time after They purchased another Fiaggon
& 2 more Pewter Tankards."
The town of Bedford was now fully organized and
in complete running order, both as a municipality
and an ecclesiastical body, and was early recognized
as such by the Province and neighboring churches.
December 23, 1733, the deacons were chosen to rep-
resent the church at the ordination of Rev. Mr.
Ebenezer Hancock, of Lexington, and in October,
nSd, at the ordination of Rev. Mr. Clapp, of Woburn.
The first recognition from the Province in the way of
a tax was in 17.30, amounting to £20 13s. lit. There
was also assessed the town's proportion of the repre-
sentative tax in 1729, which was £7 19». 9rf., the
minister's salary, the expenses of the ordination of
Rev. Mr. Bowes, the allowance to Joseph Fassett
"for time spent at General Court in perfecting our
township, together with his pocket expenses while
there," and the county tax, making a tax of £188 9s.
The allowance to Jonathan Bacon for his time
spent " in perfecting our township," waa £8 8s. 3d.,
doubtless paid from funds in the treaaury. Such a
drain on the limited income of the early settlers of
Bedford must have been a severe trial of their cour-
age, and especially hard after the town tax of the first
year of their existence aa a municipality. In 1729
they paid "a Meting- hones Reat of £306 Ss. 3d.," and
a " town and minister Reat of £51 15«. -id." There
is no evidence that more than two voters lost courage,
and they were refused an abatement of their proportion
of the tax.
There are but few of the farms of the town that re-
main in the same family possession as at the incorpo-
ration and only two instances where the descent of
possession has not occasioned a change in the surname
818
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS
of the possessor. The estate owned by Josiah Davis
has been in the family and name since 1696, when
purchased by Samuel Davis (son of Dolor), one of the
pioneers of Concord. It has passed through six gen-
erations from Samuel, in each of which there has been
an Eleazer. Thirty-eight children in five generations
of the name of Davis have been born on this estate.
The estate held by the heirs of Cyrus Page was
purchased by Nathaniel Page in 1687. The present
owners are of the eighth generation. The original
dwelling is still standing. Mrs. Sarah Sampson owns
and occupies the estate that came into the family
possession about 1733, she is of the fourth generation
of the family of Zachariah Fitch.
Lands on the Concord side of Bedford are still held
by descendants of William Harlwell, who was
among the pioneers of Concord, and the homestead
was held in the family name and occupied by Hart-
wells continuously for two hundred years. The
present house was erected in 1758.
The homestead of Benjamin Fitch has been held
in the family and name since 1730, and the "corne-
mill" of King Philip's War, on the Shawshine River,
is still identified by modern buildings, but has passed
from the family possession. Job B. Lane owns and
occupies a portion of the Winthrop Farm that was
purchased by Job Lane in 1664 and divided by his
heirs in 1697.
"Stone Croft Farm," owned by Miss Caroline M.
Fitch, came to the family by purchase in 1766. The
dwelling was built about 1700. The mill site, on
Vine Brook, near Shawshine River, was occupied by
John AVilsou as early as 1663.
The site of the first meeting-house is very nearly
identified by the second, which is now standing.
CHAPTER LXVII.
BEDFORD— ( Continued).
ECCLESIASTICAL.
Bclation of Fimt Church and Touii — DimiAsion of Hev. Xicholii^ floirtj —
rirat BeU — SliiiiMtry of Rec. Nuihattifl Bherman aitd Her. Joteph Penni-
iiian.
The ecclesiastical and municipal relations of the
town are so thoroughly interwoven for the first cen-
tury of her history that it is difficult to separate them ;
but as it is our purpose to briefly sketch the town's
history, topically rather than in chronological order,
we shall aim to treat of the social and political rela-
tions separate from spiritual and religious, now that
we have combined the two sufficiently to show the
steps of organization. By the early Provincial laws
every tract of territory, when becoming a town, by
the same act became a parish; hence the town of
Bedford for little more than a century was the parish.
They provided for the support of the Gospel at the
same meetiug in which they made provision for
building and repairing highways.
In our effort to separate the relations we shall class
all that pertained to the house or service of worship
as ecclesiastical.
The first three pastorates of the town were cut short
for obvious reasons. Rev. Nicholas Bowes, the first
pastor, was graduated at Harvard College in 1725,
and ordained July 15, 1730, and was dismissed Au-
gust 22, 1754, after a ministry of twenty-four years.
Mr. Bowes came to the new town of Bedford under
many flattering circumstances. He married Miss
Lucy (Lucie) Hancock, the young and accomplished
daughter of Rev. John Hancock, of Le.xington. Soon
alter locating in Bedford, Mr. Bowes built a residence
on the land deeded him by the town as a part of his
settlement fee. It is now standing, and is u >tately
mansion, reminding one of the superior dignity at-
tached to the pastoral office of that day. Eight chil-
dren were born to Rev. Nicholas and Lucy Bowes
while in this town. William, the oldest, born De-
cember 3, 1734, was baptized four days Inter l)y his
grandfather, Rev. John Hancock. They all lived to
maturity with the exception of Thomas, who died at
the age of two years, eleven months. Of the pautoral
acts of Mr. Bowes but little is known. The church
and town grew and flourished ; liil were admitted to
the church, and there were 303 baptisms. The rite
was administered to ail who owned the covenant and
their children. Confessions were publicly made, but
not carried to so great an extreme as in many New
England churches. Intemperance and Ihett were
frequently confessed. Mr. Bowes, together with nine
other ministers in the vicinity of Cambridge, refused
to admit Rev. George Whitefield to their pulpits in
1745, because of his denunciation of Harvard College
and many New England clergymen. Through some
indiscreet acta the pastor's usefulness was brought to
a close, and satisfactory confession being made, he
was dismissed, and it was voted — " That he be owned
and treated as a brother in good standing and char-
ity." He could not have lost his influence in the
town, as he was employed to teach the school in
the following winter. In 1755 he was chaplain in
the Northern Army, at Fort Edward, and died at
Brookfield on his return home. But little more is
known of his family, save that his daughter Lucy
went to live with her maternal grandmother, the
widow of Rev. John Hancock, and there made the
acquaintance of her grandfather's successor, Rev.
Jonas Clark, of Lexington, and became his wife.
The estate was sold to John Reed, and still remains
in the family. It was near the close of the tirst pas-
torate before the town purchased a bell. In April,
1753, " Voted, to buy a bell not e.xceediug six hun-
dred nor less than five hundred pound weight." They
also "voted to build a house of sufficient height
to hang the mouth of the bell sixteen feet from the
' ground." The " Bell-house" was some rods from the
BEDFORD.
SI 9
meeting-house. Tlie bell Wii.s ready tor use ;U the
time of the dismission of the Krsl minister, and in the
treasurer's accounts of that year, Deacon Israel Put-
nam is charged with an order " for lamb for the
council and hem[) for the bell-rope, ■"> shillings." The
meeting-house was the shrine of these early settlers,
iloubly precious because of their great sacrifice to
erect it, and because of the great ilistance formerly
traveled to re.ich the house of (iod. On .Vpril !), 1731,
they voted "that it should beswept six times a year,"
and Deacon Israel Putnam performed the service for
ten shillings a year. In 1743 the pay was increased to
£1 l")-?., "Old Tenor." and John Mansrteld hired to
sweep it twelve times a year and " attend to opening
and shutting the doors." In 17'i" the young men
were refused the " hind seat in the gallery," and the
pew next to the puliiit stairs was made "' a ministerial
pew."
The town and church concurred in extending a
call to Rev. Xalhaniel .Sherman, ami he was ordained
February 18, Hot), '' having preached twenty-six Sab-
beths, one Fast and one Thanksgiving" during his
candidacy. He was given, as a.settlenieiit fee, £113 63.
fill., and au annual salary of £53 i!.'<. 8'/., and twenty
cords of wood annually, " after he shall come to need
it for his own tiring."
>Ir. Sherman wa.- brother of Roger Sherman, the
ili~tinguished patriot of Connecticut, and endowed
with both talent and culture.. As a young, unmar-
ried man he entered the work of the gospel ministry
in this place. He married Lydia Merriam, March 1,
17");t. She was the daughter of Deacon Nathanial
Merriam, of this town. They had three children
l)orn here, one of whom, Thaddeus, died .Vugnst 22,
ITi'o. Mr. Sherman was a man of feeble health, and
labored under difTiculties. Notwithstanding the oft-
repeated breaks in his labors, his p;istorate w.as re-
::ardcd as very successful — forty-six were admitted to
church and sixty-seven were baptiiied by him. It
was during the ministry of Rev. Mr. Sherman that
Hugh Maxwell, of Bedford, consecrated him.self to
the service of Christ and became the " Christian
Patriot," whose biography, [)ublislied in 1830, is a
most inspiring work.
A controversy arose in the churches of New Eng-
land, about the time of the settlement of Mr. Sher-
man, concerning the " half-way covenant," by which
persons were admitted to the privilege of baptism
without admission to the communion. November 6,
17i).'3, the Bedford church voted " that there should be
but one church covenant." Faith in Christ, repent-
ance for sin, holiness and a belief in the Assembly's
Catechism were required of all candidates.
Some of the changes were unpopular ; the atfectiona
of the people were alienated from the pastor, and the
relations entered upon for lil'e were brought to a close.
Upon the request of the pastor an ecclesiastical
council was called and gave advice in the matter, in
which the town concurred. The record of the
church is : " Upon the request of the Rev. Nathaniel
Sherman, the church then dismissed him as a brother of
the church and recommended him to the Church of
Christ in Mount Cirmel, New Haven." He was in-
stalled there and preached many years. He died at
East Windsor, July 18, 1797, aged seventy-three years.
The dismission of Rev. Mr. Sherman caused not
only the severing of pastoral and social relations, but
family ties were sundered, and the town had no
settled minister for a period of three years, during
which time the church agreed upon the terms of
communion as follows : " This church will have but
one covenant and therefore require the same qualifi-
cations in all ; yet if any person can desire to enter
into covenant and receive baptism for himself or
children, and yet fears to approach the Lord's table at
present, he shall be received, he promising (though he
come not immediately to the Lord's table) that he
will submit to the watch and discipline of the
church."
Rev. Joseph Penniman was the third minister of
the town, ordained May 22, 1771. He received a set-
tlement fee of £133 and an annual salary of £M Vis.
■id., and fire wood.
In planning for the service of ordination the town
voted " that the day should be religiously observed
throughout the town in accordance with the solemnity
of the occasion ;" determined as much as in them lay
to prevent " all Levity, Prophainness, music. Danc-
ing and frolicking and other disorders on "^ Day." .\.
committee of five was chosen " to open the meeting-
house and to keep the seats below the deacons' seat
and town's pew for the church and council." .V new
piistorate was an occasion for advanced steps : 1773
" Voted to bring in Doct. Watt's versions for the
present, and to have Messrs. Jeremiah Fitch and
James Wright sett in the fore seat in the front gallery
as they are appointed to begin the Psalm or tune."
The fluctuation in the currency of the* country
made it necessary for the town to grant relief to their
pastor, and in 1780 the town voted " to grant Rev.
Mr. Penniman one hundred bushels of grane, fifty
of Rye and fifty of Indian Corn." The people mani-
fested their gratitude for a successful termination of
the Revolutionary struggle by repairing their meeting-
house. It was then clap-boarded and covered with a
coating of" Bedford Yellow," a sort of mineral paint
found in the town. The old beli and bell-house were
also repaired. Like the people of the town, they had
seen hard service during the war.
The bell had sounded the alarm on April 19, 1775 ;
rung for liberty when the Colonies declared their inde-
pendence ; pealed forth its notes of rejoicing over the
surrender at Yorktown, and by its cracked tongue
and faltering notes, most fittingly suggested the suffer-
ings of the people during the war, in its final attempt
to swell the volume of thanksgiving, following the
treaty of September 3, 1783. The pastorate of Rev.
Mr. Penniman covered the years of struggle for free-
820
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
dom from the mother country, and was successful in
many respects. Forty-one were added to the church
and one' hundred and eighty -three baptisms are re-
corded during his ministry.
Some of the public acta of Mr. Penniman gave evi-
dence of extreme eccentricity, which increased by
repetition until the church took the following action
July 12, 1793 :
"The church met at Deacon James Wright's and
held a conference with each otlier respecting the un-
christianlike behaviour of their Pastor, Mr. Joseph
Penniman, the last Lord's day, it being communion
day, and every member of said church being grieved
thereat."
The conference resulted at length in the dismission
of Mr. Penniman October 29, 1793. In the light of
the present, it would be declared that strong drink
caused the trouble. Rev. Joseph Penniman was born
in Braintree, and graduated at Harvard College in
17i)j ; after his dismission he removed from Bedford to
Harvard, where he died. He was possessed of re-
spectable talents. Social customs of his time aggra-
vated natural eccentricities and led to extreme pecu-
liarities of expression, particularly in public prayer.
At the funeral service of his townsman. Captain Jon-
athan Wilson, who was killed at Concord, April 19,
1775, he is said to have uttered the following: '' We
pray thee, O Lord, to send the British Soldiers where
they will do some good, for Thou knowest that we
have no use for them about here." When visiting
the school of the town he is said to have used the fol-
lowing expression in prayer: "'We pray thee, O
Lord, that these children may be well trained at home,
for if they are not, they will act like Sarpints when
they are abroad." The act that led the church to
close the doors of the meeting-house against the
pastor brought the town into public reproach. While
the people were seriously considering the circum-
stances .■# rougish fellow placarded the doors of the
meeting-house with the following brief summary of
affairs :
'* A wicked priest, a crooked people,
A cracked bell without a ateeple."
The bill for entertaining the Council at the dis-
mission of Mr. Penniman amounted to £33 Os. -Id. %f.
There were born to Rev. Mr. Penniman and Hannah
Jackson, his wife, while in Bedford, four children,
two of whom died here iind were buried in the old
cemetery. The epitaphs now seen upon the crum-
bling headstones are most suggestive of the peculiar-
ities of the father. They are quoted in this con-
nection :
" December 22, 1790, Hannah, daughter of Kev. Joseph PeDniman
aod UaDoah, bis wife, aged IS yr«., 4 mo8., U days.
'• Ah ! now, no notice do you give
Where you are and how you live !
What I are you then bound by solomn fate.
To keep the secret of your state ?
The alarming voice you will hear.
When Cbriut, the Judge, shall appear.
Hannah ! from the dark lonely vault,
Certainly soon and suddenly you'll come,
AVhen Jesus shall claim the treasure from the tomb.'
' August 21, 1778, MoLLV, aged 3 yni., 6 mo., 3 days.
'' Ah I dear Polly, most your tender parents mourn,
Their heavy loss, and bathe with tears your arn,
Since now no more to us you must return.''
CHAPTER LXVIII.
BEDFORD— { Continued).
ECCLESIASTICAL.
The Cltrgy of .Yew Entjland — 7?*t. Samuel Stearns — Page ntid Hartwell
Fund — Wilt' of Anna Pii<je — Xew Meeling-lioitsf — Simjing-S^hool — &i6-
bath-School.
The clergy of New England, in its early years,
constituted what may be styled an educated aristoc-
racy and to a large degree circumscribed their order
by intermarriage. The common people were so bur-
dened in their struggles with the Indians and with
foreign nations, together with their efforts to subdue
the wilderness and maintain their families, that bat
little time was left them for self-culture. Their edu-
cation was limited and they relied upon the clergy
for much of their moral and religious sentiment.
The fourth minister was Rev. Samuel Stearns and the
last called by the town in its parochial capacity. He
was ordained April 27, 179G. Mr. Stearns was a
grand type of the New England clergy. He was the
son of a minister, and his paternal and maternal an-
cestry were of the clerical profession. He had inher-
ited a truly pious spirit and wa-s possessed of a firm
and decided nature. He was a graduate of Harvard
College and studied theology with Rev. Jonathan
French, of Andover, whose eldest daughter (Abigail)
he married. May 7, 1797, "a lady of rare fortitude,
energy, intelligence and practical wisdom, as well as
piety." For nearly thirty-seven years Rev. Samuel
Stearns was the teacher, leader and undoubted friend
of this entire people, and no one person ever did
more in this town to mould the character of the ris-
ing generation and lead the passing generation "into
green pastures and beside the still waters of eternal
peace." During this ministry so many reforms were
introduced and grand changes made in both secular
and religious affairs that they cannot be hastily
passed by. In preparing for the ordination of the
fourth minister the town voted to take down thecracked
and useless bell, "sell the bell-house at public vendue,
level the ground on the south side of the meeting-
house and prop up the galleries." Interested people
flocked from the neighboring towns; families of two
or three, mounted on the back of one horse, were
seen galloping in from different quarters and the
meeting-house was filled long before the hour ap-
pointed for the service. The Common was covered
with booths in which the venders of food and various
BEDFOKD.
S21
wares carried on a lively business. Rev. Jonathan
French, of Andover, preached the sermon. His te.xt
was Isaiah xl. 1-5. The new pastor bought the
estate occupied by his immediate predecessor in office
and settled in the midst of his people. The large
mansion-house which he occupied during his life and
the surrounding acres are still in the possession of
the family. Mr. Stearns received from the town as a
"settlement" eight hundred and fitly dollars and an
annual salary of three hundred and thirty-three and
one-third dollars and twenry cords of fire-wood.
Through a depreciation in currency the salary was
changed at different times until it reached five hun-
dred dollars per annum. Mr. Stearns also had a loan
from the town of one thousand dollars, without inter-
est, from 1801 till his death. The new minister's
regard for order and system began to make an im-
pression at once, as the church and town records
plainly show. The custom of public confession of
certain sins was abandoned and cases of discipline
were conducted with the best of judgment. There
was one case that kept the church and town in a state
of disturbance for years and involved many import-
ant questions and resulted in cold-blooded murder.
The light of the present has a mitigating effect on the
case, for had the present scientific and humane treat-
ment of incipient insanity been in practice the sad
act might have been averted. Mr. Stearns was pos-
sessed of a fine musical talent, having a rich tenor
voice, which contributed to awaken an interest for
music in the town, particularly in sacred music. In
May, 1798, the town voted " that the four pews in the
front gallery are assigned to the use of the singers."
A tuning-pipe keyed on A was then in use and held
as a valuable piece of the town's property. November
1798, the town appropriated twenty dollars for sing-
ing-school. In 1815 the town's viol was placed in
the hands of Deacon James Wright, " for the purpose
of assisting in taking lead in sacred music." Mr.
Stearns never voted in town affairs, but was conducted
to the place of meeting by the selectmen and began
proceedings with prayer, after which he retired.
September 6, 1812, the town chose a committee " to
receive the donations given to the town by the widow
Anna Page and Mr. William Page, deceased, and to
take care of and apply the use of the same, agreeable
to the wills of the donors." By these wills and that
of Samuel Hartwell, probated in 1822, "The Page
and Hartwell Fund " was created. The following is
the preamble and clause relating to the town in the
will of Anna Page. The others are similar in expres-
sion and provision :
" In the name of liod, .\meD.
" I, Anna Page, widow and relict of Tliomas Page, late of Bedford,
ID the CouDty of Middlesex and ronmioDwealtb of Maaaachusetts, Veo-
mao, deceased. ... I bumbly cooimit and commeud my sonl to God
my Creator, in and througti Jeeoa Christ my Redeemer, whoae righteoua-
DeoB and grace are all my hope for pardon and eternal salvation. My
Body I recommend to a christian burial at the discretion of my Execa.
tor in the blessed hope of a Joyful resurrection at the last day. . . .
" Taking into conaideration the vast importance and necessity of sup-
porting the Gospel miuistry, it is my will that after my Executor shall
have paid alt the foregoing leagacys — all ilebts, bills of cost and
charge of every kind. — all the remainder of my estate of any kiud and
wherever found, be appropriated to that use, and accordingly I do here-
by give and bequeath said remainder tosthe town of Bedford as a fund
to aid in the support of the Gospel miuistry, to be disposed of in the
manner following. That is to say: The capital of the fund shall be put
and always kept on interest, upon good security — with sutticient sureties
for the same. C)ne-3ixth part of the income arising therefrom shall bo
annually lulded to the principal as an increasing fund forever— tlio other
ftve-sixth parts of the annual income to be appropriate<l annually in aid
of the support of the Gospel ministry in the present standing orrler or
congregational order forever, and no part of said fund shall ever be ap-
propriated In aid or support of any utlier timn the present standing
congregational order forever, and no part of the said fund shall ever be ap-
propriated in aid of any suit at law or any contention whatever, atui my
will further is, that three persons, all belonging to the church, shall lie
annually chosen by the town .-u a committee to take care uf the said
fund, and that a Book shall be kept by the town clerk, fur the time
being In which shall be fairly entered this clause in my will and also
the capital of the fund and the annmil income thereof together with the
annual appropriations anil expenditures of said income, to he kept .ipou
for the perusal of all persons therein concerned forever — l)ut my will
further is, that wheneverthe income of the said fund shall be nuire tli.in
sufficient for the support of the Gospel miuistry iu Beilford, the re-
mainder of the income of said fund shall be appropriated to supiiort the
Poor, Teaching Sacred .Music, and the suppijrt of Schools or Public
buildings, and my will further is, the said sum, whatever it may bo
found to be, shall be paid by my Executor to the committee to be chosen for
the above purpose, in two years after my decease, and a true report of the
said fund, with the animal appropriation and expeiuliture thereof, shall
be annually mode to the town by the Committee having the rare of the
same forever, \Vhich report shall be reconled by the town cleik in ttie
Book which is kept by him for that purpose forever.
" Dated, signed and seated, Febniary twenty-third, 1-Slti.
*'.\NNA Paof."
The town being residuary legatee received from the
estate of Anna Page $6(3.3.93. The Samuel Hartwell
legacy was $300, and that from William Page was
-^00. For some years the trustees of these funds
were chosen in town-meeting and the record-book
was kept by the town clerk, but for the last half-cen-
tury the First Parish has appointed the custodians
and the Unitarian Church received the income. The
" Page & Hartwell Fund " (now 1889) amounts to
$2691.78. The church received by the will of Anna
Page a solid silver flagon, costing $140, and by vote
of the chiirch a second flagon was procured at the
same cost. A silver cup was donated by Mrs. Hannah
Merriam. By other donations and purchases tlie
church was now furnished with an elegant solid silver
communion service in place of the pewter dishes thus
far used. Rev. Samuel Stearns was kindly remem-
bered by this trio of public benefactors. The irreg-
ularity of the windows in the meeting-house is sug-
gested by votes like the following : September 3, 1804,
voted, " To allow Mr. Jeremiah Fitch to put a window
in his pew in the northwest corner of the meeting-
house in any part thereof." May 19, 1783, voted,
" To allow Timothy Jones the liberty to put in a glass
window in the meeting-house on the back side of his
pew at his own cost." With the exceptions of such ad-
ditions the people were contented in the old house of
worship, but the great " September gale " of 1815 de-
vastated the noble forests, and hundreds of stately
pines lay prostrate. The people seized upon this as
822
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
an opportunity for procuring lumber at a reasonable
rate, and the town voted to build a new meeting-
house. The last service in the old house was in July,
1816, and in the following week the frame was
stripped and demolished — such timbers as could be
utilized were selected for the new house.
The frame was prepared and put together on the
ground and pulled into place a side at a time, by the
assembled multitude, who had gathered on the morn-
ing of July Sth, and at the appearance of the sun
were ready for the order " Bear it up." On the
17th of the same month the people assembled for
a service of Thanksgiving on the floor of the new
house. When the house was completed, the town
chose a committee —
*• To appraise the pews by ii<Beasing the whole expense of butliliiig said
boose, includiog extra bills, utc. (leTelllug thecoinmoD and hanging the
betlexcepted),oa the saine according to rank and situation of said pewH.
. . It was further voted 'tUat no town.meetiDgs nor trainings or choos-
ing nUlitla othcers shall ever be held or done iu the meeting-house, and
no other town business shall be done in said house, except bv pemiissiuu
of the selectmen for the time being, and that this vote shall be annexed
to the article for the sale of the pews.* ' No person shall hang his hat
on any post or on the wall of the house, or on any other machine about
the railing of the pews on the lower floor, iu the body of s-^ nieetlui;-
bouse, Qor on the front of the galleries, nor on the walls in the gal-
leries.' "
The house w.is dedicated .Tuly 8, 1817. Rev. Sam-
uel Stearns, the pastor, preached the .sermon, which
was, later, published in pamphlet form. This was the
first dedication service held in the town, it being con-
trary to the New England spirit and custom when
the first house of worship was completed.
James Wright, Jr., was appointed to the responsi-
ble position of " sexton." His duties were carefully
defined, not the least of which was "to carry into the
house the basin of water for the ordinance of baptism,
when requested."
The bell, imported from London by Jeremiah Fitch
for the town, was first rung on the morning of July 8,
1817. Mr. Fitch contributed the clock to the town,
which is ornamented with a gold-mounted eagle
and balls, and still marks ofi" the hours in the
meeting-house; but the bell, being rudely handled
in a seeming display of patriotism, was rendered
useless and sold in 1863, by the First Parish, and
has not been replaced. The cost of the meeting-
house was $6623. The pews sold for a sum suffi-
cient to liquidate the debt, and left a balance
of $487, which was assigned for a ministerial fund,
by a vote of the town. The " Page Fund '' was
of use iu providing an annual singing-school, and in
1818 Leander Hosmer was employed by the town " To
perform sacred music for said town for ten dollars pr.
year, on a Bass Viol, and furnish himself with a viol."
In July, 1818, a Sabbath-School was organized,
which proved to be one of the first Church-scaools in
the country, the history of which, prepared by the
author of this sketch, was published by the Trini-
tarian Sabbath-school, in connection with the celebra-
tion of its seventieth anniversary in 1888.
CHAPTER LXIX.
BEDFORD— ( Conlimied).
ECCLE-SIASTICAL.
StpaTolUin Behreen Cftnrch ttnd T"Wn — Ti-i»itayi>iit-Congypgatio»nl Society
OrgoiiL^ed^ Their Il<-iiite uf W'urBliip — Worh of l^iiitaiian Lltitrch oud
First Parish — Dentk of llev. Sumurl SteariiB — iyletints* Descemlituls —
Church of Chrial.
PRO.srERiTY followed the erection of the meeting-
house, and peace and harmony prevailed until the
autumn of 1831, when a ditl'ercnre in opinion, which
had for years existed between the Trinitariau and
Unitarian Congregalionalists of New England,
reached tiiat point here, where the relation between
the pastor and people was most severely tried. The
love of the piustor of this town for his people, and
their strong att.achment for the one who had given
the best of his life in their service, the regard of
many for his feelings in his declining years, together
with the unswerving fidelity of the pastor to the prin-
ciples that he had proeluiuied when ordained for the
(tospel ministry in this town thirty-five years before,
may be assigned as some of tiie reasons for the .severity
with which the storm beat uimju the coiniiiunity.
The church was rent asunder, and the remainder of
the ecclesia-stical history of the town, .is regards the
Protestant faith, will be viewed in two separate i-iian-
nel.x, viz. : The First Parish with the Unitiirian
Church and The Trinitarian Congregational r^miety
with the Church of Christ. The First Parish, and
church connected with it, iielil the meeting-house,
all of the funds anil communion service, while the
Trinitarian Congregational Society anil associated
church began their w<prk with empty hands, .luiie 4,
1833, the two resident male members of the church
who remained with the First Parish met and chose
•IS trustees William Page and ('harlesSpaulding, and
adopted a new covenant, and .accessions were made to
their numbers. After the stated supply of Rev. Jlr.
Davis and Rev. Robert Walcott, Rev. Joshua Chand-
ler, a graduate of Harvard College, was settled over
the church and society. He was succeeded by Rev.
George W. Woodward. In May, 1846, he removed to
Galena, Illinois, and a series of .stated supplies fol-
lowed— the last of whom was Rev. .Tonas Whitman,
pastor at Lexington, who continued in charge until
his death, in 1848. Services were then discontinued
and the house of worship closed, until it was remod-
eled in 1849.
In April of th.at year Rev. William Cushing ac-
cepted a call to act as stated supply. Mr. Cushing
took a great interest iu education, conducting a pri-
vate school iu cininection with his pastoral work; his
successor was Rev. George W. Webster, who was in-
stalled as pastor in August, 1860. Extreme peculi-
arities, tending to mental ilisea.se, impaired his use-
fulness, and alter a year and a half, during which the
BEDFORD.
823
church and society relaxed iu vitality, he left the
charge and entered the Union army from this town.
The house of worship was closed for a period of
twelve years. It was reopened iu the autumn of
18G9, and Rev. Grindall Reynolds took charge of the
parish in connection with his pastorate at Concord.
His call to the position of secretary of the Unitarian
Association necessitated a change. Revs. Milstead
and Russell acted as stated supply until 1884, when
Rev. George Piper assumed the pastoral care of the
aocietj" in connection with that at Carlisle. During
his pastorate the meeting-house has been thoroughly
remodeled, the church revived, and the ordinances
regularly observed. In addition to the income of the
"Page and Hiirtwell Fund " the society is aided by
the Unitarian Association.
The Trinitarian Congregational Society immedi-
ately erecte<I a house of worship on land given by Mr.
Jeremiah Fitch, of Boston, a native of Bedford. The
building-lot was directly opposite the Stearns man-
sion, and was given in consideration of the regard of
the donor for his neighbor, teacher, pastor and friend.
The relation between Rev. Mr. Stearns and the
town was dissolved by a mutual ecclesiastical council,
and he accepted a call from the Church of Christ and
Trinitarian Congregational Society of the town, in
their united capacity. .Service.s were regularly held
in the dwelling-house of Rev. Mr. Stearns until the
society completed a meeting-house. Mrs. Hannah
Reed presented the church with a suitable commun-
ion service. Manv of the citizens, who had but fif-
teen years before, ISIS, paid large sums for their
pews in the town's meeting-house, had now freely
given a tithing of their possessions for the erection of
another house of worship, ;ind, free from debt, the
church anil society resumed the work of proclaiming
the gospel in the Evangelical faith. Rev. Mr. Stearns
died in December, 1S:34, and the fourth and most
notable pastorate was brought to a close.
The body of Rev. Mr. Stearns was interred in the
family vault in the old burial-ground, and there re-
mained until the death of his widow, Madam Abigail
Stearns, iu 1858, when they were both deposited in
cemented vaults on the western slope of Shawshine
Cemetery.
Of thirteen children born to Rev. Samuel Stearns and
Abigail French, eleven reached maturity. No other
Bedford family has exerted so great an influence in the
world of letters. They all received the highest advan-
tages for education that the schools atlbrded. The live
sons were all educated at Phillips Academy, Andover,
and at Harvard College, and the four who became
clergymen attended Andover Theological Seminary.
Of thirty-one grandchildren twenty-three are living.
Almost all have received a liberal education. Of the
grandsons, two are professional men and one an artist
of rare ability ; five granddaughters became teachers,
four married professional men ; a number are au-
thora of books or writers for leading periodicals. The
descendants in the third and fourth generations are
numerous and prominent in the world.
The young man who, in the flush of youth, dedi-
cated himself to the higher interests of the people ot
Bedford, had become old in their service and been
gathered with the fathers. More than five hundred
people of the town died and the entire membership ot
his church had been gathered during his ministry.
There were admitted to the church one hundred and
forty-three members while worshiping in the new
meeting-house, before the separation.
Rev. Jonathan Leavitt succeeded Rev. Mr.
Stearns, and has been followed by Rev. S. Hopkins
Emery ; Rev. Oren Sikes, who died in office Decem-
ber lo, 1852 ; Rev. Henry J. Patrick, now of West
Newton ; Rev. W. J. Batt, now moral instructor at
the Massachusetts Reformatory ; Rev. George Lewis ;
Rev. Edward Chase ; Rev. Otis D. Crawford ; Rev.
George E. Lovejoy, now of Franklin, Mass. ; Rev.
Howard A. Hanaford, now of Winchester, N. H., and
Rev. Edwin Smith, who took the charge August 1,
1886.
The church has a present membership of one hun-
dred and eighty. That element in our nature which
leads us to value things in proportion to their cost
was plainly evident in the careful manner with which
the people of this town who formed the Trinitarian
Congregational Society guarded its interests, and
that healthy activity that is generally found among
societies that depend entirely upon their own etforts
for support has been manifest through the half-cen-
tury of its existence. No ministerial fund has been
established. Small legacies bequeathed to the church
have been applied to the promotion of the work and
memorials of the donors added to the ornaments of the
house of worship. In 1886 the house was repaired,
enlarged and refurnished to suit the demands of the
times, about $7000 being expended.
Adherents of the Romish Church have gradually
settled in town, constituting a very respectable class
in society, among whom may be found some of the
most thriving farmers. Becoming weary of a journey
of five miles to attend worship (as were the first set-
tlers of the town), they erected a chapel in 1885, which
is well furnished and adapted to their use ; they main-
tain religious services in connection with the church
at Lexington, Rev. P. J. Kavanaugh being the priest
in charge.
CHAPTER LXX.
BEDFORD— { Continued) .
SCHOOLS AND LIBRARIES.
One of the highest of the municipal functions is
education. This was incumbent upon the founders of
Bedford by the act of incorporation : " Provided that
the said town of Bedford do, within the space of three
824
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
years from the publication of this act, erect, build and
finish a suitable house of worship, and procure and
settle a learned orthodox minister of good conversa-
tion, and make provision for his cotofortable and hon-
ourable support, and likewise provide a school to in-
struct their youth in writing and reading," Many of
the founders of this town knew the worth of education
through the want of it Their parents had enjoyed
literary advantages in the mother country, but in
seeking religious liberty they had lost secular advan-
tage, and in their struggle to establish homes in the
wilderness had often failed to instruct their children in
the rudiments of education. The children of the
scattered settlers were by far the greater sufferers ; sit-
uated four or five miles from the village, they could
not attend the few weeks of school that were furnished,
and doubtless some of the originators of this town
never attended a school of any kind. Until 1733 the
church was the only school, and during several suc-
ceeding years the principal means of education. The
minister was the instructor, and he was well supported.
In January, 1732-33 the town raised five pounds, equal
to about three dollars (according to Shattuck), for pub-
lic school that year. This must have been an act of
the new town to comply with the incorporation act —
" space of three years " — and have been a provision
for the winter only, as appears from the following
record : "Of the School Reat that was made by the
assessors in 1733, there was committed to Mr. Jacob
Kendall, constable, to collect £5 10s. Id., and to Mr.
Richard Wheeler £5 IGs. Id." making a tax nf £11 (is.
9rf., which, according to the same authority, was equal
to about seven dollars in the currency of that time.
In December, 1733, it was voted ''to settle a moving
school and hire a master, for which purpose an ap-
propriation of ten pounds was made.
For several years one school only was kept and
moved about as justice and convenience demanded.
The teachers were generally selected from the people
of the town, but in one of the early winters. Rev.
Ebenezer Hancock, of Lexington, taught the school
and boarded with his sister, wife of Rev. Nicholas
Bowes. The town bought a dwelling-houaeof Benja-
min Kidder in 1741, for £12, old tenor, and arranged
it for a school-house. In 1742 the school moved into
the four quarters of the town, and £10 was expended
for the teacher's salary, he "boarding round.'' In
the following year the centre school was opened and
£30 granted for its support. Previous to this but little
attention was paid to giving instruction in any branch
beyond those required by the ordinance of 1647, viz. :
writing and reading. In 1744 a part of the appropri-
ation was allowed for schools in the " quarters '' to be
taught by " school dames." In the succeeding four-
teen years a school was kept at the Centre a few weeks
in the winter and during the remainder of the year a
" moving-school " was taught by a lady. Text-books
were few and rule and the rod was applied without
stint. One may judge of the monetary value of pro-
fessional services by the records of 1754-55, when
Rev. Nicholas Bowes, the first minister of the town,
dismissed in August 1754, taught the school in
the following winter, five months for £9 6s. 9>d., and
boarded himself. In 1758 a "writing-school" was
kept four months in the village and a " woman's teach-
ing-school " six months in the quarters of the town,
although it was years in advance of the legal require-
ments. The interest in education was not abated
during the Revolution, yet in two instances the
teachers' services were gratuitous. Intelligent women
gathered the children of the neighborhood in their
dwellings and were rewarded by a vote of the town
after the war ceased.
The people iu the "quarters " were obliged to fur-
nish house and fire-wood without public charge in
order to have a school. The district bounds were
not arbitrary as yet, and the most ambitious children
would follow the school from one quarter to another,
which was allowed if they furni>lied a share of the
tire-wood. The consequent attainments and useful-
ness of some families is evident in succeeding years.
In 1780, when Captain .lohn Moore was chosen the
first representative to the " Great and General Court,"
the town voted to have three montlis " writing-school "
and six weeks " women's school '' in each quarter of
the town. The term " writing-school " was to desig-
nate this department of education from the merely
fundamental instruction of the " women's school."
In the former "cyphering" was taught as well
as writing, and also the principles of language
and " decent behaviour. ' The "sums" were ".set"
by the teacher and the work doi:e on unruled coarse
paper and carefully saved as trophies of victory sel-
dom won by the gentler sex. In teaching writing, the
instructor was required to prepare the copies, give
advice in the formation of letters and also respond to
the oft-repeated calls " Pleasesir, mend my pen?" In
March, 1790, there was a partial awakening t» the
demands of systematic education. The school-tax
was assessed as a distinct rate, and the town voted
that "such school masters as the law required"
should be employed four months in the year, and
four montlis writing-school should be kept at the
centre, " and when the master had a very full schooi
he should attend principally to those that write and
cypher."
In 1789 the Legislature provided for districting the*
towns, and Bedford undertook the task, which proved
to be a diflicult one. For sixty years the only accommo-
dations for schools in the " quarters " were in private
houses; but in 1792 a long and trying experience
resulted in a vote to raise £100 with which to build
a school-house in each quarter and made provision
for a school to be taught in each. In 1793 the pride
of the residents at the " centre " asserted itself in a
vote " not to have any woman's school." The annual
appropriation at the close of the century had reached
the sum of $300. The closing years of the eighteenth
BEDFORD.
825
century mark a very important epoch in the interests
of education in Bedford. Rev. Samuel Stearns came,
aa the fourth minister to the town. He was an emi-
nent scholar, young and energetic, and possessed of
rare qualities for leadership, which he judiciously
used. For more than thirty years every progressive
step in education bears the impress of his cultured
mind and careful hand. The limited advantages for
education were not urged upon girls, and when one
of the sex manifested a desire to push beyond the
fundamental principles she was subject to ridicule.
The evil, not contined to this town, received early cor-
rection here. In 1797 Rev. Mr. Stearns inaugurated a
female seminary, which was oneof the very early insti-
tutions of the kind in Xew England. Young ladies
from this and neigboring towns were instructed by
him in the higher branches, many of whom were
fitted for teachers and made most commendable rec-
ords in the profession. The vote of 1790 "To employ
only such masters as the law requires," cut off many
ignorant aspirants for the office, but it did not reach
the question of methods, and Rev. Mr. Stearns soon
began to exert an influence in that direction. Rev.
William F. vStearns, D.D., of Amherst College, records
the following method for teaching the alphabet in
the opening years of the present century, aa practiced
upon himself: " The master pointed with his pen-knife
to the first three letters and said : ' That's A, that's B,
that's C ; now take your seat and I will call you by
and by, and if you can't tell them I will cut your ears
right oft' with llii.s knife.'" This was doubtless an
extreme case, but the reform movement of the tiine-
teentli century wa.s well advanced belbre the youth
were exempt from the caprices of teachers. In 1798
the town appropriated twenty dollars for a singing-
school.
In 1804 the first system of bylaws for the govern-
ment of the schools was adopted and put in force.
Ignorance of teachers was guarded against. The win-
ter school was regularly opened and closed with
prayer. The Bible was read in all of the schools as
often aa once a day. The Assembly's Shorter Cate-
chism was taught weekly, and every member under
the age of fifteen yeai-s was obliged to carefully attend
tosuch instruction. It was expected of all maleteachers
" that they freciuently and carefully impress upon the
minds of the youth the principles of virtue and piety,
•as connected with their responsibility and usefulness
in life, and also highly essential to the support aud well-
being of our free Republican form of government, as
re<)uired by law." For more than thirty years the
Assembly's Shorter Catechism was one of the required
te.xt-books. Another text-book was Morse's Geogra-
phy, the first book on the science published in Amer-
ica. In the scarcity of text-books the "School
Fathers " required it to be used by the " first class "
aa a " reader." In ISOti a school-house was built at
the centre, in place of the old building that had been
remodeled for school purposes seventy- three years
before. The annual appropriation then reached six
hundred dollars and sixteen weeks of schooling were
provided ; only two schools were in session at any
one time, and pupils were not confined to district
limits. This led at length to a bitter quarrel in the
East District. The master lost all authority, and the
committee failed to restore order or peace. The sev-
eral sectiona were arrayed violently against one an-
other. The east quarter boys were on one side called
by their enemies " Shaberkins and Sharks." The
boys from the centre and north were united as an op-
posing force and named, from their locality, " North-
quarter hogs and city pigs." No day was without its
battle. Many parents sided with their children and
things grew worse and worse, until the town took it in
hand and voted, April 5, 1813, " To set off the East part
of the town as a school district, according to law, and
that they draw their proportion of the school money
according to the valuation of estates in thnt section."
A town library, chartered by the General Court, was
now in a flourishing condition. Each school district
had a " prudential committee" to attend to the local
interests of the school, and the town annually cboaea
committee of inspection whose duty it was to regulate
the text-books, to providesupplies for poor children and
adjust all difficulties. An examination of all teach-
ers was required as to moral and literary qualifica-
tions. The by-laws were remodeled in 1819, and
" master's schools" were required to be opened and
closed with prayer, and the record further says,
" which practice also is particularly recommended to
the serious consideration of female instructors, who
will be permitted to use an approved written form of
prayer."' It was found difficult to enforce rules and
.secure uniformity in text-books until 1827, when an
agent was appointed to furnish supplies at cost, and
was paid for his services, by the towns. This custom
prevailed until 1884, when the State passed the law re-
quiring towns to furnish all school supplies and made
the schools literally free.
The people were now beginning to receive the bene-
fit of the " Page and Hartwell Fund." A certain
proportion of the income was required to be expended
for teaching sacred music. A singing-school was
inaugurated in 1827, and held annual sessions at the
centre for the benefit of the whole town. In 1829 a
two-story brick school-house was built at the coat of
$2210.43. This furnished ample accommodation for
the schoola and for town business. The annual aea-
sion of the singing-school for the benefit of the whole
town was held in the "commodious" building until
1837, when the income for teaching sacred music be-
came a denominational benefit. The apparatus of the
school-room waa meagre, indeed, until 1841. The open
fire-place had given way to a close stove which
necessitated the cutting of cord-wood sticks once
in two, but this, with the "master's desk" and
" battered seats " constituted the entire furnishings.
A primitive volume called "The School-Book"
826
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
was furnished each town by the State in 1806,
in numbers equal to the districts. This town sold
the volumes at " vendue." In 1840 the School
Committee filed the first school report. In
1841 the sum of one hundred dollars was appropri-
ated for maps and philosophical apparatus. Efi'orts
were made in 1841 and 1850 to establish a High
School, but without success. The first printed report
of the School Committee was circulated in 1847, and
in the following year each district was furnished with
" Webster's Dictionary." The annual appropriation
for schools rearhed $800 in 1847, and $1000 in 1850.
This amount had been annually increased by the in-
come of the " surplus revenue fund." An unsuccess-
ful eflbrt was made about 1850 to establish a free pub-
lic library, but an association was formed and a library
started, by which superior advantages were furnished
for a small compensation.
In 1850 the town received an unexpected benefit
through the will of Zadock Howe, of Billerica, by
which a seminary was founded and endowed for the
benefit of this as well as other towns. The public
gratitude was manifested by spreading a copy of the
will upon the town records, and individual apprecia-
tion was manifested by turning to the Howe School
for higher instruction.
In 1852 the demand for a high school was gratified,
and of $885, the school appropriation for that year,
$285 was apportioned for the trial of the experiment.
It was abandoned after a trial of two years. The
school-house in each ''quarter" of the town stood as
" a ragged beggar sunning" after sixty years of hard
service, and in 1854 new houses were built at the east
and north, and the west was thoroughly repaired, and
a new one was soon erected at the south. In lS5t> the
brick house at the Centre was torn down and the pres-
ent building, combining two school-rooms with a
town hall, was erected at a cost of $8524. Mr. Charles
Lane, of Boston, presented a valuable clock to the
town for its use in the new hall. He was the same
person who fell some years later, at his own threshold
in Dorchester, by the assassin's bullet.
The dedication of the new building was an event of
much importance, as the principal parts in the exer-
cises were taken by sons of the town. Mr. Josiah A.
Stearns gave the dedicatory address and Mr. John F.
Gleason a poem ; among other speakers was Mr.
Charles Lane, the donor of the clock.
The efibrts put forth in the erection of the new town
building had a stimulating effect upon education
among all classes of society. The youth were inspired
with commendable ambition in school work and their
elders sought improvement through the iyceum. The
town appropriation now reached $1000. This was in-
creased to about $1200 by the income of the surplus
revenue, and the State School Fund, which was estab-
lished in 18.34. The town expended the " surplus
revenue," and increased the annual appropriations to
$1100 in 1861. The half-day session of Saturday was
discontinued by the vote of the town in 1863. In
1872 an attempt was made to concentrate the direct-
ing power and to employ a superintendent, but this
unfortunately resulted in an increase of the board of
committee from three to six members. The results
were not satisfactory, and a return was made to the
original number as soon as the State law would ad-
mit. Women were first elected as School C'ommittee
in 1872, and have proved wise and etficient workers
in the department of education.
At the annual meeting of the town, in 1SS5, it was
voted that the schools should be graded, that an
English high school course of two years should be
adopted, and that the school year should begin with
the opening of the fall term. This plan, put in oper-
ation September, 1885, had a most stimulating effect
upon the students in the several departments, and led
the parents to indorse a growing sentiment for con-
solidation.
In .fune, 1880, the first graduates were presented
with diplomas. The course of study was altered and
amended in 1889, so as to include three year? of High
School stutly, in which is the Latin language. The
appropriation gradually increased until it reached
S2S00, for ordinary expenses, to which is added the
town's portion of the income of the " State School
Fund." An .annual appropriation is made for school-
books and supplies.
After thirty-three years of service, the combined
town hall and school building was <leclared inade-
quate to the pressing demands of the evening of the
nineteenth century, and preliminary steps have been
taken, 1890, towards the erection of a modern struc-
ture. In the schools of Bedford, thus briefly described,
have been laid the foundations of some grand literary
structures.
As the date is comparatively recent when i>rngress
has unbolted the doors of colleges to women, the list of
those who have received a public education is con-
fined to men.
In 1870 the Bedford Free Public Library Corporation
was chartered for the benefit of the inhabitants of the
town.
The property of the Bedford Library A.ssociation
was donated and became the nucleiw of a valuable
collection of books and other publications. Every
resident of the town having reached the age of twelve
years has the right to draw books from the library
without payment of fee. Appropriations by the town
and private contributions have enabled the trustees
to make frequent additions until in 1890 there are
nearly 3000 volumes for circulation, besides many
valuable works for reference, and a collection of an-
tiquities, relics and articles of historic interest. The
town has an annually increasing fund for the erection
of a library building, much needed at present.
A local weekly paper, Bedford Bulletin, is published
in connection with other towns, under the editorial
care of Abram E. Brown. It is now in its thirty-
BEDFORD.
827
third volume. It has an extensive circulation in
the town and in various sections of the United States
where natives of Bedford are located.
CHAPTER LXXI.
liEDFORD—t, Conllivifd).
:\III,ITARY HISTORY.
hi'liau Troiihlea—LnUeidital Sfivicf—Expei-Uiice o/ Mary Lane — MajcwfU
P'tiiuli/^Prench .NVufni/s — FiviicA and [ndiiin Wni-a.
The war cry was not an unfamiliar sound to the
settlers nf this territory. They were accustomed to
hardships, many of them had done service in the
early campaigns, and sacrificed blood and treasure
long before the Revolutionary struggle burst upon
the Colonies. Of the garrison-houses ordered by the
" Honorable Council " in 1675, during the invasion of
King Philip, four were within the present limits of
Bedford. As the Bedford of to-day represents out-
lying sections of Billerica and Concord, the homes of
these scattered settlers did not suffer from any gen-
eral invasion in the Indian Wars. JIany of the men
were away in the service, and the women were com-
pelled to do double duty at home.
It is impossible to make up a complete list of those
who served in the early campaigns. Job Lane was
" impresseil," but doubtless allowed to return and aid
in the protection of his own garrison, agreeable to
the order of the "Honorable Council" of l()7o-7lJ.
Sec. 4. " The said towns have their own men returned
that are abroad and freeil from impressment during
their present state." Lieutenant John Wilson, who
had a "corne mill "' on Vine Brook, did good service
"to the Eastward " in lil92-93. Lieutenant Jolin Lane
received the following order in August, IfJ'.tS : " These
are in his Majesty's name to require you forthwith to
Impress eight Troopers with arms and ammunition for
his Majesty's service, four of which are to be daily
Imployed aa a scout about yo' town, especially towards
the great swamp.''
In 11)93 Lieutenant Lane received similar orders
from the Lieutenant-Governor, and in 1702 he re-
ceived the following order from Governor Joseph
Dudley :
" Caubbidog, 6 Nov., ITO'2.
'*Sitt; I 'leairo yon with two of yoiir troope to repayr to tbe towoa of
Marlboro', Lancaator, Groton, Cbelnisford and Dunstable, and there ile
liver *;veral!y the letterd given you and encourage the otflcera in their
<luty, agreeable to the several directions, etc."
It is evident that the Crovernor of the Colony was
personally acquainted with Major Lane, he having
attained that military title at that time, and knew him
to be a trustworthy man. In the Lane papers tiled in
this town is the following:
" A list of the names of the Troopers which served
under my command to the relref of Dunstable. July
the fourth, seventeen hundred and six." Six of the
twenty-nine were from Bedford side of ancient Bil-
lerica, viz. : Samuel Fitch, Josiah Bacon, Nathaniel
Page, Nathaniel Bacon, Benj. Bacon, Josiah Fassett.
In the succeeding August, under the same command,
Josiah Bacon served as "Trumpetter" and Josiah
Fassett with Benjamin Bacon were privates. The
following anecdote was related by Leander Hosmer, a
descendant of the heroine of the Lane family:
" Mary, daughter of Colonel John Lane, was left
during a season of alarm in the garrison with but one
soldier on guard. Something behind a stump excited
the suspicion of Mary, as she looked from a window
in the roof. The soldier declined to open fire, and
she took the gun and discharged it and saw a dead
Indian roll into sight." The Lanes had an inherent
love for military life. (Jne writes from York, April
21, 1724 : "Lt. John Lane has been so imprmlent as
to suffer his men to kill sundry creatures belonging to
the people of the County of York." He alterwards
made satisfaction for the rash act.
By an act of the General Court, November 17, 1724,
men were allowed two shillings per day for time iu
service and £100 for each male scalp in addition to
other premiums established by law. This offer of the
government was an approved means of defence
against the Indians, and aroused Captain John Love-
well, of Dunstable, to raise a company and set out
into the wilderness. He made three expeditions,
during which several Indians were killed and others
were captured alive. The third and memorable ex-
pedition of April k'l, 172'>, proved the most disas-
trous to the company, nearly one-third being killed,
among whom was their leader. In each of the ex-
peditions Bedford men participated, and Josiah
Davis was killed, Eleazer Davis wounded, and others
experienced the most painful hardship. •
From a published sermon of Rev. Thomas Symms,
preached at Bradford, on the Sabbath following the
return of the unfortunate company, the following
account of the suffering of some of the number is
taken : " Eleazer Davis, after being out fourteen days,
came into Berwick. He was wounded in the abdo-
men and the ball lodged in his body. He also had
his right hand shot off." A tradition says that, ar-
riving at a pond with Lieutenant Farwell, Davis
pulled off one of his moccasins, cut it in strings,
on which he fastened a hook, i-aught some fish, fried
and ate them. They refreshed him, but were inju-
rious to Farwell, who died soon after. Josiah Davis,
another of the four, was wounded with a ball which
lodged in his body. After being out fourteen days,
in hourly expectation of perishing, he arrived at
Saco emaciated and almost dead from the loss of
blood. He recovered, but became a cripple." This
manner of dealing with the Indiana must be severely
(|ue3tioned, and enlisting to pursue the scattered rem-
nant of homeless natives for such a purpose as ac-
tuated Lovewell and his followers must be condemned;
828
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
but the narrative serves to show the hardships to
which the founders of this town were accustomed and
by which they acquired the habits of self-reliance so
evident in their later history.
The Maxwell family furnished some brave military
men during the French and Indian Wars, and also in
the struggle for freedom from British oppression.
Hugh Maxwell entered the service aa a private,
served five campaigns and held a commission from
Governor Pownall as ensign, dated March 31, 1759.
Thompson, brother to Hugh, was with " Rogers'
Rangers " at the destruction of St. Francis and all
through the French and Indian Wars. He entered
the service at the age of sixteen years. Lemuel
Shattuck says : "Several of ihe inhabitants of Bed-
ford sustained commissions."
The descendants of Nathaniel Page, who settled
here in 1687, were commissioned officers for several
generations : Cornet Nathaniel Page, born in Eng-
land in 1679, died in Bedford, 1755 ; liis son, ,Iohn,
born in 1704, held commission as cornet from Jona-
than Belcher, Colonial Governor in 1737. Ensign
Josiah Fassfitt was at the relief of Fort Williams in
May, 1758. Sergeant Page, of Bedford, was with
Thompson Maxwell in 1758. Maxwell had a hand-
to-hand conflict with two Indians, — he shot one and
broughc the other " to a halt." He says in his pub-
lished journal : " Being exhausted, I reached a stream
and Page swam across with me ou his back with his
gun and my own. I could not swim. In 1759 our
suffering from cold and hunger cannot be described ;
thirty-seven of our number died on the banks of the
White River in Vermont, where Royalston Is now
built. Sergt. Page was with us and a very stout man.
He helped me or I doubt how it would have fared
with me." " Nathaniel Merriam (son of Dea. Na-
thaniel) died at Lake George in his Majesty's service,
Sept. 15, 1758, aged 19 years."
When the "French Neutrals'' were taken from
their Arcadian homes and portioned out in the Col-
onies, Bedford had her share to provide for. Joseph
Fitch and John Moore filed the following bill : ''The
Province of the Mass. Bay Indebtetl to the Town of
Bedford — To providing for the French Neutrals or-
dered to said town the 16 of Feb. a.d., 1760, 'till the
17ih of June, 1761, £21 7s." Bedford men were at
Crown Point, Ticonderoga and at the decisive en-
gagement on the plains of Abraham, and also on the
northern frontiers, where troops were kept to watch
the Indians until the treaty of peace was concluded,
in 1762, by which Canada became a British posses-
sion. It is gratifying to know that their services
were appreciated as appears from the following :
Voted on March 2, 1763, " To abate Josiah Davis,
his son Paul, lately deceased, and Joseph Wilson, their
town and Highway Rate and all other soldiers their
Highway Rate." Thirteen received abatements. In
1763 the people of this town entered into the
" Thanksgiving " ordered by the King for the restora-
tion of peace, with the same will that they had mani-
fested during the protracted war. They labored
under the disadvantage of having no minister to in-
spire or guide them from 1766 to 1771. The minister
was the vanguard in many towns. Concord had her
Emerson, and Lexington her Clark, but in the ab-
sence of such a leader in Bedford, there was no falter-
ing on the part of the people. Hugh Maxwell, the
" Christian Patriot," came to the front with some-
what of the heroism and organizing power which
inspired his father to le.id his entire family across the
ocean to escape oppression. There were other brave
men whose names appear in the subsequent years of
trial.
CHAPTER LXXII.
BEDFORD— ( Continued)
Coloiiud TroHbJeg — Boifton Teo Pailij — MinitU-Men — Concord Ftgttt —
n'oiiic.i's Puit—BaUlc of Bunker IlUt.
March, 1768, the town voted "To concur with
the vote of the town of Boston in October last, to en-
courage the produce and manufaclure of the Prov-
ince." The women were not behind in expressions of
loyalty. They carried on spinning and weaving at
an increased rate. A bride from one of the first
families of the town is known to have been led to
the marriage altar dressed in a " gown " of her own
manufacture, the fruit of her own loom. The town
sent no representative to the General Court until the
Revolutionary struggle was well under way. The
" letter of Correspondence " sent out from a Boston
town-meeting .isking for " a free communication of
sentiments," was received and acted upon with a
spirit of determination on JIarch 1, 1773. In the
following March the town voted " not to use any
tea till the duty Is taken off." In the "Tea Party,"
December 16, 1773, Bedford was represented by
Thompson Maxwell, although not at that time a resi-
dent of the town. His journal reads thus: " In 1773,
I went with my team to Boston, which was shut up
(blockaded), with a load of provisions for the poor of
the town. I had loaded at John Hancock's ware-
house and was about to leave town, when Mr. Han-
cock requested me to drive my team up into his yard,
and ordered his servants to take care of it, and re-
quested me to be at Long Wharf at two o'clock P.M.,
and informed me what was to be done. I went ac-
cordingly, joined the band under Captain Hewes.
We mounted the ships and made tea in a trice. This
done I took my team and went home aa an honest
man should." '
• FeariDg that this narrative and otbera that will follow, might be re.
gartied as loo good t^ be credited, we have careful ly studied the facta and
have no doubt of the validity of the journal. John Hancock, the
famous patriot and merchant of Boston, inherited the estate of his
BEDFORD.
829
When "Boston Port Bill" went into operation,
June 1, 1774, the old bell pealed forth the sound of
alarm over the hills of this town, and the already
crumbling " Bell-House" lost its equilibrium, but
not so the people. They met on the last day of June,
" To know and determine what mer^ures are Proper
to be taken at this present time of Trouble and Dis-
tress," etc. They unanimously voted to adopt the
covenant of non-intercourse. They chose the Com-
mittee of Correspondence, which consisted of Deacon
Stephen Davis, John Reed, Joseph Hartwell, John
Webber and John Moore.
The town was represented by four delegates at the
county convention held at Concord on August .30th and
.31st. On October 11th the town was represented by
Joseph Ballard and John Reed in the first Provincial
Congress, which had met by adjournment from Salem
on the 6th. John Hancock was chairman and Ben-
jamin Lincoln clerk. After a session of three days
the Congress adjourned to meet at Cambridge, and
then continued from October 17th to December 10th.
Devotion to a noble cause prompted the Represen-
tatives from this town, as there was no olfer of com-
pensation from a depleted treasury, but in March,
1775, the town voted " To allow Doct. Joseph Bal-
lard four shillings per day, for twelve days at Cam-
bridge, and four shillings for expenses at Concord."
January 18, 1775. They at first voted not to send
a delegate to the Provincial Congress of February,
but on the 27th, in a second meeting, chose John
Reed, and, agreeable to a re<'ommendation of the
Continental Congress, chose a "Committee of Inspec-
tion " consisting of Moses .\bbott, Thomas Page,
Ebenezer Page, John Reed and Edward Stearns. At
the Provincial Congress held at Concord and Cam-
bridge, the plan was adopted for enrolling all the
able-bodied men, and the order passed " that these
companies should immediately assemble and elect
their propper officers ; that these officers, when
elected, should assemble and elect field officers,
and they enlist at least one-quarter of the men
enrolled." These were the "minute-men." The
people of Bedford gave hearty assent to the appoint-
ment of Henry Gardner, of Stow, as treasurer of the
Province, and made payment to him rather than to
the royal treasurer.
In March, 1775, the town voted " to pay twenty-
five 'minute-men' one shilling per week until the
first of May next, — they to exercise four hours in a
week, and two shillings to be allowed two officers,
they to equip themselves according to the advice of
uncle, Thomu Hancock. The warehouse alluiled to, woe a portion,
and had been io the family for many yearn ; here the coiintr>' fannera
had e.\changed their prtKJuce for other waree, the Haxweila among
fhem, very naturally, .la they must have l)ecome interested in the
family through Ebenezer Hancock, brother of Thoniaa. who had taught
the Bedford acbool and boarded with the family of Rev. Mr. Bowefl,
whose wife waa hia eiater. The mutual acquaintance had led John
Hancock to cuuhde the secret of destroying the tea to a worthy friend
wboee warlike spirit wsB gratifled in this daring act.
the Congress." While John Reed was laboring in
the interests of the town in the Second Congress, the
minute-men were being faithfully drilled and the
company of militia as well. The minute-men of Bed-
ford were a fair specimen of those forces, so hastily
prepared for war, of whom Lord Percy said : " We
never saw anything equal to the intrepidity of the
New England minute-men." The officers of the min-
ute-men had no coinmissioos, as did those of the
militia already in service; hence their authority came
through the suffrage of their associates. The Bedford
minute-men organized by choosing Jonathan Wilson
as captain and Moses Abbott as lieutenant; Cornet
Nathaniel Page was standard-bearer.
The banner illustrated on this page was carried by
Cornet Nathaniel Page in the company of minute-
men from Bedford to Concord, April 19, 1775. It had,
doubtless, been in the Page family in this town for
nearly a century before the Revolution. It was re-
turned to the Page mansion after the opening scenes
of the war, and there kept until the centennial cele-
bration at Concord, April 19, 1875, when it was car-
ried with the Bedford delegation in the procession of
that day. Ten years later, October 19, 1885 {the
one hundred and fourth anniversary of the surrender
by Cornwallis to Washington), it was presented by
Captain Cyrus Page to the town of Bedford.
It was thus brought to the attention of the Massa-
chusetts Historical Society at their meeting in the
following January, when Mr. Appleton reported upon
it as follows :
" It was originally designed in England, in 1660-70,
for the three-county troops of Massachusetts, and be-
came one of the accepted standards of the organized
militia of this State, and as such it was used by the
Bedford company." Mr. Appleton said that in his
opinion " This flag far exceeded in historic value the
famed flag of Eutaw and Pulaski's banner, and, in fact,
830
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
is the most precious memorial of its kind we have any
knowledge of." The three county *roops, referred to
above, originated thus : In May, 1643, the whole
Colony of Massachusetts Bay was divided into four
shires — Middlesex, Essex, Suffolk and Norfolk, named
from the English counties. In the same year, 1643,
a new organization of the militia was determined
upon, and the Colony forces were divided into three
regiments. Middlesex had one, Suffolk one and Es-
sex was joined with Norfolk in one. The valuable
relic now owned by the town of Bedford is, without
doubt, the banner carried by the Middlesex Regi-
ment.
** By the ruUe biiJge tljat nrclied the Huod,
Their flag to .\prir8 breeze uufnrleii,
Here once tbe enibattted runners Ktood,
And flrcd the shot Lcurtl round the world."
— Emerson.
The " Lexington Alarm List," in the archives of
the State, gives Bedford credit for twenty-six minute-
men, but has no record of the captain, Jonathan Wil-
son, who was killed on April 19, 1775. This unfortu-
nate omission is, doubtless, to be accounted fur by his
brief service (the sacrifice of life being made al)out
mid-day) and the few miles of travel, making the de-
mand against the Province too small to receive the
attention of the bereaved family.
The same list is authority in regard to the number
of men belonging to the Bedford tompany of militia
of the Seventh Regiment, together with their time of
service.
According to the sworn statements of the com-
manding officers of the Beiiford com|)anies, tiiere
were, from this town, engaged in that |)art of the
opening scene of the Revolution that took place at
Concord, seventy-seven men in organized command,
besides undrilled citizens who joined the ranks on
that morning. If, as a recent writer of Concord
tight has recorded, the Provincial forces " numbered
possibly three hundred and fifty men " at half-past
nine o'clock, more than one-fifth of them were from
Bedford. Thompson Maxwell (before mentioned)
was with the minute-men of Bedford on April 10th.
His journal of that date is as follows : " I again hap-
pened in Bedford with my team. I left Boston the
18th, and got to my native town that night, and put
up with my brother, Wilson (who married my sister),
and was Captain of the minute-men. Next morning
early he had orders to march with his company to
Concord. He requested me to go with him. I went,
well armed, and joined in the fight. My brother,
Wilson, was killed. Next day I hired a man to
drive my team home." His home was at Millbrd
(then Amherst), N. H. He later adds in his journal
"I never went home until after the Battle of Bunker
Hill." It is not certain how early the news of the
movement of the Regulars first reached Bedford on
the night of April 18, 1775, but it is very probable
that the town was warned among the first. Nathan
Munroe and Benjamin Tidd, at Captain Parker's re-
quest, went up to Bedford from Lexington, some
time in the evening, and, according to the sworn
statement of one of them, " notified the inhabitants."
The people had but little sleep that night, and were
astir long before the break of day.
There is a tradition that Maxwell's familiarity with
war led him to be suspicious of certain movements
that he saw in Boston, and that he and Wilson were
sitting, late at night, discussing the condition of affairs,
when the messenger reached the house. The min-
ute-men rallied .at the tavern in the village, kept by
Jeremiah Fitch, Jr., and there had some hastily-pre-
pared refreshments. The Captain gave the following
encouraging command .as the comjiany left for Con-
cord : " It is a cold breakfast, boys, but we'll give the
British a hot dinner; we'll have every dog i>f them
before night."
It is probable that the militia rallied at the home
of their captain, on the Concord road, antl were at the
scene of action before Captain Wilson';- company
reached there. On the arrival of the two companies
at Concord they assisted in removing stores to places
iif greater safety. It is said that Cornet Page laid
down his Hag and went to work, anil when returning
to look for it " found the boys had got it and were
playing soldiers with it."
The Bedf'onl men were on the ridge when they tirst
saw the British, but, with all the Americans, soon
turned and made haste to gel to the other side of the
bridge.
The Bedford companies met with no loss at the
bridge, and were all in the pursuit of the retreating
enemy. They left the " tireat Fielils " at Merriaiii's
Corner, and engaged in the attack, then hastened in
the pursuit, and were in the thitkest of the fight near
the " Brooks' Tavern,' where Captain Wilson was
killed and Job l.,ane wounded. It is not probable
that they continued in pursuit of the retreating en-
emy, but, with satldetied hearts, returned to their
homes, bearing their dead and wounded. A British
•soldier said of them and others: "They fought like
bears, and I would ;is soon storm hell as fight them
again.'' Bedford homes were full of anxiety that
day. The women were engaged in preparing food
and sending it on to Concord. One good lady said,
".\11 day long the bell was ringing and guns were
firing; people were dashing back and forth on horse-
back, and saying there had been an awful tight."
She had doubtless seen the Reading and Wilmington
companies and others as they passed through the
town or halted to rest at Fitch's tavern.
Admitting the militia roll, taken twenty-six days
after the opening scene of the war, to have been sub-
stantially that of a month earlier, it appears that all of
the able bodied men of this town, between sixteen and
sixty years of age, with the exception of eleven, were
on duty in the organized companies at Concord, on
April 19, 1775. Had this spontaneous uprising of
the people been a mad craze for war they would have
BEDFORD.
831
rushed to Lexington; but it was rather the natural
act of children hastening to the relief of a mother
threatened by a common enemy.
They received no cheer from their minister. When
the people were hastening to the scene of conflict, the
pastor was comfortably ensconced by his fire-aide,
where he was found by a neighboring clergyman, who
halted while on his way to Concord.
Both companies reported at Cambridge on the fol-
lowing day, and teams were soon on the road with
supplies for the army. No Bedford men were at
Lexington on the lUth. It fosters a .sort of patriotic
pride, that one of the daughters, Lucy Bowes, the wife
of Rev. Jonas Clark, was the entertainer of Hancock
and Adams. In 177i5 the entire population of the
town, including negroes and mulattoes, was 482. As-
suming that to have been the number one year earlier,
it appeal's that one-seventh of the entire population
participated in the opening scene of the Revolution.
Bedl'oid hail credit for seventy-three men, on May 1,
l77-'i, in the regiment under command of Colonel
Samuel Gerish.
The I'ollowing is a letter from one of the selectmen :
" l.''t|.L llREEN.
■' >ii\ — I liav(* Ilectjjvpil iL few liiipu ffiii ymi, u liPiPin you i'e>|iiee(e<l
iiic ra T:iUe :i lidt •tfiilt tliiit are liiilile to Itaie iirtiirt. :iii<t in i'.>iii|iliauce to
VMiii- re'iuest 1 have taken a list "fall that are Ket» ixl sixteen ainULxty,
tli.it are liable to 'lu <luty. There la ei^hfy-etght in the liar, iuchiiliiig
olfieer-*
•■ Oeator.l. May tlie 15", ITTJ."
.faniiary 1, 1777, the numlier of able-bodied men in
town, from -ixtcen years U|)wards, was UJl, inchiding
five negroes. In addition to the other burdens, this
town had twenty-nine of the [)oor of Boston to .sup-
port, during the siege of that city. .V. Board of Over-
.seera of the I'ocjr, separate from the selectmen, was
tirst chosen at that time.
The Maxwell brothers were both in camp at Cam-
bridge. Thoui[)son went with the Bedford men to
camp ontheday following his experience at Concord,
and there joined liis company under Captain Crosby,
from Milford, New Hampshire, in (l^olonel Reed's regi-
ment. Hugh was senior captain in Colonel Preacott's
regiment. Their experience in the Battle of Bunker
Hill is told in Thompson's journal, and is to the
honor of their native town :
" on the Ititli i)f .Iiiiie I '■■1. Heeil wju* ■inlerotl to Charleslun'ti neck.
AWmt twelve ti'chMk the same ilay a iiiiliiher uf uur ottieera pjisseU 113
anil »eiit on tu Bunker Hill. i;.-neiTil Wanl, with the rest, returneil
aiiil wi-m to <"'ambn'i;;e. hi the en'mni; Colonel l're!H;ott passed with
Ilia reginietit. My brother Hugh i>tepi>eil oiit anil iisked I'olonel Keeil
fluit Tii>»elf if we woulil lonie on to the hill that ni:;lit. We 'lid so ; we
went to llreeifH Hill. We found Colonel Putnain there, with Colonel
rre!*colt's euninianil.
" Colonel I'rescott requested my brother Hiii;h to lay out the
::ruund for the inlrenchnienc. He did so. 1 gel up the slakes after
them. < olonel Preecutt seenieil to have the sole •'omnmud. Col-
onel Reed and I returned to our cuininand on the neck .iboilt eleven
...'eliK-k iMl. .\t day, in the morning, we a^tn went to the hill, tound
Puinaui and Prescott there. Prescott still appeared to have comniaod :
no other regiment was there but Prescott's through the night. Captain
^Iftxwell, al"ter day, suggested, in my hearing, to Colonel Prescott the
propriety of running an intrencbment from tbe northeast atigle of the
night's work to a rail-fence leading to .>lystic River. Colonel Prescott
approved and it was done. I set up the stakes after my brother, .^bout
seven o'rlock I saw Colonels Prescott and Piituani in convetsiition ; im-
mediately after, Putnam mounted his horse and went full speed towartla
Cambridge. Colonel Reed ordered his men to their commands ; we re-
turned and prepared for action. At eleven o'clock we received orders
from Colouel Prescott to move on. We did so.
" We formed by order of Prescott down to the rail-fence and part on
the intrencbment. We got hay and wadded between tbe rnila, after
doubling tbe fence by post and rails from another place. We remained
there during the battle."
Maxwell also gives a detailed account of the battle,
which is substantially the same as given in general
historj', and we omit it here.
In 177G the town took action on thequestion of the
Colonies declaring their independence, and voted
thus: "That we, the said inhabitants, will solemnly
engage, with our lives and fortunes, to support them
in the measure."
The town hesitated on the adoption of a Constitu-
tion and form of government, but in August, 1779,
chose John Reed, Esq., as their representative, " for
the sole purpose of forming a new constitution.'' He
served in this convention, which was held in the
meeting-hoase at Cambridge, twenty-one days. In
the following May the form of government was sub-
mitted to the people and received their approval in a
meeting, three times adjourned, by a vote of twenty-
five to one.
The Declaration of Independence was first read to
the people by the minister from the pulpit of the old
meeting-house, and is spread, in bold hand-writing,
on the records of the town, " There to remain as a per-
petual memorial,'' signed James Webber, town clerk.
CHAPTER LXXIII.
BEDFORD -( Contimitd).
.MII.IT.VRY niSTORV.
^uppties f'>i thf AiTtxtj — Fiuaneuil l'iouble$ — Vot* for Gorertior "wUr the
I'oMMliliaion in 1780.
In January, 1776, the town furnished six cords of
wood and two tons of English hay daily for the army
at Cambridge. With each load of hay or wood went
packages from the loyal homes to the absent members
in camp and the sufferers in the hospitals. Two of
the strong young men of the town, who fought at
Concord, fell early victims of camp-fever at Cam-
bridge (Reuben Bacon and Solomon Stearns). The
town offered a liberal bounty for volunteers in 1776,
and at the close of the year voted "that those who
had personally done a turn in any of the Campaigns
without any hire be paid the amount of an average of
those hired." The committee entnisted with the
duty of equalizing bounty reported in November,
1777, a bill of £1746 16«. Families of the town
cherish with pride the tradition that their grandsires
were led by General Washing:ton to Boston, after the
832
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
evacuation by General Howe, and aided in the shout
of joy when the British flag gave way to the thirteen
gorgeous stripes of red and white.
It is impossible to make up a complete register or
state the exact number of men furnished by this town
during the Revolution, and equally difBcult to cast up
her entire public expenditures. Bedford's Province
tax from 1774 to 1776 increased more than five fold.
The opening of the war made a demand for money,
and in May, 1775, the Provincial Congress empowered
the treasurer to borrow and gives notes of the Province
as security. Soon Continental bills were issued by
the General Government. These bills were readily
exchanged for cash for a while, but the re|)eated is-
sues of such bills by both State and nation, and no
specie to redeem them, together with the durkening
days of the war, caused a depreciation in their value.
The British officers and those who favored the royal
cause lost no opportunity to weaken the confidence
of the people in the bills of credit, until it required
about seventy-five [)ounds in paper to procure one in
specie. £1 or 20s. waa worth in January, 17SI, only
■iil. I'/r. The purchasing value of any sum during
the war after January, 1777, can only be determined
by referring to a table of depreciation reported once
a month, agreeable to a law of the State for the set-
tling of contracts:
January 1, 1777, §1 in silver was rated as sJl.O") in
currency; January 1, 1778, $1 in silver was rated as
>^3.2S in currency; .January 1, 1771', $1 in silver was
rated as !?7.42 in currency; January 1, 17S0, .■?! in
silver was rated as #29.34 in currency; January 1,
17S1, >^1 in silver was rated as #75.00 in currency. |
In 1777 the town chose a committee at the March |
meetiug to hire the soldiers that might be called for
that year and empowered them to borrow moaey. The
amount borrowed with interest was t;377 3^. Hil,, paid
as follows:
For the Cuutiiieotal soldiors' hire
For the bounty tu the UhoJe laluDd men
For the bounty to the men tu Beiiain^lua ....
For ooe iiikd to guaixl the CoDtioental stoivil ....
Fur the thirty day iiiea to juio the Contiiieutul .\rniy
For iillowaoce for liiring the men 4
For fire-arms, lead and flintu for town stuclc .... 3.5
t. ,1.
lu n
10 0
0 0
II 0
11 0
11 u
1;J
:!
C577 3 3
The above amount was assessed and paid that year.
An item appears in the records May S, 1777, which
serves to show the cost of powder: "Then renewed
the Town stock of powder from Andover 72 weight
at six chellings per pound £21 12s."
The town allowed for bounties, £293. It wa-s di-
vided as follows :
t
1st Tour. 3 men, 2 montha, to Rhode Isl.tnd, May 1, 1777, uu boun-
ty voted.
2il Tour. J* men, 3 months, to Bennington, -\ug. "Jl, 17T7. e.^ch Hd . 120
3d Tour. 8 men, 30 days, " to take and guard the truupa," Sept., 1777
(meaning Burgoyne's surreudered array), each V- 16
4th Tour. 5 men, 3 months, to Boston with Capt. Farmer, each t;(2 60
oth Tour. 8 men. 3 months, to Cambridge with Capt. .Moore, April
1, 1778, £11 each 86
John Reed to Rhode lelaud, the same rate us tliose with Cupt,
Farmer '.i
March 23, 1778, the town reimbursed Moses .Vbbot
for money paid for guns, £18 Is. 'id.; also Joseph
Convers for the same, £18 Is. 3rf.
July 29, 1778, William Page is charged with the
overplus of money in collecting clothing by subscrij)-
tion for the Continental soldiers, £9 15.<.
Careful research proves that there was .scarcely a
campaign during the war in which Bedford was not
represented by her own citizens, and sup|>lies of boots,
shoes, blankets and clothing were continually fur-
nished by the people, who bravely endured hardships
in their homes. The soldiers, who had enli.sted for
three years, were paid in the depreciated currency, of
which it was said, " a hat-full of the stufi' would not buy
our families a bushel of salt," and many siiw but little
inducement to re-enlist ; and in 1779 the duty of fill-
ing the town'.s ([Uota became a serious matter. The
town added to the commissioned ofiicers three citizens
to aid tliem in procuring men. They were Moses
-Vbbott, Timothy Jones and Jonas Gleason. The
commissioned officers were Oa|)taiii John Moore,
Lieutenant Eleazcr Davis and Lieutenant Christo-
pher Page.
November, 1779, the following bounties were al-
lowed :
Ist Tuiir. - men to llliode Iceland, i'.'/J i-iuji 7&
jil Tour. '_' men tu ICIiu^le Iplund, {."^ biiblicl^ of intlian Lurn, euili
'" I.;'! per tnishi-l .-.lil
id Tour. 3 men to Norlli Iliver, two of w lioin have t3i'ii eiich . , tiiin
Tlie utlier tu have t.l::s e;inh ami .'>l hUBheUuf cunt al t.:i {ler bush. oS7
Itli Tuiir. 1! men tu Uubtuli, to have K'-l |iu. i-arli 4"i
''til Tour- 0 uieii tu L'laverick II ., mouthe, '-' tSil per month . . (.40
There way adileii fur lUlelfSl Jiin
Tutal fur year tilLiN
June, 1780, the town voted to hire the men called
for to fill up the Continental Army, and that the
tre.isurer borrow money, if needed. In .September
the committee reported and it was voted to raise and
•jssess £5500 immediately to pay the debt incurred.
l:,i-litU .
1st Tuur. 7 men ru Nurlli River, IJ inunthK, tu have eueh 120 busli-
els of corn S4o
2il Tuur. 8 men tu ttliode Island, 3 months, tu have each 90 bubliels
of corn 72' I
l.-.i.o
Oct. 2, 17.^0, " voted that ye sum of t&l7.i be immediately assesMMl
and collected tu euable the cummittee to procure the Beef re-
'|uired from this town for the army " tsl7,"'
By the resolve of December 2, 1780, Bedford was
called upon to furnish eight men for three years or the
war. The case now became doubly serious. The records
show that previous calls for men had been met by
citizens of the town, very generally ; but the sight of
their illy-paid neighbors returning from three years
of service, and the knowledge that hostile fleets were
in our ports, and hostile armies were upon our soil,
BEDFORD.
833
tended to dampen the most ardent patriotism. One
man, Joseph Davidsim, \va> hired by tlie town tor
^^21)0 in hard money. Then the town w:ls divided
into seven classes to secure the lull quota.
The report of the chairman of each cla.«s, as tiled
in the State archives, is as follows :
"Claes I. Cnpt. Jnbo Moore, cbftirnian ; provi.led 3 Deffro called i",ini-
bridge Moore (servant uf the :iltOTe), ;ind agreed to i;ive him, aj a bouD-
ty. Twenty bead of cattle, three ye.ird old, lu raoe he coutiDued iu the
service three year«.
■' riafis II, Ltetit. Mosee .\hlK)tl, chairniaa . hire<l .1 negi-o called
Cfeaar Preacolt for the same nuiiilier of cattle :ui the first class paid.
"t'lastilll. Tliuddeiia Deau. chalruia[i : hired oue Hetiry Kueelon, at
the same rate.
" f'lasa IV t'apt. Christopher P.ii,'e, chairuiau ; ' tlik- clasa, by rea»)n
of disappoiDtiuenl, have nr.t provided a man, but .ire ntili in piirtitit to
|'ru\ uje one.'
" ""Usw* V, ./oliu Reed, K-'i., ■■haiiniaii ; lined one lanieg lu^lef^and
^a\e hiui .IS n bounty liflc-n bead of < attle, line- > "ai^ oM, and nine
hundred and ninety pound in [laper money,
" '"'laiNi VI. Air. William Pace, cbairnmii : hired one .Kihn Williams,
and Rave hiiii, a» a bounty, the exch.iii;ie for two hundred and fifty harti
dollars in canh,
'■l^IaasVTI, Pea. Stephen Dan,s, chairman : hired one ,lose[th U<^=b.
and gave hira, as a biiunty, the excb.iiiue for nvo hnndied ,ind tweut}
'* Willi vm MK.r.ni ^^l.
" WlLLI.KM P\t,F..
rHBl,^l"lllFR P.X'.E,
.SvMITt. LvXE, .'R.,
.Sele. tni-li of Be.lfopl.'
While the several cnoimittees were at work [irocur-
iug men, the town voted in January, I7Sil,
" To choose a Coiuinittee to pne iiii: the jwition ot b.,.,r for ibe army.
and direrteil the a*>esrttjr.i lua»*e*.i r.ucli sums .i,» were iiecr.s?ary to .luhwer
the demands ol 'he Ceueral Ci-urt or tlodr lonitiiittee fliett, or in the
future.
".^Uieeable lo a K— ohe of llie lieiieral ••■•oil of y Irrof .liine. 1781
hired one man lo ;j:o to Rhode lelalld, h'- >\ as .t . r'i/eii ot the town,
.Samuel Harlweii Bbfu'l. ;;a^'• hitii alHiiiniy of y.V.) Int.
".luiie -Jo, ITsl. The town sent sev.-ri ui'-ii lo imn lieneral
W.uliiuctun s army .It Woi.t Point, 'rio-i r ivi.l '.1:1 1 6».
ea- li a^ a bounty 1-ls 12
His ■.:,
'-.July ::. 17-Sl. T'-wu v.u-d !■■ r-n,-- '-loo h.nd iii..iiey. to buy t-eef, an'l
on the 16th "if the same mouth xot-'l to i-iise l.4.'» bard money, to paj
the above-uauie't *oldieii» uli.il ilo y ;.ball ii-e-l lfeti.'ie iii.inhini:, and 'll
lecled the H«jeSsors t-i lu.ike lU .irt-es,.iiieiit- for the bal.tii< e, '
It i.s plainly seen that town-nieetin<rs ami assess
ments occupied the time and minds of the people. In
addition to the demands for the war there were the
ordinary expenses. It required £o000of the depleted
currency to meet the ordinary charges in the year
1780.
The financi.il condition of the town became alarm-
ing, when in .Sept., 17S1, " Voted, to horrow £40 to
pay interest on town notes.' The town also held notes
against individuals, received by constables in dis-
chailge of the oft-repeated rates.
Jan. 22, 17^2, " Voted, that ye treasurer receive
money of ye delimjuent constables aijreeable to the
depreciation scale, uuly excepting such sums of money
as they may have collected before this time and it re-
maining on hand." The same course was pursued in
discharging the town's debts. The selectmen were
directed to iiasist the treasurer in citsting the notes
and the interest. .Vt the same time " Voted, to raise
£225 for paying notes." Constables were authorized
5;J-ii
to.discount the rates of individuals from notes held
against the town, when they could no longer respond
to the calls with cash. While in the midst of the fi-
nancial difficulty the people manifested their integ-
rity in dealing justly with individuals who had entered
the service in the early years of the war without re-
gard for remuneration : " Voted, John Lane, Jr.,
fourteen pounds in specie, for his services in the army
in 1776, and (3liver Reed and Elijah Bacon the same
sums for hiring men in 1777, as tho.se had who did
personal service in that campaign, $25 each." In
January, 1779, the town vot«d " to abate half of Job
Lane's war rates in consideration of hia wounds re-
ceived at Concord tight." In the following year
voted " to abate his poll rates for every year since the
war began." In 178.3 voted " to abate Ebenezer
Fitch"s rates for being in the service in 177.5." He
was a " minute-man " at Concord, April 19, 177-5, and
at Cambridge ten days. March, 1782, the town was
dividetl into three classes to hire three men to serve
for three years or during the war.
That this obligation was readily dischargetl appears
from the following : Springfield, .luly -3. 1782. " Reed,
of Mr. -Moses Abbott forty-five pound as a bounty to
serve three years in the Continental .\rmy for the
town of Bedford. William Grant."
Boston, May 11, 1782. Receipt from Csesar Jones
for bounty of sixty pounds for similar service.
Boston, May 13, 1782. Receipt from Zephaniah
Williams for same amount as paid to .Tones.
It is noticeable that three negroes, relics of the days
of slavery in this town, not registered as liable to do
military duty, were in the army during the greater
part of the war — Cambridge Moore, C.'esar Prescott
and CiPsar Jones.
< let. 26, 1782. Town authorized their treasurer to
i take up a number of grain notes and sub.stitute notes
for hard money, allowing six shillings for each
bushel specified and interest for said amount from
the time the grain became due.
In justice to the Revolutionary fathers of this town
it is recorded that not the slightest evidence can be
found of inclination to repudiate the least obligation,
either legal or moral.
From the evidence at hand it appears that the men
of this town suffered the greatest hardship at the bat-
tle of White Plains, New York. Moses Fitch was
wounded in the shoulder, and was being aided off the
field when his comrade, Sergeant Timothy Page, was
killed.
Thomas Cleverly, another Bedford man, escaped,
but lost everything excepting what clothing he had
on.
In December following this battle. Congress vested
Washington with full power to raise an army and
leather provisions and to take whatever he might want
for the use of the army, if the owners refiised to sell.
He also had power to arrest and confine persons who
refu.sed to take the Continental currency. This was
834
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the condition of affairs when Moses Fitch was able to
leave the hospital ; he returned to his home disabled
for life, having received for his services a portion ol
the currency that had but little purchasing value. He
was pensioned for life.
With a population ranging from 470 to 482 engaged
in agricultural pursuits, it is wonderful that the town
could meet the frequent demands for men and money.
Besides the regular calls there were continual de-
mands for delicacies for the sufferers in the hospitals
and comforts that could not be furnished by the reg-
ular channels of supply. To these the straitened
inhabitants were continually responding. The women
were busy spinning and weaving. In 177<> the town
furnished twelve blankets for the army by order of
the General Court of January 4, 1776. Shirts, stock-
ings, shoes and other articles of dress for the soldiers',
in addition to the quantities of beef, were supplied by
the people of Bedford. The treasurer's accounts show
the cost of a blanket to have been £'.10, but according
to the scale of depreciation, $2J in silver would have
satisfied the bu.iy housewife. In 17iS0 " E-m). John
Reed " was allowed «!25 per day for services and ex-
penses, twenty-one days, in forming the Constitution,
but he actually realized less than one dollar per day,
as one Spanish milled dollar was equal to forty-two ol
the old emission on April 1st, and before the close oi
that year was equal to seventy-four.
The i=1.00 bill, about two inches square, had on its-
face the Latin words " Depresisia resurgit," which is,
in our tongue, " The down-trodden rises."
Under the new Constitution of 1780 the vote in
this town for Governor, taken on .September 4th, gave
the successful candidate, John Hancock, twenty-five
ballots against two for .Fames Bowdoin. " Esq. John
Reed" was sent to the General Court in 1783 and
granted five shillings per day for his services while he
attended the court. The town chose a committee to
give him instructions in relation to the return of ab-
sentees and conspirators.
To be eligible to the office of representative at this
time, one must be an inhabitant of the town and be
seized of a freehold of the value of £100 in the town
or any estate to the value of £200. The representa-
tive was cho.sen in the month of May, ten days at
least before the last Wednesday. The members of
the Executive Department were chosen ou the first
Monday of April, and inducted into office on the last
Wednesday of May following.
CHAPTER LXXIV.
BEDFORD— ( Continued).
MILITARY HLSTORY.
Sha^B* BtinUion aiid Subiequeni lyoublet — CifH War — Btd/ord'* Honored
Dead.
Bedford was reluctant in voting to adopt the Con-
stitution, but having done it, she was true to its
provisions. In the County Convention at Concord,
August 23, 1786, "to consult on matters of public
grievance, under which the people labor," John
Merriam and Timothy Jones represented the town.
They were active in all measures adopted to quiet
the minds of the people who attempted to oppose the
government. Captain Christopher Page headed a
large company of militia in Shays' Rebellion, and in
the following year the town voted " to pay each man
who went to Concord and Stow to join General Lin-
coln sis shillings per day."
Foreign troubles »nd the war with the Western In-
dians were occasions for calls for soldiers by the Gen-
eral Government, and the town voted on August 28,
1794, " to give each soldier that shall voluntarily en-
list the sum of eighteen shillings as a bounty, and to
make them up >^8.00 per month, including the state
pay, in case they are called upon to march, and for
the time they are in actual service." The soldiers
that enlisted were .Moses .\bbott, Jr., John Reed, Jr.,
Eleazer Davis, Jr., Jcilin Merriam, Jr., Job Webber,
A.-sa Webi)er, \\'illiam .1. Lawrence and William
Kemp.
In 171)8 troubles with the French aroused the peo-
liie in this town as elsewhere. Many leading citizens
adopted and wore the constitutional biulge of attach-
ment t<i the Government, The town voted on No-
vember 5th " that the Selectman be directed to show
out to the (irticers from the town slock as much pow-
der and ball and as many fiiuts as the law requires
for each soldier of said company on their inspection
days, and also that the selectmen be directed to fur-
nish each soldier on muster days with sixteen car-
tridges out of said town stock." The alarm of war
with Great Britain in I.'^o7 was .in occasion for action,
and the tiiwn voted " tn make up to the soldiers that
may voluntarily turn out in defence of our country,
S14.00 per month as wages, if called into active ser-
vice, and to give the men, ordered to Ije discharged
from Captain Lane's Company, if they should volun-
tarily turn out, $3.00 per man, as an encouragement
to the same, whether they march or not."
December 27th the town "granted to Captain Lane's
soldiers who should enlist in the defence of our coun-
try for the term uf sis months $13 per month as
wages during the time they are in actual service."
The 1812 or Madison's war, was a time of anxiety
and increased military duty. The order came for the
Bedford company to march at once for the defence of
Boston; anight wiis passed in the preparation, women
cooked, while men and boys made cartridges. It was
on a beautiful Sabbath morning of September that
the fife and drum summoned the militia together
at the old meeting-house, Captain David Reed in
command. With saddened hearts the entire people
assembled for a brief religions service. After words
of exhortation and earnest prayer from the patriotic
pastor, came the partings and the march.
The last person who lingered outside the meeting
BEDFORD.
835
house, and watched with tearful eyes the departing
troops, was the venerable deacon, who, still suffering
from the wounds received in the Revolution, felt
most keenly the parting from his son. It required
but .1 few days to prove that the call had been a
mistaken one, and the company were gladly received
to their homes.
In 1815 the Commonwealth reimbursed the town
" for rations furnished the militia when called to Bos-
ton."
Bedford saw but little of military life for nearly a
half-century after General Jackson's victory at New
Orleans.
The militia observed the spring " training,'' when
officers were elected and the fall preparations for
muster.
The full company of the town «as in .ittendance at
the reception tendered Marquis de Lafayette, in 1825,
when the corner-stone of Bunker Hill monument was
laid. For some years the military duties were but
little more than a dull routine, unless enlivened by«a
sham figly:, etrling in a representation of the sur-
render by Lord Cornwallis to Washington. The
town had no oriianized company after ISo-'J. The
sentiment of the town was with the 'tovernment in
regard to the Mexican trouble. In .March, 1847, res-
olutions were adopteil and placed upon the records
of the town. They begin as follows:
" Rt-8olve<l,— Tliat we .iiiprove of the rMurao our !r«iv.*rnment hiw,
pursued ill jti-oswMiliDi; th«» war with ^lexico for the .ittMinment of ue
goCuitiuiid t<>r .111 lH)iiunilile pe;i> •-. '
The years that followed the .Mexican trouble fur-
nished important subjects lor (lebate, and the citizens
of this town organized a lyteum, where perfect free-
dom of speech w:is enjoyed. The Fugitive .Slave
Law, the Kansas and Nebraska Bill and many kin-
dred themes wt-re earnestly discussed. The people
heartily indorsed the acts of t 'liaries Sumner. Henrv
Wilson and other unflinching defenders of the cause
of freedom. The brutal attack of Preston Brooks
upon Charles Sumner in the Senate Chamber, at
Washington, was felt by the citizens of this town as
a personal insult. A legal meeting of the voters was
immediately called and resolutions adopted and
placed upon the records.
The people carried out their bold sentiments in
their public and private acta. The advocate of free-
dom for the slave always secured a hearing, and the
homes of leading citizens were o[)en to those who,
early or later, espoused the cause of the bondmen. In
the fall of ISeiO, when the two political parties,
" Democrat ' and " Republican," were sub-divided
into four, this town gave her support to the Republi-
can, and gave a large per cent, of her votes for Abra-
ham Lincoln.
In the months that followeil, during which the
"Southern Confederacy " wiis formed, there was a
feeling of deep interest in this small town bordering
upon excitement.
The attack upon Fort Sumter, April 12, 1861,
opened the War of the Rebellion and aroused a gen-
eration that had never felt the devastations of war or
learned the evolution of troops. The young men of
Bedford, true to their ancestral record, began to en-
list, and eleven had entered the Union Army before
the close of the year. .A.mong them was Cyrus Page,
then sixty years of age, and still bearing the honorary
title of captain, conferred upon him by the old militia
company of the town.
But fifteen days after the outrage upon Sumter, a
" Liberty Pole" was erected upon the " Common '' or
"Training-Field." Oliver W. Lane, a descendant of
the Lanes of Indian and Revolutionary fame, contrib-
uted the most towering pine of his forest; every arti-
san and workman joined in the rally on April 27lh,
and raised the pole, from which the flag of the Union
was unfurled and waved daily during the years of
bloody conflict, now raising the spirits of the people
as it waved from its highest point, and anon hushing
them to silence, as, from half-mast, it betokened a
nation's sorrow.
On June 27th, 18(il, two months after the unfurling
of the Hag, and directly beneath its folds, occurred the
first los> of life in Bedford, indirectly caused by the
war. The alarm had led to a very general practice of
firearms, and a young man injudiciously discharged
his pistol across the Common and killed a bright boy
of nine years, Samuel T.Hughes. The first recorded
action ou the part of the town was a vote instructing
the selectmen to draw from the treasury, according to
their discretion, for the su[)port of the families of vol-
unteers and a tender of the free use of the town hall
"to the Ladies' Soldiers' .V id Society to hold their
meetings to render aid to the sick and wounded sol-
diers of our army."
This .society ilid most valuable service through the
war, continually contributing through the various
Christian and Sanitary Commissions. Some of the
women gave personal service as nurses in the camp.
In .\ugust, l.St;2, a bounty of $100 was voted to each
volunteer for nine months' service. In 1864 the town
raised $624 to till her quota. The sums raised by
a vote of the town indicate but a fractional part of the
money expended by her citizens in the cause. Not
less than $5000 were contributed to the war by the
town in addition to the long-continued drain by tax-
ation. Besides the direct tax, there was the indirect
or "Internal Revenue," which demanded, and vigi-
lant officers collected rates uponalmost every transac-
tion. .Vfter the war closed, the Ladies' Aid Society
turned its attention to procuring funds for the erec-
tion of a monument to the memory of those who had
died in the struggle.
About $1600 were earned and contributed for that
purpose with which a suitable Scotch granite monu-
ment has been erected in Shawshine Cemetery. The
inscriptions are as follows :
"SalJien' Memorial, 1861-05. Tbey gara their Urea for as and thalr
836
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
coaotry. The Ladies of Bfldford pay thia affectiooate Tribute to their
memory.
"Albert L. Butler, died 18fi2 ; Charles W. Goodwin, died 1802 ^ Clark
C. Cutler, died 1862 ; Henry Hosmer, died 1862 ; Thomaa Isaac, died
1863 ; James Muuroo, died 1863 ; Samuel W. Stearns, died 1863 ; Joshuii
Atwood, died 1864 ; John Byron, died 1864 ; Charles Coudry, died ISM ;
William F. Gragg, died 1864 ; Wanen G. Holbrook, died 1864 ; Charles
W. Lunt, died 1864 ; Charles A. Saanders, died 1864.
Memorial dav is sacredly observed on each annual
return, and the rapidly increasing listofgravesof those
who served their country in the war receives the at-
tention of a grateful people.
At the memorial service of 1887, immediately fol-
lowing the death of Captain Cyrus Page, the follow-
ing h)Tnn was sung. It was composed for the occa-
sion by Abram E. Brown, and " dedicated to the
Memory of Captain Cyrus Page and other Brave men
who honored Bedford in the war of the Rebellion : "
**AII honor to our soldiers brave,
Who left their home and kindred dear,
Who nobly fought this land to save,
Of the oppressors' rod to clear.
•' Their mounds we'll deck with flowerets bright ;
' Their noble deeds to children tell ;
Through passing yean and ages' lligbt
A country's pride their praise shall swell,
" The earthly file is narrowing fast.
The ranks of Heaven are gaining there.
Let's halt, and down our garlands cast,
While for the living raise a. prayer.
" In Thee, 0 God, we're trusting still.
Our fathers' (iod, Thou too bast been.
With joy we'll own Thy sovereign will,
.\nd lollowing Thee, life's battle win."
There were enrolleii as liable to do military duty
in 1861, eighty names, and in l.?62 the enrollment list
reached eighty-seven.
In the army roll ninety names are registered to the
credit of Bedford. Seventy-four ol' them were citizens
of the town. Six were in the service of the navy.
CHAPTER LXXV.
BEDFORD— {Conti7tued).
Financial Troubla — Old Tenor and Lowfvl !\foiiey — SUivery in Bedford —
Bill 0/ Sale of a A'eyro B^y te I"oS.
Bedford was incorporated at the time when the
currency of the Province was in a very uncertain
condition. The General Court had been issuing pa-
per money without an adequate provision to retain its
nominal value ; hence specie was growing scarce and
the " Bills of Credit" were continually depreciating;
but as these bills were almost the only medium of
exchange, the people clamored for more and the ma-
jority of the Legislature seemed ready to gratify them
despite the opposition of the Royal Governor, which
in 1740, occasioned a severe quarrel. Each new issue
of " Bills of Credit " caused a decline in the value of
the currency. In 1730 they had sunk more than
half below their nominal value and the depreciation
continued until 1750. The fluctuation in the value
of this currency was a source of general embarrass-
ment, and contracts involving annual salaries were
fulfilled with difficulty by the most scrupulous.
In agreeing with Rev. Nicholas Bowes, the first
minister, the town voted " that our money shall be
in proportion as it is now in valiacon, rising, fallin."
The value at that time was eighteen shillings per
ounce. The decline was so great that in 1749, the
last year of the " Old Teuor " bills, the town voted to
give Rev. Mr. Bowes £240 in place of £100, but he
returned £20 for the use of the schools. In 1750
voted to give him " £50 13*. 4(/. Lawful money."
The expectation of having the " Bills" exchanged
for specie led many to hoard them, and it became
difficult for the collector of taxes to get the dues of
the Province, and the time for settling demands was
neces.sarily extended. The following rhyme gives an
idea of the change that was anticipated :
" And now Old Teuor, fare you well.
No more sticb tattered rags we'll tell,,
New dollars pass and are made free ;
It is :t year of jubilee.
Lei us therefore good husbands be.
And good old times we soon shall see."
The town paid for their minister's wood in 1749
35». per cord " CId Tenor," and in the following year
the price paid per curd was 4». " Lawful money."
In 1749 the people worked out their highway
" Rates," and were allowed during three summer
months 14.s. each man per day, and in the other
months %s. per day; a yoke of oxen with cart 8«. per
day, "Old Tenor." In 1750 the allowance in "Law-
ful money " for a man was 'Is. per day until the last
of September, and in the rest of the year \s. per day.
For oxen and cart the allowance was 1«. 4(/. per day.
The scarcity of money was felt by the people pos-
sessed of property as well as others, and trade was
carried on largely by barter. In the list of tax-payers
reported in arrears in March, 1753, the names of
leading citizens are found. By a law of the (General
(^ourt the bills of cretlit were redeemed at a rate that
was about one-tifth le.ss than their lowest current
value — that is at fifty shillings for an ounce of silver,
which was valueil at lis. 8rf., or an English crown.
Here originated the "Old Tenor" reckoning.
March ?A, 1750, marked the era of " Lawful money,"
after which date all debts were contracted on the
specie basis of rt«. 8(/. per ounce of silver and three
ounces of silver were equal to £1.
With the currency restored to a metallic basis and
to a uniform value the people were free from all such
trouble for more than twenty years. The fluctuating
.state c)f the currency, dwelt upon at length in the mil-
itary section, made it difficult to adjust tlie ministe-
rial rates in the years of the Revolution as it was in
the pastorate of Rev. Mr. Bowes. In May, 1778, the
town added to Rev. Mr. Penniman's salary, for the
BEDFORD.
837
year ensuing, £66 1^,3. -Id. and reimbursed him for
bad money paid to him by the collector, princi-
pal and interest amounting to X9 lOi. In 1780, "on
account of the decline in currency, the town gave
him tifty bushels of Rye and fifty bushels of Indian
Corn, to 1)6 delivered in January, 1781." In 1791
the selectmen were authorized to sell the Continental
money at their discretion and the treasury was
relieved of its burdensome paper for a nominal
sum. £1032 9«. 6d. " old tenor " sold for £■> Zd. If.
A similar difficulty was encountered in the pastorale
of Rev. Samuel .Stearns. The town gave him a choice
at first of $1333.33^ as an annual salary or the same
amount in beef, pork, rye and Indian corn, but past
experience led some of the people to object to an in-
definite salary and ilr. .Stearns accepted of the defi-
nite sum ; his letter of acceptance was accompan-
ied with the following : " Resting assured that the
town will not willingly see me suffer by reason of the
depreciation of the currency hereafter." Through
the depreciation that soon followed, Mr. Stearns was
obliged to sell land and went in debt for about five
hundred dollars before he tippealt-d to the town.
November 16, 1801, the town voted to lend him one
thousand dollars, without interest, so long as he
should supply the desk. In 1808 the town voted " to
add the sum of three hundred dollars to his salary in
semi-annuai payments of fifty dollars each." They
also added two cords of wood to his annual portion.
This was both just and generous, and occa.sioned by
the change in cost of supplies and the increase of the
pastor's family. A fragmentary journal kept by
Rev. .Samuel Stearns in the fir><t year of his ministry
in Bedford shows one hun<lied and twenty-eight
donations of family supplies during eight months.
This shows how the minister was able to brimr up
and educate his large family.
Slavery- existed in Bedford, as elsewhere, though
not attended with the evils that accompanied the in-
human system in many parts of the countrv. The
atmosphere of New England, especially of Ma.-<8achu-
setts, was not favorable to its growth. Long before
the spirit of liberty manifested itself in resistance to
the mother country, and long before the .idoption
of the Constitution of 1780, individuals of Bedford had
freed their slaves, who in the maiu were held as family
servants, but were regarded aa property, and in some
families bought and sold like cattle. The extreme cau-
tion taken by towns in general, and this in particular,
to prevent the settlement of paupers, obliged a person
who desired to free his slaves, to give bonds that the
freed persons should not become public charges.
This requirement, no doubt, deterred some from giv-
ing freedom to their slaves, who were fully conscious
of. the injustice. "March y' 23, 1761, Col. John
Lane gave a bond to Stephen Davis, Town Treasurer,
to save and indemnify the town of Bedford from any
charge that may arise by reason of his negro man be-
ing set free." Colonel Lane was assessed in that year
for his '' negro man's minister's rate, 2" 6''." A citi-
zen of Bedford has the original, of which the follow-
ing is a copy :
"To 3tr. Hurriflun gray, treasurer fur the province of tlie Maaaacbu-
^ettd bay, dir, be pleaded to give Mr. Moees Abljott, tbe t>earer bereof,
;ill tbe wages that \n due to uie for niy DegrooiaD, torrey more, beiug in
the couuty service ia tbe year 17J7, uoder capta peaaer till he got to tbe
cascel, und tbea weot to L'rown point under Capt. elioglesh, or give me
Aa order to Mr. Mosea abbott, coosteble of bedfortl, and this receipt
dball be your dtacharge, and you will ubligu your bumble servant,
"John Lane."
It is evident that slaves had been kept in the Lane
family, as well as in others, from their earliest settle-
ment in this territory, and that Torrey was a family
j name for the colored race in their possession, as ap-
I pears from the following copy of the original :
I "Tbid may certify to alt persons tliat I, Mary Lynden, of Boeton, do
?elt all uiy right in a boy called Torrey, to John L&ne. given to lue ac-
' I'oi'diug to a county court record 1676. Mary Lvmden."
The following is copied from the original bill now
filed in the town :
" Nathaniel Tay sold bid negro to >Ir. John Page for twenty 'pound in
money aud six pound in bill. Nathaniel Tat, 1691."
In 1764, Captain James Lane gave a bond freeing
his slave. The records furnish other instances of
slaves being set free by the voluntary action of the
, citizens of this town. Although treated as property,
I the colored people were permitted to enjoy many
I privileges with their masters. They had seats as-
signed them in the meeting-house. The rite of bap-
I tisin was administered, and they were admitted to full
membership in the church, upon "owning the cove-
nant." The church records furnish proof like the fol-
lowing:
*' Baptised, Isbniael, rt negro (adult), July ye 4">, I7;^i;." "Baptized,
'iuinibo, A negro man who confeaaed, etc., .luly ye .>0, 1751." "Baptized,
Torrey, a negro man, January ye 1-2, 1751-'."2 " "Baptized, .\brabani, don
jf Jack, negro, Nov. ye II, 1753." " .\dniitted iut;> full coiumuoiou,
tlannnb Drury, wife of Zebcdee Drury and Lois Burdo (a uegro). Sept.
ye o'l", 1742."
I The register of deaths kept by Rev. Mr. Bowes has
entries as follows, which suggest ownership :
" Not. ye 2, 1737, Cuff, a negro child btluugmg to Mr. Zacheus
I Wbltney." " .\ug. 3, 1749. Domire, a negro boy, who belonged to Mr.
I John Lane."
[ There is evidence that slaves were retained by some
I families until 1780, when the Constitution adopted
i by the State declared in Article I, " All men are born
I free and equal, and have certain natural, essential
and inalienable rights," etc. When the articles
I of the Constitution were acted upon by the town,
there were three opposing votes to Article I, and the
I military records show that three slaves were serving
\ in the army, while by the treasurer's returns of those
years it is seen that Captain Moore collected bounty
j and pay for services of Cambridge (a negro man).
I Other similar records are found.
i There is no evidence that any of the slaves of this
town were permitted to accompany their masters to
Concord on April 19, 1775, or that they were then en-
rolled as liable to do military duty ; but when it be-
838
HISTORY OP MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
came apparent that war had really begun^ and calls
for men followed each other in rapid succession, the
slaves were pressed into the service. Cambridge
Moore, Caesar Prescott and Ciesar Jones were early re-
corded as doing military duty, to the credit of their
masters. When one campaign or tour was over,
they were put into another, and so continued iu the
service until 1780. In December of that year they
entered the army as free men, and received bounty
and pay like their white neighbors. May 11,1782,
Caesar Jones signed, by '* his X mark," a receipt for
"sixty pound, E. money, as a bounty, to serve in the
Continental Army for the term of three years." " A
free negro," is the note appended. The following
document is treasured in the town :
"Know all men by these Prf-aents — Thnt I, Jo«epb Fitch, uf Bedford,
in the County of Middlesex, in the Province of the niaasacliusetts bay
in New England, Gentleman, for and in consideration of the Sum of
Twenty-Konr Poundu, Lawful money of New England, to me in band
Paid at and before the Sealing 1 Delivery of these Presents, by Joseph
Hartwell, of Bedford abovesaid, Veumuu, tbe Receipt whereof I Do
hereby acknowledge, Have bargained A Sold & by these Pre-ieiitsi Do i
Bargain & Sell unto tbe Said Joseph Hartwell, a Nei;ro bny about Kivf 1
years old, iJallt-d Jefterree, now living at tbe said .luaeph Haitwell;", lu I
have Jc to bold the Said Negiu boy by tbese prefents Bargained lli<^Suld ,
unto the said Jo>4eph Hartwell, bis Executors & Administrators J: as-
ai^^na for Ever. X J, the baid Joseph Fitch, for my Self, my Kxeciitors and
Adniinibtnitor'b do warrant the above 6«* Negro boy unto the Said Junepli i
Hartwell, his Executors, Adntinistratoi-w A Aasigna, against me, and waid I
Ju!!iepb Fitch my Executors, AdminlBtratora a: Assigns, .v acain>t all \
\ every other Person and Per«ina What so ever, Shall and Will warrant !
X Defend by tbese Presents of which Negro lK>y, I, the said Ju*;|>h Fitcli, '
have put the S'< Jo^pli Hartwell in full Possession by Deli\eriiig S-i
Negri* at the Sealing hereof unto the S** Joseph Hartwell. In Witness ,
Whereof 1 have hereunto Set my Hand .t Seal this Sixth Day of July,
Auno Douiiui, One thoutiand Seven Hundred X Fifty Six, Jt in tbe
twenty-Ninth year ol hid uiujisties Reign, A:c. "
"Signed, Sealed and Delivered in Presence of
"HtJMPHREl PlEBCK, i
her i
"Sarah X Pierce,
ntark '
" Joseph Fitoh."
I
It is doubtful if slaves set at liberty in advanced
age, entirely inexperienced in caring for themselves,
were benefited thereby. The records show that .sev-
eral of theui became dependent upon public charitv.
They were treated with as much consideration bv
those in charge of the poor as were their white com-
panions in misfortune. In 1820 "The Selectmen
sold at vendue the wearing apparel of Dinah, a wo- ]
man of color, deceased, amounting to §7.84; also
bought a Baise gown for the use of Violet, a colored
paupef, forjil.GO, leaving a balance of S6. 24." Violet
was the last freed slave who died in this town. She
was supposed to have lived a full century, and died in
1842. John Moore, a prominent citizen of the town,
had slaves of both ^exes, and Violet is thought to
have been the one for whom he made provision in !
his will in the year 1807, thus : " to daughters Mary
Fitch and Lydia Bowers, the net of my personal es- !
tate, on condition that they support my negro girl in '
sickness and health, through life, and give her a de- i
ceut burial." Violet's unusually long life may ac- )
count for the violation of the provision made by her
master.
The only memorial-stone bearing evidence that
this race lived, served and died in Bedford was
erected inShawshine Cemetery by Josiah A. Stearns,
A.M., in memory of Peter, an honored family servant,
who was buried in the " African reservation " in the
old burial ground.
CHAPTER LXXVI.
BEDFORD— i CoiUiniifd).
PiiUic Charity, How Difjietifed — Toipn Farm for Pofi:
Great caution was used to prevent people from be-
coming paupers in the early days ; but when public
support was demanded, and a settlement established,
tbe poor were well treated. \Vhen a citizen admitted
jnerabers to his family he was obliged to report to the
selectmen and secure the town against their support
as appears by the following:
" Bt-Jfiird, .lune 21", IT.'.C. I, .Ijuc** Kt-li'lall. ..f Beilfoi'J, di' iToiiiise
iind <-ni.'ai:e fur me and my Iiciri to free .iiid ■^'-fure the tuwii .if Hedforil
from liny i-hnrire that ^ball iirjjie from tlif iimiiitfiianre of my father and
iliollier, .facoti and Alide Keud.all, ad witiic^j my hand.
".I\cuB Kendall.'
People coming into town to settle, whose record
was not fully clear, and means of support perfectly
evident to the selectmen, were warned out of town in
a legal manner, and caution entered at the Court
where a record could be consulted. Thus families
were compelled logo from town to town in a most
unfriendly manner. The following is the form of
warning used in this town and served by the consta-
ble on the order of the selectman :
■■ MiJdle:^ex, S. S., to A. B., ^iie uf tbt confit.lbles uf the town of Bed-
furil. fireetiog :
"In His >tajesty'3 oame you are hereby le.jiiiied to warn U. E. and
family thai lliey forthwith depart ihi^ town, the M.'ieclmen refusing to
admit tbeu) aa lubaliitHtitd. Voii are ulso t.. inquire trnni whence they
last i-aiue, and what time tliey came to Ibis tow n. and nmhe return here-
<t( under your baini with your di-inii- liierein, iinio tiie selectmen or to
tbe town clerlt. Dated .tt B. tbe day of , .\nno Pomine. In
the year of Uia Staje^ly's Reign.
*' Per order of the Selectmen,
"G. U., Toiaii Clerk.'
The record.s prove that parties were otlen warned
from the town. "Seth Putnam and his family
warned out of town and caution entered at March
Court, on ye second Tuesday of March, An: Dom :
1748-9."
A warning cannot be considered as unquestionable
evidence against a family ; for we tind the record of
warning against parties that appear in subsequent
records as occupying places of trust in the community.
Young ladies were legally warned out of town who
became, in subsequent years, wives of leading men.
That the selectmen were faithful in complying with
the law is apparent by the following record : " Feb. 9,
BEDFORD.
839
1767 — Mr. Thomas Page, who had received Dr. Bal-
lard into his family, as a boarder, iu Marcher Aprilla.st,
and never had informed thereof, being then present
before the selectmen, it w.as proposed to him, by the
selectmen, whether the Dr. Joseph should be warned
out of town ; and he, not desiring the same, the select-
men therefore agreed not to caution against the Dr.
Joseph, nor yet to admit him as an inhabitant." Dr.
Ballard was the second physician of the town, coming
from Lancaster. He became a valuable citizen ; was
a delegate to the Provincial Congress, in Concord,
1774, and was a distinguished man. He died Jan. 29,
1777.
In the list of orders drawn upon the treasury it
appears that the constables were liberally paid for
"Entering Cautions;" one charge was seventeeen
shillings. Iu 1737 the town had its first lawsuit. It
was with the town of Concord, over the support of a
family by the name of Ross. Bedford lost the case, but
a feeling of unjust dealing appears, from a record
made later, when a committee was chosen •' to .attend
to the witnesses who appeared against the town in
the suit before the Superior Court." How Ross got
a settlement in Bedford is not clear. The Lexington
records show that he was warned from that town.
The original of the constable's return is evidence that
Bedford did not fail in trying to locate him in Con-
cord :
" MidJIesex, ^..'^. Concord, May :',0^^, IT^T." In obedience cothia war.
mrit, I have conveyeil yo within n;iriieil I'.-uhel Ri«)« and his wife unto
tlie 9aid tou-n of Concnrtl, .v delivered tlieru to one of ye i-(io:itableH of
wl. town and at ye auuie time delivered liini a <-u|iy of ye vvitliin writletj
warrant. "Ki-hkiaai r)»\iv.
•■ f...,,(..(.(r ,./ B,,lfi,r,ir
The inhumanity of such dealing with a man at the
age of ninety years can but arouse the indignation of
a reader at this day.
That the town furnished more than the necessaries
of life for this family appears from the treasurer's
report of 1742. " For beeping of Ross t:21 3^. Od.
For tobaka for Ross 15».," and another charge in the
same year " For tobaka for Ross 8s., and for a jacket
£1,'' Rev. Mr. Bowes' register of deaths shows that
Daniel Ross died " Oct. ye 27, 1748, aged 100 yrs."
leading to the conclusion that the appetite, so gener-
ously gratified by the town, may have been acfjuired
of the Indians long before the struggle with King
Philip. For some years the care of the poor was let
out annually by " public vendue," the contract being
clo.sed with the lowest bidder, .^s late as 1804 we find
the following action : '' Dorcas Bacon put to board with
Simeon Stearns, until next March meeting, at sixteen
centa per week, they to get what service from her
they could." At length this plan gave rise to dissat-
isfaction, in that the worthy poor were liable to fall
to the charge of irresponsible parties, and the duty of
assigning homes for the paupers was referred to the
selectmen with discretionary power. In 1823 a
written contract was made with Thoma.s Page for ihe
support of the poor, and bonds were required to the
amount of $300. Some of the specifications of the
contract are as follows :
" With regard to their diet, they are to be provided
with a sutSciency of good and wholesome food, with
tea or coffee twice in each day, if they choose, with
sweetening; cleanly and comfortable lodgings, sea-
sonable medical aid in case of sickness, and other
things to make them comfortable as their condition
may require."
Paupers were boarded by other towns in Bedford
families. In 1741 twenty of such are recorded here,
some of whom were from New Hampshire. The long
distance from their place of settlement made it possi-
ble for great injustice to be done them by those who
promised faithful care. In the early years of the
town's history the needs of paupers were discussed
in open town-meeting, and a detailed report made by
the treasurer of each bill of charge for their relief.
The records show that the needs of a poor widow
were annually discussed in town-meeting, for many
years, without the slightest regard for her feelings.
Further on the charge appears, " for Coffin, grave &
gloves £1 5s., and a credit for the sale of her property
at Vendue £2 1.3s. id."
The treasurer's account of 1802 has the following
charge to the town : " Paid John Page for making a
cortin for child and fetching the corps,
.S2.25."
In 1833 the town voted to buy a "poor farm and
stock it." This being done, the care of the farm and
support of the poor was placed iu the hands of a
board of overseers, who at the town's expense, employ
a superintendent and matron, and public charity is
dispensed according to the most approved plans. By
a vote of the town, a simple stone, suitably inscribed,
is placed at the grave of each pauper, thus preventing
the increase of unknown graves in the burial-grounds.
CHAPTER LXXVII.
BEDFORD— {Continued).
BURIAL-GROTDfDS.
.A. BURIAL-GROUND was indispensable to a well-reg-
ulated town, and the incorporators of Bedford has-
tened to assign a piece of ground convenient to the
meeting-house for that use. October 23, 1729, "The
selectmen met and laid out a burying-place in the
land that Mr. Israel Putnam gave to the town."
Later they changed the location a little, making
mention of "a bridal way that leads from the road
that runs from the meeting-hous to Woburn." In
1734 the town voted " to release John Mansfield's
rates if he will keep the brush down in the bnrying-
pl.ice." Thus the citizens early manifested a regard
for this sacred spot. Having a central locatioo, it has
840
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
never been allowed to show signs of neglect that are
too often noticed in towns of New England. For one
hundred and eighteen years this was the only place
of interment in town. The most careful estimate,
aided by authentic records, leads to the conclusion
that not lesa than fourteen hundred bodies have been
returned to their kindred dust within that enclosure.
The town set apart a corner for the burial of the
African race, and there in the "African reservation,"
in unmarked graved, are Cuff, Dinah, Violet, Jack,
Ishmae), Quimbo, Toney, Abraham, Domire, Pomp,
Caesar, Cambridge and others. In 1810 the town
erected a house for keeping the hearse. It was in
the southwest corner of the yard. The expense was
$48.50. The contractor agreed to prepare the ground
and underpinning, in addition to erecting the house,
which, according to specifications, was " to be built
with good material and painted twice over." Here
were safely kept the hearse, bier and pall. The old,
cracked bell was stored here for a while, and here
was stored the town's stock of powder and other mili-
tary equipments, all of which were associated with
death or a state of uselessness. The absence of a
record of consecration leads one to the conclusion
that the incorporators of this town, like the earlier i
generations of settlers in New England, neither con-
secrated their burying-ground nor dedicated their !
meeting-house by special religious service.
The only family reservations in the burial-ground
were such as were secured through neighborly cour- i
tesy. The ground was e.xtended according to the
growing needs of the community. In 1795 John
lieed and John llerriam were granted the privilei:e
of erecting a family tomb; and in 1S24 Capt. Robert
Pulsifer buili one adjoining it. In 1824 a private
enterprise resulted in the erection of thirteen tombs,
on land adjoining the pulilic ground. These became
the sepulchres of the leading families, and delayed
the necessity of selecting a new place of burial for '
some years. In 1835 the first steps were taken [
towards ornamenting the grounds. The towu appro- ,
priated the sura of fifty dollars, and trees were plant-
ed on the borders of the yard. In the early yeai-s of
the observance of "Arbor Day" a large number of -
trees were planted and special care given to the
ground then abandoned for the purpose of inter- '
ments. The advance from the austerity of the Pil- I
griras, progress in art and improvement in the finan- |
cial standing of the sturdy yeomen is in no way more '
evident than in the memorials erected and attention '
given to the place of burial. The grim " death-head"
gave place to the " willow and urn." In 1837 the
first white marble slab was erected in the yard. So
conspicuous was it, in the midst of scores of primitive '
slate stones, that it was an object of general com- i
ment.
The tombs built for permanence became so un-
sightly through the crumbling of the exposed ma-
sonry that they were rebuilt in 1887.
In 1849 the town laid out a new burial-place, about
a mile east of the village. It is tlie western slope of
a commanding hill-side, which terminates in the val-
ley of the 8hawshine River.
Shawshine (" Shawsheen ") Cemetery is of itself a
fitting memorial of the perseverance and sacrifice of
those who started the enterprise, all of whom now
sleep without its borders. Both nature and art have
contributed lavishly in making this cemetery an at-
tractive spot. Burial lots are owned by individuals,
subject to wise restrictions, and permanent care is in-
sured by a deposit of funds with the town, agreeable
to a statute of the Commonwealth, In 1852 John
Merriam gave the town 5^100 to aid in fitting up the
L'rounds.
CHAPTER LXXVIII.
BEDFORD—l Contiinied).
lliijhwayB — Dri<i'its and Haiti oudt.
The territory set oil' as Bedford in 172!) was inhab-
ited by a good number of families who had estab-
lislied homes, but it was traversed by few public
roads. The settlers had located their homes on the
southern slopes and where tiiey would be the least
liable to attacks from the Indians. Neighborly inter-
course was carried on by the sliortest outs through
comparatively worlhle.-<s fields, and by the same wind-
ing paths the scattered families reached the "coun-
try road." The princii>al roads from town to town
were called country roads, and were the only highways
that received public care. The ways for local con-
venience were designated an " Trodden Paths," and
were obstructed by gates and bars. The road from
Billerica to Concord was laid out " 19 12""', 1600."
The description of that portion of the road which
was within the present limits of Bedford and on to
Concord Centre, is as follows : " from ye entrance of
Mr. Dudley's farme, until you come to Concord great
swamp, it shall lye at least six pole wide; and from
ye great swamp to Concord towne. Centre trees are
marked aboutc ye old road uutill you come to the
south corner of the widow foxes land; then leaving
the old dirty road on the right hand, and passing
through an opening of the swamp, acording vnto
trees marked in y' center of it, we continued to cram-
field gate, and from thence, keeping the common road,
to ye meeting-house."
If one would follow the road through Bedford at
present, he should start at Herrick's corner and con-
tinue in the present highway to Proctor's corner and
so on over the causeway road to the vicinity of the
Sampson estate, entering the present highway east of
the dwelling-house and so on in a southwesterly
direction to the Henry Wood estate, and then con-
tinuing to the " Virginia road," which was doubtless
BEDFORD.
841
the road first laid from Cambridge to Concord, and
over which the pioneers of Concoril brought their
families and goods. The '' Loop " by Josiah Davis is
given by some authorities as the section of the Bil-
lenca and Concord " Country '' road, but local records
do not support such opinions. It is evident ihat a
road from Billerica to Concord vrn^ marked out some
years later which crossed the higher land, very prob-
ably west of the present North Avenue. " Septem-
ber 9, 1743, the selectmen made bounds to the high-
way leading from Billerica to Concord, beginning
at James Lane's"- (Coolidge's), "and meeting the
present highway at Joseph Fitches" (Wilkins' Hill).
Tnis way must have gone below Farrell's and past
the mill site in Captain Lane's land.
A road from Billerica to Cambridge (Lexington)
known as the road to Bacon's Mill, or Fitches' Mill,
is first mentioned, " 16 : 1 : 63"—" Will Tay &
George farley are Apoynted to Lay out a highway
from the Towne, leading to Mr. Michell's farme, on
y* South East end of Mr. Winthrop's great meadow,
to be layed out four polls wide." The condition of
these early roads for many years is shown by an ac-
tion of the town of Billerica, mentioned nineteen
years later :
"23. 1™ 82. Whereiia Mr. Miuey luake.i a <>uniplitiiit for wautuf v.?
knowledge of ye highway from bis larme, that hee bi>u^ht uf Tiiiiothy
Brooks, to the towo " ( Brooks haJ ;i part of the Oukes gniul now the
Page estate), *' Theaelectnieri tlo ortjer (.leorge rt.irley, that wa^i one of the
coQimittee that laiJ it out at ye hist, A corpi .In" Ifrench. forthwith to
go and reuue ye tnarkea if y« said way, that it may he ohvioud to ali
traTellera ; alS't to draw up a reconi aa distinct that may hetr, how it
lyea that soit may be found afterwat'l witliout niucli dilticiilty."
It is obvious that a public way was marked out
from Billerica to Wilson's Mill (Staples') about as '
early as to Bacon's Mill, as it was " made passable "
in 1683, and ijuite probable that it followed the pres-
ent discontinued highway from Frost's by Hunne-
well's. In April, 1694, a committee was directed " to
lay out sufficient highway from Mr. Michael's farm,
through Mrs. Page's land to Shawshin River ; and
overShawshin River unto Lt. John Wilson's Mill to ■
Cambridge line; and from the same road to lay out a
suphicient highway through Mrs. Page's land unto the
land of Patrick Fasset, unto the house of Patrick
Fasset, and from thence to state the highway in the
most convenient place from Patrick Fassett's house
leading up to Concord Road, and from there to Mr.
Laines." This road may, doubtless, be traced at
present over the hill by Wilson's house (Ladds') to
the Cummings road, which led eastward to Woburn,
and westerly by the present highway, by the cemetery, '
crossing the Lexington road at Fitches' corner, by !
Patrick Fassett's (William Page place), following the
old road to Nathaniel Merriam's (Mudge's), and on to
McGovern's, and over the discontinued road to the
" Virginia " road to Concord. If " the road to Mr. |
Lane's " is understood aa beginning at Fassett's, it may j
be indicated by the present highway from Mudge'a to
the village; but if from " Concord road" to Mr.
Lane's, it is the present highway from the Hartwell
place to the village, which the town in 1734 tried to
make William Hartwell " easy about." There was a
road farther south from the Concord road towards
Cambridge. It doubtless branched off at Proctor's
corner, before mentioned, passed Samuel Huckins'
estate, and over Pine Hill by the Brown estate to the
Page dwelling, and so on by the cemetery to Fassett
or William Page estate and to Lexington, then
"Cambridge farms." Piue Hill road appears aa a
"country" road, in a deed of conveyance in 1721,
proving that it was a highway before Bedford was in-
corporated. It is also described in 1718, in laying out
a way from " Shawshine Bridge " to Concord River,
□ear James Lane's house. A road from Concord to
Woburn was undoubtedly in use before the incorpor-
ation, and followed substantially the present Mala
Street until it met the Billerica and Cambridge road
at the Page dwelling, which it followed as far as Web-
ber's (Kenrick's) and then passed over " Cummings'
Hill."
Concord and Woburn road is mentioned in a
deed as going by Josiah Fassett's in 1721. Charles
Wood's estate was bought by James Wright, of Fas-
sett, which aids in the above conclusion. The " bury-
ing-place" laid out in October, 1729, was bounded on
the Woburn road ; three months later the location
was changed "a little to the northward," giving the
|)resent location of the burial-ground. " A bridal-
way is alowed to goe from the road that leads from the
meeting-house to Woburn." The bridle-way or horse
track referred to represents, substantially, the present
Spring Street, until it reaches the " country " road at
Brown's corner.
The county roads or highways thus far mentioned
constitute, very probably, all of the public highways
at the date of incorporation.
The meeting-house, which was nearly completed
before the act of incorporation was passed, naturally
became the nucleus of the village. The site had
been selected aa a geographical centre, for it is ap-
parent that the dwellings were aa scattering here as
in other locations; there is positive evidence of only
two within the present limits of the village. Deacon
Israel Putnam's, and Benjamin Kidder's, which was
occupied by Mansfield, after Kidder built the house
now standing and owned by Miss C. M. Fitch.
The meeting-house was the centre from which the
early roads of the new town radiated. September, 1730,
in laying out the land about the meeting-house, "a
trodden path that goes to Deacon Nathaniel Merri-
am's from the meeting-house" is alluded to, and
" Mr. Bowes' compliment of land is laid out on the
west side of the trodden path to Deacon Merriam's,
next to Concord Old Line, ' " leaving two poles for
convenience for the highway." As Deacon Merri-
am's is represented by the Mudge estate of to- day, it ap-
pears that the " trodden path '■" was the only road to
842
HISTORY OP MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the south part of the town. The reservation of
two poles " for convenience for the highway " shows
the width of the road later agreed upon. In 1731 the
selectmen laid out the road from the meeting-house
to Stephen Davis' (John Neville's) and on to Lex-
ingtoD line. This is substantially the present trav-
eled highway from the village by the Mudge place to
John Neville's where it may be traced in front (south)
of the house, across the fields by a deserted cellar to
Lexington line. The present traveled road from
Neville's to Lexington is a more modern way. The
front entrance of the house, when built, was conveni-
ent to the road as then traveled.
At the same meeting a road was laid out from the
meeting-house to John Stearns' land. This may be
the road which, at first, passed north of the present
Main Street, in the rear of the Fitch dwelling, and
connected with the "country" road after going north-
ward to the present estate of Edward Butters.
A road was at once laid out from Kidder's (Miss C.
M. Fitch's) to Joseph Fitch's (Wilkins' place), "and
over to Cedar Swamp to the land of Davis & Tay-
lor, to Concord River meadow path." This at once
suggests the present highway from Wilkins' Hill to
the Sampson place.
In the same year, 1731, a highway, two poles wide,
was laid out from the meeting-house to Lexington,
which may be the present road by the Hosraer and
Muzzy estate, over the causeway a few rods when it
branched off to the south and passed the Mead's place
to Lexington. In the descriptive record of this road,
a causeway from Woolley's to Hartwell's, twenty-five
feet wide, is mentioned, over which the road passed
for a short distance. All the remaining road was two
poles wide.
In 1734 the road from Benjamin Kidder's (Miss
Fitch's) CO Ensign James Lane's (Cooledge) was laid
out, and later, relieved of its curves, became the pres-
ent North Avenue.
In 1738 the road passing in the rear of Kidder's
dwelling was exchanged for the present street, pass-
' ing south of the dwelling. It was widened at that
time, and is the present Main Street from the Com-
mon to Wilson Park.
March 4, 1734, " Town accepted the way that the
selectmen layed out from south side of Oakes' farm to
Kidder's land, so on to Deacon Israel Putnam's land
by the buring-place, and gave him (Putnam), in ex-
change for it, theRangeway on the easterly side of his
land." We here see, with slight alterations, the road
from the springs to Main Street. In 1733-34 a road
was laid out which corresponds with the present Con-
cord road across the causeway (McGovern's).
From the descriptions thus far made, it appears that
within the first decade of the town's corporate history
highways were laid out to each quarter of the town,
but this does not imply that they were in condition
for travel ; on the contrary, these acts had been little
more than official indications of prospective highways.
In almost every case the owners of the land were al-
lowed gates or bars ; in some, however, the time for
such accommodation was limited. It may be inferred
by this that fences were to be built to divide posses-
sions within a specified time.
The unimproved condition of the roads made it
easy to change locations, as it seemed wise to do, after
more mature consideration. Several decided changes
were made during the first ten years, and some roads,
of which there is record, are entirely lost.
September 18, 1732, the first highway rate was al-
lowed (£50), and Cornet Nathaniel Page was the first
highway surveyor, and in each succeeding year simi-
lar sums were appropriated for the roads, but the
roads were improved slowly, as more than a score ot
miles had been laid out already.
The new town was favorably situated as regarded the
building of bridges. The expense of preparing ways
across the streams was very small for a good many
years. In 1736 the bridge near the Kenrick place is
referred to as the " great bridge on the road to Lex-
ington."
The Hill's l)ridge "Episode," in which Billerica's
first and perhaps only niob is seen, caused this town
not a little anxiety, and in 1734 "Town voted that the
way of Hill's Bridge is not a public good and benefit."
Perhaps the people of this town thereby escaped
being forced to contribute to the building of the
bridge and road which the Court ordered to be done.
In 1747 the selectmen laid out a road leading from
Joseph Fitch's bouse southerly, by the cedai swamp
to the Concord and Billerica road. It passed through
"Hastings' improvement," wherf he was allowed "to
have gates or bars for a period of four years and no
more." The road was over a trodden path before-
mentioned. The name suggests the means of convey-
ance of that time; the better roads were passable for
carts, but very many of them could be traveled only
on horse-back or on foot. Wagons were unknown,
and the "one-horse chaise," which first appeared
about 1800, was a luxury only enjoyed by the minis-
ter and a few wealthy citizens. A special tax was
levied on a chaise, and the aristocratic owner erected
a house for its safe keeping.
The system of supporting highways, which continued
until the recent method of appointing a commissioner
to direct the whole business, was early in practice
here. A separate highway rate was assessed and men
were allowed to work out their shares, but only on
legal highways without a special vote of the town. In
1745 " Col. John Lane is allowed to work out his rate
on the way between his house and the Country Road."
In 1748 the wages allowed were established by vote
in town-meeting: "In the three summer months four-
teen shillings each man pur day, in the month of
September Eleven shillings pur day." No one was
allowed full pay unless he was .sixteen years of age.
In 1748 a road was laid out by the Court's commit-
tee through land of William Reed and Timothy
BEDFORD.
843
Hartwell. It waa the extension from the present
Loomis estate to connect with the Billerica and Cam-
bridge road at the present cemetery gate. Eleazer
Davis (2d) lost his life in building this piece of road
in September, 1748.
From 1750 to 1790 but few new roads were called
for — those already laid out were gradually improved
— gates and bars were discontinued and an occasional
bridle-way was opened to the public travel and care.
About 1790 citizens of the District of Carlisle began
to take steps to bridge Concord River. A letter from
them, dated December 9, 1790, was discussed by the
voters of this town and the subject-matter referred to
a committee.
Before that committee was ready to report, a peti-
tion had been entered at the Court of General Ses-
sions by the people of Carlisle and a meeting of the
citizens of Bedford was held in December, 1791, when
steps were taken to ascertain the best way to reach
Concord Rvver from the village. In the following
February the committee reported that they had made
surveys as follows : " From 10 milestone, near J.
Fitches' to Brother Rocks, by .Samuel L.ine's (Huck-
ins') two miles and one-half: From said mile-stone
through the swamp by Job Lane's house (Farrell's)
to the River meadow — Oak upland — one and a third
miles and forty-eight rods; From said mile-stone
over Zachariah Fitch's causway (Sampson's) to the
River, near Oak upland, two miles and one hundred
rods." The committee chosen to consider the feasa-
bility of the plan of bridging the river made an ex-
tended report, from which the following is taken:
"To put the bridge where it is proposed by the peti-
tioners would require the building of a road through
four hundred rods of meadow, deep mirey swamp
and low, tiat land, and the whole of the same lying
in Bedford (saving eight rods), when we have neither
stone nor eartb suitable within a mile, — Therefore we
think it very unreasonable and imposing upon the
town of Bedford for them to think for to make us
their slaves for ever, as we shall be, if we should be
held to maintain a highway where they propose."
The committee urged the way by the " Brother
Rocks," sa/ing — "however we are willing for to help
them over the River when they may stand upon good
bottom, and do something for them that we trust the
Court's committee will think honorable to the town."
The town opposed the plan most assiduously, but the
Court ordered the road to be laid out in the way most
objectionable to Bedford people, and they were
obliged to plunge into the swamp and build the road
and help bridge the river at an expense most trying
to the people in the beginning. The town was di-
vided into eight districts, with a superintendent for
each, and the work of building the road from the
" bar" to the river waa assigned in equal portions.
The miry nature of the ground over which the
road was built has occasioned continual outlays since
the construction, which, with the oft-repeated calls
for repairs upon the bridge, have led later generations
to believe that the investigating cjmmittee of 1792
waa endowed with prophetic wisdom. The first
bridge did not last twenty-five years, and Bedford was
obliged to make an outlay of five hundred dollars to
replace her portion in 1823. In 1873 the old mud-
sill bridge waa taken away and a modern pile-bridge
put in its place, at an expense to this town of nearly
three thousand dollars.
The road from Bacon's (Frost's) to Gleason's mill
(Staple's) was opened as a public way in 1798 and
from Hosmer and Muzzy's corner to Samuel Hart-
well's (McGovern's) in the same year. In 1800 the road
past the present East School-house first appears as a
town road, and in the same year the road from Web-
ber's (Kenrick's) to Lexington line over the hill was
straightened.
At the opening of the present century a road from
the main way to Oliver Reed's (C. L. Waits') was
opened. The evidence of the records is that it was a
town-way at times and at others it was private. Mr.
Reed was allowed to work out his highway rates on
this road by special vote of the town.
In 1802 the town voted "to open a road from John
Sprague's and so on to Eleazer Davis', they to give
the land, and fence the road, all but sixty rods, which
the town should build." It was laid out two rods
wide, and two years were allowed for its completion,
proving that the "Loop" round by Josiah Davis' house
w.as not a public way until 1804. Measures were be-
ing taken at the same time to have the road to Lex-
ington straightened, which was done by order of the
Court of Sessions in 1807. The cost paid by this
town was :S1048.10. The straightening began at
James Wright's chaiae-house (Chas. Woods), and re-
sulted in the present road over Shawshine River to
Nathan Fitches' corner and direct to Lexington line.
The Middlesex Turnpike, a private enterprise,
chartered in June, 1805, caused Bedford people a
good deal of anxiety. A committee was chosen to
protect her interests, believing the opening of such a
thoroughfare would tend to draw away travel from
the village and injure the town. It was located in
1806, crossing the town on its northeast border. The
proprietors of the turnpike were actuated by a vain
delusion that the new road built without regard for
hills or ponds would attract all of the travel between
New Hampshire, Vermont and Boston, notwithstand-
ing the ofl-repeated demand for "toll."
They enjoyed a measure of success for awhile, but
professional teamsters were slow to abandon the fa-
miliar routes and discard the hospitality of the long
established taverns in Bedford.
The opening of the Chelmsford road in 1823 was
encouraged by this town, and measures were adopted
to attract travel through the village, and the loss oc-
casioned by the tnrnpike waa more than made up to
the town by the new route. Six and eight-horse
teams were continually passing through the village
844
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
loaded with wool, butter, cheese and produce of the
northern farms, in exchange for salt, molasses, dry
goods, rum and the requisites of a " country store,"
and in early winter " the roads were full " of farmers'
teams loaded with their own fat pigs and beef and
other products of their own industry, to be bartered
in the markets for a years' supply of family necessar-
ies. The charter of the Turnpike Company was re-
pealed in 1841, and the road became a public high-
way; by this, Bedford was burdened with another
bridge and a section of road to maintain, which, be-
cause of its location, was of but little benefit to the
citizens.
When the turnpike was opened this town was
obliged to build two short lines of public road for the
accommodation of families located near it. One of
seventy-five rods, in the east part of the town, made
a new opening to Burlington, and one in the vicinity
of Abner Wheeler's (Ernstein's). May, 1822, the
road from John Merriam's to Lexington, two rods
wide, was made a town-way. But few additions were
made to the highways after the opening of the
Chelmsford road until the coming of the railroad.
A short cut from Vinebrook mill (Staples') to the
village was made by opening the road from Lyon's barn
across Shawshine River to the old road at Blodgett's
house. This added another bridge to the town's care.
The records show that while freed from building new
roads, much attention was given to straightening and
improving the old, but, fortunately, enough curves
remain to preserve the rustic beauty of the town ;
these are appreciated when driving for pleasure, but
often condemned by the ambitious farmer in his
haste to reach the market. In 1874 the road going
south from the village was widened and straightened
to accommodate the travel occasioned by the opening
of the Middlesex Central Railroad. Loomis Street
was soon opened as an eastern approach to the rail-
road station.
"Webber" Avenue, built in 1884, and " Hillside"
Avenue built, in 1888, were private enterprises, but
were soon accepted by the town as public ways.
" Fletcher " Avenue, laid out by Matthew Fletcher,
is still a private way, but enjoyed by the public.
Railroads. — In the summer of 1873 the ground
was formally broken and work commenced on the
bed of the Middlesex Central Railroad in this town.
The town invested 120,000 in the enterprise and has
never regretted the step. In the autumn of 1874 the
road was opened for travel from Concord to Lexing-
ton, where it connected with the " Lexington Branch
of the Fitchburg." The stage-coach, which had lin-
gered here much longer than in any other town
within equal distance of Boston, was set one side.
In the autumn of 1877 a railroad of a two-foot
gauge was opened between Bedford and North Biller-
ica. A road of this kind had been operated in Wales
with success, but none so narrow had been built in
this country. The novelty of the road, its cheap con-
struction and equipments attracted much attention.
Foreign philanthropists sought for the plans and re-
turned to Europe with cheering reports. The rolling
stock of the road consisted of two locomotives,
"Ariel " and " Puck ; " two passenger oars ; two
" excursion " cars and a few others for freight. For
some months trains made regular trips over the road,
and the experiment was a success as far as the work-
ing capacity was concerned, but it was a financial
failure. According to a report in the iScientific Amer-
ican of March 16, 1878, the cost reached $60,000 while
the estimate was $50,000 or fSOOO per mile. A por-
tion of the subscription " proved unsound or fraudu-
lent," which, with the extra cost, unplanned for,
placed the road in an unfortunate condition before it
was ready for service. It was unpopular from the
starting of the trains and never succeeded in regain-
ing the confidence of the people in general, although
some judicious men never lost confidence in the road
as an ultimate success pecuniarily, but time was not
allowed to test the wisdom of the plan. The road
was thrown into bankruptcy and the rolling stock
sold by assignees for $9000 in June, 1878. Thus the
loss to Billerica and Bedford became a benefit to the
Sandy River Railroad in Maine, where the rolling
itock was put to immediate use.
Individuals were the only investors here, but they
with many mechanics of the town, lost heavily by the
failure, while the owners of the land through which
the road passed were in many cases liberally com-
pensated for damages by holding the rails, etc.
In 1885 the Boston and Lowell Company, then con-
trolling the Middlesex Central, built a line from
Bedford to connect with their main line at North
Billerica, following substantially, through this town,
the abandoned bed of the " Narrow Gauge." The
town invested S2000 in this enterprise. By the ad-
dition of this line Bedford became a railroad junction,
and is within ready access of Lowell and Boston,
having abundant accommodations. As regards the
time required for reaching the capital of the State,
Bedford is to-day where Arlington was twenty years
earlier.
CHAPTER LXXIX.
BEDFORD— ( Continued) .
Stage-BouU* — Poal-Office — Postmaaten — Tnduttriea — Henideniial Toum — In-
venlioiu.
The opening of the Chelmsford road, so called, in
1823, contributed greatly to the facilities for travel,
and Bedford Centre became a popular thoroughfare.
Competitive stage-routes were established from Con-
cord, N. H., to Boston, in one of which Bedford mer-
chauts were stock owners. This fact, together with
the popular roads and well-kept taverns, led to the
selection of Bedford as a way station, where relays of
BEDFORD.
845
horses were kept. Other stage lines passed through
the village, one of which was from Lowell to Woon-
socket. An enterprise, strange, indeed, to the present
generation, was created by the regular coming and
going of the coaches, loaded inside and out with
merchants and tourists. A public conveyance led to
the establishing of a post-office in Bedford and in
1825 Elijah Stearns, Esq., was appointed the first
postmaster. The first mail that left the town con-
tained but one letter. Postage was an item of im-
portance, and with many people correspondence was
necessarily limited. The rates ranged, according to
distance, from six cents to twenty-five, and pre-pay-
ment was optional. A letter from Billerica to Bed-
ford must necessarily go through Boston, incurring
a postage of ten cents. A widow at Bedford received,
in one day, letters from four sons, who were strug-
gling for an education in different schools, and her
bill at the post-office was one dollar. The postmas-
ters in the order of their appointments are: Elijah
Stearns, John \. Merriam, Reuben Bacon, Thomas
Stiles, Jonas Munroe, Thomas Stiles, Henry A. Glea-
son, Marcus B. Webber, Charles G. Fox, Marcus B.
Webber, Henry A. Gleason.
Industries. — Bedford has always been classed
with the agricultural towns of the State; although in
common with all inland settlements during the colon-
ial period, the people were largely engaged in sup-
plying their own wants, hence every family conducted
its own manufacturing. The cumbersome loom, with
its oaken beams, spinning-wheels great and small,
hetchel, cards and the like, were re<iuisltes here
longer than in towns on the direct line of the tirst
public coaches. With this primitive machinery the
lamb's warm fleece was turned to cloth, and dyed with
indigo at the chimney-corner, while the flax, from
the fields, was made into snowy linen by the same
deft hands that were equally skillful in manufactur-
ing golden butter and savory cheese, not only for
domestic use, but to exchange for other necessaries.
The housewife had her annual season for preparing
the year's stock of "tallow-dips" or candles and
manufacturing soap for family use.
The blacksmith hammered out the nails of all sizes,
and with the aid of the woodwright supplied the
farmer with all his tools. The itinerant cobbler made
the boots and shoes from leather tanned in the neigh-
borhood vat. The village had its brick-kiln. Char-
coal was manufactured and Tarkiln Brook (crossing
the south part of the town) suggests a day when the
sap of the early forests was boiled to tar and resin on
its winding banks. When the brave pioneer's life
was over the village carpenter made the coffin for his
body. It was early in the present century that the
people of Bedford began to contribute to the increas-
ing demands of a growing population outside of its
own borders. In 1805 Jonathan Bacon and John
Hosmer began the manufacture of children's shoes
for Boston market. They were both of an inventive
mind, — made their own lasts and prepared their own
patterns. The business increased and other firms
engaged in the enterprise ; among them were Benjamin
Simonds, Zebedee Simonds, Reuben Bacon, Cham-
berlin & Billings. Several hundred people of both
sexes were employed. Young men from other locali-
ties were apprenticed in the service of the different
firms, many of whom settled here and became leaders
in public affairs. When the business was at its
height the annual sales amounted to upwards of
ninety thousand pairs, at an estimated value of fifty
thousand dollars. This was all hand work, and the
employes were, to an individual, .\merican born. " No
shoes were in better credit than those made in Bed-
ford." When machinery was introduced elsewhere,
and all classes of people were employed in producing
all grades of work, the demand for the superior arti-
cles, made here, gradually slackened, and after a time
the business entirely ceased. Another enterprise car-
ried on here quite extensively, when the shoe buaines-s
was at its meridian, was the manufacture of band-
boxes. Women were employed chiefly and many
young women were attracted to the town to engage in
this employment. Not a few of them formed holy alli-
ances with the young men of the shoe firms and
together became the founders of some of the most
enterprising families.
George Fisk in the north part of the town and
.A.ma.sa Lane in the east carried on this line of manu-
facturing. At first thinly-shaved wood for the foun-
dation work was obtained from New Hampshire, but
later a machine was introduced and the whole
work was done here. The size of the boxes varied
according to the fashion of the ladies' bonnets, which
was variable in those days, as at the present, and
created a demand equal to the supply.
.\bout the year 1812, inquiring minds were turned
to a geological formation that had already been Ufed
for paint. The first meeting-house, when repaired
after the Revolution, was painted with the material
known as the " Bedford Yellow." As before men-
tioned, it was found in the largest quantities on the
Sprague farm. Thompson Bacon and others engaged
in the enterprise. For some years it was used as a
mineral paint — yellow ochre.
A stratum of clay was discovered on the southern
border of the town and citizens engaged in the man-
ufacture of bricks for local use. The clay was teamed
to the centre, where a kiln was prepared and sufficient
quantities burnt to build several houses and chim-
neys for others. The manufacture of charcoal be-
came an important industry at one time. David
Rice, the village blacksmith, burnt the coal for his
own forges in a field near Carlisle bridge, while in
the south fields the business was carried on more ex-
tensively, a market being found in and about Boston.
About the year 1830, Jonathan Bacon invented and
patented a blind fastener known to the trade as
" Bacon's Patent Lever Blind Fastener." They were
846
HISTORY OF xMIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
made by hand and were the most approved article of
the kind in the market for some years. In the year
1832 about 4000 sets were made in town. Mr. Bacon
received encouragement from Edward Everett, who
pronounced the first pattern exhibited to be an arti-
cle of value, as it proved to be. This patent was a
source of a good income to Mr. Bacon, and the man-
ufacture of them gave employment to several work-
men in iron. Tanning and currying as an industry
waa carried on in the latter part of the eighteenth
century and the opening years of the nineteenth. It
was carried on at the centre by James Wright, Sr.
and Jr., successively, and by the Convers family in
the south part of the town. It waa chiefly of local in-
terest and prepared leather for home market. The
farmers' habit of wearing leather aprons and sheep-
akin breeches created a local demand, long since dis-
continued. The bark for tanning waa ground by re-
volving stones after the manner of a corn-mill. The
Wrights were succeeded by Benjamin F. Thompson,
who in after years removed the industry to Woburn.
About 1840 a paper-mill waa established on the site of
the Wilson corn-mill, on Vine Brook, and the manu-
facture of coarse paper was carried oc for a series of
years, giving employment to many hands. The busi-
ness was removed after the destruction of the mill by ]
fire, causing the removal of one-tenth of the inhabit- I
ants of the town. After this calamity the indus- i
tries, "with the exception of the manufacture of local
necessities," were chiefly agricultural, until after the
close of the Civil War. The opening of the Middle- I
sex Central Railroad in 1873 furnished direct and
easy communication with Boston, only fifteen miles :
distant, and prepared the way for a decided change,
which is now rapidly taking place. Men, whose bus-
iness centres are in Boston, are establishing homes,
and the centre of the town is fast becoming a resi- i
dential village. i
The old system of farming is giving way to the cul- '
ture of small fruits and vegetables, and acres are cov- !
ered with glass for the purpose of securing early '
crops. The Colonel Jones fal-m of colonial days, in I
the west part of the town, comprising many acres of
the " Great Fields " sought by the first settlers, is
being used for the propiigation of nursery stock.
Grazing has become an important feature of agri-
culture, and the production of milk for Boston mar-
ket has increased rapidly with the improved facilities
for transportation. About -iix hundred and fifty cans
of eight quarts each are daily shipped from Bedford.
Many tons of superior quality of hay are annually
produced, for which there is a good local market.
Acres are annually planted with cucumbers, for which
a ready market is found at a packing-house where
cucumbers, gathered when i|uite small, are manufac-
tured into pickles.
A wood factory for the manufacture of miscellane-
ous articles, gives employment to several men, and the
town has its complement of cartwrights, black-
smiths and other artisans. Several men are employed
with teams in marketing wood, cut from the fore.sts
of the town, but the growth keeps even pace with
the consumption. The " Bacon Snow Plow,'' invent-
ed by Isaac P. Bacon, is considered the best horse-
machine in use for clearing snow from sidewalks, and
is used in the large towns of the county. The inven-
tor died without having secured a patent and the in-
dustry is lost to the town.
CHAPTER LXXX.
BEDFORD— I. Continued).
Springs — L"kfB — P"udt — Plthtic- HouBes — Bedford Springt.
The streams- of the town have never contributed
very largely to its industries, although in the early
days there were more places where the water-power
was utilized than at present. Manufacturers have
been benefited by damming the Concord River near
its confluence with the Merrimack, while the people of
Bedford have seen their broad meadows depreciate in
value by the overflow of the banks. Peppergrass
Brook, which drains the western slope of the village,
furnished power for a saw-mill at the opening of the
present century ; the mill was located on the southerly
portion of Winthrop farm and owned by Job Lane.
The Winthrop, or Great Meadow Brook, was utilized
by the early inhabitants : a remnant of the dam is
now to be seen (Jii the left side of the highway in go-
ing from the village to the East School-house. Far-
ther down the fame brook and near Sandy Brook
bridge was another mill. There is evidence of an
early mill near Farley Brook. The natural ponds
cover but a small area. The dams at the saw-mills
on Shawshiue River and Vine Brook have aided in
forming small ponds where ice is gathered for local
use. " Spring Pond '' or " Fawn Lake " covers seve-
eral acres, and is fed by a succession of springs ; it is
a beautiful sheet of water and adds much to the at-
tractiveness of the estate.
PdblunHuuse.s. — Benjamin Danforth and Walter
Pollard were the inn-keepers of the town, very
soon after the incorporation, and possibly furnished
entertainment to travelers before the town was organ-
ized. The early records show that Danforth and Pol-
lard each had bills against the town for entertainment
aa early as 17.'!8. The former was doubtless located on
or near the site of the " Shawshine House," and was
succeeded in business by Captain John Webber and
his son, John Webber, Jr. The Pollard Tavern was
near the Job Lane Mill, and the Fitzgerald house of
the present is thought to represent the original house,
in part. It was re-located after the discontinuance of
the highway from James Lane's to Thaddeua Fitches'.
Tradition furnishes proof of the honesty of Pollard by
BEDFORD.
847
ahowing that he represented goods, offered for sale, in
their true condition, thus : " Want to buy any yellow
pork ?" says Walter Pollard. " Think not," says
Job Lane. Jeremiah Fitch, Jr., opened a tavern
about the year 176*5. It was there that the minute-
men of the town lunched on the morning of April
19, 1775. The opening of the stage routes and the in-
crease of teaming through the town led to the open-
ing of a tavern towards the close of the eighteenth
century. Its location was near the present corner of
Concord Street and Park Avenue. It was first kept
by Phineas Chamberlain ; he died in 1809, and his
successors were Stearns, Porter, Flint, Hurd and
Phelps. The house was destroyed bv fire in 1837.
At the opposite end of the village David Reed opened
a tavern in 1707, and conducted the business until his
death in 1832. The present " Bedford House " was
built in the first quarter of the present century, as a
private house, by Joshua Page. It was soon enlarged
and turned into a public-house, and has been so kept
until the present. In 1SS8 the sale of intoxicating
liquor was suppressed in the town, and the property
purchased by a stock company. The house now fur-
nishes the comforts of a first-class suburban hotel.
" Bedford Springs" is located about one and four-
fifths miles north of and on the Billericaside of Bed-
ford Village. The name is derived from three natural
fouutains strongly impregnated with mineral proper-
ties. Thisi)lace was included within the Oiikes farm,
which consisted of 150 acres, granted by Cambridge
to Captain (iookin, in exchange for h's lot on the
township, and by him sold to Tlioma.s i lakes. It is
evident that the lake and never-failing springsot pure
water attracted the attention of the aborigines long
before 1643-44, when " Shaweshin was granted tc
Cambridge."
Family traditions furnish unmistakable evidence
leading to this conclusion.
The keen students of nature early detected the
remedial properties of the bubbling springs. The
Pawtucket Indians had settlements in this vicinity
and their medicine-men resorted to these watere.
Scattering remnants of the tribe made occasional vis-
its long atler the Wamesick Purchiuse of 16f<5, by
which " all manner of Indian rights and claims to that
parcel of land granted by the General Court to the
town of Billerica" were honorably extinguished.
Mrs. Franklin Stearns, of Billerica, who was born
in 1801, tells the following : " My mother, who lived
near the springs, often told me that she remembered
distinctly when the Indians came a long distance to
fill their leathern bottles with water from the springs
and told her, when stopping at her home, that it was
medicine." These children of the forest also brought
their sick to bathe in the waters. This evidence
seems to have been lost sight of, and the instinct of
the brute creation was needed to lead man to this
fountain of health. About 1835 the farm was owned
by -Augustus Pierce. It consisted chiefly of woodland
and pasture land. The owner furnished pasturage for
the villagers' cattle. It was noticed that the cattle
always went to the springs for water rather than to
the open pond, and that cows having access to the
springs were in better condition and gave better milk
than those contined in neighboring pastures, where
the grass was better, but the water was taken from
other sources. This led to the analysis of the water
by Dr. Jackson, of Boston, whose report, confirmed
by later chemists, gave rise to the present beautiful
health resort.
-A. company was soon formed who bought the real
estate, and a commodious building was erected for
hotel purposes. The enterprise was never a financial
success until the Billerica and Bedford Railroad was
put into operation. The estate was purchased by
William R. Hayden, M.D., in 1856. It then com-
prised forty acres of land with the hotel, stable, bath-
house and bowling alley. It now comprises 175 acres,
with buildings added, at a cost of $25,000. An equal
sum has been expended on the grounds, making one
of the most attractive health resorts within equal dis-
tance of Boston.
Here is the laboratory of the New York Pharma-
ceutical Company, of which Dr. Hayden is president.
They make here 350 different preparations for drug-
gists and practicing physicians, of which Hayden's
N'iburnum Compound, The Uric Solvent and Phos-
[ihorus Pills are the principal. More than 25,000
pounds of the Viburnum Compound were shipped
from this place during the last year (1889).
The Billerica and Bedford Railroad passes over the
western border of the grounds, making the resort
within convenient access of Boston and Lowell. The
hotel, now under the proprietorship of William
.\dams, is filled with guests of prominence during the
summer numths. A post-otfice was established here
in 1888, of which Dr. Hayden is the postmaster.
Bedford Springs is a distinct natural feature of the
town, and the pharmaceutical works are entirely sep-
j arate from ail other enterprises, but they, together
constitute the most attractive feature of the town.
! .V sketch of the life of William R. Hayden, through
whose perseverance natural possibilities have become
realities, and whose fertile brain has produced a
blessing world-wide in its extent, will be found else-
where in this connection.
CHAPTER LXXXI.
BEDFORD— ( Continued).
Fire-Eiigiiu — F.nforremeiH o/ tjiri — Urtnk Oulom — Witchcraft— Botrnt:/
for CVowf, eU.
The first action of the town towards procuring a
machine for extinguishing fire was in October, 1827,
848
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
when $225 {two hundred and twenty-five dollars)
were appropriated for that purpose, "providing the
sum could be increased to an amount sufficient to
purchase an engine with equipments for service."
This was done by organizing a stock company of
nineteen members, each owning a share, the par
value being $15 (fifteen dollars). Each owner of a
shsire held a certificate which, by vote of the town,
entitled the bearer (provided he be deemed eligible)
to a preference in the appointment of engiue-men,
who were annually appointed by the selectmen,
agreeable to the statutes of Massachusetts. In 1845
hooks and ladders were added to the apparatus, bul
forninately there was but little use for the machinery,
and but little attention was paid to it after a few
years.
In 1879, after a disastrous conflagration, the town
voted to buy a suction hand-fiie-engine, and the sura
of ?475 (four hundred and seventy-five dollars) was
appropriated for it. This being done, the "Shaw-
sheen Engine Company," of forty members, wat^
formed, and paid an annual fee of $2 (two dollars)
each.
The " Wiuthrop Hook-and-Ladder Company " was
also organized, and in 1883 the annual compensation
was increased for the members of both companies to
six dollars. Cisterns for the storage of water wert
built in 1888, and the town is well protected againsi
the ravages of fire, at an annual expense of aboul
?30() (three hundred dollars).
Bedford has always been jealous of its good name,
and made haste to mete out justice to any who, by
violation of law, have brought reproach upon it.
In March, 1797, and for several succeeding years,
officers were chosen to prevent theft, with instruc-
tions to pursue offenders to justice at the public ex
pense. At this time there was a family in town so
addicted to larceny that its members would steal
from each other. The vigilance of the officers is ap-
parent, as one of the family was brought to condign
punishment by being tied to an apple-tree (in th(
absence of a whipping-post) in the village, and pub-
licly and legally whipped with thirty stripes. Thi-
was the second ofl!ence ; a third was punishable " b\
the pains of death without the benefit of clergy.'
This act of justice was not sufficient to deter othej
members of the family from similar offences, and thi
town was not rid of the family until two farmers,
whose estates joined that of the offenders, purcha-sed
their farm, upon condition that they should not re
locate in the town.
A greater evil, the sale of intoxicating liquors, met
with but little opposition until 1.S28. The customs
of society here, ;is elsewhere, gave full endorsement
to the free use of ardent spirits in public and private.
The "flowing bowl" was prominent on both solemn
and joyful occasions. The records are reinarkablv
free from itemized bills for liquors, but the oft-re-
peated charges for " entertainment," together with
traditions, leave no room for doubt as to the nature
of the entertainment furnished at the public charge.
In 1804 the use of liquor at funerals was abolished by
vote of the town. In 1822 a committee was chosen
to repair the Common, free of expense to the town
for labor ; but they were allowed to furnish " those
that do the work with some spirit at the expense of
the town." It is doubtful whether it would not have
been more economical to have paid for the labor. In
1834 the overseers of the poor were instructed not to
furnish ardent spirits for the poor unless directed by
a physician. The first temperance society was organ-
ized in 1830, and moral suasion was faithfully ap-
plied, but it was not until 1888 that the State law was
made effectual, through the vigilance of the " Law
and Order League." To remove unfortunate possi-
bilities, public-spirited men purchased the Bedford
House property and organized a stock company.
The witchcraft delusion, that had been such a
scourge in the Colony, had left its effect upon credu-
lous minds in this town. There were those who at-
tributed every my.sterious occurrence to an eccentric
old woman. They believed she was responsible for the
power that is now seen in a balky horse — refusing to
advance, or a wheel to revolve on a neglected axle.
There is a tradition that in the early years of the
Revolution, when the British troops were stationed
in Boston, this woman, in the disguise of a Tory, had
a concerted meeting with some of the proud officers
of the army. She represented to them that she had
a great secret, which she would reveal upon their
paying a heavy fee. The officers, anxious to engage
in the enterprise, met her, upon agreement, at mid-
night near her own home. <)n being satisfied that
the booty was in the chaise of the officers, she led
them, by the dim light of a flickering candle, across
a narrow plank which served as a temporary bridge
over a swollen stream into a dark recess ; she then
extinguished her light, recrossed the bridge, which
she pulled after her, secured the bags of English coin
and went home. The ambitious officers, foiled in
their undertaking, gladly left the town, but not until
they had aroused a family and obtained aid in the
search for their team and guidance back to Boston.
It appears that the early farmers of Bedford were
greatly annoyed and their crops seriously damaged
by the crows, blackbirds and squirrels. This was a
prevalent evil in the Province, so much .so that the
General Court enacted a law in 1740-41 authorizing
towns to pay a bounty on the heads of the little
creatures, and were reimbursed from the Province
treasury. There was allowed " for every dozen of
blackbirds taken in their nests, and not fledged,
twelve pence; for the like number of blackbirds
grown and fledged, three shillings; for each crow,
six pence, and for every water rat, gray squirrel and
grouiid-squirrel, four pence." The town indorsed
this law at once, and the boys, stimulated bj a bounty
for the work of destruction, entered upon a competi-
BEDFORD.
849
live war of extermination. The treasurer's report of
1741 shows twenty-two orders " given to parsons for
squirrels and birds," amounting to £12 14«. Sd.
The list includes the names of the leading men of
the town. As orders were only drawn fur the parents,
the number of individuals enlisted in the work of
destructiou is not determined, but there were, doubt-
less, as many as one hundred, and the records show
that the practice was continued for years. One boy,
William Webber, in his eagerness, mistook an owl's
nest for that of a crow's, and when about to capture
the fledglings was attacked by the mother owl, which
plucked out one of his eyes, subdued the youth and
provided a priceless meal for her brood. In 1823 the
town voted ''not to allow Robbins to be killed iu the
town this year."' Iu 1820 voted " to pay twenty cents
for old and teu cents for young crow's heads, caught
and killed within the limits of the town."
CHAPTER LXXXII.
BEDFORD— {Continusd).
Prn/nnity au<l DrunJ,"iiiieH3 P'Uiialied l"j L'tw — Titltin^men atuL tlicir
bittiee — Minor Officer:* — EwjlitU Ili-jhl.
At the time of the incorporation of Bedford, pro-
fanity and drunkenness had become flagrant crimes
ill the Province, and occasioned special legislation.
In 1734 the following act was passed by the General
Court:
" Whoever shall be convicted of prophane swearing
or cursing shall, for the first offence, forfeit ani pay
the sum of ten shillings ; and for every such oath or
curse after the first, uttered at the same time and in
the hearing of the same person or persons, the sum ot
two shillings, and for a second offence the fine was
ten shillings.' The fine for drunkenness was ten
shillings for the first offence, and twice that for a rep-
etition. In order that the law should be enforced,
tithingraen were annually chosen as town officers.
Their general duty appears to have been to promote
the Divine honor and the spiritual welfare of the peo-
ple, by encouraging family worship and discipline,
and checking profanity. Sabbath-breaking, idleness,
intemperance and kindred immoralities. The oflicial
title, " Tithingmen, or tenth men," originated from
their having a tithing, or a company of ten families,
each to oversee, including their own. Two such offi-
cers only were chosen at the first town-meeting, and
as subsequent records furnish no evidence of an in-
crease in number, it may be inferred that the people
were disposed to obey the laws here better than in
some places.
The most respectable voters of the town, often the
deacons of the church, were elected to this office and
sworn to the faithful discharge of the duties.
They were required by law to make complaint to
54-ii
the magistrate of what they saw amiss in any one
under their inspection. Long poles or statfs were
furnished as instruments of authority, and espe-
cially used in the meeting-house during public
worship. In the expenses for 1742, Oliver Pollard
has a charge of " 4 shil.ings for tithing men's staves."
The faithfulness of the officers appears in a record of
1764, in which Stephen Davis, treasurer, gives credit
for " 4 shillings for a tine for a prophane oath." It was
the balance after deducting the cost of the prosecu-
tion. Tithingmen were annually chosen by the
town until 1848, but their duties had long before fal-
len to other officers. In March, 1822, Deacon Michael
Crosby, Zebedee Simonds, James Webber and Elijah
Stearns, Esq., were chosen as tithingmen and sworn
to the faithful discharge of the trust. They were in-
structed to keep such order on Lord's day in the
meeting-house and the Centre School-house as they
may think proper. By virtue of a law of the Prov-
ince of 1739 40, deer-reeves were annually chosen with
the other officers of the town. The record of Decem-
ber 17, 1739, has the following : Voted, " that viola-
tion of the act relating to killing of Dear in the prov-
ince be legally prosecuted. Major John Lane and
Mr. Thomas WooUey be for that service sworn to the
faithful discharge of the truit." Hog-reeves were
chosen at the first election of officers in the town, and
annually thereafter. As the town voted that the
swine should go at large, according to the restrictions
of the law, the duty of the hog-reef was to see that
the animals were properly yoked from April to Octo-
ber. The remaining months they were allowed to go
free and untrammeled.
''The English Bight," an annuity from estates in
the mother country, was of great assistance to some
of the early families. The Lanes and Pages were the
beneficiaries for several generations. It originated in
New England with Job Lane (before mentioned) and
came to the Page family, through the marriage of a
granddaughter with Nathaniel Page, the second of
the name in this country, who was born in England
and came a youth with his father, Nathaniel, to
Boston in 1G82, and to Bedford (then Billerica) in
1687. A fragmentary correspondence, consisting of
scores of letters and bills, ditting from 1651, between
the custodians of the English estates and Job Lane,
is among the interesting papers treasured in Bedford.
The annual remittance was sometimes made in mer-
chandise according to the requests of the owners,
as appears from items preserved. "May 2, 1721,
St. Stephen writes alone: Sende 6 large quarto
bibles," one of which is now owned by Miss Sarah
Chandler, of Lexington. It contains the Page family
record. A letter dated " London Mar. 20, 1754, to
Job & John Lane," expresses regret that " the Bibles
did not suit."
" July 26, 1748, Zach. Bourryan sends Mathew
Henry's Exposition on ye Bible 5 and 6 vols." Dress
fabrics were often ordered and received, and two of
850
HISTORY OF iMIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
the ladies of Bedford appeared on important occasions
attired in tlie " English Gowns.'' The arrival of the
large leather-covered trunks were occasions of much
interest to the several families. It is evident that the
town did not fail to exact a tax on the income, as ap-
pears from the records of 1744 : Voted " not to abate
the Rates that the Lanes and Pages — gentlemen —
were asaest for their income from England." During
the Revolution the income was not received and
the privations of that period were felt more severely
by those families than by others that had depended
upon their own energies entirely ; but after peace
was restored with England the full amount came in
one remittance. The English law of primogeniture
was not transferred to this country. New England
adopted tlie older rule of the common law, by which
all the children shared alike in their parents' estate,
except in Massachusetts, where the oldest son had
a double portion. The legal claimants of the Lane
income at length became very numerous, and the just
division very difficult ; hence the claims were sold in
the early part of the present century.
Job Lane died in Maiden, August 24, 1097, and his
estate was inventoried at i:2036 lis., the larger por-
tion of which was in New England.
Other families received aid from England in the
early years of the town's history, as appears from the
following: "Feb. 23, 1756, Widow French's rates
abated for income at England."
The following is a copy of the goods ordered by
one of the heirs of the Lane e.-tate:
" Bedfoed, September the 10, 17S5.
'* Mr. Lane, tliis is to Inform you what .\rticles 1 aui De&iruus to send
to England for. j
"Art. Frst. one Pice of I'hents for one jround,*ery Dork.
" .\rt. 2d. one Pice of Sattain for oae Cloak.
'■.\rt.;id. One Imif Pice of Base.
'* Art. 4tli. one yard ..t three-<iuuiter8 of Scarlet Brad Clotb.
"An. 5tli. one bilk Handkerchief.
" .Vrt. bth. The Rest in fine Linnen.
" lu So Doing you will oblige,
" (.'itnVT Page,"
CHAPTER LXXXriL
BEDFORD— ( Continued).
NOTED OCCASIONS.
The ordination services at the settling of the minis-
ters, mentioned in the Ecclesiastical section, compris-
ed all of the convocations of note previous to the year
1800. On the 22d of February of that year a most
imposing ceremony was participated in by ihe whole
town in honor of General George Washington, who
had died in the closing days of the last century. Rev.
Samuel Stearns delivered the memorial sermon.
In the various anniversary celebrations of Concord
fight, held by the mother town, Bedford has been
well represented. In March, 1850, ten leading men
were chosen to confer with the people of Concord in
regard to the seventy-fifth anniversary, and three of
the vice-presidents were from this town at ihat cele-
bration. At the centennial, April 19, 1875, a good
company of civilians was in the procession with ban-
ners. The one carried by Bedford minute-men one
century earlier was borne by Isaac E. Fitch, and one
with the following inscription : " Captain Jonathan
Wilson killed April 19, 1775. He died for us and
Liberty," was carried by Abram E. Brown. Both
standard-bearers were great-grandsons of those who
fought on the memorable day at Concord.
On Memorial Day, 1874, the Soldiers' Monument
was dedicated with imposi::g ceremonies. The paresit
towns of Billerica and Concord assisted in the ser-
vices. The former furnishing a Post of the G. A. R.and
brass band and the latter sent Company C, of the
Fifth Regiment, .nnd a brass band. Josi.nh A. Stearns,
A.M., was president of the day ; Ralph Waldo Emer-
.son, Sampson Mason and Rev. William J. Batt weie
among the speakers.
The one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the in-
corporation of the town was the grand jubilee day of
its existence. At the autumn town-meetinj;-, Sep-
tember 30, 1878, it was voted that the town would ob-
serve this occasion. Rev. Jfjnathan F. Stearns, D.D.,
one of Bedford's sons, was chosen to prepare an his-
! torical address, and a large committee of citizens wns
j chosen to conduct the celebration. The committee
organized with Josiah A. Stearns, chairman ; Rev.
George F. Lovejoy, secretary, and Oliver J. Lane,
treasurer.
The funds for the celebration were obtained by sub-
scription; more than six hundred dollars were con-
tributed to the general fund ; beside-", there were many
generous contributions for special objects.
When plans were so far matured as to issue notices
and invitations, the committee called for a nr.nie fv/r
the celebration, and Mr. Elijah W. Stearns, the vil-
lage druggist, called from his ancient Latin the nu-
merical adjective " Sesi)ui " (one and a half). This
gave the occasion a tinge of novelty and added spice
to the post-prandial remarks.
August 27th, the day on which " the Great anil
General Court" that granted the charter for the
town commenced its session, was selected for the cele-
bration rather than September 23d, the date of the
act of incorporation. This was to accommodate sons
of Bedford engaged in literary work who were then
enjoying their annual season of rest.
A mammoth tent was erected on the fields near the
Common, where the exercises were held and the din-
ner served.
The occasion was replete with interest for yourg
and old. For judicious planning and careful execu-
tion, the Sesqui Centennial of Bedford is recorded
as an event that reflects credit upon all who contrib-
uted to its success. Chief among many were the
historian and president of the day, both of whom.
' — —- — • — ..— ..i.».---Tm. - \ ■ , V
RESIDENCE OF WALLACE G. WEBBER,
BEDFORD, MASSACHUSETTS.
BEDFORD.
851
with a brother, the last of the sons of Bedford's hon-
ored minister (Rev. Samuel Stearnsj, have, since that
day, joined the great company that they labored to
honor through that celebration.
The organization of the church, which took place
in July following the incorporation of the town, was
celebrated in July, 1S80, by the Church of Christ,
connected with the Trinitarian Congregational Soci-
ety. Rev. George F. Lovejoy, pa.stor of the church,
preached an historical discourse, which was printed
in pamphlet form. At the conclusion of the services a
thanli otfering waa made and the society freed from
debt.
The fiftieth anniversary of the gathering of the first
S.ibbaih-schoui was held in July, 1S(58. It was an
occasion of general interest. Rev. William F. Stearns,
D.D., president of Amherst College, and other sons
of Bedford, were prominent in the celebration.
The seventieth anniver.-;ary was another important
event, when a general reunion was enjoyed. The his-
tory of the school, in pamphlet form, was issued at
that time.
CHAPTER LXXXIV.
BEDFORD— (Cmlinued).
Topogriiphical and .^[iBcellaneoua.
Bedford is in about the central part of Middlesex
(bounty, fourteen miles northwest of Boston and
twelve miles south of Lowell. It is connected with
both cities by rail.
It has Billerica on the north, the same with Bur-
lington linil Lexington on the east, Lexington, Lin-
coln and Concord on the south, and Concord and Car-
lisle on the west, from which it is separated by Con-
cord River.
The village stands on a slight elevation and con-
stitutes a water-shed. Peppergrass Brook extends in
a wiuding northwesterly course and Trout Brook in
a southwesterly course to Concord River. Shawshine
River enters the town from Lincoln at its extreme
southern point and Hows the entire length of the town,
east of the village, entering Billerica at the north. It
receives the waters of Tar Kiln Brook soon afterenter-
ing Bedford, and after crossing Lexington llain
Street it receives Elm Brook, which drains a long
range of meadows on the Concord side and takes in
Hartwell Brook on its course.
Spring Brook, an outlet, of Fawn Lake at Bedford
Springs, unites with Potash Brook or Ash Gutter in
its southeasterly course to the Sfaawsh'ne, which it
reaches near the East School-house. Vine Brook
enters the town from the east and becomes an import-
ant tributary of Shawshine River. Uthi?r small
streams are tributary to either Concord or Shawshine
Rivers. The only motive-powers, utilized at present
are on the Shaivshine River and Vine Brook.
" Tiie soil," says Alfred C. Lane, of Boston, a grand-
son of Bedford, in "Notes on Geology of Bedford,''
"may be divided into three kinds — the dark peat of
the swampa and meadows, boulder clay and high
level sand-beds."
The peat is found on the lines of the water-courses,
where a considerable portion of the surface appears to
have been formed of vegetable matt^'r and was used
for fuel, before the development of coal-mines ; a firm
white sand subsoil which underlies this vegetable de-
posit made it comparatively easy to cut out the peat
or turf in convenient pieces to stack for drying. It is
aUo used as a very good fertilizer for the saudy soil of
high lands. The cranberry and an inferior quality of
grass are natural productions of this soil, and turned
to some profit by the farmer. The buulder clay is
composed of sand, pebbles and boulders, together
with clay varying in quantities according to the lo-
cation. This is supposed to have drifted here with
the ice and been deposited during the glacial period.
The underlying ledge crops out in some locations
and shows unmistakable signs of the southerly course
of the ice-fields. The most noticeable is in the vicin-
ity of the North School-house.
The boulder clay is the soil found in the northerly
part of the town, more generally than elsewhere; it
is hard to cultivate, but productive when broken and
fertilized ; if left in its natural condition it produces
the huckleberry and other small fruits of compara-
tively little value.
The s'and, besides forming the subsoil of the peat
lands, is thrown up many feet above the stream level
and found in beds ; by digging in these beds one may
easily detect layers of successive deposit, which indi-
cate the action of the water when the ice was disap-
peariag, before any well-defined water-courses had ap-
peared and this territory wa.s an inland lake. The
pine trees seem to be the natural production of this
soil, which is light and dry, but when enriched be-
comes productive and is easily cultivated.
In general the geological formation is calcarei)us
gneiss and sienite, in which are found good specimens
of garnet. " In Bedford the strike of the gneiss is
northeast and the dip nearly perpendicular." Hitch-
cock mentions the yellow ochre in connection with a
rusty mica schist.
Bedford is indicated aa a locality for garnet by
Dana and Hitchcock both, and at one time the at-
tention of the people was turned to this formation, as
ot merchantable value, but it was not remunerative.
The iron and sulphur springs indicate the decompo-
sition of certain mineral properties that are visible in
some locations about Bedford Springs.
The village is well drained and free from miasmatic
influences. It is classed among the very first locali-
ities of the State in point of healthfulness. No de-
structive contagion has visited the town since about
1750, when a throat distemper baffled the skill of phy-
sicians and brought sorrow to families in the east part
852
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of the town. Loogevity ia noticeable in the families
that represent the first settlers and particularly in the
Davis, Lane, Page and Hartwell families.
Tbees. — Besides the pine already mentioned, there
is the white cedar, that takes kindly to the peat
of the low lands in the vicinity of Concord River, and
the red cedar found in small quantities, making its
slow growth in the boulder clay, where oak, maple
and birch flourish the most abundantly ; the elm
flourishes here, having beea planted by the early
settlers for shade, and many venerable specimens are
standing — useful monuments of the past. Flora:
The following is condensed from alocalwork, "Some
of the Wild Flowers of Bedford," by Charles W.
Jenks, a careful student of the soil and productions
of his ancestral territory :
"The wild flowers of Bedford are neither numerous
nor rare. We have few deep valleys of rich soil, and
few running brooks falling over rocks, both of which
localities are the chosen haunts of many species. The
earliest, perhaps, of all our flowers is one rarely no-
ticed, the skunk cabbage, which may often be found
in March, with its peculiar spathe of yellow or red,
peeping out from some damp or swampy place.
"Soon after, along the banks of ditches or in low
meadows, the cassandra or leather leaf, with its long
line of heath-like bells; this plant, if gathered in fall
or winter and kept in a warm room, will blossom
freely. Together with this is generally found the
sweet-gale, a low shrub with small and insignificant
catkins, but having a delicious aromatic fragrance.
Then, after the hazels and alders have flung their
delicate tassels to the wind, the whole array of spring
flowers is upon us — seven species of violet', blue and
white (the yellow I have never seen in the town
limits, though I have found it in the neighborhood);
the wood anemone, with its neat and prettier rela-
tion the rue anemone, the columbine or honey-
suckle, the houstonia, the false Solomon's seal, often
called wild lily of the valley, and that little marvel
of beauty and color, the fringed polygala, the marsh
marigold, under the false name of ' cowslip,' lighting
up the meadows with its brilliant yellow, and occa-
sionally, on some rocky land, the early saxifrage, the
bell-bower with its pale yellow lily-like flower, and
deep in some pine grove the moccasin flower or lady's
slipper, one of the most curious of the remarkable
family of orchids, the trillium or wake Robin, which
among us is represented by its least attractive form,
the nodding species — these, with many others, make
up what may be called the spring flowers. Then the
shrubs begin to blossom — the shad-bush, the rhodora,
with its purple flowers, followed by the many vibur-
nums and cornels, the wild cherry, the choke, and the
more palatable black or rum-cherry, the barberry,
with its nodding raceme of yellow flowers, whose
sensitive stamens throw the pollen on to any insect
visiting it, to be borne to some other flower ; the low
and high bush blueberry, huckleberry and the azalea,
with its clammy white and spicy flowers.
" About the middle of June, in the meadows, will be
found the side-saddle flower, more commonly known
as huntsman's-cup or pitcher-plant; about the same
time of the year, and generally with the side-saddle
flower, are found two of our early orchids, the are-
thusa and pogonia or adder's-tongue, resembling each
other in shape, — the former of a deep magenta color
and the latter much paler, but with a delicious frag-
rance. A little later, in these same meadows, will be
found the yellow lily, the tall meadow-rue, the trum-
pet-weed with its large heads of dull purple and the
button-bush with its globular head of flowers, while
hidden in the grass, but making itself known by its
odor, is the meadow mint. Then along some water-
course, either ditch, brook or meadow, bursts forth
the flaming cardinal flower, one of the brightest
and most brilliant of all our flowers, and never
ao handsome as when seen in abundance in its native
place. With this fore-runner of autumn come the
goldenrods ; the clematii', clothing the bushes over
which it climbs with a beautiful wreath of while
flowers, followed by the feathery fruit; the ground-
nut, with clusters of fragrant chocolate-colored
flowers; the cleihra or white alder lining the road
in some swampy place ftnd sending forth a rich
spicy odor from its pure white spikes; then the
asters, purple and white, along the roads, the wood-
lands and meadows, of as many species and as diffi-
cult of determination as the golden-rods; the gerar-
dias, the tail yellow and the smaller purple species;
the gentians, ihe deep blue with its closed flower,
and among our latest, if not the last of all, the
fringed gentian, by many considered our most ex-
quisite flower. The only companion of the gentian is
the witch-hazel, with its weird-like yellow blossoms,
which comes late in the fall and does not mature its
fruit till the next season.
"The plants found in and along the river seem wor-
thy of special mention. Among the earliest is the
yellow water-crowfoot, which is found in May, and
resembles a large buttercup. Later in the season the
shores are lined with the blue pickerel-weed and the
white arrow-head, while farther out are the white
and yellow pond lilies, — the latter in two species, one
much larger than the other; the bladder-worts are
also found. " In August the hibiscus or swamp rose-
mallow may be found on its banks, while in the river
itself is the water-marigold and the beautiful floating-
heart.
" The family of composites is largely represented at
all seasons of the year. The dandelion, golden-rods,
asters, cone-flower, wild sunflower, trumpet, iron-
weed, thistle, hawk-weed:", climbing hemp-weed, ele-
campane, white-weed or ox-eye daisy, and tansy are
of ihis family. Among the orchids are the lady's-
slipper, pogonia and aretbusa, four or five species of
rein-orchis, including the ragged-fringed and the pur-
BEDFORD.
853
CHAPTER LXXXV.
BEDFORD- •( Cmlimud).
Earhj Method of Cottecling TaseM — Some Early Custom* ami Improvement*.
For many years the town was divided for the pur-
pose of taxation into classes. They were designated
as the south list and the north list. The two con-
stables were the authorized collectors and the duty of
levying the tax fell to the selectmen. The tax for
each department of government was assessed by itself,
which made the duties of these oflBcers the most im-
portant within the gift of the town.
In the year 1736, after the expenses of organizing
the town and church had been met, the rates and
portions were as follows and entered upon the records
as here given :
Province tax
NalbaDiel Page is to coltecC .
DuDiei Taylor is to collect .
County tnx
Xatbaniel Page is to collect
Daniel Taylor is to collect
Rev. Sir. Bowes' aaiary . .
Nathaniel Page is to collect
Daniel Taylor is to collect
Town and School tax . . .
Nathaniel Page is to collect
Daniel Taylor is to collect
£.
67
30 R.
30 13
04 14 2
jo 5 10
North
South
North
South
North
South
91 9 0
49 11
41 17
North
South
pie-fringed, the rattlesnake plantain, two species of
ladies' tresses, the calopogon and rarely the coral-
root.
" There are a few parasitic plants found in Bedford,
the dodder being one of the commonest; the Indian-
pipe is found in some of our woods and in many
pine woods, the pine sap or false beechdrops, and
rarely the one-flowered cancer-root. Rushes, sedges
and ferns are also found here and furnish interesting
study to any one enjoying the science of botany."
Constables were required to use severe means, even
to resort to imprisonment, to secure the collection of
the " rates."
The following is a copy of the warrant issued to the
constable for the collection of the taxes in 1743 : (But
two punctuation marks appear in the original, and
they might be regarded as accidental)
" Middx Ss. To Zacberiah Fitch one of the coos' of the Town of Bed-
ford Greeting In his Majeetya name you are Reijuired to lory and col-
lect of the several parsons named in the list herewith committed unto
you each his respective proportion therein set down of the snm total of
such list being faro assesment granted and agreed upon by the Inhabit-
ants of the town of Be<lford Regularly assembled for defreying the nessa-
sary charges arising with in the same and to deliver. and pay lu the stun
and sums which sb.ill so levy and collect unto John Wbitraore Town
Treasurer or where you ihall have orders from the selectmen, and to
compleat and make up an accompt of your collections of the whole
sum at or before the first day of June next in serving the date bear of
and If any parson or pations shall neglectorrefuse to make payment of the
sum or sums whereat he or they are Respectively assessed and set In the
said list to destmin the goods or chatties of sncb parson or parsons to the
value thereof and the distress or distreses so taken to keep by the space
of four days at the cost and charge of the owner and if the owuer do not
pay the sum or sums of money so assessed upon bim with four days than
the sd distress or distresses so taken you are to expose and openly sell at
an out-cry for payment of sd money and charges notice of such sail
being posted up in some piiblick place w ithin the same Town Twenty
fore hours before hand and the over pluse coming by the sd sail If any
be beside the sum or sums of the assessment and the charges of taking
and keepingof the distress and distresses to be Imediately restored to the
owner and for want of goods or chattels whereon to make distress you
are to seese the bodle or bodies of the parsonfor parsons so refusing and
bim or them commit nnto the common goal of the said County there to
remain until he or they pay and satisde the several sum or sums whereat
they are Respectively sasessed as aforesaid unless upon aplicatioo mode
to the Court of general Sessions of the peace the same or any part there-
of be abatted
Dated in Bedford October y= n" day 1743
by orders of the assessors Iseakl PrrrKAK
Town Clerk."
The following is the tax-list of Bedford in 1748 :
SoutA I.i«(. —Samuel Bacon, Stephen Davis, James Dodsoo, Joseph
Fitch, Zncharlah Fitch, Peter Fasset, John Fasset, Benjamin Fasset,
Joseph Hartwell, Henry Harrington, William Uanings, James Honsteu,
John Merriam, .\nios Merriam, Samuel Merriam, Nathaniel Merrlam,
John .Moore, Joseph Heads, Walter Powera, Paul Raymond, WUUam
Raymond, Edward Stearns, James Rankin, David Taylor, Thomas
Woolly, Jonathan Woolly, Thomas Woolly, Jr., Richard Wheeler, Sam-
uel Whltaker. North Liat.— Obed Abbot, Josiah Bacon, Joslab Bacon,
Jr., Benjamin Bacon, Michael Bacon, John Bacon, Thomas Bacon,
Jonas Bowman, James Chambers, John Corbet, Samuel Duiton, Benja-
min Danforth, Comelins Dandley, Benjamin Fitch, Jeremiah Fitch, Jo-
siah Fasset, Jonathan Grimes, Benjamin Hntcbinson, Timothy Hartwell,
Btujamin Kidder, Deacon Job Lane, Col. John Lane, Capt. James Lane,
John Lane, Jr., Job Lane, Jr., John Lane, (3d), Timothy Lane.
The basis of suffrage in 1810 appears in the warrant
for the spring meeting: "To the freeholders and
other votable inhabitants of said town, qualified to
vote in town-meetings, namely, .»uch as pay to one
single tax, besides the poll or polls, a sum equal to
two-thirds of a single poll tax."
In 1812 " a voter must have been a resident for the
space of one year, and have been taxed during said
time for his poll. The property qualification was
then declared to be a "freehold income of ten doUara
or other property valued at $200."
The changes in the observance of funeral rites, aa
indicated by the records of this town, have been as
great aa in any direction. The custom of holding any
religious service at the burial of the dead was not
general when this town was incorporated, but it was
the custom to furnish mourning friends with certain
articles of wearing apparel, and the custom was ob-
served in some families in a modified form until a
much later date. The following receipt is self-ex-
plaining:
" Boston, June 24, 1715, Becd. of Mr. Job Lane, of Blllerica, y« sum
of ten pounds, at twice, for gloves for y* funeral of his father." ** I say
reced by me.— Behj. Fitch."
Rev. Samuel Stearns was instrumental in breaking
up the drink habit at funerals, which was carried to a
most ridiculous extreme in some cases. In 1804 the
town voted "That the practice of carrying round
drink publicly or in a public manner, and also of in-
viting the bearers to return to the house of mourning
after the funeral, be laid aside." It iwaa also voted
S54
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
"That notice be given to those who are desired to of- and Crowninshield. In 1821 his parents removed to
ficiate aa bearers, previous to the time appoi^ited for Moullonborough, N. H., where they lived a few years,
attending the funeral. That two or more suitable and William was sent to the village school for a brief
persons be appointed by the town to superintend on ! term. The family next moved to Boston, which was
these solemn occasions. That prayer be attended to be the scene of the boy's development into man-
in one hour after the time appointed for the funeral." I hood. He attended the North Bennet .Street .School,
In 1817, after the erection of the new meeting-h' use,
and purchase of the new bell, it was voted "That the
bell should be tolled one hour before the time set for
the funeral service. It was also customary to notify the
people of the death of a fellow-citizen by tolling the
bell and indicating the age of the deceased by the
under the instruction of "Master Capen.'' His
father was lost at sea, and the family having no re-
served means, the mother was thrown upon her own
resources for their support.
About this time William entered the law-office of
the Hon. James T. Austin & Sons, Joy's Building, as
number of strokes of the bell. On the Sabbath fol- j errand boy, for the liberal salary of one dollar per
lowing a death, all of the members of the family were j week, where he remained one year, at the end of
expected to attend the service of public worship at
the meeting-house and present written petitions for a
remembrance in the "long prayer." The " note for
prayers" was expressed according to the case— that of
a widow was as follows : " Mrs. B. desires prayer that
which time he went to live in the family of Mr. An-
sel Lucas, at South Abington, Mass., where he had
the opportunity of attending school, and where he
made good progress. At the end of eighteen months
Mr. Lucas moved to Eel River, now Chiltonvilie, a
the death of her husband may be sanctified to her ' suburb of Plymouth, where he remained until the
and her family for their spiritual good." Petitions ' death of Mrs. Lucas, who was a most estimable lady,
were also sent in for prayers for recovery of the sick, j and very much beloved by all who knew her.
or delivery from impending danger. It was expected William, who was then sixteen years old, returned
that the pastor would make early calls on Monday to Boston, to be his own lord and master, with but
following, upon all of the sick who had thus asked an little experience in the wnys of the business world,
interest in the public prayer. i Being of a sanguine temperament the future appeared
In 1810 Mr. William Page gave a hearse to the to him to be all beauty and sun.^hiue. Oh, Youth I
town. Until that time the dead were carried to the Oh, Hope ! angels of beauty and love, you are kind
burial-ground on the shoulders of men. When intox- ' only to be cruei, and when dark clouds overcast your
icating liquor was too freely used the scene became gorgeously painted sky, despair is ne;ir. William soon
most disgraceful. It was a repetition of these scenes found tbat the price cf honest bread was labor, and
that led to the action of reform by the town. , that he must find employment, which he did with
The erection of the frame of a building — "araising" ' Mr. Tucker, one of the original conductors on the
— was an occa.«iion where the sublime and ridiculous ' Boston & Worcester Railroad, in delivering letters,
were strangely combined. The people of the town ' pack.ng-s and money parcels from the railroad to par-
assembled in large companies, and aided in putting I lies in Boston, dividing with Mr. Tucker the proceeds
themassiveoak timberstogetherand pulling the frame i of this primitive express business. At that tune Mr.
into place, a side at a time. The minister was ex- | Harnden was ticket master in the Boston & Worces-
pected to attend and offer prayer during the work, j 'er depot, which position he resigned to succeed
and all were treated to as much liquor as they would ! J'oung Hayden, and at that time commenced the reg-
drink. At the raising of Colonel Timothy Jones'
house, about the year 1780, tradition says, the Rev.
Mr. Penniraan gratified his appetite for strong drink
so much that he offered one of his most peculiar ad-
dresses to the Deity, and when returning home fell
ular express business between Boston and New York,
which has now become so important and extensive.
The next scene was the pit of the old Flag Alley
Theatre, and the first appearance of our hero iu a play-
house. The mimic world was a new revelation, and
from his horse and lost his wig. This was found by the ^'°"^ that hour he was simply " stage-struck." He hung
boys, and some days later put in a hollow log near i around the stage-door to see the tinsel kingi, queens
his house, when the owner was called upon by the ^"d villains enter and exit. They were the beings of
boys to assist in capturing a wood-chuck that had ; romance,
lodged in the log, and there found bis much-needed ' The next scene was the old Fredonia Society, in
article of dress, ins'ead of the little animal.
BIOGRAPHICAL.
AVILLI.VM RICHARDSON HAYDEX, M.D.
The subject of this sketch was born in Salem, Mass.,
May 7, 1820, in a house on the opposite corner to the
one in which White was murdered by the Knappa
Devonshire Street, where John 6. Gough, William
O. Eaton, John Salmon, George A. Wyatt and other
noted amateurs delighted the " Hoodlums" and our
subject played Doric in " A Race for a Dinner." The
favor accorded to the Fredonia gave life to the His-
trionic Society, which was well fitted up for the times
in Castle Hall, corner of Castle and W.-i-hington
Streets, which sent forth several noted actors, amongst
them James Stark, Octavus Johnson, Harry Paul
BEDFORD.
855
and others. There was a rivalry between Stark and
Hayden for leading parts. At one time Mr. Starki
being manager, and desiring to play the leading part
in the play called " The Seven Clerks ; or, The Three
Thieves and the Denouncer,'" cast Hayden in a minor
comic part out of his line, much to his chagrin.
Feeling the slight and that he should not do himself
credit, he went on the stage sure that he would fail,
but instead of that he made a brilliant success, play-
ing the part twenty-one nights to overflowing houses.
He was afterwards elected president and manager of
the society, but as there was no income from amateur
theatricals, he entered the Old National Theatre under
William Pelby as a supernumerary and assistant
property man.
The child prodigy. Miss Davenport, during an en-
gagement at '' The National," in one scene of a play
in which she appeared had to pay off some factory
help, who filed before her and received their tin
money. Several passed her in due order accepting
their pittance, when our hero, being the last and not
being satisfied with his part and aspiring to be author
and actor, accepted the coin with all the di.sdain of
which he was master, threw it upon the stage, and
with folded arms stalked down to the foot lights and
out at the prompter's entrance. The audience saw the
"gag "and cheered the "supe" to the echo. Man-
ager Pelby was a witness of the debut, and coming
down to Wright, the prompter, exclaimed, " Who in
hell is that boy ? " On being informed he said, " Give
him some small business ; he will rise." Desiring to
obtain a position in the company of the Old Lion
Theatre, there being no opening lor a novice, he ac-
cepted a place as a supernumerary in the play of " Ma-
zeppa." The actor who had a short speech to make as
a sentit.el on a bridge, being taken suddenly ill, the
manager gave orders to have one of the supernumer-
ies placed on the bridge and when Mazeppa entered
the wing and motioned him to go off, he should do so.
Hayden was the one placed there, and having become
familiar with the lines, he, instead of leaving the
bridge, went on with the part, much to the surprise
and satisfaction of the manager, and continued in the
pare until the piece was withdrawn. He next joined
a strolling company of players as leading man and
"did" some of the prominent towns in this State.
The business was bad, the manager stranded, and his
company with empty pockets were obliged to " foot it
to Boston." Mr. Hayden established the Dramalic
Mirror, which, however, after a few months, died of |
what the doctors would call "marasmus." He next
became a clerk for Mr. George W. Redding, a news
agent at No. 8 State Street, Boston.
When W. H. Smith, the eminent actor, was man-
ager of the Boston JIuseum, he gave Mr. Hayden an i
engagement at that theatre, but on account of sickness
this engagement was canceled, and, much to his re-
gret, his theatrical career closed.
Dr. Havden has been thrice married — first to Re-
becca Wyman Erskine, in 1840, by whom he had
three children, one of whom still survives (Mrs. R.
W. Rouse, of Port Richmond, New York). Mrs.
Hayden died in 1847.
For his -second wife, in 1850, he married Maria B.
Trenholm, of Falmouth, a lady possessing remarkable
intellectual abilities. In 1866 she graduated in New
York ai a physician, and for several years hada large
and influential practice, and was on the Board of
Medical Censors. Mrs. Hayden had four children,
two of whom survive her, she dying in 1884.
In 1885, for the third wife, he married Sarah Hol-
den Everett, by whom he has three children, who are
now living.
In 1845 he commenced the study of medicine, grad-
uating in New York City, where he followed his pro-
fession for eleven years, when he moved East to accept
the presidency of the New York Pharmaceutical
Company the laboratory of which is now in successful
operation, making 350 medicinal preparations for the
physicians and druggists, three of them being special-
ties from original prescriptions of Dr. Hayden, and
are in high repute with the medical profession. They
are The Compound Phosphorus Pills, The
Uric Solvent and Hayden's Viburnum Com-
pound, the latter having a most extensive sale, and
being of a remarkable character. The company has
received and published the written testimonials of
more than five thousand physicians, being more than
was ever before given by the profession for any other
special remedy in the history of medicine. At the
end of the first year after the incorporation of the
company it virtually failed, and proposed to close up
the business. To this Dr. Hayden objected and en-
deavored to arrange to carry on the works on his own
responsibility. After much negotiation a trade was
made, which at the end of twenty-four years is a great
buceess.
In 1867, when Dr. 'Hayden came to Bedford, there
was no railroad nearer to Bedford and the Springs
than Lexington (six miles distant) Dr. Hayden
went before the Legislature and obtained a charter
for a line from Lexington to Bedford, which was built
by the Middlesex Central Railroad Company.
The next move was for a narrow-gauge road from
Bedford to the Springs and North Billerica, which
was also built. Dr. Hayden being the second president
of the road, which practically was a success. Dr.
Hayden, who desired this road changed to a standard-
gauge road, enlisted in its behalf the co-operation and
able services of Mr. Mellen, the general manager of
the Boston & Lowell Railroad, without whose favor
it would not have been done. Some idea may be
gained of Dr. Hayden's labors when we state that at
one time he was president of the New York Pharma-
ceutical Company, working chemist and pharmacist,
doitg all the compounding in the laboratory ; land-
lord of the Springs House Hotel for sixteen years;
having for six or eight years the larger ^art of the
856
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
practice in the town of Bedford, two miles distant;
risitiog Boston upon an average of five times a week ;
having for the past twenty-five years written all the
company's band-books and advertisements, attend-
ing to the general business, and carried on a farm of
forty acres. During Dr. Hay den's residence in Bed-
ford he has served the town one term on the Board of
Selectmen, and two terms on the School Board, and
received a very la-ge majority of the votes of the town
for the Legislature. During the past three years Dr.
Hayden has built two laboratories and one of the most
beautiful houses in the country, and made an ex-
tended tour of Europe, from Ireland to Italy, Austria,
Switzerland, France, Belgium, Holland, Germany,
England and Scotland.
Dr. Hayden has visited Europe several times and
made the acquaintance of some distinguished men,
among them Lord Lytton (BulwerLytton) Professor
John Ashburner, Louie Blond, the Rev. James
Smyth, and the great Robert Owen, Robert Cham-
bers and many others, and in this country he enjoyed
the personal acquaintance of William Lloyd Garri-
son, Horace Greeley, Theodore Parker and other re-
formers.
Bedford Springs, the residence of Dr. Hayden, is
one of the most beautiful spots in New England, six-
teen miles from Boston, on the Bedford and Billerica
Railroad. The estate comprises about two hundred
acres of cleared and wood land, one of the largest arti-
ficial lakes in the State, a summer hotel, three medic-
inal springs, railroad station, express and post-office,
and is a little world in itself.
In religion Dr. Hayden is an agnostic, in politics
a progressive Republican, believing in the party when
it is in the right, but never when in the wrong. His
creed is, " Right and Justice for all men and women
alike."
JONATHAN BACON.
Jonathan Bacon was descended from Michael Bacon,
who went from Engiacd to the north of Ireland,
where he lived fur several years, when, in 1640, he
came to this country and settled in Connecticut.
Michael Bacon, son of Michael, settled in that psi-t
of Billerica which is now within the limits of Bed-
ford. He built a saw and grist-mill on Shawshine
River, which was burned by the Indians in King
Philip's War. At his request a military guard was
detailed for his protection, and his mill was rebuilt.
A saw and grist-mill, owned by Charles Clark, now
stands on the s'te occupied by him. In the early
history of Bedford, which was incorporated in 1729,
the Bacon family was a prominent one. In a petition
to the selectmen of Concord for permission to be set
off as a new town, dated May 1, 1728, the name of
Joseph Bacon appears, and at the first town-meeting
of Bedford, held October 6, 1729, Jonathan Bacon was
chosen one of the Board of Selectmen. Among the
taxable inhabitants of Bedford, in 1748, were Samuel
Bacon, Josiah Bacon, Josiah Bacon, Jr., Benjamin
Bacon, Michael Bacon, John Bacon and Thomas
Bacon. In 1780 Jonas Bacon enlisted as a soldier in
the Revolution, and Jonathan Bacon was one of the
signers to the covenant of the first church in Bedford,
organized immediately after the incorporation of the
town. Benjamin Bacon, who was born December 6,
1713, and died October 1, 1791, was chosen a deacon
of this church February 15, 1759.
Thompson Bacon, son of John Bacon, of Bedford,
and ^ member of this family, married Martha Hos-
mer and had nine children — Jonathan, John, Reuben,
Elbridge, Thompson, Eliza, Nancy, Octavius and
Albert. Of these, Reuben was an extensive manu-
facturer of shoes in Bedford, and Albert is still living
in his native town. Another of these children, Jona-
than, the subject of this sketch, was born in Bedford
April 15,1785. With only the advantages of a common-
school education, he was in his early life employed on
his father's farm. Possessing a naturally thoughtful
mind, his attention w.as soon turned to mechanical
pursuits, in which he displayed an ingenuity which
laid the foundation of his eventual success. Associated
with John Hosmer, he was the first in this country to
engage in the manufacture of women's and children's
shoes, and his careful management resulted in the
establishment of a profitable enterprise, which grad-
ually increased and before many years was carried
on by a considerable number of firms.
In connection -vith his shoe business he made pat-
terns for lasts, and for shoes, which he manufactured
himself, and thus opened the way for the display of
his inventive powers in a broader field. He soon
found that new mechanical enterprises, more conge-
nial to his tastes, required the abandonment of his
manufacture of shoes, and, selling out that business,
he ever after devoted himself to inventive study and
the manufacture of such devices as were its result,
and their sale to the trade. George H. Gray, Joseph
West, Charles Brooks and Horton, Hall & Co., of
Boston, were among the principal dealers in his arti-
cles of manufacture. Among these devices were sash
and blind fastenings, latches and various carriage
appliances, of which the article known as " Bacon's
Patent Lever Blind Fastener " has been for upward^
of fifty years on the market, and has never yet been
equalled by anything used for the same purpose.
Mr. Bacon married Abigail, daughter of Eben
Clark, of New Ipswich, New Hampshire, an officer
in the Revolution, and at one time on the staff of
General Washington. His children were Abigail,
who married William Ripley, of Abington ; Clark,
who married Emma C. Burr, of Hingham ; Frederick,
who married Ann Robbins, of Bedford ; Caroline, who
married Isaac Hurd, of Concord ; Eliza, who married
Prescott J. Bigelow, of Abington ; Warren, who mar-
ried Lucy A. Lawrence, of Bedford; Jerome A., who
married Marion M. Darling, of Boston, Eliza F. Mer-
tiam, of Boston, and Anna R. March, of Bedford ;
LITTLETON.
857
and Emma A., who married Sebastian Kramer, of
Boston.
Jlr. Bacon, tliougli largely interested in public af-
fairs, neithersought nor accepted office except such as
he believed that he could administer for the benefit and
welfare of his native town. He was chairman of the
Board of Selectmen of Bedford for many years, only
consenting to an election because he believed it the
duty of every citizen to bear his share of town bur-
dens, and to perform his part of a townsman's duty.
Further than this he refused to go, and at one time
declined a nomination (equivalent to an election) to
the State Senate. In politics he was a Federalist
and Whig, and as long as he lived, after the organ-
ization of the Republican parly, he was one of its
devoted membeis. Civil Service Reform, so far as a
part of its policy is concerned, would, if he were now
living, be no novelty to him.
As long ago as August 28, 1840, during the Harri-
son campaign, he drew up and signed a constitution
for a poli:ical association advocating the election of
General Harrison as President, in which opposition
was declared " to members of Congress dbtributing
executive patronage until two years after they had
ceased to be such." He belonged to that -class of
men whom older readers well remember, distributed
all over the Commonwealth, one in almost every
town, who ruled the communities in which they
lived, not by wire-pulling and trickery and self-seek-
ing, but by advice and counsel, sought and followed
on account of their wisdom, and by an honest and
earnest effort to put the best men in office, and thus
promote and secure the public welfare.
In theology he belonged to what was called in his
day the liberal wing of Orthodoxy, and remained in
the old church and parish when they became Unitar-
ians and the conservative wing seceded. In the con-
troversy which followed the division of the church,
in which it was claimed that the property of the old
territorial pariah belonged to the town, he took an ac-
tive part, and the claim, largely through his efforts,
was successfully resisted.
It will not be difficult to portray the character of
the man thus briefly sketched. With a mind elastic
and susceptible of expansion and growth, with a
training which had implanted within him a love ot
truth, integrity and faithful labor, he combined a ten-
derness of spirit and an affection for his family acd
home, a regard for public interests and a respect for
the rights and comfort and welfare of those about him,
which made him a conspicuous figure in his town,
and one receiving the entire confidence of his friends
and neighbors.
His son, Jerome A. Bacon, is one of the eminent and
successful merchants of Boston. Receiving his early
education in the public schools of Bedford and at
the Lawrence Academy at Groton, at the age of nine-
teen, though fitted for college, he became the appren-
tice of his brother, Clark Bacon, who was engaged in
Boston in the manufacture of gold leaf, foil and plate.
So faithful wsa he in his work that, after a few months,
apprentices were placed under his charge, and at the
age of twenty-three he removed to Bedford and there
established the same business on his own account.
After a few years, upon his father's death, which cxi-
curred in August, 1856, he removed to Boston and
engaged in the manufacture and sale of paper, which
he baa since carried on with eminent success.
CHAPTER LXXXVI.
ZITTLETOy.
BY HERBERT JOSEPH HARWOOD.
The origin of the Indian town of Nashobah, which
once occupied the greater part of the territory now
Littleton, irj traceable directly to Rev. John Eliot, the
apostle to the Indiana and the translator of the Bible
into the Indian language. He began to preach to the
Indians in 1646 at Nonantum, a part of Newton.
Many became converted to Christianity and expressed
a desire to become civilized and to live more like
white people. Eliot advised them to adopt the gov-
ernment which Jethro proposed to Moses for the Is-
raelites in the wilderness (Exodus xviii. 21), and to
choose rulers of hundreds, of fifties and of tens ; he
also advised that they live in towns apart from the
white people, and accordingly obtained from the Gen-
eral Court a grant of territory at Natick, where the
"praying Indians," as they were called, formed their
first town in 1651.
Other towns of the same kind were formed soon
after, and among them Nashobah.
The Indians of this neighborhood were among the
first to listen to Eliot's preaching, and Tahattawan
the elder, sachem of Nashobah, was, according to
Shattuck's " History of Concord," one of the first con-
verts.
Rev. Thomas Shepard, of Cambridge, in his "Clear
Sunshine of Gospel," speaking of the Indians and
Mr. Eliot's preaching, says : " The last effect was their
desire of having a town given them within the bounds
of Concord near unto the English."
Among the orders and regulations for the Indians,
agreed to at Concord, January, 1646, is the following:
"29. They desire they may be a town and either
dwell on this side of Beaver Swamp (in Lincoln) or at
the East side of Mr. Flint's Pond."
It would seem from these facts that the praying In-
dians of this vicinity had it in mind to form a town in
or near Concord for several years before they were
granted the Nashobah plantation, and that they had
discussed different localities.
It would be interesting if we knew more abont
Eliot's preaching to the Nashobah Indians, that he
858
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
stood on such a spot on such a day, that be came
again on such a day, etc., etc. ; but I have been una-
ble to find any record of his coming to this vicinity.
That both Eliot and Gookin came here I have no
doubt, for it is known that they were in the habit of
going about to all the settlements of praying Indians.
From the fact that Tabattawan the elder was
among the first of the converts we may conclude that
he first listened to Eliot's preaching at Newton or in
that neighborhood, and it may be that by his invita-
tion the apostle afterwards came np into the wilder-
ness beyond Concord ; but these are mere conjec-
tures.
In May, 1654, Mr. Eliot petitioned the General
Court fur the incorporation of several Indian towns;
the part of the petition which interests us reads as
follows : " First, therefore the inhabitants of Nashoba
living 7 or 8 miles west of Concord, desire to have
liberty to make a towne in y' place, with due accom-
modations thereunto. And though Concord have
some conditional grants of lands y' way, yet I under-
stand that we shall have a loving and Christian agree-
ment betwixt them and the Indians."
The petition is dated Boston, 4th of the 3d (May),
1654.
In the General Court records, under date of 14th
of May, 1654, is the following :
*^ Id rdb' to the petlcoD of Mr. Jno. Elliott, od b«balf of Banerall lu-
dians, the Court graunta hia request, viz. : liberty fur the inbabituDts
of Naabop [Nasbobah] and to tbe inhabitanta of OgkooDtiquookamea
[Marlborough] and also to the iohabltautsof Uasoemeauclioth [Graftou]
to erect tseuemll lodJaD tounea iu tbe places propounded, vi^ cuovejent
acoiiiodacon to each, provided tbey p'judlce not any former grnuuts ;
Dor shall tbey djapoae of it v^ out leave first bad and obtajned from this
Court."
In reference to the incorporation of Nashobah, Mr.
Shattuck, in his " History of Concord," says :
"Naabobah, lying near Nagng Pond, partly in LiUltfon and parity in
AcUm as now bounded, accordingly became an Indtau town ; and here
a part of the Praying Indiana in Conconl, with otbera in tbe viciuity,
gathered and adopted civil and religioua order, and bad a Ruler and
other municipal ofllcerv, though no church waa formed. Such aa were
entitled to Christian ordinances probably went to Natlck to calebrato
the communion after a church waa organized there in 1660."
Let US hope that the last part of the quotation from
Mr. Shattuck is more trustworthy than the first ;
he gives no authority for saying thut Nashobah
was "partly in Acton," and I am inclined to think
thp.t he drew on his imagination for the statement,
as I am unable to find any authority for it what-
ever, while, on the contrary, I have been able to
locate the original Nashobah with tolerable accur-
acy, as I shall show hereafter, and am morally cer-
tain that the town of Concord never had a valid
title to one inch of the land where the Indian town
was laid out, and consequently that it was never
"partly in Acton," which, as we all know, was set
off from Concord.
We will drop the question of boundary for the
present and take it up later. It may seerti a little
peculiar that the white people, who had taken pos-
session of all Massachusetts, with very little regard
to the Indian?, who had occupied it from time im-
memorial, should gravely grant back to them a
small portion with restrictions; but such is always
our " Indian policy."
The white people took possession of all the land
in the Colony by virtue of their charter from the
Crown of England, and the Crown protected iheui
merely by its power.
Thus we see why it is that Indian deeds are and
were of little value in conveying a title, for the
Indians, having no stable government, had no power
to enforce a title, and therefore a title acquired
from Indians could not stand against one from the
Crown.
Daniel Gookin, in his " Historical Collections of
the Indians in New England," chapter vii. § 10,
says : "Nashobah is the sixth praying Indian town.
This village is situated, in a manner, in the centre,
between Chelmsford, Lancaster, Groton and Concord.
It lietii from Boston about twenty-five miles west
northwest. The inhabitants are about ten families,
and consequently about fifty souls.
" The dimensions of this village is four miles square.
The land is fertile and well stored with meadows
and woods. It hath good ponds for fish adjoining
to it. The people live here, as in other Indian vil-
lages, upon planting corn, fishing, hunting and some-
times labouring with the English. Their ruler, of
late years, was John Ahatawance [Tabattawan], a
pious man. Since his decease, Pennakennit [or Pen-
nahannit] is the chief. Their teacher is named John
Thomas, a sober and pious man. His farther was
murthered by the Maquas in a secret manner, as he
was fishing for eels at his wear, some years since, dur-
ing the war. He was a pious and useful person, and
that place sustained a great loss in him. In this
village, as well in other old Indian plantations,
they have orchards of apples whereof they make
cider, which some of them have not the wisdom and
grace to use for their comfort, but are prone to abuse
unto drunkenness.
" And although the laws be strict to suppress this
sin, and some of their own rulers are very careful
and zealous in the execution of them, yet such is
the madness and folly of man naturally, that he
doth eagerly pursue after that which teudeth to hia
own destruction.
" I have often seriously considered what course to
take to restrain this beastly sin of drunkenness
among them ; but hitherto cannot reach it. For if
it were possible, as it is not, to prevent the Eng-
lish selling them strong drink ; yet they, having a
native liberty to plant orchards and sow grain, as
barley and the like, of which they may and do
make strong drink that doth inebriate them, so that
nothing can overcome and conquer this exorbitancy
but the sovereign grace of God in Christ, which is the
only antidote to prevent and mortify the poison of sin.
LITTLETON.
859
" Near unto this town is a pond, wherein at some sea-
sons ihere is a strange rumbling noise, as the In-
diiins affirm ; the reason whereof is not yet Icnown.
Some have conceived the hills adjacent are hollow,
wherein the wind being pent, is the cause of this
rumbling, as in earthquakes.
" At this place they attend civil and religious order,
as in other praying towns, and they have a constable
and other officers.
"This town was deserted during the Maquas War,
but is now again re-peopled and in a hopeful way to
prosper."
This, then, was the state of affairs in 1674, the date
of Gookin's writing.
The pond where the rumbling noise occurred is, of
course, Nagog. Traditions are plenty of rumbling
noises, sometimes said to be like the discharge of can-
non in the vicinity of Nashoba Hill, which is near
Nagog Pond, but I have not heard of any occurring
of late years. They were probably earthquakes.
John Ahatawance, mentioned by Gookin, was Ta-
hattawan the younger, son of the eider of the same
name.
Pennahannit, also called Captain Josiah, was the
" marshal general" of all the praying Indian towns.
In the year following Gookin's account came King
Philip's War, which proved disastrous to the Nasho-
bah Indians, owing to the distrust of their loyalty to
the Colony, and fears of their joining Philip and per-
haps endangering their neighbors, the white people.
I have never found that there were any grounds for
these fears; but no Indian was trusted, and the atroc-
ities of the hostile ones made the name Indian odious
everywhere.
In the Massachusetts Archives, vol. 30, page 185, I
find the following under date of November 19, 1675 :
** It ia ordered By the Counsell Ihnt the curnitte of miHtla of Concord
nnd the select Diea uf thiit towtie with the ujvice of Major Willurd do
ilispoae & order nnitten referriog to the lodiuos of N'ualiubah that
have subjected to this GurermoD, Jc to setle ^ secure y^ in the towne of
(.'oucord under the iiifipectloD of John Ho.re of Concord ; (Who hath
tuuuifested himself willing tu to take sy^ care of iheoi It. tu secure them
by dLiy & by night) Jk to see they bee iniployd to laubor ; for their lively
hood that the country may be eaeed ; or in cnse they cannot or do not
agree \vh John Hoare atforesaid y' they are inipoured to contract w^
any other iwrsou or persons in the said towne, for the same end, or to
phise the said ludiaiisor ny of them to service, provided tlie mayueend
beeattaiiied vizt. : that thi* indiaos may be imployed tu laubor <& peaarTed
froodnnge & the country Jt towne secured.
* I'oat by y« Coaucel lUlb of Xovember, lG7j.
" E. B. S."
Also the following :
"9 Dec., I6To. It is ordered that llnjor Willatd, Capt. Gookin with
Mr. Eliot by the first opportunity are to repayre to Concord and
Chelmsford A to e.xamin those Indians there, Ji tu use their t>e8t en-
devor tu settle them in such a posture either at Deare IsUnd or in the
place where they live so y' they who am friendly to the English may
secured A and the English iu thuse parta u1.-k> secured A .is much no may
oatisflfd with their settlement and the «aid coniittee or any two »r thro
of ttiem £ inipoured tu etfect this matter .£ they are to use their beet
indevorthat those indiaos maybe impluyd •& kept to lauUir & take
care they be all disarmed.
" 'J Ilecember 75 Past by j*« Councel
" Edw. Rawson, Secy."
In accordance with these orders, the Indiana of
Nashobah were taken to Concord and put in charge
of John Hoar, who kept them employed and contented
for a short time. Hoar was compensated for his
trouble by being exempted from impressment and,
perhaps, taxation.
Gookin, in his " History of the Christian Indian?,"
gives the following interesting account of this epi-
sode :
"About this time there befell another great trouble
and exercise to the Christian Indians of Nashobah,
who sojourned in Concord by order ; the matter was
this. The Council had, by several orders, empower-
ed a committee, who, with the consent of the select-
men of Concord, settled those Indians at that town,
under the government and tuition of Mr. John
Hoare ; the number of those Indians were about fifty-
eight of all sorts, whereof were not above twelve
able men, the rest were women and children. These
Indians lived very soberly, and quietly, and indus-
triously, and were all unarmed ; neither could any
of them be charged with any an faithfulness to the
English interest.
" In pursuance of this settlement, Mr. Hoare had
begun to build a large and convenient work-house for
the Indian?, near his own dwelling, which stood
about the midst of the town, and very nigh the town
watch-house.
" This house was made, not only to secure those
Indians under lock and key by night, but to employ
them and to set them to work by day, whereby they
earned their own bread, and in an ordinary way (with
God's blessing) would nave lived well in a short time.
Bnt some of the inhabitants of the town, being in-
fluenced with a spirit of animosity and distaste
against all Indians, disrelished this settlement ; and
therefore privately sent to a Captain of the army,
[Captain Mosely] that quartered his company not
far off at that time, of whom they had experience,
that he would not be backward to put in execution
anything that tended to distress the praying Indians ;
for this was the same man that had formerly, without
order, seized upon divers of the praying Indians at
Marlborough, which brought much trouble and dis-
quiet to the country of the Indians, and was a great
occasion of their defection ; as hath been above de-
clared.
"This Captain accordingly came to Concord with
a party of his men, upon the Sabbath day, into the
meeting-house, where the people were convened to
the worship of God. And afler the exercise was
ended, he spake openly to the congregation to this
effect : ' That he understood there were some heathen
in the town, committed to one Hoare, which he was
informed were a trouble and disquiet to them ; there-
fore if they desired it, he would remove them to Bos-
ton ; ' to which speech of his, most of the people
being silent, except two or three that encouraged
him, he took, as it seems, the silence cf the rest for
860
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUWTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
coDBeot ; and immediately after the asaembly was
dismissed, be went with three or four files of men,
and a hundred or two of the people, men, women and
children, at his heels, and marched away to Mr.
Hoare's bouse and there demanded of him to see the
Indians under his care. Hoare opened the door and
showed them to him, and they were all numbered
and found there ; the Captain then said to Mr. Hoare,
' that he would leave a corporal and soldiers to secure
them ; ' but Mr. Hoare answered, ' there was no need
of that, for they were already secured, and were com-
mitted to him by order of the Council, and he would
keep and secure them.' But yet the Captain leff his
corporal and soldiers there, who were abusive enough
to the poor Indians by ill language. The next morn-
ing the Captain came again to take the Indians and
send them to Boston. But Mr. Hoare refused to
deliver them unless he showed him an order of
the Council ; but the Captain could show him no
other but his commission to kill and destroy the
enemy; but Mr, Hoare said, ' these were friends and
under order.'
" But the Captain would not be satisfied with his
answer, but commanded his corporal forthwith to
break open the door and take the Indians all
away, which was done accordingly ; and some of
the soldiers plundered the poor creatures of their
shirts, shoes, dishes, and such other things as they
could lay their hands upon, though the Captain com
manded the contrary. They were all brought to
Charlestown with r. guard of twenty men. And the
Captain wrote a letter to the General Court, then
sitting, giving them an account of hi^ action.
"This thing was very offensive to the Council,
that a private Captain should (without commission
or some express order) do an act so contradictory to
their former orders ; and the Governor and several
others spake of it at a conference with the deputies at
the General Court. . . .
" The Deputies seemed generally to agree to the
reason of the Magistrates in this matter ; yet notwith-
standing, the Captain (who appeared in the Court
shortly after upon another occasion), met with no
xebuke for this high irregularity and arbitrary action.
To conclnde this matter, those poor Indians, about
fifty-eight of them of all sorts, were sent down to
Deer Island, there to pass into the furnace of affliction
with their brethren and countrymen. But all their
com and other provision sufficient to maintain them
for six months, was lost at Concord ; and all their
other necessaries, except what the soldiers had
plundered. And the poor Indians got very little or
nothing of what they lost, but it was squandered
away, lost by the removal of Mr. Hoare and other
means, so that they were necessitated to live upon
clams, as the others did, with some little corn provided
at the charge of the ' Honorable Corporation for the
Indians,' residing in London. Besides, Mr. Hoare lost
all his building and other cost, which he had provided
for the entertainment and employment of those In-
dians ; which was considerable." This was in Febru-
ary, 1675-76.
In another place Gookin relates that fourteen
armed men of Chelmsford went to the Indian camp
at Wameset, near by, and called on them to come out
of their wigwams, whereupon they fired on the unsus-
pecting Indians, wounding five women and children
and killing outright the only son of John Tahatta-
wan, of Nashobah, a boy twelve years old, and wound-
ing his mother, Sarah or Kehonowsquaw, then a
widow, the daughter of Sagamore John, of Paw-
tucket.
She was then a widow for the second time, having
had as her second husband Oonamog, ruler of the
Praying Indians at Marlborough.
William Nabaton, or Tahaltawan, a brother of
John Tahattawan, was among the Indians at Deer
Island, and was one of the six selected to serve as
guides under Major Savage, in March, 1675-76.
Tom Dublet, or Nepanet, was another of the Na-
shobah Indians who proved of great service to the
English in treating with the hostile Indians and re-
deeming prisoners. He it was who procured the re-
lease of Mrs. Rowlandson and others.
For one of these expeditions, which was successful
in ransoming prisoners, an order was passed by the
General Court awarding him two coats.
His wigwam was near the present residence of Mr.
Joel Proctor, and his favorite "hole" for fishing is
pointed out some distance down the brook.
There were white people living at this time in
the part of the present town of Littleton which we
designate as Nashoba, but which was not within the
Indian plantation, but was part of Concord Village,
so-called, and was sometimes designated as Powers'
Farm and Nashoba Farm.
The Reed house, the ruins of which are still to be
seen at the foot of Nashoba Hill, was built as a gar-
rison, probably about this time, for protection against
hostile Indians.
A family by the name of Shepard was living in
the vicinity during King Philip's War, and in Febru-
ary, 1675-76, Abraham and Isaac Shepard, two broth-
ers, were killed by Indians as they were threshing in
their bam. They had set their sister Mary, a girl of
fifteen years, to watch on Quagana Hill, near by, but
the Indians stole up behind, captured her before she
could give an alarm and carried her away to Nasha-
way (Lancaster), where they encamped for the night.
While the Indians slept she escaped, mounted a
horse, swam the river, and rode home.
There may have been more cf a village at Na-
shoba Farm than is now there. The ancient burying-
ground, which was on the Reed Farm, was ploughed
up several years since. Such desecration is shame-
ful ; but in the absence of records to show that it
was ever set aside for a public burying-place, and
never having been under the town's care, nobody f"lt
LITTLETON.
861
authorized to take action after the desecration took
place ; the contemplation of which was known only
to the perpe'rator, who claimed the land.
The tombstones were used in buiiding a wall, and
some were taken away as relics, so that now. proba-
bly, no vestige remains of the last resting-place of
the earliest white settlers of this town.
East of where the burying-grouod is said to have
been may beseen a well-preserved dam, canal and mill-
site beside the brook which runs through the woods.
Very few of the Naahobah Indians ever returned,
but when released Irom Deer Island went to other
places, the greater number to Natick. In the mean
time white people moved into the deserted plantation,
perhaps hud done so to some extent before the In-
dians were removed, and settled there with no real
right, save that of possession ; for, though some bought
land of the Indians, the latter had been expressly
forbidden by the General Court to sell without its
sanction.
Lieutenant Joseph Wheeler, of Concord, by trad-
ing with the Nashobah Indians while they still lived
on their plantation, became their creditor, and peti-
tioned the General Court in 1662 for a grant of two
hundred acres of land in the south part of Nashobah
in payment, but it was refused.
Peleg Lawrence and Robert Robbins, of Groton,
were probably the first purchasers of Nashobah land
from the Indians. A plan on file at the State-House,
made by .Jonathan Danforth, surveyor, and bearing
date January 2, 1686-87, shows the Robbins and Law- I
rence'tract as laid out in the northeast corner of the ,
plantation, one-half mile wide by about two miles j
long; one side, the northerly, being just two miles,
and the southerly a little longer.
It appears to have been supposed by these men \
and Groton people that the purchase of the laud from
the Indians brought it into Groton territriry, and i
when, in later years, it was found that the jurisdiction
over Nashobah lands was in question, and that other
towns were preparing to annex it, Groton sought to !
strengthen her claim by getting possession of the '
Indian deeds. At a town-meeting in Groton, June
8, 1702, it was voted to give three acr^ of meadow j
land and ten acres of upland each to Robert Rob-
bins and to the heirs of Peleg Lawrence, on condition
that they give up their Indian titles to the town.
G.oton people or others who desired to belong to
Groton also settled within the bounds of Nashobah,
but outside of the Robbins and Lawrence purchase.
In the Middlesex Couuty records I find that at
court held at Charlestown, June 20, 16S2, the follow-
ing was entered :
" CaplftiD Thomas Henchm.in, Lt. .Io8. Wheeler & Lt, Jno. fiynt
eurTeyor, or aoy two of them tire nominated x impowered a coiuit-
tee to run the ancient hounds of Naebubab Plantation, i remark the
lines, aa it was returned to the Ftenenil court by eaid M'. flynt, at the
charge of the Indiana, giving notice to the selectmen of (irotton of time
i place of meeting «<:'> is referred to >lr. riynt, to appjnt, i to make re-
tiVD to next coun court at Camb. in order to a tioall settlement."
The return is as follows :
" We wboM Dames are underwritten being appointed by j" Honored
County Court June 2Uth, lbS2, To run the Ancient bounds of NasLo-
bey, have accordingly run the said bounds, aud find that the Town of
Gtoton by tbeire Second laying out of theire bounds hare taken into
theire bounds as we judge neer halfe Indian Plantation.
"Sevventll of the Select men and other inhabitants of Groton bein;
there with us Did see theeree error therein Jt Do declire that btying out
So far as they have Invaded the right of y* Indians.
" Also we find y« the Norweat Corner of Nashobej is mn into ye first
bounds of Groton to ye t.juantlty of 3oU acres accorxling as Grvton men
did there Show us tbeire Said line which they Say was made before
Nashobey was laid out, and which bounds they Do Challenge as theire
Kight.
"The Indians also have Declared them Selves witling to forego that
Provided they may have it made up upon th. iie West Line.
" .\nd we Judge it may be there added to theire Conveniunce,
" :; October 1682.
" J08BPU Wheeleb,
"John Flint.
" Exhibited in Court & approved 3 : 8 ; 82.
"T. D. B."
From a comparison of Jonathan Danforth's plan
of Nashobah and the first plan of Groion, made by
the same surveyor in 1668 and published by Dr. S.
A.Green in his "Boundary Lines of Old Groton,"
with a modern county map, it will be seen whtre the
.350 acres lay in which Nashobah and Groton over-
lapped each other.
The northwest corner of Naahobah was undoubt-
edly the same as the present northwest corner of
Littleton, on the side of Brown Hill in Pingreyville,
and very nearly a right angle. It was formed by
the present westerly line of the town and a line
whose general direction from the comer was easterly,
and is laid down on Danforth's plan of Nash-
obah as a straight line, although records slate
that it ran by blazed trees which were not in a
straight line.
The southeasterly line of Groton by Danforth's
plan of that town ran from Forge Pond to a point
near the Lactate factory, or between that and the
" Newstate " railroad crossing; there it made an angle
of about 150° and ran to a point at or near the pres-
ent westerly corner of Littleton and northerly corner
of Boxboro', from which point the Groton line ran
northwesterly to what is now Shirley Village. It
will be seen that the easterly end of Oak Hill and
considerable land in the Pingreyville corner of the
town must therefore have been included in the maps
made by Danforth of both Nashobah and Groton.
To which plantation this 350 or more acres right-
fully belonged is a question of great doubt.
The grant of the Indian plantation of Nashobah
was in 1654, and though no area nor bounds were
given, it was stated by Gookin in 1674 and by others
to be four miles square ; in reality it was only three
miles on the north aide.
The original grant of Groton was in 1655, and was
stated to be a tract eight miles square, but when first
laid out by Danforth in 1668 it was on the average
about seven miles wide by eleven long.
Groton neglected to get Danfoith's plan con-
862
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
firmed by the General Court until after Nashobah
waa incorporated for a second time as an English
town in 1714, and then the overlapped territory had
been confirmed to Nashobah.
In their report Messrs. Wheeler & Flint refer to a
second laying out of Groton, by which, no doubt, was
claimed the Bobbins and Lawrence purchase and
more too, as the amount of land within Nashobah
claimed by Groton was stated in a legislative report
by Jonathan Tyng, Thomas How and John Stearns
in 1711 to be 7840 acres, ind elsewhere that the line
extended beyond Beaver Brook. It does not appear
that Groton ever had any valid right to this tract,
but afier it was taken beyond their reach by the in-
corporation of Nashobah in 1714, Groton men had
sufficient influence in the Legislature ro procure the
grant, mainly in lieu of it, of Groton Gore, so called —
a tract not then included in any town, but in what is
now Greenville, Mason, Brookline, Milford and Wil-
ton in New Hampshire.
The next purchase of land from the Indians, after
the Robbins and Lawrence tract, and the first one of
which the deed is recorded, was made June 15, 1686,
by Hon. Peter Bulkeley, of Concord, and Maj.
Thomas Henchman, of Chelmsford, who bought the
easterly half of the plantation for the sum of £70.
The Indian grantors were :
" Kebonowsquaw alias Sarah, the danghter and sole heireiis of John
TiihattawaD, Sachem and lute of Naahobah deceased ; NaanisUcow,
allaa John Thomas ; Naanasquaw alias Rebeckah, wife to the Baid
NaaDislicow ; NaatibkloomeDet, alias Solomon, eldest son of n^ Naanisb-
cow and Naanasquaw, sister to the aforesaid Tabattawnn ; Weegram.
mominet alias Tnomas Waban ; Nackcominewock, relict of Crooked
noblu; WacDuhhew alias Sarah, wife to \eepaDum alias Tom Dube
let"
The description of the land is a» follows :
** And it contains one moyetj or balfe part of said Kaebobah planta-
tion, dt the easterly side uf it ; It is bounded by Chelmsford plantalion
(atwut three miles & three-quarters) on the easterly side; by Concord
Tillage Land Southward, abont two miles & three-quarters; Northward
it is boonded by Land sold by the aforesaid Indians to Robert Bobbins
and Feleg Lawrence, both of Groton Town, which land is part of the
aforesaid Kashobah plantation, & this Line is exiictly two miles in
Length A runs East three degrees Northerly, or West three degrees
southerly, & the South end runs parallell with this Line : On the West-
erly side it is bounded by the remainder of said Nashobah plantation ;
& that West Line nina(from two little maples marked with H for the
Northwest corner) it mns South seven degrees & thirty minutes east,
foar miles A one-quarter ;. the most Southerly corner is bounded by a
little red oak marked H, the north east comer is a stake standing about
four or five pole sonthwanl of a very great Rock that Lyeth in the line
between said Nashobah & Chelmsford plantation."
The great rock is no doubt the one in the orchard
on the farm of the late Barnabas Dodge, a short dis-
tance south of the road, and that is now in the line be-
tween Littleton and Westford.
I am forced to the conclusion that Jonathan Dan-
forth, whose plan of 1686 appears to have been made
for the purpose of locating the Bulkeley and Hench-
man purchase, made his plan more in the interest of
his clients than of accuracy, and suspect that he did
not measure the north line of the plantation at all,
but assumed that it was four miles long and so meas-
ured off two miles for Bulkeley and Henchman, and
ran his other lines accordingly. My reasons for this
belief are that the distance from the great rock men-
tioned to the northwest corner of Littleton oc the
side of Brown Hill, which all authorities agree is the
original northwest corner of Nashobah, is only about
three miles, and when it came to be surveyed under
the direction of a legislative committee in 1711, the
north line of the plantation is reported as three
miles.
If the reader will look at a map of Littleton and
note the following points, he will have the four cor-
ners of the ancient Indian plantation Nashobah: the
no.'tbweat corner of Littleton on the side of Brown
Hill, near the road to Ayer, was one corner ; a point
near the centre of Boxboro', found by prolonging the
present west and south lines of Littleton until they
meet, was another corner; the westerly end of Nagog
pond was a third corner, and a point on the Westford
line, between the Dodge place and Forge Pond, was
the fourth corner. It was uniformly spoken of as
four miles square, but was not exactly that, being, as
we have seen, only three miles on one side, acd hav-
ing corners which varied slightly from right angles.
The purchases of Robbins, Lawrence, Bulkeley and
Henchman left in the hands of the Indians only that
portion of the plantation which Danforth in his plan
designates as "Nashobaih the Indian part," being ihe
westerly portion, four miles long on the west linn
two miles theoretically on the north line, but actually
only about one, and 412 poles on the south line.
Deeds from the Indians covering this portion are
on record at Cambridge as follows : Under date of
May 9, 1694, from Thomas Waban, of Natick, to
Walter Powers, of Concord, in consideration of fif-
teen pounds, and other things —
" A certain Tmct of Land upland, Swamp, Meadow .t !\Ieadow Land,
Containing one Quurter part of an Indian Plantation know-n by ye
name of Nashoby within their Msjestiea Province of ye Mossachtisetts
Bay. The easterly half of 3** PluntiXtiun being formerly bought of ye
Indians by 3lHJor Hlncbman and ye Westerly (Junrter part of ye Plan-
tation is yet in Possession of ye Indians being Challenged by John
Thomas Indian and this Quarter part of the plantation by one now sold
as above lies between ye b^ halfe that Miijur Hincbman bought of ye
Indians and ye other Quarter part yt pnid Indinn John Thomas claims
from End to End both upland and Meadow, ye Souther End bounds upon
Pompasittaquitt, or ye Town Ship of Stow, and ye Northerly End nina
[toj Groton Line."
And under date of May 10, 1701, from
"Solomon Thomas A John Thomas jr., both of Xalick, to Josiali Whit-
conib of Lancaster," "a certain parcell or Tract of Land lying and be-
ing in a place Commonly Called and known by the name of Meshonah
[Nashobah] and is a Quarter part of a Tract of Land four miles square.
It being four mile in Length and one mile in breadith be it more or less
as it is bounded with Stow Laud on the South and West and Wilderness
Land on the North and the Land of Walter Powers on the East, and all
that is therein and thereupon, and all rights, privileges, easements and
appurtenances belonging to the thereby granted premises."
Solomon Thomas and John Thomas, Jr., were sons
of John Thomas, and it is fair to assume that he had
transferred his interest in this tract to them, as he
was still living at the time.
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LITTLETON.
863
A confirmatory deed of the Bulkeley and Hench-
man purchase was given in 171-1 by Thomas Waban,
John Thomas and John Thomas, Jr., to Major
Henchman and the heirs of Peter Bulkeley, and states
that the consideration was passed twenty-eight years
before.
This deed, old and yellow, but still legible, bearing
the signature of Waban, and the marks of the other
two, is still in existence, and in the possession of the
writer, to whom it was presented by his father, Hon.
Joseph A. Harwood. It is an extremely interesting
document, and was formerly owned by Mr. Samuel
Gardner Drake, author of " Drake's Book of Indians,"
from whose hands it passed through one other only to
Mr. Harwood.
What disposition to make of Nashobah seems to
have beea a troublesome question for the General
Court to decide, and the conflicting interests which
sought possession of the very desirable farming lands
there lying idle were powerful enough to keep the
question in suspense for many years.
It appears to have been a contest between Major
Henchman and others, who had bought of the Indians
and wished to colonize the place and form a town, on
one side, and the neighboring municipalities, which
wished to annex the territory, on the other. In the
eud the colonization interest won.
Reference is made to a petition from Concord people,
who desired a grant of the land for settling on it, but
it was stated not to have been pressed, owing to the
"publick troubles that hath happened," referring no
doubt to the troubles in England at the time of the
accession of William and Mary; but in 1698 it was
renewed by a petition signed by twenty-one Concord
men and seventeen Chelmsford men, stating: "And
your petitioners, for themselves or children, stand in
need of an iclargme"' & accommodations (who, if not
accommodated neer home, must be necessitated to re-
move out of the Province), having also obtained the
Indian Title of ye one-halle of ye sd Tract, of ye Ad-
ministrators of ye estate of Peter Bulkeley, Esq-, de-
ceased, and of Major Thomas Hinchman, ... In
order to the setting up of an English plantation."
Major Henchman endorsed the document to the
effect that the petitioners had purchased the title to
half the tract.
The matter wa.s put in the hands of a committee to
report to the next session, which again put it otf in
the same manner, and it seems to have come to noth-
ing for several years after. The signatures, however,
to the petition include many Littleton names, from
which it is fair to assume that lliis was in a me.isure
the party which was finally successful in getting the
grant. I give the names in full :
CoNroRD.— Joseph Estabrook, Thomas Dackin, John Wlieeler, Jno.
Jnoe:i, Elipbelet Fox, Synion Davie, Seur, Tlionius Urowoe, ^en'., S;im"
How, Sumucl Prescott. Jn. Jleriam, :?aniuel Ilarlwell, Nalh" Harwood,
Moses Wheatt, lioger Ubaiidler, Walter Power, Sen., Wm. Wilson,
Saouiel Jones, Jno. Hore, Jno. Wood, George Hobins.
C'HELMSroED.— Jno. Hartwell, sen'., Jno. Hold, Sam" Siniltou, Jona-
than Prescott, Jiin'., Jacob Taylor. The. Wheller, James Snedty, Tliomas
Clark, Josepb Farwell, Edward Emerson, Joseph Adams, Jno. Kidder,
Steven Pierce, Abraham Parker, John Perram, Moses Parker, Elezar
Brown.
As has been stated before, Groton attempted to
annex a large part of Naahobah, but was not success-
ful. Stow also made an attempt to get the whole, and
in 1702 petitioned the General Court, reciting the
facts that Nashobah, a tract of land four miles tquaje,
was deserted by the Indian proprietors, who wished to
sell ; that certain English claimed it by purchase, and
that Groton had of late extended their town bounds
to take in a large part, especially of meadow, but that
Stow, being small, stood in the greatest need of it, and
praying for leave to purchase and join the land to
Stow. The petition was granted on the part of the
House, but negatived in the Council.
This left, the nsatter still open, and people continued
to settle in Nashobah, some by right of purchase and
others without right. Of course they had no town
government, though uo doubt most of them associated
themselves with the neighboring towns, where they
attended church and paid minister's rates, and per-
haps other taxes, as towns were allowed to tax out-
lying settlers not in other towns.
Jonathan Whitcomb, nephew of Josiah Whit-
comb, who purchased of the Indians, settled where his
descendant, Jonathan Hartwell Whitcomb, now lives,
the farm having been handed down in the family ever
since, and as he was a shoemaker, or " cordwainer' '
and kept accounts with his neighbors as early as 1708,
i I have been able to gather from them the names of
t many of the first settlers. Among them are the
I names of Robbins, Lawrence, Parker, Wilhird, Farns-
! worth, Pearce, Powers, Wheeler, Wetherbee, Stone,
Davis, Whitney, Jewett, Woods, Gilson, and many
1 others not now familiar. The next move for a grant
I of Naahobah, of which I find record, was in 1711,
I when tweuty-three, who styled themselves " Inhabit-
ants of Concord, Chelmsford, Lancaster & Stow, &c.,''
petitioned for a grant of Nashobah, " In a regular
I manner to settle a township," reciting that sundry
: persons had made entry upon the land without appli-
cation to the government, and that others were in-
tending to do the same.
The petitioners were ;
Gershom Procter, Sam" Procter, Jolin Procter, Joaeph Fletcher, John
.Miles, John Parlln, Robert Robin?, John Darby, John Barker, Sam'
Stratton, Hezeklah Fletcher, Josiah Whitcomb, John Bnltrick, Will"
! Powers, Jonathan Hubburd, W«. Keen, John Heald, John Buteman,
i John Heywood, Thomas Wbeeler, Sam" Uartwell, jun'., Sam" Jones,
j John Miriam.
Acting thereon the General Court, on June 7, 1711,
"Ordered thot Jo'. Tyng. Esq'., Tboni'. Howe, Esq'., & Mr. John
Sternes, be a ("oniraittee to view the l.and mentioned In the Petition, ,fe
' Uopresent the Lines or Bounds of the Overall rdjaceut Towns bounding
i on the S** Lands, and to have Speciall Uegard to the Ldiud granted to
the Indiana, ,^ to make report of the quantity 4 Circumstances thereof."
1 The report of this committee gives the best descrip-
j tion to be found of the plantation, and the state of
I things at that time, and I therefore copy it in full :
864
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
**The report of the ComJttj of the Hoot)!* Court upon the petition of
Ooocord, ChelmHford, Lancaster & Stow, for a grant of Part of Naabobe
Unda,
"Pursaantto the directfoDs given by tbfa Hon^'" Court bareing Date
tbe 3t<^ of I^y, 1711, The Comity Reports aB followetb ibat la to Say,
" That on the second day of October, 1711, tbe s^ comitty went upon
the premiaea with an Artts andToved (viewed) and serraied tbe Land
roeotionad in the Peticon, and hnd that tbe moat Southerly line uf the
plantation of Nathobe la bounded partly on Concord & partly on Stow,
and thia Una contalna by Estimation apoo the eerrey a bought three
milee and 61 polle. Tbe Westerly line Bans partly on Stow & partly on
land claimed by Groton and containes fonr milee and 20 poll, extending
to a place called Brown hill. The North line Runs a long curtain landa
claimed by Groton and contains three milea, tbe Gasterle line Runs
partly on Chelmefiord, and partly on a farm caJd Powervis farm, in Con-
cord ; this line contalna a bought foner milea and twenty-five pule.
" The landa a boue mentioned wee shewed to ts for Naabobe Planta-
tion, and there were ancient marks in tbe Seuerall lines fairly marked,
And S' comlte find rpoo the Serrey, that Groton bath Run into Nuehobe
(aa it was Showed to vs), So aa to to take out nere one-bulf S** plantation
and the blgeat part of tbe medows, it appears to vs to Agree well with tbe
rpport of Mr. John Flint & M'. Joseph Wheeler, who were a Commetty
imployed by tbe County Court in midlesexa, to Run the bounds of said
plantation. (June y« 2nth, '82), The plat will demonstrate how the
plantation lyeth & bow Groton coma la vpon it, aa aleso the quaiutete
which la a bought 7840 acres.
"And said Comite are of tbe opinion that tber may [be] a township in
that place, it lying So remote from most of tbe neigbboreng Towns,
provided this Court Shall 3e reaon to continew the bounds us we do judg
thay have been maid at the first laieng our. And that tber be sum addi-
tion from Concord & Chelmsford which we are redy to tbink will be
complyd with by S<i Towns, And S<* Cumite do find a bought 15 famelys
Settled in S** plantation of Naabobe, (5) in Groton claimed, and tea in
tbe remainder, and 3 famelys which are already settled ou the powerses
farm, were convenient to joyn w sd plantation and are a bou(^ht Eitigbt
mllle to any metlng-bouse. (Also tber are a bought Eaight famelys In
Chelmsford which are allredy setled neer Naabobe line & six or Seven
miJea from their own meetiag-bouae.
*' Jonathan Tt?*o,
"Thomas How,
"John Stcabns.
"In the Hoose of Bepreaentativea Not" 3, 1711, Read.
" Oct«. 23, 1713. In Council Read and accepted ; And the Indian
native Proprietors of tbe S<* Planta»», Being removed by death Except
two or Three families only remaining, Ita Declared and Derected That
the said Landa of Naahoba be preaerved for a Township.
" And Whereas it appears That Groton, Concord and Stow by Several
of their Inhabitanta have Encroached and] Setled npon the Said Lands ;
This Court sees not reason to remove them to their Damage, but will
allow them to be and remain with other Inhabitants that may be ad-
mitted into tbe Town to be there setled ; And that they have full Lib-
erty when their Namea and Number are determined to purchase of the
few Indiana there remaiaiog, for the Establishment of a Township ac-
cordingly.
" Saving convenient Allotments and portions of Land to tbe remain-
ing Indian Inhabitanta fur tbelr Setting and Planting.
*' Is*. Addikgton, Secry,
** In the HoQsa of Bepreaentativea, Octor. 23*^, 1713. Bead."
It will be noticed that this report was not acted on
bj the Council for nearly two years after it waa made
and acted on in the House.
By thia action the General Court decided that
Nashobah should be a town for English people, and
for the first time committed itaelf on the question.
The act of incorporation followed about a year
later, that ia, on November 2, 1714, under which date
tbe following entry ia found in the General Court
Records :
'* The followlnf: Order Paas^ by the Represent'", Read A Concnr'd,
viz. : Upon Consideration of tbe many Petitions & ClHima relating to
the Land called Naahoba Land ; Ordered that the said Nashuba Land
be made a Township, with (be Addition of such acljoiuiog Lauds of the
Xeighbourlog Towns, whose Owners shall petition for that end, & that
this Court should thiuk fit to gniut. That the stiid Nasbolia LauJs
having been long since purcliaded uf tbe Indiana by 31'. fiulklt^y .&
Henchman, one-Half, the other Half by Whelcutub i PoweiB, That
the Said purchase be cuuhntied to tbe chiltirm of the 6Hid Bulkley,
Wbetcomb JE Powers, A Cpt. Robert ileers as Assignee to il'. Ueutb-
man according to their respective Proportions ; Reserving to the Inb^ib-
itants, who have settled wiihin ibese tiuunds, ibeir Settlemeuts with
Divisions of Lands, in proportiuu to tbe Grantees, tL such aa Shall be
hereafter admitted ; the said Occupants or Pr-'ttent luhabitanta paying
in Proportion as others shall pay for their Allotments ; Provided the
said PlantaUon shall be settled with Thirty-five Families & an orthodox
Minister in three year? time. And that Fi 'e hundred Acres of Land bo
reserved and laid out for the Benefit of any of the Deect^ndanta of the
Indian Proprietors of tbe Siid Plantatiuu, that may be surviving ;
A Prop<)rtion thereof to be for Sarah Doublet alius Sarah Indian. Tbe
Rev. M'. John Leverett it Spencer Phip% Ed^^ to be Trustees for tbe
Said Indians tu take Care of the Said Lands fur thoir Use.
" .And it is further Onlered that Cpt. Hopestill Drown, M'. Timothy
Wily it Mr. Joseph Buroap, of Rt-atlhig, he a runiniittee to lay out the
said Five hundred Acres of Lund reserved fur the Indtiins 1 to run ttie
Line between Groton <k Xaahoba, at tbe Charge of both Parties, X make
R.'port to this Court ; Aud that howuvt^r tbe Liue niav divide the Lititd
with regard to the Township, yet the Proprietora uo either side luay be
continued in tbe Possession of their Iniprovemeots, paying as afuresaid ;
And that no Persons legnl Right or Property in the Said Lands ahiill [be]
hereby taken away or infringed.
" Consented to J. Dudlev."
From ibis act of November 2, 1714, we date the
present town, afterwards, as we shall see, named Lit-
tleton.
The report of the committee finally establishing the
bounds and laying out the Indian reservation was us
follows :
"The following Report of tbe Committee for Running the Line be-
tween Groton <Sl Naahoba Accepted by Represent^** Read and Con-
cur'd ; viz.
" We tbe subscribers appointed a Committee by the General Court to
run tbe Line between Grcton & Nashoba & to lay out Five hundred
Acres uf Land in said Nashoba to the [sic] Descendants of ihe Iiiiliiins ;
Pui-Buaut to saidOrderof Court, bearing date Octub' 'JUth [the open-
ing of the session] 1714. We the Subscribers return as fullows: That uit
the 3u(t> of Noveml>er last, we met on the premises, & heard the lnfurni<»-
tion of the Inhabitants of Groton, Nashoba & others of the Neighbour-
ing Towns, referring to the Liuetliat has been between Groton &. Nash-
oba A seen several Records, out of Groton Book, & considered otiier
Writings, that belong to Groton and Nashoba. &, We have considered hII
and We have run the Line (Which we account Is tbe old Line between
Groton & Naahoba ;) We begau next Cbelnisfurd Line, at a Heup uf
Stones, where, we were informed, that there bad been a great Pine Tree,
the Northeast Corner of Naahoba, and run Westerly by many old mark-
ed Trees to a Pine Tree standing on the Southerly End of Brown Hill
markM N and tboae marked Trees had been many times marked or re-
newed, tho they do not atand in a direct or stmtt Line to said Pine
Tree on said Browu Hill ; Aud then from said Brown Hill we turned a
little to the East of tbe South, &, run to a White Oak being an old Mark,
and ao from said Oak to a Pitch Pine by a Meadow, being an other old
Mark ; St the same Line extended to white oak near the North East Cur-
nerofStow: And this is all, aa we were informed, that Groton .& Nasho-
ba joins together ; Notwithstanding the Committees Opinion ia, that
Groton Men t>e continued In their honest Rights, tho they fall within
the Bounds uf Naahoba ; And we have laid out to the Descendants uf
the Indians Five hundred Acres at the South East Comer of the Planta-
tion of Nashoba ; East side. Three hundred Poles long. West side three
hundred Poles, South A North ends. Two hundred and eighty Poles
broad; A large white Oak marked at the North west Corner, and many
Live Treea we marked at the West Side A North End, & it takes in PurC
of two Ponds.
"Dated Decern' 14, 1714.
" HOPKSTILL BbOWN
"TiMOTHT Wilt
** JObEFH BdRMAP
*' Consented to J. Dudlct."
LITTLETON.
865
The two ponds referred to in the part laid out for
the Indians were Fort Pond and Nagog Pond.
The town having been duly incorporated, we find,
as in all the old towns, two record books started, the
Proprietors' Record-Book and the Town Records.
The proprietors contiaued their meetings and
records until the last of the common lands were di-
vided in the part of the town known as " New State
Woods," or more properly New Estate, a name I sup-
pose applied about the time of the division of it into
individual holdings. The last entry in the Proprie-
tors' Record-Book was in 1755. The first entry begins
by reciting the act of the Legislature of November 2,
1714, then follows
" No (21
"To all Cbrifltian People before whotne these preeentA shall Come
Greeting Kdow yee y' we whose Dames are underwhtteo liaviag obtaio-
ed >• General Courts grant of a certain tract or parcel of Lund comooty
ciild yasboba which was long since purchased -^f ye Indian Proprietors
of e^ Land, by our selves & predisessors as may appear by our several
Deeds. Do by these presents mutualy agree to throw all in CoraoD for
y« good of ye Town, & ao to druw our several proportions acconliog to
our several intrests A former agreements — & y* we do further agree to
admit as associates according to former agreements, Paul Dudley Esq',
Addington Davenport Esq' & BI' John White all of Boston— A also to
reserve two or three Lots where it is most convenient for y* ministry
Scoole or such other Public uses as may be thought Propper to be at y*
disposition of ye major part of y" Propriety also to bare our proportion
of all y" Charge y' hath or may arise on ye premises.
" To y* conlirmacion of which we And ^ obliege our selves our hein
executors and Administrators firmly by these preeeota in witness where-
of we have liereinto set our hands and seates this 15u> of Decern' 1714.
Note that y« lands cald Powerses farm is not by this instrument in-
cluded
".Vddington Davenpo-f,* Jn" White,* Joseph Buikely,* Robert Bob-
bins,* Marah Wheeler,* Increos Powers,* Jon* Prescott,* John Han-
cock,* D:iuiel Powers,* Robert Meari,* Isaac Powers,* Tho» Powers,
Waller Powers,' Josiab Whitconib," Will*" Powers,* John Bulkeley,*
Paul Dudley,* Eliezer Lawrence.*
" Signed ^ seald in presence of us
" D.\si. Lawbknce
" Sax'. Lo.no."
The admission as associates of Paul Dudley, Ad-
dington Davenport and John White, "according to
former agreements " shows that influence was requir-
ed to get the measure through the Legislature.
A curious error seems to have been made in the
act of incorporation which made the following action
necessary, under date of
" Satdedat, Dec'. 3, 1715.
" Upon Reading the Petition of Josiah Whitcomb of Lancaster, im-
porting
" That whereas tho Great and General Court or assembly at the Ses-
sion in Oct' 1714, in considermtioo that the Land called Nashoba Land
then ordered to be made a Townsbp was purchased of the Indians, one
Halfhy 51' Bulkley 4 11' Henchman, & the other half by Whitcomb
{the Petitioner, who was snppoeed to be dead as he is informed) and
that one Powen did Order that the said Purchase be confirmed to the
Children of the said Bulkley Whitcomb & Powers A to Cup'. Robert
Mearsasaignee of M' Henchman according to their respective Propor-
tions, as by the copy of the Order of Confirmation of the General
Court will more fully appear Humbly Praying that the General Court
will please t > revoke the Confirmation or Grant made to his Children &
confirm to him his fourth part of the said Land, that he may enjoy what
he honestly purchaa'd X that he may have Liberty to make Disposition
thereof according to his own Will & Pleasure.
'* In Council, Read & Consented that the Prayer of the within Peti-
tion be grantad. And Ordered that tbo name of the Township he hence-
.55-ii
forth called Littleton. In the Hou-te of Representatives Read <& Con-
curd.
"Consented to W" Tilixa."
The date December 3, 1715, has been erroneously
used for the date of the incorporation of the town,
but the reader can see for himself that the former
act of November 2, 1714, is the correct date, and that
the new town bore the name Nashoba for one year.
It is said that the name Littleton was given as a
compliment to Hon. George Lyttleton, M.P., one of
the commissioners of the treasury, and that in ac-
knowledgment he sent from England a church-bell
as a present to the town ; but on account of the error
in spelling by substituting " i " for " y," the present
was withheld by the person having it in charge, who
gave the excuse that no such town as Littleton could
be fiiund, and sold the bell.
The first recorded town-meeting was held March
13, 1715-16.
The record begins somewhat abruptly, and it is by
no means certain that the record-book, which is quite
loose in the covers from age, has not lost a few pages
bearing previous records. Isaac Powers was modera-
tor, Samuel Dudley was chosen town clerk and first
selectman, and the other selectmen were John Per-
rum, John Cobleigh, Moses Whitney and William
Powers. The other town ofiicers were : Samuel
Corry, constable ; Samuel Barret, tythingman ; Tho-
mas Power aud John Wheeler, surveyors of highways;
Ebenezer Robbins and Jacob Powers, hog constables ;
John Barrett and Thos. Farr, fence-viewers, aud Isaac
Powers, sealer of weights and measures and treasurer.
Of these men, Isaac Powers lived first in the sec-
tion of the town we call Nashoba, and afterwards in
the Centre, where George Whitcomb now lives.
Samuel Dudley lived beside the mill-pond, on land
now owned by John A. Kimbali and used by him for
a pasture. A magnificent elm having a peculiar long
horizontal limb a short distance above the ground,
stands by the Dudley cellar-hole. He probably own-
ed land extending from there to Fort Pond.
Mosea Whitney lived where Frank Ford now lives,
in the south part of the town. John Perrum or Per-
ham lived probably in the southeast part of the town.
Wm. Powers lived in Pingreyville; Jacob Powere
lived at the Old Common.
One of the first things for the new town to do was
to procure and settle a minister, and a town-meeting
was held April 17th in regard to the matter, at which
time it appears that Rev. Benjamin Sbattuck was a
candidate. A committee consisting of John Cob-
leigh, John Perham and Eleazer Lawrence were
chosen to confer with the ministers of the neighbor-
ing townes, the Reverend Messrs. Eveleth, Stoddard,
Trowbridge and Whitney, and get their advice in
regard to Mr. Shattuck.
Their report is not recorded, but on May 9th, at a
meeting called for the purpose, Mr. Shattuck was
chosen minister, and the sum of £70 was appropriat-
866
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
ed towards his settlement to be " added to his lot."
Hia salary was fixed at £55, to .advance 20 shillings a
year until it amount to £70 a year.
Rev. Benj. Shattuck accordingly took up his resi-
dence as the first minister of the town and completely
identified himself with it. He had several daughters
who married in town, and the Hartwell, Tuttle and
Tayior families all trace their ancestry back to him.
Mr. Shattuck was bom in Watertown, July 30, 1078,
graduated at Harvard college in 1709, and for the fol-
lowing six years was teacher of the grammar and
Enelish school in Watertown, at the same time study-
ing for the ministry. He was ordained at Littleton, on
Christmas day, 1717, and continued as the minister of
the town until August 24, 1730, when it was agreed by
mutual consent that a council be called for his dis-
mission. He continued to live in town, however,
until his death, in 1763.
His residence was the house now owned by Mrs.
Eliza Hartwell.
The first meeting-house was located on the Com-
mon, in front of John B. Robinson's present resi-
dence, where it was located to accommodate people
from the borders of Chelmsford and Concord, who
helped bear the cost of the building, and attended
church here, and who, it was hoped, would be set off
to this town by the General Court, which was peti-
tioned to that effect for several years in succession,
the people in question and Littleton citizens joining
in the petition. There were six families from
Chelmsford, and Walter Powers, John Powers, Da-
vid Russell and John Merrium, of Concord, living on
Nashoba Farm, who were for several years freed from
their minister's rates in those towns, and allowed to
pay ii: Littleton, and I find that at several of our
early town-meeting", at which the town acted in
its parochial capacity, a vote was passed allowing
Concord, Chelmsford and Groton men to vote in
the meeting, and at one time two Concord and
Chelmsford men were chosen assessors to assist in
making the rates.
Finally, in 1725, the General Court granted the
petition for annexation so far as related to Concord
families, and a large tract of land extending from
Nagog Pood nearly or quite to the Old Common, was
added to the town, enlarging the bounds in that
direction, probably to their present position.
Mention is made of the meeting-house as early as
1717, and it was probably in an unfinished condition
at the time of Rev. Mr. Shattuck's ordination, but
was not completed until 1723.
It had entrances on three sides, after the custom of
those days, with probably square pews all around the
walls at least. No mention is made of bell, steeple
nor gallery, and I am of the opinion it had neither.
The building committee appear to have taken mat-
ters rather leisurely, and the following vote was passed
August 26, 1723 :
" To accept the meetiDg-hoase on coaditioD that prerious committee
finisli seals aoilrlnplwrd wliAt ia wanting as Boon as possible, this fiill
&■ the cealing [sir] by next fait, or make altuwance of to have it
done. CuDiQiiItee 10 l* at-qnilted wtien work done.**
It looks as if the committee did the work them-
selves.
The meeting-house being finished, the great ques-
tion was how to apportion the seats in a manner satis-
factory to all.
It was decided in assigning the family pews, first,
to have respect to age, and then the one having the
highest income to have choice and so on. A com-
mittee having the matter in charge made a report
which is recorded in full, giving location of the seats
assigned to various persons as follows : Eleazer Law-
rence, the pew on the left of the west door; Walter
Powers, second pew from the pulpit, that i.s, as I un-
derstand it, at the side of the pulpit, and probably to
the east; Joshua Fletiher, on the right of the east
door; Major Prescott, the pew next Mr. Shattuck's^
that is, probably on the west side, the minister's
being next to the pulpit; Samuel Dudley, the pew on
the east of the pulpit ; Joseph Baker, the northeast
corner pew ; Isaac Powers, the pew at the right of
south door ; Moses Whitney, the pew at the left of
south door; Robert Robbins, the pew at the right of
Isaac Powers', which was given up to Robert Rob-
bins by Thomas Powers, who took Robbins' seat, the
"fore seat below," that is, front seat iu the main
body; John Perham, the pew at the right of west
door; Samuel Hunt, the northwest corner pew; John
Wheeler, the pew at the left of Moses Whitney's ;
Deacon Caleb Taylor, the pesv at the left of the east
door.
For years the seating of the meeting-house, that is,
of those not having family pews, seems to have been
a troublesome duty, which had to be done annually,
and it was no uncommon thing to have the first at-
tempt of the committee rejected. The women sat on
one side of the house and the men on the other. In
1760 the rear seats were assigned to negroes by vote
of the town.
An incident occurred in 1720 which made quite a
sensation in town at the time. It was no less than a
witchcraft accusation which might have proved still
more sensational had it not been for the death of the
person accused.
Joseph Blanchard, who lived on or near Mr. Elbridge
Marshall's place, had at that time three young daugh-
ters— Elizabeth, aged about eleven, Joanna, about
nine and Mary, about five or six years. These children,
first the eldest, then the next, and finally the young-
est, began to act in a very strange and unaccountable
way. Elizabeth began by telling very strange stories
of things happening at the time, or supposed to, and
of strange dreams ; she would also swoon into a
trance and appear dead ; she performed sleight-of-
hand tricks and told fortunes; she would be found
iu strange places, such ?s in the top of a tree, or in a
pond of water, asserting she flew to the tree or was
LITTLETON.
867
forced into the water, and :n danger of drowning, at
which she would cry out in distsesa. She also com-
plained of pinches and prickings of the fleah, and
showed wounds, and rents in her clothes, asserting
she was bewitched, and accused Mrs. Dudley, wife of
Samuel Dudley, town clerk, of bewitching her-
When put to the test of reading Scripture she would
read, but fall down apparently lifeless when she
came to the words "God," "Christ," or "Holy
Ghost." She would bite people, excepting Rev. Mr_
Shattuck, whom she appeared to have no power to
hurt.
About four months after Elizabeth began to act in
this way, Joanna also began to do the same things,
and once was found on the top of the barn, a place
apparently impossible for her to reach by her own
exertions, and whither she said she was carried up
through the air. About two months later Mary be-
gan the same actions.
Elizabeth would often cry out, "There she is!
there's Mrs. Dudley!" when Mrs. Dudley was no-
where visible. Once she told her mother there was
a little bird in a certain part of the room ; her mother
having something in her hand, struck at the place, at
which Elizabeth cried out, " Oh, mother, you have
hit it on the side of the head." It was afterwards
found that Mrs. Dudley was at the same time hurt
on one side of her face. Another time Elizabeth
said to her mother, " There's Mrs. Dudley ; she is
just there; coming to afflict; me!" Her mother
struck the place with something and Elizabeth cried
out, " You have hit her on the bowels."
It Was found that Mrs. Dudley, at the same time,
felt a pain, took to her bed and died in a few weeks.
On the face of this story it appears very mysteri-
ous and inexplicable by natural causes. Blanchard
and his wife believed the children sincere and guile-
leas, and though some wiser ones including, it is
thought, Mr. Shattuck, advised separating the chil-
dren by taking one or more to their homes, the parents
would not consent to it, and the majority believed
them bewitched. A few days after the death of Mrs.
Dudley the strange actioos of the two older children
ceased.
It proved however, that Mrs. Dudley's death was
perfectly accountable; she was ic a delicate condition,
and on riding horseback behind her husband at a
rapid rate felt something break within her.
Though the children for a long time persisted that
their stories had been true, and Elizabeth did not
weaken, even when, requesting baptism, she was
questioned by Mr. Shattuck about the circumstances,
and told that some of her neighbors suspected her of
falsehood ; yet eight years after the girls confessed to
Rev. Mr. Turell, minister of Medford, to which place
they had moved, that their stories were all false and
that their strange actions, begun in a playful spirit of j
mischief, had been continued because they were
ashamed to own up.
When they heard of Mra. Dudley's death, who, by
the way, was a most estimable woman and against
whom the children had no cause for ill-feeling, the
two oldest children were thoroughly frightened, and
for a long time lived in fear of a ghostly retribution.
Elizabeth told Mr. Turell that she got her idea of
acting in the strange m' nner from reading about
witchcraft, and the other children picked it up from
her.
There appears to have been some friction between
the town and Rev. Mr. Shattuck, the cause of which
is not apparent on the records, but which led to bia
retirement from the ministry in 1730. For a year or
two previous there was a growing opposition to him,
manifested in the opposition to the customary vote of
£10 to him annually, in addition to his salary, in lieu
of paying the same into the Province treasury, and
finally, at the April meeting in 1730, the town refused
to appropriate his salary. Mr. Shattuck made a pro-
position to the town through Joseph Underwood, and
in accordance with that a committee consisting of
Capt. Isaac Powers, Robert Robins, Samuel Corey,
Dea. David Russell and Dea. John Wood were chosen
at a meeting May 11, 1730, to treat with Mr. Shat-
tuck concerning his dismissal, and the meeting ad-
journed to the first Monday in June, when it was
voted to refer the matter to the church, so that a
church meeting might be called with Mr. Shattuck'a
son, for the purpose of calling a council to settle the
afiair.
The church, however, came to an agreement with
the minister without the aid of a council, and upon
the report of that fact to a town-meeting August 24th,
it agreed to his dismissal by a council to be called,
and his salary to the middle of the following May was
voted.
The town began immediately, however, to hear
candidates preach, and probably Mr. Shattuck did
not officiate farther.
With the prospect of a new minister the town be-
gan to consider building a new meeting-house, and
in December, 1730, it was voted that when the town
should think proper to build, the location should be
on the Ridge Hill, as it was then called, describing
the present location of the First Congregational (Uni-
tarian) Church.
In the following July the town voted to call Rev.
Daniel Rogers, who is previously referred to as " Son
of y' worshipfuU Mr. Dan'. Rogers, Esq'., which has
Lately preached at Byfield." The word "which"
here refers, I think, to the son, as I cannot find that
his father was a minister.
The town voted £200 for his settlement and a
yearly salary of £100, but that does not seem to have
been sufficient to secure him, and in October the offer
of settlement was raised to £300 and of salary to
£140 a year, to rise and fall with silver, the standard
to be eighteen shillings per ounce. Mr. Rogers ac-
cepted and was ordained March 15, 1731-32.
868
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
There ia a tradition that Mr. Rogers was descended
from John Rogers, the martyr, but that is denied by
so good an aulhority as Mr. John Ward Dean, of the
New England Historic Genealogical Society. Mr.
Rogers was, however, a grandson of Rev. John Rogers,
president of Harvard College, and great-grandson of
Rev. Nathaniel Rogers, w1m> came from England about
1636, and settled in Ipswich, and was born in Ips-
wich October 17, 1706, and- graduated at Harvard
College in 1725. His first marriage was in 1734-35 to
Mary, daughter of Rev. John Whiting, of Concord.
She died three days after the death of her child in
February, 1738. In May, 1739, Mr. Rogers married
for his second wife, Mrs. Elizabeth Dummer, widow
of Samuel Dummer, of Wilmington, and daughter of
Rev. Samuel Ruggles, of Billerica, — they had nine
children.
One of his sons, Jeremiah Dumraer Rogers, a law-
yer, was one of the addressors of Hutchinson in 1774,
and removed to Boston. He was a Tory, and, after
the battle of Bunker Hill, was appointed commissary
to the Royal troops that continued to occupy Charles-
town, and lived in a house on the present site of the I
Unitarian Church, corner of Main and Green Streets.
At the time of the evacuation of Boston he went with
other Royalists to Halifax, where he died in 1784. His
son, of the same name, became a classical teacher in
England, though a Harvard graduate, and had Lord
Byron for one of his pupils. Daniel Rogers, another
son of Rev. Daniel Rogers, continued to live in Lit-
tleton, and ended his days there.
An ordination in those days must have been quite
an affair. The town entertained liberally and paid
bills for the same to the amount of £41. for Mr.
Rogers' ordination.
The meeting-house question came up again in 1738,
and the question was whether to move the old one or
build new. June 12th the town voted not to move
the old meeting-house, and, on December 25th, voted
to build a new one, and chose a committee of seven
to see what to do with the old one and decide on di-
mensions of the new one. No money appears to have
been appropriated for the meeting- bouse until No-
vember 5, 1739, and probably nothing definite was
done until then, when £250 was voted in part. No-
vember 19th, £350 more was appropriated, and de-
cided that the building should be forty by fifty feet
with twenty-three feet posts. The Building Commit-
tee were Maj. Eleazer Lawrence, Deacon John Wood
and Benjamin Hoar. £300 more were voted in De-
cember, 1740, to complete the meeting-house, making
£900 in all. The building was not completed until
1742. Those who had private pews built them at
their own cost, except Mr. Rogers and Mr. Shattuck,
for whom and their families, the town built pews.
Mr. Rogers had his at the foot of the pulpit-stairs and
Mr. Shuttuck in the rear, on tho women's side.
This meeting-house had a gallery, which the former
one probably had not, but I have no reason to sup-
pose there was any great change in the arrangement
of pews from that in the old one.
About the time of which I am writing, a serious
trouble arose between the proprietors of Liitleton and
the town of Stow about the boundary between the two
towns, and quite a tract of land, in what is now Box-
borougb, was claimed by Stow, but finally relinquished
after a long lawsuit lasting many years, and after at-
tempts to get action in favor cf Stow by the Legisla-
ture. I find records referring to ihe matter in 1732,
1740 and in 1750.
In this suit Littleton Proprietors' Record-Book was
used as evidence, and by mistake was not returned to
the town until Mr. Richard H. Dana, the second of
that name, found it among some old papers, a century
or more afterward. Littleton's counsel was Mr. Ed-
mund Trowbridge, and I have been told that Mr.
Dana married into the Trowbridge family.
An addition to the territory of the town was made
January 4, 1738-39, when the General Court granted
the petition of Peleg Lawrence and others, of Groton,
so far as that they and their estates be set off to Lit-
tleton, thereby probably establishing the present line.
Groton did not oppose that part of the petition, but
opposed and prevented the establishment of the line
as originally asked for, which they claimed would in-
clude part of their proprietors' land. Peleg Law-
rence lived near the brook by North Littleton Station,
where the cellar-bole may yet be seen.
A curious entry occurs in the town records under
date of May 27, 1751, as follows:
*• Voted to accept Jacob negro, son of Caesar, for an inhnbitant of this
town in case Mr. Peter Reed give up the bill of sale of 8<i negro to the
town and write .1 discharge."
That gives the town an anti-slavery record of early
date. Slaves were owned in town, however, much
later.
Within the first thirty-five years of the existence of
the town a great many roads were laid out and re-
corded in the town-book. Most of them were merely
paths, marked by blazed trees, following very tortu-
ous routes, quite different from the present roads.
Ftjr instance, the road from Chelmsford to Groton
was through the Old Common, turning beyond Mr.
Shattuck's (now Mrs. Eliza Hartwell'f) to the right
through Turkey Swamp and across Beaver Brook to
the Farr place, where Mr. Chas. P. Hartwell now
lives, then through the New Estate, turning eastward
to Saml. Dudley's, near the mill pond, from whence
it went to Pingreyville; a branch probably turned to
the left past Saml. Hunt's tavern, near Mr. Peter S.
Whitcomb's bouse.
The first road to Newtown started from the Old
Common, a short distance ease of the house of the
late Capt. Luther White.
The road to the south part of the town passed
Joseph Baker's, which was at a spot now marked by a
large elm, midway between Mr. W. H. Tenney's and
the Haley place, from whence it went past a cellar-
LITTLETON.
869
hole and spring ia the woods which locates the house
of Capt. Joseph Harwood, and thence on through the
valley to the place now owned by Mr. J. A. Priest,
then owned by one of the Powers family, and so on.
Under the system of representation in the Legisla-
ture which was in force a century and a half ago the
members of the lower House were elected by the
towns, and Littleton was obliged to send a Repre-
sentative once in a certain number of year.-, and also
obliged to pay him.
The result was that the town very frequently failed
to send a Representative and was repeatedly fined by
the General Court therefor. The year following the
fine the town would elect a Representative for the
sole purpose, apparently, of getting the fine remitted.
A fine or some question before the Legislature re-
garding Littleton's territory seems to have been the
only incentive to representation. On one occasion
the town voted to send a Representative if any one
would go for half pay, and on another if for £12. In
this last instance Captain Isaac Powers accepted the
offer and was elected without opposition.
In the year 1749 the town offered, in connection
with some of the adjoining towns, a bounty for wolves'
heads in addition to that offered by the Province,
with the condition that the ears be cut off to prevent
a second claim for bounty on the same head.
Almost invariably previous to the year 1800, and
frequently after that, it was customary to vote every
March meeting that the swine be allowed to go at
large the year ensuing.
Hog-reeves were chosen, whose duty it was to
insert a ring in each swine's nose to curtail the
amount of damage he could do by rooting.
Littleton was represented in the French and In-
dian War, as she has always been in every struggle in
behalf of the Sc.ite and the nation, by brave and able
men.
Colonel John Porter, when only sixteen years of
age, enlisted as a captain's waiter and was at the bat-
tle of Ticonderoga. He was taken with the small-
pox, and his mother, on hearing of it, hired a man to
go and care for him. This person took the money,
but soon reported that young Porter was dead. The
rascal had, in fact, never been near him, but in spite
of neglect Porter recovered, and great was the sur-
prise and joy of his family, who lived where Deacon
Manning now lives, to see him appear one day, weak
after his sickness and tired, sitting to rest on a log
near the hou.'e.
The 19th of April, 1775, found him returning from
Beverly through Lexington. The British troops had
just marched out toward Concord. Porter procured
a gun and ammunition of a Lexington farmer, leav-
ing his horse as security, and joined the minute-men
who fought the regulars on their return from Con-
cord.
He served all through the Revolution, enlisting as
ensign and working up to be lieutenant, captain,
adjutant and major. At one time he was a recruiting
officer, and also served on the staff of Gen. Lafayette.
He was at the battle of Benniuf^ton and afterward
sent home three or four of the Hessians there cap-
tured, to work as laborers on his farm, while he re-
mained at the front. He wag present at the surren-
der of Cornwallis.
His '.itie of colonel was acquired in the militia,
after the war. Colonel Porter was a man of great
force of character, but had only such education aa he
picked up himself.
It is said that his wife taught him to read.
Previous to the outbreak of the French War, on
July -14, 1748, Jonathan Lawrence, Jr., and Ephraim
Powers, of Littleton, were in a dquad of seventeen
men, who were traveling from Northfield to Fort
Dummer and Ashuelot. They were attacked by In-
dians, who captured Lawrence and took him to Can-
ada. Powers was stripped of clothing, arms and
ammunition and wounded in the head. In the latter
part of the war we find Jonathan Lawrence in Capt.
Leonard Whiting's company in 1760-61 in the "ex-
pedition for the total reduction of Canada," and with
him the following other Littleton men : Sergt. Peter
Procter, Sergt. Peter Fox, Ephraim Corey, Jonathan
Hartwell, who died in the expedition, George Hiber,
Joseph Hartwell, Robert Procter, Josiah Procter,
Moses Shattuck, David Stimpson, Samuel Tredwell,
David Trull, Abel Whitcomb, Silaa Whitcomb and
Benjamin Worster. Captain Whiting then lived in
We^ttord, but soon after moved to Littleton, where
he kept tavern and was living here from 1764 to 1772
at least. He afterwards lived in Hollis, N. H., and
was a Tory during the War of the Revolution.
By the courtesy of the Massachusetts Historical
Society I am enabled to copy from the original jour-
nal of Lieutenant-Colonel John Winslow, dated
Bason of Annapolis Royal, Nova Scotia, May 28, 1755,
the names of many residents or natives of Littleton.
It reads :
** A B«turu uf LieuteiiaDt Cul^ JoliD WiDaluws CompaDy in tho First
BattaLlion of bis Excelleocj, Got' Shirley's. Re^ments, rnitfi for the re*
moviug the Freach EDcroiichrueDts frooi bis Majesty's Gorerament of
Nova Scotia, Sbo^Tl□g the oamas uf the auU'Cu[Dniish<i otficers aod Priv-
ate mea Cbeir atatioa age Place of Birth Last residence aod occupa,
tiou. . . .
■'John Trainer, Prlrate, 19, Leytb, acotlaud, Littleton, Balier.
Capt. Humphrey Hobbt Ooinp»,
Epfaraim Warrin, Private, 18, Littletoo, Littluton, Labi.
Captain Oagocd Company.
Isaac Lawrance, Serjant, 24, Littleton, Littleton, Cooper.
David Powera, Corporal, 30, Littleton, Littleton, HusbandmaD.
Walter Powers, Private, 23, Littleton, Littleton, Uuabandman.
Isaac Wbitcpmbe, Private, 21, Littleton; Littleton, Conlwainer.
Abel Hunt, Private, 22, Littleton, Littleton, Husbandman.
Peter Hunt, Private, 26, Littleton, Littleton, Cordwalner.
John Bobins, Private, 28, Littleton, Littleton, Cooper.
Charlee Robins, Private, 25, Littletoo, Littletoo, Bncltmaker.
Timothy Cobleigb, Private, 17, Littleton, Littleton, Laborer.
Ephr^m Wheeler, Private, 20, Littleton, Littletoo, Cordwainer.
Aboer Whitcombe, Privaf , 21, Littleton, Littleton, Btisbandman.
870
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
BeDJ* Monrow, Prirate, 19, LexlngtoD, LittletoD, Laborer.
PbiDeas Parker, Private, 21, Groton, Littleton, Husbandman.
James Miller, Private, 20, Billerlca, Littleton, Brickmaker.
Thomas Wbitcomb, Private, 19, Littleton, Littleton, Laborer.
2Iajor Joseph Fn/ea Company.
John Adama, Prirate, 19, Littleton, Andover, Coniwainer.
Major Wintam Boumt Company.
Thomaa Edtvarde, Private, 22, Littleton, Oxford, Carpenter.
Captain Elijah WSlarda Company.
Aaron Taylor, Corporal, 25, Littleton, Lnnenburgb, Hasbandman.
Tim" Baker, Private, 24, Littleton, Peterebani, Taylor.
Joba Taylor, Private, 25, Littleton, Lnnenburgb, Latxirer.
Captain Ephraim Jones Company.
Oliver Kdward, Private, 20, Littleton, Stow, Laborer.
Eliot PowerB, Private, 22, Littleton, Actoo, HusbHndman.'*
Capt. John Fox, of Littleton, was also in the French
War. He returned sick from the expedition on the
Kennebec River, and after six weeks' illness died.
Others of his family took the same disease from
him, and on petition from his wife the Legislature
granted money in aid of herself and family. Capt.
Fox kept tavern in the Centre, and after his death
his wife continued the business.
As we approach the period of the War of the
Eevolution, it is well to take, as far aa we are able,
a general view of the town. What was Littleton in
those days, we ask ? Not so very diflferent from the
Littleton of to-day.
The population varied not more than one hundred
from the present, though the territory was larger, in-
cluding a large section of Boxborough, and therefore
the people were rather more scattered. In the year
1776 the population was 918.
The church stood on the same spot as the present
Unitarian Church. The town had just bought a new
bell, and had hung it not on the church, but on a
convenient frame near by. The committee to buy it,
reported that it was made in " this Province," and
cost £78 0». 9Jrf. Very many of the names now famil-
iar were then in town, such aa Robbins, Lawrence,
Whitcomb,Tuttle, Taylor, Hartwell,Jewett,Harwood,
Tenney, Sanderson, Reed, Brown, Proctor, Warren,
Hoar, Dodge, Kimball, Patch and others. Even the
farms are in many cases held in the same families
now as then.
It is very interesting to trace the growth of public
sentiment in town concerning the relations of the
colonies with the mother country.
The indignation at the exactions and oppressive acts
of the British government was spontaneous and unani-
mous ; but later on, when protests, entreaties and de-
mands had notavailed, and matters wore a more serious
aspect, when it began to dawn upon the colonists that
their only hope for justice lay in revolution, then it
was that a difference of opinion was evolved, which in-
creased with the progress of events until the line
between patriot and Tory was clearly drawn.
When we think of how the colonists, with their
scanty resources and slight preparation, resisted, made
war on and finally vanquished the greatest power on
earth, it seems as if they accomplished impossibilities,
which it would be madness to attempt.
It was not strange, then, that there were many con-
servative and intelligent people, who considered it
folly to attempt to resist the government of England;
they deprecated the state of affairs, but saw no pros-
pect of relief in war, and in most cases were further
influenced in their opinions by ties of friendship and
relation to the mother country. That class was rep-
resented in Littleton by Rev. Daniel Rogers and at
least one of his sons, also by Capt. Joseph Harwood,
and his son of the same name, as well as by others.
Mr. Rogers was then an old man, had been pastor for
many years, and was universally loved and respected.
He was a cultured and refined gentleman, a graduate
of Harvard College, and connected with some of the
best families in the Province. His sons were able and
educated men, and took an active part in town affairs.
Others of the Tory sympathizers were prominent men
in town and, with Dummer Rogers, had been the lead-
ers so long as matters had drifted along in the old
way ; but when the issue came, and feeling began to
run high, they found themselves a small minority,
and had to sufler the consequences at the intense feel-
ing which prevailed against chem.
They were suddenly dropped from the list of town
officers and vigorously dealt with. Many of them
were put under guard, including one of the writer's
ancestors, and even Rev. Mr. Rogers was summoned
by an armed squad to come out of his house and de-
clare his principles. When he hesitated, perhaps
considering it beneath his dignity to comply with
such a demand, a volley was fired into his front door.
The bullets passed through the door and entered
the casing just below the stairs upon which Mr.
Rogers was standing. He then complied. He lived
where Mr. George Wbitcomb now lives, in the house
which has since been moved down the hill toward
Mr. Frost's. Many persons, including the writer,
have seen the bullet-holes in the old door, which has
since been replaced by a new one, and those in the
casing may be seen to-day.
Of the patriots, William Henry Prentice seems to
have been one of the leaders. He kept a tavern at
or near where Mr. Everett E. Kimball lives, and we
may readily imagine that as the headquarters where
each evening the earnest patriot farmers, many of
them minute-men, gathered to hear the latest news
from Boston and to discuss it excitedly over mugs of
flip.
To go back now to 1770. The following article,
copied from the Boston Gazette of March 12th, of that
year, the same issue in which appeared an account of
the Boston Massacre, so called, gives an idea of the
unanimous feeling in the town over the taxes imposed
by Parliament on imported goods :
LITTLETON.
n
" At a Meeting of the Inhabitants of the Town of Litttleton, in the
County of Middlesex, on Monday, 5Iar. 5. 1770, a Committee «-iia chosen
to preparecertHin Votes to be passed by the Town relating to the Impor-
tattoQ of Britisit G<io<l8 who after retiring a Short Time iulo a private
Room, returned and reported the following which was unanimoiuly
Voted.
"The grievous Impositions the Inhabitants of the British Co:anies
have long suffered from their Mother Country, strongly claim their At-
tention to every legal Method for their Itenioval. We esteem the Jleas-
ure already proposed, riz. : the withdrawing our Tnule from England,
both oxononiiCHl and effectual. We do therefore Vote
"1. That we wilt not (knowingly), directly or indirectly, purchase any
Goods which now are or hereafter may be imported conirary to the
Agreement of the -Merchants of the Town of Boston.
"2. That if any Inhabitant or the town of Littleton shall be known
to piirchaae any one Article of an Importer of Goods contrary to the be-
fore mentioned .\greement or of any one who shall buy of any such Im-
porter he shall suffer our high Displeasure and Contempt.
" 3. That a Committee be chosen to inspect the Conduct of all Buyers
ond Sellers of (ioods in this Town, and report the Names of all (if any
euch there should be^ who shall violate the true Spirit and luteotiun of
the above-mentioned Votes and Resolutions.
"4- That we will not drink or purchase any foreign Tea howsoever
Imported until a general Iwiwrtatioa of British Goods shall lake
Place."
The committee who reported these resolutions
were Samuel Tutile, Leonard Whiting, Samuel Rog-
ers, Robert Harris and Nathan Raymond.
Matters went on from bad to worse throughout the
Colonies, and in November, 1772, when Boston under
the leadership of Samuel Adams came to an issue
with Governor Hutchinson about the stipendiary
judges, and the righls ot' towns to discuss such mat-
ters, and the Boston Committee of Correspondence
was chosen, with instructions to appeal to ail the
towns in the Province, " that," as they said, " the col-
lected wisdom and fortitude of the whole people
might dictate measures for the rescue of their happy
and glorious Constitution." A letter and pamphlet
were received from the Boston Committee of Corre-
spondence, and at a town-meeting in Littleton, De-
cember 31st, it was voted to choose a committee of
five to consider the same and make a report to the
town. The committee consisted of J. Dummer Rog-
ers, Jona. Reed, Captain Joseph Harwood, Sr., Cap-
tain Josiah Hartwell and Samuel Reed.
From this time we must date the division of this
town into patriots and Tories. The committee was
divided in their report, which was made at au ad-
journed meeting for that purposeon February 1, 1773.
The mnjority of the committee, which we can confi-
dently assume included Dummer Rogers and Captain
Harwood, reported verbally " not to have the town
act any further upon that article." That waathe con-
servative view, represented by those who must thence-
forth be called Tories. They feared a conflict with the
authorities, and tried to smother the correspondence
with Samuel Adams and the Boston patriots.
The town rejected the majority report, and then ac-
cepted the draft of a paper laid before them, and
chose a Committee of Correspondence.
At the annual meeting, March 1, 1773, the draft,
amended by the addition of more grievances, was ac-
cepted and ordered to be transmitted, with a respect-
ful letter of thanks, to the Boston Committee of Cor-
respondence.
This amended paper was as follows :
"The British Constitution appears to na to be the t}eBt calcnlnted to
answer the ends which manitind proposed to themaelves in forsaking
the n.-itural state of ludepeodenca and entering into Society than per-
haps any form of Government under Heaven, as here we find a more
perfect union of the three Great Qualities of Government than coold be
expected in any other form ; it is therefore of 'high Importance that
those who live under this (destitution should In all proper wriys en-
deavor to preserve it Inviolate ; it was the Happiness of our forefathers
who came into this Land to bring with them the Liberties and Immuni-
ties of Englishmen and to be entitled to the Privilegesof the British Con-
stitution, under which they and their Descendants have enjoyed great
Security and Happiness- But in consequence of some acts of the British
Parliament, which are daily executing by officers and men unknown in
the Charter of the Province, whereby a Revenue is imposed on this as
I well as the other Colonies, and extorted from us and appropriated to
most destructive purposes, the establishing the salaries of several of the
first men in this Province, and also of the Judges of the Superior Court,
thereby making them independeut of the people, aiid making them de-
pend on the Crown for their support, the gr^at extension of the power
of the Courts of Admiralty, the unlimited authority of the Board of Com-
missioners of his Majesty's Customs; all which we look upon to be great
grievances ; the quarteriogof soldlera upon us in time of peace, without
our consent ; the demanding and giving up Castle William, onr chief
fortress, into the hands of those over whom our Governor has declared he
has no control, is a great violation of one of our Charter Rights— for
thereby the Governor for the time being has full power to erect Forts,
and to furnish them with all things uecessar)', and to commit the cus-
tody of the same to such person or persons as to him shall seem meet.
The frequent alterations of the Boundaries between Ibis and the other
colonies we think we have Just reason to complain of; for thereby the
property of many hundreds of the Inhabltaots of this province are in-
vaded.
" We are greatly alarmed by a late act of the British Pariiament en-
titled An Act for the better preserving his Majestys Dock Taids, Maga-
zines, Ships, .\mmiinitlons and Stores ; By this art any peraon may be
apprehended on the most groundless pretence and carried to any part of
Great Britain for trial ; the thoughts of which Is enough to make any
person having the least sense of the freedom of an Englishman tremble.
By this act we are deprived of one of the most essential of our Charter
Privileges, that ot Trial by our Peers In this Vicinity.
" We are further of the opinion that if the measures so justly com-
plained of by the Provinces and the other Colonies on this continent are
persisted in and enforced by fleets and armies, they will, in a little time
we fear, issue in the toul dissolution of the Union of the Mother Coun-
try and the Colontis, to the entire loss of the former, and r«gret of the
latter— OS the General Assembly Is now sitting, who are the constitn-
tional guardians of the rights of the people, we hope that Assembly will
take every reasonable measure to obtain removal of all our grievances ;
we shall always be ready to join with the towns of this province in a
regular and cooadtutional method in preserving our liberties and privi-
leges."
Note how carefully the town considered the matter
and of what importance it was deemed.
It was the decisive step in the policy of the town,
and took three town-meetings to settle it, aovering
nearly the whole winter.
There was no wavering or vacillation, but no haste.
At the Middlesex Convention, held in Concord,
August 31, 1774, Littleton was represented by Captain
Josiah Hartwell, Oliver Hoar and Daniel Rogers, Jr.,
and in the first Provincial Congress by Abel Jeweit
and Robert Harris.
The town records show conclusively that with the
opening of the year 1775 the approaching crisis was
felt to be near at hand and was prepared for.
Had we any full and accurate history of the events
87
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
of that year, we should be astonished at the activity j
and careful preparation. ,
There were at least two companies in the course of
that year officered by Littleton men, and made up, in
a large majority, of privates from this town, a few be-
ing Irom the adjoining towns. j
We may imagine ihem with the early spring, 1
which was a ifionlh in advance of the usual season, ;
holding frequent drills and musters, and the town I
must then have been aglow with military spirit and
enthusiasm, which has never been equaled since.
The 19th of April came, and in the early morning i
a messenger on horseback rode into town with the !
news that the regulars were on the march to Concord. '
The horseman then hurried over Beaver Brook 1
bridge, near Mr. Frost's house, and proceeded to warn i
other towns.
The Littleton men mustered, ammunition to the
amount of fourteen pounds of powder and thirty- eight
pounds of bullets was dealt out of the common stock,
and the whole squad, including many uneulisted vol-
unteers, proceeded to Concord, and thence to Cam-
bridge.
The following is the muster-roll of Lieutenant
Aquila Jewett's company who marched that day :
Aquila Jewett, lieuteDaat ; John Porter, Matthew Brooka, aergeants ;
Daoiel Whltcomb, corporal.
Privatee, Saiuuel Lawrence, Joaalhan Lawrence, Charlea White, Ben-
jnniin Warren, Joseph Robbina, Samuel Hurtwell. Silua Whitconib,
Kliaba Robbiua, Joseph Wor»ter, Peter Fox, Job Dodge, Josepli Jewett,
Joeeph Ruasell, Thonia« Lavirence, Nathan Cbaae, WJUarii Merriam,
Benjamin Moore, Maxi Jewett, Nathaniel Proctor, Muaes SuDderaon,
Joseph Raymond, Ebenezer Pbillipe, Ismel Hloda, Simeon Proctor,
Samuel Tenney (4th), John Dix, William Tenney. Eleazer Lawrence,
Tbomaa Ruaaeil, Benjamin Hoar, Benjamin flartwell, Ji>hn Oreen, Jubn
"Whiting, Jr., Stephen Tnttle, Thomaa Stearne, Sampaon Warren, Daniel
Tuttle, Peter Reed. OUvtr Hartwell, Tbomaa Wood, Benjamin Woreter,
John Tuttle.
A few of the men dropped out at Concord, but the
most of them are putdown as having marched twenty-
six miles and having served nineteen days.
Jonathan Warren and Nathaniel Whitcomb also
received ammunition, and so were probably either in
another company or went as unenlisted volunteers.
Among the rolls of the army at Cambridge made up
to August 1, 1775, is another company, mostly com-
posed of Littleton men, whit h was probably organ-
ized after the Concord fight. The list is as follows :
CaptAln, Samoel Qllbert ; Lieotenanra, Joseph Gilbert, Joseph Baker,
Jr. ; Sergeants, Daniel Eiraball, Jacob Porter, Thomas Treadwelt,
Kphr&im Proctor; CorpolBla, Ezra Baker, Jonathan Cowdrey.
PriTates, Joseph Baker, Cornellns Bachelor, Beojaraiu Cux, Lemuel
Dole, James Dutton, Benjamin Durunt, John Dinsuiure, Benjamin Dole,
William Farr, Samuel Hant, Joseph Hey wood, Moses Holden, Isaac Law-
rence, Peter Cnramings Gilbert, Elijah Proctor, Jonathan Phelps, Samuel
Phillips, Paul Bobbins, John Bobbins, Isaac Bussed, Nathaniel Russell,
Oliver Sawyer, James WhICtemore, Peter Whitcomb, Isaac Whitcomb,—
with others from Lancaster, Dunstable and other
towns.
This company of Captain Gilbert's was also in Colo-
nel Prescott's regiment, and took part in the battle of
Bunker Hill, in which were killed Peter Whitcomb,
Benjamin Dole, John Lawrence, James Whittemore
and Isaac Whitcomb.
In addition to those whose names have been given,
the following served for Littleton in the continental
army, at various times, during the war :
Amos Atherton, Paul Brown, Peter Baker, Timothy Baker, William
Burke, Johu Cflvender, Joseph Carter, Henry Durant, Jason Dunster,
Jesse Dutton, David Baker, John Brown, Lucius Bluncliard, Siipio
Chase, Hildreth Dutton, Joseph Dole, John Dodge, John Dix, Jonathan
Fletcher, John Foster, Solomon Foster, Jonathan Laoglee Fisher, Jamrs
Uolden, John Hartwell, Cuptuin Aaron Jewett, William Juliuson,
William Johnson, Jr., John Kilburn, Abel Lawrence, Reuben Leigbton,
Joseph Lewis, Jonathan Longley, Joseph Loogley, Scipio Negro, Thonins
Nutting, Peter Oliver, Charlea Phippa, Timothy Proctor, Samuel Pool,
Abel Proctor, Amos Parliog, Jr., Zacbory Bobbins, Joiiulliau Kueai-ll^
John Rusaell, Jr., Lieutenant-Colonel Joniithan Reed, Samuel Reed,
Samuel Reed, Jr., Artemaa Rei.'d, Nathaniel Reed, William Smitli,
Saniuel Stearna, Levi Shepherd, Rol>ert Sever, Amos Shed, William Ten-
ney, Jeremiali Temple. Jonatbun Tuttle, John Wood ^M), Sergeant
Peter Wheeler, Peter Wright, Stephen Wright, Jacob Warren, Suniiiei
White, William Whiting, Jonathan Welherbee, Second Lieutenunt
Ephraim Whitcomb, Paul Whitcomb.
These names have been collected by the writer
from the Revolutionary rolls in the State archives,
and from town records and vouchers. The number is
surprisingly large. That 150 men, or nearly seventy-
five per cent, of the male population, of military age,
should have taken part in the war, speaks volumes
for the patriotism of the town, and, as well, shows the
desperate character of the struggle. The male popu-
lation of sixteen years of age, and over, was only 209
on January 1, 1777.
The smoke from the burning of Charlestown was
distinctly seen in Littleton, and caused great alarm.
In May the town had voted to purchase a stock of
fire-arms with bayonets, the number to be left to the
discretion of the selectmen, who were that year
Major Jonathan Reed, Jonathan Patch, Samuel Gil-
bert, William Henry Prentice and Aaron Jewett.
Notice that three out of the five afterwards served as
officers in the continental army.
At a town-meeting held June 17, 1776, at which
AVilliam Henry Prentice was moderator, the follow-
ing vote, in accordance with the recommendation of
the General Court, was passed after some debate and
motions to adjourn, which were not carried :
" If the Hon' Congreas abould, for the Safety of tbs Colonies, Declare
them Independent of the Kingdom of Great Britain, the Inhabitants of
Littleton engage to support them in the measure."
On October 14th following, the town voted its con-
sent to the plan proposed by a resolve of the House .
of Representatives that the Council and House should
propose a State Constitution to be submitted to the
people.
In March, 1777, the town voted a bounty of £18 in
addition to the State bounty, for every three years'
soldier who should make one for its quota, and also
voted " to take up the matter at large from the 19th of
April, 1775, and Chuse a Committee to apprise each
Campaign and make an Everage according to their
poles and Rateable Estatt s, as other Taxes are Levied,
and that each man shall have credite for what he has
done."
LITTLETON.
873
As the war progressed and more men were called
for, it became difficult to procure them, and no won-
der, when we consider the great number who went
from this fmall town, and at one meeiing it was im-
possible to choose a committee who would serve to
hire men.
The fluctuations of continental money were ex-
tremely embarrassing, and a large number of bounties
were paid in rye and other produce, which was pre-
ferred to paper money. As high as £2550 in paper
money was paid for a single bounty.
On December 21, 1780, the town voted " 100 hard
dollars or other specie equivalent & 1 Pr. good shirts,
shoes & stockings, to be delivered yearly in October,
so long as they serve, 'o all soldiers who enlist accord-
ingly."
By summing up the various appropriations for the
payment of soldiers and purchase of supplies, as re-
corded on the town records, I find they amount to the
enormous sum of £126,172 16«. lOd., or its equiva-
lent in produce.
It must be remembered, however, that this was not
all hard money, but much of it was continental paper
currency. While on the other hand it is probable
that this sum does not include a great deal of money
which was paid out on account of the war, but did not
appear under specific appropriatious.
Captain Aaron Jewett was a delegate from Little-
ton to the Constitutional Convention of 1779. This
gentleman, after serving in the war, became a Shaker,
and was one of the founders of the Harvard Shakers. I
Rev. Mr. Rogers, being ijuite advanced in year.",
asked a dismi.-sion in January, 1776. Not desiring to
have him sever his connection with ihem, the church
voted not to dismiss hira, whereupon Mr. Rogers pro-
posed that he continue his relations to the church as
minister, but relinquish his salary in future and be
released from obligation to perform ministerial ser-
vices.
This proposition was accepted, and the town began
to look for a colleague, and it is noticeable that at this
time the initiative in ecclesiastical matters was taken by
the church meeting, which first took action, and after-
wards the town voted on concurrence. After calling
two ministers as colleaguej, first Mr. Wheaton, then
Mr. John Bullard, who do not appear to have accepted,
and then waiting for some time, finally in October,
1780, Mr. Edmund Foster was called, and accepted, at
a salary of £80 a year, based on the value of certain
articles of consumption, such as corn, pork, beef, &c.,
as recorded, and a settlement of £200.
Mr. Foster was ordained at Littleton January
17, 1781, and succeeded to the ministry on the death
of Mr. Rogers, in November, 1782.
Mr. Foster was born in North Reading, Massachu-
setts, April 18, 1752, and was left an orphan when
seven years old ; he worked his way through Yale
College, and afterwards studied for the ministry.
Both Harvard and Yale conferred honorary degrees
upon him. While a divinity student he shouldered
his musket and went to face the enemy at Concord
and Lexington.
He represented his district both in the Senate and
House, after the War of 1812 (in which three of his
sons held commissions) ; on one occasion he preached
the Election sermon, and was a delegate to the Con-
stitutional Convention of 1820. He died March 28,
1826, in the forty-sixth year of his ministry.
Mr. Foster assumed his daties as colleague to Mr.
Rogers under very adverse circumstances; he was
called against the opposition of a minority, who re-
corded a protest signed by forty-six persons. The
town was impoverished by the cost of the war, and in
1782-8-3 by severe drouth, and was in the midst of
the hardest limes ever seen in this country.
It was found difficult to raise his salary, and he was
obliged on one occasion to bring snit before he got it.
The town settled and paid costs.
The hard times, as is always the case, made discon-
tent, the church was badly out of repair, so much so
that it had to be propped up, and furthermore a
movement was started a few years before Mr. Foster
came to set off the south part of the town for the pur-
pose of forming a new parish, which resulted in the
formation of first the district and finally the town of
Boxborough.
The first reference to this matter appears in the
town records under date of November 4, 1778, when
the town chose a committee consisting of Deacon
Josiah Hartwell, Jonathan Reed, Esq. and Mr. Dan-
iel Rogers, Jr., to wait on the General Court and
show reason why the south part of the town should
not be set off as petitioned for. The same committee
was chosen for the same purpose in the following
February, and in July there was an article in the
town warrant to see if the town would " vote off"
that part of the town to form a new parish, with parts
of Stow and Harvard. The town voted against it.
In October, 1780, a vote was passed to take the
names of those who wished to be set off, and it is re-
corded that Bennet Wood, Phis Wetherbee, Israel
Wetherbee, Abel Fletcher, Ephraim Whitcomb, Ed-
ward Brown and Boston Draper appeared.
In February, 1781, the town again chose a com-
mittee to oppose the petition to the General Court.
This attempt to form a new town or parish waa a
failure, as had been the previous one, but in March,
1782, Silas Taylor and sixty-nine others petitioned
the General Court again, stating that they were at a
great distance from the meeting-houses in the towns
to which they belong, to remedy which they had built
a house for public worship in a convenient place and
procured preaching much of the time for several
years previous, but had not been excused from paying
for the support of preaching in some of the towns to
which they belonged, and praying to be incorporated
into a town, district or parish. The petition waa re-
ferred to the second session, in September, when the
874
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
committee to which it had been referred reported
that the petitioners who belonged to the towns of
Stow and Harvard should be incorporated into a dis-
trict with such of the inhabitants of Littleton as were
included in the petition, and should, within the space
of twelve months, signify that they desired to belong
to the said district and no other.
Littleton people had evidently been caught nap-
ping, but aa soon aa they learned of the report of the
committee they sent to the General Court two remon-
strances, one signed by the selectmen and the other
by Samuel Lawrence, Elias Taylor, Thomas Wood,
Daniel Whitcomb, Jonathan Patch, Nathaniel Cob-
leigh, John Wood, Solomon Foster and Jedediah
Taylor, living within the bounds of the proposed dis-
trict. It was, however, too late, and a bill was passed
February 25, 1783, which, after stating the bounda-
ries, said : " And all the Polls i>nd Estates that are
included within the said boundaries shall belong to
said District, except those of such of the inhabitants
of that part set off from Littleton as shall not, within
the term of twelve months from the passing of this
Act, return their names unto the office of the Secre-
tary of this Commonwealth, signifying their desire to
become inhabitants of the said District." The result
of this was, that while a number returned their names
as desiring to join the new di^trict, yet others, to the
number of thirteen or more, did not, but preferred to
remain in Littleton.
In June, 1793, Boxborough, which had become a
town, petitioned the General Court to establish an
obvious and uncontrovertible boundary between that
town and Littleton, against which the thirteen citi-
zens of Littleton who had the right to join Boxbor-
ough, but had not done so, remonstrated, stating that
they believed the object of the petition was " more to
divide them from the town of Littleton than to ascer-
tain more certain boundaries." Thereupon the Lpg-
islature passed the act of February 20, 1794, which
gave the owners of such farms lying on the Boxbor-
ough side of the straight line which was originally
proposed as the boundary, and who had not joined
Boxborough in accordance with the act of 1783, the
right to apply to Boxborough to have their polls and
estates belong to that town, and the same was to be
accomplished upon the vote of Boxborough and
proper notice to the town of Littleton. This right
was to go with the ownership of the land. In the
course of time all the farms in question had been
transferred to Boxborough save two, owned in 1868
by Henry T. Taylor and Wm. H. Hartwell. At that
time Boxborough petitioned the Legislature to have
those farms set off to her, but was unsuccessful.
Another attempt was made before the Legislature of
the present year, 1890. It was met by opposition on
the part of the owners of the two farms, now Deacon
Henry T. Taylor and Mrs. Olive Hall, and the town
of Littleton, who remonstrated and filed a counter-
petition, asking for a new line between the two towns,
I which leaves the greater part of the two farms and
I the buildings on the Littleton side, as well as a small
; place, formerly in Boxborough, lying between them on
j Liberty Square, and owned by Wild, thus doing
away with the previous provisions allowing a transfer
to Boxborough. The Littleton petition was granted
and a bill passed in accordance with it. The Taylor
farm is the same which was owned, in 1783, by Dea-
con Elias Taylor, the ancestor of Deacon Henry T.
Taylor, having remained in the family from that
time. The Hall farm was then owned by Samuel
Lawrence, and was the same where the Lawrence
Tavern was kept, the sign •o which bore the legend
" Pay To-Day & Trust To-morrow,' with the picture
of an officer with a drawn sword, below which was
the word " Entertainment'' and date 1768.
As has been stated, the meeting-house was out of
repair at the time Mr. Foster came to Littleton, and
for several years the question of building a new one
or repairing the old one was agitated, and many votes
on the subject were passed and afterwards reconsid-
ered. Finally, on December 31, 1792, the decisive
vote passed to build anew on the same spot, and the
town proceeded to erect its third meeting-house,
" 40x55 feet, with a steeple and porches." It was com-
pleted in the summer of 1794, and was a very impos-
ing structure and really fine for its period. A new
bell was procured in 1808.
The meeting-house appears never to have been
heated except by religious fervor or a town-meeting
discussion until 1818, when, in January, the town
voted to have two stoves, provided they were given by
subscription. They must have been popular, for in
October, 1820, it was thought best to vote " that the
town considers that the stove pews are appropriated
t(5 elderly people."
The history of the way in which paupers have
been cared for in this town is rather interesting. The
first pauper on record was the widow. Thanks Dill,
concerning whom there appears to have been a ques-
tion between this town and Concord as to where she
belonged. The poor woman was carried back and
forth from one town to the other and finally died in
Littleton in 1733, whereupon the town expended nine
shillings for rum for her funeral and a further sum
for gloves used on the same occasion. It was a
common thing to carry paupers to other towns to get
rid of them, and to warn out of town persons who
were likely to become a charge against the town.
In 1787 paupers were put out by vendue, among
them several illegitimate children. In 1798 the town
voted to hire a house for the town's poor. The town
farm was purchased in 1825.
Any one walking up Everett E. Kimball's lane to
the top of Long Pond Hill will see the remains of a
road which formerly ran where the lane is over the
highest part of the hill to the Haley place. The
recordsshow that this road, from William Henry Pren-
tice's to Edward Baker's, as it was described, was ex-
LITTLETON.
875
changed, in 1789, for the present road !o Newtown,
turning off by the present residence of William H.
Tenney, and that the road was turned a little to one
side so as not to obstruct Dea. Oliver Hoar's " out
seller," thus showing the antiquity of Mr. Tenney "s
side-hill cellar.
In ISOl the town voted to buy a piece of land of
Mr. Rogers and others in front of the meeting-house
to enlarge the road and Common. The line, as then
located, ran very close to where the rear wall of the
town-hall now stands, and a strip was added to give
space behind the building when it was erected in
1886.
The town records make no allusion to the War of
1812, but from other sources the names of three Lit-
tleton men who served have been obtained as follows:
Sampson Warren, who returned from the war sick
and died at home, Micajah Rice and Reuben Durant.
No doubt others from this town also served in that
war.
December 4, 1815, Rev. Mr. Foster preached a cen-
tury sermon on the history of the town. It was an
able and interesting discourse and the writer is in-
debted to it for much information. From it we learn
that the post-office at that time was on the "great
road," probably at the " long store," now the dwell-
ing-house of Charles F. Watts. The town voted to
print three hundred copies of Mr. Foster's sermon to
distribute to every family and sell the rest for the
benefit of Mr. Foster.
Up to 1822 there had been but one church, the town
church, and as we have seen, church business was
done in town-meeting by the town acting in its ca-
pacity as a parish.
On March 14, 1822, the Baptist Society was organ-
ized with twelve members. It had been intended to
organize on the 7th, but the town voted to refuse them
the use of the church for that purpose on that date.
Rev. Benjamin Willard had preached for the Baptists
previous to their organization at various times from
1820 and until 1823. There was also preaching in
the interest of other denominations about this time.
In April, 1821, the town voted leave to Aaron Tut-
tle and others to have preaching in the West School-
house on Sundays.
These inroads on his flock were naturally distaste-
ful to Mr. Foster and he took vigorous measures to
oppose them. On several occasions he attended the
meetings and addressed the audience in refutation of
the doctrines there promulgated, and once he took
possession of the meeting with the announcement
that he was the minister of the town, and proceeded
to conduct the services and then dismissed the audi-
ence, so that they had no opportunity to hear the
speakers who were present to address them.
In the church Mr. Foster had ruling elders appoint-
ed to assist him in bringing back to communion those
who absented themselves to hear the " itinerant and
disorderly preachers.'' A few were brought back, but
many joined the Baptist Society and all received in-
dividually a vote of public censure.
The Baptists built their first meeting-house in 1822,
on the corner of the road leading to the north part of
the town, where now stands the house of the late John
P. Tuttle. It was built of brick, and was dedicated
July 9, 1823. Rev. Amasa Sanderson was ordained
their minister at the same time and continued his
pastorate until March 23, 1831.
The succeeding Baptist ministers have been : Rev.
Sil.is Kenney, 1831-34 ; Rev. O. Ayer, 1837-43 ; Rev.
T. H. Lunt, April, 1844, to March, 1845 ; Rev. Aaron
Haynes, April, 1845-47; Rev. B. H. Clift, June, 1847,
to February, 1848 ; Rev. George Matthew/", May,
1848-52 ; Rev. F. E. Cleaves, June, 1852, to October,
1857 ; Rev. D. F. Lampson, July, 1858, to April,
1861 ; Rev. C. M. Willard, August, 1861, to Novem-
ber, 1867 ; Rev. C. L. Frost, August, 1868, to June,
1869 ; Rev. J. F. Morton, September, 1869, to Sep-
tember, 1872; Rev. B. N. Sperry, January, 1873, to
May, 1875; Rev. William Read, July, 1875, to May,
1878 ; Rev. Paul Gallaher, November, 1878, to No-
vember, 1880; Rev. W. H. Evans, December, 1880,
to July, 1883; Rev. R. G. Johnson, December, 1883,
to August, 1888; Rev. William J. Clones, September,
1888. .
The brick meeting-house was burned, probably by
an incendiary August 5, 1840, and the present wooden
one built at the Old Common and dedicated in June,
1841. Within a few years it has been raised and a
vestry built in the basement.
After the death of Mr. Foster the town voted, Octo-
ber 29, 1827, to call Rev. William H. White to settle
as minister. He was born in Lanc.ister, Mass., in
1798, and lived on alarm in Westminster until he
was twenty-one years old, when he fitted for college
under the tuition of Rev. Dr. Stearns, of Lincoln.
Mr. White graduated at Brown University in 1824,
and at Cambridge Divinity School in 1827. He re-
ceived a call to preach in Kingston, Maas., but pre-
ferred Littleton, where he was ordained January 2,
1828.
It is said that it had long been his ambition to set-
lie in this town and to win the daughter of his pre-
decessor, Sarah Bass Foster, to whom he was married
a year after his ordination.
He was an earnest, active and able man, and the
church and town still feels and will feel the benefit of
his ministry for years to come, if not for all tiae.
He was the founder of the Littleton Lyceum, of
which an account more in detail will be given later,
and of the first Sunday-school in this town. He died
July 25, 1853, in the twenty-sixth year of his minis-
try. He was succeeded by Rev. Frederick R. Newell,
September, 1854, to November, 1856; Rev. Eugene
De Normandie, February, 1857, to July, 1863; Rev.
Albert B. Vorse, June, 1864, to Juue, 1869; Rev.
David P. Muzzey, October, 1869, to April, 1871 ; Rev.
Timothy H. Eddowes, January, 1872, to December,
876
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
1872; Rev. Samuel R. Priest, January, 1873, to Au-
gust, 1874; Rev. J. Wingate Winkley, March, 1876,
to July, 1882; Rev. William I. Nichols, October, 1884,
to November, 1889; Rev. E. J. Prescott, July, 1890.
In 1841 the society took down their old church and
built the present one on the same spot, the fourth
building of the First Congregational Society. In 1882
a vestry, with dining-room and kitchen below, were
added to the rear of the church.
Within a few years of each other were formed three
other religious societies in this town, of which only
one has survived; they were the Universalist, the
Uuionist and the Orthodox Congregational.
The Universalista held meetings in the Centre
School-house and in Chamberlain's Hall from 1830
until December, 184fi, when they bought at auction
the meeting-house the Unionists had built a few years
previous, a short distance east of the present Union
school-house, on the road between the Centre and Old
Common. The meeting-house was burned probably
by an incendiary in 1847, after which the society
disperfed.
The Unionists or Millerites were an offshoot of the
Baptists, in whose meeting-house William Miller first
preached in town. They built the small house before-
mentioned in 1840. They had set a time for the de-
struction of the world. The time came and passed,
the society went out of existence, but the world still
remains.
The Orthodox Congregational Society was formed
March 22, 1840, and the church May 14th, of the
same year, with thirty-two members, all or nearly all
of whom had withdrawn from the town church, now
the First Congregational, Unitarian.
They had held services for some time previously in
the hall over the yellow store which stood a short dis-
tance west of Dr. R. H Phelps' house, and continued
to use it until their present meeting-house was com-
pleted in the fall of 1841.
Their pa-itors have been Rev. Jamts C. Bryant, Oc-
tober, 1840, to March, 1845; Rev. James M. Bacon,
October, 1846, to November, 1849; Rev. Daniel H.
Babcock, April. 1851, to February, 1853; Rev. Elihu
Loomis, October, 1854, to November, 1870; Rev.
George Spaulding, November, 1870, to December,
1871 ; Rev. Henry E. Cooley, June, 1872, to October,
1874; Rev. George E. Hall, September, 1875, to Feb-
ruary, 1877; Rev. William Sewall, March, 1877, to
October, 1881 ; Rev. Nshemiah Boynton, October,
1882, to September, 1884; Rev. John C. Staples, No-
vember, 1884, to November, 1889.
In 1882 the church was raised, moved back and a
vestry and kitchen built in the basement; a new organ
was also added and the church re-dedicated in Octo-
ber of that year.
The church and society celebrated their fiftieth an-
niversary on May 14th of the present year, 1890, at
which time addresses were made by Rev. William G.
Tuttle, one of the founders of the church, by several
I of the former ministers and a historical address by
! George A. Sanderson, to whom the writer is indebted
for some of the facts here stated.
I In ancieut times a carriage was taxed as a luxury.
I The-returns for the years 1786, '87, '88 and '89 show
that in each of those years there were but two in
town, both chaises, though not recorded as owned by
the same persons in every year. The owners were :
Captain Jonathan Davis, Mr. Jeremiah Cogswell,
Captain David Lawrence.
The owners of slaves for the years 1770-71 were :
NatliHD Cliaae, one slave : Cnpt^in Leonard Whiting, one slave ; Jo-
seph lljirvvood, twij slaves; CapLiiu D.iviil Lawrence, one slave ; L'uptaiii
John Itusselt, one slave; Captain Samuel Preston, one slave; Simon
Turtle, oue slave.
A public school appears to have been first estab-
lished in 1725, for on March 3l3t of that year the
town voted that the selectmen should provide a school-
master and " to agree with him," that is, as to pay.
They hired John Powers. The following January
the town again voted that there should be a school-
master and chose a committee consisting of Deacon
[Caleb] Taylor, Lieutenant Lawreuce and Walter
Powers to hire the school-master and, in connection
with the selectmen, to order where the school was to
be kept in the several parts of the town —in private
houses, of course.
There was but one school, and to be fair to all, it
kept in various parts of the town, thus usually mov-
ing three times during the short time it kept, which
was only three or four mouths a year in all. In 1727
anarticle to see if the town would build school-houses
' was voted down. In 1732 it was voted to have school
I four months in one place — that is, not to move at all
for that year.
From 1755 to 1757 Mr. Phillips Payson was the
school-master. He was a graduate of Harvard Col-
lege in the class of 1754, of which John Hancock was
a member.
From 1758 to 1760 Mr. Samuel Payson was theschool-
maater. He was a Harvard College graduate of 1758.
In May, 1760, the town voted " to abate Mr. Stephen
Shattuck the Rates for his Son's Poll y° last year on
condition his Son Goes to college the next year."
This was no doubt Benjamin Shattuck, who gradu-
ated at Harvard College in 1765.
Mr. Stepheu Shattuck, Jr., was the school-master
in 1761 — he may also have been a Harvard graduate,
as the class of 1756 contained that name.
As the town did not build school-houses of its own
until the year 1796, the schools, during all the years
previous, were kept in buildings owned by private in-
dividuals, but it appears that school-houses existed
which were no doubt fitted up by their owners and
leased to the town.
In 1772 it was put to vote to see if the town should
be supplied with school-houses, " proper allowance
being made to the present proprietors of the School-
Houses," but the proposition was defeated.
LITTLETON.
877
It appears to have been quite the custom to have
the school-masters of this early period Harvard Col-
lege graduates who were studying for a profession,
and sometimes undergraduates, as in 1785 Mr. Elisba
Gardner taught in the Centre and graduated at Har-
vard the following year.
In 1790 James Green was the school-master. Oc-
tober 7, 1795, the town voted to build five achool-
houseo, but in May following reconsidered and voted
to build four. The matter was left in the hands of a
committee to buy the land and plan the buildings,
which was done probably soon after. This, however,
did not .'settle the question of four or five schools,
which caused much feeling and seems to have been
carried first one way and then another. The contest
was between the Centre people and others who wanted
a school located there and the residents in the outer
portions of the town, who wanted only four, located in
the south, east, north and west parts of the town.
The matter hung along until February, 1799, when
an attempt was made to settle the dispute by leaving
out to a committee from neighboring towns the ques-
tion whether there should be four or five schools, or
what number ; but the proposition was voted down.
This, no doubt, came from Centre people, and at
the same meeting a motion to appropriate money for
a school, to be kept in the old school-house at the
Centre, or give certain inhabitants their proportion of
the school money was also voted down.
In May, however, the town voted $100 for "women
schools," and to divide it into five equal parts.
In May, 1801, the advocates of four schools again
carried the day, and it was votea not to build a school-
house in the Centre.
In March of the next year the Centre got its por-
tion of the money for a " woman school " for summer,
but in October the town refused them any.
In March, 1808, the appropriation for schools was
$400 for Grammar School, S150 for Woman School—
and these meagre sums were more than hud been ap-
propriated in some, or perhaps any, previous years.
The four school-houses built in 1796, or there-
abouts, were located as follows: The North was on
the great road, east of Beaver Brook, and near the
long store, which is now a dwelling-house ; the East,
or Newtown, was at the corner of the road, a short
distance south of Mr. Eldridge Marshall's house; the
South was near Mr. J. A. Priesit's ; the West was
near its present location.
All attempts to get a school permanently located in
the Centre failed for many years ; but Rev. Mr. Fos-
ter was earnest in his efforts for it, and was not
the man to give up in such a contest ; furthermore,
the North School became overcrowded, at one time I
as many as 120 scholars attending in 1820-22, while
Mr. Ithamar Beard taught. Finally, on the last day
of the year 1821, a vote was carried, 51 to 52, to build
a school-house near Daniel Kimball's, now Mr. A.
P. Hager's, in the Centre, another in Nashoba, near
Shaker Lane, and to move the North, South and
Newtown School -houses. This was reconsidered Jan-
uary 14th, by a vote of 68 to 53 ; but two weeks later
another meeting was held, and the erection of the
Centre School-house, though on a different spot, and
the removal of the North School-house were agreed
to, while other plans submitted by the committee
were rejected, and the meeting adjourned to the fol-
lowing Thursday, January Slst, at which time the
whole matter of school -houses was settled as follows :
The Centre School-house to be built on the town land
nearly opposite the church, where it stood until it
was removed to make way for the town hall and li-
brary building, in 1886, and the bricks used in the hall ;
the North to be moved to very near the sf>ot occupied
by the present North School-house; a new one to be
built at Nashoba — still standing, but used as a farm
building by Mr. Allen Kimball ; Newtown to be
moved to Jeremiah Tuttle's land at the foot of the
hill, and the South to be moved seventy-eight rods,
to very near or at the spot where the railroad cross-
ing now is.
The question has been a hard and vexatious one,
and when finally settled the shrewd suggestion was
made to build the houses of brick to prevent their
being moved at any future time. It was immediately
carried. In 1831 new school-houses were built in the
north and sonth parts of the town, on the old locations,
and in 1832 at Newtown.
In 1831 began the attempts to get a school-house
at the Old Common, which were renewed in various
forms, sometimes to get a corporate school district
and sometimes to have the town build, until 1843,
when, in April, it was voted to build at the Common
and move the Naihoba School-house, or to sell it and
build another.
This was reconsidered, but again carried, so far as
related to the one at the Common. The Nai-hoba
matter was putotf, but carried the next year, at March
meeting, and a school- house built on or near the
present location. At the same meeting a committee
was chosen to confer with the directors of the Fitch-
burg Railroad about moving the South School-house,
as it was on or close by the location of the track. It
was afterwards moved a short distance south.
As we have seen, the location of school-houses has
always been a disturbing element in town politics,
and any attempted change has called forth Repeated
and stormy meetings.
This was the case again shortly after the Civil War,
when, after many meetings, it was decided to unite
ihe Centre and Old Common Schools in a graded
school, and build the present Union School-house,
which was done in 1867. Within the next decade
all the other school-houses were rebuilt. Additions
were made iu 1888 to the Union School- house of a
room for the High School, and to the West School-
house of another room in order to make a graded
school of it. . •
878.
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY", MASSACHUSETTS.
A few yeara ago a High School was established
and kept one term a year, for several years, in the
old Centre School-house, which had not been used for
school purposes for several years after the erection of
the Union School-house. Now the High School is a
regularly established school, keeping throughout the
whole school year, and with a course of study ar-
ranged either to fit for college or to give an English
course.
The present principal is Mr. C. H. Harriman, who
was preceded by Mr. Ira A. Jenkirn*, Mr. Edwin C.
Burbank and Mr. William H. Snyder.
For a few years the High and Centre Grammar
Schools were, for lack of accommodations, kept as
one school, with Miss Mary G. Tuttle as assistant.
Bunning back over some seventy years, the follow-
ing have been prominent teachers at various limes in
the public schools :
Miss Josephine Newhall, Miss Nellie M. Jacobs
(now Mrs. J. M. Hartwell), Mrs. Ellen F. Johnson,
Mr. Albert F. Conant, and his wife (formerly Mi=s
Patten, of Weatford), the Misses White (daughters of
Rev. W. H. White), Mr. Frank A. Patch, Mr. Laban
Warren, Mr. Warren Bolles, Mr. George StevenS'
Rev. William G. Tuttle, Mr. Benjamin Kimball, Jr.,
Rev. Edmund B. Willson (now pastor of the North
Society in Salem ) Mr. N. B. Edwards, Mr. Henry
Prescott, Mr. D. A. Kimball, Mr. Noyes, Mr. Nathan
A. Reed, Mr. Otis C. Wright, Mr. Stearns, Mr. Stone,
Mr. Ithamer Beard, Mr. Joel Hoar, Mr. M. S. Eager
and Mrs. Sophia K. Harwood (formerly Miss Kim-
ball).
The Littleton Lyceum was organized at a meet-
ing in the Centre School-house, Monday evening,
December 21, 1829, after several preliminary meet-
ings had been held, at one of which a constitution
had been adopted. The officers chosen were Rev.
William H. White, president ; Rev. Amasa Sander-
son, first vice-president ; Hon. Jonathan Hartwell,
second vice-president ; Col. Nahum Harwood, treas-
urer; Deacon John M. Hartwell, recording secretary;
Mr. Joel Hoar, corresponding secretary ; Mr. Ben-
jamin Kimball, Deacon Thomas S. Tuttle, Mr. Nathan
Hartwell, curators.
The object of the Lyceum, as stated in the pream-
ble of the constitution, was as follows: "We, the sub-
scribers, feeling desirous of affording every possible
facility for the improvement of our schools, feeling
the importance of personal cultivation and the gen-
eral diffusion of useful knowledge, and believing these
objects can be best accomplished by united and con-
tinued efforts, agree to form a society, under the
name of 'The Littleton Lyceum.' "
The founders were the leading men of the town at
that time. Rev. Mr. White may be considered the
father of the society, and for twenty-three years was
its president.
The literary work of the Lyceum began January 5,
1830, with parsing and criticism and reading from.
the North American Review. January 12th there was
I reading by the first classes of the schools throughout
I the town, and the reading of a portion of Hall's lec-
j tures on School-keeping. January 19th began a
course of three lectures on Astronomy, by Mr. Abel
Fletcher, of Boxborough. Two more evenings were
occupied by reading on School-keeping, and one by
a debate.
From that year down to and including the present
the Lyceum has continued and flourished each year
without a break, the only one of the many lyceums
formed about that time throughout the State which
has done so without the lapse of a year or more.
The exercises have changed somewhat, and of late
years take more the form of a course of popular lec-
tures and concerts, with, occasionally, a debate or an
evening occupied by the schools, as a reminder of the
original custom and purpose of the Lyceum. There
is no permanent fund, and the money for the support
of its lectures is raised each year either by the sale
of tickets or by popular subscription — the more usual
manner — and in that case the lectures are free and
public to all.
During the winter months, Tuesday evening is, by
common consent, assigned and set apart for the Ly-
ceum, and rash, indeed, would be anyone who should
appoint any other public meeting for that evening.
Among the names of those who have lectured be-
fore the Lyceum are Ralph Waldo Emerson, Dr.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Mr. E. P. Whipple, Rev.
James Freeman Clarke, Mr. A. Bronson Alcott,
Judge E. R. Hoar, Mr. C. C. Coffin, Prest. C. C. Fel-
ton, Wendell Phillips, Mrs. Mary A. Livermore, Col.
T. W. Higginson, Rev. E. E. Hale, Rev. Dr. E. H.
Chapin, Rev. E. S. Gannett, Hon. N. P. Banks, Hon.
Geo. S. Boutwell, Hon. John D. Long, Hon. Geo. B.
Loring, Prof. Morse, Col. Thomas W. Knox, Hon.
Wm. Parsons and a long list of other prominent men.
■ In 1879 the semi-centennial of the Lyceum was
celebrated on December 23d. On that occasion Hon.
Geo. W. Sanderson presided. An historical address
was delivered by Miss Hannah P. Dodge, to whom
the writer is indebted as authority, and other addresses
were made by Hon. Geo. S. Bjuiwell, Hon. Geo.
Stevens and Rev. Edmund B. Willson. The proceed-
ings, including letters from invited guests, were
printed in pamphlet form.
Littleton people are justly proud of this honored
institution, which has been so well supported and
has added much to the culture of the town.
It is interesting to relate the traditions about sev-
eral of the large trees which beautify the town and
are among the few landmaiks connecting us with
the past.
The great elm on Mr. John A. Kimball's land, near
the mill-pond, marks the spot where lived Samuel
Dudley, the first town clerk, and whose most excel-
lent wife was cruelly accused of witchcraft.
The two largest elms on Colonel Joseph A. Har-
LITTLETON.
879
wood's lawn were set out by his grandfalher, Captain
Joseph Harwood, the younger, who, when a young
man of about seventeen years, dug them up in the
woods, carried them on his back and set them out
where they stand, as well as two others which time
has long since removed.
The elm by the house of Dr. R. H. Phelps, the
most beautiful tree in town, was set oat by Captain
Kidder to serve the practical purposes of hitching-
post and shade for his horse when he came to meet-
ing. It is estimated to have been sit out about the
year 1810.
Captain Kidder kept the Tremont Tavern on the
spot where the Baptist parsonage stands, and after-
wards built the house owned by Mr. John W. Adams
and occupied by him at the time it was burned by
Scribner, the incendiary, in 1883.
The elm tree by the Baptist parsonage was set out
by Mrs. Nye, the mother of the late Mr. Thomas Nye.
The elm tree on the sidewalk between Mr. Everett
E. Kimball's and Mr. William Grimes' is the ' Rogers
Tree,'' so named by Mrs. Zadoc Rogers, who lived
where Mr. Grimes does, and paid some young men
five dollars to set it out where she designated.
The ash tree near the town hall door came from the
valley on the west side of Long Pond and was
brought on the shouldersof one of the young men of
that time. Many of our older residents will remember
a very large elm which formerly stood in the rear of
the house of Mr. Eugene Feh-h. That tree was a
memento of the courtship of John Hartwell and
Mary Dix. Mr. Hartwell came along the road one
day carrying some small elm trees, and meeting the
lady who afterwards becprae his wife, gave her one
which she set out, and which grew to immense size,
and under it they both lived and died. The row of j
maples in the Centre, beginning at the Rogers tree I
and extending south on Foster Street, was set out
in 18G1. Littleton's record in the War of the Rebell-
ion has not heretofore been fully compiled, as the
town has only a partial list of the men who served
as representing Littleton. The names here given,
however, are believed to include all, both residents
and others, accredited to the town as volunteers.
General Schouler in his " History of Massachusetts
in the Rebellion," states that the whole number of
men furnished by the town during the war was 117,
a surplus of eighteen above the quota, but the follow-
ing fifiy-six are all the names which appear on the
town book of record :
ChariM E. Beard, Warren B. Ball, Daniel Brown, Luther Battles.
Josepb A. Butterfield, Marcus Conanc, [Maj.] Sbennan Cooant, Edward
J. CaiTi, James Ci.s«ello, George W. Clark. Theodore C. CUrk, Isaac N.
Dodf^e, James L. Duraot. Hallowell R. Danham, [Sergt.] Jantes T. Estea,
Daniel C. Fletcher, Charles Fninklin, Williiim L. Klagg, John Fowley,
Warren W, Oilsou, [Sergt. ] Fraocis W, Goodwin. Barney Gulden,
Edward Golden, John 3. Hartwell. Charles H. Holton. Elbridge H.
Jefta, Charles 3. Jefta, Sherman H. Jewett, .\hel H. Joues, [Corp.] Geo.
W. Koowlton, John M. Kidder. Henry .\. Lawrence. George A. Loring,
Calvin L. Lahhani. [Corp.] .\lhert B. Marahall, Patrick Moore. Nicholas
O'Neal, [Corp.] George H. Patch, [Lieut.] Cj-rua P. PIckard, [Corp.] I
Herbert E. Preston. Oscar Preston, Ralph W. Parker, James Powere,
[Corp.] Chnrles W. Reed. [Lieut ] George A. Reed. [Sergt.] Albert W.
Robbius. [C.)rp.] Luther R. Searlee. James C. Smith, Nalhon E Tultle,
[Corp.] Adams W. Tutlle, [Corp.] William C. Turner, AllfD P. Whit-
ronib, Nuhum H. Wtntcomb, [Corp.] George L. Whilcumb, George
White, Henry S. Wlllard.
The following forty-nine additional names have
been collected by the author after careful and diligent
search.
Corp. Edward D. Battles, Henry Bode, Charle* P. Bnckley, Henry 0.
Burnham, Edward Cameron, Hugh Casey, Corp. John Clark, Hugh
Connolly, John Currun, George M. Downs, Henson Dyson, Edwin C.
Field, Thomas Geary, Michael Gubbins, William Haley, John Hawkins,
John Henderson, Thomas Jones, Jnllua Keiser, BaUbasa Kellar, Joseph
Kleehamer. Stephen B. Knigbts. Charles A Long, Edmund Maunder,
Jacob McAlee, Edward C. Magoreu, Charles McCarthy, Ebeo S. Mc-
Cleary, Alexander McGregor, George C. Monroe, Darius H. C. Nelson,
Corp. James O'Brien, Cornelius O'Connor, William Parker, Calvin B.
Paige, Asst. Surg. Isaiah L. PIckard, SergL Comfort Preston, Austin
Richanlson, Albert J. Robbius, Frederick Shaffer, Patrick Shorey,
George Smith, William Smith, James Sweeney, John D. Sanborn, Homer
A. Warren, Anton Winch, August Vanderhyde, Edward Vanaicklen.
Some of these never resided in town, and were
merely engaged to fill the quota, or as substitutes
from wherever they happened to come, without regard
to residence. The number 117 was no doubt made
up by re-enlistments, of which there were several.
The first town-meeting to consider matters relating
to the war was held May 1, 1861, when it was voted to
raise by taxation $1000, and the selectmen were
authorized to borrow $2000, if needed, to pay each
soldier belonging to the town $10 a month while in
the service, and to provide for their families.
In July a committee, consisting of the selectmen,
who were John F. Robbins, John Cutter and James
A. Parker, with the addition of Dea. Richard Hall,
Francis P. Knowlton, Dea. Thomas S. Tuttle and
Benjamin Edwards, were chosen to expend the money
appropriated at the previous meeting.
A year laier, in July, 1862, a bounty of $100 was
voted to each volunteer for three years' service, and
again, a year later, in August, 1863, the bounty was
raised to §125.
At the same meeting resolutions were passed appro-
priate to the death of Nahum H. Whitcomb, of the
Sixth Massachusetts Regiment, who was killed at
Suffolk, Va., and the town voted to pay the expense
of bringing home and interring his remains.
The town continued recruiting and paying bounties
during the remainder of the war, and expended, ex-
clusive of State aid, §11,104.33.
In 1863-64-65 the selectmen were Joseph A. Priest,
William Kimball and George W. Sanderson.
Though a small boy at the time, the writer well re-
members the impressive citizens' meeting in Central
Hall when the first volunteers, enlisted for nine
months, took their departure. Speeches were made
by prominent citizens, and the soldiers appeared in
their new uniforms.
A Soldiers' Aid Society was formed under the pres-
idency of Mrs. S. B. White, widow of Rev. Wm. H.
While, and many boxes of clothing, bandages and
comforts were forwarded to the seat of war.
sso
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Libraries. — One of the earliest public libraries in
this State was in Littleton, and was established pre-
vious to 1827, probably by an association. It was a
small collection of books, several being on theology ;
there were also Josephus' " History of the Jews,"
"Gil Bias," with some of Scott's and other novels of a
standard character, and was kept on a set of three
or four shelves which were placed in the house of the
person having them in charge for the time being,
and given out to any citizen who called for them.
At the date above mentioned the library was kept
in the house of Mr. Timothy Prescott, who lived in
the Rogers house, on the spot where Mr. George
Whitcomb now lives. The books were sold at auction
in 1834 or '35. About this time was established
another library which was in charge of Dea. James
Kimball, town clerk in the house now occupied and
owned by Mr. A. P. Hager, unlil the evening of Jan.
1, 1847, when the books were sold ac auction and
bought by different people in town. Many of the
books are still in existence, and the writer has seen
one with the original book-plate headed "Littleton
Town Library " on the inside cover.
An agricultural library was also established, prob-
ably after the sale of the town library, and kept an
assortment of books on subjects of interest to farmers
on some shelves in the Centre store. This library
was maintained and owned by an association, and was
more of a book club than a public library.
For several years previous to the foundation of the
Reuben Hoar Library the case containing the agri-
cultural library, the books of which were little, if any
read, had been kept in the old brick Centre School-
house, which was used as a town office, and had also
a vault for town books and records in it.
These were all turned into the Reuben Hoar Li-
brary, together with many books belonging to the
town, which were in charge of the selectmen, and had
also been kept in the brick school-house.
This lot of town books contained many valuable
sets which had been issued by the State from time
to time, such as the Massachusetts and Plymouth
Colony Records, Hitchcock's " Ichnoiogy of New
England," and others.
We now come to the Reuben Hoar Library. Some
time during the full or early winter of 1884 a gentle-
man who desired to remain unknown communicated
to Dea. George W. Tuttle his desire to assist in
founding a free public library in Littleton, and re-
quested Mr. Tuttle to consult with several citizens as
to the best way to proceed, at the same time express-
ing his willingness to give the sum of $10,000 under
certain cooditions.
Mr. Tuttle congulted with Hon. George W. San-
derson, Mr. Gardner Prouty, Mr. Shattuck Hartwell
and Mr. Nelson B. Conant, who held several meetings
in regard to the matter and communicated with the
unknown gentleman through Mr. Tattle. Before mat-
ters were in shape to lay beibre the town, Mr. Tuttle
was taken sick with what proved to be his final ill-
ness, and in the latter part of the winter the people
of this town mourned in his death the loss of a highly
respected and valued citizen. Before his death he
communicated to Mr. Nelson B. Conant his scn-in-
law the name of the gentleman making the offer and
negotiations were then carried on through Mr. Conant.
After deciding on a plan to propose, a citizens'
meeting was called for Monday afternoon, March 23,
1885, at which time the donor's offer and conditions
were announced as follows : $10,000 to be appropri-
ated by the town, S2500 to be raised by subscription,
$10,000 to be given by a party (his name to be un-
known), on condition that the library be called the
Reuben Hoar Library, and that $5000 be invested in
books, and $5000 be invested and kept as a fund of
which the interest to be expended yearly in books to
replenish the library.
None of the gift of §10,000 to be expended on the
building. The books to be kept insured by the town
and all expenses attending the running of the library
paid by the town.
The library and its funds to be in charge of seven
trustees, viz. : the pastor of the Unitarian Church
and one layman, the pastor of the Orthodox Church
and one layman, the pastor of the Baptist Church and
one layman ; one of the selectmen.
The plan proposed by the gentlemen who called
the meeting, that is the conference committee, was
to accept the offer and to build, with the S10,000 to be
appropriated by the town, a town-hall and library
building combined.
Some opposition was manifested, as many desired
to see the plan modified so that the town would not
be required to expend so much money on a building,
but the plan of the conference committee was carried
out and resolutions favoring the acceptance of the
offer were adopted.
The committee and others then began a canvass for
subscriptions toward the §2500 to be raised in that
way, and after sufficient progress had been made a
town-meeting was held in Central Hall, Monday,
June 8, 1885, to see if the town would accept the con-
ditions of the gift and appropriate money for building
a hall and library and other matters connected with
the matter. After considerable opposition the offer
and conditions were accepted and a building com-
mittee chosen consisting of Gardner Prouty, Joseph
A. Priest, George W. Sanderson, Edward Frost and
Herbert J. Harwood, with instiuctions to report plans
and location for a building at an adjourned -meeting
two weeks later. At that time the committee reported
in favor of the location opposite the Unitarian
Church, and showed sketches by Hartwell & Richard-
son, architects.
The report was accepted and it was to build, and
$10,000 appropriated.
The committee then went to work, but care and
caution marked its proceedings, which were also pro-
LITTLETON.
881
tracted by finaacial difficulties of the general con-
tractor, so that it was two years before the building
was completed and furnished.
For furnishing, the town made a further appropria-
tion, which brought the cost of the building up to
$11,000 or thereabouts.
The building was dedicited July 28, 1887, with an
oration by ex Governor John D. Long, addresses by
Hon. George S. Boutwell and Hon. Charles H. Allen,
a letter from the founder of the Reuben Hoar Library,
and other appropriate exercises.
The founder wrote as follows :
" About fifty yettra ago a resident of Littletoa became iDvoWed and
was obliged to fail ia busioesa.
" Bouben Hoar belag his largest creditor waa madt* aaslgDee. Alter
looking orer tbe aoets and fiodiag tbat If sufflcieot time was glvea
tbey migbt realize Juat about eoougU to pay tbe debts in full, Ur. Hoar
said to tbe man, ' I will make you my ageat ; go on, collect aod die-
tribute until you have paid all their just due, and if there is nothing
left 1 will furnish you with capital to start again.'
** For some two yeate the business was managed wi(h the most rigid
economy, during which time ^r. Hoar proved wise In counsel and
genel^uB in help.
" Wheu the estate bad b««n settled, leaving a safflcieot sarplns to pay
Mr. Hoar bis legal and proper commission as assignee, he refused all
compensation.
" It is from the careful use of that small residue by two generations
that the means have t>een acquired with which to found this Library io
honor of Reuben Hoar. " By the donor."
In the mean time library trustees had been chosen
on July 3, 1885, aa follows: Rev. Robert G. Johnson,
Rev. William 1. Nichols, Rev. John C. Staples, Nelson
B. Conant, Herbert J. Harwood, Hon. George W.
Sanderson, Miss Hannah P. Dodge, who organized
with Mr. Sanderson, chairman; Miss Dodge, secre-
tary and Mr. Conant, treasurer ; and proceeded to
make a selection of books, and to invest the perma-
nent fund. Miss Sarah F. White was chosen librarian,
a position which she still honors.
After purchasing, classifying and arranging about
2200 volumes, the library was opened to the public a
•few days after the dedication of the building.
A printed catalogue was issued in December, 1889,
and at that time the library had grown to about 4500
volumes. The benefits of the library are fully appre-
ciated by the citizens of the town, and there are few
people of eligible age who do not either take out
books or frequent the periodical table, so that the
total circulation of books is over 7000 a year in a
population of 1000.
The library is open on Wednesday and Saturday
afternoons and Saturday evenings. A fine oil por-
trait of the late Reuben Hoar, in whose honor the
library was named, hangs upon the wall of the read-
ing-room, the gift of his daughters, — Mrs. Adelbert
Mead, of West Acton, and Mrs. Isaac Wright, of Har-
vard.
The library also received a bequest of $1000 by the
will of Augustus K. Fletcher, formerly of this town,
and has also been favored with many gifts of books
and some pictures, as well as a valuable manuscript
collection of historical and genealogical matter be-
56-ii
longing to the late Samuel Smith and given by his
heirs.
Tbe town is also the owner of five shares in the
Boston Athenaeum Library, presented many years ago
by Dr. Shattuck, of Boston, a relative of the first
minister of the town, by the use of which books
can be taken out by Liitleton people.
The three churches have each a library of Sunday-
school books, and that of the Unitarian Church is
also quite general in its character, and contains books
for people of all ages.
Littleton is principally a farming town, but has at
the depot village a factory for canning and pickling
fruit and vegetables, operated by E. T. Cowdrey &
Co., the plant being owned by a company of Littleto
men. There are two saw and grist-mills owned and
operated by Fred C. Hartwell, — one at the depot and
the other at the old Warren mill-site. At the Com-
mon Village are located the factory for manufactur-
ing elastic webs and suspenders and the apple evap-
orator, both owned and operated by Conant &
Houghton. Conant & Co. have stores at the Common
and depot. Thacher & Hazen, a new firm, recently
succeeding A. W. & W. H. Sawyer, at the depot and
C. C. Hildreth at the Centre.
A few years since a large and costly brick factory
was built near the depot by the Avery Lactate Co.,
for the manufacture, by a new process, of lactic acid,
but the company failed and the building and machin-
ery stand idle, having been sold for taxes.
About the time of the War of the Revolution there
was a factory for dressing cloth on the brook near the
house of Peter 3. Whitcomb ; it was owned by a stock
company, which had, in 1779, seventeen shareholders,
mostly residents.
The population of Littleton in 1776 was 918; ia
1860, 1063; and in 1885. 1067. The number of polls
is 305 and the valuation $8';9,273.
The town has been represented in the State Senate
by Rev. Edmund Foster, Hon. Jonathan Hartwell,
Hon. Joseph A. Harwood and Hon. George W. San-
derson, and in the Executive Coancil by Hon. Joseph
A. Harwood.
The State engineer of the Hoosac Tunnel, com-
pleted in 1875, was Benjamin D. Frost, of this town.
Taverns have been kept in Littleton by Samuel
Hunt, probably near Peter S. Whitcomb's house,
mention of which is made in the early records of
meetings held there as early as 1722 ; also by one
Lawrence, probably Samuel, in the south part of the
town as early as 1768, in the house now occupied by
David Hall, of which previous' mention has been
made ; by John Fox and after his death by his wife,
in tne Centre about the time of the French and Indian
War ; also by Capt. Leonard Whiting in the Centre,
previous to the Revolution ; by William Henry Pren-
tice, in the Centre, where Everett E. Kimball lives,
during tjje Revolution ; by Samuel Gilbert and after-
wards about the beginning of this century by Captain
882
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Kidder, at the Common, called the Tremont Houae,
which stood where the Baptist parsonage now is —
the building continued to be used as a hotel until it
was struck by lightning and burned in 1845; by
Simeon Proctor, where Solomon S. Flagg now lives;
by Madison Loring, who succeeded Captain Kidder,
at the Common, in the house afterwards occupied as
a dwelling by the late John W. Adams ; by Samuel
Smith, on the spot where Albert F. Conant's house
stands, and later, in the same building, by J. M. Col-
burn, William Chamberlain, Boynton Needham and
others, and last by George D. Brown, who owned the
place when it was burned, in 1878, but had not kept
it open to the public for several years previous.
William L. Mitchel now keepr* a public-house at
the Common and has for several years.
As before stated, the earliest cemetery in town was
at Nashoba, and was plowed up a number of years
ago. The second and oldest of the two present ceme-
teries, the one at the Common, was laid out in 1721 and
is described as having for its " East Corner an oak
tree by King St. so called." The other cemetery was
purchased in 1801, but was used only for the inter-
ment of paupers until the year 1812.
The following epitaphs are to be found in the old
cemetery at the Common : —
" ilemento Mori.
Here lies the Body of Dr. Enoch Dole, of Lancaster, M 33 yre. 5 moa.
i 3 daye, he unfortunately fell with 3 others y» 9th uf Mar, ITTfi, by a
cannon Ball from our cruel A UDoataral Foes y British Troops while on
bis Duty on Dorchester Point
No warning giv'n
Unceremonious fate I
A sodden rush from life's meridian joys I
A wrench from all we are from all we love,
What a change from yesterday !
Thy darling hope so nenr (Long labored prize),
Oh, how ambition flushed Thy glowing cheek— ambition truly great
Of virtuous praise ;
And Oh I y« last (what can word eipress thought reach), y last, last
silence of a Iriend.
Meaning his entrance into Boston which so soon took Place & on
which his heart was mncb eet.'*
' As you are now, so once was I,
Rfjoicing in my bloom.
As I am now. you soou must be,
Dibsolviug in the tomb."
" Here lyes the body of Isaac Powers,
One of those sweet and pleasant flowers,
Who in his Lifetime Lived well.
But God did toll his mournful bell ;
Let this be a call unto the rest
When God doth take from na the best
Who was a pattern to us all.
But God can give a louder call
All earthly parents now behold ;
The price of Grace is more than gold.
Prepare to meet your children flrst
At the Besnrrection of the Just.
Wto died December 16, 1729, in the 29th year of his age,'
."Affliction sore, long time I bore
Physicians was in vain.
Till God did please
And Death did seize
To ease me of my pain."
" Present useful
Absent wanted.
Lived desired
And died lamented.'^
BIOGRAPHICAL.
HON. JOSEPH ALFRED HARWOOD.
In Littleton the number of old families living on
farms'which have been handed down from sire to son
for many generations is remarkable, and among the
oldest is the Harwood family, of which Hon. Joseph
A. Harwood is the head.
Nathaniel Harwood, of English origin, was living
in Boston in 1655, whence he removed to Concord.
From there hia son Peter and grandson. Captain Jo-
seph Harwood, moved to Littleton and bought in 1737
the estate upon which the family now live.
Their first residence was in a lot since grown up to
woods near the new load to Newtown from Littleton
depot, and some half-mile east of Mr. Harwood's
house.
The cellar-hole may yet be seen and the old well
filled with stones, while a short distance away is a
finespring which comes up through a hollow log set in
the ground no doubt some 150 years ago. About 1754
a house was built near the present one by Captain Jo-
seph Harwood, and his son. Captain Joseph Harwood,
Jr., then a young man, set out the elm trees, of which
two large ones are still standing, and under which
Mr. Harwood's grandchildren, the seventh genera-
tion on the place, to-day play.
The Harwoods have always been prominent in town
afiairs, and have been pioneers in all movements of
reform and improvement.
Colonel Nahum Harwood, the father of the subject
of this sketch, was one of the first Abolitionists, and a
co-worker with Garrison and Phillips. He was also
one of the projectors of the Fitchburgh Eailroad.
His wife, Mrs. Sophia Kimball Harwood, who lived
to the advanced age of a few days less than ninety-
four years, used to relate many incidents of the olden
time, among them how she wore crape, when a girl, for
the death of George Washington, reminiscences of
the last slave owned by the Harwood family, etc.
The old house above referred to as built in 1754,
was destroyed by fire in 1874, together with a great
number of relics and heirlooms.
It was one of those substantial square white houses,
with an immense chimney in the centre, standing un-
der the broad elms on the sunny southern slope o( a
hill, the style of houae which, though now becoming
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LITTLETON.
883
scarce, has always been the typical Xew England
farm-house.
From its windows were seen the smoke of the burn-
ing of Charlestown and the battle of Bunker Hill,
and in its cellar the frightened inhabitants took ref-
uge during the "dark day "of 1780. Many slaves
were born and raised in the house, but the slavery
was n^ver like the Southern slavery, and the Har-
woods were among the first Abolitionists.
Here was born Joseph Alfred Harwood, March 26,
1827. He attended the district school and afterward
the academies at Westford, Groton, and Exeter, New
Hampshire. It was intended to send him to college,
but his father dying when he was fifteen years old, he
came home to take charge of the farm.
Many old heads predicted failure for a boy with a
large farm on his hands, and a fondneos for fine horses
and cattle, but the boy had a level head and managed
well. He made many improvements on the farm
" making two blades of grass grow where one grew be-
fore," draining old bogs and making them produce,
heavy crops of fine English hay, plowing up huckle-
berry pastures and planting orchards, and similar
things. Meantime he paid his bills, rent and interest
on the portions of the farm belonging to the other
heirs, and finally bought aud paid for the whole. He
found time to teach school for a number of winters,
and was noted for his good discipline, and the ease
with which he maintained it. A school in a neigh-
boring town, containing a number of full-growu schol-
ars, men in size, who had driven away two or three
te.achers, and vowed vengeance on the next who
should come, was turned over to ilr. Harwood, when
he was only seventeen years of age, to complete a
term. He held his place without resorting to harsh
measures, and left the school orderly, obedient and
respectful.
The .stock on Mr. Harwood's farm has always, since
under his management, been of the best. He intro-
duced among his cattle the first thoroughbred animals
ever brought into Littleton, and by frequent additions
of new blood has not only improved his own herd, but
the stock on all the neighboring farms. He devoted
himself almost exclusively to agriculture untiri868,
when, in partnership with his younger brother, Na-
hum, under the name of J. .\. & N. Harwood, he
commenced the manufacture of leather board, their
factory being at North Leominster, on the Nashua
River, and their salesroom in Boston. The great
Boston fire of November, 1872, found the firm mov-
ing a large stock of goods from one store to another ;
both were burned, but by good fortune and good
judgment combined — for they always go together —
their insurance was divided among a number of out-
of-town companies and was all good.
During the panic of 1873 the firm stood its ground,
while many of its neighbors succumbed.
On .\pril 1, 1S84, the Leominster factory was de-
stroyed by fire, causiug a loss to the firm and a fur-
ther indirect loss by crippling the business during
rebuilding, but by good management all liabilitie.^
were promptly met and the business continued. A
fine new factory was built, the firm was made into a
corporation under Mas-sachusetts laws, by the name
of the Harwood Manufacturing Company, and has
continued the same business, branching out somewhat
in the manufacture of patent fibre chair-seats and
chairs, and settees for churches, theatres and halls.
Joseph A. Harwood is president and treasurer.
In all matters, both of public and private business,
Mr. Harwood's policy has been liberal and expan-
sive, encouraging all improvements such as new roads,
public buildings or any project which will increase
the business and prosperity of his town, and also ia
the improvement and adornment of his estate. After
the old house was burned he built a large and ele-
gant new one on the top of the hill, a few rods from
where the old one stood. The wood-cut opposite
gives an accurate idea of the house and surroundings.
The view from the house in all directions is very fine,
covering the park with its walks, drives and ponds,
all planned and laid out by Mr. Harwood, who is in-
tensely fond of landscape gardening, beyond which
the eye pas-ses over a large expanse of hills and valleys
to Mounts Wachusett, Monadnock, Watatick and the
Peterboro' hills.
Mr. Harwood has in his farm about 240 acres, a
considerable part of which he has added within a few
years by the purchase of land extending in the direc-
tion of Littleton depot, on which is located the
United States Cittle Quarantine Station, which was
moved from Waltham in 1885, as aresult of his efforts
and against much political oppositiou stimulated by
those who wanted it elsewhere.
Mr. Harwood was postmaster of Littleton for
about twenty years, and during the greater part
of the time accommodated the citizens by sending
the mail at his own expense to sub-offices at the
Centre and Old Common, previous to the establish-
ing of aregular office at Littleton Common. Through
his inrtuence a telegraph office was established in con-
nection with the post-office, which could be done
only in that way, and by his bearing a part of the
expense of a clerk for both offices.
In 1873 Governor Washburn appointed Mr. Har-
wood on his staff, and he was re-appointed by Lieut.
Governor Talbot when acting Governor for the unex-
pired term after the election of Governor Washburn
to the United States Senate. Col. Harwood was
elected to the State Senate in 1875 and re-elected the
following year and w.os an active, practical and
influential legislator. He served in his first year aa
chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs, and
also on the Committees on Agriculture, and on En-
grossed Bills, and in the following year was chairman
of the Committee on Agriculture and a member of
the Committtee on Public Charitable Institutions.
An important matter that wss carried through the
884
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
Senate largely through his influence and efforts was
the building of the State Prison at Concord. During
his second term occurred the celebration of the Lex-
ington and Concord Centennials, and Mr. Harwood
was made chairman of the joint special committee
havinjc the whole matter in charge for the Legisla-
ture, including the entertainment of President Grant
and his cabinet.
General Grant, on Jiis return to Washington, wrote
him an autograph letter as follows : —
" EXKCurrvB Mansion, Wa8himotoh, Apl. 27, 1875.
" Hon. J. A. Habvood, Chairman Legislative Committee.
'* Dear Ool. : — Permit me tbroagh you — the chairmao of the com-
mittee of the Mass. Legislature, appointed to meet the Cabinet and
myself on the occasion of the late centennial celebration of the bat-
tles of Concord — Lexington, and convey to us the invitation of the State
to be its gneats for the time— to tender my thanks, and the thanks of the
accompanying Cabinet Ministers for the courtesies received from his
Excellency the Governor of the state, and staff, your committee and
citizens generally. Nothing was left andone to make oar short stay in
the state most pleasant. With great respect,
" Yonr obt. svt.,
" n. S. Geant."
At the expiration of Mr. Harwood's second term in
the Senate, he was elected to the Executive Council
from the Sixth Councilor District, and served in that
capacity three years — the first two in Governor Rice's
and the last in Governor Talbot's.
The first year he was on the Committees on Par-
dons, on Penal Institutions, on Military Affairs and
chairman of the Committee on Accounts ; in the two
succeeding years he was on the two first-named com-
mittees, also on the Committee on Railroads and the
Hoosac Tunnel, and chairman of the Committee on
Military Affairs. During his third year he was one
of the senior members of the Council and was con-
sidered Governor Talbot's right-hand man in that ad-
ministration, which has been celebrated for its careful
and business-like management and strict integrity.
In 1879 and again in 1882, Mr. Harwood was a
prominent candidate for the Republican nomination
for Lieutenant-Governor, and in the convention of
the former year received 181 votes and of the latter
283.
He has always been a staunch Republican, and
prides himself on having invariably voted the straight
ticket in both State and national affairs.
In his whole career, both in business and politics,
determined persistence has marked his course and
has been the cause of his success.
He is now president and treasurer of the Harwood
Manufacturing Company, president of the Live Stock
Insurance Company, director in the Mutual Reserve
Fund Life Association of New York, trastee of the
New England Agricultural Society, trustee of the
Middlesex Agricultural Society, trustee of Westford
Academy and trustee of the Massachusetts Agricultu-
ral College. He has always been an active member
of the Unitarian Society and Church, and was at one
time a president of the North Middlesex Conference.
In peisonai appearance Mr. Harwood is tall, with
iron gray hair and beard, a full face and a sharp eye ;
be walks with a long stride and very fast. He is very
cordial in manner and makes and holds many friends.
Id 1852 Mr. Harwood married Lucy Maria Hart-
well, of Littleton, daughter of Hon. Jonathan and
Elizabeth Briard (Walker) Hartwell.
Two sons have been born to them — Herbert Joseph,
who graduated from Harvard College in 1877, and is
now associated with his father in business, also, with
his wife and five children, living with his father and
mother at the old place, and Edward Alfred, who
died in infancy.
WILLIAM KIMBALL.
William Kimball, son of Deacon James and Rachel
Hartwell, Kimball was born in Littleton December
6, 1817. The greater part of his life was spent in his
native town, in which, for about twenty years of his
early manhood, he kept a store, and during a portion
of this time was postmaster. For many years he was
justice of the peace. In 1845 he married Mary Adams
Lawrence. Of their six children, four survive, —
George A., William L., Myron A. and Mrs. Mary K.
Harlow, the first and last living in Somerville, Mass.,
William L. and Myron A. residing in Littleton.
At the semi-centennial of the church of which Mr.
Kimball had been a member, his pastor, in alluding
to him, said: " His pleasant countenance was an in-
spiration."
The following resolution from the town records
shows the esteem in which he was held by the citi-
zens :
•' Itcmlved: That in the lamented death of William Kimball we greatly
mourn our loss of an exemplary and honored citixen. an experienced,
efficient and uprightofflcial. Living most of his life of eixty-Bii years
in bin native town, by bis sterling traits of character, his kindly spirit,
bis habitual courtesy, his modest manliness, his firm principles and
proved integrity, bis genuine and ready support of the public interests,
and bis earnest, simple. Christian faith and life, be gained and held the
confidence and esteem of his townsmen, as shown in the continuous and
unanimous choice of bim to be their town clerk for more than a quarter
of a century."
It was said by one who knew him well : " He walked
among men one of earth's noblemen, whose integrity
was so staunch and whose honor so true that there
was none to point the finger of scorn at him or to im-
peach his honesty."
In 1869 he married Mrs. Lucy M. Houghton, young-
est daughter of John Goldsmith, of Littleton. He
died October 14, 1884, aged sixty-six years.
DEACON JAMES KIMBA.LL.
In presenting a sketch of the life of Deacon James
Kimball, it seems suitable to prefix some account of
his father, Deacon Daniel Kimball, the progenitor of
the Kimball family in Littleton:
Daniel Kimball was born ia Haverhill, Massachu-
setts, July 14, 1751. Soon after his removal to Lit-
tleton the Revolutionary War broke out. He entered
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LITTLETON.
885
the army, in which he soon obtained the rank of
lieutenant.
In 1779 he married Lucy Button, of Littleton. Of
their twelve children, three died in infancy; the re-
mainder all married and settled in Littleton. The
following are their names:
Daniel, James, Benjamin, Jesse, Lucy (Kimball)
Mead, John, Sophia (Kimball) Harwood, Sebia
(Kimball) Goldsmith and Rebecca (Kimball) Fletcher.
At the present time (1890) more than sixty worthy
descendants of Deacon Daniel Kimball reside in Lit-
tleton, and more than 125 are scattered through the
States from Vermont to California. He died in 1813,
aged sixty -two years.
In the archives of the town library may be found a
funeral sermon preached by Rev. Edmund Foster, in
which his character is delineated.
Deacon James Kimball, second son of Deacon Dan-
iel Kimball, was born in Littleton in 1783.
He married, in 1807, Rachel Hartwell, of Littleton.
Of their ten children, two — Sophia (Kimball) Hurter,
of Jacksonville, Florida, and Elizabeth (Kimball)
Stevens, for many years a resident of Lowell — are still
living.
James Kimball was, while quite a young man, prom-
inent in town and other public interests. He was one
of the pioneers of the anti-slavery and temperance
movements. From 1838 to 1851 he was town clerk.
He was an interested and active member of the Ly-
ceum from its beginning: a society which for more
than half a century has had an important educational
influence in the town.
He was for many years chosen as one of the Board
of Selectmen, and for a considerable period repre-
sented the town in the State Legislature. He was
deacon of the Orthodox Congregational Church from
ita organization (which occurred in his own house), in
1840, to his death. He had previously held the office
of deacon in the Unitarian Church.
His second wife was Mrs. Mary B. Harris.
He died in 1869, aged eighty-sLx years. His life
fully warranted the estimate of his character shown
by his father in the advice given his children upon
his death-bed ; " My children, take James for an ex-
ample."
JOHN GOLDSMITH.
John Goldsmith was a native of Acton, Mass. He
was a son of John and Maria (Houghton) Goldsmith,
— the former being a native of Littleton and the lat-
ter of Harvard. It is supposed he was a lineal de-
scendant of the Goldsmith family that was of the
early settlers of the country, and which tradition
states was of Irish descent. On the town records of
Wenham is the statement that in 1659 Richard Gold-
smith was taxed for the salary of the minister cne
pound, fifteen shillings. In 1731 Richard Goldsmith
married Hannah Dodge, of Wenham, and in the old
burying-ground at Littleton some ancient grave-
stones mark the spot where their ashes repose. Mr.
Goldsmith was also a lineal descendant of Rev. Ben-
jamin Shattuck, first minister of Littleton. The
Goldsmith family moved from Littleton to Harvard,
and John, the subject of this sketch, having been de-
prived of his father, through accident, in early life,
was put in charge of his grandfather, who brought
him up. In 1818 he was married at Littleton to
Sebia Kimball, a daughter of Deacon Daniel and
Lucy (Dutton) Kimball, both of Littleton. In early
manhood he engaged in farming, and owned and oc-
cupied for sixty years the homestead where he died.
His estate is situated about a half-mile easterly of
Littleton Common. It is beautifully located, and the
buildings and grounds indicate the thrift bf their
former proprietor. Mr. Goldsmith was a fine type of a
■ New England farmer. He was industrious, economi-
cal and attended strictly to the interests of his farm.
He made a business of farming, by which, together
with safe investments, he acquired a large property.
As a citizen he was public-spirited and had the con-
fidence of his fellow-townsmen, who many times
elected him to positions of honor and trust. He was
a prominent member of the Unitarian Church, a con-
stant attendant on its services and a regular contrib-
utor to its support. At bis decease he left a sum of
money for the benefit of the Littleton public schools,
and the appreciation of the gift by the town is set
forth by the following resolutions :
" Wrebea^, Our lamented townflmAD, the late Jobo Goldsmith, tM-
qneathed to the town of Litlleloo the ' Sam of Fifteen Hundred dollara,'
to be bolden and invested bj the Selectmen and their Bocceeaore, aa
truBteefl, the income of which he desired should be expended annuallj
for education in the Common Schools of said Littleton —
"Fbferf, That the citizens of the town hereby express and record their
grateful recognition of the yalue of Mr. Goldsmith's long life among
them as that of an upright and honored citizen, of diligent indnstrj, of
sound integrity, and strict fidelity to erery trust; of great wisdom in
council, and excellence of heart, whose memory we cherish with just
pride and whose sterling character and example we conunend aa worthy
of personal emulation.'*
Mr. Goldsmith died at Littleton February 14, 1883,
at the age of eighty-seven. His family, beside his wife,
consisted of two sons, John and Daniel, both of whom
died unmarried, and three daughters, Sophia, Julia
and Lucy Maria, the latter being the only child now
living. Sophia married Francis Conant; Lucy
Maria, the youngest daughter, married Daniel P.
Houghton, of Harvard, and later William Kimball,
son of Deacon James Kimball, of Littleton, and now
resides at her father's late residence.
OTIS MANNrNO.
Otis Manning was bom at Littleton, Maasachu-
setts, October 31, 1805, and was a son of Jona-
than and Lydia (Howard) Manning, both natives
of Chelmsford. His education was obtained at the
district school, with the exception of one term
spent at the Westford Academy. In early life he
leari:ed '.he wheelwright's trade, and for more than
886
HISTORY OF MIDDLESEX COUNTY, MASSACHUSETTS.
half a century he followed this vocation, working
most of the time in a shop that is still standing near
his present residence, which is a little northerly of
Littleton Common. December 10, 1833, he was mar-
ried at Westford to Miss Ann Crosby Carter, daughter
of Ezra and Anna (Jaquith) Carter. He has one
child, Ann Maria Manning.
Mr. Manning is a Republican, but has never ac-
tively participated in political affairs, except to per-
form the ordinary duties of citizenship. In matters
of reform he has always been on the right side — being
an Abolitionist in the days of slavery, and an advo-
cate of temperance in the early days of that reform.
When almost everybody was accustomed to use
some alcoholic liquor, he was a total abstainer, and
this practice he has followed through life. In his
church relations he is a staunch Congregationalist.
In early life he joined the church in Westford, and
for some years was superintendent of its Sunday-
school. He was one of the original members of the
Orthodox Church in Littleton, which was organized
May 14, 1840. Since the formation of this church he
has held the office of deacon, and for years served as
clerk and Sabbath-school superintendent. As a
church officer he has been faithful and efficient, and
as a Christian his life has been exceptionally com-
mendable through these many long years of service
for the Master. He has but rarely been absent from
his place at church on the Sabbath, or at the weekly
church meeting; and has been a ready and willing
contributor for the maintenance of the institutions of
his faith. Not only has he been devoted to the
spreading of the Gospel at home and in his own land,
but he has been much interested in the propagation
of it in other lands. He has been a firm and substan-
tial friend of the great missionary societies, and dur-
ing a long life he has spent but few nigbts away from
his native town except to attend religious conferences
and conventions.
Few lives have perhaps been more exemplary than
his; and in the quiet retirement of old age he still
retains a lively interest in the causes that he has long
helped maintain. He resides with his daughter, and,
with the exception of the infirmities incident to ad-
vanced age, he is still in the enjoyment of robust
health.
BARNABAS DODGE.
Barnabas Dodge, an old and respected citizen of
Littleton, was of English stock, the ancestor of the
American branch of the family, William Dodge, be-
ing among the company that landed at Salem in
1629, under the leadership of John Endicott.
His father, John Dodge, served in the War of the
Revolution, under his father, Captain John Dodge.
His maternal grandfather, Barnabas Dodge, was a
captain in Colonel Gerrish's regiment, which was in
service at the battle of Bunker Hill.
Mr. Dodge was born in Wenham, Massachusetts,
in 1795. His father was a farmer, but in his youth
had made several voyages to foreign countries, as was
common with the young men in the coast towns at
that time. The family came to Littleton in 1818, hav-
ing bought the estate known as the Captain Cogswell
farm, in the north part of the town. In his youth Mr.
Dodge taught a district school. While in this em-
ployment he met, as his pupil. Miss Sarah Corning,
of Beverly, who in 1820 became his wife. Mr. Dodge
cultivated and greatly improved his farm, never seek-
ing public life or honors. It has been said of the
Dodge family, that they do not seek public office, but
when it is conferred upon them, that they perform its
duties with ability and fideiity. This was true of the
subject of this sketch. He he d various town offices,
school committee, selectman, &c. He was the father
of ten children, who lived to adult age. The eldest
daughter became a teacher. After several terms in
the district schools of Littleton, she became succes-
sively principal of the Townsend Female Seminary,
whence she had graduated ; Oread Institute, Wor-
cester; Codman Hill Young Ladies' School, Dorches-
ter ; Ladies' Department Kalamazoo College, Michi-
gan, and of Colby Academy, New London, New
Hampshire. She was superintendent of schools in
Littleton four years after her return to her native
town in 1877. Another daughter was for several
years teacher in the Winchester High School. She
married Rev. E. B. Eddy, of Calais, Maine, and died
in 1879. Two of the sons are in business in Cam-
bridge; two remain in Littleton. Three of the
daughters and four sons are still (1890) living.
Mr. Dodge was a man of more than ordinary intel-
ligence, was a diligent reader, and assisted in forming
two small town libraries, which, unfortunately, sur-
vived but a few years. His older children remember
the interest which all felt when the father brought
home anew book from the library, and their enjoyment
of the winter evenings when he would read aloud from
these, or the family newiipaper, as they worked around
the cheerful fire-place, filled high with glowing logsi
over the ruddy heaps of living coals beneath. Mr.
Dodge was an honest man. No one could ever bring
against him charges of cheating or meanness in trade.
He was truthful, sympathetic and a faithful friend.
He was interested in the affairs of the town and of the
state and the nation, never seeking to control them,
but always on the side of what he believed to be the
right. He died in 1873. His wife survived him fif-
teen years, dying at the old homestead, still in posses-
sion of the family, to which she had come as a youth-
ful bride almost seventy years before.
GARDXEB PKOUTY.
Gardner Prouty was born at Spencer, Worcester
County, Massachusetts, September 4, 1817, and was
the son of Gardner and Ruth (How) Prouty, both of
/J . '^■^Z
Cj^^
LITTLETON.
887
Spencer. He attended the common schools of his
native town till about seventeen years of age, when
he went to Westminster, where he spent one term at
the Academy. After leaving school he learned the
carpenter's trade, at which he worked about six years.
In 1847 he went to Boston, and for a time engaged in
the ice shipping business. Afterwards he was in the
business of wharfinger, in which he continued till
January 1, 1889. In 186-1 he went to Littleton and
purchased the place where he still resides. His house
is pleasantly situated on the main street at Littleton
Common ; and connected with it is a farm of sixty-
four acres, the care of which has afforded him ample
opportunity for exercise since his retirement from his
former business. June 3, 1851, Mr. Prouty was mar-
ried at Boston, by Rev. Thomas Starr King, to Clara
D. Wheelock, of Calais, Vermont. Miss Wheelock
was a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Welcome Wheelock,
formerly of Charlton, Worcester County, Massachu-
setts. He has one child, Gardner W., who is married
and lives in Littleton. Mr. Prouty Is a Democrat,
and was a delegate to the Presidential Convention
held in New York in 1868. He has taken an active
part in the public affairs of Littleton, having been
selectman and assessor seven years, and overseer of
the poor six years, and five years chairman of these
boards. For several years he was also a member of
the School Committee, and was moderator of the
annual town-meeting of Littleton twenty years. His
paternal ancestor came to Spencer from Scituate.
Ot^
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